Back to School!

Back at school this week, on Tuesday there was a special sort of panel of speakers in the culture house related to the current election. My friends translated a few of the questions for me and it seemed like something I would really get into. They discussed things like Finland’s immigrants and government support for students etc. Our sport class switched to Basketball this week and the guys in my class are hilarious! There were pyramids, somersaults and tackling! At the end of our lesson the teacher got out the mini tramp so we could do slam dunks, cool teacher much? I went bowling with my rotary club that afternoon which was really nice and good for my Finnish too because they insist on speaking to me in Finnish even though I barely understand what they are saying! I came home that afternoon to find a parcel from Lisa with chocolate and Vegemite! I did lots of writing this week, letters and postcards.

On Thursday I went to the stationery shop and bought some coloured pens and a Moomin pencil case. Moomin stuff here is really expensive! You could stick a Moomin picture on a rock and sell it for 5 Euros but I guess I can’t critique because I love it! (The pencil case that is, not the rock) That evening was the night of the really cool moon so there was a special skiing track set up on the lake. It was my second time skiing and thankfully it was only flat so I didn’t have to worry about uphill! It was tough at first but once you get used to the action it doesn’t hurt so much. We got to have warm juice by the campfire and the trip back was in the dark and the moon made everything glow which was really awesome. I was actually really proud of myself that night because it was tough work that at the start wasn’t that enjoyable but I stuck at it and it was great fun by the end. I guess a lot of things are like this on exchange, you might find things different or difficult but I guarantee if you keep up with it you’ll start to wonder why you didn’t like it to start with! I have had this with a lot of foods too, like fried egg and capsicum. Both foods I never really liked or ate in Australia but love now!

We had porridge for lunch at school on Friday which I thought was hilarious! I really need to do a “normal school day” post soon; I promise it is on my list! Antti was the only one home this weekend and on Friday the snow was perfect for snowballs so we had a snow fight and made my first ever snowman, although I didn’t really do much of it! It had a name, but I’ve forgotten it. We played guitar hero after that and I am getting pretty good at it.

Our Snowman

Cool photo! 

On Saturday my host mum brought Tiina and I to the school to go ice-skating! I’d skated before but I wasn’t very good and I was terrified I was going to smash my head open on the ice! We didn’t skate for very long and after we went to the shops to buy stuff for my cooking. We went to family friend’s house after that and it was really nice to meet them, somehow I was actually part of the conversation even though it was in Finnish! I fooled even myself! We had a really delicious dinner and then watched a movie and had ice-cream. When we got home we played guitar hero for almost 4 hours and it was super late when we all went to sleep.

Sunday was my day for doing a bit of cooking and I was making ANZAC biscuits first up. I had just assumed that because Finland uses the metric system they would use the same cups etc. I was very wrong. They use decilitres, I had heard of these a few times in maths before but it was very confusing especially since I was using an Australian recipe! It was actually quite stressful as I had no idea if I was doing the right amounts of everything. In the end, I had the right amount of butter and golden syrup but not of flour, sugar etc so they were very oily and a bit crunchy. They were still good though and I now knew to change it next time. The next recipe I attempted was a Sticky Date Pudding. I know it’s not very Australian but my dad makes the best Sticky date and I just really wanted to make it. The pudding was really good but definitely not as good as my dads. I made fried rice for dinner and again very Australian! It was tasty though and it was nice to have a food I love from Oz. I literally collapsed on the couch after that, I was drained! Cooking in a foreign country is exhausting! Also I didn't take any photos which I was pretty disappointed about.