what's it like living in Iceland?

Greetings. I was born in California and now live in Iceland. :)

Okay, first off: Moving a place without ever having visited is quite frankly silly. Come visit first, then decide about moving. ;) And try not to just do the whole tourist thing, try to do the everyday life thing as much as you can, act like you're surveying the place for a potential move. That doesn't mean don't enjoy yourself - part of the appeal of Iceland for me, for example, is its crazy-awesome arts scene, esp. music (I average about a concert a week, not counting the 50-60 I go to during Airwaves - the number of amazing bands here is staggering compared to the population), and I love just going off and hiking in nature too (parts of the country are just otherworldly). But life here isn't a bunch of tours! ;)

If you're even considering Iceland, then you should start learning Icelandic. Now. It takes a long time to learn a language, you need to get started. Yes, everyone here speaks English. But do you really want to go your whole life as an outsider, or do you want to be part of the community? Do you want people who have to switch their conversations from their native language whenever you're around? To not understand signs, the news, politics, courses, and on and on? So... lærðu! :)

Economically, we're recovering from the greatest recession, per-capita, in modern history. But the recovery has been pretty rapid, proportionally. There's still some looming problems - the housing fund, currency controls, etc - but my personal view is that we're still well positioned. We have very strong economic fundamentals - practically limitless low-carbon energy, one of the world's strongest fisheries, a rapidly growing tourism industry, a highly educated, creative population, etc.

Jobs in tech fields are the easiest to get for people not in the EU. There's always demand (Iceland is sort of an artists' colony in the Atlantic, everyone wants to be a writer or musician or artist or whatnot, not enough want to be programmers or engineers!) and it gets you past the rigorous immigration requirements. They have to show that they can't meet the demand locally or from the EU or other Nordics. Note that it takes bare minimum 3 months to get your permits, and can take longer. Oh, and one mistake to avoid that I made: your criminal background check has to be from the *FBI*, not local police. And it takes 3 months for the FBI to process.

If you're in a tech field, odds are you'll be working in the capitol region. I mean, it's possible you might end up as some local sysadmin in Ísafjörður or whatnot, but it's not likely. In the capital region, your livestyle depends on where you live. People in the 101 pay a lot more in rent but don't really need a car. In the suburbs you can get places cheaper but need to drive. It's technically possible to live in the countryside near the capitol but can be surprisingly difficult (I'm trying to buy land to build a house). The road system is generally excellent compared to the population density (tied for second/third lowest in the world), but still, roads to the more remote areas aren't as good as the ring road. Volcanic-glacial floods (jökulhlaup) sometimes take out the ring road in the south, but they rebuild temporary bridges amazingly fast.

Direct financial comparisons are almost impossible, they vary too much depending on how you live and what you value. And some things are impossible to put a price tag on. For example, new parents here get 9 months paid vacation between the two of them. How do you put a price tag on something like that? There's all sorts of little "secret" benefits you keep running across as you live here that would make things difficult to tally up. And then there's the issue that the exchange rate can swing so wildly. I'd simply say, don't focus on "dollar" figures - just look at how people live compared to their jobs, and decide if that's what you'd like.

Some general comments. Life is generally laid back. Good for you for less stress of course. But it also means that people who are processing your applications for things or refurbishing your apartment or whatnot may just disappear on vacation for a month. "Þetta reddast" (Things will work themselves out) is sort of the unofficial national motto. People prefer to start on a project and just deal with things that go wrong as they come rather than overplan and delay. People meet at concerts and parties late. It's standard practice to expect at least an hour between when it says to meet and when it actually starts. The party scene doesn't start until midnight and runs until 6 AM, peaking at around 3.

Living In Iceland

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what's it like living in Iceland?

Hello all I am a 20 something man living in northern California I am an audio visual networking commercial integrator. I have a job that can trafser internationally anywhere basically. I was contemplating moving to Iceland and I was curious what it was like to live or even visit there. Economy?...

You need to be employed by an Icelandic company paying taxes in Iceland in order to apply for a residence visa.