HB COLD

Bachelor week begins! Watch out town, the wife's gone for a week and that means things are going to get crazy! The things I'll do...like, uh...yeah like, well...um, ok so there's not much to do. Sure I'll clean the house and study some Finnish and watch some television and maybe ride my bicycle and take some pictures of things, but at night! Well, I'll probably go to bed early, but at least I'll be able to sleep in the middle of the bed instead of on the side. Well at least I'll start off in the middle.

So why is it that when I have the bed all to myself I start out in the middle, but wind up in the same corner I always wind up in? Can someone really go from one side of the bed to the other, or to the middle with no trouble? How many couples have ever decided to switch sides of the bed? How is it determined in the first place? I have been on the left side of the bed since K and I have been together, although I am pretty sure that at one point in time I found great enjoyment on the right side of the bed. But obviously K liked the right side better and that was that. I think that I am going to try to declare that while on vacation, or sleeping in a different bed than our own, we will switch sides. So anyone think that'll happen? Me neither.

But seriously, tonight I will go to my first rock concert in Joensuu and on Sunday, horse-racing season begins. It's trotting, where the horses don't run full speed and the jockey sits in the cart behind the horse. It should be pretty cool and cold considering the weather and the fact that the race track is covered in snow. Hope to have some cool pics from the event.

We played our first basketball game in the Arena and wow it is some building. Soccer fields, track course with long jump sand pits and pole vaulting tracks, floor hockey, self defense classes and basketball. Ok, so which one of these elements do you thing was the least important in the planning process? You guessed it, basketball. There was only one hoop and we had 14 guys show up. 5 on 5, half-court. As physical as it can get. Not to mention the fact that the basket was really stiff and the lighting system in the Arena lends itself to impossible shots. It was like playing in a cavernous cave or something like it. I've never been in such a building. It was a far cry from the intimate, cozy courts we had been playing at. Time will tell, but this time, let me tell you.

On to some job stuff. I began the solicitation process for the film festival that we are putting together in October. "The 4th Annual Festival of Visual Culture" www.viscult.net

I put together an email and sent it out to about 10 universities around the world that offer studies in Visual Anthropology. I received a response from NYU and an Acamdemy in New Mexico, which bodes well for the international aspect that we (read me) are trying to generate.

I am also in the middle of plannig our itinerary for Rome and Cannes - tough job, I know. I gotta say that this could be a real cool thing. I have my fingers crossed. It sure seems like it is going to happen. We have received approval from our financiers and are awaiting approval from the Cannes festival itself. They say that there are limited number of invites per company which means that it could still be up in the air and until then, fingers are firmly crossed.

But now onto a much more definite trip - Amsterdam. It's happening in less than 10 days. Tickets have been purchased and the excitement is building. I wonder if the Hague will still be in session regarding the Israeli barrier. I would like to check it out if it is, could be interesting. Volatile, emotional, interesting.

Speaking of Middle East politics, I have started to reply to Op-Ed pieces in Arabic publications and I received a message from the author of a recent op-ed that I took issue with. He took issue with my issue taking and we had a polite back and forth and eventually saw eye to eye. It was quite thrilling, however small it really is. It was gratifying to be able to express myself in such a way that I was able to force a compromise. I suppose that it could be something to do with this journal and how I am writing more and more every day. I was thinking about a subject that I will suggest, maybe even force upon my children one day and that is debate. Sure all those kids in high school debate seemed like a bunch of dorks, but looking back we all looked like dorks - spiked hair, tight rolls, Generra.

Finnish lessons are moving slowly, but...well slowly. It's fascinating to be in a class with two guys from Switzerland who pick up languages like I pick up...well something that I pick up easily. We were learning partitive - a word I have no idea about - and Emanuel said to Tobias, "Oh, it's like the negative partitive rule in French." He said this seriously and Tobias understood and then was able to comprehend the rule. I still don't know what partitive means (I can understand that it is necessary, but that's as far as it goes) and this guy was throwing out negative partitive rule of French.

If this were high school, I would make fun of them. (I would do this because they make me feel stupid and so a few well placed insults would easily make me feel better about myself). But how do you make fun of the Swiss? I really don't know. And then I would feel even more stupid about not being able to make fun of them that I would be forced to resort to the ol' reliable - I would wrap their stinking Swiss Army house and see how they like it. I guess the point here is that I should study more.

Well I thought that I was going to take advantage of this warm weather and ride around taking pictures, but I realized something about the warmer weather, it makes things much more difficult. Let me explain, there is approximately three feet of ice and snow that is blanketing the city (and another five feet or so that make up the mounds in and around the parking lots and busy intersections) which means that when the temperature warms up, this city becomes iceville.

For example, above our entrance way to our house there is a small roof. Normally there is a 12 inch layer of snow that covers the roof. But now, because of the warmer weather, that layer of snow has become a layer of ice and this layer of ice is sliding down the roof inch by inch, centimeter by centimeter so that now, a 12" thick sheet of ice is hanging 12" off of the roof. Had the weather stayed warm this glacier would have dropped, but because it cooled off again, the ice froze in place - dangling dangerously off of the precipice awaiting unsuspecting tenants on their way home from work. So Karoliina and I run across the danger path and jump onto the covered patio.

For the record, I totally know more lyrics to Duran Duran's "Wild Boys" than Karoliina does, no matter what she tells you. And fortunately, since she has no journal to record of her own, my word is truth.

We were arguing this point last night and it led to our first snow fight since we've been here. Let me tell you, there is a lot snow out there - although it is melting right now and turning from a soothing white into a disturbing dirt color.

I just wanted to let everyone know that before I forget. I don't have much more to say than that.

Hot damn! Camera problem solved! It must have been fate. Don't believe me? Here's the story:

Yesterday after my meeting with Cliff, I went to Sokos to buy some food for breakfast (potato pancakes, yogurts, juice and some fruit) and also some dinner. Well, I forgot that we were out of olive oil and I couldn't go back because I would miss the bus - which I did anyway, but that's another story and a little embarrassing so I won't talk about it here and now - and so I decided that I would get it at our neighborhood "kauppa : store" SIWA. But after a nice little conversation with the employee, there was no olive oil to be found.

Side note, olive oil might very well be THE most difficult thing for me to say in Finnish: oliiviöljy

So on the way to Finnish class this afternoon I went to the closest store SPAR, but the oliiviöljy that they had looked gross and so I went off to the Citymarket - which is a veritable Super Target. Of course they had the olive oil, but this isn't the point either. Wait for it...because I was coming from the Citymarket, I was on a street that I had never been on before and on the corner was an electronics store. I thought about going in, figured that there was no way thay they would have what I was looking for and passed on bye. But then, after about 100ft I turned around and said what the hell.

I get into the store "Minä puhun hyviin vahan Suomea. Puhutko Englantia?" He doesn't and so commences a five minute conversation that neither one of us understood. So I look around the store and walk right to the magical cable that has been eluding me since I came to Finland. I look at it and the other employee of the store tells me that this is what I need, without asking me what it was that I did indeed need. I tell him that I would like to be able to return it if it is not the right cable. He tells me to take it and if it works to come back tomorrow and pay him 10 euros. And I will be back tomorrow with the man's 10.

Alright, I admit that I don't know if that is truly fate or simply me blowing it out of proportion; but, I have been looking for that shit everywhere and to finally have it happen out of the blue like that was thrilling.

So there will soon be pictures. I am going to paint the town camera. After being here for more than 4 months, I will finally be able to take the pictures I thought I would be taking as soon as I arrived. I think that this weekend should be really warm, like 0° or something and I will get on the bike and take advantage of the warm weather.

Speaking of weather, although it's been really cold here and that is getting old, at least the sun is coming out and staying out. When I leave for work at 8am the sky is full of the colors of a distant sunrise, but it is definitely light out. And when I leave work at 4pm the sun is shining brightly. Sure it's deceiving as hell to have so much sun light and for it to be so cold, but you take what you can get. It's kind of like being in a freezer with a really bright light that gives off no warmth whatsoever.

I had a great meeting today with Cliff, the local American basketball player here in Joensuu and he was on board with the idea of the documentary and was a cool guy too - which is very important. OK so what the hell do I do now? Now I have to get serious. I have to create a business plan, determine a budget, craft the story and do so in order to capitalize on the multiple market appeal. In other words, it is possible that the Finnish audience would appreciate different elements of the story from those that an American audience would appreciate, but this is something for the editing room.

So over the next few weeks and months I need to get my pitch together and figure out what kind of money I can raise. I would like to be able to get to €100K, but we will see. My feedback has been very positive from all those that I spoke to about the story. And the fact that Cliff has agreed to do it, if it comes together is just the impetus I need to get to it.

Some really cool things that I learned today: 1, he is from Hawaii and makes that his home away from Joensuu - talk about a difference of environment and visually striking. Not to mention that if this happens that means yours truly and K will be in Hawaii (fingers crossed until that happens). 2, he is the firstHawaiiann to be a professional basketball player and the first to get a full ride to a Division 1 school - Oregon State. 3, the fact that he has been playing here in Joensuu for more than 5 years means that he has some insight into the way things are and this could be great for the expose of life here as a basketball player.

So anyone out there know how to use a digital camera, lights and sound?Couldd be a trip to Hawaii and a long stay here in Joensuu. Quick, which one of those options sounds moreappealingg?

On to another topic, but a topic that is quite exciting...Amsterdam! Phil and I have been talking about going to Amsterdam for a long time now and it will finally happen. March 4-7.

Funny story this morning. Ok, everyone has had those moments when, while asleep, you fidget or jerk your arm, leg, whatever, or say something aloud. Well, this morning at around 6:30am I was sleeping and heard what, at first, I thought was a turkey gobbling. Turns out it was Karoliina in the middle of an action adventure dream where she was trying to get my attention because the woman who had just jumped overboard off of our yacht (not too shabby) was now swimming back towards us and the motor. I think that she was pretty scared because apparently that gobble gobble was actually her way of yelling "help!" Sure this sounds like it was scary and I am sure that is was, but when she realized what she sounded like and that it was just a dream, we started to crack up.

Thought I would let you know that I have become a bit of a message board basher lately. I have been reading the political discussions on the UT website and I have increasingly been attacking people when they state something stupid or ignorant. Now I do not know if it is because I am so annoyed, bored or far enough away to feel confident to tell people that they are dumb, but I have gotten a real kick out of it and truly enjoy ruffling some feathers. I guess after being able to yell at anyone I wanted to on a daily basis in New York, I feel a need to take out that aggression somewhere and I do not think it would look good if I walked around yelling at people for no good reason.

Speaking of yelling, after talking with Cliff about the calmness of the basketball crowd I have come to the decision that, come crunch time I am going to be a loud crass mofo. So what if I cause a scene. If it is for the home team and hurts the competing team than no matter what people think, they cannot say that I do not support my team.

Interesting note here, I did not use a single apostrophe on this entry. I was having the ™™™ problem again with the keyboard and let me tell you, it is real difficult to write without using ™™s.

I guess I can feel it in the air, or maybe because we have made official plans, but I am really looking forward to this spring. K and I will be flying straight to Dallas on the 21st of May and will go to NYC on the return to Finland, this makes our return trip more segmented and not quite as brutal.

Adios muchachos....Dos Charros, Blue Goose, Chuys...man.

I had a brief desire to become a vegetarian this weekend. It only lasted a few seconds, but it happened nonetheless. We were cooking our first whole chicken on Sunday night. We have this recipe for a whole chicken cooked in milk, with garlic, sage, lemon and cinnamon. Well K bought one of the frozen organic chickens from the Citymarket and I guess it must have been more organic than the others because it had a bunch of hair on it.

Now we've purchased fish from this same market that still has scales on it, but that's ok, fish are supposed to have scales. But hair on a chicken? I thought that they had feathers, so what the hell was hair doing on its plucked, frozen body. Whenever I remember mom making chicken I remember two things: First, there was never any hair on the chicken; Two, the chicken was able to feed a family of five. The amount of meat we got from this chicken was laughable - and of course, covered with hair. Sure we don't eat the skin anyway, but there was a certain disgust factor that lead to the feelings of veg for a few seconds.

Other stuff: I have two things to say about Talisker Scotch, it is really smooth and that is really bad. I must have had a few too many the other night and did so because it just tasted so damn good and was so easy to drink. I think I need to buy a stronger, less smooth scotch in the future or else I could be in trouble.

I was able to watch the movie, "The Dog Clipper" with English subtitles this weekend and I must say I found it more enjoyable than I did at the premiere. The dialog was a little obvious, as was the storytelling, but the point came across and the characters were empathetic enough.

K's back at work today and feeling I think about 85% right now. She is really looking forward to exercising again and getting back into a physical routine. Being on your ass for two weeks is a hard thing to do. And now getting back into the groove will take a little bit of a struggle, I'm sure.

That's all I got right now.

Everybody check out www.effc.fi - our first website is up! This is the initial website that simply states that we are in business. We are in the process of designing the official effc website and this will take a few more weeks, perhaps months to accomplish.

Coldest day of the year by far! It was a balmy minus 28 degrees C (*9/5+32= -19 F) this morning on the walk to work - and by walk I mean from the bus stop to the front door of Science Park (where the office is) - and I had the longest, most painful brain freeze of my life. Now normally brain freeze happens when the body encounters a cold stimulant usually ingested orally - either ice cream, or ice tea, anything cold that overpowers the senses and causes a minor malfunction.

Well this was brain freeze by osmosis and there was only about 2 cheeks, a nose and a chin of my body exposed to the cold. My face is still tingling and I have been inside for more than 15 minutes now. How the hell do people get used to this? How the hell do they ride their bikes in this cold? I don't know if you can ever get acclimated to something like this. And just so I know, I'm lucky, this winter has been exceptionally warm. For example, last winter the temperature was regularly this cold and colder still on a normal basis.

And to make matters worse, every morning I like to read the Dallas Morning News on the web and resting in the right corner of the screen is the five day forecast and it's always in the 50's...That is almost 70 degrees warmer than what is going on here in Siberia, I mean Joensuu, I mean home. Man.

So some good news on the idea regarding the basketball documentary I was thinking about when I first arrived, and the good news is...I've finally gotten off my ass.

I placed a few communiques with the Finnish Film Foundation and received some positive feedback. The FFF is the funding entity for most every film/documentary/short film in Finland. They also provide some development funds for the initial research portion of the project.

I also attempted to get in touch with the local American basketball player and he got in touch with me today. I'm hoping to have a meeting with him and talk about the project. Ideally I would begin filming in the summer, before the season starts, when he is back in the States. I think it would be cool to see him in his state-side environment and also allow me to get some interviews from family and friends. And then watch as his environment changes.

The only problem that I think will arise with this is the fact that this is not new to him, that this change of scenery will not be as intense because it will be familiar. I will need to find a newbie sometime during the season and follow them around for a week to get the "Oh my god" aspect of the cultural shock.

Maybe I'll juxtapose my own basketball league with the professional one. See how the other half lives, or plays rather.

I hope the meeting goes well. If I can come to an agreement with a subject then I can truly package the idea for financial assistance.

So I think my wife is going a little stir crazy. She spent all last week in a hospital, sharing a room with a ninety year old woman who breathed louder than...well, I can't really think of anything, but she breathed really loudly. And now she has been in the house since Friday. Her mother was here until Sunday, but that's 3 days now where she has spent all day, everyday in the house. She goes out for a walk, but when it's this cold out, it doesn't really relax you. I think I will rent the movie Stir Crazy this week for her (although I wonder if it is available here).

Other bits and pieces:

We begin to play basketball in the newly constructed $12M Arena next week and that should be exciting.


I leave you with this piece of advise from an old friend.

You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, know when to run. You never count your money, when you're sitting at the table. There'll be time enough for countin' when the dealing's done.

I think that just about says it all.

I am beginning to feel a certain frustration here and that frustration has everything to do with dinner. In Brooklyn, we could make dinner every few days and the other days hit the restaurant circuit that was on our street.

The choices were: Chinese, Thai, Japanese, Indian, Italian, Mexican, Middle-Eastern and they all delivered and were relatively inexpensive, except for sushi and that's a good thing (beware cheap sushi).

In Dallas, we had essentially a one-stop shop of take home and that was Eat-Zi's. We could choose from salads, sandwiches, kebabs, full meals even. Or we could go to the numerous restaurants that we all within a few minutes from our place.

However in Joensuu, the choices are less than stellar. Let's see on the way home we have pizza (and not very good pizza) and that's about it. Which means that every night we have to go to the store, which is easier said than done, figure out what the hell we want to eat and then cook. You know, if we had a car at our disposal this wouldn't be quite the same pain in the ass as it is now. Hell, even a bicycle would make it easier. But have you looked outside lately? It ain't bicycle weather and probably won't be for another 6-8 weeks.

Sometimes I just wish we could pick up 2 wonton soups and some steamed veggie dumplings and maybe an egg-roll. Or maybe get home and call the Thai restaurant to come and deliver the fresh spring rolls and peanut chicken. Or run to the Italian store across the street and get some manacotti and puttanesca. Hell, if the pizza place by us had anything resembling good pizza on their menu, that would at least be a step in the right direction.

So after all this, the question still remains, what do I want for dinner tonight?

By the way, I have just added a comments section to the blog. I am not really adept with html programming and have no idea how well this is going to work. There are places for your name, email address and URL page. These are not necessary to fill out if you want to leave a comment and not have your email address advertised to just anyone. So feel free to comment and let me know what you think.

First class is in the bag, only 7 more to go. It's a good thing that the first class took me more than 3 weeks to prepare for and now I will only have one week between lectures to prepare for the remainder of the classes. I admit I was a little dissappointed with the turnout, 8 people. I was hearing rumors of many interested people and since the auditorium I was lecturing in can hold up to 60 people, I thought I could be in for a large crowd. I was a little fearful of the number, until I got into the lecture and then I realized that I was well-prepared and would have enjoyed a larger crowd. I've got to get cracking for next week.

So what do I do after lecturing about independent films and spouting out an anti-studio, anti-blockbuster message? I have to get Tomb Raider 2 because the patient wants to watch it. Now we were able to see the first Tomb Raider for free thanks to Karoliina's job at Montel and it was one of the worst movies I can ever remember seeing and I'm pretty sure that Karoliina agreed with me at the time. So why the the hell are we going to watch the sequel to a movie that we both thought was crap? Patient gets what patient wants.

Got a call from Scott Horwitz this morning. I was in the pharmacy picking up some medication for Karoliina and in the middle of the conversation my phone rings and a scream Scott is on the other line. Obviously for one of us it was Saturday morning and for the other one, it was still Friday night. It was a nice way to get my mind off of the class and a nice way for Scott to spend 56 cents per minute. Fair trade if you ask me.

Don't know why, but I woke up this morning with 3 songs in my head: The Gambler, Islands in the Stream, and On the Road Again. I guess I was dreaming about Texas or something last night. So, of course I had to download them and now I am jamming to Kenny and Dolly.

K is doing much better today. She will be eating real food and if all goes well, she will be home tomorrow. Anneli will be arriving tonight and earlier than I expected, which means I need to get my ass home and clean up a little. Sure the place isn't too dirty, but it's not mother-in-law clean either.

The latest person to find this journal did a search for Daniel Sunshine and this blog came up. Just thought I would fill you in with that bit of nonsense. And speaking of nonsense, the subject matter here has been very serious lately so I thought I would take some time to change the direction towards something a little more brainless...the weather.

It has been so warm out lately (+2 today) that it feels like spring is in the air. Yet, one week ago saw the most mammoth snow storm that has taken place since I arrived. It continued for 3 days and now, when walking outside, there are 3 levels of snow - waist, shoulder, dune. Everyday the walking paths and streets are cleared and are effectively walled in by what is now, snow up to the waist. This layer of snow continues from the paths to the buildings, which makes it hard to gauge the real depth of the snow. At intersections the wall reaches as high as my shoulder and at parking lots the snow turns into an amusement park of sorts. Like small scale ski resorts for the toddlers, who line up to slide down the path that one of the parents has smoothed out of the pile of snow that is at least 15 feet tall. And there are dozens of these hills.

Unfortunately, the warmer weather is causing a bit of mayhem. The top layer of the snow has now turned into ice, which makes it very difficult to get around. I can practically hear muscles in my legs screaming, "What the hell is going on? Since when did walking become this difficult?" Well, it has. I had to run an errand downtown yesterday and the walk that normally takes 10 minutes was close to 45 minutes. The ground was so icey and broken up that it was impossible to walk in a regular manner.

Another reason for the mayhem is the fact that over the past few months a great cake of snow has landed on top of the houses and buildings and other such places. Well this warm weather has created mini-avalanches all around town. Sometimes 3 feet of snow will come toppling down from the roofs and if anyone is nearbye, run.

Another topic that is now starting to dominate my life is this class that I will be teaching this weekend, and possibly the following 7 weeks. I went to my Finnish class yesterday only to see many large posters announcing this class. Right now I am in an auditorium that will hold as many as 60 people. It sure seemed like a good idea a few months back when I agreed to teach the class. I thought that I would not have much to do and would need some money. Well funny how things turn out. I have very little time and am fortunately, but strangely financially set for the next 11 months. Still, there's no backing out now.

Good news everybody. After all this and that, it was just a bad case of gas.

Karoliina went into surgery last night and they were going to remove the stones from her gall bladder, but they couldn't. She had a bunch of scar tissue from her appendicitis when she was 8 and this caused the procedure to suffer some difficulties. And this was all the news that we received last night. We were under the impression that there might be further surgeries and we were preparing to move her to Turku, to Anneli's hospital. But this morning (Wednesday) the doctor came in and told us that the scar tissue was causing a tightening around her small intestine and this was blocking the flow of air, which was causing her so much pain. So they were able to flatten out the intestine and clear a path for the easy flow of air, which will hopefully end the pain.

She will be in the hospital until Friday morning and then she will be able to come home. Anneli will arrive tomorrow night and will spend the weekend with us. We were planning on going skiing this weekend, but just laying on the couch together will be better than anything else. She will have 4 little scars on her belly, like 4 little gun shot wounds and that's all.

So Sunday night sucked. Sure the game was great, as exciting as it could possibly be and I did get to watch the game, at least the entire 4th quarter which was when the fun was, but I had to watch it in the hospital, and that sucked. Karoliina came down with some real bad stomach pain on Sunday night and had to go to the hospital. We thought it was gas, but it was unrelenting and after an hour we decided that enough was enough and we called a cab and went to the emergency room.

That was Sunday night. It is Tuesday morning and she is still there. They have done all sorts of tests and there is no cancerous anything in her body, for which we are grateful. It turns out that she does have some gall bladder stones and they are going to remove them this afternoon, which means that she will hopefully be home tomorrow. I sincerely hope that this is the cause of the pain. The doctors were unable to ascertain the root of the pain and because they were unsure of what was causing the pain, they couldn't give her proper medication. She was finally given some pain relief and was able to get some sleep. I got home at 4pm Monday and went to bed at 6pm and woke up this morning at 7am. I am off to the hospital now to bring Karoliina a pair of tweezers - her eyebrows are getting a bit unruly (as sure a sign as any that the pain is going away and her spirits are up).

I will keep you all posted when anything new develops. But all things considered, a few stones ain't too bad.

I just got back from the hospital to visit Karoliina. She was resting and was not in pain. She will go into surgery later this afternoon and should be at home late Thursday or Friday. She was in a good mood, and made me pluck her eyebrows. The doctor will remove the stones and look around to see if there is anything else in there that could be causing her pain - perhaps an ulcer.

Ahh, Finnish pre-game. Nothing else like it. Really adds to the excitement. Every once in a while I am able to catch Massachusettes or Carolina and that's about it. I never thought I would miss Terry Bradshaw, but I would really like to hear his crazy ass opinion of the game. Sure he's incoherent, but at least I can understand what he's saying, maybe not what he means, but what he is saying.

Super Bowl Sunday has never been so festive. You should see this town, it's completely dead. Everyone must be at home, or in a bar watching the game. It's more quiet than Dallas when the Cowboys are in the Super Bowl. It's really quite remarkable, they must really love American football here in Joensuu. Either that or it's midnight and the game doesn't start for another 40 minutes. I don't know.

The movie premiere was yesterday and I will say this about that, I didn't fall asleep. It was the first time I've ever watched a movie in a foreign language without subtitles. And of course, it was a movie that apparently is dialogue heavy. It was really interesting to see this region of East Finland during the late 40's. Attention to detail towards the time period was well managed and to see what life was like in the area at that time - after the continuation war, which was Finland's battle with the Soviets before, during and after WWII - was great. Horses and sleds and everyone skiiing everywhere, it was really fascinating.

The problem with the movie was that the central character who suffered a head wound in the war and became an invalid was such a crappy actor that it was hard to watch. His choices of how to portray mental instability was to have a bunch of facial twitches and that's about it. And since I could only really understand the setting and the acting from a physical standpoint, this really took its toll on me throughout the movie. There were many verterans and older people who were children at the time in this area and the movie did seem to have a strong emotional impact on them, so I will reserve final judgement until after I read the script.

The after party was strangely non-celebratory. It took a long time for people to start having fun, like many hours. I was asked the same question maybe 20 times and you can read my response above - almost verbatim, except for the fact that I did not mention any criticisms. I suppose the premiere of a movie is not the time to say that I didn't think that it was great. I laughed, I cried, it was better than CATS, I will see it again and again.

Something very interesting about the Finns in general. They are a very reserved bunch. They say just what is necessary and usually nothing much more than that. If there is to be a personal conversation, it will be very short lived and pretty bland. UNTIL...the booze. It opens them up so much so that it can seem as if the person in front of you is not the same person you see everyday and the conversation is diverse, personal, sometimes provocative, sometimes funny and sometimes provocative, funny, personal but still extremely tedious and boring. Work should be interesting on Monday, considering how many people were way too open with me last night.