So. A while ago, when I was in Iceland, I saw one the more disturbing and upsetting things that I've seen in a long time. Me, and my chums N (a chap, Dansk) and E (a lady, Svensk) were wandering up Rekjavik high street looking for somewhere to grab some food and maybe a beer or two. I was actually not that into a drinking fest, which N was, given that I'd just shook off a massive hangover. The last few hours had been spent being parboiled in the blue lagoon so I was feeling pretty mellow. So, we wandered up the hill, looking into restaurants when we heard raised voices - sorry, thats very English. These people were screaming at each other, a man and a woman. She was attractive and well dressed, he was a tank - a brick shit house. So they are walking towards us, still arguing, when suddenly, shockingly, he lashed out punching her in the face and then twice in the stomach. She stumbled to a halt while he simply strolled on. It was so brutal and so quick, that we were shocked into inaction. I put my hand onto her arm, but then she ran after him shouting and screaming incoherently. Me and N looked at each other and then he said - we should do something - so was went back down the street where the couple were shouting at each other again. Only about 20 seconds had passed. Even as we arrived she then punched him, in the face and he, once again, began to wade in. So, after only some minutes ago thinking about what to have for dinner I now found myself in between two stangers, trying to stop the guy hitting the girl again. As I put my hands on his arm and chest, I realised that his bicep was fucking huge - it was at this point I wondered vaguely if they'd fly my body home or just leave me where I fell. Fortunately he backed off, but the weird thing was - as N said later - was that it was almost as if we were not there, he seemed completely oblivious to our presence. He then began screaming at her, she screaming back. Her lip had been split and there was blood on her face. He suddenly stalked further off the street, checking his face to see if he was bleeding from where she had hit him - yeah mate, real fucking hero that you are. She realised we did not speak much icelandic so dropped into English, which was totally surreal. N, who is a trainee Doctor, checked out her face while reasuring her - one of her teeth had been cracked and broken. At the same time the guy had returned and was now prowling around us, him speaking in English now, demanding that she give him his money. So, she says that he can have his money and we end up in the surreal situation of escorting her to a cash machine where she drew out a load of cash and threw at the blokes feet. She then staggered further off down the street with us all in tow, the asshole picking up the cash from the street and then leaving up another street.
She was now in total shock, shaking and continually touching her already swelling face. She was crying like mad, so we used her phone to call the cops. Well, to cut a sad story short the cops turned up and while she was talking to one of them in the back of the cop car we gave our details to another. But heres the kicker, while we talking to her - waiting for the cops to turn up and trying to comfort her - turns out the guy, who it seemed was her boyfriend, was on steriods. Which went some way to explaining his total wierd state of mind when were trying to help her.

So, the post match analysis - in the pretend world we would have righteously waded into the bloke, beaten him up and sent him running home, she would have escaped a probably abusive relationship and everything would of worked out fine. In the real world we did little but pick up the pieces. We helped her, sure, but did we help enough? We have not heard from the Icelandic cops so either she pressed charges and the physical evidence was sufficient or, perhaps she did not.




well, I was going to blog another site but this one fought the law and broke in.......six degrees and the power of networks will have to wait. This is more geekness but its cool.....Quarks to Quasars, Powers of Ten