Wandering the Internet

I had some fun today, going from link to link and learning more than I needed (or wanted to!) about a few things.

It began with a mention on the Airline Business blog at Flight Global of an Icelandic airline blog that was described as ‘quirky and entertaining’. Intrigued, I went there to have a look. The Iceland Express blog is indeed fun to read, and I enjoyed it. One entry in particular caught my eye.

The official Icelandic national schnapps is not unlike Hobbes’ natural state of mankind: nasty, brutish and short.

Having a national beverage seems to be de rigeur for small countries who want to sell stuff to tourists maintain their cultural identity. Iceland is no exception.

The local tipple is called “Brennivín”, an ancient Icelandic word that translates as “we see a really bad headache in your future”.

The way the bottle’s label manages to clearly convey this exact prediction can either be attributed to a triumph of graphic design or the fact that the contents of the bottle used to be produced by those wacky and fun-loving guys over at the National Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

But should your lifestyle happen to be less morbid, depressive and/or unwholesome, just relax — you can now get the new and improved “cute version” with the bottle wearing an actual Icelandic sweater. (According to rumour, a Hello Kitty version is in the works.)

So what kind of person drinks Brennivín? Well, according to some guy who really likes freeze-framing Quentin Tarantino movies, Brennivín is what Kill Bill’s Budd uses to ease the pain. Apparently there also exists an outtake where Michael Madsen explains the subtleties of the drink to Darryl Hannah. (Time for the Icelandic Tourist Board to organize a break-in at QT’s editing room, we think.)

There’s more at the link.

I’d never heard of Brennivín, so I did a quick Internet search for more information. I found what I needed at T & T’s Bad Booze Review. They had this to say:

For this episode, we sampled Brennivín (a carraway-infused schnapps known colloquially as BLACK DEATH) and Opal (a salty mentholated licorice schnapps). These may seem like weird alcohol flavorings, but bear in mind that Iceland is a country where people eat ROTTING SHARK for dinner.

Both of these liquors are intensely flavored, and you’ll either love them or hate them. The Brennivín experience is sort of like drinking a loaf of rye bread that’s on fire and punching your esophagus as you swallow it. Opal tastes like…well, salty Halls cough drops. They both have a strange appeal, despite the weirdness of the ingredients. Tucker and Erin loved both of these drinks, but Paul and Tory were less receptive to the strange Icelandic beverages. Although, Tory and Tucker were both suffering from head colds during filming, so the Opal was especially welcome. So since most people who come into contact with Brennivín seem repulsed by the stuff, we’ve come up with a list of ten alternate uses for the stuff.

TEN FUN THINGS TO DO WITH BRENNIVIN

1. Make a pastrami and rye cocktail with it. Combine 2 parts Bakon brand vodka with 1 part Brennivín. Garnish with cocktail onions and pastrami on a skewer. Don’t actually drink this.

2. Clean your kitchen with it.

3. Spray it on weeds in your garden.

4. Use it to punish disobedient children.

5. We’re just kidding. There’s nothing fun about Brennivin.

Again, there’s more at the link. Here they are, sampling Brennivín and Opal on camera.

I was intrigued by T & T’s mention of ‘eat[ing] ROTTING SHARK for dinner’. A further Internet search revealed that this is, indeed, an Icelandic custom. Here’s a National Geographic video about it.

At this point, I decided that my investigations had gone far enough. I was planning a venison steak dinner, braised in wine with onions, corn, tomatoes and seasonings . . . and the thought of rotting shark was putting me off my food!

Anyway, I thought you might be interested in following my peripatetic perambulations around the lesser-known stretches of the Internet.

Peter