I can't believe I am a third of the way done with my trip to Finland already!
I got here (Central Finland) on the 20th of July and was greeted by my FANTASTIC
host mother Marita and I met my three host sisters later that evening, Vilja (14),
Venla (11), and Viola (8). They have been wonderful and accepted me right into
the family, my face hurt from laughing and smiling in less than 4 hours.
 They live in a renovated
school house that
I happen to think is the
coolest idea for a
home ever, I would love
to live in an old school
someday. So far my first
few days
have been filled with bike
riding, swimming, sauna,
cooking, and Lego construction.
As well as my Finnish
language lessons from
the girls: Uksi, Koksi, Kohlme,
Nelji, Visli, Kooze, Saitsama, Kadeksan,
Udeksan, Cuminan. Spelling aside, that's the correct way to count to ten in Finnish
(from memory), look at me go! Hearing only Finnish instead of Finnish and Estonian helps.
I have been meeting friends and family all the time and everyone is so welcoming,
I really feel like I am part of the family here. I never cook at home and I am getting
a crash course in these Finnish homes, maybe by the time I leave I will be able to
actually feed people!
It really is a beautiful area here, I feel like all of Finland could be a movie set or
something and Sirkkamaki is no exception.
I'm not sure if this is common in Finland but there is a food truck that comes by twice
a week, like a mobile supermarket, its quite interesting really, I've never seen
anything like it!
Marita has told me of plans to take me to a couple of places on this end of the
country, including her home town and family farm (which has been in her family
for some 260 years! I am certainly looking forward to my adventures in this family!
Now I am at the one week mark, it is hard to believe I only have been here for
a week! It has taken no time at all to adjust to the family and get to know
everyone, I feel like I have known them for so much longer.
The last few days have been a blast, we went to a tower in a town about an hour away and got to see
some amazing scenery, then we went on a hike to visit a farm nearby with old time practices and
equipment. I did see a baler nearby making hay bales and it reminded me of home.
After sweating our behinds off trekking all over we drove to the town center where I was able to get some great gifts (I'd tell you what they were but I never know who is reading!). We met with a Finnish IFYE named Laura who ate ice cream with us and directed us on the best walking route to see the harbor, which was beautiful as well. After some shoe shopping and my first trip to an IKEA we headed home, more than ready for bed.
As is tradition we have spent a considerable amount of time in the lakes and saunas here. Nearly everyday we manage to make time for it (my favorite activity so far). The water is usually around 24 degrees Celsius and so after a while you start to get chilly, but never fear! Just go hop in the Sauna for a while and you will be just fine, too hot in the sauna? Back to the Lake! It is refreshing after feeling hot sticky all day and I really do love it!
 Eating a hearty diet of Macara (sausage) Mansika (strawberry) and poulla (bread) keeps us ready to go at all times, not to mention the ice cream that seems to be everywhere, I think I have spent most of my life under-appreciating ice cream!
I am excited to see what is next!
I turned 24 in Finland this year! How many people can say that? :)
We went on another road trip today, we being Marita, Venla,Viola, and I. This time we went East as far as a city called Punkaharju. We Stopped for a picnic along the way, which was exciting to me since I haven't had a picnic in as long as I can remember! At our farthest point we saw a castle that was used and built for soldiers
 (what!? I thought they were all for kings and queens! Apparently not) to protect the country from invasion from the east.
Punkaharju has a large lake that it surrounds, large enough for steam boats and a full harbor, I am always amazed that the
lakes here are large enough to warrant a harbor. After looking at the castle (only from the outside since there was an Opera taking place there that evening), admiring the harbor and ships, and eating an ice cream (of course) we headed back. On our way we drove over these HUGE sandbars that have full roads built on top of them, Marita told me that they were all natural sandbars through the center of this huge lake. The drop off was at least 500 feet in places and the views were absolutely amazing.
 
On our way back we stopped for dinner at an ABC, decent restaurant at a gas station, I was HUNGRY and confused and frustrated that I couldn't understand any of the menus, even a bit grouchy.
My host mom really is a great person, and once we ate I had to apologize for my moment of hunger driven
crazyness, she laughed and laughed and said she knew what was happening. We got home at around 22:00 and were asleep by 23:00, in which time they gave me a home made card and sang Happy Birthday to me in English, all in all a pretty great birthday!
Its officially August now! Time has really flown when I remember that I left for this trip in June!
Today was the Rally races, I wasn't quite clear on how these would all go, I had cooked up images of NASCAR meets dirt bike racing, that wasn't really accurate. Rally is where drivers from all over Europe come and drive their rally cars through a winding dirt road course for a time and then the fastest wins. We had a mile long hike, half of which was through forest, from where we parked to where we watched the rally cars drive by. Like all good fans we got there a while early to ensure a good viewing spot, in this early time we got rained on, no we got poured on. Luckily Marita being the super mom that she is whipped out these foil things that kept us mostly dry until we got some ponchos. By the time the race started the rain had lifted and there was a warm breeze and the sun poked through the clouds, we were perfectly comfortable when the rally was running!
  
While we were getting rained on and hiking and watching the two older host sisters, Vilja and Venla were with the 4H club making and serving pancakes to the rally drivers as they finished. We met up with them after and got a pancake (so so good). The girls were squealing and blushing at the rally car drivers (as all teenagers do) and ended up staying after we left to make sure everyone got their pancakes, or maybe it was to do some more driver watching, I'll never know...
Next on my list is the 4H camp, we were going to have the camp last week but illness struck and it was postponed. 4H camp was an experience for certain. It was 9 girls (including myself and three host sisters) in their dad's summer cottage for two days and two nights. While we were at camp we did many activities. Of course we went swimming and to the sauna 4 times, but we also had a shaving cream fight which was alot of crazy fun. Meals were kept simple, roasting macara over a fire, and chicken on the stove. The home made pizza was what really surprised me though, I have always used pizza sauce or BBQ or ranch dressing as the pizza sauce but not here in Finland, no, here we used Ketchup. Just Ketchup. It was different, kind of strange, certainly edible but so weird. And on the last night I showed them how to make s'mores! More importantly I showed them the art of marshmallow roasting, how to cook the outside of the marshmallow, eat just the crispy part and then cook it again. I hope if they learned nothing else from me they remember that!
  
After our days and nights of talking, games, movies, cooking and general playing it was time to go home. Everyone was good and worn out come Sunday morning when parents started showing up, that must mean it was a success!
Throughout my time here we have had many many viewings of The Lego Movie, which really is quite spectacular given it is about plastic building blocks and every viewing is in Finnish (I have the subtitles memorized at this point) the movie is centered around the bad guy wanting to glue the Legos together for a perfect Lego world that never gets messy (bare with me, this rambling has a point I promise) the substance that is used to glue the Legos together has an acronym of TACO TUESDAY so they actually say TACO TUESDAY in the finish version, I found this HIGHLY amusing. My family meal is coming up and I make tacos, so for at least 4 days now we have been awaiting what we affectionately refer to as Taco Tuesday.
It went well, cookies turned out a bit cakey but anything made of flour, sugar, butter and chocolate can't really be that bad, right? My family liked my tacos, which were soft shelled since the last set of taco shells left me disappointed in the company for calling them taco shells, my host mom found some Coors light for us to sip and complete the American experience.
After running the oven and stove top all evening the kitchen was unreasonably hot, what do we do when it gets too hot? Swimming of course! After we were all back and showered there was tea drinking and bed. Yet another amazing day.
School has started, much to the dismay of some kids I've met. My host sisters all seem to be pretty jazzed about it! We did some pre school shopping, got hair cuts, and searched for the illusive perfect backpack for Vilja, the sister who either LOVES something or HATES it. No luck on this trip, there may have been until I opened my big mouth and said one looked boyish, woops.
I got to attend school with Vilja on the second day to see what it is all about. She goes to the Finish equivalent of a high school and they have quite the schedule.
7:20-9:00 Bus Ride
9:00-11:45 Finnish, Religion, Math. Each are 45 minutes and have 15 minute long breaks.
Lunch
12:00-15:00 English, Swedish, History. Each are 45 minutes and have 15 minute long breaks.
15:00-16:00 Buss
 A very hectic feeling day but it was nice to only have to sit in class for 45 minutes at a time.
There was rumor that Finnish students don't have homework, LIES, they certainly do, even on the second day.
Shortly after getting home we packed up and left for Lapperranta (where Marita is from) to visit family, about a 3 hour drive.
After a long drive we arrived in Lapperranta which is on the far east side of Finland. I'm not really sure what it is about it but I find this end of the country far more attractive than the west side or central, maybe its the flat-lander in me appreciating being able to see a little ways into the distance (the trees are shorter here). When we arrived we were greeted by the cousins, Sanni and Lauri, Grandma, Grandpa and Marita's brother and his wife. We talked for a while, ate a snack and then went to bed shortly after we had had a long day!
 The next day started with a good breakfast, courtesy of Grandma who is an awesome cook, and passing out of hand knitted socks, I even got a pair! Marita, Vilja and I hit the city for some sight seeing and shopping. We lucked out and went on a day where the museums were free and there was a parade! There was also a sandcastle show done by professionals that was really cool. On the way home we stopped at a PRISMA (the Finnish version of Walmart) and finally found the perfect backpack!
When we got back we ate lunch, then headed to the family summer cottage for swimming, sauna, and a BBQ of mackara (of course).
You know, I listen to adults talk to one another about what seems to be a really serious topic then suddenly I start hearing the word mackara sprinkled in and I realize that yet again we are just talking about sausage.
By the time 22:00 came around we were all worn out and ready for bed, another full fantastic day.
Our last partial day in Lapperranta has come, it is cousin Lauri's names day.
A name day is a tradition in many countries in Europe and Latin America that consists of celebrating the day of the year associated with one's given name. The custom originated with the Christian calendar of saints: believers named after a saint would celebrate that saint's feast day.
(Confession, I was lazy and googled that, I have no idea what a "saint's feast day" is)
Getting back to the point, we had cake at like 9:00, I love cake for breakfast, this is brilliant, I wish I had a names day.
Marita and I decided to take a drive to the Russian border. I really wanted to get a stamp in my passport but the border guy looked at me like I was dumb and said I could only have it if I was going into the country, so no luck.
There is a stone called Spectrolite that is found only here in Eastern Finland. Spectrolite is a less common variety of labradorite feldspar. Spectrolite exhibits a richer range of colors than labradorite (that shows only tones of blue-grey-green) and high labradoresence. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a thing for the shiney, colorful and sparkely, well this stuff has it all. We stopped by a shop that sold it and it was like dropping a kid in a candy store. I was flitting around like a moth in a room full of strobe lights. I bought quite a bit of it too... but a stone found only in the part of Finland that I am in? What did you think would happen?
Knowing that we had a drive in front of us we headed back in hopes of getting things ready to head back, making a stop at the summer cottage for swimming and being informed that the kids needed another feeding (Like all good grandmas she loved to feed us) we realized that it would be a late night. Eventually we did make it out though and headed back, I even got to drive part of the way!
Today was my day to go to school with Venla and Viola.
 We took the same bus from the house but got off earlier and school started at Eight. There were only two classrooms for the 6 grades and one teacher teaching in each classroom with a teaching aid. It sounds hectic but it really wasn't. Each had only four classes today and they were on the same schedule as the high school: 45 minutes in class and the a 15 minute recess. Three classes before lunch, lunch and then one after. We left at noon, it was AMAZING. They had Art, Math, Sport (PE), and Finnish. On different days they have longer and short schedules and different classes, this was just today's schedule.
It was a grey and rainy day so when we got home it was hot tea, snacks, and drawing until Aiti (mom) gets home.
Went to a movie with a family friend that is closer to my age, Anni. The movie choice may have been mostly decided by how attractive the male actors were but what more could you expect from two 20 something year old girls? After we met up with her younger sister, Ellie, and also my family here. and we went to the American Diner restaurant, which makes a pretty darn good cheeseburger. This will probably be my last time seeing Anni and Ellie and so the good byes are starting already, I hate this part!
I feel fall starting to drizzle in, the air is cooler in the mornings and evenings and there is a crispness about it that tells you cooler days are coming. I am so thankful for the warm weather we have had and all the swimming it allowed for but I cannot deny my urge to wear fall clothes! Even during my walk today the lake didn't seem to "call to me" like it did before when we would walk to it. Tomorrow is my last full day here and I am NOT looking forward to packing!!
  On my way to Rovaniemi already! The last day and a half went so so fast. My day was spent packing and cleaning, making sure I grabbed all my stuff (surely I will still realize I forgot something). It may seem like the food here tends to be what life centers around, a thought that certainly has some merit. The final supper we had really did out do all excess I had previously experienced. We made home made pizza, 3 of them that were quite possibly the best pizza I have ever had, Salad, American Beer, Followed by the best carrot cake I have ever had, some darn good mocha bars, cloudberry ice cream and raffel potato chips. The girls wanted to cook for me (my goodness I love them) hence all the baking. Before bed we watched Mr. Magoriums Wonder Emporium and it was the perfect ending to a impossibly perfect last day. I said goodbye to them as they went to school in the morning and then Marita and I went to the train station (after eating leftover dinner for lunch... and breakfast). I will miss them an incredible amount and I know that a visit to their family is in my future!
Not sure where to include this since it happened in Tampere, between catagories but we ate dinner at a burrito bar and one of the meat options was hevonen or... drum roll please... HORSE MEAT! For those of you that know me that is among the few things that were a must do while I am in Europe. So I accomplished it without even planning it. It was the strangest burrito ever, some kind of oat shreds in place of rice, red cabbage in place of lettuce, but the guacamole was free and as a whole it was delicious, better than Chipolte.
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