How to convince people you are from Iceland

"Looks interesting…”
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“Well, okay, but, I don’t think that’ll really convince people.”

(Sorry @beschizza, I kid, I kid, it’s a fun video.)

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I’ve long been saying that I’ll use virtual assistant software when they make one in the voice of Björk.

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Less whimsically, it was fun, (and interestingly, apparently most of speaking in an Icelandic accent is speaking as a drunk Geordie with laryngitis - who knew?) but felt a bit more like we were ‘laughing at’ rather than ‘laughing with’ at the end - sure, I like a good European non-sequitur saying like the rest of us - but they internally make sense, it’s just that we lack the context.

I may just be overthinking it, though. :innocent:

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If only Pratchett had written Scandinavian folklore.

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Is this a good time to mention that Sigur Rós often deliberately sing nonsense ‘jargon’ in an Icelandic cadence (so it sounds like Icelandic without any actual content) to get people to stop trying to figure out the meaning of the words, and just enjoy the flow of sound?

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Didn’t he?
The dwarves are definitely pseudo-Jewish (made me cringe in the earlier books with the gold jokes) but surely the trollies are Scandinavian - kryophiles, with echoes of the Ice Giants. Of course Pratchett’s roots are mixed but Thud! is quite Scandinavian - though I wouldn’t want to spell it out because, plot spoilers.

Or are you suggesting that he should have been around to write the Íslendingasögur? That would be interesting.

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Good points.

You misspelled awesome :wink:

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Those would be good tales to have embedded in the common folklore.

After the survivors crawl out of the wreckage of our world, I wonder what they’ll have? Some will be clutching their KJB, no doubt. A group with a few seasons of the Simpsons on a hand-cranked tablet as their Canticle for Leibowitz would be interesting. The group with 50 Shades of Grey, never mind.

By the way, Njarl’s Saga isn’t half bad, with a view of Iceland and the lands around it in that age. It’d make a good mini-series with a catchy tune: The Song of Lawsuits and Ice. :wink:

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  1. Tell people you are from Finland.
  2. People know that Finland doesn’t exist.
  3. “Ah,” they will say, “You must be from Iceland instead!”
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Sprouting is such a pour substitute for spouting.

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I think whoever put the caption ‘that even natives will be fooled’ is sprouting something, or at least never got to the part where she adds a disclaimer saying that people from Iceland will spot your fake accent from a million miles - a tad poor methinks

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The final part of this video clearly explains that a native speaker of icelandic will see right through this technique, that its only non-icelandic speakers who might be fooled. So Robs blurb has got it completely backwards, 180 degrees off course, counterfactual fake news.

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I don’t wish to be from the same place as Björk, but rather in the same place as Björk.

However, I do realize her life is hard due to the paparazzi (“What kind of zany shit is Björk up to today?”), so yeah, having me around is probably not going to make life any better.

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Bjork should be on the UN registry of cultural landmarks.

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A person can’t be a landmark. They move around. You would have people falling off cliffs and driving into oceans.

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She needs to be protected though! If we don’t make her a cultural landmark, how can we protect our precious supply of Bjorkness?!?

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Now I reallyreallyreally want a Björk voice for Tomtom. Or Björk sat in the back seat giving directions, that’d be even better.

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Wouldn’t telling them that your last name was somethingsomething_dottir_ do the trick?

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That would only work for women, though.

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