followyourbeans

I was travelling for a year around Scandinavia playing the guitar in the streets and sleeping in a tent. I got to Iceland in winter and it was to cold to camp, so I got a flat and the first job I found. I was obviously broke, and selling hot dogs was the only choice. Then I stayed way longer than expected.

No, I don't. It's really hard. They have words with more than 20 letters and I can't barely pronounce anything without the locals laughing at me. I know some basic stuff, but I didn't want to go deep into it since I'm not staying here for too long.

I can take an order in icelandic, but most of the workers in customer service are foreigners. So yes, they have to use English instead. Sometimes they get offended and invite you to leave the country (but that just happens with old grumpy local men, specially the ones in a suit).

The sausage is made of lamb, pork and beef (all mixed) and they top it with raw onion and fried onion. The sauces are also Icelandic. There is some sort of brown mustard called sinep, something called remuladi and tomato sauce.

I had really shity jobs, but this one has been specially tough. Hot dogs in Iceland are pretty popular. Apparently Bill Clinton came to Iceland 10 years ago and said "this is the best hot dog I've ever tried". So you can image. I had huge lines of tourist everyday asking me for Bill Clinton and taking pictures and videos of me while I was preparing their food (they didn't even ask me).

It's not about dealing with Icelandic people, it's more about the whole touristy thing. You feel like you work in a theme park.

That's the problem. Iceland is commonly seen as a fairytale country where all your dreams become true. The landscape is amazing, right, and there's no unemployment, but right now we just have 3 hours of sunlight (you can't see the sun anyway) and the wind drives you crazy. Maybe that's the reason why Iceland is the biggest consumer of antidepressants (per capita), and I can attest that myself: most of my Icelandic workmates are on pills.

I ask myself that question all the time. I like to try new countries. In the last five years I've been living in Spain, Scotland and Norway too. It's really easy to live in Iceland, the wages are pretty big and I kind of like small capitals, but this is probably my last year, can't deal with the isolation anymore. I went on a holiday to England this summer and I felt like I just came out from a cave.