WANHAT

WANHAT oli todennäköisesti paras päiväni Suomessa. Oikeasti erinomainen päivä.

Kiitos kaikille, kuka autaa ja järjestää! En osa kiittää tarpeeksi. Minun tanssi pari oli aivan mahtava, kiitos Joel! Sinä olit niin kärsivällinen, kun minä en ymmärtänyt. Joka tanssi tuntia oli hauska, ja minä tulen ikävä tanssista tunnista.

Mutta juu, oli upea päivä, ja en ikinä unohda! :D :D :D

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I don't know any words in English, French, German or Finnish that can do the vanhojen tanssit justice. It was an outstandingly fantastic day that I will never forget.

We had three performances of our dances, two in the morning and one in the evening. Though things went wrong in each of them, the overall performance was always well done. The shows consisted of ten traditional dances from around the world, including the Virginia Reel, the Salty Dog Rag, and the Finnish Tango. After the ten formal dances we had our oma tanssi, which means "own dance", which we choreographed ourselves.

I had an amazing partner, who put up with all of my stunned looks and moments of confusion. He was so patient in explaining what we were doing, and I don't think he'll ever understand how much I appreciated it!

A video of our oma tanssi can be found here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TB7VdePznGA. Some of the choreography won't make sense to you if you don't speak Finnish, but I feel I really need to explain the second song. The song is called koirakaveri by Heikki Kulla, and the name translates to "dog friend" (but it sounds much catchier in Finnish). I admit that I don't understand most of the song, but the guy wrote the song for a girl, saying he's like her dog, or something to do with dogs... and that's why the boys are crawling around on the floor. It might have been my favorite part of the dance, just for the humiliated faces of the guys. You could just see them thinking "Saatanan perkele, täs on uus puku" which roughly translates to "rolling around on the floor is the best. I should do this more often."
You might also notice that the song after Sexy Back - around 5:25 - uses the 'n-word' very frequently, and that it is not bleeped out! That's something I've noticed about Finland; they don't cut out the swear words. They do it sometimes if the swearing is in Finnish, but I hear F-bombs on the radio all the time, and I even heard an uncensored version of Classico!

Sadly, there isn't really much more I can say about this day, unless you want a list of "awesome" synonyms, so here, have a bunch of pictures! Hope you enjoy 'em! (HINT: click on the pictures to enlarge them. They aren't the best quality, I know, but it would take years to upload the full-sized ones!)

Always classy

Awe, girl look at that body.

WANHAT 2014!!

Penkkarit

En sano niin paljon tästä, mutta pitää kirjoittaa vähän suomeksi :P Penkkarit oli aivan mahtava. Minä mietin koko aja ’Miks meillä ei ole jotakin näin? Mää haluan heittää karkkia!’ Ehkä kun minulla on minun ylioppiston päättäjäiset, minä pukeutun odosti ja heitän karkkia. Kaikki olisi ’mitä hänen ongelmia? Ah niin, hän oli vaihto-oppilas. He ovat aivan outo, vaihto-oppilat.’

Se oli masentava, kun kaikki toisen vouden puhuvat ensi vuodesta (vau sori, tuo oli mahtava lause). Minä olen surullinen, että minä en ole täällä Muhoksella ensi vuonna... Mutta minä voin katsoa kaikki kuvat ja kuvitella minä olin tuossa!  

JK. En tiedä kennen idea se oli, että oppetaja tekevät Chubby Bunny, mutta voi ei se oli hauska. Hyvin tehty! 

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Penkkarit was everything that they said it would be, and it was awesome. I arrived at school to see some of the best and worst costumes ever. Every single Abi (third year) went all out, and the result was fantastic! The whole school piled into the gym for a presentation full of funny songs (at least, I think they were funny, haha), strange gifts to teachers, and little shows put on by the teachers. The highlights were when the teachers were asked to ‘act out what the Abis would be doing tonight’, which of course turned into a party scene with teachers throwing up, passed out on the floor, or being the classic Finnish boy and sitting in the corner with a drin- *cough cough* energy drink. This was the final product:

Four teachers were also selected to play the game ‘Chubby Bunny’ which is, for those who don’t know, a game where you have a plate of marshmallows and have to shove as many in your mouth as you can, but with the addition of each marshmallow must say/ attempt to say “Chubby Bunny”. Props to the Abis who thought of this because it was hilarious. I almost peed my pants watching, and half the audience had tears in their eyes. Here are some of the best photos I took, when my hands were steady enough to capture a photo:

After this assembly, the third years got to eat the cakes that myself and other second years made the day before. The parents of the third years also came to the school at this point to speak with the teachers and enjoy the rest of the festivities. Conveniently, there was a Finland men’s hockey game against Austria at that time, so most of the third years sat glued to the TV, as well as many of the dads and even moms. After some socializing, the fun began again for the Abis…

Each of the third years was carried out to these big trailers by second years. I really mean carried out. Once they were all loaded into the trailers, they thanked us by throwing candy for us. I spent most of the time dodging the tasty projectiles, because some of those kids had quite an arm! One of the teachers had a helmet on, and a big bucket to collect the candy. He was obviously a veteran, because I would have loved a helmet at that point. Then, with a chorus of screams from the third years, the trucks drove off down the street to visit all the elementary schools in the Muhos area. Thankfully the weather had warmed up from the -20 degrees we had the previous weeks, so we didn’t lose any third years to the cold.

(Kiitos paljon Jemiina kuvasta!)

While the third years were impaling children with candy, the second years were stuck cleaning up the mess. I actually had fun cleaning up, and managed to dodge all the icing in the cake fight… but it was depressing to hear the second years talking about how it’ll all be their turn next year. I have really started to feel a part of this school, and knowing that I won’t be here to throw candy and dress up with them is quite sad.

PS. The one on the left is a guy, if you couldn't tell.

SAM AND FRODO

All the third years in their crazy costumes

After this long day I went home and mentally prepared myself for the vanhojen tanssit, which were the next day. I am writing all about this in another post, which will be up soon…ish…maybe. Haha no promises :P 

Kaksi paras maa - The Two Best Countries

Moi kaikki!

Tänään on Penkkarit Muhoksen lukiossa, ja sitten on Vanhojen päivä huomiseksi! Voi ei olen jännittävä!!!! Ennen kuin kaikki alkaa, haluaisin kirjoittaa lyhyt posti.

Minä luulin, kun Olympia alkoi, että minä pystyin kannustaa suomen ja kanadalainen joukkuetta. Olen oppinut, naisen jääkiekon peliin jälkeen, että en pysty. Kun minä katsoin kanada/ suomi maanantaina, minä olin täysin Kanadalainen. Suomi on aivan mahtava, teidän maa on kaunis, erinomainen ja loistava! Mutta Kanada on minun kotimaa. Olen täysin Kanadalainen :D

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Hey readers!

Today is the much anticipated Penkkarit! I'm currently sitting at school, waiting for the festivities to start. I'm really excited for today and tomorrow, I'm almost jumping out of my skin with nervousness and jitters! So to take my mind off it I thought I'd give you all a little post to tide you over until I write my Penkkarit/ WANHAT post.

So yes, I hope you all know, the Sochi Olympics have started, and I have been watching it quite a lot, I think more than any other Olympics I've ever been alive to experience. One theory as to why is the fact that I now have two countries to cheer for! It's exhausting keeping up with all the darn hockey games, haha! I've had a lot of people ask me, in a friendly way (except one time that was very much not friendly), "if Canada and Finland are competing against each other, for example in a hockey game, who will you cheer for?" My answer is usually "both!" or "I'd be happy and sad at the same time every time there was a goal." I really believed I could cheer for both countries... Until the Canada/ Finland women's hockey game this Monday. I didn't say anything out loud, but I was very much cheering for Canada. I realised at that moment that, as much as I adore Finland and love the Finnish people, Canada is my home. It's my country, and I'm proud of it. Don't get me wrong, I still cheer for Finland all the time, and sometimes even cheer when they beat a Canadian! But when it comes to hockey, sorry Finland, but second place will have to do; the gold metal of my heart is going to Canada.