As crazy as it seems I only have a few days left in Finland. Nine, to be exact, but who's counting? I am really sad to be leaving, but of course excited to see my family and friends at home. But, however nice it will be to be home I am still ridiculously sad to be leaving my family here. I truly wish I could stay a few more months. The stress of knowing I only have a short time left is rather tough though. It makes me feel like I should be out everyday doing stuff and securing the friendships I have made.
My last months have been fun. It seemed like summer was never going to arrive, but, after waiting forever, it did. Finland is truly beautiful in summer. Everything is green; look out the window and you will see nothing but different shades of green. Both the winter and summer seasons are beautiful, but winter is beautiful for is stark harshness. I find I like the summer much more. School ended at the beginning of June. At the end of April I switched to my last family. I have loved all of my families, but I really love this family. I get along great with them all, plus I am now closer to the center. In May I got to go to Stockholm, Sweden, with a group from school. That was an awesome trip and it was awesome to visit another country in Europe. After school got out, it seems I have been constantly on the move. I have taken a road trip to Jyväskylä, Savonlinna, and Helsinki with my friends Kati and Laura. After being home for one day I went to a rock festival for the weekend in SEINÄJOKI with my friend Jenni. Later the following week I went to my host family's summer cottage for the weekend. The day after we returned my host mom, Katja, my host sister, Sofia, and I left for a trip to Tallinn, Estonia and Helsinki. The day after we got back from the trip I went to a theme park in Tampere with my friend Piia. All of these trips were amazingly fun. I couldn't have hoped for more. With so much to do my last months have passed in whirl. Over the last few days I have been able to catch up on sleep and start packing.
The road trip was great in that I got to see parts of Finland I haven't seen yet and spend time with two really awesome friends. The trip was mainly for Kati because she was taking entrance exams at universities in the the different cities. But over all it was awesome to be invited. The rock festival, Provinssirock, was awesome. I have been looking forward to this festival for months. Jenni and I have been planning for ever. I got to see some awesome bands, System of a Down, Avenged Sevenfold, Wolfmother, Pendulum and many others. It was an experience to say the least. I met a bunch of finnish people, and saw them in their natural habitat of rock festival=D It was a three day festival. It was awesome, but needless to say it was nice to get home and take a shower. It was my second time going to the summer cottage and it was a fun weekend. It was the Juhannus celebration, and even though it was too cloudy to see, it was the midnight sun weekend. We got home from the cottage on Sunday night and left for Helsinki on Monday afternoon. We took a train from Seinajoki to Helsinki, had some time to walk around Helsinki, then left by ship to Tallinn. We spent the night on the ship and then got off in Tallinn at 7 a.m. the next morning. We spent Tuesday wandering around Tallinn's Old Town. It was a beautiful part of the city. We ate delicious food at a few really nice restaurants. Wednesday we did some more sight seeing and then took the boat home the evening. Thursday we spent in Helsinki and then took the train home that evening. The next day, Friday, I went to Tampere with Piia to Särkänniemi. It was a really fun day, and it was really nice to spend the day with a really good friend.
This next week I plan on spending as much time as possible with friends and doing what I can in my time left. Friday I have my goodbye party with friends, and then Saturday I will have my goodbye dinner with family. I will probably spend Sunday moping and finishing up my packing. Monday my host family has been awesome enough to offer to drive to Helsinki to drop me off. Early early Tuesday morning I...fly...home....sigh.
It is so hard to come to terms with the fact the my year, my exchange, this amazing, hard, crazy experience, will be over. I feel like I'm going back to reality, leaving this alternate life I have created. I am excited and sad in turns. Listening to songs that make me think of the year make me sad, thoughts of seeing my sisters and parents and nieces and nephews and grandparents and so on make me happy. It is an undeniably weird state of emotions, and I'm not sure I like it. But then again the thought that this will be over soon because I will be home is equally unpalatable. I feel like the embodiment of bitter-sweet.
I may post one more rant after this, but I may not. I am not good at being faithful to my ranting here, so I don't know if I will feel that I have more to write. But for now, farewell!
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Monday, January 17, 2011
New Beginnings
Almost two months since I have updated and lots has happened. November was a good month, lots of snow and very cold. That of course is something that November has in common with December, and January, and Febuary for that matter. The best part of November was the Thanksgiving dinner I cooked for my host family. It was my first undertaking of such a huge menu, not to mention my first turkey. I got up around 9:30 to get the turkey ready and into the over by 10. I spent pretty much the rest of the day up to 18.00, when we ate, cooking. I cooked turkey, candied sweet potatoes, gravy, lingonberry sauce, mashed potatoes my host dad did, sauced asparagus, and... other stuff. I can't remember what all it was, but that is the main gist of it. It was a lot of work, but it was all ready to eat on time and none of it was raw or burned! I have to say I am still pretty proud of it. It was a really nice dinner, and I think my host family enjoyed the American tradition. After that I ended up going to a dance club with some friends which was another experience all on its own.
Christmas and the whole season was a fantastic way to get to know the Finnish and their traditions even better. First off, because it is SO DARK, and I really mean this, what with the sun setting around 2:30, people kept assuring me that with the Christmas lights and deocrations things wouldn't seem so dark. So I was expecting the stellar light show we get each year in the States with houses becoming little lightbulbs. I was extremely surprised to find that my defenition of Christmas lights and the finnish defenition are a bit different. They employ a moderate method of one string of lights on the roof, maybe, and some festive candles. The candles are beautiful so nothing wrong there. But for me it still seemed a little dark and less festive than I anticipated. Most houses don't get the Christmas tree until relatively close to Christmas. Decorations are very nice inside, although once again a bit less extravagent than what I am used to. Christmas Eve is the big day in Finland and we celebrated then. My host family prepared a large dinner, delicious, including ham and mashed potatoes and salads and so on. It was very yummy. After dinner Joulupukki visited and dropped off his presents. And I mean this literally, I have the picture with him to prove it! We opened all our presents on Christmas Eve and I was wonderfully surprised with some amazing gifts. Christmas day my host family and I went to a church service at 8 in the morning... it was... cold. My host family was telling me that in recent years it has become more popular to attend the Christmas Eve service than the Christmas morning. That seems natural to me but I guess in years past the church was usually full up bright and early Christmas morning.
A few days after Christmas I switched to my second host family. It was sad to say goodbye to my first family but exciting to meet a new one. I had already met my host sister in school and I had been introduced to my host mom and brother a time or two. My new family lives about 10 km out of town. Their house is the cutest thing, I love it. More than loving the house though I am loving this family. It is good to have siblings again and nice to have some change. I have been with this family a few weeks now and it has been going great. My only complaint is that I have to ride a bike, in the snow and ice. I hate riding bikes, add that to negative degree weather, snow, ice, and early mornings and you have one unhappy Dana. But alas, it is just another experience and it will be a good story to tell when I am old... super exciting. I have not fallen off the bike though so kudos to me.
My finnish is coming along. I think I have really been improving these last few weeks and hopfully with the increase of lessons and speaking with my family I will get that much better. All in good time. From now it looks like I am going to be leaving on July 13 or 14. I told Nancy that the first things I want when I get back are a Dutch bros coffee and an Oregon Burrito from Muchas Gracias, and a side order of beans and rice from them as well. I am craving Taco Bell and Burger King and all those unhealthy fast foods. Voi ei!
Well I promise to not procrastinate this long before I write again, but until then!
Christmas and the whole season was a fantastic way to get to know the Finnish and their traditions even better. First off, because it is SO DARK, and I really mean this, what with the sun setting around 2:30, people kept assuring me that with the Christmas lights and deocrations things wouldn't seem so dark. So I was expecting the stellar light show we get each year in the States with houses becoming little lightbulbs. I was extremely surprised to find that my defenition of Christmas lights and the finnish defenition are a bit different. They employ a moderate method of one string of lights on the roof, maybe, and some festive candles. The candles are beautiful so nothing wrong there. But for me it still seemed a little dark and less festive than I anticipated. Most houses don't get the Christmas tree until relatively close to Christmas. Decorations are very nice inside, although once again a bit less extravagent than what I am used to. Christmas Eve is the big day in Finland and we celebrated then. My host family prepared a large dinner, delicious, including ham and mashed potatoes and salads and so on. It was very yummy. After dinner Joulupukki visited and dropped off his presents. And I mean this literally, I have the picture with him to prove it! We opened all our presents on Christmas Eve and I was wonderfully surprised with some amazing gifts. Christmas day my host family and I went to a church service at 8 in the morning... it was... cold. My host family was telling me that in recent years it has become more popular to attend the Christmas Eve service than the Christmas morning. That seems natural to me but I guess in years past the church was usually full up bright and early Christmas morning.
A few days after Christmas I switched to my second host family. It was sad to say goodbye to my first family but exciting to meet a new one. I had already met my host sister in school and I had been introduced to my host mom and brother a time or two. My new family lives about 10 km out of town. Their house is the cutest thing, I love it. More than loving the house though I am loving this family. It is good to have siblings again and nice to have some change. I have been with this family a few weeks now and it has been going great. My only complaint is that I have to ride a bike, in the snow and ice. I hate riding bikes, add that to negative degree weather, snow, ice, and early mornings and you have one unhappy Dana. But alas, it is just another experience and it will be a good story to tell when I am old... super exciting. I have not fallen off the bike though so kudos to me.
My finnish is coming along. I think I have really been improving these last few weeks and hopfully with the increase of lessons and speaking with my family I will get that much better. All in good time. From now it looks like I am going to be leaving on July 13 or 14. I told Nancy that the first things I want when I get back are a Dutch bros coffee and an Oregon Burrito from Muchas Gracias, and a side order of beans and rice from them as well. I am craving Taco Bell and Burger King and all those unhealthy fast foods. Voi ei!
Well I promise to not procrastinate this long before I write again, but until then!
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