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.

Back on track

Moro!

Hmm been absent for a while or better say just too busy with other stuff and now i noticed that somehow the files where i from time to time wrote something down to post it here later is somehow gone or at least i cannot find it anymore on my laptop. So there won't be much on what happened here in Suomi during the last weeks since i cannot really remember it anyway. But if I forgot something important, then just remind me and i will write a little bit about it.

Just a short summary of December.
Well I was here, no internship in Germany because I am stupid. That is all i am going to say about it. And please I don't need any questions about uni or my future right now since i feel already bad enough about it and I don't need more pressure. Thanks.

So December. It was äh COLD! FREAKING COLD! Even for Finland. We had snow, very much snow which is very unusually for December at the coast here. And 3 weeks long under – 15°C is also very unusual. So we were all freezing and well not spending much time outside. But it is still one of the best month to spend in Finland.
Here December is call Joulukuu. Joulu means Christmas :D So it's the Christmas month. And Turku is the official Christmas city in this country.

So Joulukuu and in general the Christmas season starts with the openings of the Christmas markets all over the country. In Turku it opened at the end of November, at the first Advent weekend. The Christmas market here was very small but very nice and traditional, no drunken people, no weird smell of liver or other disgusting things like in Germany :) And in Turku Christmas market is just open on the Advent weekends. I was at the opening, - 20°C and of course I wasn't properly dressed. I thought my toes would freeze off.

At the same weekend was the traditional Åbo Akademi Christmas concert of the two choirs and the university orchestra. It was as 5 years ago the perfect start to the Christmas season. This beautiful Christmas music filling every corner of the cathedral. Very special I can tell you.

Anyway the next big thing was December 6th. And no it is not St. Nicolas day, ok it is but that is not important. The 6th of December is Finnish Independence Day. That day is very special. It is not celebrated as a big party like in countries as the USA or Norway but it is very quiet and a day to remember all people who fought and lost their lives for the independence of this country. The student unions of all the universities organized every year a torch procession from the student union buildings to the main cemetery. As 5 years ago I was of course a part of that procession. This year I even got my own torch. It felt pretty amazing being part of that big group of students that walked to the city in remembrance of the past. Since the procession was around 6 you could see in many windows two blue/white candles flickering. That is part of the independence day tradition. As well as watching the presidents ball in the evening on tv. I missed parts of that but well I have seen it the past 3 years so besides the different dresses it is not that much different every year.

Then I went one evening with Carolin to the so called 'Best Finnish Christmas Song' singing in one of the local churches. It is somehow tradition that in December people gather in the Churches to sing together. Sounds weird and well it was little bit weird and great at the same time. We went to Mikaelinkirkko which is a huge Gothic church, very nice and for me it was the first time that I've been to that church and well it was impressive. So was the singing. I love Finnish Christmas songs and charing that with a few hundred other people was so great. :) Definitely a great tradition.

So next on the agenda was Lucia Dagen. A Swedish tradition which comes from the days of Catholicism in the North. Well as in Sweden also in Finland there are Lucia celebrations and a Finnish Lucia is elected who is doing the whole traditional events in Helsinki. Since Turku has a big Swedish community we had also our own Lucia celebrations in the Cathedral with our own Lucia. I was a little bit late so I didn't got to see much but it was also more about here the songs and speeches. Luckily it was in Swedish so I at least understood more or less everything even if I didn't see it all.

Before Christmas it was time to say goodbye to a whole bunch of people. And that wasn't nice at all. I miss my flatmate Eva, my German friend Carolin, the crazy Peruvian girl Vicky, weirdo Adam and Hitomi my Japanese cherry blossom. :( Well life goes on, somehow although more or less all my friends are gone now so I have to make new friends.

For Christmas as I mentioned in an earlier post I was invited to a family Christmas diner with delicious food, singing, more food, Christmas story reading, caroling and well food. :D I think I gained around 3 kilograms during the holidays. If you want to know more about Finnish Christmas food just read this http://www.dlc.fi/~marianna/gourmet/season1b.htm and that is more or less everything I ate on Christmas.

The Wednesday after Christmas my friends Katrin and Tellu visited Turku at the same day and it was so nice to see some good friends again. From time to time it is just nice to see and hug some people who know you longer than 4 month and understand you better than many other people.

New Years Eve was a little bit quieter than Christmas. I was alone in my flat with my DVD collection which my mom finally send to me and since there were people blowing their money in the air I had my own private fireworks and didn't even need to leave the cosiness of my apartment. :)

So last Monday the new semester started here and that means new exchange students. Well haven't met many of them but well. Got also a new flatmate, from China, but she is already here since August which is nice that I don't have to tell so many thing for the dozens time. Seriously I am so tired of answering questions like: 'How long are you in Finland?', 'What do you study?', 'Why did you came to Finland?' .... bla bla bla. I know that it is necessary if you meet new people here but seriously I explained everything already a thousand times and at one point it is just annoying.

So that was it for the moment. Should get a little bit sleep before the Combined race and grand opening of the Culture capital year tomorrow. :)

Oh yeah I forgot: Turku is next to Tallin the culture capital of Europe so if you have the chance you should visit this amazing city this year. There is a lot going on.

Will tell more about opening ceremony during the next days. Hopefully before I leave to France.
Jeap I am going to France next Wednesday. The first time that I leave this country since August! Woohoo!!

Nähdään! (See you!)


PS: Happy New Year to you all! :P