Day 9-meeting the provost

   January 13-We figured that the recent snow would bring out the Nordic skiers, but we have seen exactly ZERO people skiing since we arrived in Iceland.  In fact, it was not until today that we finally met someone who even owned Nordic skis!  So, why do we call it "Nordic" skiing?  I guess the snow is more reliable in Norway, so they do it more there.  The rain today certainly made me rethink the idea of renting Nordic skis long-term.  Skiing in falling snow is a pleasure, but I can't imagine that skiing in any rain at all would be fun.  As you might imagine, the snow is compacting and melting fairly rapidly, too, due to the rain and the air temperature being above freezing.  Maybe we should look into snowshoes........
   We got the girls to the bus stop by the administrative building by 8 am today and they were off to their second day of school.  Apparently, the bus had to chain up at one point to get up a hill near Varmaland, because the roadway had iced up, courtesy of the rain!  Today was the first day that all of the kids were in school for the full day, because we took Spencer straight over to the kindergarten after the girls left.  Sally and I used the morning to get some work done and then we met Magnús, Signý, and the provost, Jón Ólafsson, for dinner at the Kaffi Bifröst, which is the coffeehouse/restaurant on campus.  Jón told Sally that he was still considering whether or not to have her offer a Masters level course on environmental economics.  He also told us that the university offers short, four week seminars to their students and that Sally or I could teach one if we were interested.  We both said that we would be more than happy to do so, and Jón said he would get back to us on it later.  I am not sure what I could teach that would be interesting for students concentrating in business, law, and economics.  I suppose that a discussion of the new bioinformatics-based technologies that are being rolled out may be of interest.  We will see what Jón says later.
   It was interesting to discuss the challenges facing Bifröst university with Jón, Magnús, and Signý, because many of them sounded like challenges we have in Colorado as well!  Bifröst University is actually a private university and charges tuition above the amount proved by the Icelandic government, so the recession has resulted in fewer students with the extra money to pay for tuition and, consequently, a drop in enrollment.  Jón mentioned that Sally's class of nine students would have been unheard of just a few years back.  There were also other interesting little tidbits we learned about Iceland and the education system here, but I will save those for a "slow news day."
   After dinner, Magnús showed Sally where she would have some office space with another faculty member, whose daughter is one of the girls Alex has been playing with.  We also met Ian, a part-time faculty member, who is from Rochester, NY.  I don't know what his story is, but he has lived here for some time and speaks flawless Icelandic, according to Magnús.  He offered to answer any questions we might have about the university, but he lives in Reykjavík, as do many other faculty members, as it turns out, so we will have to find a Friday, when he teaches on-campus, to talk to him.
   The girls' school gets out at 2 pm on Mondays and Fridays, so they got back to Bifröst around 2:30 and immediately hooked up with their friends to go sledding.  Àgusta came back over to our apartment and played with Joslyn for a while before going home.  I picked up Spencer a little after 4 pm.  It turns out that the school closes at 4 pm (oops, lost in translation), so the head of the school was just leaving with Spence to bring him over to our apartment.  She did not seem put out at all, though, but now I know that he is to be picked up BY 4 pm!  Joslyn spent a little time in the evening starting to do her homework to learn Icelandic.  Since Alex is learning from the same book, she followed along, too.  We worked on the conjugation of eiga (to have): I have=Ég à, You have= Þú àtt, We have= Víð eigum, and They have= Þið eiga.  The kids are beginning to discover how difficult it is going to be to properly learn Icelandic.  However, I hope that that realization will also make them appreciate the fact that their friends have learned to speak English so well at such young ages!