
Iceland's Water Cure - wallflower
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/24/magazine/icelands-water-cure.html
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gardarh
I'm an Icelander and I quite like this article, it is one of the better
written pieces I have seen on a cultural phenomenon I relate with - and it is
no exaggeration, swimming pools are quite central to our culture. I have two
young kids and I take them to an outdoors swimming pool nearly every week,
also in the wintertime. Since I live in the capital area we have a few
swimming pools to choose from and we rotate between them.

The title hints that this is the reason for the country's high score in
happiness surveys such is this one:
[http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/denmark-
happi...](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/denmark-happiest-
country-for-third-time-united-nations-report-a6934196.html) . While I don't
think it's that simple I can forgive the author, the title "A survey on
Icelandic swimming pool culture" just doesn't have the same ring to it.
Usually when I see these surveys the first question that pops up is "How do
they measure that?" and it seems journalists generally are not to keen on
pursuing that question.

My point is that isolating one thing from a culture and pinning that down as a
"cause for happiness" seems a bit silly to me. But apart from that the article
is pretty accurate.

~~~
saiya-jin
I did car trip around Iceland few years ago in may, having most of inner part
still unreachable due to metres of snow. Running tiny Chevrolet Spark in
places like Western fjords on their dirt roads with meeting car overy 1-2
hour, good memories. Communal pools could be found in most small villages
around, I recall a big one in Akureyri, second largest city (population
18,000). Definitely part of the culture and considering overall ridiculous
prices there, pretty cheap.

But all pools are standard treated clean water although whole island has
natural hot springs with bluish hot water coming straight form he ground all
over it (it's basically like a big volcano all over). Very few places to enjoy
those. I guess tourists want to have different experiences than those living
there.

~~~
vezycash
>second largest city (population 18,000)

Could a SMALL population increase bonding / a sense of belonging amongst
countrymen thereby creating happiness?

~~~
ajmurmann
I would definitely agree with that. In the US large parts of the country seem
fairly alienated from each other. Not only do they seem to not be able to
relate to each other but often times actively vilify. I have only lived at the
West coast which largely seems at odds which some other parts of the country.
Parts of the South come to mind immediately. The circumstances people live I
seem so very different and thus are their needs and concerns. I rarely meet
people who have social bonds to the South who fondly talk about them. I fact
that might have never happened. For contrast on Iceland life also send to be
very different if you live in Reykjavik rather than I a farm in the rural
South East. However, even during my few visits I've heard people talk about
how they will go to their cousins farm in spring scabs help with the lambs. I
think that that kind of relationship is needed to keep political discussions
from resulting in discontent if there is a conflict of interest. That's
something that send took be lacking their larger the country is. Originally
being from Germany I found my home country to be somewhere I the middle in
this regard. There sometimes would be a little bit of conflict between regions
but never even close to the almost dehumanizing things I hear in the US.

~~~
wtbob
> I have only lived at the West coast which largely seems at odds which some
> other parts of the country. Parts of the South come to mind immediately. The
> circumstances people live I seem so very different and thus are their needs
> and concerns. I rarely meet people who have social bonds to the South who
> fondly talk about them. I fact that might have never happened.

I think that might be an artifact of living on the West coast: the Southerners
you meet are likely to be those who hated the South, hated their neighbours,
hated their families — and moved as far away as they could. Believe it or not,
a lot of folks love the South: good, decent, kind people who take an interest
in one another (of course, if one is neither good nor decent nor kind, that
wouldn't be appreciated, and if one is private then one might find them nosy).

Everyone's different.

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StavrosK
I've been to Iceland and tried the pool, and it was one of my favorite
experiences (well, pretty much the whole trip was a favorite experience,
Iceland is amazing). It was very invigorating to stand up from the 35 C water
into the 2 C air and back.

If you haven't tried it, you need to.

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shin_lao
_Can the secret to the country’s happiness be found in its communal pools?_

If you use suicide rate as an indicator, Iceland doesn't seem to be so happy.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_r...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate)

~~~
viraptor
Iceland gets next to no sun November-February, leading people to depression,
drinking, etc. It would likely affect you much more than the winter you know
from other countries.

If anything, the social aspect of going to a hot pool in the winter is likely
to keep people from committing more suicides.

~~~
ptaipale
This explanation of little sun => suicides doesn't work, at least as directly
as most would think:

 _Research on seasonal effects on suicide rates suggests that the prevalence
of suicide is greatest during the late spring and early summer months, despite
the common belief that suicide rates peak during the cold and dark months of
the winter season._

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasonal_effects_on_suicide_ra...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasonal_effects_on_suicide_rates)

~~~
nabla9
People with some level seasonal affective disorder (SAD) and people with
depression react to change differently.

For people suffering from SAD symptoms typically start in the fall and stay
during winter months. For people with clinical depression it's the springtime
that throws them off.

I live in Finland and I have clear SAD symptoms in the fall and winter (very
tired and low energy). Using Philips light therapy lamp completely fixes it
for me as does trip to Spain in the winter.

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yason
A very interesting article. It made me look up some facts, actually. In
Finland, there are 218 public swimming halls. There are 313 administrative
districts (communes, towns or cities) in the country. Thus, practically even
the smallest of the communes with population of only a few thousand have a
swimming hall; big cities have several. Lacking geothermal heat, the pools are
indoors and explicitly heated obviously.

This isn't generally talked about much. I didn't realize it myself before
reading this article: Finland probably isn't famous for its swimming and
swimming hall culture, but it's everywhere. Except for people who don't
specifically like water practically grow into a culture of swimming at halls.
Nobody really thinks much about it. Everyone knows how to behave there. Old
people gather at swimming halls for bathing, swimming and aquajogging.
Physical education classes at school swim at the local hall, kids are brought
to swimming halls in the first year, regular people go to swimming halls to
exercise... There's nothing much special about it. We swim outdoors, in lakes
and the sea, mostly for fun but swimming halls are the place for a more
focused physical exercise. I would assume Sweden and Denmark are similar,
roughly.

I've had subpar experiences trying to find an abundance of swimming options
when travelling abroad. My culture might not be that common after all.

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turaw
Augh. Almost 100% unrelated to the article, but:

"There are ramshackle _cement_ rectangles squatting under rain clouds..."

It's _concrete_ [1] not _cement_. Even the word _cementing_ can mean "settle
or establish firmly", which is what happens to the _aggregate_ in _concrete_.
Augh.

[1]: [http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/12/the-
differen...](http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/12/the-difference-
between-cement-and-concrete/)

~~~
pdabbadabba
+1 for the information, but I don't think all the "Augh"s are warranted.

One of the widely accepted, dictionary definitions of "cement" is simply
"concrete." (In fact, Merriam Webster has this listed as definition #1.) I
understand that the terms have different technical meanings, but in common
English they are simply synonyms.

E.g., [http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cement](http://www.merriam-
webster.com/dictionary/cement)

There may be an opportunity for a Battle of the Dictionaries here, but I think
this skirmish in the language wars may be over.

~~~
turaw
Fair enough :/ it just feels like 'misusing' words is disrespectful to their
source, as though a lack of effort was taken to use it 'properly' (air quotes
since those are highly subjective terms). In a detached sense, I suppose
seeing semantic change [1] in action is neat, but it is still just the tiniest
bit depressing.

edit: Ah! Also cool is dental cement [2] which is, as the name would imply,
used in dentistry (but without any aggregate equivalent!).

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_change](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_change)

[2]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dental_cement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dental_cement)

~~~
pdabbadabba
Totally agree. Even if "concrete" and "cement" can "properly" be used
interchangeably, I myself prefer to use words in a way that recognizes these
sorts of distinctions. It keeps language more information rich and
historically connected. (And keeps me from being looked down upon by well-
educated people who, like myself, incline towards language snobbery :))

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known
A type of Japanese communal bath house
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sent%C5%8D](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sent%C5%8D)

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Huhuh
I cycled around Iceland in may of last year. Slipping into a hotpool after a
day of pedaling against the wind in barely above freezing temperature was
simply amazing.

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orbitingpluto
Saturday in Icelandic is laugardagur - literally 'pool day'. Gives you an idea
how central this is to the culture.

~~~
wtbob
I thought it meant 'washing day' originally …

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im_asl
Geothermically heated water often contains lithium. This could contribute to
the good vibes coming from the water.

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michael_h
Where exactly is my 'undercarriage'?

