Spring Soliloquy

I am a child of the forest and the field.
I grew, toes dipped in cold streams,
dandelion crown upon my head
black walnuts in my pocket.

My feet were not made for shoes.
I sought the hidden places,
knew the taste of lemon clover,
violet, mint, and bitter acorn

Grown, walls contain me.
In voluntary exile
I stare at walls and screens
But a sliver of blue seen through my window calls my name

I escape down dirt paths to nowhere.
Bathed is solitude
immersed in birdsong
I am renewed.

What doesn't kill you makes a good story

It's 4:15 am and after an hour on the trail it's still pitch black.  I pick my way along the narrow path, coffee trees on either side of me.  The beam from my flashlight tenuously lights the next few steps, and I trudge on, one foot in front of another me while one line from Christina Perri's "A Thousand Years" runs in my head on repeat: "one step closer. one step closer. One step closer."

Suddenly, my foot slips in the loose earth. I start sliding off the trail, down the hill, the other foot following.  Before I can catch myself I've dropped off the trail, my body gaining speed as I fall down the steep slope. I try to brake with my feet, hoping I don't slide half way down this mountain, or worse, that there's a dangerous drop off before I can stop.  It's all over in a couple of seconds. I've managed to stop, lying in the dirt with my head just below the edge of the trail.  My cry as I went over the edge alerted everyone to my fall and they come over to check on me. "Can you help me?", I ask our guide, and he gives me a hand as I try to hoist myself up. It's harder than I expected, like trying to jump out of a swimming pool, except, my body doesn't have the weightlessness of water, and what would be the pool edge keeps collapsing under my hands.

I finally scramble back up, stop to catch my breath, and we keep going.  If we want to make it to the top in time for the sunrise, there's not much time for breaks. We walk a couple hundred more yards, the path becoming less distinguishable and more prone to crumbling beneath our feet as we go.  Finally, our guide stops us and tells us we have to go back and try the other path.  Disheartened at needing to retrace our steps, I carefully make my way past what momentarily felt like a near-death experience.

This section isn't so bad, and we stop to catch our breath and get a drink with a clear view of our destination ahead of us.  It still looks impossibly far away, but our guid assures us that it's only about 40 minutes.  We start back up hill, and not too much later 2 men pass us walking downhill.  "How close are we?", I ask.  "About 5 minutes" they respond.  "Thanks for lying!" I say cheerfully, knowing how often people have exaggerated while on hikes before just to keep up morale.  We think we still have 20-30 minutes left.  But then, wonder of wonders, we reach a steep wooden staircase, and a last uphill climb. Our guide stands smiling at the top. "You made it!"

We step out on the peak, collapse on the bench for a minute, then move out to the viewing platform.  Below us, the towns around the lake lie shining in the darkness.  Off to the east the sky is just slightly tinged with pink.  We drink in the beauty as the sky turns deeper pink and shades of orange.  The town below wakes up- someone starts setting off firecrackers right around 5 and the church bells start ringing at 5:30. "It's the early morning mass" our guide explains.

The sun well above the horizon, the cold at the top finally forces us back down.  We return to town a longer, gentler way, winding our way through fields of corn, and later coffee, towered over by mango trees.  The lake is gloriously beautiful every time we catch a glimpse of it, deep green volcanoes framed by the brilliant blue of the sky.  I don't think I'll ever tire of the beauty of this place I call home.

We finally arrive back at our hostel, ready to devour the free breakfast that came with the room. We bask in the comfort of sitting still and I wince at muscles I forgot I had reminding me of their existence as we get up to go.  A quick boat ride across the lake, and I'm back home again, right around 11.

A Very Different Thanksgiving- Part 2

The sun was close to setting and I was getting tired.  I wanted to sit down, but something about the black sand of the beach made me more wary of that than I usually am. Suddenly, a large line of people emerged from a gate at the edge of the beach.  As they made their way down to the shore, I noticed two women with large tubs and a group quickly gathering around.  The turtles had arrived.  I hurried over and peeked over the heads of the children crowding close and squealed with the “aww” factor of dozens of tiny baby sea turtles, all clamoring to get out and start their journey to the ocean.

“Step back behind the line”, the volunteers instructed us, shepherding us to a line that had been drawn in the sand. They walked the line in trios, one person taking our 10 quetzales (about $1.30) and giving us a ticket, the next person handing us a little plastic bowl and depositing a diminutive turtle from the tub the last person was holding.

I stared at my turtle in delight.  It was so tiny, so full of life, so anxious to go.  It tried to crawl it’s way up the edge of the bowl, so I covered it with my hand, afraid it would flop out and fall to the sand. Once everyone had gotten a turtle, they counted to 3 and we all released our turtles at once as the sun sank below the horizon.  Their little flippers moving madly, they stumbled their way toward the ocean, 3 strokes forward, pause, 3 strokes forward, pause. They were so tiny that footprints left in the sand were obstacles that had to be carefully maneuvered. We cheered them on, urging them to the sea, to survive, to be quick and wary.

As the waves rolled in, little turtles would disappear from the sand, bobbing out to sea.  Others, the stragglers in the group, wandered haphazardly, heading down the beach before veering back towards the ocean.  Finally, as it grew darker and the grey turtles blended in with the sand, the last of the turtles finally made it out to sea. My heart was full- thankful for this amazing and unusual Thanksgiving experience.

The Turku Public Library

One thing that brought me to Finland was its stellar education system.  According to their PISA ranking, Finland was educating a nation of readers, and since since developing literacy is one of my first academic goals with my students, I wondered what they were doing to be so successful.

Well, no education success story is complete if you only look at the classroom.  Finland is a nation that values reading.  In a 2002 survey by the European Commission, Finland was the country in Europe where library visits are most common.  It was also the top country for reading magazines and daily newspapers, and 2nd for leisure reading.  

So perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise that their library system is superb.  Just a few blocks from me is my local branch library.  I've actually never been in since the main city library is really close to campus and completely gorgeous.  The original library was built in the early 1900s, and a modern addition was added in 2007.

The historic exterior of the Turku City Library

I like to walk in through the historic side.  The ornate wooden doors that look as old as the building never fail to make me happy as they swing open automatically as I walk up to them.  Just inside the front doors, a curving double staircase goes up to the music collection.  Unfortunately, I didn't take a picture, so you'll have to imagine a room full of CDs and music magazines on one side of the circulation desk, and on the other side, another room full of scores and songbooks.

This is where adult fiction in Finnish is kept.  I love the dome.

Instead of walking upstairs, we'll do what I usually do- walk straight through to the prettiest part of the library, in my opinion.  Here under the dome all the Finnish language fiction is stored.  I always veer off to the left though if I'm looking for fiction for myself.  

Adult fiction in foreign languages.

After walking through a section of Swedish language fiction (Swedish is the other national language in Finland and spoken as a mother-tongue by around 5.5% of Finns), I get to a section that delighted me when I discovered it- the adult fiction section in foreign languages.  A full three aisles, both sides, are dedicated to English fiction, more than enough to keep me occupied the whole time I'm here.  There's even a section of Spanish fiction, and though not as extensive still more than I'll manage to work my way through.

Kirjasto= library in Finnish.  This is a section of the modern addition to the Turku city library

I'm not always headed to the library for pleasure reading though.  I come at least as often to look for children's books to practice my Finnish.  They're in the modern side of the library.  After walking through the reading room (again, no pictures- I felt bad taking photos with people in them, and this area is always busy.  The center of the room has racks with newspapers, and all along the floor to ceiling windows there are tables where people sit and study.  The other side of the room has comfortable chairs looking out onto the library courtyard) I make it to the children's section. 

Looking out over a section (I think this is Swedish picture books) of the children's area of the library

 It took awhile for me to navigate my way around here.  There are separate sections for Finnish and Swedish, fiction and non-fiction, easy readers, picture books, and young adult books.  And of course, the children's section wouldn't be complete without their own foreign language books section.  All of the most commonly spoken languages in Turku are represented here.

This is the foreign language children's books section

It's an amazing library with wonderful resources and a beautiful, welcoming atmosphere.  I wish I had felt comfortable taking photos of the study and reading areas, because in both the children's and adults' sections they're really nice.  There's also a 2nd floor on the modern side where the adult non-fiction is kept.  I don't wander up there nearly as often, unless I want to study up there, but they usually have some sort of rotating cultural or photography exhibit there as well.  

There's a connection here.  A society that values literacy is a society that values libraries.  Not only is this  library beautiful, a library card is free (not the case in Colombia) and people take advantage of the space to study and read. On Friday around 5 pm when I was there all the study tables were occupied and I'm not sure there was a single computer free at the computer station. So the libraries themselves in turn encourage literacy, creating, in a way, a self-perpetuating cycle.  

Beyond expectations

I set off today with low expectations.  The ruins didn't look like much on google satellite view, and most of our "hike" would be on roads instead of hiking paths.  But still, how many chances will I have in life to hike to Roman ruins, and have it not cost me a penny?  And so, we set off for the town of Neustadt.

The day was beautiful- A sunny day in the 70s, blue sky, white puffy clouds, a slight breeze.  We took a few wrong turns (maps?  Who needs them?  I wrote down what streets to turn on, and besides, I'd looked at the map online before I left), but finally made our way down to the river.

The beautiful blue Danube

We followed the river, and then headed across fields, to where hops and corn were growing.  The rolling hills covered in corn reminded me of home, but we had to walk right up to the hops to figure out what we were seeing (and then google it at home to confirm our guess)

Hops growing to be used to make beer.

The ruins, when we finally arrived, were way more impressive than I had imagined.  Seen from above on the satellite image, they just look like lines in the grass.  But standing there, you look out across a giant field of wall after wall, waist high and higher, trying to imagine what it was like almost 2000 years ago, when the Roman fort was first built there.

The Roman baths originally in the settlement outside the fort

We sat on the outer edge of the fort walls, eating our lunch and enjoying the view.  The breeze picked up and the sun hid behind the clouds, that had gotten thicker.  We decided it might be better to take a bus back, instead of risking getting caught in the rain.  We still had almost an hour until the next bus came, so we explored the ruins some more.

The view from the fort walls

I was intrigued by what looked like aqueducts running under the floor in some of the ruins.  A sign explained the whole Roman under-floor heating system that was used to heat both rooms, and water for the Roman baths.  I pulled myself reluctantly away from my explorations when I realized the bus was supposed to arrive soon.

Flowers growing on the walls of the ruins

 Unfortunately for us, the bus came about 3 minutes late, and pulled up to the train station at the same time as our train was pulling up.  We jumped out of the bus, and hurried towards the tracks, then realized we needed to take the underground passage to get to the right track. Just as I was headed up the stairs, back out to the track, we heard our train pulling out.  The next one came in about an hour, which we decided was the perfect amount of time to head into town in search of an ice cream cone.  Generally speaking, it's a safe bet that there will be an ice cream shop within a stone's throw of the largest church in the center of town around here, but just to be on the safe side, I tried out my German with a family on the street.  "Excuse me", I asked them, "do you know where we can" . . . (and then, already committed to asking my question, I realized that I had temporarily forgotten the word for to buy) "pay for ice cream" I concluded.  My work around, while certainly a bit awkward sounding, did the trick, and they assured us that if we just kept going straight, we'd get to a shop on the right.  And, just as I'd predicted, the ice cream shop was across the street and half a block down from the church.  A snickers ice cream cone and a nap on the train rounded out a perfect trip.

Looking for ice cream in Neustadt?  Look no farther, it's right by the church

The unexpected

We were on a train heading to Deining.  The girls wanted to do a photo shoot somewhere scenic and Fluvio and I wanted to hike.  But only halfway there, we spotted some castle ruins on the hill.  We all started wondering aloud if we could get there as the train pulled in to the next station.  As it was stopping, I spotted a hiking trail map out the window.  "Come, on, let's go!" And suddenly the 4 of us were piling out onto a platform in, well, we didn't really know where. The hiking trail map didn't have enough details for us to make up our minds which way to go, so we just set off in the general direction of the castle.

First, we had to make a mad dash across the train tracks, since we didn't see a crossing anywhere.  A sea of yellow rapeseed flower in bloom stretched in front of us, and we walked around it and down to an intersection.  "Maybe we should have looked at the platform sign before we left the station so we would know where we are" we mused.  A trail post stood at the intersection, "Laaber Burgruine" it read.  "Are we in Laaber, maybe?" I asked.  Fluvio looked at the sign. "Burgruine means castle ruins". Apparently we were on the right track.  A staircase lead downhill, and we caught our first glimpse of the castle ruins sticking up above the village.

The view from the castle was spectacular.  Past the town and the train tracks, forested hills touched the horizon.  A little church nestled in the trees half way up the hills.  Below us, the town spread out neatly, steep red roofs and pastel colors clustered around a church.

We decided that there probably wasn't a much better picnic spot on earth than right there in the castle ruins, and a fresh baked loaf of bread with brie cheese was the perfect picnic food.

After our lunch, the girls headed off to find the perfect spot for their photo shoot, and Fluvio and I headed into town to explore and find a hiking trail.  Behind the school headed into the woods, we found a trail marked by the stations of the cross.  We followed it up the hill to a clearing with three crosses, then beyond the clearing into an open field with views of the forests and mountains behind it.  The mountains weren't nearly high enough, but I still felt a bit like I was in the opening scene from The Sound of Music, and I just might have spun through the meadow singing "the hills are alive with the sound of music" for a second or two. . .

We crossed some more fields, and then entered a dark pine forest.  Pinecones covered the ground and the stillness of the place spoke stillness to my soul.  On our way out, I spotted some pussy willow that had been cut down, and cut some of the branches off to take home and decorate.

As we headed back to the train station, an ice cream store in town caught our eye.  There's not a much more perfect way to end a beautiful spring day than with an ice cream cone. The friendly lady behind the counter loved talking to foreigners.  She spoke in German clearly and slowly, so we could understand, and then chatted with us about where we were from and what we were doing in Germany. Just as we were finishing our cones in the outside patio, a few raindrops started falling.  We dashed for the train platform, but the shower finished before we even got there.

There's nothing much more delightful than a perfect day in a place you didn't even know existed when you left the house. 

Plan B

Our spur of the moment plan made sitting in the beer garden the day before didn't sound so good anymore, staring at the weather forecast.  Showers all day long, highs in the mid teens.  Who wants to spend 3 hours on a train, just to go see some mountains in the rain?

But, it was already 6:15 and we were meeting at 7:20.  If I didn't come up with another plan quickly, I'd be hiking in the rain (or more likely, huddling in a cafe) like it or not.

15 tabs in my finder later, I had a basic plan. It sounded good: take a shorter train ride to a place with a good weather forecast, pick up the Frankenweg trail there, follow it to the next town, and ride the train back.  There were just a few minor details missing, you know, things like, where to pick up the trail when we left the train station, how close the trail passed to the next town, and the actual distance we would be hiking.  Oh, and the fact that I couldn't actually print the map.

However, little details like that weren't enough to stop our adventurous crew (that and the fact that I may not have *ahem* disclosed that I didn't know the actual distance.  Google maps claimed 8.5 km.  Of course, that was following the road).  Our train stopped at Deining, and we stepped out onto the platform.  We looked around us, a bit bewildered.  We'd assumed if there was a train station, there would at least be a large enough town to find a cafe and drink a coffee while we waited for a friend who had over slept to catch up with us.  But all we could see was the platform, a road, and a sign.  Deining was apparently not a thriving metropolis.

We sleepily looked at the sign and tried to figure out which direction the hiking trail was, until Mikko made the brilliant deduction that we'd better continue the direction the train was going since our final destination was that way.  Our decision was pretty quickly confirmed as we spotted the first of the red and white stickers that were our lifeline for the rest of the day.

Turns out people do live in Deining, because we passed some backyards before the trail veered off into the forest.  Birds were singing, flowers were blooming, and trees were budding.  Our enthusiasm lasted for a couple of hours, as we moved in and out of forests and pastures, and through farmsteads.  A little village nestled in the distance, it's church steeple sticking up above the roofs. Giant wind turbines dotted the landscape, their modernity and sleek lines strikingly out of place.

After a couple of hours hiking, we came to a cross road.  The path continued one way.  A major road with a sign pointing to Neumarkt (our final destination) pointed the other.

Morale immediately sank to zero.  When you don't have a trail map and road signs are telling you the opposite of the trail blazes, it's hard to trust a sticker over a road sign, especially when only one person in the group has even seen the trail map and can confirm that it heads to the destination.  After a lengthy discussion, we decided to risk the hiking trail, but then realized we'd temporarily lost it.  At our most lost, our missing group member called us.  We told him to get off at the next town and walk back and meet us.  "Take the Frankenweg trail" I told him.  "It has red and white stickers.  Don't take any other trail, or you won't find us.  We're a bit lost now, but we'll let you know if we stop following the trail."

We crossed the road, looking to see if we could pick up the trail again, but there weren't any stickers to be seen.  We flagged down a young guy and practiced our German, but he could only tell us that yes, the road lead into town, and no, he didn't know any hiking paths.  We regrouped, confused again.  Should we follow the main road?  Or look for the hiking path?  Just then an older gentlemen came by on his bike.  "Entschuldigung!" (excuse me!) one of our group members called out.  The man stopped and the guy who stopped him suddenly realized he didn't have all the German skills necessary to ask what he wanted. "Kerlys!" he called, and our best German speaker went over to help him out.  She only got a few words out before she was calling me over, "what's the name of the hiking path we're looking for?"  Despite the poor man being overwhelmed by a succession of people all trying to ask the same question with varying degrees of German fluency, he finally understood us and answered.  "Straight ahead, just follow this path.  Yes it will take you to Neumarkt"  Feeling slightly more confident, we did as he said.

It wasn't the last of our confusion though. The path twisted and turned, stubbornly avoiding the direction that we were sure the city was.  Signs we passed neglected to mention Neumarkt as a destination.  We started to second guess ourselves again.  Our missing friend Hugo wasn't having any luck either.  I got a text message from him, "I'm on trail 5, with a yellow and white blaze".  Wait, what?  How were we ever going to find each other if we weren't on the same trail?  I called him back and explained once again what trail we were on.  "Make sure you find the same trail, or we'll never find each other"

The next trail sign we passed was stamped by the city of Neumarkt, so we started to feel more confident.  Even so, we'd passed 8.5 km long ago, and the city was nowhere to be seen.  Would we ever get there?  And would we ever find Hugo?  The last we'd heard from him, he'd found an orange church and was waiting there, sure we'd find him eventually.

Despite some dire predictions of death in the woods, starvation, meeting roaming bands of cannibals, or alien kidnapping, we eventually made it to civilization.  A sign post kindly informed us that we were 13.2 km from where we had started and that Neumarkt was only 3.7 km away.  (Whatever happened to 8.5 total?!  Thanks Google maps!) There was also a church only .8 km away, and a quick phone call to Hugo confirmed that it was the same one he was at.

We broke out into cheers when we reached the church and saw Hugo sitting in front of it, the city spread out in the valley below.  We'd been intrepid explorers, and finally were within sight of our destination.  The view made us all decide it was worth the extra kilometers of walking.

From the church, we headed down the mountainside into the city where we decided lunch was a must. After all, you work up quite an appetite walking 17 kilometers.  Sausages, potato salad and beer took the edge off our hunger, and then we wandered the town for a bit before catching our train back.

Five minutes before our train left, as we were speed walking to the station, a fire truck pulled up and the firefighters jumped out and rushed towards the platforms.  An ambulance with it's lights flashing was already parked there.  "That doesn't look good" one of us commented, as we rushed towards our platform.  Out of breath from dashing up the stairs, we checked the schedule as we wondered why the train wasn't there yet.  An announcement soon had everyone changing tracks, and we followed, a bit confused.  "Our train was canceled, we have to take the other" someone explained.  That train didn't seem to be going anywhere either, even though it should have left 2 minutes prior.  The conductor explained to someone through the window that all the trains were delayed, followed by something I couldn't understand.  Nina asked in English if the train went to Regensburg, and he assured us that it did, but then followed it up with, "But somebody has died.  We're not going anywhere until the track's cleared"  The ambulance and firetruck took on a whole new meaning.


We boarded the train, alternating between morbid curiosity and the feeling that our curiosity probably wasn't very respectful of whomever had died.  Uniformed officers went back and forth outside the windows, caution tape was put up, and then removed only minutes later, someone thought they saw the body being removed, and then realized they were mistaken.  Minutes ticked by and curiosity dulled to boredom and tiredness.  "Maybe we should walk back to Deining and take the train from there.  It might be faster" someone joked.  Just thinking about it made me exhausted.  As we were beginning to wonder if we'd be stuck spending the night in a town none of us had even ever heard of before, they made an announcement and everyone got off the train.  Good thing everyone in our group speaks more German than me- I would have been lost. They sent us to board a bus, which, we thought, would take us directly to Regensburg.  Ten minutes into our trip, as we were drifting off to sleep, the driver came on and made an announcement.  "Wait, what was that?"  No one really understood that time.  We arrived at another train station, and the driver said something else.  All that I understood was the time- 5:20.  The bus clock said 4:07.  It finally dawned on us.  We had to get off the bus and board another train. It would be there at 5:20.  The thought of spending over an hour on a platform made me want to cry.  But as we walked to the platform and checked out watches, we realized the bus clock was an hour slow- the train would be there in only 12 minutes.

Finally on the train to Regensburg, we closed our eyes.  If nothing unexpected happened, we should be home soon.  Fortunately for us, this time around, all went as planned.

This Beautiful Adventure

I'm so happy to see Anna's smiling face at the airport, that I almost re-enact the scene from Spanglish when Flor runs into the sliding glass door.  Her words as she greets us, "I did manage to get a car after all" make 2 travelers, overladen with bags, more than happy.  She hands us "Welcome to Germany" snack bags she made for us, anticipating we'd be hungry after our long day of travel.  When I see a soft pretzel inside, I'm sure of it, I've come to the right place.

After a 2 hour drive from Munich,  the thought on our minds as we open the door to our rooms is "I wonder if we won the lottery, or we lost it?" 1 person apartment, 2 person apartment, or dorm room with shared bathroom and kitchen facilities for 10?  Those are the possibilities in this building.  As the door swings open I glance quickly around: bed, bookshelf, desk, wardrobe, and YES! another door next to the wardrobe.  I think I've won the lottery.  The 2nd door leads to a tiny little kitchen with a bathroom off of it, and a 2nd bedroom on the other side, and I'm lucky enough that Liza, one of my classmates, got the key to it.

The next day, as we hurry from one errand to the next, we can't help but stop and admire.  From one bank of the Danube river, the cathedral and houses reflect into the water below.  The perfect blue sky is such a relief after nearly a month of grey skies in Turku.  I stop in delight- there are snowdrops and crocuses growing in a garden.  Not only have we arrived in a fairy tale, we've arrived here in spring.

Today, orientation over, I head off to try and open a bank account.  I'm not successful in the attempt (the bank closes at 12:30 on Wednesdays. . .), but I do manage to find the German equivalent of a dollar store (a euro store).  Nothing is cheap in Finland, so finding rolls of tape in a 5 pack for a euro, and notebooks for .55 here made me excited.  Now I know where to go if I need toothpicks or batteries or random party supplies.  On my way back, a double church steeple catches my eye.  I make a detour, hoping for a closer view, delighted at such a pretty church, right here in my neighborhood.

I'm here, starting a new adventure, studying a new map, meeting new people, stumbling through words in a new language.  It's lovely and challenging, and exhausting and thrilling.

Chinese New Year in Finland

If you've been following my blog for awhile, you may remember this post, when I celebrated Chinese Mid-Autumn Harvest Festival in Colombia.  Well, it's been awhile since I've enjoyed Chinese dumplings, and they are much too much work to bother with for just one person (and besides, how on earth would I eat so many?), so I figured Chinese New Year was the perfect occasion to invite some friends over and celebrate.  

Lucky for me, there's an Asian grocery right downtown, so I got almost everything I needed.  Ground pork was the hardest. After asking (in Finnish!  Go me!) if they sold it at 2 stores, and being told no at one, and it was sold out at the other, I finally settled on a 60%pork, 40% beef mixture.  (I should really ask some Finnish friends why they sell it. . .  Anyways, if you're ever in Finland and making dumplings, it works fine if you can't find ground pork). Oh, and don't plan on serving green beans in Finland in February.  After searching in 4 stores, I finally found a largish handful for €3.80. It didn't seem worth the price to me.

On the menu: Pork (ok, ok, pork/beef) dumplings, orange chicken, spoon vegetables, jasmine rice, and bubble tea.  The orange chicken was a new recipe and it was delicious. If you're looking for a new recipe, you should give it a try.  

Have I mentioned what wonderful friends I have here?  I was running a bit late, (searching for green beans and ground pork in 4 grocery stores the day of will do that to you) so they pitched in and helped assemble dumplings and cook the veggies while I finished off the chicken and bubble tea.  

Dinner finally ready, we sat down to eat.

Well, I never said they were normal

 We ate until we were full.  Then we kept eating.  We ate until there wasn't anything left to eat, and then took a break for dessert.

So yummy

And then, in true international fashion, we combined one celebration with another.  We happened to be celebrating Chinese New Year a few days late, and it also happened to be Runeberg's day, a day to celebrate a 19th century Finnish poet who penned the national anthem.  For whatever reason, it's typically celebrated by eating Runeberg's Torte, so  eat them we did, compliments of Alistair and Birte.

新年快樂！

(xin nian kuai le- Happy New Year!)

Winter is Coming!

When I first arrived in Finland, almost every conversation I had with a Finn went something like this,

Finn: "How do you like Finland"

Me: "Oh, I love it here!  I've been having such a great time, and everything is beautiful, and the weather has been so nice"

Finn: (In a foreboding voice, the kind of voice one uses to talk about Mordor, and Sauron and other Very Horrible Evil Things) "Winter is coming"


So, needless to say, I was a bit apprehensive about my first Finnish winter.  I was expecting snow in October, sub-zero temperatures, skating down the river.  Instead, we eased through October, November, and into December with only a couple of days dipping below freezing.  I kept bike riding and didn't get a bus pass for much longer than expected.  It was colder, and snowier back home than it was here.  I was beginning to think that Finnish winter really wasn't going to be anything to contend with (and that maybe we weren't even going to get any snow)

I did my best to bring the winter back with me after my trip home to the States for Christmas.  After all, several friends in Finland requested it.  And I must have done something right, because I got in on Friday, and woke up Saturday morning to snow falling outside my window.


Ever since, we haven't had temperatures above 20, and low teens seems to be the norm (by the way, extreme temperatures sound even more extreme when given in celsius.  Today, a chilly 10 degrees, was -12 in celsius.)  The river is freezing, the skating rinks are open (I skated this weekend!), and there's snow on the ground.  I think it's safe to say that winter has arrived.