Finland Bound!

Hey everyone! It's time for my little series, "My Neck of the Woods."  This week I'm very excited to have my wonderful friend Sabrina give us a peek of....

 

What's unique about this post is that Sabrina isn't originally from Finland.  She's from another European country and decided to move to Finland some years ago.  I think that's pretty cool.  If I could pick up and move to another country, I definitely would.

Take it away Sabrina!

1.  Tell us about yourself!

First of all, thanks a lot Erin for making me part of this!  So, my name is Sabrina. I was born on December 9th 1984, which makes me currently 26. I was born in Cologne, Germany and lived there most of my life. For about three years I call Finland my home where my fiance is from, Antti. We live in this tiny town with our three monsters, aka, the cats -- our two ladies Jenny and Socks from Dubai and the crazy kitten Merlin.  I love to spend time at home with them and Antti, relaxing on the couch, watching a movie and write a letter. I am such a movie-o-holic. We watch something all of the time, same as I am always writing something. A letter, my diary, scribbling or drawing something. I am not much of a party girl, I rather spend time with family and friends. :)

I work in a coffee shop/bakery but I am trying to get into university this year. We also recently got engaged and are in the process of planing a wedding. So this year I am all about new and fresh starts! :)

2.  Can you tell us about your town?

Well, originally I am from Germany, but since three years I live in southern Finland. This is my home now. A big part of my life is work. I am working in a shopping center, which is mentioned later again, in a lovely coffee place. So naturally I spend a lot of time there. The place holds a lot of amazing memories for me from a former job. A lot of fun and being silly.

Another place I spend a lot of time at is a lake called Pannujärvi, mostly in summer, when we go there to swim.

Very important to me is a town named Hämeenlinna, 27 km from Tuulos. Hämeenlinna is a place full of history itself. There is a magical medieval castle called “Häme castle”, we have the birth home of one of Finnland's most famous composers, Jean Sibelius... and then we have what is most important to me... HPK! HPK is the ice hockey team from Hämeenlinna and this sport has become a passion of mine. Watching of course, I can not skate to save my life. ;) I go to see games as often as my time and money allows. The atmosphere is magical, I love it. The best was the winning of the Championship in 2006. ♥

I have two favorite restaurants there, which we like to visit from time to time. Pancho Villa is a Mexican restaurant with the best bean tortillas and burgers. The second place is a pizza place, maybe not the fanciest place but the pizzas are huge, cheap and simply delicious. You can find them at “Don Sergio's”.

 

 In Hämeenlinna we have a park area called Aulanko. It's nature at it's finest. There is a viewing tower with the most amazing view over Hämeenlinna. You can go for walks, hike and ski in the winter. As we have something called “Everyman's Right” in Finland, in such areas you can pick berries and mushrooms.

But mostly I am just with my family and friends. My amazing friend Jonna, Antti and his family... home is where the heart is. :) And I made this my second home!

3. What is life in Tuulos like?

I had to chuckle when I read this one. L-I-F-E in Tuulos, oh boy. The thing is, there is NO life in Tuulos, which is exactly what I love about this place. It is silent, there is a lot of nature around, lakes, woods... you get the picture. Another reason why I like it so much, the cats can run around freely, they love to climb trees, our Dubai monsters. In summer we go out to the lakes to swim. No swimming pools. Midnight swims are amazing. It is completely silent – if you ignore the mosquitoes. ;) At winter time, we have lots and lots – too much – of snow. It looks beautiful, definitely, but.... after all, it is snow, cold and slippery. But on a bright and sunny day, it feels like a Winter Wonderland.

Technically there is no Tuulos by itself anymore. On January 1st 2009 Tuulos was consolidated with Hämeenlinna. It is located in the province of Southern Finland and is part of the Tavastia Proper region. Wikipedia informed me, that in 2003 we had a population of 1536 inhabitants, probably counting us now, 1538! Wikipedia also knows that there is an covered area of 171.24 km² of which 13.14 km² is water. The population density is 9.7 inhabitants per km². 

What Wikipedia does not know, that in the actual center of Tuulos we have no stores at all, though have a library. If we need something we need to drive four kilometers to the shopping center called Tuulonen, in the middle of nowhere. When I was working in the tourist info there, a Canadian once asked me “Why the heck do you build anything like that big in the middle of nowhere??” Well, for us it is not that much of nowhere, two of Finland's bigger roads cross there and the summers actually do get busy.

Some people may think this is place is boring and dead and they could never live that “remote”, but I love it. When I want to go out, I just drive to Hämeenlinna, there is everything I need, cinema and ice hockey. ;)

4.  What are some traditions/major holidays you celebrate?

In Finland we celebrate of course the typical holidays most parts of Europe also celebrate. Christmas for example. I can not really say a lot about the Finnish Christmas as out of 26 Christmases in my life, I celebrated 25 in Germany. So, for our family here, very traditional are the sauna on Christmas Eve, preparing the food, like a huge Christmas Ham and different casseroles like carrot or minced meat. We also decorated a Christmas tree taken from the own yard. Santa Claus aka "Joulupukki" brought us the presents in the evening. This might be different from how other Finnish families celebrate, this is our way. :) Oh yeah, we celebrate Christmas on December 24th. Also New Years Eve we celebrate on the 31st of December. Shooting rockets at midnight, and melting tin. The hot tin is poured into a bucket of hot water and we try to interpret our future from the shape of the tin.
Very Finnish/Scandinavian are the next two holidays I am going to mention. In Finland, Walpurgis Day (Vappu) is one of the biggest carnival-style festival held in the streets of Finland's towns and cities (though, being from one of Germany's major Carnival cities, you can not compare the two). The celebration, which begins on the evening of 30 April and continues to 1 May, typically centers on copious consumption of sparkling wine and other alcoholic beverages. One tradition is to drink sima, a home-made mead, along with freshly cooked doughnuts. We always make sima on Vappu, but we never really celebrate, as I mostly worked on this day. :) Making sima is pretty simple, just remember not to use a lot of yeast, or your whole kitchen will be covered in sticky sima and raisins... O.o
 

Next one to mention is Midsummer aka Juhannus in Finnish. In the Finnish midsummer celebration, bonfires (kokko) are very common and are burnt at lakesides and by the sea.  In folk magic, midsummer was a very potent night and the time for many small rituals, mostly for young maidens seeking suitors and fertility. An important feature of the midsummer in Finland is the white night and the midnight sun.  It is so beautiful to see. We have spent one Midsummer in Lapland and it is really light all night long. We climbed the second highest mountain in the evening and it was light. That is because of Finland's location spanning around the Arctic Circle. Nights are, if, very short. It is a really weird contrast between summer and winter. 

The last two years we spent the holiday in central Finland at a flight show. The Finnish Air Force, the Midnight Hawks, performed there. And as Finland being Finland, there is always heavy drinking involved. That is actually the sad part of it, to open the newspaper and read how many people have drowned in the lakes because of alcohol.

5. What does pen palling mean to you?

Penpalling has always been a big part of my life. I started in 2001 through a Friendship Book I received from a friend at home. I always loved writing letters to friends, so I thought, writing letters to people abroad? Cool! Why not! My first pen pal was funnily from Finland. The one who really got stuck in my mind is a Portuguese girl called Maria Joao. Maria, if you read this and miss me as much as I miss you, find me! :D (Sorry Erin, I had to use your blog for that ;))

Especially last year I had the chance to meet some of my pen pals and it was a great experience to see that they are exactly what I imagined them to be. I hope there are more pen pal meetings coming in 2011. The pen pals I have now are incredibly important to me. They know me better than most people do and I trust them so much. Letters are some kind of therapy. You can be yourself, you can ask for advice. You can give advice back. It is not just some writing on paper, it is a real friendship. Thanks to all my lovely pals for being there, you are amazing and I would not want to miss you anymore! I think penpalling will always be a part of my life. 

6.  Can you give us a sneak peek of your life?

Below are some photos Sabrina managed to send my way.  Thank you!!

Church of Tuulos

Tuulos

Home

My garden in autumn

From my yard

Tower in Hämeenlinna

View from Tower

Merlin and me!

Merlin

The cats

HPK!

Jonna, Michael and I

Me!

Work

I want to thank Sabrina SOOO much for taking part in my feature!  This makes me want to come visit Finland even more.  The landscape actually reminds me a bit of northern Alberta.  :)

If you're interested in telling us about where you live, e-mail me!  eeegadserin (at) gmail (dot) com.

Much love,

~E