Erilainen.

I want this post to be different than the rest. Usually, I write random things and I may refer back to them to either remember what I wrote about last time or to show someone pictures of Finland or the apartment. But I want this post to be something that I refer back to whenever I need to remind myself of what I've accomplished here.

It's no secret: moving to a different country is really hard and really scary. But I, like 99% of people [I'm convinced that made-up statistic is correct] was expecting the hard and scary but without actually thinking too much about it because then that fear might hold you back. In any case, I just wanted to make a list of the things I've accomplished so far in my time here and of the things I'm most grateful for.

But first, a short note on goals. For as far back as I can remember, I've been in school. I do not remember a time when I wasn't. Or if I have distant memories of that time, they don't factor in a whole week's worth of events. Studying shapes up in a very specific way. There are lessons, homework, group assignments, presentations, grades, results and of course, summer vacation. None of this is new to any of you, I hope. That system gets you in the habit of always knowing what to anticipate. It might be a dreaded result, I remember being in grade 4 and feeling pretty discouraged about the EIGHT remaining years of school. Still, imagine kindergarten kids! They don't even realize that they likely have as many as 22 years of school ahead of them. Some people become academics, teachers, professors and, in a way, always revolve around a school calendar. Others don't. What you don't anticipate though is the big black void of nothingness that follows the end of your life in school. And although I did get accepted to study for my Master's in September, that void is something I've now learned more about and will know to anticipate again, while I figure myself out in the next 2 years.

Things I've accomplished so far...
- Learned about big black void.
- Narrowed down some career possibilities [this had previously been done by the process of elimination so it was horribly slow and inefficient.]
- Learned to cook!
- Learned to eat healthy food!
- Stayed away from sugar, white flour, alcohol and bread for 3 months. [Don't think this is a big deal? You try.]
- Made friends in a completely foreign place.
- Learned to plan a day out of completely nothing! [Mind you, I haven't mastered this quite yet.]
- Got accepted to a Master's of Science in Marketing at a Swedish-speaking university in Helsinki.
- Scored a 650 on my GMAT.
- Learned how to say interior designer in Finnish. [Sisustussuunnittelija]
- Learned my way around Tampere.
- Learned how to ask questions in shops in Finnish... without being afraid.
- Provided e-support through Skype or phone whenever the occasion arose.
- Organized a Finnish language summer class for people interested. [Although the idea wasn't mine, it was Anne's. And I really hope people show up next week!]
- Speak Finnish with Juha, so long as we don't need to tell really long stories.
- From Start to Finnish by Leila White.
- I can follow along with the Finnish subtitles while watching Cold Feet and if I don't understand what they say in English [because their accents are so thick at times] I sometimes understand the Finnish translation. And the general gist of the subtitles makes complete sense to me now.

...
I can't think of other stuff right now but I'll can always come back later.

Things I'm really grateful for...
- My parents, family, friends [from all over] and Juha for continual support.
- Finnish summers.
- Finnish winters.
- The light after dark.
- Our apartment.
- Hanken.
- H&M [haha!]
- Pyynikin näkötorni.
- Canada.
- pretty much everything in between...
...
And again, I can't think of much else.

So thank you for listening, even though this post was written more for myself than for anyone else.

Cheer Up!

This post is for my dear friend who is very sad today.

Step 1) Open browser.
Step 2) Enter link.
Step 3) Search puppy post.
Step 4) Cheer up!







N.B. These are not my puppies; these are not my pictures. Google puppies or dachshund.

Bundle of randomness.

ZOMG. I have lots to update BUT TODAY was a very important day - it still is - because today was the day that Hanken published it's admission decisions. I was really uncertain about how that would go, especially following my last 2 rejections letter. I turned on my computer, checked my email but they hadn't written me yet. I checked my other email, my Facebook, etc... and then noticed a new email. And yes, I GOT IN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There are two main reasons for all those exclamation marks:
a) I get to stay in Finland, worry-free for 2 years.
b) I didn't have half the prerequisites they specifically asked for but I did have a strong application [I got more adamant about this as time went on haha.] so I'm really happy they didn't just say no because I hadn't taken a few extra marketing courses. [Now I'm just hoping that this wasn't a mistake and that I won't get another email later telling me that I got the wrong email. That is however, highly unlikely.]

In other news, not that I can focus on anything else right now, SUMMER IS HERE! I love summer. And I welcome the sun and the heat... but my brain doesn't function so well in them. I may have to buy a hat or something. I get really dazed. I think I drank over 2 liters of water yesterday and it still wasn't enough. Mind you, I did spend most of yesterday keeping Juha company during work. So I wasn't even actually in the sun!

Last week, Eeva and I had our usual Kokkikerho [cooking club] and cooked up one of my favourite dishes so far: Mediterranean Vegetable Rice Pie - A-M-A-Zing! I can't wait to make that again.

Thursday Mia and I went to Koskenranta and ate an avocado. It wasn't meant to be a picnic or anything, but rather, a sampling of avocado. [She'd never had it before!] We also went to 3 different coffee shops trying to find decaf coffee before finally settling on a decaf cappuccino from Cafe Europa.

Friday was very confusing. I wanted to see an exhibit at TR1 on the Finlayson grounds and asked Kate to come but her phone was dead and things got complicated haha. I ended up at the park with Heikki, who was studying math. Then Mia came and we all spoke Finnish. Then Juha came with some coffee and Batchi Balls [sp?] and we played [more Finnish!]. Needless to say, it was a great day to practice Finnish. After that, Juha and I headed over to that exhibit and later took a walk around Keskustori, where Finland's first McDonald's [25 years old] had burned down that day. Along with it went several +1M euro flats that were newly renovated and situated on top. The street was closed down for hours and I think the area is still taped-off.

Friday evening I had dinner at WokWok with Mia before she left for Italy! Mia's mom also came by! I later finished my dinner at Jonne's with Jonne, Anne and Juha while watching the hockey game. Belarus vs. Finland was pretty slow and uneventful but Finland won 3-0 in the end! We had lots of time to chat and catch-up. Anne had just gotten back from a trip to Prague and Copenhagen.

Saturday was Juha's Birthday!!!! We delivered some flowers in the morning [work-related] and then had most of the day to enjoy without having to worry about work. We lazed around, had lunch at 2h+k [2 huonea ja keittiö - 2 rooms and a kitchen], went for a short walk through the park, went grocery shopping, went to Nina's tuparit [unofficial /house warming], met up with Heikki, met up with Tuomo, ran into Antti, met up with Jonne 2, went to Doris, met up with Jonne 1, went to Tillikka [it was closed], went to Armas, met up with Eeva. Called Pena, went home, fell asleep in random places, woke up, went to bed!

And now I'm burning with impatience to check out what courses and such Hanken has!!

P.S. We bought our tickets to China last night. June 20-29th, Shanghai here we come!

Leaving notes for one's self...

Note to self: Stop living vicariously through TV shows.

On that note, check out How To Make it in America on HBO. Awesome.

May Kick-off post!

Dear friends and family,

It has been a rather interesting week here in Tampere. Upon returning from Germany, much of the information I'd been waiting on for the past couple months was delivered to me this week [Nokia-Siemens is out]. First off though, I hung out with Lauren on Tuesday - she brought hummus, we made stove-top popcorn - it was a delicious evening!

Wednesday I received a rejection letter from Aalto University. I'd applied to their International Design Business Management program back in February. Sadly, I can't fight their decision. 1/3 of the application is work experience and I just couldn't compete with the 1104 other applicants. The rankings they give you are out of 15 and since 5 of those points are for work experience, I ended up with a 9. I can't complain though. If I would've had relevant work experience (counted in years), I would've gotten in for sure.

Since getting that letter and having absolutely no other options to pursue at Aalto, I decided to appeal the first decision from Uni. Helsinki, which I found was very subjective. I wrote them a well-constructed letter today explaining that my undergraduate degree isn't way off base for this master's I applied to. I have no idea if this will make any sort of difference whatsoever, but in the meantime, I felt that at least I could do something with it!

Last night, Eeva came over and we began a kokkikerhu! (Cooking club) We want to meet regularly and make food so that we can both develop our cooking skills and cook in good company - thus the club! We made Spinach Tofu-stuffed Zucchini and it was absolutely delicious! I didn't take a picture and now that half the pan's been eaten, it wouldn't look professional to snap a shot but I'll be sure to capture it next time.

Today, I wrote my appeal in the morning, mailed it by 12:30 and met up with the WokWok crew around 1pm. Mia was there too so I got to see lots of friendly, familiar faces in one place. Nina had her car so I got a ride home after lunch and here I am. I started scanning through more job websites and found some interesting stuff. I'm going to keep applying and I'm also going to start applying to more permanent, full-time positions, especially in Tampere when I can find them. I can't rely 100% on getting into school so it's good to have other options. Nevertheless, I haven't yet bothered to get all stressed and work on a plan B in case all else fails. Either way, I actually want to be interested in the program I would be studying so I need to do some research into the universities as well and make sure that's where I want to spend the next 2 years of my life.

So for now, I'm just being patient for a few more days (I'm waiting on another decision May 17th.) and finding new opportunities through different media modes. [For example, I just joined Twitter this week! Look me up!]

Tidbits from my visit to Düsseldorf this past weekend.

I tried to keep the pictures in order this time. The daytime photos were taken Saturday and the night time photos...Saturday night/Sunday in the wee hours of the morning. The big party was for our family friends who celebrated their 50th birthdays and 30 year wedding anniversary this weekend.

Tidbits from my parents' visit to Tampere!

There is absolutely no order here so don't worry if you think you're missing the point on some cryptic comic-book plot.

Tuesday morning...

GAH! I just worked up the courage to call this company I've been meaning to apply to for the past week. I finally called and was told that Finnish would, basically, be required for the position. The position, in case you're interested, is as a Romanian interpreter... so... yeah, I'm not sure how many dozens of other Finnish and Romanian-speaking candidates I'll be up against. But it won't hurt to apply.

And now, off to write a cover letter.

And tonight, Firefly party!

Saksassa.

There's always something disconcerting about flying with a discount airline. This is probably due to the fact that I grew up flying transatlantic, most often, and I'm used to the treatment offered by what I would call a "real" airline. What does this mean? Well... you check in at a regular airport, with lots of armed security guards and serious security measures. The airport is huge and you get a sense that you can connect to anywhere from that one place. You check your baggage, as per usual, at no extra fee and are allowed to carry 1 or 2 suitcases weighing 23kg each. You are obviously fed on the plane and your flight lasts over 6 hours. This is how most frequent-flyer North Americans travel. Now even though we complain about airline prices, we still yearn for a discount airline to fly us across the ocean or to the other side of the continent for $20. That would just be heavenly. But what we don't consider, are the perks we have to give up for the small price you pay.

Having recently moved (back) to Europe (again), I still haven't quite rapped my head around these short-haul flights. Especially not with an airline like Ryanair. As some of you may know, I took a little trip to Germany this weekend (I'm writing this from Dusseldorf right now) and I flew here with Ryanair...thus the disconcerting remarks.

I get to the tiny Tampere airport to check in and see a long like before me. There are no electronic signs flashing which line you should be standing in because it's very obvious: there is only one plane leaving the terminal and everyone in the airport will be on that plane. Check in is very unofficial. Instead of showing your passport so they can find you in the system, you show them a piece of paper you have to have printed ahead of time, otherwise you face a 40e fine for your lack of preparation. The woman checks my paperwork and I'm free to head towards security... does she even have a computer back there? I can swear it's just a keyboard without a monitor so it sounds like she did something. How does the system even work? IS there a system or would that set the airline back a couple thousand euros too far?

I "head" towards security, which is basically a continuation of the same line. The employees there seem to be more concerned about baggage restrictions rather than checking for bombs or forbidden items. The man standing in front of me was traveling with his wive and baby, who had stepped out of line to go PURCHASE a zip-lock bag for the affordable price of 3e (I knew to bring my own.). The security woman instantly attacked him "Sir. Yes, you. You have TWO bags. You are only permitted ONE bag." He looked at her... (confused as to why she was speaking English when he spoke Finnish, although of visible minority she assumed him to be English-speaking) and answered in Finnish that he's with his family. She eventually laid off him but I was asked to step in front of him to pass through security. I went through peacefully since none of my possessions seemed to arouse any suspicions.

The waiting area is a mess... there is one place to wait, but the room morphs into two sections and the seating area is movable, since it consists of chairs instead of seats that are screwed into the ground. This doesn't seem like a big deal, and it really isn't if you think about it, but the airport just gives you a sense of ... cheap... and cheap usually comes with some sort of assumptions on quality... and a cheap plane is the last thing you want. Anyway, I fought my way to get a decent seat and ended up with a window seat, my preferred option. Thank God for Juha and his noise-canceling headphones. I had charged and re-synced my iPod for the first time in 4 months before getting on the plane and realized that it had only loaded songs by artists A and B... so every artist starting with C to Z didn't make it. Nevertheless, I enjoyed Badly Drawn Boy for the entire flight and managed to drown out the loud talking and plane engine noise.

Now there's a weird phenomenon that takes place on these discount flights... somehow, people act less civilized because they pay less for their ticket. I'm not sure what it is but the air stewardess with a thick slavic accent had to ask us to quiet down and listen to the security video two times... repeating that "It's important and for your own safety!" Poor woman, we didn't really quiet down but the tape was played anyway. Then throughout the flight, you're constantly harassed by advertisements for smokeless cigarettes and deliciously-smelling pizza (nothing is free).

So here's the disconcerting part. As we began our decent, or what I supposed was the decent since no one said I couldn't wear my noise-canceling headphones and thus, I drowned out all the announcements, the turbulence started. It was a really cloudy and rainy day and we were jolted quite a bit. It wasn't too bad but enough to make you think, even if very briefly, that you hope nothing goes wrong. At one point, a girl even screamed, although I found that to be rather unnecessary. As we neared the ground, I noticed something seemed to be coming out of the wing... it looked like a stream of something... smoke, water, cloud...? I couldn't tell but was a little afraid. Still, I thought it must be normal since it seemed strangely familiar to me. (I later realized it was water because it was raining but not directly on the plane... just that the water was coming off the wing in a steady, small stream across the sky alongside us.) I busied myself by staring out the window the whole time and drowning out my surroundings. It was surprisingly helpful to picture myself on any other flight: Lufthansa, Air Canada... etc. Anything other than Ryanair, even if that seemed a little difficult since Ryanair is proudly scrawled into the plane's wing.

Now I've been on a hell of a lot of planes in my life, and I'm no pilot. I don't think I'd have the nerve to ever get in the pilot's seat for a lesson, or even do it professionally but I do have a keen sense of when the plane should take off the run-way and approximately what a smooth landing is going to look like. Nearing the ground and descending much faster than most landings I'd experienced before, I realized we were coming down pretty hard. Instead of a smooth landing, the pilot somehow slammed us down on the strip and people gasped a little. Nothing drastic, just that the whole discount image didn't make me feel as safe as usual. A few seconds later, that moronic trumpet goes off and everyone laughs. (There's a trumpet that welcomes you to whatever city and congratulated you on being on one of the 90% of Ryanair flights that arrive on time...because they inflate exaggerate their ETA to boost their ratings. No large feat.)

Now I may be sounding pretty bitter at this point but I really don't mean to. The flight was fine, I got from point A to point B without any problems and I paid much less than I would've on another airline (mostly because I knew the ins and outs... otherwise my ticket would've been an extra 40e if not printed, plastic bags are 3e and you need one, luggage is 10-15e/kg if not purchased ahead of time...etc). Still, being North American by pure habit, I can't deny that these trips don't make me a bit uneasy. Sure, we whine about high prices but for those prices, you get your perks too. No pesky announcements and NO trumpets. (That trumpet gets on my nerves every time... and what's worse is EVERYONE laughs. That will only encourage the trumpet further.)

But point being, when you fly with one of these airlines, people seem to consider their lives, hanging in the balance, much less seriously, while security and aircraft quality remain much the same. From a rough landing to laughing at a silly trumpet, it's purely a matter of perception and what each of us are used to. Still, I look forward to my transatlantic flight in late May with included meals, minimal announcements and my very own TV screen.