When it's light you'll see much more

I first met Erla Ruth Harðardóttir when we started on the Acting Course together in 1984. It's only now that I can imagine the total weirdness for her of arriving in England and being thrown in with the Kids from Fame. She says she was mystified by how winter could be colder here than it was at home - primarily because our homes are not built for the cold in the way that is standard in Iceland. At the time, we were a bit mystified by this punky, colourful, funny, viking who understood English very well, but didn't say much but sounded hilarious to us when she did

My friends from GSA hold a special place in my heart. We spent so much time together being vulnerable and opening ourselves to doing whatever was needed next. We all watched each other try and fail and try again over and over, so my other long-term friends who went straight to work or university and into putting on social masks sometimes find it hard to understand how we can fall back into comfortable company with each other. Not just re-enacting nostalgically, just really as if no time has passed at all.

So when I messaged Erla and said we were coming to Iceland, she immediately said she would pick us up at the airport and take us to our hotel, even though she was a little put out that we were staying in a hotel instead of coming to stay with her and then came up with options for us to meet throughout our stay.

We didn't see much of the landscape when we arrived. It was pitch black most of the way from the airport. While we drove we heard the standard facts about the place. The total population is 360,000 with two-thirds living in the Capital Region (Reykjavik and the surrounding towns) and half of that two-thirds in Reykjavik itself. We heard about how Iceland got its independence with help from the British during WW2 and the presence of the US army throughout the Cold War - this explains the amazing levels of anglophone-ry - everyone speaks English, not as a chore or even as a recent favour to tourists, but because that's how you got on with the friendly occupation. We heard about Reagan and Gorbachev coming for their historic summit and we heard the story of how Ingólfur Arnarson decided where to put his settlement here in the first place in the smoky, steamy bay by throwing pillars into the ocean and seeing where they came ashore.

Dropped at our hotel, full of saga stories and instructions on which supermarkets to use to avoid horrendous prices, we stumbled next door to a strange pub serving Japanese-Icelandic fusion food including deep fried brussells sprouts and roast duck with cottage cheese, all of it in thick sweet syrup before tripping back upstairs to sleep and sleep.