To catch a bus

Flashback: Tuesday, July 27, 2004

About five hours after getting back to the hostel, it was time to leave. Since the office was not yet open, and I hadn't properly checked in those hours earlier, I stopped to write a quick note to drop in the box with my key. It was at this time that I finally met my first fellow tourist in Akureyri.

There was a woman in her underwear, setting the breakfast table. On top of that, she didn't speak English (definitely not an Icelander then!). It took a brief moment to negotiate a communications protocol, as we each cycled through a list of spoken languages, before finding a common one in French (which was not her first language either). And then we only exchanged a couple of sentences:

Yes, I realise that breakfast won't be ready for a while. But that's not a problem, since I'm leaving right now, for the SBA Terminal, to catch a bus. Thanks anyway, and au revoir.