Iceland’s Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir walks the talk, even on ice cream runs

MANY CULTURES HAVE NATIVE WORDS FOR unique experiences. In Spain, families and friends sitting around after finishing a meal are having a sobremesa. Germans enjoying the solitude of being alone in the woods experience Waldeinsamkeit. In Iceland one such word is isbiltur, which describes a road trip to get ice cream, a hallowed family tradition on the island nation.

So when Icelandic Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir visited London recently, she was persuaded to join TIME for a quick isbiltur—a short drive from her country’s modernist embassy in upmarket Knightsbridge to an Icelandic ice cream shop on the west side of town. “You know, I think ice cream walks may be more common today than drives,” she says as the town car crawls through London traffic, noting that her