LAST week, I made a journey to hell and back. To be precise, I visited Mount Hekla in southern Iceland, one of the most active volcanoes in the world — there have been more than 20 eruptions between the 12th century and as recently as 2000. During the Middle Ages, local monks believed it was the physical location of "Hell’s chimney", or perhaps of purgatory itself.Happily, on the day of my visit, the volcano was not in eruption mode. But, in August 2008, Iceland exploded itself financially and embarked on its own journey to economic perdition. Not that the first-world ambience of the capital city, Reykjavik, betrays any sign of the recent crisis on this large island that is more famous for its elusive winter lights, luxuriant fishing grounds and geothermal geysers than for its banking prowess.In fact, it makes most other European capitals seem, even on our depleted currency, bargain basements by comparison. Its citizens throng the luxury downtown restaurants, where a bottle of rathe...
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