Icelandic Book Store

4) What about being in Iceland is a new experience for you?

Never have I visited a country where English was not the first language spoken. Being in Iceland, the primary language of most people is Icelandic. This language is a very old one—with Nordic roots. The language has not evolved much over time as the country is an island fairly isolated from the rest of the world. Before traveling, I considered how successful communicating with foreigners would be. My expectations were that it would be difficult because I did not know very much Icelandic besides a few words such as ‘yes,’ ‘no,’ and ‘bathroom.’ However, upon my arrival in this country, I discovered the language barrier would not be as large of a problem as I had anticipated. Most of the people I encountered in Iceland spoke English, as well as Icelandic. Thus, once they understood I was a tourist who did not speak their language, they quickly changed their dialogue to English and the conversation was able to ensue. Only a few instances occurred where I or the person I was in conversation with struggled to understand each other even while speaking English. Usually, we were just using different words to describe specific items and we had to search our vocabularies for the right word/s to say what we were attempting to communicate. One instance I truly encountered the difference in language was at a used bookstore in Reykjavík. Many of the books were in Icelandic, but I recognized a few because of their cover or by using context clues to deduce that their title was one of a book I had previously read in English (e.g. the book in this photo is The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien). There were a few books, however, that were in English—I think this just shows the versatility the people of Iceland have with different languages. I admire this quality and hope I can one day become at least bilingual.Read more