Blogs from Naantali, Southwest Finland, Finland, Europe - page 6

Well this journal entry is a little late but i didnt want to write about my first Rotary meeting until the pictures were sent to me! So a few Wednesday's ago Eija (my counsler) and her husband picked me up and drove me down to the harbor to a restaurant called WHAT? I was sporting a nice gray skirt and my lovely, pin covered, navy blue Rotary blazer. I had my laptop case over my arm and a stack of business cards in my pocket; i was ready to go. I walked into the restaurant and was greeted by at least 35 men. I was in shock. Yes, my Rotary club down here is a mens only association. Eija isn't even technically part of Rotary, she is just married to a Rotarian and she worked for ... read more

This morning at school I gave a few presentations to an English class in the Junior High. On my way to meet some friends in the media room I almost slipped on this big red carpet someone had layed down the middle of the hall. I pulled myself together then looked around. Almost everyone I saw was wearing a costume. There was royalty and pirates everywhere. Everyone was wearing crowns! The first person I recognized was Niko so I asked him what was going on; he told me it was TJ 100 Day. (of course I had no idea what that was) I was about to ask him what that meant but I was pulled in to a group of kids to get a picture taken. I got myself out of the mob near the door ... read more

Mom and Dad. I love you. You are both so amazing! Yesterday I had an early Christmas. I got home from school and Erkki said my package was here! He told me it was at customs because Mom had put gummy vites in it and I needed to go down to the harbor and declare them! I waited until Leena got home from work, we ate dinner and then Leena and I drove to the harbor. After getting lost in the harbor building and taking a SCARY lift up to the 4th floor we found the customs office. The lady laughed when I showed her what kind of vitamins were inside my package; she said they were fine! I could barely carry the package down the lift to the car it was so big! I almost ... read more

Friday: I talked to my parents this morning. It was fabulous! I absolutely love the webcam. It was 10:30pm there time and 7:30am my time! I was all dressed and ready for school early so I got online because I know a bunch of my friends from home are online at night New Mexico time! Mom and Dad were in bed on Mom’s laptop and their webcam is on the computer upstairs so they only saw and heard me but they were typing me questions and it was so much fun. I talked to them for almost 20 min before I had to leave for school! Today it was wet. I rode my bike to school in the rain and I was happy. I think it made me laugh when I realized I was in Finland ... read more

We are now officially not weeks behind in our blog but months. The life of a hectic traveller with no time too catch-up. Aaaaa! What a hard life I hear you say! Well no more excuses so here goes the start of it. So having been to the northern most point in Europe it was time to head back south through Finland. Our first stop was at a little village called Inari, in the Sami heartland (the local indigenous people). We camped next to a beautiful lake and ventured into the woods on our mountain bikes for a mountain trail of approximately 30km. The earlier part was mostly uphill and we took allot of strain(too much of the good life), however what goes up must come down! So we ended up tearing down very bumpy gravel ... read more