A Life in Waiting

After the fun night out on Friday, the rest of the weekend and beginnings of the next week were more of a relaxed pace.  Saturday afternoon Maria’s cousin Tommi picked me up and we went to watch the local hockey team take on one of its rivals from Tampere, a city up north.  This was not my first hockey experience in Finland so it wasn’t anything new to me anymore, but still a great experience.  The one thing that I still find to be interesting is that during the break between periods everyone heads into the corridors for a beer.  Okay, same as in the states.  The difference is that instead of cheesy little beer stands where you get your beer in a plastic or paper cup, there are full blown out bars on either side of the rink serving beers and drinks as if you were at a downtown pub.  Real glass mugs and high-top bar tables all over for everyone to gather and discuss the previous action.  Once again, just a difference in the social drinking habits. 

After the game Tommi and I parted ways and I met Maria in the center for dinner.  We ended up at this huge Czech restaurant right in the center that was four full floors of restaurant.  A nice evening out in the city.

Sunday was a typical lazy day which ended at Maria’s parents for yet another great dinner.  Seems like every time we go there for dinner Maria’s mother, Aila, uses it as an excuse to try some new recipe.  And it’s worked out in our favor every time so far.  After dinner we sped home so I wouldn’t miss a minute of Conference Finals playoff football that conveniently began at 10 o’clock at night and ran straight through to 5 in the morning.  Needless to say I didn’t do a whole lot on Monday. 

On Wednesday the 23^rd of January, I finally had a chance to meet up with an old friend that lives here in Finland.  Almost five years ago when Ria and I started dating (damn it’s been a long time) I stumbled upon an online group of expats living in Finland, mostly Brits and Americans.  It turned out to be a great source of information over the years on everything Finnish.  And one of the people I met on this site was a kid named Phil from Baltimore that had recently moved to Finland to be his Finnish girlfriend.  They had also tried the living in the states thing, but with little success.  So four years ago, he moved to Helsinki with her.  We’ve kept in contact over the years, meeting up whenever I’m in town and comparing the trials and tribulations of the Finnish woman. 

We met for lunch at a Thai restaurant near our flat in Töölö.  After spilling his water in my lap, he began telling me that he had recently received a nice promotion within Nokia and was explaining to me all about the business world in Helsinki (Don’t worry Mom, I’m coming home.  Just educating myself)  It was good to see that he was finding success as an American in the Finnish business world, something I wasn‘t sure if it was possible.  Definitely opened my eyes to yet another possibility.  (Really, I’m coming home)

5 Responses to “Life and its daily happenings”

1. Mom Says:
   January 29th, 2008 at 6:02 pm

   OK, I understand that “Someday” you’ll be coming home. But in the meantime, please have a great experience, be safe
   & we’ll talk soon.
   Love to you both,
   Mom & Ricky

2. Cookie Says:
   January 31st, 2008 at 4:52 pm

   Superbowl is broadcasted live Sunday on MTV3. You’ll miss the english commentaries, but maybe you can get that through the slingbox and get better video quality on the finals by watching it on tv. How is the slingbox bitrate by the way? Oh, and I found you thorugh Phil’s blog. You write well, interesting read.

3. Mikie Says:
   February 1st, 2008 at 10:43 am

   Thanks Cookie. I am actually out of Helsinki for the moment, so I will probably miss the game and hopefully be able to watch it after the fact.

   The Slingbox is ok, but far from great. A friend had set it up, so I’m not sure if there are settings on his end to increase the quality, otherwise it gets the job done but is far from HD quality. Football especially is difficult because of the fast movements, but regular TV is comfortable.

   Thanks for the compliments, there should be some updates sooner than later, as Carnival in Cologne has proven to be quite full of surprises.

4. Cookie Says:
   February 1st, 2008 at 2:33 pm

   Nice, looking forward to reading some more How CAN you miss Superbowl live, how do you sleep at night?? I’m not even American, and I can’t miss watching it live and won’t sleep sunday night We’re gonna stay up all night with some friends. Doing some finishing touches at a friends house on his media room, Full HD projector, Bose 5.1, 150″ screen and nice chairs from thailand which you can lie on as well on top of a platfrom which is built over a pool And then we’re gonna pump it up to eleven, put the subwoofer in the pool, under the platform and feel the crowd. Gonna be great! Oh and just out of curiosity, how come you’ve never been in Finland during the summer? Only the months when you feel like you’re living in Mordor and feel like slitting your wrists? Dude, summer rocks. Oct-Feb suck big time. It’s been a mild winter thus far, but it can get a lot worse and it still can. I was in the army 2003, spent a hundred nights in the woods in -25-30°C add wind. You could put your trousers to guard the tent. In the dark, no one could tell the difference Enjoy!

5. Mikie Says:
   February 2nd, 2008 at 7:48 am

   I REALLY do not want to miss it live, however I am currently at Carnival in Koln and it is A) crazy and B) hard to get online at 2 in the morning on a Sunday. Sounds like a sweet setup you guys got there. When I return for summer (the non-Mordor time of year) I’ll have to check that out.

   I hoping for an great summer up there this year, to make up for all of the missed Finnish summers. Hopefully it will be better than this winter was.

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