Kosminen kotinurkka

First of all please excuse me for this long break and let me explain… There are several reasons for this silence: first Robin came home from Finland and I didn’t want to sit in front of the computer at night but in stead enjoy his company after a long week of solitude. Then a wisdom tooth was surgically removed from my mouth and it led to more than a week of intense suffering. Honestly, I’ve never felt as horrible before, it felt like having a migraine in the left part of my head around the clock and I practically lived on painkillers (which I normally never touch). Now I’m finally feeling better, the stitches have been removed and I can even open my mouth to eat and brush my teeth! The forced soup and yoghurt diet is now over and I have to say it has been very effective if my goal would’ve been to lose extra weight… But so now it’s return to normal, enjoyable life again (although I’ve been to work every day never mind the pain – don’t ask me how I managed, I can hardly remember) and that means back to blogging! The below post was written  5th of January, I know it’s late to talk about New Year but I just have to because the night was so lovely and memorable…

And so another year ended and the new one was greeted with great weirdness and sparkling enthusiasm in Helsinki! During the day me and Robin hung out with Bella, whom I cruelly forced – after a cup of tea at a cute café called Fleuriste – to follow me shopping. I’d gotten these gift cards that were only valid in Finland so I absolutely had to spend the money on Saturday, a day before I had to leave. Bella was valiant and gave me excellent advice when I was choosing exciting things like a new pepper grinder – I chose the most expensive one, a Peugeot one. Then we had to separate, but in the safe knowledge of seeing each other later during the night. Me and Robin more or less ran home to change clothes and then proceeded to run and take the bus to Robin’s sister Tanja, where we had dinner with her family, Robin’s sister Helena and their parents. Very nice, a lot of interesting discussions on literature and philosophy, and nice port wine.

After that we had two parties to chose from – but didn’t end up going to either of them. What happened was very spontaneous: Bella texted that she and Jockum had decided to dispose of our Christmas present at midnight. Our Christmas present was two Chinese lanterns, a.k.a big paper hot air balloons that you light and then they sail away glowing a warm, yellow light. Unfortunately we got really late as Robin’s sister lives outside the city center and the bus was slow and the tram never arrived. So when the clock stroke 12 me and Robin stood on a tram station. But Bella, Jockum and their friends waited courageously on top of the Observatory Hill for our arrival. On the way there we met Samir, Sanna and Sanna’s brother who joined us. Up on the hill the lantern was instantaneously lit with two firemen who said they “just wanted to see how it works”. Then we stood and held the balloon straight, sang “Let It Be” and hoped it would take flight. It took what seemed like a little eternity, but then suddenly it started to lift, just a little and we let it go – it caught wind but in stead of sailing away smoothly it bounced away with us running after it to make sure it wouldn’t tumble, crash and burn. It bounced and bounced and then started lifting – not towards the sea but towards one of the houses nearby. We started shouting “Noooo” as if it would obey our orders, but just when it was about to crash in one of the windows it lifted and we – and a group of unknowns – just started cheering and jumping when it soared towards the night sky! It ended up really high in the air, visible to us tiny like a star, and then went out.

The lantern was a lovely experience, unexpectedly fun, and like Bella said: “For the New Year we lit up a new star in the sky!”

Then we were invited to a party at some girl’s place just around the corner. A nice apartment with a lot of new (albite exclusively Swedish speaking) people. One of the rooms had been turned into a club with a disco ball and a smoke machine. We spent most of the night on the dance floor taking ridiculous pictures most of which have been censored away from this post (have to keep it decent) and sometimes sitting a while in the living room talking with old friends and acquaintances. It was so nice that we completely lost track of time.

We finally left at 05:15 when the party was still going strong but I was getting tired. I don’t know when the party ended, but we walked home through the empty city meeting only random people here and there. It was a nice walk as it took us through my childhood neighbourhood which is honestly the only neighbourhood in Helsinki that still feels a bit like home…

A fantastic night!! Thanks to Robin, Samir, Bella and Jockum for making it all happen! You’re all very dear to me!

Have a great week everyone, I hope to be back soon (online I mean)!