Month 5

There's finally snow on the ground and it stayed. It's gone from kinda warm to very cold here so it is kinda hard to get used to a huge change so fast but I like the cold. The Australians are very close to leaving. It's pretty sad because I've made really good friends with them but I know I'll see most of them again. We had the Rotary Christmas party this past weekend. It was fun and I got a present. I'm not sure what it is yet but I know it does something. For now its purpose is to take up space on my desk until I find some use for it. At the party we went to the big cathedral for a celebration of Lucia. Lucia is a girl chosen by the city to be a symbol of light for the Christmas season. This is a really important thing for Finnish people. There is a new girl chosen each year. My rotary club each year hosts a Christmas event also held at the cathedral. I helped them this year by collecting money gifts. Though I was pretty bored throughout the thing, as it was all in Finnish and I understood little, I did find that the music was very similar to the American Christmas music that we sing every year. This was a nice reminder that the celebration of Christmas, no matter where you are, is for the same purpose : getting presents and eating good food. But seriously, Christmas is a great time of the year for everyone. I bought a ukulele. Ever sense i knew this thing existed, I've wanted to play it. I didn't get a really nice really expensive one because i dont have the money for something like that. I just wanted one i could learn to play on. I really do love the sound it makes. I've started taking the songs that I've written on guitar and transferred them to uke. It's really cool the sounds I'm getting. Hopefully I will be able to record some stuff with the Uke and guitar. That would be awesome. I finally learned how to ice skate. I have done it before but that was when I was 6 and I don't really remember that much. It was a lot of fun. I went with all my exchange student friends and we had a great time. Though our feet were sore from the skates and our elbows/butts/hands were sore from falling we still had a great time. So Christmas has come and past. It was nothing special for me but I had a good time at least. It was a little different than Christmas in America. We had my host uncle dress up as Joulupukki (Santa) and he made everyone laugh a lot and I got to sit on his lap which everyone thought was really funny. But I understood only one of the jokes he said and that was "People in the USA nowadays are so picky. I mean I might have to get lawyers just to say that I gave them the gift they really wanted" I thought it was very funny and true because a lot of people in the US are coming to the point were they sue just so they can get money. Back 30 years ago everything was solved with fist fights and mouth offs. Now if someone says something they can be charged with "verbal assault." I mean come on, what kind of idiot actually takes something like "verbal assault" and sues for it? Someone who has no life and nothign better to do. If someone punches me in the face, I'd probably just punch him back. And whoever wins the fight wins the dispute. End of conversation. I'm not going to sue him for "Physical and emotional damages." Those don't really exist. But back to Christmas, we had a lot of different foods here. There were a lot of different smoked fishes and mustard covered hams. it was a much different experience having all these new foods on Christmas. My favorite gift would have been the Finnish Sauna book because I want to build a sauna when I get home. I also got some candy, a jar of peanut butter from my amerikan parents, and a cd. But really i didnt want much so i got more than i expected. I also played guitar and ukulele with my host cousin who went to Australia a couple years ago. She was a really cool person to meet and hopefully i will see her again. its nice to have a host cousin you can hang with and talk to. and before you the reader gets any ideas she's 23ish and engaged and lives in Sweden and is about to become a doctor, i f you get what im going at. Anyways... The next day we couldn't go to Christmas Mass because we had to drive several hours to my host dad's side of the family to have dinner there. Same deal, smoked ham and fish, lots of potatoes, my host grandma dressing up as Joulupukki. It was funny having her dress up as Joulupukki cause she kissed her boyfriend and everyone thought it was funny. Then we watched some of the Harry Potter movie with my other host cousins and I had a good talk with my host uncle who went to Cincinatti on exchange many years ago. It was fun to be able to talk to someone about sports and teams again. And when we drove back home my host bro and i nolifed on Xbox until 2 am playing through Halo 1,2 and 3. Though we only got halfway through 1 and called it quits. I got to skype my family which was nice cause they said it was weird not having me there at Christmas. I guess it will be weird next year not having my sister there as she is also going on exchange but to where we dont know. I went and saw the 3D movie AVATAR which was probably the most graphically amazing movies I've ever seen. Currently my favorite movie and you should definately go see it. It was my first New Years outside of the country today. I must say, probably one of the best times I've had. I went to visit my friend Ashley in Nokia which is close to the big city Tampere. For New Years, her host dad gave us like 5 fireworks (which are LEGAL) and we went into Tampere and joined 3 other exchange students for the New Years. Most of the night we hung out in this coffee house kinda place and just chilled and talked about things. Then when it was close to midnight we went to this lake and we had a hung yelling count-down to midnight and when it was midnight we lite our fireworks and watched them fly. It was a great time. Afterwards, two of the exchangies had to catch their busses so the 3 of us went back to the coffee house and hung out there. We met these Finns there who were really interested in us cause we were foreigners. It's cool how many people like you because you're not from the country. Then we went back to Ashley's house and had a bunch of fries and amazing cake that her host fam made us and went to bed. Goodbye 09 and hello 10. Hope you enjoyed reading this.