FAROE FRIDAY: CLINTON WRAP

Yes, it's a bit past Friday, but you must cut me some slack, I'm a very busy and unimportant man.

Bill Clinton's trip to the Faroe Islands came and went with almost no notice in the English language press. The best stuff came from blogger Faroe Man, who translated local news reports into English and recorded his own impressions of the event as well. I highly recommend checking out his full coverage. Most of what I have to report on the subject is essentially stolen from him.

Clinton's visit to the islands was pretty short, he arrived on Monday morning and didn't even spend the night. But he did spend a part of the afternoon doing some early Christmas shopping in Torshavn. As the first current or former US president to visit the Faroes, Clinton drew big crowds on the streets. In this picture, he appears to be in full campaign mode. Both photos in this post come from portal.fo. A gallery of pictures from the visit can be found here.

Later that night was the big speech. Clinton spoke at a business forum at Nordic House with UN weapons inspector Hans Blix. An excerpt of Clinton's speech can be found here. Watching his comments, I was struck by how tired he looked. He spoke about the interconnected word and the opportunities and perils it brings. Then the 10 minute excerpt ended, so I don't know what he said after that.

But from the pictures it appears he did a Q&A session while sitting on a pretty fabulous orange stuffed chair. I do love Scandinavian design. The background image at the venue was pretty cool as well.

Things appeared to have calmed down since Clinton's visit on Monday. With all the summer festivals done, it seems like the Faroes may be heading into the quiet doldrums of winter. We'll see.