In Star Wars lore, the Sith Lords represented all things dark and perverted.  In order to save the evil Sith empire from complete destruction, the Sith Lord Darth Bane instituted what was known as the rule of two: Two there should be; no more, no less. One to embody power, the other to crave it. Through this ancient code, the Sith remained undetected and grew in power, accumulating arcane knowledge and dark powers.  Only when the apprentice destroyed his master could there be a new Sith Lord, and a new apprentice could be chosen.  For aeons they remained undetected, until one fateful night in Reykjavik the newest Sith Lord, Darth Croatia, sought a new apprentice, and by a strange twist of fate, found a suitable servant in our traveling companion Jeff, whom he tried to make his Sith bitch.

When  I awoke the morning of day three of Pride, Jeff was nowhere to be found.  This was only a little bit disconcerting, because Jeff had developed his own schedule.  I started to compose yesterday’s blog entry, a process that ended up taking most of the days.  Part of that is because it is written in fits and spurts, and other because it takes a fair amount of time to figure out how exactly to interpret the day’s events into a coherent narrative.  As I was writing, Patrick got up and started to check his Facebook.  At around noon, Jeff finally walked through the door.  His story is so fantastic that I feel compelled to write it down for posterity.

If you read the previous entry, you know that Jeff had already had an encounter with a character that we dubbed the Sith Lord.  Our narrative begins with that first contact.  The first night of Pride we went to Barbara following the Opening Ceremonies.  Jeff, of course, was continuing his UN sanctioned efforts to spread world peace (of ass).  During our walk to Barbara, I counseled Jeff to use the power of the Law of Attraction to visualize what he wanted.  This proved to be an unusually challenging task, as we swung from one fantasy visualization to another.  My powers of concentration were not vast enough to hold the number of different options that Jeff was looking for.  Let’s just say that what Jeff wanted to settle on was your standard Viking with blue eyes.  It was with this thought in mind that Jeff, Patrick, and I went into Barbara.

Barbara was, of course, starting to get full, and after a drink or so we headed to the dancefloor.  The music was that strange Icelandic blend of Michael Jackson, Top 40, and Pall Oskar that I had come to enjoy.  We were dancing near the DJ’s table, and we noticed that there was this dark haired man looking in our direction, and more specifically, at Jeff.  He did not look Icelandic, but more Slavic, and he did not have the blue eyes.  The law of attraction clearly did not speak English in Iceland.  Finally, Patrick went over to this dark-haired gentleman, and brought him over to speak with Jeff.  Patrick, his job as international pimp finished, and I left the bar shortly thereafter to come home.

Now you know how Patrick unwittingly introduced Jeff to the Dark Lord of the Sith.  The Dark Lord of the Sith took Jeff on not one, but two, adventures.  The first adventure occurred on the night of opening ceremonies, and the second occurred on the second night at Club London-Reykjavik.  Both involved strange magic and dark side powers that resulted in Jeff swearing off of alcohol and complaining that his body was going into shock.  It also involved us recognizing that one of his colognes that he brought clearly had Sith pheromone in it, and consequently, he would switch to a Sith repelling scent instead.  And now back to our main narrative.

With Jeff escaped from the Sith Lord and restored to the Light Side of the Force, we decided to head to Bonus to get groceries prior to Pride.  Pride started at 1400, and we wanted to watch it from the safety of our balcony.  We picked up some additional supplies and headed back to the apartment.  Steini let us know that he would be coming by with Brian and his girlfriend to watch Pride, and then we would be heading down to the concert.  I set up my camcorder to record the parade from one of our windows, and we settled in for the parade.  According to Kathy, our contact with Apartment K, pride in Iceland was fairly small in comparison with US Pride celebrations.

I don’t know what her definition of small is, but Reykjavik Pride was not small in my opinion.  The main street of Laugavegur was packed with people, and the parade involved several floats.  The dykes on bikes started off the parade, and from there, several different groups marched.  One of the most interesting thing was the number of gay supporters in the parade.  In the states you might have PFLAG, and perhaps some corporate floats that probably have straight people on them, but in Reykjavik, there was a number of groups that seemed to be in support of lesbians and gays, but not actually gay themselves.  The overwhelming presence of straight supporters was very heartening, and seemed to be a hallmark of the Iceland Pride experience.  Steini and Bryan had pointed out that one of the big part of Pride were all of the people out to support it.  In fact, I saw a large number of young children holding flags and waving them.  Later, as we were leaving the apartment, I noticed that even the Christian bookstore had Pride flags in the window.

The Pride Parade has passed by our apartment by around 1500, so we headed out to follow the parade down to the Pride Concert.  The place was packed with people — I think at one point I heard that there was something like 70,000 people there.  Viggo and Violetta were MCing the concert; we heard them over the A/V system as we walked down to the plaza where the concert was being held.  Steini guided us to the front of the concert where we could clearly see the stage.  The next couple of hours was filled with mostly awesome music from Icelandic artists, including a couple of performances from a German group called Robotron.  That performance almost destroyed my eardrums.  The music was described as disco punk, and it sounded like heavy metal thrashing, ear-splitting industrial sounds, and screaming all rolled into a package that made my ears bleed.

Pall Oskar also performed during the concert.  Throughout our stay in Iceland, we have continuously heard this one particular song called Ég Er Eins Og Ég Er, which translates into “I Am What I Am.”  Jeff made the connection that this song was one he had heard before, and I later discovered that it was a song from La Cage aux Folles.  Every time Pall Oskar performs everyone goes crazy, but this song seems to drive everyone wild.  Steini explained that this song is kind of the Gay Pride anthem in Iceland, but it also speaks to anyone who is feels like the don’t want hide who they are.  We rocked out to Pall Oskar’s performance and then headed back to the apartment to relax prior to the big party at Club NASA.

When we finally made it to Club NASA it was probably around 0030, right before our VIP passes stopped allowing us to line jump.  We got into the building and checked our coats, and headed inside the club.  Club NASA was well-named, because the heat in the room felt like I was underneath a space shuttle about to take off.  Pall Oskar was DJing, and he started off his first set by playing “Gay Classics.”  We were magically transported in Pall Oskar’s way back machine (with glittery pants and jacket) to the land of ABBA, the Village People, and the Weather Girls.  We danced until sweat started to pour down our necks, which was about 5 minutes in.  And then we kept on dancing.  I wasn’t drinking, so I was intent on just enjoying the music.  Surprisingly, the night also included a couple of live performances for Hera Bjork and Haffi Haff, both of which were very enjoyable (and in English).

Pall Oskar took the stage, now changed into a black suit (with sparkles!).  Naturally, we listened to the same songs that we had already heard, and I was getting good at faking the sounds by trying to focus on the vowel sounds and end of words.  Luckily, Pall Oskar tends to hold his notes for a while which allows me to feel like I’m singing along.  Patrick and Jeff were near the front of the stage, and they were reaching out their hands to Pall Oskar.  At one point, he actually touched them, and they looked very very excited by that.  I don’t think Patrick was planning on ever washing that hand again.  I joined them up front and got to see Pall Oskar up close.  I think at one point he made eye contact and I said to myself: “I am never going to wash my face again.”

Eventually, the party at Club NASA got down and dirty with Pall Oskar inviting people onto the stage and starting to spin some house music.  The crowd on the stage was shaking their groove thing and we all started getting down.  Patrick and Jeff had been appearing and disappearing all night to go cool off in the Front Lobby, and they reappeared at this point, and we started dancing to progressive house.  Shirts were coming off left and right, and the entire stage was full of people, all of whom, it turned out were straight.  The other thing is that Icelandic straight guys get pretty flirty, and so it’s really hard to tell what exactly is going on until the moment they draw the line.  It’s like the riddle of the Sphinx, except it’s the riddle of the Straights: “What goes to bed at 4:00 AM, walks on two legs in the afternoon, and teases you with its third leg at Club NASA?”

The other dark side of this evening is that I finally got to see what happens when Icelandic people get a little bit out of control at a club.  They get beat down faster than a fat girl on “America’s Next Top Model.”  I think I noticed someone with a bleeding nose, one overly enthusiastic young guy was getting thrown around like a rag doll (he just jumped up again, like a weeble wobble), and I got slammed from behind when two people got pushed from the stage.  One of the guys responded by jumping back onto the stage to beat down the person who pushed him.  This was the same guy that was taking drinks from everybody, including Steini, who was not pleased with losing the rest of his beer to this person and let him know it.

That pretty much is how the evening ended, with Patrick asking if I was ready to go.  I was a little bit bummed about leaving, but it was probably a good idea.  We — of course — stopped for pizza, and got back to apartment.  We had a good talk about the evening and the trip in general, and we feel asleep as the sun began to rise again on our second to last day in Iceland.