Stray leaves

What's up, readers? Are you feeling the cold, dark winter sneaking up on you? I am. It's pitch black outside, the trees are soon left naked, pretty leaves are flying restless alongside the pavement, the air is cold and crisp and the shops are already selling Christmas decorations. It's just a matter of weeks before good, ol' Santa breaks into your home - pipestyle! Some people don't fancy Christmas that much, but I for one actually like it. I like the atmosphere - it's truly magic. Gingerbread, julebrus (a red-colored soda sold only during Christmas in Norway), marsipan, Santa, Christmas movies. All of it! For most people it's a time spent with the people you love: girlfriend, spouse, family, kids etc. Some like to escape the cold winter in the north and go south. I've been on Gran Canaria once during Christmas. It wasn't bad, just different. I did miss the snow though, but with global warming and whatnot, who's to say we even get snow this year? The last years there's not been a whole lot of that white lovin' on the ground. Christmas just isn't the same when it's raining outside. It should be snowing! Let's wish for lotsa snow this year.

The last couple of weeks I've just been doing what I always seem to be doing. My life isn't exciting enough to write a whole lot about. I study and when I don't study one can usually find me at home in front of my beloved computer. Sounds boring, doesn't it? Truth is - I love it. I do miss having a social life, though. Just so that's clear. I hate spending too much time alone and only with the computer. It's fun for some time. Everything in moderation! Last week I actually went to Helsinki to see some friends (at that point I felt I really needed to see people, not only the ones I run into at the uni and in the city). So I went on Tuesday, but I already returned on Thursday. I got sick, so I decided it was better to just go home. Besides, I had an important assignment that needed to be worked on. Not to mention that my time schedule didn't exactly match that of my friends. I hate it when it becomes hard to see friends because of time schedule crashes. One is working, the other one is free. Stuff like that. Oh well, it was still good for me to see friends. Things are looking up socially; I'm getting to know people at school better and a good friend of mine is coming to Vaasa this week to spend over a week here. He's actually from Vaasa, so his family lives here. At least I'll have someone to hang out with for some time. My birthday is getting closer and closer. I'll be going to Estonia to celebrate it with another friend of mine plus a bunch of other friends (from mine and from her side). Looking forward to that.

I have a new addiction, people. It's called "Dexter". If you watch TV at all, you know he's America's favorite serial killer. You read right. Serial killer. One who kills people. A lot of them. And I support him! Sue me. Hear me out first, though. Dexter is the kind of serial killer that only kills bad people. He kills scum. He simply takes out the "garbage". His victims are murderers, rapists, pedophiles and so on. I don't see anything wrong with that. Besides, Dexter is so brilliant that it's impossible to hate him. The show is full of black humour. Gotta love it. I watch so much of it I feel like I'm part of the show. It's a great way to kill time though. And as if I didn't spend enough time on the computer already, I recently downloaded a SNES emulator. Only a true geek will know what that even means. Put shortly: It's a program that lets you play old Super Nintendo games on your computer. I've heard of it many years ago, but I never thought it would be anything for me. How wrong I was. I'm addicted to that shit now! It takes me back to when I was 10 years old and Mario was my favorite plumber. My little hero in red. My little ass-kicking fireball-yielding Italian. It's great to play those old games again. I find it so entertaining I easily spend hours on it. It just proves that gameplay is king.

A different chapter

Things have happened. I have moved. Moved from Helsinki, which was my hometown for three years. That means I had to leave some really good friends behind. That's what hurts the most. Helsinki is a great city too - it's the city I've enojoyed living in the most this far. Somehow it just fit my personality, although I gotta admit it wasn't perfect either. Sometimes it just felt too stressful and depressive to live there, amongst hundreds of cars, thousands of people and companies. Helsinki never really slept. Despite that, I still liked living there. I think a lot of it was due to my friends. Those were what really made Helsinki a place to love. I often find myself re-living those memories: the movie nights, the crazy nights in the bars, the freak-outs, the game nights and simply all the great, crazy stuff that happened over there. I'll always keep those memories close to my heart. I still remember walking into Eira High the first day, scared and nervous of how things were gonna go. After a few months however, I had already made plenty of friends, so the remaining time there went fast. Almost too fast...

Now I live in Vaasa, which is a city on the coast of Finland. I study at a university here. The first weeks are usually a bit awkward: you don't know anyone, you don't know the city and you miss your friends. That's how it felt for me too. Still feels like it to some degree, especially the friends part. But it has gotten better. I really hope this is the place for me to be. I enjoy my studies so far, more so than the nursing studies. Still there is some restless part in my soul that feels something might be missing. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's a normal part of student life - maybe a fear of committing to a certain education. Freud only knows. I wish he could psychoanalyze me. I also miss my dear Norway. Maybe I'll go there for Christmas though, to see friends and family. If things go well, I will be able to study in Norway next year too! That would be great for me. I just feel I've been gone too long. Besides, the last summer spent in Norway has been great. It's left me wanting more of that Norway goodness!




Not much else going on. Studying mainly, and of course keeping up my nerding hobby (playing games, listening to music, chatting, watching movies and so on). A dude has got to keep busy when he's alone! It's weird not to have friends around...there's just so much more time for myself. Don't get me wrong - I like being alone, but I miss being able to call to friends to go out for a cider or go to the movies. One thing is for sure though - I'm going to Helsinki at the end of this month (if not before) to celebrate my own and Vivian's birthday! The plan is actually to go to Tallinn! I'm really excited about that. A friend from Germany is coming over too. It'll be really great to catch up with him.



That's all for now, folks.

Fjords, fishing and all that

Around mid-June we left Finland, heading for the land of trolls, viking sagas, fjords and steep prices - Norway. The reason for taking on such an adventure was mainly to earn some hard, cold cash working in Norway for the summer. Now we (to clarify matters I refer to me and my wench when I use the word "we") have been in Norway for over a month, so I thought it was about bloody time to write some notes about our time here.

Now me being in Norway don't really say much, does it? Okay, so it's clear that I'm in the actual country, but where exactly? The answer is Alta. Alta is a small city on the tip of Norway, about a two hour drive from Hammerfest (which is the northernmost town in the world), so that should give you a clue. If not, look it up on a friggin' map. To be specific, we are staying at my dad's place. He resides about 10 minutes from the center of Alta (by car). It's sorta on the countryside. The view is great: mountains surround us and the Altafjord is right in front of the house. Nothing to complain about when it comes to visuals. TV reception and internet access however, isn't all that great. The internet works fine for surfing, but not much more. We get the basic TV channels (dodgy image quality from time to time though, because the TV signal is blocked by the mountain(s)). Because of this we read to entertain ourself. It's all good though. Reading is good for you! Thus it must be good for us too. So far I've exploited Elf secrets with Artemis Fowl and done the Reapers work on Discworld. If you don't have a clue what I'm talking about - google it. Okay then. You now know a lot about my whereabouts and what I do. I think I've supplied you with enough information, so let's move on.

One of my best friends, a person who goes by the name Joel Francis Peart, decided to go visit me in June. I honestly wasn't sure if he would actually come, but he did. Me and him did fish a lot (and we actually caught quite many fishes), we watched football (that's not normal for me!), and generally had a good time. Unfortunately my work prevented me from spending a lot of time just doing fun stuff, but I like to think he had a good time here anyway. He also ate some Norwegian specialities. I also like to believe he enjoyed them. He stayed here for about a week, then he left for Finland by airplane. Thank you for visiting and please come again!

So my summer job then. Well, I work at ICA. It's a chain of supermarkets that operate in many of the Nordic countries. I don't run the shop or anything, I just sit at the counter most of the time, scan the products they buy, and ask them for money and if they want the receipt and a bag. That's it, really. Occassionally I fill the store shelves with products and so on. I'm the stereotype salesclerk. It's an okay summer job though. It really is. Maybe mainly because of a good work atmosphere - my colleagues and I get along well. It's also fun to see the different kind of people that come to the shop - you have the granny that ALWAYS needs to get the receipt, you have the families with kids always begging for candy and new comic books, you have the drunks who only come in to buy beer, you have the foreigners who don't know how to speak English and talk to you in their native tongue, hoping that you understand what they say. These are just a few of the shop stereotypes. Of course we also have the occassional underaged kid who comes in trying to buy beer or tobacco. We try prevent them from getting their greasy hands on "the forbidden fruit".

That's all for now. I don't want to write a novel tonight. Main point - we are havin a good time, and it's going to be bitter to leave.

When does adolescence end?

As a youngster I often perceived the people that were three to four years older than me as really mature compared to me. When I started attending upper elementary at an age of 13, I thought the 9th graders (the 15 and 16 year olds) were scary and well, as already mentioned, much more mature than me. Funny thing, isn't it? 16 year olds are nothing but kids in the big picture. Naturally then, when I was 16, I saw 18 and 19 year olds as big boys and girls. I thought they were close to being adults with cars, real jobs and all. I was so wrong. I mean, some actually have aquired all those things at that age, but they are still far from being adults.

I am now 24. Twenty-friggin-four. Wow. The 18 year old me would consider that pretty adult. The current me, however, considers it pretty young. I like to think I'm smarter and more manly than ever before, puberty is also a thing of the friggin' past, but 24...I like to think of 24 as the new...err...18. It's so strange. Now I can see 30 year olds as equals to me. I have friends that are that age and we get along well. It just blows my mind sometimes. Age is such a peculiar thing indeed. According to a book I'm reading, the age of adolescence or youth in today's society (or at least in our western culture), can be from 15 to the late 20s or even stretch into the 30s. That actually gives me great relief. I'm really not that old.

According to the famous psychologist Erik H. Erikson we all go through something called psychosocial development. Erikson claims that there are eight different developmental stages for human beings, each with a new challenge to confront or master. The succesful mastering of the task at each stage will eventually make you complete as a person. Put differently; you will simply create your own personality by doing them. Failing to complete a task can lead to difficulties later in life. Here is an example of one of the eight stages in Eriksons theory.

The adolescent stage:

Psychosocial Crisis: Identity vs. Role Confusion

"The adolescent is newly concerned with how he or she appears to others. Superego identity is the accrued confidence that the outer sameness and continuity prepared in the future are matched by the sameness and continuity of one's meaning for oneself, as evidenced in the promise of a career. The ability to settle on a school or occupational identity is pleasant."

The adolescent is supposed to find his identity by, for example, expressing and arguing his different opinions and try to find where he stands on certain issues. The adolescent can identify with others or completely disagree with them. Naturally the social aspect is important here; does the adolescent agree with what his/her parents think or stand when it comes to such things as, for example, religion? That's just one example of many though. The adolescent is supposed to create some sort of image of who he/she is.

I bring this particular stage up cause I feel I haven't figured it out myself quite yet. Who am I? Who is hiding behind this face I'm wearing? I'm not completely lost here, I know myself quite well, but there are definitely areas where I'm uncertain of things. I often find it hard to decide things and decide where I stand. Sometimes I find I'm too easily persusaded by other people's opinions. Choosing the right education also proves harder than I had imagined. I hope that gets better with time...I have my own theory as to why this stage might be causing problems for me, but that's not something I'm going to lay out here now.

I hope I will get what I want from life. The last couple of years have definitely been better than some of the stuff I've gone through earlier, and hope is the one thing that has kept me going. The hope that things actually get better. Sometimes I just compare myself so easily to others my age. So many seem to have their lives sorted out - cars, bachelor and master degrees, permanent jobs and so on. I hate that society is the way it is. I wish we valued other things more; family, friends and silence. Nowadays money and a great career seems to be the most important thing. It's quite sad, really. I wish we all could just slow down and enjoy life. I do hope things get better. The stress of today's society doesn't do us any good.