I'm heading the wrong way, swimming upstream. I've convined my mother that it's not worth it for her to drive me across rush hour New York City to get to JFK Airport, so instead we wait together at the local train station as four outbound trains growl by before the next northbound one arrives.

Last night Wan and I had a powwow to catch up on the veritable diaspora of our high school gang. "You've never been to Europe?!" she asked, agog. I guess I've roamed quite a bit, long periods in Arizona and the Olympic peninsula and the Pacific Northwest, and of course college across the country, which might give one the impression that I'm well-travelled in general. But —

"Nope, never ever ever," had to be my reply.

In fact, I've never been in a country other than Taiwan, the U.S., and Canada. I'm slightly apprehensive about vising a country where I don't speak the language, to the point where I found an online pronunciation/basic vocabulary tutorial, and crammed in some odds and ends about the voiced eth and the unvoiced thorn, probably unnecessary as my Rough Guide implies that all Icelanders speak perfect English. But it's felt nice to try.