Hyvästi ja hei

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!