Christmas calender day 7th - 26th

so since I don't want to spam on my own (not because I am so very very lazy ;)) I summed up the last 'few' songs from my Christmas calender.
December 7th
December 8th
December 9th
December 10th
December 11th
December 12th After so many depressing songs here a funny one to cheer things up a bit
December 13th Glad Lucia Dagen!
December 14th
December 15th
December 16th
December 17th
December 18th
December 19th
December 20th 
December 21st
December 22nd
December 23rd
December 24th
December 25th
December 26th

PS: I am really trying to update some stuff here but I am sick for almost a week now, managed to go my good friend Janine's wedding but because I didn't rest much I am still carrying around a head ache and though thought and not to forget that runny nose. well what doesn't kill you makes you stronger but during the past days i wish it would kill me because strong isn't a word that i would use for my state of being at the moment. But I try my best.

Christmas calender day 4th-6th

a bit late but well

December 4th
December 5th because there was a tiny bit of snow today while it snowed in every other freakin part of the country :(
and December 6th

 Happy St. Nicholas Day! hope you all cleaned your boots!

 

Christmas calender day 3

So today I was baking my first Christmas cookies and what better song to accompany this than with a Rolf Zuckowski classic! In der Weihnachtsbäckerei

updates: 1. letter of recommendation

So let's start with the update where i left of, in July. I finally received my letter of recommendation from my internship and wow it was worth waiting for. When i read it the first time I literally cried. Nobody has every used so many nice words about me before. I actually felt competent! :D Not that I would do so very often (especially since i am such a university failure). But well decide for yourself! Here are some quotes:

Ms R's contribution to the Book Fair was vital to the Consulate's success at this key event.

Ms R assisted with [several official visits (shouldn't mention the specifics, SBU you understand! ;))], demonstrating a high degree of organizational competence and reliability.

Ms R [wrote several drafts and remarks for the CG and the two Officers.] Her texts were clear, relevant and readily usable, something greatly appreciated by the users of the material.

Ms R also expertly created and maintained information about restoration of the historic Capa building in Leipzig.

Ms R was an effective translator, providing quick, accurate translations of press articles or internally generated documents as needed.

Ms R provided regular input and updates for our social media sites, breathing new life into these increasingly important communication tools. Her style, consciously pitched at a youthful audience, resulted in consistently fresh material for the Consulate's official Facebook page. (how can you make updating fb and twitter sound so important and noteworthy?)

Her willingness to learn and to get involved with a wide variety of activities is noteworthy.

..... These were my favorite parts! I have now idea about whom they are talking in this letter of recommendation but I hope to meet that person one day or maybe even become her! ;) Tomorrow hopefully more on my trip to Copenhagen in July and well everything that followed afterwards. :)






PS I thank leo.org and wikipedia for the useful help during my internship! :D

Christmas calender day 2

December 2nd Today I am sharing one of my favorite German Christmas songs with you which i listened to during most of my childhood. My old GDR records are just the best. Enjoy! Vorfreude, schönste Freude Happy 1st Advent!

Christmas calender

I am back! It has been a while since my last post, I will update this blog during the next days but i want to start with my personal Christmas song advent calender which I am also posting on facebook and twitter. :) I didn't had much of a Christmas last year so i need to make up for that and spread some Christmas spirit, especially since I found my favorite GDR records on youtube and will for sure share some of these amazing children's songs with everybody. Enjoy the the little adventure through my little world of Christmas songs:

December 1st: Rajaton - En Etsi Valtaa Loistoa
Let's start with something Finnish. Finland's best a cappella group Rajaton with a song from the Finnish national composer Jean Sibelius. Is there a better song to start the advent time with? I don't think so! :P

And don't miss tomorrow when I share one of my favorite German songs with you in my childhood GDR version!


 

Song of the month - July

This months I want to share a song which I also found more or less by accident. I don't give much about music casting shows. At least not in Germany. But surprise surprise I really like some of the contenders of Finnish Idols and such things. So when I noticed that 'the Voice of Finland' was over I checked out some songs and well I have a new favorite. :) This guy was just 3rd in the competition but who cares? Not me because this song is just amazing! Still gives me chills!

Enjoy Jesse Kaikuranta with Vie Mut Kotiin!



Well what can I say, I am a sucker for good ballads! :)

Time flies - I don't

(at least not at the moment)
June is already over? How did that happened? Seriously the second half of the year started and I am wondering where the time went.

I am working my butt off, well literally just my legs since I can't feel them except for the pain every night after work but well no pain no gain, right? So since my last real post not much has changes. I am still doing other people's food almost every day, have 2 lovely flatmates and do spend many evenings just sitting in the kitchen talking about this and that. last night my flatmate M and i even cleaned the kitchen. Long planed by us and finally executed. Who need 15 pots anyway, so now our kitchen is a bit more organized and the basement storage space is not empty anymore :D

And I've been to the 4th of July party by the US Consulate General here in Leipzig. Not as a guest but I was there as a service team member and was even allowed to guard the toilets. What a special task! I had tickets for a 'Die Ärzte' concert (one of my favorite German bands) for the same night but I decided to work at the Consulate instead. Kind of stupid I thought but in the end it was worth it. To see everybody from the Consulate again was so awesome, I finally got my letter of recommendation (there will be an extra post about it later), I saw my English professor and had a nice chat with him, met some people I got to know while working at the ConGen (so great that my work actually made an impact), I saw my new bosses (they didn't saw me,luckily) and a colleague from another Subway store. So funny! Oh and of course I made a couple of Euros which is always good. Oh and my vacation is taking shape but I'll post about that also later. So enough for today. Need to get some rest before work and another 4th of July bbq. :) Have a nice weekend

I don't want to ...

Song of the Month - June

So there were a couple of options for this months 'Song of the Month'. Since I am now now one of those working people we listen to a lot of radio at work. I was never a big fan of German radio especially since they play the same songs every day and almost the same songs every hour which is so annoying when you have to listen to it 6 hours in a row. But still you start liking a few songs if you hear them on a daily basis. Well but I also checked out the latest Finnish single charts, as i always do when I need new music and there I found the perfect summer song. So perfect since summer officially starts tomorrow and the weather is getting warmer again (or let's say it was way too warm again during the last 2 days.
So here it is June's Song of the Month:
Elokuu with Saatilla. But maybe I should have waited 2 more month since elokuu actually means August. ;) And jeah the video is totally weird and well I think one shouldn't watch it, but the song is good. So close your eyes and just listen ;)

Other songs that almost made it are 'We are Young' by Fun, Marina & the Diamonds with 'Primadonna', Die Ärzte with 'M&F' (so sad that i can't go to the concert in Hannover even though I have a ticket :'( ) my favorite Finnish rapper Cheek with 'Sokka irti' and the wonderful 'Count on Me' by Bruno Mars, which just made me miss my best friends even more these past too weeks.

Feel free to share your summer songs with me. I am always up to to new stuff.

'You Don’t Have to Be Pretty'

A friend of mine just posted this on facebook. Nice blog entry and still true even though it is 6 years old. Something people should keep in mind!

My favorite part is this:
'You Don't Have to Be Pretty. You don't owe prettiness to anyone. Not to your boyfriend/spouse/partner, not to your co-workers, especially not to random men on the street. You don't owe it to your mother, you don't owe it to your children, you don't owe it to civilization in general. Prettiness is not a rent you pay for occupying a space marked "female".' 

I would just add a '(wo)' before 'men' since women can and are very judgmental as well.



 

Age ...

Why did nobody tell me that when I had my birthday scare 3 weeks ago? ;)

Leipzig part 2

So I am behind on a few stories here and since I might be without Internet for a while, since we are switching contracts, I should better finish some posts here.

So I am  in Leipzig for almost 5 month now. Totally crazy! So many things happened. I finished my internship, moved again, got a job and still didn't manage to get much done for uni which totally sucks but I am on to it.

For the internship part. Well it was pretty cool. i learned many things, met many cool people and could really imagine working for the foreign services in the future. The only bad thing came afterwards. 2 months are gone and i still haven't gotten my letter of recommendation. Obviously the people at the consulate think we just worked there for the fun of it. Will write another email tonight and hope that this whole thing is behind me very soon. Weird is also that I didn't learned much about the US during my internship. Maybe because I new already so much but it is strange anyway. But I learned tons about Germany and the region were I am from (Saxony-Anhalt) and now living (Saxony) which might be good fro the future. And I learned that just because people work for a government doesn't mean that they are necessarily smarter than an ordinary student. And it is obviously much harder to work for the German foreign services than for the US state secretary. ;)

As I mentioned , I moved again. After sleeping at a friends place for a week and staying at my parents place for another couple of days I was very fortunate to find and apartment with 2 lovely flat mates.  the two girls and i get along well and I think we'll have a good time together. After sleeping on an air mattress for 3 weeks I finally have furniture. More about the decoration of my room in another post, very soon. :D


Luckily in the same week that I found my new flat I also found a job. I am working now part time at Subway, the sandwich store. I never thought i would stay there more than a couple of month but who knows. The salary is super bad but the people are very nice and I get free food for every shift I do. So i am very lazy in cooking lately but at least i am eating healthier. And I worked over 50% more than I should this months. Not that I will get that extra money right away (stupid German tax system) but at least i can plan my vacation to Copenhagen for July now without worrying that i won't have enough hours in July.

So much for now!

better late then never

Here a little flashback on my trip to Finland in March. I know it is already the end of May but i was busy and well better late than never :D

So from March 1st until March 8th I was in Finland, in Lahti, Turku and Helsinki to be precise. And I am so glad that I have so amazing friends there. I never had to pay for any accommodation just for trains and buses which were super expensive as always. But well it's Finland after all.

In Lahti, usual, I went to the Lahti Ski Games. Same procedure as every year you might say, just that this time I didn't have so many friends around. But well with 2 Katrins in the city I still had a fun time including a night out with dancing and watching ex-skijumpers, coaches and Nordic combined athletes getting drunk and hitting on ugly old women. Well if they need it! :D
Oh jeap and then there was 'some' wind again. looks like every 3 years or so Lahti weather just sucks. So half of my comps were canceled and this year i didn't had a press accreditation so no place to sit and warm up. Really need to work there next year to make it fun again. :)
But to spice things up I almost killed myself. Totally by accident of course! Stupid Steffi doesn't listen when people tell her: Don't walk over the frozen lake. Steffi just sees ice fishers on there and thinks: If they can do it, I can do it! I ended up ankle deep in water and knee deep in snow, made it to the shore, totally exhausted and scared as h*ll. After almost crashing my car a couple of years ago, I think this was the second near death experience in my life. I hope the last one. At least i won't go on a frozen lake ever again!

Oh and in Lahti I finally had the chance to watch an ice hockey match again (Ok not true I watched a regional league match in February in Leipzig but well that doesn't really count). It was a pretty cool game. The Pelicans from Lahti won, who later came in 2nd in the Finnish championship. Nothing compared to a match Turku but  we have the second biggest arena in the country so of course the ice hockey stadium in Lahti looked kind of cute to me. :D

And this year I got another cool souvenir from Lahti. During the last 2 years I started (thanks to my friend Katrin) collecting bibs (start numbers) from different Nordic Combined athletes. and this year I got one from my favorite ski jumper. Too bad that he fel in exactly the bib from the team competition that i got but he was Ok in the end and kind enough to sign the bib. Now i will have to frame it together with my Mikko bib from last year and then i will have some cool wall decoration in my new room.

All in all I was from Thursday till Sunday morning in Lahti. And if i say morning i mean my bus to Turku left at 4am! So after dancing half of teh night I spend the rest sleeping in the bus, or well trying.

I arrived around 7am in Turku, went straight to McDonalds, the only one in Turku and the only place open that early on a Sunday. I had 2 cocoas (I LOVE OBOY!) and killed 2 hours before surprising my friends. Oh my goodness. Who would have thought people could be so happy to see me. Surprise visits are just the best. I was for 2 more days in Turku and went on Tuesday morning to Helsinki to visit other friends. :D Seriously it is so awesome to see people again who you are so close to but haven't seen in 6 or 9 months! 
I then did some sightseeing with my friend Laura and just relaxed the last days in Helsinki.


I had to fly back early in Thursday morning. early means i had to be at the bus stop around 5AM. And of course the troubles started already there. i didn't have enough money for the bus and was almost kicked out of it again. But a nice man gave me the 15c that were missing. Can you believe it that somebody makes such a fuss about 15c. Ok in Germany nobody would have borrowed me that money and i would have been kicked out of the bus for sure but in Finland it was a surprise for me. The whole bus was full and nobody besides the driver would have checked if i paid or not and in Turku the bus driver would have taken me in for free but well Helsinki people are always different. So and then the bus driver almost drove the wrong way and we were so very late that i nearly missed my flight. So much stress so early in the morning. But also no surprise here, always when I travel everything just goes wrong. But I arrived eventually in Berlin were I spend the rest of the day.

Unfortunately the weather was really bad so i didn't really do anything besides waiting to meet another friend for diner. Around 9pm I finally caught my train back to Leipzig. Totally exhausted and somehow i caught some stomach flew on the way which made my next working day a very short one.

So much for my trip to Finland and Berlin. Don't know when I'll be back home in Suomi but everybody, especially the people in Turku told me to move back. Well if it was that easy. But I think if I ever go back for longer I might not leave again. third try is the charm, isn't it?

Next trip: Copenhagen in July. I hope! :D



 

ESC - the recap

Wow this Eurovison Song Contest sucked so badly. Not just because I could barely watch a performance because my computer is a piece of junk but no this voting result is a shame for Europe. That Denmark barely got points is so sad but that Sweden won and ALBANIA, a song which doesn't even deserve to be called music got more points then Estonia and Germany. Seriously, I don't get it! And Sweden didn't even give points to Denmark! The Balkan countries are perfect in giving neighboring countries many points even if the songs suck but Northers and western Europe really need to work on this.

 Ok Estonia became sixth in the end, and Germany, which had for the first time since 2004 a song that I actually liked, became 8th which is Ok. And Serbia who became third had a good song as well. But poor Iceland and poor Denmark. Amazing songs and in the end just 20th and 23rd place out of 26.
Ok i am way to flipping exhausted after today and this week to wait for the officially pages not to overran and working again, so I will update the results tomorrow. If i manage before my evening shift.

But Conan was as always right:

Good night everybody!
 

in case you didn't know ;)

Eurovision Song Contest 2012

Same procedure as every year. It is ESC time. Always around my b-day but I got used to it. :D

And thanks to my new very cute USB-loudspeakers, I am able to watch it at home without inviting myself to somebody with a tv or working computer. (Oh how I missed listening to music or just watching a movie or tv series)

As last year I listened to all songs and well what can I say, most of them suck of course! I have the feeling the more often I watch it, the crappier the songs get but well it is entertaining after all. But there were some great surprises as well.

So here is my TOP 5 list of the Eurovision Song Contest 2012 in Baku.

5th Place: Divided between Israel and Netherlands (Seriously I can't decide!)
Israel: Izabo - Time
What a fun song! A bit weird sounding chorus but seriously I like it. Fun to listen to even though the clowns are insane.
Netherlands: Joan Franka - You and Me
When you just listen to the song, it is a really great folk song. I like songs like that a lot. But please leave away the Pocahontas costume from the live show.  It ruins the song!
6 Points!

4th Place:  Island: Gréta Salóme & Jónsi - Never Forget
This song is exactly what I expect from Iceland. A very good song which sounds somehow familiar. And that model like singer is of course a great bonus for us girls (Nordic guys are just the best!) ;) And the video makes me want to pack my bags and fly to Iceland right away! Well next year maybe! :) 7 Points!

3rd Place:  Denmark: Soluna Samay - Should've known better
In knew I heard this song already on the radio when I listened to all ESC 2012 songs last Thursday. Really great song, weird costume the girl had in the live show but who cares if the song is nice. 8 Points!

2nd Place:  Finland: Pernilla Karlsson -Jag är blunda
Of course I always support Finland in the ESC but this year, as last year (Heja Oskar!), I am very surprised about the song and like it a lot. It is in Swedish, which hasn’t happened in a while (since 1990 precisely) and it is a very nice song. It really was my favorite until last Thursday, now it's my No. 2 and running on my mp3 player very often since I heard it for the first time. :) Kymmenen pistettä Suomeen! 10 Points to Finland! (or 11 if I could choose!)

1st Place Estonia Ott Lepland - Kuula
My undefeated Number 1 this year! The more often I listen to this song, the more I love it. Seriously can’t believe that until last Thursday I haven’t heard about it! What a great and powerful ballad. 12 Points or much much more!!!

Also nice songs this year come from Switzerland (The singer just should learn English pronunciation), Hungary (good song, could run on the radio all day long) and surprisingly Germany (But you can't go wrong with a song written by Jamie Cullum).

So and the worst songs this year, well there are so many but I am seriously disappointed by Norway (You don't have to send an Erik Saade copy since he sucked already last year and his Doppelgänger sucks even more), Sweden (I really don’t get why everybody thinks this song will win), Russia (send this Babushki back to their old people’s home!), Turkey (usually one of my favorite ESC contestants :( ) and well Austria (I can’t even put in words what I think about this song). I won't post any of the links here. I don't want to encourage bad taste ;) but you can find all the videos on youtube.

Last but not least, a bit out of the ranking for me is Slovakia. They only real rock song. Pretty OK song but what I will most remember is the gorgeous singer. Are men allowed to be that beautiful? Wow! Usually I wouldn’t say something like that, or at least not in public ;) but he is definitely a keeper. And that hair!!! I am so jealous! Definitely my highlight of this years Eurovision when it comes to looks.


And since my favorite Swedish Eurovision show did it this year es well, some highlights from the past that I like:

Brainstorm - My Star (ESC 2000- Latvia, and no i don't think the singer was on drugs ;)) 
Roger Pontare - When Spirits Are Calling My Name (ESC 2000 Sweden) 
 August & Telma - Tell Me! (ESC 2000 Iceland)
Lordi - Hard Rock Hallelujah (ESC 2006 - Finland \,,/) 
Marija Šerifović - Molitva (ESC 2007 - Serbia 
Bonaparti.lv - Questa notte (ESC  2007 - Latvia) 
Eirikur Hauksson - Valentine Lost (ESC 2007 - Iceland)
The Ark - The Worrying Kind - (ESC 2007 - Sweden) 
Boaz Mauda - The Fire In Your Eyes (ESC 2008 - Israel, my favorite ESC song ever! Knew it by heart 1 day after hearing it for the first time) 
Anonymous - Salvem el món (ESC 2007 - Andorra)
Yohanna - Is it true (ESC 2009 - Iceland) 
Urban Symphony - Rändajad (ESC 2009 - Estonia)
Tom Dice - Me and my Guitar (ESC 2010 - Belgium) 
Jon Lilygreen & The Islanders - Life Looks Better In Spring (ESC 2010 - Cyprus) 
Anna Bergendahl - This Is My Life (ESC 2010 - Sweden) 
Didrik Solli-Tangen - My Heart Is Yours (ESC 2010 - Norway)

And something really old (well one year older than me so super old :P), until last year I didn’t know that it exist but I had the chance to meet the younger brother in this group so I had to check it out. Herreys with Diggi-loo Diggi-ley. Oh and I was able to touch the golden boots! Haha funny moment indeed!

So enough for this year! now it is time to watch the shows!

Enjoy the ESC 2012 and Light your fire!

 

My new mantra

                                                                                               

THE GAME IS ON!

The Ice Hockey World championships started today! After last years sensational win of the Finnish Team, the Worldchamps are taking place in Sweden and Finland this year. I don't think the Finns can repeat the victory from last year, especially with Ville Peltonen missing, but we'll see if it is enough to score a medal.

 So let the games begins!

 
 

Sometimes

That's how I feel a little bit at the moment. Way too much of everything going on and no strong shoulder to cry on. So i just have to chin up and keep going on my own. As always!

Hauskaa Vappua! Glada Wappen!

As every year May 1st is Vappu in Finland. Too bad that i missed the craziness this year but if somebody forgot what it is all about, check last years post or ask google or auntie wiki.




PS I hope I have soon some time top write a few posts since a lot has happened during the last weeks. I got a job and a new flat but even though today I had the day off, I was just too lazy to write anything. Sorry about that!

Happy Easter!

Hyvää Pääsiäistä!
                       Glad Påsk!
                                    Happy Easter!
                                                       Frohe Ostern!
                                                                         God Påske!
                                                                                     Joyeuses Pâques!
                                                                                                        ¡Felices Pascuas!

I wish you all a happy Easter time. Enjoy the free days with your families but don't forget what we are actually celebrating. :)

"He is dead!" ...

... Is definitely not what you want to hear when somebody looks at your computer. :'( But so it is. May you Rest in Peace you piece of junk!
Just 3 months after my own laptop died, now the one of my dad which I used as a replacement until I have the money to buy a new one is dead too. (Hmm is it me that I kill all computers or is it the computers that just decide to die in my hands?) Now I am stuck with my 8 year old laptop where the loudspeaker and even headphones don’t work, which is so slow that it takes about 15min until you can use it, where the wireless Internet connection of my flat isn’t accepted and well if I use a cable to get online it just takes 10 min to open a page. So I can’t even think about doing any research on this piece of crap. :( So maybe that is now the time that I should actually write my university papers since Word is more or less the only thing you can use on this laptop. :/
Well not today, probably tomorrow. Now I will just wallow with a crappy book and my last bit of Christmas chocolate from Finland.

Computers just suck!

Song of the Month

miracle

I don't know how often you have miracles but I can say I had a few in my life but what happened yesterday was just unbelievable.

So since the preparation for the Leipzig book fair are just crazy at the moment at work (the book fair starts tomorrow) and so I was in a hurry as always in the morning. I heard some noise when i went on my bike to work but didn't looked around because I thought I just rode over a little stick or something. When I arrived at work I noticed my mistake: My cell phone was gone. It obviously fell out of my pocket while riding to work. The day at work was so busy that i almost forgot about it but when i got home I checked my whole room still hoping that i didn't loose it but just misplaced it.

Well, nothing!

I called my mom with the regular apartment phone and told her under tears that my phone is gone. And while talking to her I realized what I really lost, all those phone numbers and a lot of data for university which i saved there during last weeks trip to Finland. Gosh I am such a moron for not having these numbers written down somewhere and for not saving this date when I got back from the trip! It took me even 10min just to find somewhere my parents phone number. So after calling my mom I was about to leave to meet some friends but wanted to check my emails before leaving.

And there she was on ICQ. My guardian angel for that day. :) A friend who I wanted to mail or call for months since we haven't really spoken in a year or more. That friend had for whatever reason tried to call me. And somebody other than me answered my cell. So she told me that somebody found my phone and that I should contact that person and will get back my phone.

Unbelievable?! Isn't it?

For me it was the biggest miracle of my life! Because why was that friend trying to call me that day and not 2 days later or a week earlier?? Totally insane!

Well my mom who didn't know about my friend telling me that somebody found my phone, tried to call my number this morning to test if it was still working and then talked to that nice man who found my phone. So i called him tonight and got my phone back within 5 minutes since he just lives down the street. So now i am complete again with my phone and finally appreciate it. And i am saving all numbers now separately. Just in case.

So that was my miracle for this week. :)
Let's see what the rest of the year brings.



PS Thanks Janine for trying to call me yesterday. :)

PPS I try to update now the blog a bit during the next weeks. it's about time and my internship is almost over and i was in Finland for a week so enough to write about and have some nice pictures to post as well.

Hyvää Ystävänpäivää rakkaat ystävät kaikkialla!

Happy Friendship Day to all my friends around the world!

Leipzig

On Wednesday the 5th, after spending some nice hours in Magdeburg (thanks to Tim and Andy for taking some time to meet me for lunch), I moved to Leipzig to start my internship. Well, moving is maybe not the right term. Since I still don’t have an apartment. I am staying at the moment in a youth hostel until I find a flat. Shouldn’t take so long, I hope. I looked at a room today in which I could move in next week. I will look at some other place tomorrow and decide but the room I looked at today is much cheaper and with the money I save I could buy a new laptop in case my old one cannot be repaired.

So I started my internship on Thursday and after 2 days I can say I like it. Everybody is super nice and although I didn’t do a lot during the first 2 days, the next weeks will be busy. Got 3 assignments 20min before my day ended on Friday. :D Perfect timing. But I will have a lot of research to do and that is something I always enjoyed.

That's more or less all I can say about my internship, at least in a blog. If anybody wants details please email me. :)

end of 2011

So it is a bit late but better than never.

I hope everybody had nice Christmas holidays and well came good into the new years.

My Christmas was really short. I had to work till 2pm on Christmas Eve and wasn’t home until 6pm. My family had then our traditional Christmas Eve diner, rice with a pork casserole. The only food on Christmas I actually like at my house. ;) Then well we had a small gift giving. It wasn’t much, although probably the first time we had something like that in about 5 years or so. I even got my favorite Finnish chocolate from my sister. Never thought she could be that nice. :P On the first Day of Christmas we had my maternal grandma and my paternal grandpa over which was really nice even though I could have skipped the food altogether. I just like Finnish Christmas food much more, or well just any other food than my mother’s duck or goose. So that was more or less Christmas. I had to be at work again on the 27th at 3pm. I worked then till the 31st. The plan was to have a shift till 6pm but nobody thought we would work in the afternoon after all. But in the end we worked from 11 to 5pm! I was at home around 8pm, so very late for New Years Eve! And I was so tired so no big party for me this time. Not that I ever went on a big New Years Eve party. I don’t consider that evening to be something special so during the past years I was pretty often alone, or just with one or very few other people.

So that was 2011. Very interesting year. The first half was so awesome, and then there were a few not so nice months, or well the rest of the year just sucked but that I got my dream internship was pretty awesome. But the year didn’t end so well. My laptop sort of broke and I might need a new one. Just good that I still have my 7 year old laptop, so at least I can get a little work done, but the monitor is partly broken, you can get any sounds, so no tv or movie watching and you can’t really do two or more things at the same time. So I need a lot of patience. And well it took me 3 days to find out why my laptop wasn’t connecting to the wifi at the hostel.