Well it is insane, but I have been here for about a month and a half! That feels so so so weird, but good. I have been putting a lot of effort into learning finnish. It's coming along. This Tuesday marks the beginning of the next... period I guess you should call it. New classes, and hopefully I will meet even more students. It shouldn't be hard to say I have at least talked to every kid at the school by the end of the year. This period I am taking English, with the third year and first year students this time; sports, art, spanish, and a finnish course. The finnish will be mostly me reading some finnish books (in english) and also taking lessons. I will be taking two finnish lessons this period. I have a lot of early days this period which is lame, but oh well.
This weekend, Saturday and Sunday, I went on a backpacking trip up near Oulu, about 30 km away. We left Jurva at 6 in the morning. I was there right at 6 =D and forgot my camera and my jacket (takki). Luckily my host parents were on top of things and they chased the bus down and got me my jacket. It was awesome, I fit the "American" persona to the T. Nice. We drove for about five hours, making two stops, and got to the starting point at around 12 I think. We started out the hike and I was dying about ten minutes after we started. My pack weighed a lot, not sure exactly how much, but a lot. I think about 12 kilos or 25-ish pounds. After many breaks and lots of sweat and two huge blisters on my heels we arrived at the camp. I felt like I was about to pass out BUT I made it. Luckily I was with my little host sister Sophia, who new what she was doing, because I didn't. With her guidance, we set up the tent, got dinner cooked, and I promptly zonked out after. I got a good 11 hours of sleep, well not good, but I didn't get out of my sleeping bag for 11 hours. I had about five layers of cloths on=D Sunday morning we woke up about 7:30, ate breakfast broke down camp and headed out. This time I lasted a whole five minutes before I was ready to pass out, literally. I don't think I have ever been so tired or in so much pain ever and it was awesome, because I made it. 10 kilometers later we got back to our destination, which was a spa conveniently enough. We took showers and had sauna and recovered. All in all we hiked about 20 kilometers (12 miles, sounds much more impressive in kilometers) , I am very proud of myself. And lucky for me I don't have any school today so I am being lazy and doing a whole lot of nothing! hmmmm so here are some words in finnish: tree-puu, white-valkoinen, nice-kiva, tent-teltta. and I know more but can't think of them off the top of my head.
My birthday is in a few days which I am excited about! 18! Feels weird, but good. As of now I am being lazy, listening to the soundtrack from "Miss Potter", which is awesome by the way, and relaxing. One month gone and many more to look forward to!
