Contract? Visas?

"we are working on this... a lot of paperwork!" Uhuh. It's a country of 300,000 people, and it sounds like 90% of them must be bureaucrats - how long can getting a contract sent out take?! It's now nearly 4 months and counting...

An address!

We'll be living in/at/on Víðihlíð in Reykjavik. Yay! We'll have a spare room, so start preparing your visit now! Check out our street in GoogleEarth, or have a look on the maps:
A map of Reykjavík: http://www.backman.is/mapofrvk/
The University is here: http://www.backman.is/mapofrvk/part1.html

Flat #2

I've just heard from Flat #2, and it sounds quite lovely - the owners (who live upstairs - it's one of those houses they have in Europe where each floor is self-contained, and when the teenage kids move out, the bottom floor gets rented out) both work at the uni too. I've accepted it ($2,000 per month, sounds cheap!), and hopefully hear back about it soon!

Flat #1 "not available"

The close flat is no longer available! (Person decided not to move.) So House-elf Margrét said we should write personally to the owner of flat #2, and plead our case, saying what lovely, quiet, responsible, interesting people we are. Flat #2 is the fully furnished one - hopefully they respond soon. I started the email in Icelandic, because one of the few things I can do is say 'Hi! My name's Tania!' ;)

After the initial disappointment and some trawling on YouTube, L & I have decided that maybe it's better we're not right in town - we saw someone's video looking down from their balcony at 3am, where it's daylight, and the streets are chockers with cars & people, and the noise echoing up the street is like it's the middle of the day!

I'm looking forward to seeing what their words for 'day' and 'night' mean: in Norwegian 'dag' means ~6am-~7pm, (with 'ettermiddag' being around midday-7pm), 'kveld' means ~7pm-midnight, and 'natt' means midnight-6am. Daylight (or the lack of) doesn't change this. I remember coming home from a bbq dinner with E & her 5 year-old daughter, where Daughter was talking about the tv she was going to watch when we got home. E told her she was actually going to bed, because it was night-time. Daughter replied (shading her eyes from the glaring sun), "But I can see the sun right there!". The Viking's reply: "Yes, I know it's broad daylight. But it is nonetheless night!" ("Ja, men da e natt forda!")

We're not criminals

Got our criminal record checks back a couple of days ago, and neither of us have a record. That the Australian Federal Police know about. :) L chucked a tanty when I said we'd probably have to send over the hard copies, because "the piece of paper is forgable in the hard copy, so why can't we just email a pdf scan of the things?!"

Applied for a flat

okay, we've said we'd like to live in the small-but-close-to-everything flat, and we'll find out next week if it's still available. House-elf Margret has said she'll help us buy a bed and mattress before we get there, because the house is furnished with a washing machine only, which she said 'might be a bit uncomfortable'. Fingers crossed!