Dealing With Unemployment During COVID-19

Flatten the Curve - Iceland Battles COVID-19 Epidemic

Data last updated on June 14th.

Reykjavik is empty. Most Icelanders are starting to practice social distancing. Daily news is devoted to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Paranoia but with good reason? Are you disinfecting your hands so often that they are beginning to dry up and chap? Is the gentle tickle in your throat just that, or is it a dry cough for something more serious?  Do you also feel like saying “bless you” has lost its meaning when you actually have to fight the urge to shun the one who just sneezed? 

Apart from the weather, coronavirus is the most popular talking point in Iceland right now, with 473 COVID-19 cases confirmed in Iceland by March 21st. The outbreak that devastated a major city in China has found its way to mainland Europe and now to Iceland. People here are worried. In mainland Europe, supermarkets are empty and fights are breaking out over the last toilet paper.

Tuesday, March 17, 2020. Two people were sitting on a beach in downtown Reykjavik in a sunny afternoon. The city looked empty. [Photo by Christine Einarsson (Tína) | Tína Einars photography]

Iceland’s Curve

Iceland started testing for COVID-19 on February 1st, with the first COVID-19 case being confirmed four weeks later, on February 28th. A male in his forties who had recently returned from Northern Italy. 

Subsequently, the National Commissioner of the Icelandic Police activated the ‘Department of Civil Protection and Emergency Management’ alert phase in consultation with Iceland’s Chief Epidemiologist. On March 6th, local transmission in Iceland was confirmed. 

Iceland has to join the battle to flatten the curve.

“Flatten the curve” is an expression derived from the widely-used graphic in this epidemic. The goal is to use collaborative efforts, including practicing social distancing, so we have fewer and fewer newly confirmed cases and protect the most vulnerable so that when the outbreak reaches its peak, the number of people who are confirmed with COVID-19 remains below the health care capacity. It’s a successful strategy implemented in most affected countries. As the epidemic develops in Iceland, the chart below will be updated accordingly.

Watching a global pandemic on this scale unfold, where every day holds multiple new Coronavirus-related news stories, can be hard on your mental health. I personally experienced the impact of the virus during the initial coronavirus outbreak in China. I wasn’t directly in the concentrated area of Wuhan, but my parents live on the east coast of China (if you are into beer brands, you might have heard the name Tsingtao). I visited them during the Lunar New Year, that’s also when the outbreak started to unravel and increase drastically.

Isolation in China

For two weeks, I stayed at home in isolation with my parents, only making essential outings for groceries, prepared with masks on our faces, hand-sanitizers in our pockets, and stress on our minds. Wherever we went we had to have our temperatures taken before we went in. We had our names, IDs, temperatures and the time written down. If people came in a group, only one person from the group would write down all the information and then have their hands sanitized - I thought it was very efficient both in saving resource (only one person touched the shared pen so one person needed the sanitizer) and keeping track of things.

The city, Qingdao, has a dense population of more than six million residents and so far it has 61 confirmed cases, one of whom is a student returning from overseas. In all these cases, the local press release put out information on the chain of transmission so when a case was confirmed, their whereabouts were traced and people in close contact alerted and quarantined. 

Needlessly to say, it’s a lot of work. People put life on hold only to focus on fighting this battle. Now, it’s contained, and everyone contributed.

Feburary 3, 2020. An empty street in Qingdao, Shandong, China, where a police van was parked on the side of the road. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

In early February Finnair canceled all its flights to and from Beijing starting February 6th. My flight was scheduled on February 5th, so that was lucky!

First Self-Quarantine in Iceland

I was told to self-quarantine right away after I arrived home in Iceland. After writing an email to Landlaeknir, they suggested I contact a local health care provider if I develop symptoms, which thankfully I didn’t need to do as I was fine. Two weeks passed just like that. It wasn’t too difficult.

My quarantine ended on February 20th and by that time, Iceland had zero cases. Italy had four- all traceable. The United States had 1 but China had 75,465.

My parents thought I went back to a safer place so they were relieved.

Exactly one month from that day, the world has completely changed. The epicenter shifted to Europe and soon the United States.

February 3,2020. One of the busiest streets in Qingdao was void of the usual buzz, only deliveryman were on duty as they were a big help during the difficult time. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

March 16, 2020. A man walking on an empty street in downtown Reykjavik, where it’s supposed to have more traffic. [Photo by Christine Einarsson (Tína) | Tína Einars photography]

Outbreak in Iceland

Alma Möller from Landlaeknir, the Directorate of Health in Iceland, stated in a program at RÚV with great reservations that the epidemic is expected to peak on April 10th, give or take five days. Until then, there will be 1,200 to 2,000 infections cumulatively. Iceland has 26 ventilators in Reykjavik and three in Akureyri, besides 15 donated by Icelanders living in the United States, and another nine coming soon. If her prediction is somehow correct, and when more infections lead to more people in the need of intense care, Iceland’s medical resources will be scrambling to have things under control, especially if people don’t abide harsher rules for social distancing.

If you want to see how it’s spreading globally, here are some maps by The New York Times which constantly updates the current situation, and the newspaper’s COVID-19 coverage is outside the paywall.

Back in Iceland, the testing effort was solely from the Department of Microbiology at the National University Hospital of Iceland. On March 14th, deCODE, a private company joined the force, with the intent of screening the entire Icelandic population for the coronavirus.

According to statistics, in the latest census, Iceland’s population reached 364,134 by 1 January 2020, a 2% increase from the previous year. At the end of 2019, the Capital Region of Iceland had 233,140 inhabitants, which is roughly 64% of Iceland’s entire population. The Capital Region has more confirmed coronavirus cases.

There are eight regions according to covid.is data. The map below shows the confirmed cases in each region, a larger circle means more cases. Hovering on the circle, numbers will pop up. A comprehensive version of the maps can be found here.

Please note that, to date (March 20), there are 7 confirmed cases and 20 people in self-quarantine whose locations are unknown, while 4 people are in quarantine abroad, according to covid.is. 

Donald McNeil, a science and health journalist who has covered epidemics including AIDS, Ebola, and SARS, said in a news program at MSNBC that the most effective way to contain the virus is by testing and breaking the chain of transmission. By diagnosing those infected as soon as possible, isolating them, and asking the rest of the population to stay at home (social distancing) we can work to mend the sickened and protect the healthy. One key point he mentioned, which was also a strategy Wuhan, China has later implemented, is keeping suspected cases away from their families and to separate suspected cases into self-quarantine away from their healthy family members. 

I haven’t heard any news about Iceland using this approach.

Second Self-Quarantine in Iceland

I visited the States for a journalist conference in early March and went back to Iceland on March 9th. One day later I received an email from the conference saying that one attendee was confirmed with coronavirus. I called 1700 (Iceland's designated hotline in this epidemic) in the afternoon and I was the 40th in the queue. 

After about 45 minutes of waiting, I got through. The nurse suggested I call my local health care provider to see if a test was needed. The local clinic suggested I quarantine at home for two weeks since my symptoms (sore throat, congested nose, and slight chest pain) can be either from my previous, not entirely recovered bad cough, or a mild COVID-19 infection. It wasn’t enough to make the cut for the actual test. So I had to stay home for two weeks - for the second time - in self-quarantine.

A magical time, once again. I didn’t predict that schools would be closed that week and the neighborhood kids would be so loud, but now I know! Working from home wasn’t the peaceful tranquility I expected to process all of this new information in but it was crazy to think that the kids playing outside had no idea of the magnitude of this global crisis. 

March 21, 2020. The view from my study’s tiny window. Self-quarantine has been a magical time. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

My doctor at the local clinic called me to follow up on my symptoms. By that time, I felt alright, the previous symptoms had gone, and I had no fever the whole time. my doctor was happy to hear I was doing okay and I was somewhat relieved as well but I was unable to go out into crowds so I couldn’t book the deCODE testing.

Yet Iceland has been doing a lot of testing. In fact, based on data from ourworldindata.com, Iceland ranks top one among the European and North American countries for coronavirus tests per million people. 

When testing is the key to identify infected from healthy crowds, Iceland is doing a great job. With a relatively small population, the testing rate is still impressive, although no matter how you test, with one confirmed case or one test conducted, let’s just say in all countries, it naturally puts Iceland on a higher place on the chart since the population number is smaller than most countries. So I also need to ask someone in the field that what this number really means.

What happens next?

The question is, just by testing aggressively, is it enough to contain the outbreak?

What about separating suspected cases from other healthy ones, not letting them share the same space. That’s been proven effective in China.

That’s why I want to know how many infections are transmitted from a suspected (later confirmed) case to its healthy family members during self-quarantine at home. What’s that number in Iceland?

When the epidemic first hit Iceland, we could still get information about the confirmed cases; who they are, where they visited, and how they are doing, as there were so few.

Then things start to escalate and get worse. More people are getting confirmed diagnoses every day. They call it exponential growth. Every day we hear statistics and numbers. We no longer hear their stories.

Numbers without context can’t be scary. When confirmed cases are in three-digit, quarantine cases in four, and Iceland’s entire population is merely a six- digit number, it’s worrisome.

On the official information site, the donut chart for the origin of infection has three segments, the segment for ‘unknown origin’ just keeps getting bigger.

Chart credit to covid.is by The Directorate of Health and The Department of Civil Protection and Emergency Management [Date of the chart: March 21, 2020]

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Updated on April 9th:

The numbers for daily new confirmed cases in Iceland have been going down continuously and today is the fourth day for this trend, while the testing efforts are still robust. 
The hopeful days for more people recovering than being tested positive are finally here. The Icelandic hardworking health care workers are just like any other nations in the world, fighting around the clock, making our home a safe and peaceful place to live again.

Since the blog published, I’ve been updating the numbers daily and watching closely. Iceland’s aggressive testing and diligently identifying the origin of transmission are paying off. And today, the donut chart for Origin of infection only has one case with unknown origin. If we keep staying at home to do our parts, we are helping the health care workers break the chain of transmission.
I hope other parts of the world will see light at the end of the COVID-19 tunnel very soon. 

Chart credit to covid.is by The Directorate of Health and The Department of Civil Protection and Emergency Management [Date of the chart: April 9, 2020]

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While people have confidence in the authority’s capability and information transparency, there are so many questions that need to be asked. If the pandemic spreads the mild cases get more severe, self-quarantine at home with healthy family members is not an effective approach. Patients need hospital beds and medical equipment if more protective measures are needed for medical workers.

Do we have answers for these questions? Is Iceland prepared to handle the epidemic?

Reykjavik’s peaceful summer night. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

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The cover photo is created by freepik - www.freepik.com. Thanks to Lauren Renyard for editing and Christine Einarsson for photos.

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When Darkness Falls Early in Reykjavik

On December 22, 2019, Reykjavik welcomes its Winter Solstice for the year as the Sun sets at 3:29 p.m. The twilight gives way to the dimness little by little and the pinkish glow gradually disappears from the horizon, a delicate veil of blue covers over the city. Not long after, the night falls.

As a landmark in Iceland’s capital, the back of the Hallgrimskirkja Church is less captured than its front. During the twilight hours on the Winter Solstice, the structure looks stunning while its inside well lit.

When the night lands early on the back of the Hallgrimskirkja Church while its inside well lit, Reykjavik, Iceland. December 22, 2019, the Winter Solstice of the Northern Hemisphere. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

Downtown Reykjavik neighbouring the Hallgrimskirkja Church in twilight. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

Downtown Reykjavik neighbouring the Hallgrimskirkja Church in twilight. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

Walking in twilight from the Hallgrimskirkja Church to the city center on the downhill street of Skólavörðustígur, Reykjavik, Iceland. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

Locals and tourists walk in twilight down the Skólavörðustígur street in Reykjavik, Iceland. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

The Christmas wreath lights decorating the windows of the local restaurants and coffee houses in downtown Reykjavik, Iceland. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

The Christmas Cat that’s famous in Icelandic folklore transforms into a huge sculpture attracting locals and tourists alike. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

The ice skating rink in downtown Reykjavik is installed every year during Christmas along with the Christmas market. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

The Reception and Office space of the Icelandic Parliament building - Althing - after sunset on the Winter Solstice. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

People passing by one of the popular coffee houses in Reykjavik, Iceland, on the Winter Solstice. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

On this day, Iceland goes through the shortest day and the longest night. After that, there will be more and more daylight in the coming days until the Midnight Sun when Iceland has the longest day and the shortest night (or no night no darkness at all.)

What Do You Think About Iceland and the Icelandic Language?

Liz Dornan, a young woman in her twenties, living in the South of England, whose insights and wit are delightful, opens up about her thoughts on Iceland, the country once she planned to move to but didn’t.

“I imagine this is what it feels like when you love your boyfriend/girlfriend but you know that in order to have the best experience you have to break up with them, but you haven't told them yet and every time you're about to, they unwittingly remind you why you're with them in the first place and you're back to square one. That's what leaving my Iceland dreams behind feels like. I'm grieving!”

Liz Dornan opens up about her thoughts on Iceland, the country once she planned to move to but didn’t, during her fourth time being here in Reykjavik. Photo by Yanshu Li

1. How did Iceland start to appear on your radar of interesting places in the world?

I suppose the financial crash in 2008 was the first time I knew anything specific, and then in 2010 when Eyjafjallajökull erupted I tried and failed to pronounce its name. My thoughts were wow they can't handle money. Wow they actually imprisoned their bankers! Why are they all banging pots and pans outside Alþingi? How the hell do you pronounce this volcano?

I've always been a big Tolkien fan and of course he was heavily influenced by the sagas and the Norse culture so my current interest grew from there! I also prefer being cold to hot and the concept of The North appeals to me.

What cemented my interest in the Icelandic language was my language history lectures during my Linguistics degree. Always '(except Icelandic)' so I googled this language which apparently doesn't change! Plot twist - actually it does just not in its grammar.

2. What do you think about Iceland after you visited and studied in the country?

I've visited Iceland four times, twice on short holiday breaks and twice to study. I preferred studying there than visiting on holiday. 

I think you only understand Reykjavik after having been there for a while, because it's scenes are lower key and more cozy than in larger cities so a holidaymaker misses them. It's also useful to have things to do during the day! I got bored as a holidaymaker. I think the feel of Iceland is very different between holidaymakers and locals, highlighted by the language barrier.

There's a lot that I only found out about when my Icelandic got better, and when I'd got into the culture. I shan't ask what kind of things other people say until I've said what I want to so it doesn't affect what I say.

Downtown Reykjavik feels really fake even though there are Icelanders hanging out there all the time. Like the locals and the tourists are moving in two separate worlds. I don't know if you've read The City And The City by Gina Miéville but it felt like that: two populations moving in the same or similar places by carefully ignoring each other.

3. You planned to eventually come to Iceland and work here for a while. Has that plan changed?

I'd love to but the reality is that I would feel stifled in the job market. It feels like every industry is run by one or two families so if you don't like how one company operates then it's difficult to find alternative employment in the same sector. Yeah, I love Iceland but the small scale of the job market doesn't appeal. Working for RÚV is still at the back of my mind though! But I don't think I'll ever be proficient enough in Icelandic for the market to really open up for me. I think having Icelandic as a second language would be quite limiting.

I would be very daunted working in an environment where everyone was speaking Icelandic, but it would be the best way to improve my language skills! The realisation that because of my English v.s. my Icelandic skills I would probably end up in the tourism industry was a big part of putting me off. I have no desire to work in tourism. But I also meant it in another sense; that career development is probably harder in Iceland due to its small size. I think if I did start a career there I'd have to move after a few years for career progression. I think not being native would hamper my development.

4. What do you do currently in England? 

I work as an administrative assistant in a commercial supply chain role for an online retailer.

5. About learning Icelandic, what are the biggest hurdles for you to master this language? What turned out to be easier than you thought in learning?

“The difference between Icelandic and English.” Photo courtesy to Liz Dornan.

I understand far more than I can say but the morphology got me in the end! I loved learning the language and as a native English speaker with a fair exposure to Welsh, the phonology didn't bother me, but yes, the morphology is a beast! It's redundant, too because the word order is fixed now rather than flexible as it was in Old Norse. Which is why other Nordic languages like Norwegian and Danish have lost so much morphology.

Also whilst I love the logic of combining nouns to make new nouns like ljós and mynd = ljósmynd, this was also very confusing because they end up sounding similar. Bíómynd, ljósmynd, hugmynd; if you're feeling tired you have to split them apart and backwards engineer to get to the meaning rather than film, photo and idea which sound very different to each other. But I do love the logic there! What's also frustrating is that you have to learn all these case endings and then Icelanders swallow them anyway!

Wait, is it bíómynd or kvikmynd... oh it's both!

6. There are a lot of information about Iceland that are actually stemmed from marketing or public relations. What are your thoughts on that?

PR is like the fantasy that could never be real, with the perfect lighting and filters and other photoshooting. But I prefer the real Iceland full of real people, concrete buildings, too much sun or too little sun, rain, humidity, dull colours. Because it's more interesting. And then sometimes you really do get that Instagram shot and its rarity makes it mean something and makes you pay attention to it.

Icelandic countryside does look like a painting though because there are so few trees. You can see to the horizon from one spot so I was happy to stand and stare rather than wanting to walk into the landscape as I do in the forested parts of Wales or Scotland say. I suppose that's good because you shouldn't walk on the moss anyway!

I think that really you can get as good a feel of the dramatic icelandic wilderness from photos, it's the people that matter. Which is funny because so many guides say GET OUT OF REYKJAVIK ASAP.

I haven't seen Iceland in the dark so I sadly can't comment on the Northern Lights. And I did enjoy my excursions into the countryside but it was the company and the comments on the wilderness which made it rather than this magical connection to the raw power of nature or anything like that. Mind you twisting my ankle demonstrated the 'raw power' of the rocks on Mt. Esja.

The healthcare system is very good. Happily I didn't have to go to hospital, especially as they're digging up the main road atm! That construction site made the walk to university much more interesting. Also the Reykjavik cats are as cute as promised. And finally taking a swimming costume last time was the best decision.

Dinning at Hlemmur Food Court in Reykjavik after her Icelandic class at University of Iceland, July, 2019. - Photo by Yanshu Li

7. If you were to describe Iceland only with three words, what would they be?

My three words are different from Reykjavik and for the countryside. 

For Reykjavik: self-assured, swamped smalltown.

For the countryside: eerie, half-dressed filmset.

Gay Rights History Tells Iceland's Arduous Journey Towards Equality

Unlike many parts of the world where gay pride month is June, in Iceland, August is when the rainbow colors and flags shine. As the gay pride weekend is always set to be the second weekend of every August, this year on Saturday, 17th, Aug 2019 it marked the 20th anniversary of Reykjavik Pride - a parade and celebration of diversity in an open society. Icelanders have shaped their nation to embrace differences and diversities, but the achievement didn’t come this far overnight. 

The Icelandic society wasn't as open as today. Now when international media refers to Iceland as “an LGBTQ+ friendly country,” and anecdotes all the politician figures who are open about their orientation, it makes such a flattering image for Iceland as if it’s the most progressive society in the world.  Ást ert ást. Love is love. Iceland is indeed a very open society for the LGBTQ community, today, whereas the timeline below journeys back to 1869 when the law that criminalized same-sex sexual relations came into effect in Iceland. 

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Highlights of #reykjavikpride #prideweek #2019 . . . . . . . #reykjavik #iceland #icelandreview #loveislove #lgbtq #lgbt #lgbtq🌈 #icelandtoday #liveiniceland #parade #ig_iceland 19 #gaypride #gaypridereykjavik #gayprideiceland #gaypride2019 #gayiceland

A post shared by Yanshu Lee (@yanshuphotography) on Aug 18, 2019 at 4:18am PDT

Take a look at this story map listing all the countries and regions so far that legalized same-sex marriage, along with other rights.

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The Coal Burning Iceland

It’s hard to imagine Iceland burns coals. The Iceland that I know has “the purest water in the world,” “the best lamb meat in the world,” and possibly “the cleanest air in the world” - quoting the locals. The land of fire and ice is renowned for its geothermal and hydrothermal energy that’s completely renewable, making it hard to imagine the black solid fossil mass being burned in a furnace. So, it may come as a surprise when the domestic consumption of coal has been increasing in recent years.

According to the earliest data we can collect from Orkustofnun, the National Energy Authority, from 1940 to today, the coal consumption has fluctuated but has been rising since 2000.

A study named ENERGY IN ICELAND Historical Perspective, Present Status, Future Outlook conducted in 2005 said that out of the amounted 150 kiloton coal consumption, 90% was by the ferrosilicon plant in Grundartangi of Hvarffjord, West Iceland.  The cement factory in Akranes, now has been closed, used to a major coal consumer as well. The other one is the United Silicon smelter in Helguvík, Reykjanesbær.

However, heavy industries wasn’t always the major consumer of coal. More than a century ago, Iceland was dependent upon coal and oil, its fishing vessels, home utilities, and transportation fuels all needed coal to sustain. At that time, when the urban areas of the globe aren’t lit as they do now at night, the homes in Iceland might have been like what was depicted in Van Gogh’s masterpiece “The Potato Eaters.” And steam or smoke (reykja) was just a source of inspiration for Ingolfur Arnarsson to name his land on the Faxi Shoreline “Reykjavik” (smoky bay) - instead of being utilized for the greater good.

Iceland doesn’t have an abundant mineral reserve so it relies on imports from a number of counties over the years. For coal specifically, Netherland, the United Kingdom, and the United States have been major import sources on Coal, Coke, and Briquettes- a Harmonized System Classification - based on the import data from Statistics Iceland.

Driven Factor for Recent Reykjanesbaer's Population Outgrowth

To be honest, I was always amazed by the news made on the Icelandic media regarding anything about Iceland population. As the earlier post in which I used three maps to show you what the population in recent years looked like, the entire population was not a big number compared to most counties in the world. It felt more so from the perspective of a Chinese person. Any notable annual population increase in Iceland would be on a scale of four digits in which the first digit usually equals to one. Evidently, if one municipality outgrows another one by number of population, the number will be small but relatively impressive.

Like the one made on national news today: the population of Reykjanesbaer outgrows Akureyri by 40 more people counting from 1st December of last year to this year’s February 1st, making Reykjanesbaer the forth populous municipality in Iceland by number of population (by population density it stands too). Akureyri used to be the forth in this category.

The driven factor for this outgrowth is due to the increase of foreign citizens, as the charts show below.

By population density, Reykjanesbaer is more populated than Akureyri as the map shows below.

Three Maps to Brief on Iceland's Population

The latest news about Iceland is that in the forth quarter of 2018, Iceland had an increase of 1,420 in population. A majority portion of its land is uninhabited or far-less populated. The graphic indicates how it looks like by showing more populated area in stronger red and less populated in paler pink via mapping out the population data and the municipality spatial data.

Looking at the population density map of the Capital Region, the town of the highest density was Seltjarnarnes, an affluent town located North to Reykjavik.

Seltjarnarnes’s popular lighthouse Grotta. [Photo by Yanshu Li, 2016]

Talking about population density in Iceland is complicated yet simple to some extent. Iceland is home to vast area of wilderness and nature where moss fields covered lava land, including the most populated Capital Region. It makes the population density topic more complicated than the number shows since, cities, for example Reykjavik, also host enormous area where some forestry and planation grow. The population density indicated in the map is just an average figure. However, the simple to look at this is that the property / nature structure was very similar across municipalities. The inhabitants usually choose to reside in a compact area. So the error mixing averaged density with the actual space where people live can apply across municipalities. We can still trust the numbers before we move further to investigate other correlated subjects, such as crime rate, housing prices, cost of living, prices of goods, and featured industries.

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The satellite maps show the property / nature structure of each town. Before compiling and anlysizing real estate data but to be only based on heard experience, Hafnarfjordur is an ideal place for young professionals to put their downpayment for their first home since it has both lower housing price and vast nature leading to a balanced life.

Further more, Iceland has become more diverse than many people thought. The map animation below clearly shows that Iceland, right now, is home to people of diverse origins.

Let’s end this blog by a very interesting map showing how diverse the population of Iceland was in 2018.

Who Has Been Buying Fish From Iceland Since 1999?

BERGSSON RE is a lunch restaurant in Reykjavik. It's neatly located near the Reykjavik Harbor where you can see the colourful boats are coming and leaving, or simply fastened shore. The fish-themed lunch menu offer many options for a healthy and tasty meal at a reasonable price.

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Grilled at BERGSSON RE as a healthy and tasty lunch on a Friday in June.

Fish is important for Icelander's dining table. Many people also enjoy to go fishing in the rivers. The most common fish species are salmon and trout. Each year, you can only fish for salmon between May 20th - September 30th, as stated in Icelandic law.

Data Source: Iceland Statistics and Icelandic Customs Authority

Click on the categories of Salmon and Trout, you will find dramatic lines reaching out to many countries from Iceland. 

Iceland Really Looks As Depressed As The Data Shows?

When most people think about the Nordic countries, they probably think about the people's quiet characteristics, the unbelievably beautiful landscapes, and, of course, the long winter - the long winter that has only a few hours of sunlight; the long winter that has many hours of dimness. Would the darkness impact people’s mood? I can’t say for sure without any scientific evidence proving the correlation, but Iceland does have the highest antidepressant sales, according to health data.

The Nordic Health & Social Statistics keeps the sales of antidepressant data for all Nordic Countries from 2004. And the beautiful little island country, Iceland, has a strikingly higher ranking on almost all categories and it’s continuing to rise.

There are five categories of antidepressant in the data in which four of them are clarified, and one is under the "other" category.  

Several news outlets reported that the antidepressant pills are not only used for treating depression, it can be prescribed for other causes too, such as anxiety, social phobia, or ADHD. 

Despite what you see from the chart, there is more investigation needs to be done and questions that need answers. In Iceland, if the pills are prescribed for other treatments, what is the scale of other causes, and why?

When clicking through the years listed in the data, we can see that Iceland has the highest growth rate in the past decade in antidepressant sales.

A study that’s published in 2004, done by four scholars, Daylight Availability: A poor predictor of depression in Iceland, has concluded that winter depression in Iceland is not the result of less availability of daylight. Illuminance affects the mood more often, and the quality of daylight and genetic factors should both be considered.

“Average daylight availability does not explain the lower than expected prevalence of winter depression in Iceland. The great variability in illuminance might, however, affect the expression of winter depression, as could daylight quality and genetic factors.”

— Daylight Availability: A poor predictor of depression in Iceland

How Many People Have Travelled To Iceland Since 2002?

The same data can be rendered via Flourish in a globe view where you can see the clear trajectories and volume of the tourists coming to Iceland. In the data visualisation below, the category of "other countries" were omitted because in the original dataset no specific country was identified, which makes geo-coding impossible. You can see the number in the dataviz above.

Iceland Tourism Story

Top 10 Countries Where The Forest Land Area Increased and Decreased Between 1990-2015

The top 10 list has not included the factor of country size. We are going to see that set on later post.

Iceland Is Getting Greener

In early April 2018, the public transportation company in Iceland, Straeto bs, put four electric buses on the road, according to RUV, the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service.

Straeto bs ordered 14 electric buses from China at a total cost of 880 million ISK (est. USD 8.2 million), based on Frettabladid, an Icelandic daily newspaper. Once all the clean buses are in movements on the road, together they will reduce the harmful gas emission by 1.750 ton annually.

Since there are speed barriers on the roads in the Capital Region, where most of the buses are operated, before the buses were successfully delivered, the Chinese bus manufacturer had to put extensive efforts to make sure that the buses are capable of handling this type of road condition in Iceland.

For a country where electricity is almost entirely generated by clean, recyclable energy, such as hydropower and thermal power, Iceland is once again outpacing the rest of the world by inaugurating clean electric buses that consume clean energy.

This is not the only idea Iceland has to build a green, clean country. Let’s first take a look at the CO2 emission in Iceland since 1990.

The World's Forest Land From 1990 - 2015

  The World's Forest Land From 1990 - 2015

Vibrant Colours For The Nasty Icelandic Winter Weather

By Yanshu Li

The sun came up soon after 10:00 a.m. in Reykjavík on a November Saturday. Slowly, the sky was dressing up with otherworld colors. A good day began in the still weather.

Jóhanna Tomasdóttir picked up her down jacket and walked to her car. Her footsteps on the snow crushed the silence in the crisp air. The rouge eyeshadow tinted a soft warmness on her face, while the dimming skyline of Kópavogur was still in the shade of blue. She was heading to Bazaar Reykjavík, the shop she opened in 2013.

11:00 a.m. The sounds of engines were on and off in the parking lot outside the shop. The first customer purchased a France-made tablecloth, one of the most popular items in her store, hanging on the hook on the oak plank that was originally made for a wine bucket.

A colourful spot in Reykjavik Bazzar.

Bazaar Reykjavík is a 143-square-meter store featuring durable products for the home. There are more than 15 brands displayed in the cabinets and the shelves. Most of them were from France, Germany, Italy, and Belgium. The designs and colors were distinctive from what one can see in the shops on Laugavegur, the main shopping street in downtown Reykjavík.

A large dining table in the back covered with a tablecloth of waterproof fabric led the customers to the kitchenware section. Lamps lined up on the stand near the front window: ceiling lamps that resemble paper art; desk lamps that cast clear shadows on the wall when the Nordic sun shining in.

As the styles of the consumer design adapted and evolved in the culture of each country, Icelandic design shared the common ground with the Scandinavian norm. They prefer functional simplicity presented in the scale of gray. Saturation was muted.

Jóhanna did not like that.

When she was traveling in Europe, Jóhanna found herself fell in love with Southern France: the vibrant colors passionately exuding joy, the azure glistening on the ocean blinding the eyes, and the crowds and noisiness speaking of life. All the vividness inspired her in a warm weather of the south.

First for one month then for one year, she lived in Nice, France, and discovered more about the designs, the styles, and the market. Her Daughter, Marta Palsdottir, who was studying Interior and Industrial design in Milan, Italy, joined Jóhanna in the journey of exploration after she graduated in 2010.

Before 2012 Christmas, they invited friends to their home in Iceland for a pop-up sale to test the idea of bringing the products to Iceland. The praises received from this sale motivated Jóhanna to open up a store for Icelanders with more options as a getaway to escape the ubiquitous gray.

“We always try to find quality products but also colorful. Especially during the winter, you need light in the houses, you need a little bit of color because it’s gonna be a lot of snow, it’s going to be very dark and ugly weather outside, you just need a little bit of colors inside,” said Marta.

Later they picked up a spacious location in Kópavogur where it attached a large parking space.

“It’s very important for people in Iceland to go around the city with their cars. Some of our products are bigger, so it’s not easy to handle them without having your own car,” said Marta.

The commercial rental price in downtown Reykjavík was too expensive for a sizable space. Also, finding a parking space in downtown was hard.

“We wanted to be able to have the product range and the prices of products similar to those which are standard in Europe,” Marta added.

Locating in Kópavogur, the second largest municipality in Iceland with a population of  31 thousand, it provided adequate customer traffic, according to Marta.

Selling the brands that were never sold in Iceland was tricky. Marta said that the trust from customers began with touching of the products.

“The customers need to touch the item before they buy it,” she said.

It is hard to resist buying something in the shop once you touch or take a look at them. A firmly woven tablecloth will lift up the holiday spirit. A rosy scented soap fills the space with a romantic aroma. Especially for the holiday season, when the household wanted something different from most of the on sale items in the area, they will find it at Bazaar Reykjavík.

Bazaar Reykjavík had its online presence only for product displaying. Since the business has been continuously growing, Jóhanna planned to launch the online shop soon.

In recent years, the booming tourism industry in Iceland contributed a significant economic growth. The alleys and streets in downtown Reykjavík were bustling during holiday seasons, making the northernmost capital of the world a hearty place to sojourn.

“Now in Iceland, you can see different people from everywhere,” Jóhanna said with a smile. "And they buy the puffin toys in downtown."

Although the shop didn’t target at tourists market, it surely wanted to expand the customer varieties. While the tourists can go horse-riding and fishing tours in the area, picking up one thing or two in a not-so-Icelandic shop can be on the to-do-list too.

Jóhanna Tomasdóttir, owner of Bazaar Reykjavík, 2015. [Photo by Yanshu Li]

Jóhanna and Marta visited Paris twice a year for a major trade fair named Maison & Objet to expose themselves to the innovative interior design world. They also walked around Paris in seek of inspirations, ideas and new products. Their persistence made Bazaar Reykjavík the hidden treasure in Iceland capital area. 

Besides managing the shop, Jóhanna was also an accountant, and Marta has started to study Marketing. While the fickle weather in Iceland went on, which was “a little too much” for them, they finally started to like it.

The turquoise ocean in Southern France resided in Jóhanna’s mind, as she looked around in her shop and wondered if she had brought a piece back.

“Color means everything to me,” said Jóhanna.

But for her Bazaar Reykjavík, as Marta put it, being colorful means to offer “something that can sparkle some joy in their homes.”

“Life can shape as it likes.”

By Yanshu Li

Spring arrived a little late in Blacksburg, Virginia this year. It still felt chilly in April. Khaing came to the quiet town as a Humphrey Fellow, which is a U.S. fellowship for professionals who had no previous experience in the states.

Born is Khaing Thandar Nyunt, she now is a 37-year-old woman and a mother of a four-year-old daughter.  She works for the central bank of Myanmar as an assistant director.

Her first name pronounced as /kai/. Short and handsome.

Besides studying English, fellow experience American life with their hosts around was tight schedules. The fellowship program also required all fellows to do volunteer work.

There was one woman, a 65-year old who lived by herself, who asked for help with her garden. The lady wanted a tidy garden, but she was too sick to get the job done.

There were too many small trees that appeared to be disturbing the woman. Khaing decided to cut off those trees first. She needed a chainsaw.

“It was my first time using a power tool,” Khaing says.

Thanks to a group effort with other volunteers, the small piece of land looked clean soon after.

The old lady was not pleased. “Oh.. I wanted some of the trees in my garden,” the lady asked. “Can you help me to move some back in?”

Khaing started to pick up some remaining complete trees and planted those back in the garden. The lady asked her to put in some fertilizer in the soil.

Some other fellows went up to fix the rooftop. Khaing went to remove the mold in the outside wall later. They all brought their food jars but had no time to eat.

After the work had completed, the lady looked at the outside of her house and said, “clean, clean, clean.”

“It was hard work,” Khaing says. “But I enjoyed it.”

Khaing observed a strong sense of community in Blacksburg, which she has not felt before in Myanmar. She became attracted to it and began volunteering in the community theater ‘Lyric.’

With 11 staff, the theater depends on the volunteers to take care of the rest of the work. Khaing’s main job was to sell popcorn and soda drinks during her 45-minute shift.

“At the end, I can sell theater tickets as well,” she burst into laughter.

Khaing was born in a Buddhist family. Helping others as a kind action is praised in the religion. Volunteering is a kind act of aid, but Khaing felt it’s very different compared to her childhood experience of helping to build a pagoda. When she was around eight years old, her neighborhood came to help. She came to the pagoda construction site as well.

Buddhism is the predominant belief in Myanmar, there were a lot people coming to help build a pagoda.

“The help was more for the merit in the religion,” she says.

Like earning an extra credit if the practitioner helped with something related to the religion, it is to be believed that it will be rewarded after. They believe in karma.

“In Virginia, my volunteer was for other people, not for myself,” she says. “Because I saw there are people who really need help.”  

The fellowship required each fellow perform 10 hours of volunteering during the four-month program. Khaing did 10 hours per month.

After 4 months studying language in Virginia, she transferred to Boston University to continue her program in finance.

Soon as she settled down, Khaing called her coordinator asking for a volunteering location in Boston.

A Father’s Girl

Khaing read books about Buddhism since she was a little girl. But the one book she calls the one that influenced her was a children's book named Pollyanna.  

Her father gave it to her when she was eight.

“For me, that book told me how to be,” Khaing says.

The way of being, as Khaing describes what she learned from the book, was that instead of complaining about or blaming for what has happened, for example, an accident caused a broken leg, the person should be thankful for the other intact leg.

“Always look at the good side,” Khaing says.

Khaing says this is also the way her father is. Her grandfather passed away when her father was seven. Lacking a male model in his life, her father tried hard to be a man he wanted to be - taking things in as it is; never complaining.

Her father was the youngest son. His older brothers bullied him because he was their stepbrother. After their father had died, the condition became worse.

Khaing’s father made it through those dark days, and now he is the affluent one in the family. He went back to help the brothers who need support, regardless of what happened before.

‘Do you remember about Pollyanna?’, her father would say this to her when Khaing blamed others for something.

Twist and Turns

Khaing’s father joined the military because the family couldn’t afford him to go to college. He didn’t want the same thing to happen to his daughter. He supported Khaing’s education all the way, and the family was excited when she was admitted to Yangon University of Economics in 1996.

As a freshman in college, Khaing was the other student busy and focused on their majors, although it only lasted for three months.

In October, the university was closed due to public roit. People, including students, were protesting for ending the military government. It escalated and finally caused the shutdown of all universities across Myanmar.   

Khaing was forced to quit school.

“Go learn something,” her father said. “My friend told me there’s an accountant training program, go learn Accounting.”

Her father didn’t want her time to be wasted, or worse - her falling in love with someone when she was only 19 years old.

During the first two years of education recess, Khaing distracted herself from being depressed and bored by learning Chinese and English. Her mother taught her how to embroider. She even learned how to be a pilot with simulation machine.

But the scattered system didn’t satisfy her aspiration, Khaing took her father’s suggestion and signed up as the accounting trainee.

In 2000, Khaing earned her diploma of accounting at a professional level. It was not a bachelor degree, which was supposed to be hers if the universities weren’t shut down. For the university system, she was still a freshman.

The universities were re-opened in the same year.

Before she came back to school, she was employed by a private company for her accounting skills. Seven months later, she quit.

“There were mostly men in the company. They smoked and drank a lot in business dinners, and one manager started approaching me,” she says. “I decided to quit.”

She went back to the university as a sophomore and changed her major to accounting. Three years later, Khaing passed the academic test and was awarded a bachelor degree in commerce.

To be a real professional in accounting in Myanmar, she needed to be a certified public accountant. It took her three more years of studying to be qualified.  

No pain, no gain. In 2005, she was chosen for a position in the banking system among 600 applicants, along with other five candidates.

“I was also looking to get a master’s degree, but the policy changed, so I decided to apply for a government job,” she says.

For her expertise in accounting, her supervisor in the bank recommended her a scholarship for a masters degree in public policy, which was funded by The Asian Development Bank.

She went to Grips University in Tokyo, a renowned college for the major, and studied with fellows from different countries.

Studying in Japan was her first time living abroad. She took her Burmese way of thinking with her - when good things and unfair things happened she would think everything was fine.

“It’s because of my karma.” she would think.

Unlike Khaing, the students from other countries would argue and debate reasonably about what they saw that was not good enough in their eyes. The dynamics in class informed her that the blaming and complaining is not always bad.

“I should not be very aggressive, but I should know what is right and what is wrong,” she says.

One year later she finally received the master’s degree. She came back to Myanmar and was promoted to work in the central bank.

Now when she criticize the changes in Myanmar, her father gets surprised, his daughter has changed as well.  

“You can see my life; there are cause and effect, cause and effect. I can not control; only I did my best,” Khaing says. “Life shapes as it likes.”

In her room, except a twin size bed, a desk,

and a two seat couch, there is a small Buddhist altar at the corner. She put a thumb-sized Buddha statue on the altar.

Sitting on the couch, legs crossing in a relaxed posture, she heard the sound of steaming in the kitchen. It’s white rice in her pot.  

Winter has come to Boston. Khaing still walks from school to her apartment in the three-kilometer route.

“It’s cold tonight. There is the white steam,” Khaing says, breathing into the air as it condensed. “I like it.”

Tourism - Need It And Hate It

By Yanshu Li

After flying nearly 8000 kilometers from Beijing to Reykjavik, the tourists were experiencing an increasing excitement while the airplane descended. Through the window, they saw the land of wonder unveiled by the tip of the Reykjanes peninsula. The sheer beauty of Icelandic nature was about to become real.

They were a group of seven, renting two jeeps heading to the south in September. Little did they know, the two drivers were fined approx. $770 for driving off-road.

Ugly tire tracks embedded in the pitch-black lava field that took hundreds of years to form. 90,000 square meters of the land was damaged.

It is illegal to drive off-road in Iceland, and the tourists were given clear instruction by the car rental company before they hit the road.

That was not the sole incident that happened. Two months earlier, a foreign motorist, whose nationality was unrevealed, was fined for $1,100 for driving off-road and causing damage to sand field and delicate vegetation by tire tracks. This motorist’s reckless behavior was caught by another motorist and was reported to the police in Eastern Iceland.

When the police asked why they did it, the answer would usually be “I didn’t know it was prohibited.”

They are foreigners; they don’t read Icelandic. They want to enjoy the nature, as much as they could - by as much as what they know.

“Damage like this does not repair itself, and it can take years for the tracks to disappear. In the meantime the view and natural beauty have been destroyed for everyone else,” the Icelandic Magazine wrote.

It is not only concern about nature but also the concern for the safety of the travelers. There were also many cases that the tourists ignored the on-site warning board, and stepped on the steaming wetland near the geyser just to take pictures. It can be vital if they get burned by the hot water, which happened multiple times.

Tourism has become a major revenue generator in Iceland in recent years. It even surpassed the fishery industry in 2014, contributing 27.9% in the exportation of goods and services sector. In 2014,  the average spent per person was $1529.22 according to the report released in April 2015 by Icelandic Tourism Board. It is expected to hit a million-milestone of international visitors in 2015.

That is to say, if the Icelandic government wants to boost the G.D.P., it needs the support from the tourism industry, at least for now.

It is the pure nature that makes the tourists come and come again to the latitude of 64 north to see the dancing green light, various colors of moss, and the magic combination of glacier and volcano. Would it be ironic if the core of Icelandic tourism to be destructed by those who are attracted?

France, another tourist heaven, has been overcoming similar issues.

The famous Lascaux, a set of complex caves, was discovered in 1940. It contains the Paleolithic cave paintings that date back an estimated 17,300 years ago.

It’s open to the public eight years after its discovery, without the anticipation of a thousand visitors daily who bring carbon dioxide, heat, humidity and other contaminations. Poor preservation strategy caused visual damage to the paintings and introduced lichen. It had to be closed for restoration in 1963.

Learning the lesson from Lascaux, Chauvet Cave was strictly restricted access right after its discovery in 1994.

Now they both have recreation sites for tourism purpose.

The replica of Chauvet cave opened in April. It expects 350,000 visitors a year, so it won’t take long to cover the $59 million cost of replicating the original.

To put it in a nicer way, a replica provides the basic needs from those who are intrigued by art and humanity. But it might not suffice for serious interest.  Jonathan Jones, a British art critic and Turner Prize jury, wrote for The Guardian in April suggesting the people read the full report of Chauvet Cave done by the French prehistorian Jean Clottes and watch Werner Herzog’s film Cave of Forgotten Dreams.

“When it comes to Chauvet, it is better to look at photographs and films than fall for a fake.” Jones wrote.

Massive tourist traffic came as pretty figures into the financial reports of businesses, and the government. While it caused problems in the preservation of cultural heritage, it also disturbed and annoyed the residents.

In May, the French government approved a group visiting visa for 6,400 visitors from a Chinese company treating its employees to a holiday. In return, it will pump $15 million into the French economy from the tourists’ spending in the four-day visit.

Nicolas Wasilewski is a Parisian young man who loves traveling. He goes to the museums very often. But he didn’t go out much in those days just to avoid the crowds. He knows the approval was good for economy and relation among the two nations, although it was a short period of deranged life for those who lived in the city.

“Basically, to me, it’s not traveling, it’s consuming,” he said to me.

Similar to the Japanese tourists in the 90s, the robust economic growth in China in the recent decade allowed the Chinese nationals confidence to spend on traveling far and often. More and more tourists choose to buy luxuries overseas to avoid paying higher taxes in the mainland. It is no longer news that in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Seoul, and Paris that the waiting line would be there before the shops open, and many of the customers speak Mandarin.

In Hong Kong, for example, the mass tourists shopping group disturbed the local life. The tension got serious in past years while some confrontation happened between residents and tourists. Some locals complained that the surge of buying power from the influx increased the price level in the already expensive places such as Hong Kong.     

The Chinese tourists are merely an extreme example of holiday spending because they behaved in a high-profile manner. Especially the temptation of the domestic traveling wanes while more people can afford to spend overseas.

Globally, traveling abroad is continually increasing. Concerning overseas, travel is possibly the case that those countries were merely known for the tourism reputation. People flock there to find out more while they carry less differentiation of the cultures and the regulations.

Income from tourism is good money. The money will continue to be good only if it is sustainable. For tourists, being sustainable means enjoying the trip without exploiting the chances of others.

Because people will always travel.

My friend, Le Shao, an office lady in a state-owned company in China, is in Paris right now, and she sent a message to me saying it can cure the cervical spondylosis because there are so much to see on the ceiling, and over the tops of churches and palaces.

She stays in Paris for four days, which she thinks it’s too short time. She went there nonetheless, as one member of a 35-visitor group under a condensed traveling plan.

“In fact, you can see the hi-resolution pictures of every tourist spot online. But when you actually stand on the land, the feeling is profound,” she said.

She wants to enjoy the visual feast in the museums, to experience the history, culture, and to meander on the Parisian streets.

“I was lucky,” she said to me in content. “I walked along the Seine in the rain. ”