Last report from Vienna

This were our last days in Europe:

Nina arrives in the evening and successfully invades the floor of Simones room before sunrise.

                                We were dancing at a french concert.

                The last evening we discovered new ways of transportation.


...and then we were walking around, drinking coffee, talking, visiting Christmas markets... and in 2 hours we are going to drive to the airport. And that's it, then. Bye, Europe!

On the way...

I guess Nina is sitting in the train to Vienna now. And I am sitting here, getting nervous. How is it going to be? What will she think of my home? How are our last days here going to be? Did I organise everything? Haven't I forgot anything?

Nina is already on her way, she said goodbye to her family and friends, she packed her bag, she took the airplane... and she met new people, a new country... for me it still seems so far away. I am leaving on Tuesday?? No way. But yes, it is true. In some days I will understand how she feels now. I hope I will. In some days we will be in the same situation again, in the same world. Until then life may be strange, discussions may be hard and thoughts may be confused. But we are leaving soon. That is for sure.

After 6 months of waiting I can finally say: We are leaving on Tuesday!!!

It's time. Nu sker e!

In two hours I am leaving Finland. I'm nervous exited and sad. All feelings possible at the same time.
First I'll visit a friend in Hungary before going to Vienna to catch up with Simone.

I really can't belive this day finally came.

Bye bye fields and forests of Ostrobothnia, my dear Pampas,
 see you in the springtime.
Hello Simone, Vienna & India.
See you really really soon!

                                                                          finished packing!

Meanwhile

Home is a strange thing to me. In a way I belong here.
The forests that are mine, driving along the roads in the middle of the night. Having stupid theme-partys
with best friends. Coffe at the only café in town. The language, the family, the smell om coffe in the kitchen every morning and homemade marmelade. The newfound lover, our language.

But.
Home is like chocolate. In small pieces it's good for your well-being and your peace-of-mind.
But too much could make you get high bloodpressure, die young perhaps, get chubby.
I am having an overdose of home right now. And I think if I can't go really soon
I am going to have a smaller mental breakdown. I need a challenge and a vacation.

Visa, vaccinations, all of that I've got it.
13 days left of work. 13 days left to freedom.
16 days left to leaving and
23 days left to adventure.

But at the moment I am just...
waiting.

Home sweet home?

Not the best picture, but this is "my" street

After a year on Strynø I finally made my way home - and arrived in Vienna about 3 weeks ago. It was a good journey, where I visited some of the people I met during my stay in Denmark.
And now, after 3 weeks of reflections, confusions and irritations I would say I feel home again. Actually it feels like I've always been here: the people, the city, the daily life.. it didn't change a lot. Vienna is a constant - maybe the only constant in my life.

So now I try to do some orientation and organisation work: I go to university, write applications, buy books about India, talk to people and yeah... I am waiting . Waiting for the next part.

Who are we? - Part II

So now I guess it's my turn to write something about my dear future-travel-companion Nina.
It's not very surprising that I don't know her better than she knows me, but I'll try my best. Actually it's quite surprising how different "our story" is from my point of view.

You know, sometimes you meet people and the first time you see them and you talk to them, you feel they're kind of special and that they could be an important person in your life. Nina was one of those, and I can't even really explain why. I just knew it. (but I wasn't expecting it to become real)

So that's why I was really surprised when we were talking about our future plans in that jazz-bar, and Nina proposed that our ways could cross at a point. And now, when I'm looking back, I'm quite surprised about how quick and how easy we decided to go (without knowing each other).

One of Ninas most important characteristics for me (one I couldn't travel without) is, that she is so uncomplicated and "nemt at være sammen med". She was never complaining about anything (me getting up early in the morning when she tried to sleep, me coming late and noisy into her room when she was trying to sleep, me asking if someone else might sleep in her room too - that means two people getting up early... ok I think you get the point) I never experienced her being in a bad mood (maybe a bit tired), or unmotivated, or unfriendly. And even though I thought I must've been a very annoying guest - she was always caring.

What else do I know about Nina? She worked as a volunteer in a social café in Copenhagen. She grew up in a little village in Finland, where she is working as a postman at the moment. She has two siblings and she makes really good sauces. She's interested in plants and her garden, and she's just started to be a vegetarian. She can be enthusiastic about things, what I really appreciate, and she always thinks that she's being cheasy when she writes something (and then I begin to ask myself if I'm cheasy too or if I just say how things are, and if they are cheasy - why not?)
I like her humour and that she's not afraid of making fun of herself, and she's curious as well.

So after writing all these things (and there're many more) I realize, that I know quite a lot of small puzzle pieces. Not a bad start. To be continued -

Simone

Who are we?

Some of you knows Simone and some of you know me; Nina. A part knew one of us a long time ago and need to cath up a bit. But nearly no-one knows both of us. So we'we decided to make a short presentation of ourselves (better late than never), or actually I'll try to present Simone for you all and I'll hope she'll find something nice to write about me later on.

hey ho let's go...

let me introduce you to Simone. Age : 7 months and 22 days older than me. Haircolour: something between blond and brown. Eyes: Kind of blue I think. Occupation at the moment: working as a volunteer at loveley Strynø in Smakkecenter. Other facts: As we wrote in the post from Strynø. We don't really know much about eachother. I know she sometimes makes jewllelry, I know she had a cat that was older than her in Vienna, I know she tried to knit but she thaught it was too boring and quit. She's the only child and back in Austria she went more to the cinema than in denmark, partly because of the price and partly because they now don't easily have access to cinemas on Strynø. She's not THAT GOOD at football but she better than she says herself.I live in the belief that she reads quite a lot and is interested in literature. I always have a lot of fun with her. I think we have the same kind of bad huomor. We met: On a EVS-seminar in Ollerup, denmark. I must say I kind of liked her from the start.This will sound cheesy but I really felt like the smalltownchick meeting the bigtowngirl, I thaught she was really cool and I felt quite uncool. Yeah this IS cheesy (and It'll get worse) I know. Simone is really tolerant against other people. I never really heard her say something bad about someone. If she for some reason been hurt by someone and wanted to say something about it, it was always in a constructive way. No shittalk.It's a feature I envy. In decemeber 2009 the cop15 was held in Copenhagen and Simone came to visit. I guess she didn't care that much about me. The biggest clima-demonstation ever for sure had bigger effect, but I remember we were sitting talking for a long time the last evening about everything and nothing. After that I told my boyfriend I wanted to be her best friend. For sure it was a statement made with a bit of sarcasm - or no, self-irony is better, and my boyfriend laughed at me. But later on we met again in CPH for another seminar. This is when we hatched the idea to go. Simone was as always- cool. She said we had to think about it and do some planning. We spended an evening laughing trying to figure out if the best way to India would be by donkey, rollerblades or bike. After this i told my boyfriend he could be happy Simone was not a boy, then I would've taken her instead.He laughed again. The sentimental point of this is that it was yeah...perhaps a bit exaggerated. But actually I kind of ment it. ( I have to work on my sentimentalside before we start blogging for real, I'm aware of that. I'll be very proffessional when we once'n for all get to India, promise)

This is how I know Simone,

Since I am starting work at 5.00 am I'll say goodnight now.

Sleep well.

/Nina

picture: simone by me. At strynø for her birthday, march -10.

Back in Finland

I grew up here


Me and brother





A piece of finnish summer and a small piece of finnish gas station

After almost a week on the road I am back in Finland.
My sunburn I got at stryno is already gone.
I can't really explain how it feels to be back. The big news since I left:
we got a new pizzeria, one of my friends broke up with her boyfriend and nordea changed location to the other side of the street. So actually not that much. It's like always have been.
India feels far away from the slow countryside rhytm of this place. But I'm preparing with reading. I've decided I should read a lot about India before we leave. More for the pleasure of daydreaming away than for the facts, but anyway.

Selvtak Simone for the time we spent together on Stryno. Det var virkeligt dejligt at ses.
It feels like we're going to be a good team.

Vi ses!

Det var altså det...
Efter en rigtig hyggelig dag med meget solskin (og heldigvis ikke så meget arbejde), en spændende fodboldkamp (Nina er vores ny fodboldekspert) og en masse af nye ideer og drømmer skulle vi sige farvel. Men hvordan siger man farvel, når man ved, at det tager 6 måneder til man ses igen?
Jeg vil bare sige tak til dig, Nina, tak for din dejlig besøg! Indien føles lidt tætter på nu.
Ha' en rigtig god tur hjem og jeg glæder mig til vores rejse!!

Greetings from Strynø

We are celebrating 6 months until we make our first steps in India today. To make the day even more special this is the last time we'll see each other before november in Vienna. Tomorrow when we'll say goodbye Nina will go back to Copenhagen and then continue her journey to Finland. Simone is going to stay on Strynø until september when her voluntary service ends.
All this still feels a bit unreal and far away, but at the same time very exciting.

We just realized that it's the first time we spend time together without anyone else around. After getting to know each other a bit deeper we got kind of scared... But we agree that we both seem quite ok and trustworthy enough to make a trip like that together. When we know something more about it we'll let you know!