Oh yes! The last week and a half before we left it snowed, and not just pathetic slushy rubbish you get in England, but a good six inches of "oh my god where have my feet gone?" white crunchy snow! So iv spent that time being as giddy as a child and built snowmen and been sledding (not recommended in -11c temp though, a bit cold!).
Our last two weeks were generally spent getting ready to come home, ie buying last minute pressies, shutting bank accounts etc but we also got to see people from uni when we did the videolink for the problem based learning sessions, that was good.
We also managed to fit in going to see the local ice hockey team, Oulu Karpat, who are 2nd in the Finnish league. I was really excited about the match and it was fab, they proper barge each other into the sides and the lead point scorer for each team wears a gold helmet, how cool! Oulu won 4-3 but the match was so changeable that either could have won.
Unfortunately we had to come home. It was a strange concept that we would actually be going back to England and doing English things that it freaked me out a bit. Its weird, the past 3 months have flown by but at the same time it felt like we'd been there ages.
Lucky me had to get the train home to Leeds from the airport because my parents were on holiday but it was still nice to be home and I got to see all my family the days after. I also went up to Newcastle to visit my boyfriend for a few days as it was his 21st last Wednesday. We went to Newcastle dogs, that was a good laugh and I think we came off even so that's alright. He also had a party back home last Sunday which was fab because there were people there that we hadn't seen since 6th form!
So as I sit in my Salford flat typing this, avoiding the work i should be doing, I'm going to leave this as my last post because the rest of the year is going to be nowhere near as exciting as Finland. Iv had a fantastic time on the exchange and Id definitely recommend it! My highlights have been the air guitar contest, Santa and the huskie pups but its all been fab and Iv got no regrets. Its been a great opportunity to write this blog too and i hope anyone who's read it has enjoyed it too.
I suppose all that's left is "kiitos, hei" (thanks, bye)
27 November 2007
6 November 2007
The Christmas Edition
Ha Ha I´v tempted you with the prospect of Santa now, but I'm going to leave that until last...
Remember when we went to Tampere we met Debbies friend who lives there? well she came up to Oulu to visit us weekend before last which was cool as it was nice to see her again and apparently her friends have been like "when are they coming to Tampere again?". Shes been to Oulu quite a few times before so we were in a bit of a predicament with what to do with her. We ended up going out a lot as shed never been to 45 special before, and took her to this museum and just chilled out really.
That Sunday was Aarons birthday so we went out for a meal and had a mini party with a cake. We had another poker tournament and my winning streak was over I was first out ah well, the birthday boy won though so I think he was chuffed.
So yeah we went to Lapland! The Santa Village is next to the city of Rovaniemi which is where we stayed. Rovaniemi is pretty small but it was nice and it had a Lordi restaurant! Since winning Eurovision song contest Lordi have become gods in Finland, the kids love them and everything. The restaurant was cool it was like Addams family meets hard rock cafe because it had all these statues of Lordi and other monsters and then downstairs in the bar there were guitars etc given from bands, I was loving it.
This Finnish guy we once met on train from Tampere lives in Rovaniemi so he met up with us and took us to some pretty cool bars. We also ended up trying other Finnish spirits - we had more jaloviina, we tried this mint liquor and also tar liquor - its not that bad but it had a funny aftertaste. On the Sunday we went to this Arktikum museum because we couldn't get a bus or rent a car to go to the big arctic wildlife park they have up there which was a shame but the museum was alright.
Santa Claus is one cool guy. Hes also a giant, his hands were as big as my head! He was really funny though because obviously we´re not children so he didn't do the patronising "what do you want for Christmas little girls and boys?" He had a bit of banter with us like asking us whether were united or city fans (ahem neither) and to Me and Debbie he was like "are you girls good all the time or most of the time?" and "one of you come sit on my knee", pervy funny Santa :)
Remember when we went to Tampere we met Debbies friend who lives there? well she came up to Oulu to visit us weekend before last which was cool as it was nice to see her again and apparently her friends have been like "when are they coming to Tampere again?". Shes been to Oulu quite a few times before so we were in a bit of a predicament with what to do with her. We ended up going out a lot as shed never been to 45 special before, and took her to this museum and just chilled out really.
That Sunday was Aarons birthday so we went out for a meal and had a mini party with a cake. We had another poker tournament and my winning streak was over I was first out ah well, the birthday boy won though so I think he was chuffed.
So yeah we went to Lapland! The Santa Village is next to the city of Rovaniemi which is where we stayed. Rovaniemi is pretty small but it was nice and it had a Lordi restaurant! Since winning Eurovision song contest Lordi have become gods in Finland, the kids love them and everything. The restaurant was cool it was like Addams family meets hard rock cafe because it had all these statues of Lordi and other monsters and then downstairs in the bar there were guitars etc given from bands, I was loving it.
This Finnish guy we once met on train from Tampere lives in Rovaniemi so he met up with us and took us to some pretty cool bars. We also ended up trying other Finnish spirits - we had more jaloviina, we tried this mint liquor and also tar liquor - its not that bad but it had a funny aftertaste. On the Sunday we went to this Arktikum museum because we couldn't get a bus or rent a car to go to the big arctic wildlife park they have up there which was a shame but the museum was alright.
Santa Claus is one cool guy. Hes also a giant, his hands were as big as my head! He was really funny though because obviously we´re not children so he didn't do the patronising "what do you want for Christmas little girls and boys?" He had a bit of banter with us like asking us whether were united or city fans (ahem neither) and to Me and Debbie he was like "are you girls good all the time or most of the time?" and "one of you come sit on my knee", pervy funny Santa :)
Sorry about the blob from my flash but that's the photo we got done - 23 euros but theres no other way to get a pic with Santa. Santa village was very cute but we must have visited before the season started because i expected there to be elves and reindeer and little shows etc but there wasn't really anything apart from souvenir shops and a line where the arctic circle is. But it was still very cool, minus 7 in fact as the winter has now arrived, but no snow yet.
The next two weeks should be ok because we´re going to be doing our problem based learning meeting via video link, sod the work it´l be cool to see our mates on the big screen!
Well theres not much else to say so heres some photos...
This is Nallikari beach which is near Oulu, it was really nice there but unfortunately the weather wont be the same now.
This photo actually comes out quite well if you blow it up, this was the Mexican guy at the air guitar championships - he so should have won!
This is me (not the most flattering photo) on a bed of nails at the science museum in Oulu - dint even hurt either.
This cute little thing is a 6 week old husky puppy from the husky farm in Muonio. Such a sweety.
This view is fab, its from the top of the tower at the Olympic stadium in Helsinki, so would you believe, its a picture of Helsinki.
Finally this is the model of Lordi from the restaurant.
Well thats me for now, only got two weeks left...
24 October 2007
Weeks Holiday
So after a fun filled weekend in Muornio we had a short quite weekend back home just chilling out. We went to see that stardust film and it was really good so definitly recommend it i really enjoyed it. The good thing about finland is its probably not economic to dub films so they just subtitle them instead (probably why their english is so good too) so we actually understood it.
I finally took my week off! it was great because my boyfriend mark came up the first weekend until monday night, and then on the thursday i jetted off to helsinki for the weekend with my parents and grandparents meeting me there.
me and mark stayed round oulu and just went shopping and to the science museum and out for meals - hes now a fan of reindeer too. It was just really great to see him after nearly 2 months! one night we had a games night at our finnish friends house which was good, they had this game called carcasonne which we´ve never heard of but was easy enough - kind of like an elaborate game of dominos but you have to build a village type thing instead. then we played poker and in some very strange twist of fortunate events (since i still dont entirely know how to play properly) i won which was very cool so it was a good night in all.
i had a couple of days off to kill so one day went to this spa in nallikari, oh my god it was divine! i had this treatment where i had a back massage, then a face mask and massage, and then they put me in a bubbling jacuzzi and indian head massage. i may have to go back before we leave.
the hotel in helsinki was absolutly fabulous! i was so excited when i got into my room i had to ring mark and tell him there and then! the room was gorgeous and the tv even said "welcome madeleine steele, please pick language.." very posh! helsinki is a beautiful city which was good because i was half expecting it to be a bit of a dump. we spent the friday just wandering round looking at the shops and cathedrals and stuff and finding out whether there was anywhere that did the rugby the next night. we went out to this traditional lappish restaurant and it was fantastic, all the decoration inside was like being in a log cabin and the food was delicious (reindeer again). saturday we went to this island fortress called suomenlinna which was nice but it was really cold. we had a right fuss with the rugby though because this bar had told us we could watch it at midnight however debbie texted us in the middle of another fab meal telling us she was watching it at 10 so we only caught the last ten minutes! ah well there was a black jack table with the flukiest croupier in that bar too so that was a laugh. sunday we only really had the morning before we flew our separate ways so we just went to the olympic stadium and this winter garden. again it was just nice to see my family and my mum brought me goodies from england too. it was just torture getting up for work monday morning...
well again i was going to put some photos up but the city library wont let you upload anything so ah well until next time.
I finally took my week off! it was great because my boyfriend mark came up the first weekend until monday night, and then on the thursday i jetted off to helsinki for the weekend with my parents and grandparents meeting me there.
me and mark stayed round oulu and just went shopping and to the science museum and out for meals - hes now a fan of reindeer too. It was just really great to see him after nearly 2 months! one night we had a games night at our finnish friends house which was good, they had this game called carcasonne which we´ve never heard of but was easy enough - kind of like an elaborate game of dominos but you have to build a village type thing instead. then we played poker and in some very strange twist of fortunate events (since i still dont entirely know how to play properly) i won which was very cool so it was a good night in all.
i had a couple of days off to kill so one day went to this spa in nallikari, oh my god it was divine! i had this treatment where i had a back massage, then a face mask and massage, and then they put me in a bubbling jacuzzi and indian head massage. i may have to go back before we leave.
the hotel in helsinki was absolutly fabulous! i was so excited when i got into my room i had to ring mark and tell him there and then! the room was gorgeous and the tv even said "welcome madeleine steele, please pick language.." very posh! helsinki is a beautiful city which was good because i was half expecting it to be a bit of a dump. we spent the friday just wandering round looking at the shops and cathedrals and stuff and finding out whether there was anywhere that did the rugby the next night. we went out to this traditional lappish restaurant and it was fantastic, all the decoration inside was like being in a log cabin and the food was delicious (reindeer again). saturday we went to this island fortress called suomenlinna which was nice but it was really cold. we had a right fuss with the rugby though because this bar had told us we could watch it at midnight however debbie texted us in the middle of another fab meal telling us she was watching it at 10 so we only caught the last ten minutes! ah well there was a black jack table with the flukiest croupier in that bar too so that was a laugh. sunday we only really had the morning before we flew our separate ways so we just went to the olympic stadium and this winter garden. again it was just nice to see my family and my mum brought me goodies from england too. it was just torture getting up for work monday morning...
well again i was going to put some photos up but the city library wont let you upload anything so ah well until next time.
4 October 2007
Are you sitting comfortably?
Ok so I´m actually halfway through this exchange but I´v only just been sent the link from uni, so here goes the past six weeks...
At first we were mainly just finding our feet, ie moving in, sorting out bank accounts, buying a coat (didn´t think it would be cold in august!). Oulu isn´t the largest of cities anyway so its easy enough to figure out. Where we are living is fab, its more like a holiday home which is great compared to halls.
We visited this beach called Nallikari and went for a paddle and some food. Most of the holiday/ activity places are open during the summer in Finland so we arrived at a bad time but ah well. That night we went to the university open party - pretty much the universities hold a massive party for the students at the beginning of the year and a lot of the students tend to dress up in boiler suits which are colour coded for the different schools! it was novel at first but you see students round town in these jumpsuits and just think why? and do you ever wash? But yeah found out that the Finns favourite pastime during the winter is getting completely off their heads so its been a fun trip as you can imagine. We had to leave for a little while in the middle of the party however as we went to the AIR GUITAR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS!!! Oh my god it was, in no word of an understatement, awesome. There were people from all over doing a air guitar sequence to a song of their choice and the attention to detail ie tuning and everything was well good, then in second round they all had to do a performance to this ozzy osbourne song. There was a lot of wolfmother i was pleased to hear and one guy even did dueling banjos! I wanted this mexican guy to win because he was doing backflips and allsorts but Debbie wanted this french guy to win but unfortunatly it wa a bit like eurovision where a country wins just because of the country and not the act so this crap fat japanese guy won and he didnt even do anything good! The uk guys performance was a bit crap as well but what do you expect.
The next day we went to Sweden. Literally we got a trian north to Tornio and walked across the border. When we got there we kind of understood why people thought we were going to ikea - that was really the only thing there, so went for a chinese and went home but at least weve been now...
The next weekend we went to Tampere which they call the manchester of finland - no its much nicer than manchester! A friend of debbies lives there so it wa good because she took us out to some cool bars and clubs and we got to try Jaloviina which is a finnish shot - suposedly half purest vodka and half purest congac and its probably like drinking lighter fluid but ah well cant say were not embracing the finnsh culture.
In Tampere we visited the moomin museum (weve gone a little moomin crazy over here) which wa so sweet there were all these hand made models and the attention to detail was fantastic but you werent allowed to take pictures. Then there was the gift shop...
We also went to this spy museum which had loads of espionage stuff from the wars and then fun stuff like invisible ink. Apparently the guy who wrote james bond was a spy (but then again it figures)
We spent the whole of that sunday trying to find this stupid black sausage thing, which is supposedly a traditional food in Tampere, probably just black pudding, but couldnt get any. In finland everything is closed on sundays and so theres bugger all to do, only thing to do is travel so had 5 hour train journey in the pet carriage. This is wierd right, they have a carriage for pets and their owners but its like being in the twilight zone because theres no chaos - literally dogs and cats few feet from each other and they just sit there!
After all the excitment from the prevoius weekend we were going to have a nice quiet relaxing weekend, but no that ended up being a 4 night bender with a trip to a science museum on sat and a 12km hike on sunday. Nice one.
We went to a sauna party one night. Before I came here Id been warned that the finns really like their sauna and that they consider it a social thing however they go in naked apparently which isnt too appealing for this very modest brit! Fortunatly the party we went to isnt like everyones walking around naked, the sauna is a separate room and i dont think any of the girls there actually went in anyway (youd spend the rest of the night blowdrying your hair and getting ready all over again). But it was a good do got to meet the finnish radiography students and also two english lads who are staying in same halls as aaron. we have ventured into the sauna at our house with towels on and it is soooooo good!
There are I think a grand total of two nightclubs in Oulu - 45 special which is a damn good rock club and onnella which apparently has all kinds of music but i havent been yet. Fortunatly most bars dont close til 3 most nights anyway so its good. We generally tend to go to a bar called never grow old and 45 special. We went to see a band on the saturday but we thought the support act was the main guy so we thought wed gone to see this guy called Huoratron who we caught the last 5 mins of cos we didnt realsise he was on. Instead we were entertained by DJ Scotch egg who im embarrassed to admit is british and he was crap - any idiot can put nintendo themetunes to drum beats. The crowd was hilariuos though trying to dance it made my evening.
The science museum was pretty cool I think its more for kids but it had loads of cool stuff to do like a bed of nails to lay on (actually quite relaxing) whereas you wouldnt get anything like that in UK thanks to health and safety.
Last wekend we went to a town called Muonio which is in the heart of lapland (but not where santa lives - thats for later) it wasnt snowing or anything becasue its still autumn but it wa really pretty because theres loads of woodland in finland and this goes double in lapland. we saw the northern lights the first night - its so cool its like this big green ghost floating around the sky. saturday we went for this hike up this hill and went to the one pub for a cheeky few. sunday we went to this husky farm where they keep and train the dogs for sledding it was so cute there are aparently 420 dogs there and it sounds like they treat em and train them really well which is good and we got to hold the puppies! we also went for a meal and got to try reindeer, its really nice like really rich beef so will definitly have to have it again, just got to try bear now...
Weve tried to do some finnish things aswell. finnish people are really into nature (probably because theres so much around) so weve done things like hiking and fishing and mushroom picking - theres somethig really novel about running around a forest going "ooh a mushroom" and then picking it up. tradional finnish food tends to be fish in breadcrumbs served with mashed potatoes and weve had that in hospital canteen aswell as other meals but they are just a little bland. reindeer was good but i dont think il bother with lingonberry porrige again its just these sour berries and flour in a goo.
the hospital is ok. the language thing is a bit difficult but if you just get stuck in it seems to help and most of the staff have basic english. you just tend to notice the little differences like how they wear socks with sandals to work and how the patients just strip off in the room rather than put a gown on (that was a shock first time!)
well i was going to stick some photos in but my cameras battery has gone so itl have to be next time. at least from now on theyl be short and sweet.
At first we were mainly just finding our feet, ie moving in, sorting out bank accounts, buying a coat (didn´t think it would be cold in august!). Oulu isn´t the largest of cities anyway so its easy enough to figure out. Where we are living is fab, its more like a holiday home which is great compared to halls.
We visited this beach called Nallikari and went for a paddle and some food. Most of the holiday/ activity places are open during the summer in Finland so we arrived at a bad time but ah well. That night we went to the university open party - pretty much the universities hold a massive party for the students at the beginning of the year and a lot of the students tend to dress up in boiler suits which are colour coded for the different schools! it was novel at first but you see students round town in these jumpsuits and just think why? and do you ever wash? But yeah found out that the Finns favourite pastime during the winter is getting completely off their heads so its been a fun trip as you can imagine. We had to leave for a little while in the middle of the party however as we went to the AIR GUITAR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS!!! Oh my god it was, in no word of an understatement, awesome. There were people from all over doing a air guitar sequence to a song of their choice and the attention to detail ie tuning and everything was well good, then in second round they all had to do a performance to this ozzy osbourne song. There was a lot of wolfmother i was pleased to hear and one guy even did dueling banjos! I wanted this mexican guy to win because he was doing backflips and allsorts but Debbie wanted this french guy to win but unfortunatly it wa a bit like eurovision where a country wins just because of the country and not the act so this crap fat japanese guy won and he didnt even do anything good! The uk guys performance was a bit crap as well but what do you expect.
The next day we went to Sweden. Literally we got a trian north to Tornio and walked across the border. When we got there we kind of understood why people thought we were going to ikea - that was really the only thing there, so went for a chinese and went home but at least weve been now...
The next weekend we went to Tampere which they call the manchester of finland - no its much nicer than manchester! A friend of debbies lives there so it wa good because she took us out to some cool bars and clubs and we got to try Jaloviina which is a finnish shot - suposedly half purest vodka and half purest congac and its probably like drinking lighter fluid but ah well cant say were not embracing the finnsh culture.
In Tampere we visited the moomin museum (weve gone a little moomin crazy over here) which wa so sweet there were all these hand made models and the attention to detail was fantastic but you werent allowed to take pictures. Then there was the gift shop...
We also went to this spy museum which had loads of espionage stuff from the wars and then fun stuff like invisible ink. Apparently the guy who wrote james bond was a spy (but then again it figures)
We spent the whole of that sunday trying to find this stupid black sausage thing, which is supposedly a traditional food in Tampere, probably just black pudding, but couldnt get any. In finland everything is closed on sundays and so theres bugger all to do, only thing to do is travel so had 5 hour train journey in the pet carriage. This is wierd right, they have a carriage for pets and their owners but its like being in the twilight zone because theres no chaos - literally dogs and cats few feet from each other and they just sit there!
After all the excitment from the prevoius weekend we were going to have a nice quiet relaxing weekend, but no that ended up being a 4 night bender with a trip to a science museum on sat and a 12km hike on sunday. Nice one.
We went to a sauna party one night. Before I came here Id been warned that the finns really like their sauna and that they consider it a social thing however they go in naked apparently which isnt too appealing for this very modest brit! Fortunatly the party we went to isnt like everyones walking around naked, the sauna is a separate room and i dont think any of the girls there actually went in anyway (youd spend the rest of the night blowdrying your hair and getting ready all over again). But it was a good do got to meet the finnish radiography students and also two english lads who are staying in same halls as aaron. we have ventured into the sauna at our house with towels on and it is soooooo good!
There are I think a grand total of two nightclubs in Oulu - 45 special which is a damn good rock club and onnella which apparently has all kinds of music but i havent been yet. Fortunatly most bars dont close til 3 most nights anyway so its good. We generally tend to go to a bar called never grow old and 45 special. We went to see a band on the saturday but we thought the support act was the main guy so we thought wed gone to see this guy called Huoratron who we caught the last 5 mins of cos we didnt realsise he was on. Instead we were entertained by DJ Scotch egg who im embarrassed to admit is british and he was crap - any idiot can put nintendo themetunes to drum beats. The crowd was hilariuos though trying to dance it made my evening.
The science museum was pretty cool I think its more for kids but it had loads of cool stuff to do like a bed of nails to lay on (actually quite relaxing) whereas you wouldnt get anything like that in UK thanks to health and safety.
Last wekend we went to a town called Muonio which is in the heart of lapland (but not where santa lives - thats for later) it wasnt snowing or anything becasue its still autumn but it wa really pretty because theres loads of woodland in finland and this goes double in lapland. we saw the northern lights the first night - its so cool its like this big green ghost floating around the sky. saturday we went for this hike up this hill and went to the one pub for a cheeky few. sunday we went to this husky farm where they keep and train the dogs for sledding it was so cute there are aparently 420 dogs there and it sounds like they treat em and train them really well which is good and we got to hold the puppies! we also went for a meal and got to try reindeer, its really nice like really rich beef so will definitly have to have it again, just got to try bear now...
Weve tried to do some finnish things aswell. finnish people are really into nature (probably because theres so much around) so weve done things like hiking and fishing and mushroom picking - theres somethig really novel about running around a forest going "ooh a mushroom" and then picking it up. tradional finnish food tends to be fish in breadcrumbs served with mashed potatoes and weve had that in hospital canteen aswell as other meals but they are just a little bland. reindeer was good but i dont think il bother with lingonberry porrige again its just these sour berries and flour in a goo.
the hospital is ok. the language thing is a bit difficult but if you just get stuck in it seems to help and most of the staff have basic english. you just tend to notice the little differences like how they wear socks with sandals to work and how the patients just strip off in the room rather than put a gown on (that was a shock first time!)
well i was going to stick some photos in but my cameras battery has gone so itl have to be next time. at least from now on theyl be short and sweet.
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