Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind. ~Seneca

So there we were at the airport Tracy and I and some of our closest friends of the time, today we are still sort of in touch with Ellen on the left and Cilla on the far right... I really need to do a google search for Louise with the stunning yellow pants ensemble... She was on her way to be a model way back then - and was a fairly successful one for a while..

Anywho, to carry on the long and sorry/boring tale that is my life.. nah not really everyones life is interesting - at least to them.  So we flew off to London, where we went to the Y hotel and looked for the Icelandic agents that took people to work at fish factories.... Yep, that lasted about the 10 minutes of the interview, the jobs that we could get were in the far reaches of north east Iceland - so far away from anyone I knew.... we then went to Swindon to the arms of friends of the family of Tracy, they were great - we saw Bath, Stonehenge, Somerset, Cheddar, a great heritage village in Wales and the Cotswalds... Absolutely amazing - England really does have green and pleasant lands... 

After deciding that we were not cut out for the life of "normal" itinerant Australians and New Zealanders we decided to try our luck just going to Iceland and see what would happen... Here I need to take time out to thank my big brother and his wife for taking us in and for being so patient... It could not have been easy to take on two semi grown up teenage girls into the house ... what with the big B being on a ship most of the time and Sigga already having to deal with two young sons.  THANK YOU!!!  

But first... the immigration thing.  You see, we were only 17, actually not legally responsible according to Icelandic law... also, Tracy was Australian - had no rights to any sort of work permit - but we had sort of wrangled that - I had written to the head police guy who was then in charge of foreigners - aliens - and he sent me a letter to show to immigration on arrival - giving us special "dispensation", so that Tracy could enter the country and apply for work.  She had to go and get an xray to prove that she didn´t have tb and also to show up at the Office for foreigners to get a stamp in her passport.  We arrived at KEF and the guy in immigration asked as to step aside as he read the letter that I had... he said "this is all very much out of the ordinary.... tell me your story..." so I did, and he smiled and said - "hope it all goes well and really aren't you guys too young to be doing this?"  

(this is another reason why I loved this country so much - the red tape was not as red as it is now)

So, big brother and sister in law took us in and were far too good to us... We ended up working in a fish factory in Reykjavik - again thanks to the family network... Dad's cousin was the manager of a factory near the centre of Reykjavik - it now houses one of our banks.. yep ... it did have a really good location.  It only took a week for us to get the job and we lived in relative bliss, we spent the summer travelling around Iceland by bus, we even went to the westman Islands - where we had another adventure... our tent was destroyed by locals that were still getting over the festivities from the week before.  We again got special dispensation from the police and the local YHA  (we were only 17) to stay there while our tent was being repaired... again, an eye opening experience for us.  We had the opportunity to stay with my Afi in S´Krók - he still lived in the house that mum lives in now... my amma was up in the olds home at the hospital.. had wonderful moments with her and Sína an old friend of the family that was sort of like an amma for my mum, so she was super nice to me as a result.  

My cousins that I had met when I was 13 came to the rescue when Tracy and I needed a place to stay in Rvk.  Again, we had the most amazing time and learnt to live in a "communal" type set up.. how to set up a kitty - how to share the chores around the share house - all of that we learnt in Iceland..  They were the best of times, sometimes they were also the worst of times, we missed home a lot - our parents, our friends, but we also realised how important it was to have each other to depend on - and just how nice people can be when they want to be.  We learnt how to be hosts and how to accept help when you need it - and also - how lucky we were in our experiences.  We came home sometime around my 18th birthday in October....  we were happy to be home - but we were also wondering when we would ever have that same freedom again....

At the airport in Perth on arrival....