Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Finally back home. I've been singing the theme song to "Green Acres" lately as I feel it suits me at this point. Joensuu might not have all that much going for it, but you can't say that it's not a relaxing kind of town. I mean there is nothing going on here and after weeks of crazy travel, nothing is just what the doctor ordered. For now at least. In 10 days we have guests and then there is the Midsummer Festival, for which we will hopefully be in Helsinki, enjoying the empty town as everyone and their mother will be in the country. Yet July is looking attractively empty and I would like to keep it that way.
It was very nice to have guests here in Finland. But it is one thing to have guests at your house, it's quite another story to have guests at your in-laws house. I cannot wait until we are living in Helsinki and no longer have to live out of a suitcase when we are there. All in all I think Karel and Aaron had a good experience. Sure it's hard to be with the same people for 10 days in a row, even if those people are family. But I think we kept them pretty well entertained, even if they didn't get too much time alone. Well, neither did we come to think of it.
The vacation started out slow. After Karel and Aaron arrived from Newark, we could tell that immediate bus travel was simply not going to happen, Karel's belly made sure of that. So we went to Helsinki and had a couple of sandwiches in the Esplanade park. We situated ourselves directly in front of an easy to use bathroom. Say what you want about Finland, the toilets here are great and private and I think Karel appreciated that very much. OK, enough of that.
We got on the train to Turku and made it to Raisio where our guests promptly fell asleep. K and I went to the store and got some grub to cook. We decided to take it easy and stay in. However, in this case take it easy meant a lot of booze. I kept telling Aaron that whenever he wants he can simply say no and stop, well first impressions I guess, cause he didn't stop. The night was long and the sun set at around 11pm and was beautiful.
The next day we made it to the summer house where we had to clean the lake so that we could swim there the following weekend. This was no easy task. The unfortunate thing about the summer house is the location on the lake. It becomes sort of a resting place for all the grass and crap - and because of the pig farm on the other end of the lake, I do mean crap - that accumulates during the melting of the ice. So we put on our boots and got to work. The weather was too cold and wet for us to stay the night and so we headed back to Raisio for another night at home.
The next day we had dinner with Lilleri and Bjorn and Aaron was able to sample his first sauna. I don't think he had a clue how hot 180 degrees really is, but he soon found out and was a champion of the sauna and quite addicted to it after that.
Ah ha- it's time to go home. I will continue this post later tonight. Even though the night seems more like morning. It does not get dark here, at all. Last night I thought about going for a midnight bike ride to the lake because it was still light enough to do so. Maybe I'll do it tonight. For some reason the bright night makes it very hard to sleep. I just don't feel as if the day has ended until it gets dark.
So Adios for now.
It was very nice to have guests here in Finland. But it is one thing to have guests at your house, it's quite another story to have guests at your in-laws house. I cannot wait until we are living in Helsinki and no longer have to live out of a suitcase when we are there. All in all I think Karel and Aaron had a good experience. Sure it's hard to be with the same people for 10 days in a row, even if those people are family. But I think we kept them pretty well entertained, even if they didn't get too much time alone. Well, neither did we come to think of it.
The vacation started out slow. After Karel and Aaron arrived from Newark, we could tell that immediate bus travel was simply not going to happen, Karel's belly made sure of that. So we went to Helsinki and had a couple of sandwiches in the Esplanade park. We situated ourselves directly in front of an easy to use bathroom. Say what you want about Finland, the toilets here are great and private and I think Karel appreciated that very much. OK, enough of that.
We got on the train to Turku and made it to Raisio where our guests promptly fell asleep. K and I went to the store and got some grub to cook. We decided to take it easy and stay in. However, in this case take it easy meant a lot of booze. I kept telling Aaron that whenever he wants he can simply say no and stop, well first impressions I guess, cause he didn't stop. The night was long and the sun set at around 11pm and was beautiful.
The next day we made it to the summer house where we had to clean the lake so that we could swim there the following weekend. This was no easy task. The unfortunate thing about the summer house is the location on the lake. It becomes sort of a resting place for all the grass and crap - and because of the pig farm on the other end of the lake, I do mean crap - that accumulates during the melting of the ice. So we put on our boots and got to work. The weather was too cold and wet for us to stay the night and so we headed back to Raisio for another night at home.
The next day we had dinner with Lilleri and Bjorn and Aaron was able to sample his first sauna. I don't think he had a clue how hot 180 degrees really is, but he soon found out and was a champion of the sauna and quite addicted to it after that.
Ah ha- it's time to go home. I will continue this post later tonight. Even though the night seems more like morning. It does not get dark here, at all. Last night I thought about going for a midnight bike ride to the lake because it was still light enough to do so. Maybe I'll do it tonight. For some reason the bright night makes it very hard to sleep. I just don't feel as if the day has ended until it gets dark.
So Adios for now.
// posted by Howard @ 3:15 PM 
