Finland

I’m a little – nay, a lot – behind. I considered simply letting it peter away, but as I have at least one reader still, and I am sitting on a train to Edinburgh, I decided perhaps to let everyone in once again on what and how I’ve been doing.

After Oslo, Mom and I traveled to Helsinki, which I enjoyed much more. I’d been there before, when I was 10, but I have very few memories of it. We have several family friends living in a suburb of Helsinki, and it was great fun seeing them again. The trip was a little more relaxing, though still an awful lot of sightseeing. I’ve confirmed something I had suspicions about before, which is that, perhaps, two months (and counting) of traveling is a bit much. I’m having a fantastic time – but sometimes I really long for my own bed and to not move my place of residence for at least a week.

Some interesting occurrences in Helsinki:

We saw a group of school band kids from Denmark. As they converged on us, all speaking Danish, suddenly things felt right and normal and “this is how it’s supposed to be.” Then I had to stop and think for a moment, and I realized I was very weird if after hearing too much English, I was comforted by the strange, strange language that is Danish. Actually I was very weird to think I was hearing too much English in the first place.

Our friends took us to a medieval market in the city of Turkuu (possibly with only one u, but with Finnish, I think it’s safer to misspell on the side of too many vowels, rather than too few). The majority of it didn’t get going until the afternoon, but the morning was still great, seeing all the crafts. Sort of like a Renaissance Festival, without the shows, but in an actual old city. So much more authentic when you’re in Europe!

We took a steamboat ride to the town of Naantali, a small, cute town, which also is the location of Moomin land. Moomin, if you do not have the joy of being acquainted with it, is a series of cartoon characters developed by a Swedish-Finnish writer (back in the day when Finland still belonged to Sweden). They are about the cutest things ever, and I spent way too much money in Finland on Moomin paraphernalia.

The last day, we e went on what Olli kept referring to as a “southern cruise…with pine trees, not palm trees!” Also known as sailing to one of the southern islands. We were able to actually sail for a bit until the wind completely died, so we had to use the motor the rest of the way. We picnicked on the island, and then even though it was (almost) the hottest day in Finland in 100 years – we didn’t break the record by .2 degrees – the water was FREEZING…but I jumped in anyway. However, I did not stay in for long.