Snowy Times.

It's been a long since I wrote here, but I was pretty occupied the last weeks. I was writing about 20 assignments and reports and had three exams. Also I had to do some Christmas shopping and there were a lot of parties and dinners. So no time to write here.

Anyways, now it is over, the presents are bought and I am right now in Ekenäs at A's parent's house, where we are going to spend Christmas. I am alone right now, A. went working and her parents somehow to town and so I found some time to wrap some Christmas presents.

Yesterday I packed all the stuff I need for Christmas, brought S., one of my flatmates, to the airport and said "see you later" to M. one of my neighbors. It is weird to know that we all are going home for Christmas, but next year just few familiar faces are returning to Helsinki. We had such a good time during the last five months together. It makes me really sad, that they are not coming back.

In the last weeks it was pretty cold up here. Minus 20°C and loads of snow. Especially in the last three days we got a lot and more is coming on Wednesday. A. and I went out yesterday with a mixture between sledge and ice-skates. It's a thing made to go over ice or really packed snow. We went around through the village and were sliding along the icy roads. When we came home we had a sauna and were chillaxing the evening.

I am right now really getting a Christmas feeling here. It is wonderful. The whole house is full of Christmas stuff and it is snowing all the time. The radio plays Christmas songs, just AWESOME! I hope the snow is staying and we will have a white Christmas. This would be so nice.

~M~

Just quickly!

There is a lot to tell, but no time for it... Anyways, now I have to go back until last weekend, so not this last weekend, but the one before... the one just right before December!

We were in a cottage between Hämeenlinna and Tampere, about 130 km from Helsinki. To get there we rented a tiny car and went there for the weekend with three people. We started on Friday afternoon and drove there in the middle of the rush hour. In the evening we wanted to have sauna and grill. However we encountered the problem, that all the wood was pretty wet and it was hard to get the sauna and all the other ovens started. It took us over one hour to make fire. In the end everything worked out fine and we could enjoy the relaxing hot air. Afterwards we grilled infront of our cottage and even ate outside... at 4°C !!The Saturday we went to Tampere, just to see the city. We walked around and visited some sights. It is a nice city, especially because it is located between two huge lakes. This give the city a certain character, as you are can not walk far without coming to a lake shore. We had lunch in the Kaupatori, the market hall of Tampere, we had köttbullar (Meatballs) with salad. The guys also bought there some bread and mausta makkara, a blood sausage, typical for Tampere. We wanted to grill again in the evening and also have sauna again. This time the sauna was already on when we wanted to warm it up. The other cottages in the area were also occupied and the Finns seemed to be better in making fire than we were. We enjoyed the 80°C sauna and grilled afterwards, however, this time we ate inside.

The Sunday, we cleaned the cottage and headed home to Helsinki. But before we stopped in Hämeenlinna as we read that it would be a nice small town with an awesome castle. When we came there, we were a little disappointed. Yes, it was a small town, but it was not so nice and also the castle was just... disappointing. We were walking around for maybe half an hour, were consulting our LonelyPlanet travel guide and decided then to finally go back to Helsinki, as there wasn't anything to see on the way.


Last weekend I was once again, after a long time, in Turku. A. had bought tickets to a Christmas Dinner. What I didn't know was, that she meant with Christmas Dinner/Party a Christmas Sitz. A sitz is something from the swedish speaking population, the students in particular. So to say its a ritual to get drunk. You sit with a bunch of other lads in a room, drink and eat. However, every time before you drink a snaps you have to sing a snaps song. As it would be too embarrassing to sing alone, the whole group is always singing... and of course drinking. I experienced it already once before, but this time was way better. It was chic, the food was really good and the variety amazing. After the eating and ritual drinking a band was playing and everybody was dancing. I didnt had so much fun in a long time....

~M~