Below some observations on random encounters - in chronological order.
FYI: I had a full time job, little time and no energy in 2022. Hence the incompleteness of this year's blog, as well as many scribbles on headlines that may or may not turn into small stories once day.
Have a look if nonetheless interested.
- 1.1./ A neighbour
That dad of a neighbouring girl stands there on the ice, looking a little dorky with his fleece pipo flipped up over the ears and his touristy camera hung on a ribbon over his neck. But I agree on each point he raises.
He fears fraction of the social tissue, even in Finland - finger-pointing to the lack of dialogue. Little willingness, little opportunity. "Not only talking, also listening is important", he says, "trying to understand the other’s side". He sees a real danger in people’s disbelief of facts and attitude of being either-or. He is disgusted by those filthy rich taking advantage of social clashes to push their ideological agenda forward.
Smalltalk my ass! I couldn’t agree more there on that ice, first day of 2022, mildly hungover.
He works in advertising, which requires him to put himself into the shoes of others, he says. I suddenly hope people would get more into the advertising mind, if that’s what it takes to finally communicate with one another without blindly judging at first sight. #avdertising #tryingtounderstand
- 2.1. / two bunnies
I stopped skiing when I saw them. Snow fell silently, and once they figured I was no danger to them, they walked closer. They took their time searching in the frozen branches for food, whilst I stood there.
I felt so peaceful. The quietness and closeness to nature was grounding if not touching.
- 3.1. / a delivery guy
Sometimes people don’t see the miracles right in front of them. They don’t see the impact they have on others (which can be a bad thing in many circumstances). We ignore many realities around us - just like that fridge delivery guy.
Once he had pulled out the old and left to bring the new one, we found between dust and dirt that small baking heart shape we had been looking for since we boke our first Christmas cookies!
Small yet powerful miracles. Thanks, sweaty long-haired guy with uncombed hair!
- 10.1. / extended family
Today’s replacement teacher knew me still from Brussels - some second degree cousin from my husbands side. We watched our men play in the football league back then; their goals uncertain, but beer intake reliably steady and high.
She is divorced by now, she tells with a big smile. Was meant well, it seems to suggest, just can’t always be a happy end.
Reminds me of her ex scaring the shit out of our *big one (*still being tiny): pantomiming on Esplanadi, first motionless like a statute, then waving and chasing her. It’s years ago but she still remembers. He meant well, but!
Happy end is a subjective matter.
- 11.1 / our supermarket worker
She is my age with two small kids. A grown-up working tough shifts, possibly with a loan somewhere and certainly with both feet on the ground - until recently.
Cause she and her family caught covid over the holidays, merry Christmas! - and three weeks in, she still can’t taste much. Nor smell. ”Latter is worse”, she says, and I believe it.
When bending over boxes with foodstuff to fill up the shelves with, I can see it. And then she says it,that she is exhausted, ”still and more than ever before”. That from a mother of two, working as a cashier since two years pandemic.
That virus sucks even if long gone. I felt like hugging her, but we’r in Finland after all. Plus I have never seen her face without that mask - a well-known stranger.
- 12.1. / my future boss
Two days ago I got that mail to ask me to pitch. To get to the next round. Application - assignment. I filmed some takes and then handed in the first; authentic and without a plan, my mom yell-laughing in the background.
Two days later I meet him for a videochat, last round, a sympathetic and highly ambitious person. A fair guy, big smile, no bullshit. A great and utterly important mission ahead, his company and my new employer: ”democratising career opportunities throug tech”. Taken from his LinkedIn, but why changing a winning combination of words?
Can’t wait contributing to exactly that - democratising careers. By recruiting *migrants in Finland with coding background and talent, winning them over for a competitive course that hooks them up with a network and job chances they’d have never had before.
That encounter changes my path. It also changes our arkki - and the future of hundreds of people who deserve better. Action, not words. I’m game!!
(I’m also terribly excited, slightly overwhelmed, and deeply impressed and motivated. And humbled - that too, for sure.)
*P.s.: I write 'migrants' because it's sadly a synonym for disadvantaged leaving their home, voluntarily or involuntarily, to try their luck to work and/or survive elsewhere. But I could also write 'people'. Humans like me and you.
- 20.1. / our bay
I stand there and breathe in your power. The cold wind almost burns in my eyes and my shoes are soaked from the slush. Because the paths by your shore are not very userfriendly at the moment - yet I am filled with joy to be here again. Here, were my feet free my mind and your cold air warms my soul.
It’s only the forth day I am working full-time. Yet I have been missing you, craving to spend some quality time with you, no matter the duration. And my better half shoulders this all, jiggles the kids and dinner and his x-th call and just says: ”I will make it happen. Just go and enjoy.”
So I went. And enjoyed. All in.
- 21.1. / an interviewee
I felt immediately upbeat. Our smiles rose over the last fifteen minutes, simultaneously and alongside our discussion. That was what it was: a discussion, not an interview.
I wondered how often she had such an encounter over the last two months of having arrived on Finnish ground, with respect and without prejudiges. I guess quite a bit; Finland and its services - both public and private - are accessible and uniform, uniserval I’d say and hope. (The fact I speak from the perspective of a white EU-national points to the direction of a rather limited if not naive perspective - how could I know about the frequency and scale of racism, hidden or direct, in the daily life of a veiled woman from another continent?)
What I can say with certainty though is this: speaking about one’s passion and career aspirations doesn’t happen every day. Neither to her not to me. So the fact we were there, on the small screens smiling and talking about exactly that, made our day. And the fact that I have tools in my hand to allow her nurturing that passion and kicking off her career path in Finland - that’s the sweet background music to our talk.
Upbeat, without a doubt!
-25.1. / morning light
The incredible power of light. Especially impressive when it hasn’t been around for so long!
Light has been hiding away in the mornings like a hibernating animal to only stick out its nose for a couple of hours - with the sole aim of taking a shy glimpse into the winter sky. And then retreating again, way too early, avoiding contact with the life out there that has to go on, darkness or not.
And now? One feels the difference by the day. Each additional minute of daylight like another kilometer sign passed during a marathon. The energy that it brings to the mind and bones, kicking in like that piece of banana; the willingness to get up and move, to shower and make breakfast, to undress and dress and redress the kids …
… all of that accelerates with light.
Like an orchestra playing crescendo, barely noticeable at first but steadily increasing. The orchestra of the seasons is a careful composition, with a long set of low key notes during the winter that barely ressemble a melody at all… but then it comes: light. And with it the ressurection of sounds, and the impatience of life to accelerate again, to get out of that cave and to get going, moving.
What a powerful morning with a powerful message: Light is coming! A gamechanger.
-28.1. / my neck
It’s telling when one gets a stiff neck from a chat. My spine is not used to curling in on a comfy chair and looking over one shoulder to chat about past and future, childhood dreams and adult worries, small steps and big journeys.
Of course we sit there often, on those chairs. Me usually on the left and my better half on the right; him enjoying the daily Hessari, me trying to replace my Phone with a book.
(A good one atm makes it rather easy: ”Platz an der Sonne” - a spot under the sun turns our global Migration flows and north-south divide upside down and makes one relate to the hopelessness of facing scarcity, domestic corruption and violence. More about it in week 7, 12.2.)
Not too much nor long talking there though - we hold long conversations over a tasty dinner, a bottle of wine, by the bondfire of our mökki shore or when jogging.
So the day after the long chitchat with the mother of our elder daughter’s besty came as a surprise: stiff neck. I am unsure whether to blame social distancing for it, or the fact our armchairs face the shoreview instead of another - or my age? Cause those wrinkles highlighted by the new company picture I am posing on are there to stay. Luckily, it’s the good sort: around the eyes from lots of smiling and embracing life.
Only when the neck is stiff, the embracing part is a challenging endeavour. Slow motions for a day or two! And no more site-chats.
- 1.2. / cross-country slopes
This might be the only place where strangers in Finland smile at another. Otherwise, spontaneous smiles into the unknown tend to only happen late-night - usually after much intake and at the end of a sloooow karaoke song.
(Before the pandemic that is; nowadays i.e. since two years plus, sharing a microphone with strangers is one of the thousand no-gos we all gave up way too fast; shaking hands or sharing cabs or straws are high up on that self-inflicted blacklist).
Thinking about it - smiles to strangers might even be the secret currency in Finland! The corruption of the north: you have to earn a proactive smile. You need to predict the other’s mindset and values first before a mouth turns into a smile; only if a connection of trust has been priorly established through words (pragmatic) or actions (responsible).
Only here, on the slopes, smiling comes naturally to all. Uncorrupted.
Skiers on the tracks seem to have unlocked that hidden power - mindset and value being clear and shared, a community bond of trust is established by definition. Yes, smiling at strangers in the slopes is the secret place where Finns dare the otherwise undearable: connecting to the unknown.
Might be ’cause this is the perfect scenario to become intimate with a nobody: contact remains distant and short, covid-confirm, and without the possibility to be extended into social awquardness.
Or then my own face is shouting ”pure happiness” , and all the others are just amused.
Amused by mom’s hideous head band from the 70ies I am stubbornly wearing. Amused by my particular cross-country style of lifting the knees way too much. Amused by my childish excitement when I pass them with the biggest laughter penciled on my cheeks.
Yeah. Thinking about it twice not just once, this might be very much the case too. No deep meaning, no secret place. Just me infecting strangers with my infantile joy and authentic oddness.
- 4.2. / two drunk
They are loud but barely understandable. Their vocal chords scream alcohol abuse, their wollen hats dont stay put over their sweaty foreheads. It’s quarter past four and rushhour home, the tram is packed - just not around them, there is space.
The two form a sad bubble, together alone. What happened to their lifes that they are spending their afternoon there, here, like this? What made them loose or ditch what kept them together?
And what first - the classical job-wife-house scenario? Or something else? On which scale of lostness and lonelyness are they?
Many questions, no answers. Even if I’d had dared and they tried - I fear they couldn’t have made themselves understood. The bubble pulls them downwards, into loud silence.
- 6.2. / Freeman & lobotomy
We watched another DiCaprio movie. I liked him before he defended the environment at the UN, even before he kissed Kate whilst flying into his destiny (freezing to death as a third class gentleman). He made a huge impression on me in two of his first films, as handicapped youngster and drug addict respectively.
DiCaprio is like a chameleon - a charming one. (With an appropriate world view/value set it turns out.) He can be good or bad, rich or poor, fast or slow - and sane or insane.
Or sane AND insane: In this movie called “Shutter Island”, he is more than a chameleon. He is a guy who suffers, increasingly obviously, and it is rather uncertain until the end to which extent he is who and how he is. In fact, it is somewhat kept open. A mindfuck somehow.
Another mindfuck is the historical truth of “lobotomy interventions”: that in the early and mid 20th century, some psychologists were convinced they can fix the the brain of mentally sick people. Manually. By inserting ice pickles through the eyes of patients and disconnect nerves in the brain responsible for certain compulsive behaviour.
Yes. Manually. Inserting ice pickles. Through the eye sockets. To destroy parts of the brain. As a treatment. (Over 70.000 official lobotomies were performed between 1940ies and as late as 1980ies.)
DiCaprio had a special taste this time. Bitter. Revolting and intriguing. Neither nor - both.
- 8.2. / interviewer's discrimination
I probably should never post this anywhere professionally (now, that I am a recruiter and should assess people objectively). But this is my personal writing, so I can and should be honest with myself and others:
We think the biggest discrimination is between men or women, or black and white, or left and right. In my view, the most blatant and ignored basis for discrimination is: appearance.
Studies show how receptive humans are to symmetries - there is a reason that baby things are round and even because it triggers affection and an impulse of care (that’s true for all animals incl. us humans). Symmetries can calm our mind and positively affect our sense of orientation.
In return, things or faces that do not match our preference of clarity and symmetry can upset us, trouble us. It’s impressive how susceptible we are to asymmetries.
When I connected via videoconference with a candidate who was, bluntly said, very ugly, I had a hard time control my impulses. It was the most challenging call I had so far - looking beyond the repulsive shell for objectivity.
It was saddening to realise that this person will have a very hard time proving himself in life, both professionally and socially. Because of his appearance, or better: because of his environment reacting to his appearance.
The silver lining of this call was the effect a smile made - when I finally got him to open up and dare to smile at me, he looked instantly more aesthetic. Whilst the most appealing faces may, in return, become unreliable and more resistible when they lack empathy or sympathy.
The sad reality though is: symmetry blends us, and kindness and compassion can be faked as long as our eyes are appeased by beauty. In our personal, somewhat natural quest for aesthetics, we exercise a brutal form of discrimination based on judging appearance that is hard to defeat.
- 10.2. / M for another M
I really had no idea what kind of encounter that was. What I wanted to write here. It seems back then I was convinced that title would remind me - but it didn’t. I had no clue for a month. But then …
… I remembered. Just like that, I dug out that thought from some remote corner of my brain: I mistook an applicant for another. Congratulated a dude named M- and welcomed him to our academy, whilst he hadn’t even passed the interview stage with me.
I should have informed another dude named M- … but I didn’t focus enough. I got inattentive between preparing dinner and fighting with screaming kids (or with myself, my own impatience?), yet wanted to “just shortly”, “just quickly” get something done. I did, yet I failed.
(No big repercussions this time, I blushed and apologised and got a second chance, just like I myself give second and third chances all the time, to applicants and colleagues easily, less easily to those dearest to me - but that is another topic. Maybe the number one challenge I face, that I am kinder to strangers than to my own family or myself. Odd and scary. Anyhow.)
Why “just quickly”? Why can’t I, we take more time?
I like to blame social media, electronic comms addictions, the fact that the human brain is bad in multitasking (one), and easily distractable, divert-able (two). But maybe that’s too easy. I should take time for stuff. Pleasant and unpleasant things alike.
Concentration means mindfulness. Focus means valorisation.
M for an M was supposed to be a funny anecdote of an unprofessional misunderstanding - yet it turned into a plea/reminder to self of taking every single interaction and moment in life seriously. Or rather: with awareness. Fully present.
Not only for the sake of avoiding mistakes - but for the sake of living in the now and then. Without “just quickly”.
- 12.2. / Joshua Brenner
This is an easier one: I won’t forget that name. It’s not a real person but a character of a book that leaves traces - because it turns the world, the own guts upside down.
It’s a German Novel called “the place under the sun” (“Der Platz an der Sonne” by Christian Torkler). It’s a long fictious story of life of a working class guy from Berlin, who faces corruption, poverty, and losses, and who decides to try his luck to succeed in the south.
Upside down: Africa being the place everyone wants to be, aiming at getting a piece of the cake, a chance to reach a place under the sun.
Upside down, because Africa is the continent with golden fences that pushes refugees from Europe back. Or at least most of those who make it, who don’t freeze in the alps, drown in the Mediterranean, or get killed half way through.
Upside down, because there is no hope in Europe; a (fictious?) world war three has torn the place apart. And though Joshua Brenner could have lived a somewhat ok-ish life amongst all the corruption and dirt and shattered career dreams, one can relate.
This upside down effect is both eye-opening and hopeless. Because one can SO relate to him not wanting to just exist and then die at some point; one can understand that he cannot appease his utopian idea of a better life somewhere else.
One can feel in one’s own body the drive he has when he starts working off his ass - with the conviction in mind that he might be one of the lucky ones to get a place under the sun. If only he tries hard enough, gives all he has and more.
And whilst Joshua Brenner suffers and breaks and falls and stands up again, and again and again - one is the bystander, just like in the real world. And just like in the real world, one knows there is no good end to this.
It’s not an upbeat read. But it’s not too subjective after all, surprisingly so, despite all the cruel and nitty-gritty insights into the destiny of a man on the move, escape, fight for liberty.
The gist of this book is the objective realisation: there are losers and winners. Upside down or downside up - the world is cruel, no matter the drive or perspective.
-16.2. / a drug addict
The woman at the tram stop 8 reminded me of a documentary I watched several times back then as a teen.
Could have been Christiane F. Yet it was another example of a young girl stuck in the vicious circle of prostitution and heroine.
“Young girl” being a bendable concept - the girl on that VHS cassette was 15 but had the body of a (sick) 30 year old and the health of a (weak) 70 year old. Some teeth were missing and her hair was fatty, and she had troubles finding veins to shoot the liquid poison into.
I can’t forget how that “young girl” in the documentary announced with triumphant eyes that she found a new area in her body without scarfs (i.e. not just yet); the spots between the toes, “painful but very efficient”. Triumphant eyes - turning into glassy eyes - turning into tears of surrender - before she closed them, forever. With 17 or 19, not sure anymore.
The woman in front of me holding my jacket and trying to hug me has the same eyes. She is maybe my age, but she has those same weak limbs, the same torn body. Her hair, teeth, eyes - everything reminds me of that girl on the VHS cassette.
She mumbles weird stuff, can barely bring her point across; whilst she tiptoes in front of me and tries not to collapse, she shouts the name of the Metro station she wants to get to, again and again. It’s clear she gets there what she needs, what her body tells her brain to pursue no matter what.
When I tell her the tram comes in 3 minutes, she starts shouting that instead, together with praising me, her piece of gold: “three minutes - thank you Kulta, three minutes - thank you oh thank you Kulta, three minutes”.
When I give her a face mask, she thanks me and puts it on.
When I show her a quiet seat to sit on, she thanks me and takes it.
When I tell I will alert her when her stop comes, she thanks me and falls asleep.
And whilst she snores I fight with myself. With my conscience: I know it won’t help her when she gets out at her stop; I also know it won’t help her when she doesn’t. I can’t change the fact she is lost, that her life is screwed. Letting her miss her stop won’t keep her away from the drugs. So I wake her up in time, and she thanks me.
She doesn’t know I betrayed her. That I told the tram driver to alert the security guards at the metro. I calmed my conscience telling myself that these guards will just make sure she doesn’t tip over onto the road or tracks on the way to her relief.
And whilst the guards look out for her, she is already long gone. Passed them as contained and invisible as possible.
Her body got all grip together when she faced them - them, who stood between her and her destiny.
She will tip over, now or later. But until then, her body commands her brain in a lost game. No matter what.
-18.2. / an Indian candidate
He wants to give Finland a last chance, he said. Tried to land jobs in software development for a while now, after a relevant Master programme.
He pays his bills cleaning - a job many unemployed yet skilled developers seem to end up with. Here in Finland, but surely elsewhere too.
I wonder whether there is a skillset overlap… being thorough maybe, structured surely. But otherwise? A waste of talents. A waste of time.
A waste of opportunities. No wonder this guy is being asked by his family to come back home, having lost over 20 grand and about to lose his dignity.
Yet he has a hard time deciding. That quest for success again, for luck, a more promising life. I start to relate more and more, from my comfy armchair and solidly filled bank accounts. Why is he stuck cleaning and not me?
- 23.2. / a Vietnamese mother
I don’t know her and will never meet her I guess - but she already got my attention and respect. That random mom from Vietnam who decided to take her two teenage girls off school for a gap year to travel their country in a jeep.
She had an actual educative mission, compared to all those who pursue their own dreams of travelling the world and end up backpacking with small kids (“They really like it!”, ”Homeschooling is so much fun”, ”life teaches them SO much more than school”).
Instead of aiming at travel adventures and accepting kids’ education as somewhat uncircumventable side effect, that Vietnamese mother persued the opposite: showing her kids their roots no matter the cost.
She gave up her own comfort zone (her settled life in the city) and loaded instead onto that Jeep not only her teenage girls, but also her mission: to show them their sourroundings. Their Nation: with all different shades of culture, shapes of nature, faces of people. With the aim to make them understand where they come from.
Giving children both roots and wings - that mother understood the Irish saying we chose for our small one’s christening so well.
That’s exactly what a parent can do, ideally: convey a value mix of altruism, self-confidence, respect, and curiosity.
And whilst the kids of ”King’s of the world” might become restless travelers feeling a certain void they can never fill, that Vietname mom has managed to convey a deep sense of understanding and belonging. Without a travel insta account.
PS: Her older daughters sits there over her third drink, and tells me she will certainly go back at some point. My nation needs us bright people sooner or later, she says. Just getting some more professional experiences - but the plan is back to the roots.
I am almost jealous she can feel those so strongly. Shoutouts to that wise mom!
- 24.2. / Kevin Kühnert
He sat there with this Besserwisser face that he had already back then in high school. The Besserwisser face of someone who actually does know better than oneself; like fair enough. And just as he represented our pupils’ interests with a mix of boring factfulness and dry stubbornness (whilst the rest of us thought back then mainly about getting hammered and making out), he represents nowadays the (leftist) social democrats’ values and priorities - whilst the rest of the politicians think mainly about their careers and strategic alliances.
He had and has strong social welfare and community inclusion convictions, in school and as politician. He had and has shown balls, back then and until now, to not only ask for stuff but demand it instead; he criticises, speaks up and out, calls for action. As Besserwisser, he had been prepared for elaborations on school toilet renovations just as much and well as for driving a revolutionary rethinking of distribution of wealth and opportunities in German society forward. He claimed and claims knew better than others, and again, always had a point and the conviction. The right attitude.
Now, that first night of the attack of Russia on Ukraine, he wasn’t the Besserwisser. And that made him more valuable than ever. He sat there as a politician in shock; as a person who is not only openly appalled, but also openly confused. A wounded human being who has been shattered in his core belief of diplomacy and argumentation for change - a mind who simply does not has answers ready on how to solve a game where someone is violating the rules so bluntly.
Him saying that he wouldn’t have an answer to the humanitarian crisis ready, but just a broken heart made him professional (and human). Him saying that he has no idea how to stop Putin’s invasion, nor what would be the driver for criminals to stop being criminal other than power, made him more convincing than ever.
And that he demanded from high-level collaborators in Germany (ex-Chancellor Schröder!) to look into the mirror and find a last bit of self-respect made him the best, spot-on Besserwisser I met.
-26.2. / some Ukrainian dad
Images come and go, yet some stay marked into the brain and heart. The Ukrainian dad who has no tears left is one of those who sticks. One of the early pictures, one amongst thousands and millions:
How he hugged first his wife goodbye, temporary or eternal, forcing himself to make it less dramatic than it is. How he then bends down to his daughter to do the same, but can’t let go of her. How his face is a human mask of pain and fear and love. How this marks the misery of a man and a family and an entire country.
I can’t forget it. I can’t forget him.
- 1.3. / hairdresser
You might or might not know I was loyal...
- 3.3 / an applicant - and Claudia
U made my day
- 5.3. / Dude in sauna
him overdoing the löylyt
- 10.3. / double game NC
the racist blacklist
- 14.3. / sharing the Covid exhale (S)
- 16.3. / J (Gender does not matter)
- 17.3. / We - really bad English
- 22.3. / Smalltalk dude about money
- 25.3. / mummeli about wartimes feelings of parents
- 28.3 / ballet move at workout
- Malaga Hausmeister dogpoop ”la gente”
- Malaga / Bad windowcleaner
- ”Guapa” waiters to me and MOM 70+
- 16.4. / the “overdoing-it” donut
- 20.4. / the ultra runner
- WW1 movie
"If death becomes cheap, it is the watcher that becomes poisoned, not the dying."
- 24.4. / Security control lady
I had bought the most tasty honey, judging by the cover and origin. Sunflower honey from the hills the French monastry Mont des Cats, golden and liquid it was. I had bought sunshine for the stomach and the heart in a jar; 500ml of pure joy to be enlightening calm weekend breakfasts and sour throats for months ahead, with a glimpse of freedom, nostalgia and the feeling to have supported a piece of balanced ecosystem.
And then she held it in her hands. The lady at the security checkpoint. She was almost more sorry about the jar of joy than me; my voice and face must have had annoyance, disappoinment and some sort of mild grief all over it, even if mostly covered by the mask.
I saw that jar already being thrown into one of those big black trashcans; all the work of the busy happy monastry need for nothing! So my claim was rhetorical: ”please dont throw it away, take it for yourself!”
”Ah non madame”, she said, ”I can’t. But we work together with a Charity organisaation - they give it to people in need.” And that made it all of a sudden a beautiful outlook: the jar will bring liquid joy and sweet unity and golden nostalgia to months and minds - just not ours. But to those who are in dire need of some sunshine, inside out.
That made me smile - through my mask. And the lady from the security checkpoint saw right through me again.
- Candidate with sick child/CV break
- T.A., the white terrorist
- Ainas crying mom / losing a parent as a parent
- Choreography dancer
- Eritrean asylum seeker w doublemaster in AI
- The anal neighbour killing flowers
- The waving child at kids dance performance - a classic
- Our mökki swallows x-t generation
- Candidate who designs skate rolls
- beer with a dad / the feeling of a date
- G / racism by the in-laws ("she is a gold digger")
- Crying dancer (old woman)
- Kaivuri mies Vesa from Sammatti
- Berlin - old buddies (Camping pictures with 16)
- The woom mom at playground
- My ex, viavia
- Sherry - doing something. Anything.
- Ukrainian lady at my cousin’s / sharing the house for a year
- Terveysasema & anxiety
- Sevil (and US-Nato "small"talk)
- Candidate with v soft voice
Some people have such a soft voice that I have to force myself not to fall asleep. It appeases me instantly, yet also can become misplaced unless it’s the voice of a yin yoga teacher or a doctor who needs to calm nerves.
Like this candidate: coding was only his plan B - plan A was deep into Biology, difficult stuff we went on to explain, that got me deeper and deeper into this very. Relaxed. Place.
- Bird we buried at mökki
It really seemed to just sleep. Tightly there on the stones that the soft morning sun heats, just enough for humans to make the walk bare-feat comfortable, or for birds to make the short resting and picking break a pleasant one.
Only that this little fellow had taken a break forever. His or her wings around the small body, as if to sooth itself into death.
We took it up, with some skin of the trees, and carried her or him to a safe place. Buried it into the ground, next to strawberries and those plants that are impossible to get rid off.
And we sang “Jumalan kämenellä” and planted a little flower on top - that now blossoms most beautifully, thanking the little bird to provide all nutrition it could have ever asked for.
Nature is amazing.
- Laura with white wine in summer (2 cultures)
It’s like two cultures in one. The summer Finns. And the winter Finns.
Those who embrace the moment and postpone the long sleeps during the summer weeks off until arkki, regular life, hits again with the first leaves changing their colour. And then it’s about cocooning up, layers of layers over the soul and body alike, until moving becomes too tiresome.
They turn silent with the autumn winds and start saving their words for the summer, maybe, just to drown all the accumulated hibernation depression in cold white wines, crayfish and shots again, in summer sauna with too many beers and sausages, in the most beautiful midnight skylines that just highlight how rare and how pure living in the four seasons is. With one season being the longest (winter) and the others being the shortest (something that barely deserves to be called spring, followed by intensively short / shortly intensive summers, and colourful, yet very wet and autumns that requires full-body rubber clothing).
I can’t deny I love love love Finish summer - but I can’t deny I struggle with the rest. Or rather: with how the Finns handle the rest. Shout up and retreat into your shell of pragmatic habits and un excited predictability until next June? Not sure I can pull this off again.
Right now though, here on the big rocks with a good old friend who ditched her 3 small sons for me, white wine, and sushi … now this all feels irrelevant. Now we are here. Living the spirit of summer. The rock populated by chatting Finns who embrace the moment and celebrate the evening sun. Life is humans best time - better digestible though in our current condition. Cheers! To the preciousness of summer vibes that turns Finns upside down - luckily.
- Hannus goodbye hug to Ida
They hugged long and tight. And when her kindergarden teacher let go of my old one, he, the big loud optimistic grandpa material, had tears in his eyes. And so did I.
Just the big one jumped off, full of energy into the future. Her future.
- husband / get rich or die trying
I met him once a long while ago, when both our kids had to leave the party for a spontaneous pee behind bushes; he looked attractive yet detached with his apologetic smile. As if a secretive pee of 2-year-olds would be shaking up his belonging to upper class.
Might be our random encounter made him taste the daily duties of childcare on the other end of his spectrum. Juggling millions and billions and trillions in Financial Markets (him) versus HIPP glasses, diapers, and wet wipes (me).
The pee behind bushes sets the 800 square metre Disney villa he own nowadays in perspective, more real than the market price of 30 million dollar plus. Thats 10 million HIPP glasses, easily, and could feed some if not all of the hungriest Jemeni toddlers for weeks if not months. Absurd.
Hearing about him seeing ghosts and trading BJs against Dior items with the housewife makes me ponder whether he should have spend more time to reflect during this assisted pee in the bushes. Whether he’d have exchanged his bitcoins in that moment against a battery of wetwipes if only he would have known. Whether he’d have chosen for fighting germs and snoddy noses instead of pursuing the Disney castle at all costs.
In fact, it’s rather possible that the apologetic smile wasn’t about the pee at all. It was about a normal life he’d never have once he made the choice: to go all in, hardship the way up and upper until there was no way back.
- Woman at Airport
She looks tired and smells like alcohol. Just a little, but enough for me to breathe throug the mask. ”8 hours delay. And they knew it before.” Her younger child climbs on the counter of the restaurant between Gates 52 and 54; the older one I dont see, but after her description of the morning events, I picture him being the one in jogging pants on the phone. Something on social media.
They have 7 weeks holidays, she says. Or rather: work-holidays - her husband owns a Hotel in La Palma. I am painfully inclined to be jealous - not about the ridiculous delay and non-existential customer service. But about the prospect of working face to face and hands-on, with sweat and sand and complaining tourists instead of sitting in video calls like pearls on a chain, repeating program features like a parrot.
Thinking about it, also I look tired and smell like alcohol.
-Ukrainian fisherman
The dude was topless and fishing without catching fish. Just feeling the freedom to do what the fuck he wanted, no matter how pointless it was.
Our girls were all so curious about him, so we talked a bit. A Ukrainian guy who was in Dresden when the wall fell. With his dad, as a youngster. The world suddenly open and free.
Whilst is country is bombed and the future in barricades, him fishing there without catching anything was suddenly the most reasonable thing ever. Doing something without an impact, just for getting as close as some sort of pleasure as possible. Or fishing without hope as a Metapher for living without hope? Giving in to world politics unfolding, again, over our heads and straight into our hearts?
Maybe that was the point. The pointlessness was the point.
- the dogwalker
One of my preferred neighbours: the widow with slow, old hips and a slow, old dog. We usually chat but today we talked. About her husband making her travel Europe in a camping van back then. About the massive gardens they had, and passion for plants and vegetation in general - she even planted and harvested peanuts! About her respect for German cooking receipts and some Garden magazine I never heard of.
Her eyes were glowing during our talk, and she looked 30 years younger. I love those moments. Making old people young again is my magic stick. And buying plants my to-go-to balm for the soul - our mutual treat, it seems.