Acting, visitors and TJ

This weekend has been quite a busy one. On Friday I went to Moreton in Marsh to take part in a crisis simulation on a Red Cross delegate training. As an actor that is.
I got to play a JFOR soldier, a rebel and a representative from the ministry of internal affairs. I won't go in to details of what I did, because that COULD spoil it for future participants of the training ;) Anyhow, that took from Friday afternoon 'til Saturday afternoon.
When I came back to Oxford on Saturday, I had a friend from back home waiting for me on the train station. She's been traveling in Scotland for a month now, and came down to the south (and our "warm weather") yesterday. We been wandering around the city a bit, and eating some lovely food :)
Tomorrow is back to work. Luckily I have Wednesday off, so I can sleep a bit more than I have this weekend.
I like sleeping.

TJ 28.

Wow..

I really DO suck at updating my blog right now, I'm sorry for that.

Last Saturday-Sunday, I was on my first event as a first aider. Since I'm not full qualified yet, I was "only" there shadowing. The event was quite a big university college ball. Not too much to do, though, which means the youth of today seems to be quite good at taking care of themselves.

I really enjoyed the eight hours I spent there, from 10pm-6am but I'm still quite exhausted from the lack of decent sleep.

I have Wednesday off from work, so I'll sleep then. And clean my room.. Oops...

Only like 44 days of EVS'ness left. Then back to Finland for the Groke knows how long, and then we'll see what happens.

After my EVS year I might start up a blog updating my everyday life post-EVS. Don't see why not :P

If you don't know about Questionable content, I suggest you check it out pronto. I loooove it. It's probably the best webcomic of all times. Just start reading from strip one, I'll bet you'll get hooked, just as I did while on Åland in the beginning of June.

That's it for this time, cheerio ;)

I miss you <3

Tillbaka till andra verkligheten

Har nu spenderat två veckor i Finland.
Troligtvis två av de bästa veckorna typ EVER.

Var med Sötis till Åland där hon blev student och fick träffa typ alla hennes kompisar ja bara hört om tidigare.
Den andra veckan spenderade ja mest i Pargas å hälsa på massa människor och firade en kompis 18-årsdag.

Börjar lite längta hem :P

Tack alla för en massa underbara dagar! :)

PS. Till er alla jag inte hann träffa: vi ses om typ två månader. Varför inte komma å säga "HEJJJJ" åt mig på flygfälte när ja landar? :D

Weeks fly by.

Have I told you about my Wednesday nights? I'm on a Standard First Aid course, so that I can go out on events as a first aider.

On Friday 14th my girlfriend came to visit me. We hadn't seen each other for 4,5 months. Yikes.
We had a wonderful week and a few days together, even if I had to work a few of those days.

I also had the chance to get photograhphed while playing The Lying Down Game. You can see my pictures here.

Im going home to Finland for two weeks in June, to go on Sandra's graduation and to meet some friends in Pargas/Nagu.
I HAVE to try and meet my cousins aswell. My cousins are the best. (What, me and my summer neighbours AREN'T related?? Oh well, I count them aswell)

Finnish summer, HERE I COME!*
* Terms and conditions apply
Subject to availability
Look in store for details

"Not in service" and cheeseburgers.

Note to people traveling in the UK:
If a local bus shows "Not in service" instead of a line number, you bet your ass that that bus is not going to stop and pick you up, no matter how late you are or much you wave and look at the driver angrily. Yapping on about it to your husband after the bus passes will not help either. So, wen you see a bus with "Not in service" on it, don't bother waving and make a fool of yourself on the bus stop.

From buses to snacks, without a donkey bridge.

Walkers, a crisps factory* has got somekind of campaign going on, most probably to boost their sales. They have launced 15 new flavors of crisps, and if you do some stuff on Walkers' web page based on which flavor you liked the most, you can win £10.000.

Some of the new flavors are Japanese Teryaki Chicken, British Roast Beef and Yorkshire Pudding and Argentinean Flame Grilled Steak. Today, I found another flavor. American Cheeseburger. My first thought was, "whaat?! No way, these prolly taste like mud" (I did use another word than "mud" in my mind, but sssch!).
I decided to buy them just to taste (now you see where the boosting sales-part comes in) and I'll be damned! They really DO taste like a ceesebuger directly from the heat tunnel at McDonald's!
Now THAT'S weird!

Hmm.. No pictures yet.. Oops.. Just tell me if you're very bored with text only :)

*Crisps are the british name for "potatischips".

Midway seminar, ashes and such

I know I promised pictures in this post, but since I am at work, that is not going to happen.
Sure, I can edit and put in some pictures later, if that makes you happy ;)

Last week we had the midway seminar, where all of the BRC volunteers got together and talked about thow the projects are going and had a a few lessons, like deaf awareness where we learned the BSL's (British sign lnguage) letters and a bit more aswell. We also got to look on an emergency response vehicle and it's equipment. Aaand we also had a bit of a self defence training! That was FUN! Even if we didn't get to hurt anyone :P
Most of all, we were able to talk to each other. Most of us haven't met since Guildford in September, and it was really nice to see all again! I don't think I could have gotten a better group of volunteers! :)

Next week, Sandra is meant to come and visit me (wihuuuu!!). BUUUUUUT because of Eijafjatlajökull, that might not happen! :(
We've been looking forward to this week for, hmm, four months now. BLARGH!
Let's hope the ashes have mercy on us.

One month here or there..

The last month has been kinda.. well, not quiet, but not that much new things have happened at work.

I can tell you a few new things.
I will be giving our normal STI presentation on a year 13 assembly in April, 240 students attending at once. Yikes! :D

And last Tuesday me and Lera went with Josh, one of our supervisors, and also the line manager, to a college, and sat in on his homophobia presentation. Me and Lera will deliver the same presentation on another campus this Friday. Really good presentation, and it seems to have got the young people thinking about what they say to each other and such.
I do look forward to delivering it myself, after a few adjustments to the Power point presentation we have.

Also, our computers got upgraded to Windows XP last Thursday. We have been working with Windows 2000 up until then, and still two computers are left with the old OS on them, and one is not starting at all A fourth wont let anyone log in.
The nice man from IT who came up from London to upgrade our computers is off work this week, so we will have to cope until next week.
I got to play a bit of an IT man myself last Friday, when one of the computers wasn't connecting to the main system. Oh well.. Next week we should be all sorted again.

This weekend I went to Liverpool to celebrate a fellow vol's birthday. I had a blast! Even if the traveling there takes about 3,5 hours...

Until next time, try not to hurt yourselves ;P

Mate..

I just threw in a "mate" when I asked one of our volunteers (I'm recognized as a member of staff) how he's doing, just to see how it felt.. Man, dit it feel wrong? :D
But the volunteer didn't seem to mind, so it's prolly just my head.

Wow.. The wrongness.

December 2009

I just remembered quite a funny thing that happened while I was home in Finland in December.
I bought some stuff from the local-ish supermarket, and paid with my British debit card.

The cashier asked "Bank or credit?"
I found this a bit funny, since it's a debit card it doesn't have any credit side. It's basically a normal bank card.

When I said this to the cashier she looked at me and started to say something, but the cashier from the till behind mine interrupted with a reminder to my cashier:
"Since it's a Swedish card, we'll have to put it under credit" (The correct term would've been "foreign", but maybe everything outside Finland is Sweden for him..?)

Still trying to convince both cashiers that it doesn't have a credit side, but they didn't seem to listen, so I said "Ok.. Credit it is then.."

When the transaction was finished and I'd signed the receipt my cashier said:
"These Swedish bank/credit cards can really mess things up sometimes"
I could't help myself from saying
"It's in fact British, and it does not have a credit side, but I agree."
I like the look I got. Can't describe it though..


I miss Finnish sweets.

Red Cross element

A (big) part of my EVS year is to be a part of some Red cross group or doing some work for the Red Cross. I haven't done anything yet, but the circus around that begins tomorrow when I'll be going to Abingdon to a Red cross HQ to meet up with a volunteer organizer (no, that is probably not the right term, but anyways) and have an induction to Oxfordshire's Red cros and see what they're up too.
So hopefully tomorrow I'll know what I'll be doing for the last six months or so. Wow.. Am I soon o be half way through? Geez..

I've found some misusage of the Red cross symbol. Should report that aswell. A childrens doctors costume and a nurses dress for Valentine's day.
People who come up with these dresses seems not to have been to a hospital, well.. at all.

Oh, and that text to the Finnish Red Cross.. Haven't started yet. But there are no plans for the weekend either :P Buuut.. I guess there are now ;)

New music.

I was asked to write a text to the Finnish Red Cross' website about my first half of the year here.
Good thing I started this blog! Gives me some help.. Otherwise I wouldn't know waht to write.


I've recently discovered the Swedish duo Far & Son. They sing the amazing song Panik, and another good song called Tjeckoslovakien. One of the guys in this band is also a member of Maskinen, who plays kinda the same music. I really like Maskinen aswell.
The first song I heard from Maskinen came out when I was in the army.

Can't describe the bands music, so I guess I'll just have to show you some videos.

OH! Speaking about Maskinen. When I first arrived in the UK, a French guy listened when i played Maskinen on my computer and said, with his perfect English with the perfect French accent
"This sounds quite like a French band!". I'll give you that aswell.

Enjoy!

Cancelled weekend plans

Two volunteers from Kent were about to come around for a night this weekend, but their car broke down, so they re not coming. Quite a shame, since I really like meeting the other volunteers. But there'll be more weekends, so no worries there.

So now I'm free for the weekend.. What to do?

BTW. I did bring my camera to London, bub didn't find that much to take pictures of, so there...

Monday tomorrow.

Tomorrow is the Humanitarian Action day for the Red Cross EVS volunteers in the southern part of England.
This HA day will focus on justice and fairness.
It's going to be really nice to see some of the other vols, whom I haven't seen since September in Guildford.

I'll bring my camera, so there will prolly be some pictures up on Monday or Tuesday evening.

The informaion letter sent out to us about the HA day had a funny sentence in it.
"Lunch will be provided, but bring your own pen"
Okay, maybe that wasnt the sentence exactly, but something like it :)

Some pictures of the snowy weather in Oxford.

Back in Oxford

Now I'm back in Oxford after spending Christmas and New Years with loved ones.
I've had such a blast, even though I only got to meet about half of the people I intended to meet.
Well, I can't blame any other than myself, since I didn't get in touch with them.

Christmas was spent with family and relatives, and New years with a wonderful girl, who is now my girlfriend! Can you believe it!? :D

I'm a bad storyteller. If you want me to tell you something specific about my holidays, just ask :)
The only stupid questions, are the ones that remain unasked.

Home soon

Okay. 4 days and I'll be home for about two weeks.
And at this time of preparations and stuff, my one month old mp3-player decides to not let me use it anymore. What am I supposed to do now? The battery to my PSP wont hold fot the whole of my journey, and I'm out of books to read. The bus from Oxford to Stansted is 3h40min(!!). That's longer than a plane to Finland from here... I'm also quite out of time to get some new books, if I don't throw away my lunch breaks for book shopping.

Hmm. That actually sounds like an idea.
And I also should go back to WHSmith to tell them what I think about their mp3-players they sell. Cheap doesn't mean they don't have to work properly.

Enough angst.

I'm frikidilling going HOME! :D
Haven't seen my friends for four months! Except from Jenny and Emma, whom I went to London to see. A nice soft start to the Swedish language again, which I don't speak to often these days. It feels quite weird to speak Swedish, none the less Finnish! Geez..
But I'll get tho hold of both in a day or two.

Vi syns snart. Jag kan int vänta. NUUH!

There they go again..

"They just keep talkin and talkin but they have nothin to say"

Some ten days again since the last text. Sorry 'bout that. But this time I have an excuse ;)
It has been the World Aids week, and I have been swamped with work, both during days and some evenings aswell.

I was out collecting money on WAD (World Aids Day) and giving out a Red Ribbon to everyone who gave a donation. That evening, which also was my birthday, I had evening work. Tuesday was quite calm, just more clients than normal in the office. That evening I was at work until about 8pm (jaa alltså klockan 20 då för alla som använder klockan på ett normalt sätt), packing condom packs that the Young peoples' team give out, while a few others packed some that the Gay mens' team give.

Wednesday, drop in, Thursday staff meeting.
Friday: London to help packing stuff for the Young Peoples Conference being held on;
Saturday, doing random tasks on the conference that was held in the Baden Powell house in London.
During this weekend I've been on the THT office in London, the head quarters for the trust. Big office, many people. The people I worked with this weekend were all really nice! I loved every single moment of the weekend, even though I had to go back to Oxford for the night between Friday and Saturday.

Coming back from London I talked to a Belgian woman. She sat next to me on the train. We talked about famous people, politicians and from respective countries. Also a bit culture. Like what Finns wear when in the Sauna. She asked, and what else could I tell her than the truth.
She found it a bit odd that we drink maybe one or two cold ones in the sauna.
We also talked sbout the languages used in our countries. The whole thing was a giving conversation!

The coming week will be a little London, a little deliveries and MUCH paintball! :D

TJ 13. Kohta räjähtää.

Whaaat?! TEN days ago since I last wrote?!?
WHOA, that time went like a jetplane on speed. Gawd!

Not that much extra has happened acctually. This week has been full of trainings and deliveries and drop in's and health stands and.. Just plain stressful. But today was quite a quiet day in the office, so no worries there.

The D day is even closer now.
And my birthday is coming up.

No plans for the weekend. I have the house to myself though.
Maybe a party for all my friends here in Oxford? Wow! One so far :D

TJ 21

Going home for two weeks.

Okay, the Day with capital D is closing.

On friday the 18th of December, I'm catching a plane to Stockholm Skavsta and then I'm taking the morning boat from Stockholm towards Åbo.
"Huh? Why not fly directly to Finland" you might ask?
The only answer I will be giving is there is a reason for it (obviously).

Gonna say hello to my friends in Pargas, some of them will probably be pretty surprised to see me. Hopefully at least some of'em will be glad :)
The ones I've spoken to about my plans have been very positive to the idea, seeing as they've thought I wouldn't be coming home a all during the year.

I'm waiting for the holidays like a little child is waiting for Santa. Who wouldn't?
I haven't seen my friends for four months, and then the special little twist I might talk about some day. I remember sitting on the back entrance's stairs of my old work place, talking with my colleague about me "only having 70 days of employment left". That' quite a while ago... :)

And WILL I go out partying with them? Sure will! Let's just hope I can sleep somewhere :D

TJ 32

Halloween in London

So. Last weekend was Halloween. Just a few days before the weekend, my cousin asked me if I wanted to come to London for a fancy dress party. Since it was only a few days before, and I had no idea what to wear and I recently lost my wallet with all my credit cards in it, I had say no. Then she came up with the brilliant idea that I should dress up as Håkan Hellström, a Swedish singer/songwriter.

“Just put on one of those hats of yours, and write ‘Ta mig till kärlek’ on a white t-shirt or a piece of cardboard, and that’s it!”

That persuaded me, I loved the idea of being dressed up at HH! And so, I bought a return ticket to London and went out scouting for a nice white shirt and a t-shirt. This after looking on pictures of Håkan, so I could get the best available clothes.

When I came to London on Friday night, I met up with my cousin and we went for a glass. We watched a bit of A clockwork orange when we got to my cousins boyfriends house. Interresting movie.

On Saturday morning we went out hunting for braces, the only thing my dress didn’t have yet. Took a good few stores before we found some nice green ones.

When we got back to the house, there wasn’t much time left before we had to leave to the party. Neither one of us knew what size of a party it would be, but once there we got surprised on many people there were. We saw everything from the devil and Wednesday Adams to an Egyptian Pharaoh and a dead nun. Oh, and not to forget, the party thrower. He had the best Joker make up I’ve ever seen, and had a nurses dress on. Priceless! I had a really good time on the party, talking with random people about.. well, anything that came to mind.

Some people tried to pronounce the text on my T-shirt, some of them actually got it quite right, but no one understood what it meant, and thought they were being stupid. The sentence “It’s Swedish for ‘Take me to love’” made a few light bulbs glow..

On Sunday we watched the last bits of A clockwork orange and then I had to start packing so I wouldn’t miss my bus back to Oxford.

This Halloween was the best one 'I’ve ever had! Thank you Sofia and Ant, for everything! I owe you big time.

This is me as Håkan Hellström

This little beauty sat outside the main door.

PS. My cousins blog. Mainly in Swedish. A few posts back there are more photos from the party, but take your time and read som other posts aswell :)

PPS. Sorry for the bad image quality. Someone should take their time and teach me how to do it properly.

Losing and gaining.

One odd week ago, I lost my wallet. It kinda sucks.
I had to block my bank cards, and my driving license was in there as well....
Oh well. I got a new card from my British bank after two days, and it's good that I leave my Finnish account untouched for some time :)

Last Friday night me, Lera and one of our supervisor and her family went to Millets farm to experience the "Mass-acre Maze", a Halloween maze in a cornfield with some hired people running around scaring the living hell out of the people walking in it. I shot a video of 99% of the time we spent in the maze. I'll put it up sometime, if I remember :)

Tomorrow Friday, I'm going London to my cousin, and on Saturday night we're going to a Halloween party. I'll dress up as Håkan Hellström :D It was my cousins idea, and I like it!

And the latest news, I'm going home for Christmas and New years! OoOh!
My first plans was to go to Liverpool to some EVS friends, but since then, something has happened, and I've chosen to go home instead.
No, nothing bad happened. Not bad at all acctually. :)

Happy Halloween!

Ps. All of you non Finnish people who might read this, remember the words "Maalaisjärki" and/or "Bondförnuft", I'll talk about it another time :)