My sister has just returned from a vacation in Iceland. She hit some popular night clubs and talked with several women about the singles scene in that exotic land.
Apparently, the biggest issue men have when hooking up with women in Iceland is not that the ladies are frigid. The men can be a little frosty themselves — but temperature is relative. The problem is that the person they meet at the Moose Antler Pub could actually be a relative.
Here’s why: Iceland is the home of only about 320,000 people with a lineage that has been documented over the past 1,000 years. Generally, people don’t move away from Iceland. (Why would they? And give up the best reindeer barbeque in the world?) Not a lot of people summer in Iceland, largely because summer lasts about four hours. As a result, swinging singles often end up together not realizing that some of their ancestors were once actually swinging from the same family tree.
Most Icelanders hail from a group of ninth-century Viking settlers whose descendants are still on the island, except those who went to Hollywood to make Capital One commercials.
Wedding planners and family reunion organizers compete for the same guests. Online dating services in Iceland try hard to match people who enjoy spectator sports, hunting and moonlight walks, and whenever possible, have different grandparents.
Recently, software engineers produced a smart phone that features a “bump” function. Potential lovers tap phones together to see how closely they are related. If it’s a genetic match, an alarm will sound. In Iceland there are 22 hours of sunshine each day from May through August, so if you are looking for things that go bump in the night, you have less than two hours to make your move on a potential kissin’ cousin.
So far the app is drawing rave reviews, with a 4.5 out of 5 rating from Wired magazine. This puts it a little behind the video game Grand Theft Auto, although stealing a car and kissing your cousin both carry similar jail terms. One user who commented on the app’s website regretted that it wasn’t released a little earlier: “If I had been able to access this service last year,” he wrote, “I probably wouldn’t have gone home with a relative.”
The operative word is “probably,” because pickin’s for eligible women are slim in Reykjavik and my guess is that if this gal shared his love of ice fishing and miniature golf, well, the heck with her DNA.
Innovators of the app have been unhappy with the publicity. They claim that the main intention was actually to give data about the rich genealogical history of the country and also to provide information to customers about relatives’ birthdays and anniversaries. But news of a computer program alerting you that it is Uncle Olafur’s 50th just doesn’t have the same chance of going viral as one that tells you who to shack up with. One of the developers of the software, Arnar Freyr Adalsteinsson, says he seldom even uses the bumping feature. “I just use common sense,” says Arnar.
The developer notes that the application is not for iPhones; it’s only for Androids. I’m no expert on human sexuality, but if you’re an android, it’s probably safe to go home with anybody you want.
