November in Reykjavik.

I know, I've become very lazy in updating my blog, but it's just not too much happening here right now. We spend most of our time at work doing the project and on weekends we are so lazy to do anything :P Anyways, here are some pictures I was able to take in November. Enjoy!

Saga Party @ Innovation Center. People were dressed as different characters from Icelandic Sagas - vikings, elves, witches etc. There was some traditional Icelandic food, like smoked lamb, dried fish and other, not necessary, tasty things; a lot of alcohol, singing and a realistic viking fight.












In Iceland during Christmas all kinds of shops are releasing Christmas line of products. They not only look different, but also sometimes taste different.




Hjaltalin concert @ NASA, Reykjavik.




Best burgers in town.


My 4th flatmate...


Yoko Ono's Imagine Peace Tower on the small island of Videy near Reykjavik. You can read more about this project here.


Sweet tasting in Innovation Center - Iceland cake :P


Because of the economic crisis, which struck Iceland very hard, people are angry on government, that they didn't do much to protect country from the after effects. Situation here is really hard for some people. A lot of them lost their jobs and because of the fact, that it was really easy to get a loan from the bank, they find it really hard to afford paying interests. Every weekend people are gathering on the main square in Reykjavik, in front of parliament and are protesting against Icelandic Government.

Happy Easter pt. 1

Finally we have a break from school longer than 2 days!! We're trying to get as much from it as we can (a lot of sleep!). Unfortunately whether doesn't like to cooperate with us in this matter...
Our break started on Tuesday. Arnbjörn, our Director of International Relations came back from Mexico, and brought us some "presents" which we had to consume immediately :P So we had a small party in our beloved living room. Here are some pictures:






As you can see we got ourselves a nice projector! We're watching huge amounts of movies here, so it's gonna be used very often. We just finished watching "Californication" - small TV Series with David Duchovny, I highly recommend it!

On Wednesday we wanted to go skiing, but it started to rain, so we changed our plans for a swimming pool. The next day we planned a nice trip to the North of Akureyri, but again whether didn't allow us to fulfill the plan :P


Our driver didn't care about the road much, as he couldn't see a shit anyway...

Again we had to change the plans, so we decided to finally go skating. There is a big skating hall near Akureyri, and they have students discounts, so we made a quick decision, and after the lunch everybody was ready for some ice experience.


Typical outfit for this kind of weather here...

Skating hall - well, I don't actually remember when was the last time when I was skating, so it means > 10 years, but it's like with riding a bike I think. After couple of tries, I finally got it and we decided to play a small hokey match with a group of 10-year old kids. Well, needless to say, they bit the shit out of us ;)







Speaking of sports, I don't think I mentioned that, but we have a opportunity to go to the sport hall once a week. We fight hard sometimes, but always fair :P After that, we usually relax ourselves in a nice swimming pool next to the hall.








Typical for me - cramp.


Heineken commercial...




One evening we made a small golf course in the living room.

Other pictures:


This one is from the trip guys had one day, it's about 8 km from our dorm, one of the drivers decided to drive on the beach... well he dug himself up in the sand, and as the water was coming closer and closer to the van, it started to be scary. Finally they found a farmer with a huge tractor to get them out of there.


A morning before one of the exams.


Night - near the dorm.


Nice...

And some artistic stuff :P

Trip to Mývatn.

So we had this trip on Saturday. Forecasts weren't so good the day before, but we decided to go anyway. As it occurred later, Icelandic forecast sucks :) We planned to go to Godafoss - the waterfall of gods first, then visit Dimmuborgir - which is the area created after the eruption of volcano. The Norwegian melodic black metal band Dimmu Borgir took its name from this place. Later we went to see a part of Mývatn lake. It was created by a large eruption 2300 years ago. It's very shallow, mostly 2-3 meters deep. During the winter most of its part is frozen. It's also surrounded by many volacnos. At the end we wanted to go to Dettifoss - the biggest waterfall in Europe, but as i t occurred later the road was closed because of snow, so we finished watching snowmobile competition :)


Our team - we took 2 cars = 18 people (one is missing on the photo).


Restaurant near Godafoss - as you can see weather was better than they said in the forecasts.






Godafoss - waterfall of gods.








On the way to Mývatn - motor bike racing on the frozen lake.




Dimmuborgir - satans fortress :P


Gates to hell!


Geothermal power plant.


Hot muds near Mývatn.


Snowmobile competition.


Back of our truck after the trip...

Other pictures:


Putting competition :P.


We recycle!


Dr Dean Abrahamson on the dinner in our dorm. I chose the wine :P


Dr Paulo Ferrao during the classes.


Working hard or hardly working?


Our small gym, I'm there at least 3 times a week :D