Skiing on the Lake...

Our Finnish family, actually mama Anne, asked if we were available to get together for some winter sports. YES! So, we met up at the lake after work and their daughter, Julia, just so happens to wear the same size shoes as me...which meant I got to try her cross country skies. COOL! So, Anne and I skied around the lake while Charlie ice skated around the track. Anne drove us all back to the families house for sauna (Daddy Timo just renovated the sauna and bathroom in their apartment). What a nice way to relax after skiing. We finished the evening with Russian Earl Grey tea (remember Daddy Timo loves everything Russian) and Anne had some baked some savory pastries and homemade fruity cheesecake.

American Sunday Brunch with Sledding, Winter Biking & Ice-Skating!



Finnish bacon or Amerikan Pekoni?!

Our backyard...seriously!

One of our colleagues at the Institute where I do my research is an American who is married to a Finnish woman. They have two sons. We invited them over for an American Sunday brunch because their boys LOVE American breakfast and so do we, so why not enjoy it all together? We made scrambled eggs, Aunt Jemina pancakes, oat pancakes, bacon, hash browns, guacamole, and a fruit salad. YUM! Then, we all went sledding down the BIG hill that is about a 2-minute walk from our apartment. All I have to say is that I think sledding gets scarier as you age or at least my fear has increased.



The handlebars just disengaged...



Happy Charlie is BACK!



Classic! Look at those contradictory facial expressions.



After a little rest from the big breakfast and the sledding carnage, we tried our skills at biking in the snow. After about 2 minutes on the bike I heard Charlie spitting out cuzz words at a rapid pace and I turned around to see him holding up his handlebars that had dislodged from the body of his bike. Literally, the entire handlebar unit disengaged from the bike frame. He managed to stop without crashing and we walked the bikes back to our apartment. Wah wah!

We then decided walking to the lake would be a better idea. The lake has an ice skating track on it, that the city smooths out with a zamboni. So, our first time ice skating on our second-hand ice skates. COOL! Despite the rough ice, we managed to make it to the other side of the lake and enjoyed a hot drink in a cozy little hut. Life is an adventure!

Nice to Come Home to...

Ah, yeah. During the winter months, Finland may be lacking in the produce department, but not in the flower department. I came home to these beautiful flowers that my super-fiancé gifted me. Good thing my betrothed does not need training in the men-should-give-flowers-to-their-partners-more-than-just-on-Valentine's-day-and-major-holidays department. Kiitos, Charlie. 

Another Research Week...in Helsinki!

Someone carved "Helsinki" into the snowy steps.

Good news, I am nearing the end of conducting qualitative interviews for my PhD research project. (Yippee, another landmark in this long-winded PhD experience!) After this week in Helsinki I will have completed 20 interviews and only five more to go. Wow, this has been a process of discovery and I have actually really enjoyed the interviewing phase despite the zany planning and travel logistics. It would not be so bad, but I have chosen to research two universities in two different cities, so the scheduling of interviews and the travel means I spend a lot of time on email and in trains. Even so, I have enjoyed it...I really like connecting with people and qualitative interviewing allows a researcher (that's me) to build rapport with the respondents. There are times you feel like an investigator trying to get to the bottom of a mystery. Watch out Sherlock Holmes!

This time I stayed in the University of Helsinki international housing apartments, Töölö Towers, which are really nice and located in the center of the city. Charlie came down for the weekend and we went ring shopping (now that was f-u-n!). We both found very funky and cool designer rings at Union Design.

During my time in Helsinki I also experienced another big snowstorm, but it simply did not stop life in the big city. The Finns still continued their everyday routines, you saw moms with strollers, people jogging, and the trams and buses still moved people throughout the city. But, there was one fatality that resulted from this big dump...a woman was killed by falling ice-snow from the rooftops. Yeah, and here was the sign in our building warning us of the danger.

It's the LAST Day of School

...for the seniors in high school. Today, at 11:45 a.m. about 20 big lorries (trucks) carried the local high school seniors through the city center. The screaming teenagers dressed up in costumes and threw candy to the crowds (or shall I say pegged us in the head a few times with Finnish candy). This is yet another Finnish tradition, all kids do it. Although classes are over, they still have matriculation exams through the spring. Go, Angry Nerds!

Happy Valentine's Day with a RING!

Senate Square, Helsinki with LOVE!

I have BIG news to share...Charlie and I are tying the knot, gettin' hitched, making it legal, coming together in holy matrimony, or more eloquently becoming husband and wife! Charlie proposed to me a few weeks ago in a hot, hot, hot Finnish sauna (how apropos) and put a gaudy yet awesome golden dove (that really looks like a flying carp) on my finger (see photo).

Engagement ring (flying carp?!)

Now ladies do not judge, we actually picked out the real rings from a designer in Helsinki. In the midst of all our travels and an intensive academic week we are finally getting around to making it "public".  The time has actually allowed us, as a couple, to relish in and melt into the realities of marriage before jumping up and down with a ring on the finger and screaming from the mountain top, "I am getting married!" (Which is what I am doing now.) It has been a little weird not being able to tell people in person, as most of our close friends and family heard this news via Skype video calls or email. While email (and blog) is not my favorite way to communicate such news, in this day and age I suppose it is the most fluid way of communicating especially when you live a thousand of miles away from most of your cherished ones. All in all, we are both VERY happy and we look forward to building a future together full of compassion, playfulness, and love. At the same time we are also enjoying calling one another "fiancé" with a wicked French accent.

A cheesy and steamy photo taken in Lucca, Italy.

We are considering getting married in Finland...which would consist of a small court ceremony and a party at the sauna on the lake. For those of you in Colorado...get ready for a BIG party! Sometime in the next year, we will sojourn back to the motherland for a Colorado and Ohio (that is where Charlie is from) celebration. More details soon...

5 Days of Brain Gymnastics

Me with Sheila and Berit at the conference

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Italy, then the Arctic Circle, and now a visit from my PhD adviser from the U.S. Dr. Sheila Slaughter visited us in Jyväskylä, gave a few lectures, and then we all traveled down to Helsinki for an academic conference. Sheila was the keynote speaker and both Charlie and I gave presentations at the conference. While the week of academic gymnastics was fun, intellectually stimulating, and proved to be very important to drive my dissertation forward,

Charlie and Sheila: pre-sauna.

The swimming hole at the lake.

the real fun came when a group of us from the Finnish Institute for Educational Research (FIER) got together for a night at a traditional Finnish sauna called Savutuvan Apaja. Us ladies were lucky enough to get the sauna on the lake, while the men had a sauna far away from the lake. The beautiful antiquated wooden sauna was stocked with cold beverages of your choice (cider, beer, sparkling water, etc.), towels, and even the unique Finnish sauna shampoo and soaps. We enjoyed the hot sauna and then went for a few dips in the ice cold hole in the lake.

Before dipping in we had to break the thin layer of ice that formed on the exposed water with a shovel nicely placed next to the hole. After one hour of sauna we met up the men again in the candlelit dining hall where we enjoyed Finnish specialty foods including the ever-popular muikku fried fish (oh, and scrambled eggs for us vegetarians).

The UGA crew (or all of those affiliated with UGA) at the Nordic conference.

No Time to Unpack: We have a Birthday to Celebrate in the ARCTIC CIRCLE!

Our bags from Italy remained unpacked on our bedroom floor as we enjoyed a weekend in Rovaniemi, a small Finnish town in the Arctic Circle.The weekend was organized by the Fulbright Center, so our travel companions were fellow Fulbright grantees and their families. We stayed at the cozy Guesthouse Borealis, about a 10 minute walk outside of the city. We did not have much of a chance to "explore" the great arctic outdoors because it just so happened to be the coldest weekend in Finland (temperatures as low as -33C--yikes!) But, there were certainly many highlights of the weekend, despite the frost-biting weather. The Arctic Center, Arktikum, was our first excursion where we learned more about the Sami people, reindeer herding, and historical Rovaniemi. Honestly, I am not much of a museum diva, but when it is "arctic cold" outside a museum is a lovely place to spend the day. (Charlie even experienced pre-frostbite on the tip of his nose as we walked to the Arctic Center.) Plus, the reindeer herding photo exhibit was really amazing! In the afternoon we met Arctic center researchers and heard about their fascinating multidisciplinary projects on global climate change and the Sami people. We were also hosted by the University of Lapland and the international office invited us to enjoy the university sauna two nights during our stay, one of which we enjoyed a sauna party with other international students.


There was also a very unique opportunity presented to us...AVANTO--a swimming hole in the lake (without a sauna nearby). We were going to do it, but the freezing cold weather was just too much to fathom swimming in an ice cold hole in the lake, but others in our group were braver than us.


Of course, a trip to Rovaniemi would not be complete without a visit to the inauthentic Santa's village. Seriously, this place was a tourist trap (not a big fan)! Photos with Santa cost 20 euro and all writing was in English. We stayed one hour, snapped photos with the REAL reindeer, and then we hopped back on the bus.


We celebrated Charlie's birthday this weekend with a big traditional Finnish birthday cake. Happy 30-something, my romantic dude!

Argh! Technical Difficulties...

A whirlwind of F-U-N...in the midst of tech difficulties!

I am way behind on my blog! The last four weeks have been crazy GOOD...but left no time for creative play with my photos or writing blog entries. Apologies to my frequent blog readers which seems to be two mothers, one in Colorado and one in Ohio. Another problem that has recently depleted my blog dedication is the new YouTube copyright infringement crack-down. Argh! I love to make videos of my/our travels and normally I will very carefully choose music to play in the background to highlight the mood. YouTube has now decided to come down on these sorts of video projects with an iron fist...and most of my videos, posted on the blog, are now blocked. So, some of my free time, that would have been spent writing my blog, has been spent investigating this. Anyway, long story short...I will post an Arctic Circle entry soon. And, sorry about the videos...it sucks!