Three Tokens and Five Minutes of Glory

Three Tokens and Five Minutes of Glory

There are moments in Iceland when luxury has nothing to do with hotels, white bathrobes or a glass of champagne.

Luxury is hot water.

After days of wind, rain, mud, dust and sleeping in a tent, the showers at the campsite in Vík looked like the entrance to paradise.

There was only one small detail.

Tokens.

One token. Five minutes of hot water.

Five minutes.

At home, five minutes is barely enough time to decide whether the water is the right temperature. In Iceland, five minutes suddenly becomes an Olympic discipline.

We had three tokens.

Three small pieces of metal and an unreasonable amount of hope.

I stood there wrapped in a towel, mentally rehearsing the entire operation.

Undress. Shower. Shampoo. Rinse. Soap. Rinse again. Do not think. Do not enjoy. Do not waste a second.

This was not hygiene.

This was strategy.

I dropped in the first token and ran behind the curtain.

The water started immediately.

Of course it did.

For the first few seconds I was still fighting with clothes, towel and everything else that suddenly seemed to have twice as many sleeves, straps and fastenings as usual.

Somewhere above me, precious seconds were disappearing.

Tick.

Tock.

Hot water.

Gone forever.

Finally I was under the shower.

Wonderful.

Warm.

Almost emotional.

For approximately four seconds.

Then the responsible part of my brain took over.

Move!

Shampoo.

Rinse.

Soap.

Rinse.

Hair.

Face.

Arms.

Legs.

Everything at a speed normally seen only during emergency evacuations.

And then, just as I had begun to feel almost human again, the water stopped.

Silence.

I stared at the shower head.

The shower head stared back.

Five minutes had passed.

Impossible.

I had barely started living.

Second token.

Another five minutes of glory.

This time I was ready.

No wasted movement. No contemplation. No standing under the warm water thinking about life.

I had become a professional.

The second five minutes disappeared even faster than the first.

By the third token I no longer wanted cleanliness.

I wanted victory.

I wanted to leave that shower washed, rinsed and with shampoo nowhere behind my ears.

The third token went in.

Water.

Speed.

Concentration.

And then — silence again.

Finished.

I stepped out from behind the curtain wrapped in a towel, hair wet, face red from the heat and with the ridiculous feeling that I had just completed some kind of Icelandic survival test.

Outside, the three of us sat side by side, wrapped tightly in towels like caterpillars in cocoons.

Steam floated around us.

Nobody spoke for a moment.

We simply sat there in complete satisfaction.

Clean.

Warm.

Alive.

Through the window, Vík was still doing what Vík does best — mist, rain, black landscape and the strange sharp silhouettes of Reynisdrangar in the distance.

And suddenly three shower tokens felt like one of the greatest luxuries Iceland had given us.

Because Iceland teaches you very quickly that happiness is relative.

Sometimes it is the northern lights.

Sometimes it is a perfect sunrise.

And sometimes it is simply five minutes of hot water.

Three times.