Another Þorrablót

Well on Saturday night I attended the town's Þorrablót. Besides the traditional Icelandic food which you have all read about in a previous blog, this also had lots of singing, jokes, music and dancing, plus big screen with a slideshow of historic and contemporary photographs of the town and its residents. Also on TV that night was the final voting selection of the Icelandic entrant in the 2010 Eurovision song contest and there was even a live cross to this Saudarkroker Þorrablót on the show.

The event was held in the sports arena and was packed with over 500 of the towns folk. This year the organization committee were those born in 1957, next year it is the 1958ers turn...as this is my year who knows I may end up on the committee if I am here. The food and alcohol were BYO.

Every Icelandic household has at least one of these wooden trays which the BYO food was brought to the event on. I have seen heaps of these at the local supermarket and had wondered why they would have a big market for such an item...now I know!

The entertainment was provided in the form of speeches and comedy send ups of local personalities and events that happened during the previous year. The jokes must have been good as everyone laughed continuously.

This is a picture shown on the big screen of Olga's amma's (Kristin) house that I am staying in at the moment...it originally belonged to her husband's parents....since this photo there has been a small extension to the right. The little white house in the picture that heads this blog is what it looks like today. (Sorry about the headshot)
This is a photo of the main street that I am staying on back around the early 1900's, many of the houses are still standing today.

Here are a of short, poor quality videos from my little camera....but it will give you the idea what the whole evening was like....there was lots of singing like this throughout the event. The tune is very familiar on the first video but the words are different....I think our version maybe A Bicycle Built for Two.

Here is one of the finalists for the Icelandic entrant in the Eurovision song festival. This young man lives in the area and we were requested to vote for him with the promise that if he won he would come to the town and sing for free. Unfortunately that won't happen as he was the runner up.

The evening finished off with several hours of dancing till around 3am.