Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Sunday, April 12, 2009

the adventure continues...

so if i havnt been able to talk with you personally i apologize, but the adventure has continued after the 6 mo dts. during the school i began to date one of the girls that was part of the trip that just happened to be finnish. so now iäm typing in finland wondering where my crazy choices in this life could take me.
so far the finnnish experience has been great and for the most part i've met all the family and freinds (almost) as her most prized souvenir from the trip. everyone has been very welcoming including both of her parents who offered me a beer right after they met me (man, they really know how to make a guy feel at home). for the most part everyone speaks english or at least a little bit, except her dad who is hilarious. think of larry the cable guys with a deep voice mixed with mr.bean idioscyncrasies and youäve got her dad; o and he's a farmer. actually all of her family owns and operates farms, ranches or some derivative there of. everyone has roots here its amazing history lesson every time i meet someone new. the house my girlfriend lives in is 200 years old and has been in the family for 100 along with postings in many articles of papers and magazines.
last week i was able to ice fishing with her grandfather. it was quite the rush going from sub-zero kirgistan to hot socal for a few weeks and back to snow and ice, but its warmer now. everyone has a cottage next to a lake because there are more lakes here than minnesota, if you can imagine. the finnish have an affinity for salted licorice called salmiakki that is quite disgusting. they really donät eat dinner because the big meal is at lunch so think bread and cheese for all other meals and everyone has tea time in the afternoon, everyone. also if you didnät know they have this obsession with saunas. everyone has one, even small apartments have one that looks like a closet for two. her dad built a traditional one that is fired with wood for hours and provides a more natural experience along with the whole being naked deal (ya there's no being broken into a family like stripping down and getting all close and hot together). oh, and of course thereäs the whole polar bear deal: ya after sauna they have this tradition of jumping into the whole they break in the ice lake and then getting into a hot tube and it wasnät as bad as you might think, but damn it was cold.
we visited helsinki the last few days. its a nice european city obsessed with design and fashion. think san francisco but more clean and about 12 degrees colder and just as windy. back at her dad's farm its now time to pick eggs in the evening, pheasant eggs (a side business her dad began about 15 years ago).
that's about it for now, iäm off to a lakeside cottage for easter bbq. i'll post pics in a few days if i can and hopefully see most of you at the end of the month. my apologies if you do not receive a post card b-c i would get back before the postcard :)