Puoliväli - Halfway

Yep, you read it right. I'm officially half way through my exchange. Holy crap-on-a-cracker. I was not prepared for this realisation.

I am now used to the quiet of my new host family, and though sometimes it is great to have some peace, I really miss the chaos of the Manninen family. I also really miss the kids; they were a great excuse for me to not do my homework... haha! The weirdest part about changing families was that I had made myself a system, a routine, which was completely flipped on its head; I had certain chores that I would do in the house, and certain places I'd put my things, and now it has all changed. I almost felt more culture shock changing between Finnish families than when I first arrived here. Thankfully, the Pulkka family has sauna as often as the Manninens, about once every two or three days, which was a real life-saver. My new host mother and father are very nice, and I enjoy spending time with them. I only spend about two months with the Pulkkas, which is disappointing, as I won’t have as much time to get to know them and feel comfortable and at home. But these are the cards I’ve been dealt, and I can’t change them!

Just over a week ago, my floorball team played in a tournament in Utajärvi. Oh yeah, I should mention: I'm on a floorball team. Last jakso (semester) my PE class played floorball and I volunteered to be the goalie. I had a lot of fun and I guess I was better than the average girl with no experience, because when my school made a floorball team they asked me if I would be their goalie. I agreed, and we had a practice where I attempted to figure out what the hell I was doing... then three days later we went to a tournament. Talk about baptism by fire!! I admit, I played rather poorly, but I learned little tricks from watching the opposing team's goal keepers. Despite my crap skills, our awesome team won all three games we played! GO MUHOS! We will be playing in more tournaments and games soon, once our exam week is over. Floorball is not the same as floor hockey, as I know a lot of you are assuming. I’d get into the details, but most of you probably aren’t super interested… but here’s the Wikipedia page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floorball)

This is my Floorball helmet. Note the design on the forehead... I thought it very appropriate

Oh exam week, how I adore thee... This jakso I had two Physics courses, Geography/ Earthsciences, Finnish Language, Music, and Dance class. My Finnish course is called äidenkieli, which means 'mother language'. This is a course for people who have spoken Finnish their whole lives. It's like English class in Canada. What the hell was I thinking? I've written three fairly awful essays this jakso, two were about 200 words, the other closer to 650. These would be a breeze in English, or even French, but they take me quite a while to write in Finnish. I learn a lot from writing the essays, and one of them my teacher actually took the time to correct my mistakes. I learned so much from her corrections, and also felt like crap at the same time. Oh well, constructive criticism is better than none at all! We also wrote part of our final exam today in school; it was the grammar part of the test (meaning we had to put commas in the right places, change the capital letters, all that kind of stuff…) and I GOT 50% ON MY TEST!! Oh my goodness gracious I was so damn excited. I don’t think anyone in the class at that moment was as happy as I was, because I passed the test! Awe yeees…

In the next few weeks, some interesting things will be happening at my lovely school... First off, the third years are currently spending their last week in school right now, and then will write their final 'in school' exams. The 13th of February is Penkkarit, the day where the third year lukio students are 'kicked out of the school'. On this day they dress up in crazy costumes and weird outfits and such. They also write a song for their teachers which they perform for the school. After that they all jump on a bus and throw candy at people on the street. This is too weird to make up :P I'm not 100% certain how everything works, since this is my first time in the Finnish school system, but this ritual happens every year. I'm really excited to see what will happen, and will give you blog readers many photos and a synopsis.

On the 14th of February, the day after the third years are kicked out, the second years perform in something called the vanhojen tanssit, which translates to 'the old dances'. The performance is sort of like a celebration of becoming the oldest in the school, and is sort of like Finnish prom. All the second year girls are fussing over the dresses they will buy and how they will do their hair... I'm going through Grad all over again, but this time I'm letting myself enjoy it. It helps that we get to dance, because I frakkin love dancing! I am honestly extremely excited for the 14th, and will be extremely sad when it is over. I want to dance all year :( I'm sure a lot of you Canadians have many questions about how this works, but right now I couldn't even answer your questions with much certainty. Trust me; there will be a long post about the dances, pictures, and maybe even videos! GAH! I feel like a 6-year-old girl at Christmas I'm so excited.

And now I really should get back to studying. Can’t promise another update anytime soon, with WANHAT (vanhojen tanssit), and exams and everything. The next post will be pretty long though. A lot is going to happen very soon!

Minun hullu joululoma – My Crazy Christmas Holiday

>>>English Below<<<

Joululoma on nyt loppu, mutta se oli aivan hauska! Lapset Kanadalainen eivät näe joulupukki ikinä, koska hän tule yöllä kun lapset nukkuvat, no täällä oli minun ensimmäinen kerta nähdä joulupukki! Se oli hirveästi hauska Miljan ja Vilman kanssa koska he olivät innostunut koko kuukauta! Melkein kaikki tiedä Kanadassa joka minä en tykä joulu, mutta täällä oli erilainen! Joulu on niin mahtava Suomessa!

Olen mennyt Amorphis konsertti Club Teatriassa, joka oli ihan mahtava. Club Teatria oli pienempi kuin minä luulin, mutta se oli parempi näin. Amorphis ja heidän ”opening band” oli Suomesta, mutta molemmat laulavat Englanniksi. Olen aina vaikuttunut kaikkin Englannin kielitaito, he laulavat melkein täydellinen Englantia!

Olen muuttunut isäntäperhe lomassa. Minun uusi perhe on täysin vastakohta kuin Manninen perhe: Pulkka perhe ei ole lapset, no se on hirveästi hilja täällä. Se on parempi jossa minä teen läksyt, mutta minä kaivaan kaikki Manninen talossa. Muuttun perhee on hyvä ja surkea yhtaikaa.

Ennen kuin tulen Suomessa, minä en ole ikinä ostanut ilotulitus, edes uusi vuosissa. Minun kaverit olivat järkyttynyt, koska melkein kaikki teke ilotulitus Suomessa. Olemme ostaneet ja olen näynyt ensimmäinen kerta... Se oli pelotava ja mahtava sama aika! Nyt minä kysyn miksi ei kukaan Kanadassa teke ilotulitus! Ensi uusi vuosi minä teen! (jos se on laillinen Kanadassa. Mää en tiiä todella...)

Another "boy friend". Sonja's this time.

Helping Vilma put decorations on the higher branches of the tree.

For the entire month of December, every other sentence my little host sisters spoke had the word “joulu” (Christmas) in it. Most of you know in Canada that I’m kind of a Grinch... but Christmas is very different here in Finland, especially with a six- and eight-year-old, whose excitement is so contagious it’s impossible not to get pumped up!

Kids in Finland are very lucky because they actually get to see Joulupukki (Santa Clause), unlike the North American kids who have never seen him. Santa visits all the houses in Finland on the 24^th of December where there have been good kids. Joulupukki came to the Manninen house at 17:30 on the 24^th, and the kids were so excited I thought they’d explode! Santa Clause distributed the presents to everyone and went on his way to the next house full of good kids. Sadly, Rudolph was feeling sick that day so he had to take his car. Good thing he’s from Finland, ‘cause it would be really hard to get to Canada without Rudolph!

The Manninen kids, myself and Joulupukki

Santa is getting pretty old, he needs Aapu's help to stand up!

At around 22:00 on the 24^th, the Manninen family all piled into the car and we visited the Muhos graveyard. I was a little confused as to why we were visiting, but when we got there I stopped wondering. On Christmas, many people in Finland visit their loved ones that have passed away, and lay candles by their graves. The Muhos graveyard was a truly breathtaking sight; the paths and stones were littered with candles that emitted a peaceful glow. Graveyards normally give me the creeps, but I would go back there any day. I attempted to take some photos with my phone, after checking with my host mom that it was okay, and so these are the best I have. It gives you an idea of what I saw, but sadly doesn't capture any of the magic.

Beautiful candles laid in the graveyard

I went to an Amorphis concert during the holiday, which was quite awesome. The venue, Club Teatria, was in Oulu and was much smaller than I had expected. The area was maybe about the size of the average high-school gym, but could have been expanded for a bigger concert. At the peak of the concert there were maybe about 200/300 people there, but that’s a really rough estimate. My friend and I had a really awesome place on the floor, and we could see the band really well. Because the venue was so small, the concert felt much more personal and more of a group event than a bunch of guys standing on a pedestal and all their worshippers standing below them. It was a nice atmosphere. The ringing in my ears after the concert was equal to a full day at a Highland Games, to give some of you some perspective (For those who don’t understand, I’ll just say “it was darn loud”). So now I can cross “metal concert” off my Bucket List, but I guarantee it won’t be my last.

During the holidays I also changed host families. My new family is a huge change from the Manninens; the Pulkka family have no kids, so the house is very quiet. It took me time to get used to the noise at the Manninen household, and now it’s taking time to get used to the quiet again. Though I really miss the Manninen family, I’m excited to experience Finland through this family. Changing families is really a bitter-sweet experience.

The amazing Manninen family in front of the Christmas tree

I’m not sure why no one in Canada buys their own fireworks on New Year’s Eve, but I gotta tell you Canadians: you’re missing out! In Finland, they go nuts with the little guys! On the 31^st of December their fantastic booming sound is heard almost constantly from 8pm until around 12:45 in the morning. I felt like a kid on Christmas! Fireworks were everywhere. You can buy fireworks at the age of 18 in Finland, so a friend of mine bought us a few and we fired them in his back yard. I was so terribly excited, but also terrified at the same time. I’d never seen fireworks so close up, so when we shot the first one I almost peed my pants! I shot one after I felt confident enough that it wouldn’t blow up in my face, and that was enough for me. At least I can say I did it! At midnight we walked around the neighbourhood and watched as other people unloaded their massive arsenals.

Our little stack of fireworks.

Hyvää Uutta Vuotta 2014!!!