Finally a place to call home...

I'm probably going to skip a lot of what has happened so far, but I will do my best to talk about the most important/interesting things.
Karkku language camp was so fun and I learned a lot! (But there is still MUCH more to learn, but I believe I am starting Finnish classes the first of September, so that will help)
Since I talked a lot about Finnish design in my last blog, I figured I should post some pictures of my room at language camp. I got lucky and only had one roommate, and we had really good beds, where some other people had 3 roommates and had to sleep on a cot.

I know that isn't really much of a picture, but I'll post more further on of my first family's house. After all, we were only at a boarding school. But thankfully, that bed was very comfortable. Which was how I was able to sleep for 14 hours the first night (with a little help from jet lag, of course) 

We went to Tampere, the 3rd largest city in Finland last Wednesday, and it was really neat! There were a lot of people, and most of them acted just like our teacher Anni said that they would- like typical Finns, I suppose. One thing all of us realized was that there were many people with "interesting" style, and no one even looked at them funny at all. If they dressed like that or wore their hair that many colors in the States, they would definitely get some funny looks. But we just hung out around the markets, and went to Hesburger for the first time, where I tried to order in Finnish, but he just answered me in English. By the end of the year, I'll be able to do it all in Finnish! In the market plate (which was all outside), there were 2 really big lines. One for some type of French bread that smelled wonderful, and the other for churros with nutella. The 2nd one had the shortest line of the 2, and so of course I had to get some! Also, there were stands that had all sorts of kinds of olives, one with candies, and another with dried sausage (not sure what that is, but it was definitely interesting) 

After we got back from Tampere, we went to Sastamala Church, which was very old (over 500 years I believe), and was made of stone with a dirt floor. It was really neat being in a place that old, since there is nothing nearly that old in Manistee. 

Fast forwarding to Saturday now... my family came (except for my host dad, he was in Germany) to pick me up from camp. Everyone got out of a meeting at the same time, and our families were waiting all in one area, so we had to search for them. I saw mine all the way across the room, so I was shouting "anteeksi" (excuse me, in Finnish), while trying to get to them. It was so nice to meet them, and it almost didn't seem real since I had been waiting so long for that moment. So, I showed them around the camp a bit and took my suitcases to their car, then went to eat. After that, we drove home and I got to unpack, and we took the dog for a walk and picked some blueberries so we could make a blueberry pie for dessert. 

My room is very cozy, and I like it a lot! 

That's my room, with the dog sitting in the middle of the floor. The dog seems to like me a lot, which I am glad about, because I sort of miss Buster and Dixie, so it's good just to have a dog around. She (Hari) is adorable! 

On Sunday, we went to the summer cottage, and, unfortunately, I forgot my camera. The cottage is on the sea, and we had to go across 4 bridges to get to the island that it is on. We went there to big black currants so my host mom could make juice. We went with my host mom's friend and her daughter, who is my youngest host sister's friend. It's such a beautiful place, and I really wish I had taken my camera. 

We picked lots of berries, and had a small picnic. We also went in sauna, and then jumped into the sea of course. It felt wonderful, and it wasn't too salty like I thought it might be. There was a medusa in the water when we first got there, and we caught it and got to touch it. It was such a unique feeling. It was jelly, yet it was moving a bit and felt so strange in my hands. We had been talking about snakes earlier in the day, and Venla and I went outside to take down the hammock, and I freaked out because I thought I saw a snake! Turns out... it was not a snake. It was a sort of lizard, but without legs. So it looked just like a snake, and still freaks me out a bit, but it's not harmful. 

We had a delicious dinner at the cottage of pasta and bread. And for dessert, we had cheesecake! It was so good, but very different than the cheesecake I've had before. This seemed to have a lot more flavor, and tasted a bit more like cheese, but I would like to make it sometime. 

Before we could head home, we went to pick up Emilia's friend Iida from her summer cottage. It was also on an island, and we had to take a ferry a very short way across to the next island, and it took only about 50 seconds to get across. I will take a picture of one sometime to post on here. It wasn't anything like the SS Badger or anything. Once we picked her up, we headed back to Masku, and I slept most of the way, but I was awake when we saw a fox near the road. I am amazed at all of the wildlife I have seen so far, and it hasn't even been a week! One other thing that we saw in the neighborhood was a bunny! But it was no ordinary bunny, this was like a bunny on steroids. I swear it was about 3 feet tall, and was actually quite intimidating. Nothing like you would think when you think of a bunny. I always thought a bunny was a baby rabbit, but I was proven wrong on this one. 

Anyways, today we met with the man from Rotary who is in charge of my exchange, and talked about some things that I need to do soon and that I will go to my first Rotary meeting on Wednesday! School starts tomorrow and I am very excited, yet nervous because I have no idea what to expect, or what classes I should take or anything! But I suppose I will post more on that after tomorrow! 

The railroad near Karkku

A view from a high point in Tampere (and some friends.. of course)

A church in Tampere

The olives at the market in Tampere

HESBURGER!

The lake at Karkku