Legally Blond

I really don‘t know what to tell you today, as most of what has grabbed my attention lately is a bit odd and feels ridiculous when typed out. But seeing as ridiculous can sometimes be fun, as long as one is not an active participant, I will give you a few examples.

A man from China wants to buy up 0,3% of Iceland. He is an investor intending to build a luxury hotel and a golf course in the middle of nowhere, far up in the north of the country. The land in question is 300 km2 and is called Grímsstaðir á Fjöllum – which loosely translates to English as Grims place in the Mountains. A hot debate ensued, Side A saying that we should not sell such big chunks land to foreigners and Side B welcoming the investment. It should be noted that Iceland actively seeks investors from abroad but the chinch is that we don’t really want them to invest in anything worth investing in. Bluntly put we want their money for nothing. This has not really panned out understandably.

Funny thing about investing here, namely that the investors that show interest are never from the European Union. We have had Norwegians, Canadians, Americans, Japanese and now the Chinese – but no representatives from EU countries. I do not have any idea why this is the case, maybe the investors from there have the nerve to want to something in return for their Euros. Or they are broke like us.

Another thing noteworthy is a trial over members of a motorcycle gang called the Black Pistons. The name of this group is a mystery, they are certainly not black. But however they came to this name is beside the point, they probably thought it was cool and scary. However their cool and scary reputation has taken a beating lately and I am certain they will be looking for a new name in the near future. Possibly the Green Spark Plugs. But back to the trial which involves two members hijacking and beating up a third that had done something offensive to them. I am at loss to think what they consider offensive so I will not ponder much on that point. Whatever it was it apparently warranted them keeping the guy imprisoned for two days or so under continuous pummeling.

It is very problematic to have a hostage. It is worse than having a dog when it comes to finding people to babysit. Because of this when the leader of the Black Pistons and his lackey needed to go to the hairdressers for a haircut – I must intervene with a mention that it is not my English at fault here, they went to a hairdressers, not a barber – they had to take the hostage with them. Forget about dissing the appointment, dragging a severely beaten man along appeared more logical to them. But they were not 100% stupid and got a lady friend of theirs to come and put makeup over the bruises and scratches on the hostage. She then also went with them to the hairdressers.

It is the lady friend’s testimony that has everyone here smiling. She arrived late to court, told the judge to speak up, said that her visit had been personal and that she would therefore not discuss it, when made aware that her testimony was not in accordance to a taped interview by the police she said that she had "misunderstood herself", told the judge when he kept repeating the questions she did not answer that she was not retarded and she also said that the hostage had been the one to request make-up. And on and on and on. The whole debacle goes under the name “Legally blond” here.

Finally this past weekend (Thursday to Sunday) was the busiest in Iceland’s tourism since forever. Every single hotel room was booked and then some. To help make the matters worse, along came Irene the hurricane and grounded planes full of tourists on their way from Europe to New York. People were put up in homes and in the vacated army base in Keflavík so as not to have to stay on the street. I guess these poor people would have welcomed the opportunity to stay at Grims place in the Mountains and play golf.

Yrsa - Wednesday