friday night kreppa
Last night was my first downtown in a little while. In my new incarnation as a tame, dinner-party-hosting suburbanite, I just don't get down there that much. It's just too much hassle.
But last night I headed on down with a buddy of mine and we had beers at Brons before a few other dudes showed up. So began a rollicking Friday. Only the thing was, there was hardly any rollicking to be had.
The only place with any kind of "scene" going on appeared to be b5, our second stop. It was hard to squeeze past a thick crowd at the bar and later there were even the beginnings of a line outside. Other than that, there was hardly anyone on the sidewalks, which on a decent Friday night can become almost impassable between the hours of 1 and 4 a.m.
Not wanting to miss any kind of hijinks anywhere else, we left b5 and headed up the street. The next port of call was Ölstofan where we did the obligatory one-lap. There were maybe 30 people there, hunched over drinks in the warm, humid, beer-scented Ölstofan air. But none of the rippling roar of a good Ölstofan crowd at full tilt. Next was Oliver, which had all of the excitement of my grandmother's sitting room. Empty chairs at empty tables, and so on. Thinking we were missing something, we headed upstairs expecting to maybe run into the Star Wars Cantina scene, and instead found only a lonely bartender and two people at a corner table.
Back on the other side of Lækjargata, Apótek didn't even have a line outside at 2 a.m. and inside was lackluster. We ended up at Wrecks which just re-opened after four weeks of "extensive renovations" which seemed to basically consist of new wood paneling nailed onto the columns by the door. The place was desolate, but at least had comfy couches. And no night out is really complete without Nonnabiti, which had our sandwiches ready in record time as there were no customers around.
Now, I realize that Friday night always takes a back seat to Saturday in terms of its importance in the Icelandic social spectrum. But this was the emptiest Friday downtown I've ever seen. If I decide to fire up this blog-writing again for real, I'll for sure delve deeper into the economic meltdown here, but suffice it to say that the monetary woes here seem to be having a marked impact on even something as culturally sacrosanct as getting blitzed downtown on a weekend night.
But last night I headed on down with a buddy of mine and we had beers at Brons before a few other dudes showed up. So began a rollicking Friday. Only the thing was, there was hardly any rollicking to be had.
The only place with any kind of "scene" going on appeared to be b5, our second stop. It was hard to squeeze past a thick crowd at the bar and later there were even the beginnings of a line outside. Other than that, there was hardly anyone on the sidewalks, which on a decent Friday night can become almost impassable between the hours of 1 and 4 a.m.
Not wanting to miss any kind of hijinks anywhere else, we left b5 and headed up the street. The next port of call was Ölstofan where we did the obligatory one-lap. There were maybe 30 people there, hunched over drinks in the warm, humid, beer-scented Ölstofan air. But none of the rippling roar of a good Ölstofan crowd at full tilt. Next was Oliver, which had all of the excitement of my grandmother's sitting room. Empty chairs at empty tables, and so on. Thinking we were missing something, we headed upstairs expecting to maybe run into the Star Wars Cantina scene, and instead found only a lonely bartender and two people at a corner table.
Back on the other side of Lækjargata, Apótek didn't even have a line outside at 2 a.m. and inside was lackluster. We ended up at Wrecks which just re-opened after four weeks of "extensive renovations" which seemed to basically consist of new wood paneling nailed onto the columns by the door. The place was desolate, but at least had comfy couches. And no night out is really complete without Nonnabiti, which had our sandwiches ready in record time as there were no customers around.
Now, I realize that Friday night always takes a back seat to Saturday in terms of its importance in the Icelandic social spectrum. But this was the emptiest Friday downtown I've ever seen. If I decide to fire up this blog-writing again for real, I'll for sure delve deeper into the economic meltdown here, but suffice it to say that the monetary woes here seem to be having a marked impact on even something as culturally sacrosanct as getting blitzed downtown on a weekend night.
posted by JB at 29.11.08
5 comments
