Every Day's A School Day

 What a lovely ( borrowed) phrase. 

Whatever age we are we never stop learning. 

In Olafsfjordur I learnt to slow down 

The pace of life is slower, there seems to be more time for thinking and being and more time for others because people aren't rushing around all the time, even though many of them need to do two jobs for the benefit of the community. People don't give the impression of having too much to do, but everything always runs on time.

So I learnt to be more calm which is great because I'm always rushing around, late and trying to fit too many things in. I'll aim to be more conscious of it. 

Nature is all around and it is so much bigger than us, the weather, the seasons and the landscape is definitely in charge in Iceland. Many of us with our urban lifestyles seem to have forgotten to listen and live with nature. 

I learnt that spending a lot of time on my own was really enjoyable, I never felt alone because everyone was so close by. 

I learnt to love the quiet and silence. I'm finding lots of noises vying with each other too much now. So music can only be loud if listening to it is all you are doing.

That Icelandic people in general appear to be amazing,quirky, respectful,kind, creative, warm, conversational and friendly. Of course not everything can be perfect but my experiences were all good. 

It wasn't just about Icelandic people. The Skammdegi Artists came from lots of different countries, and even though everyone's main focus was their work, to connect and engage with each other and the local community was at the heart of everything. 

Family in Iceland is really strong, people have big families and very big extended families. Perhaps your surname strengthens this - you are either somebodies son or somebodies daughter as in Bill Angiesson or Betty Angiesdottir. ( I made that up using myself ) unfortunately though I think it is always the fathers name with son or daughter at the end, though if the father is unknown I don't know how that works. 

( we're all someone's daughter , we're all someone's son - this song is a bit of an ear worm for me, if I've passed it onto you, you're welcome ) 

I also learnt that the Aurora doesn't really look like how you see it in photographs, it's hard to see the colours with the naked eye unless it's very strong, but that what you do see is the incredible movement. A phone camera will not take good pictures. 

I also learnt to make this blog and to do some writing and take a lot of photographs,which I have really enjoyed doing even though it takes me so long. And also how much people love these pictures so I've put plenty in here. 

Rita, Gretchen and Liz learnt things too but they'll tell you another time. 

Ooh - I did learn that I'm way too old for selfies and that you should really take a lot more photographs of yourself when you are young and then just stop. Though we are rarely happy with our own image whatever age we are.