"If I were" meme

I thougth a meme would be nice for a change. I got this meme from Tuleva Kätilö.

If I were a month, I would be: September
If I were a day of the week, I would be: Friday
If I were a time of day, I would be: 11 PM
If I were a planet, I would be: Mars
If I were a sea animal, I would be: star-fish (Meritähti)
If I were a direction, I would be: right
If I were a piece of furniture, I would be: chair
If I were a sin, I would be: pride
If I were a liquid, I would be: sea water
If I were a stone, I would be: granite
If I were a tree, I would be: oak
If I were a bird, I would be: hawk
If I were a flower/plant, I would be: day lily (päivälilja)
If I were a kind of weather, I would be: light rain
If I were a musical instrument, I would be: cello

If I were an animal, I would be: lion
If I were a color, I would be: red
If I were a vegetable, I would be: aubergine (munakoiso)
If I were a sound, I would be: wind whistling
If I were an element, I would be: air
If I were a car, I would be: Old Chevrolet from 1920's
If I were a song, I would be: Seasons of wither by Aerosmith
If I were a movie, I would be: Dersu Uzala by Akira Kurosawa
If I were a book, I would be written by: Margaret Atwood
If I were a food, I would be: tiramisu
If I were a place, I would be: Porvoo in Finland
If I were a number, I would be: nine

Visiting Vaasa

Mustasaari church
I visited Vaasa (Finnish town in the west coast) on Saturday with my husband and his friend Juha. We left the dog to my mom. I wanted to see some culture, so we went to this art museum called Tikanoja Art Museum. They had an exhibition about orientalism in the art. It was nice to see their Matisse. I'm very fond of the works of the Finnish painter called Eemu Myntti. He was a Finnish expressionist and lived many years in France. Tikanoja Art Museum was a former home of a business man called Frithjof Tikanoja. He was the brother-in-law of the painter Eemu Myntti. Mr Tikanoja and Josef Lassila founded a company called Lassila & Tikanoja in Vaasa in 1905. First it was a wholesale business. Nowadays Lassila & Tikanoja is a Finnish public listed company specializing in environmental management and property and plant maintenance throughout the Baltic region.
We also visited the old Vaasa and Mustasaari (=Korsholm) church. It was built in 1776 as a Court of Appeal by Kustaa III (Gustavus III). The old Vaasa was destroyed in the fire in 1852 and they transformed the court house as a church. The new town of Vaasa was then built on the coast six kilometres from the old town.

Dogs and Cats

I've been telling so much about my dog Jekku in this blog, so I thought it might be appropriate to reveal that I used to be a cat person before.

The first cat I ever fall in love to was a cat in my grandmother's house. At the time I was six years old. The cat was called Elvis. A black-and-white cutie.
He lived in a farm and chased mouses and rats.

The second time was when I was about 12 and found kittens in the stall. They had eye infections and I decided to save one of the from the evident (you know what sometimes happens in a farmhouse...)
I named her Rose-Marie Charlotte, because it was the prettiest name I could ever think of. She was a white cat but her tail was grey and she had a grey spot in the forehead as well. I was amazed that I could finally pursuade my mother (who hates cats) to allow me to take a cat to our home. So Rose-Marie Charlotte (or Rosi as we later called her) became officially mine.
Sometimes a life of a cat can be short. Rosi lived with me happily a couple of years but one day she was gone. I remember I searched for her two weeks. Then some ambulance guys told my mom that they had run over a cat near my home.

I took my second cat when I was 18. Her name was Katza and she had a lot of stripes ( I don't know if you call them in English stripes in this case). She was a fun loving cat - she just loved the cleaning days. She used to run on the carpet and then suddenly hit the brake so that the carpet was a mess. She also liked to wake me really early in the morning (like 5 AM). Unfortunately I had to give her to my great aunts Armi and Alli when I moved to Helsinki, but she lived a very nice life in the countryside. I quess it wouldn't been so nice in Helsinki in an appartment blog with allergic roommates.

This is photo of a cat called Nasu. She belongs to my brother-in-law. She doesn't like our dog Jekku very much. They don't understand each others languages - so I quess the best word to describe their relationship is the word "distant". They don't fight or anything - they can be together in the same room, but they don't go very near each other. Nasu is always very curious about what Jekku is doing and Jekku understands the Finnish word "Kissa" (Cat) well - he always starts to look around when someone says Kissa.

Chasing relatives in Ellis Island

I got an e-mail today from my relative Waino in Utah. He is the second cousin of my grandmother.
We found each other a couple of years ago - through internet of course. We have also met each other, he visited us in Finland summer 2003.
It was his grandmother Susanna who left Isokyrö, Finland over hundred years ago 1889 and travelled to USA. She married a Finnish man Jaakko Järvikorpi in Hanna, Wyoming in September 1892.

It's amazing what internet has done to genealogy. Finding your ancestors in church books online, tracking the descendants of the immigrated relatives.

If you are interested how to track relatives in USA, here are some websites which have helped me.

General:
*Ellis Island passanger records
*Ancestry.com and US Census records
*Familysearch.org (Mormon site)

Tracking Finnish relatives in USA or Canada:
*Finnish institute of Migration (passport records online etc)
*The Genealogical society in Finland
Article by Olavi Koivukangas: Finns abroad

Seeing a lot of dentists

Last week wasn't great at all. I haven't seen so many dentists for ages as I did last week. It started as a small ache in the back tooth and turned out as a gigantic pain which didn't let me sleep at all. I'm so glad it's over, even though it ment a root canal work.

I have all these good plans, but I feel like I'm facing all sorts of obstacles. I begin to wonder. Maybe it's a sign. Maybe I'm trying to do too much.



I quess we could all learn from my dog Jekku. He knows how to live a relaxed life. At the moment he sleeps on his back, paws facing to the roof. Last month I took a photo of him while he was birdwatching near Vartiokylänlahti (Vartiokylä bay in Helsinki)

Janis and me

"Sittin’ down by my window,
Honey, lookin’ out at the rain."

This Janis Joplin song has always been my favourite. Somehow it's so sad, but there's this undercurrent of independency there like in most of her songs. Ball and Chain is my music for the melancholy moments, and the moments I'm remembering the past moments of melancholy. It reminds me of my first year here in Helsinki in a student flat, a small room 12 m2 and a window facing north. A rainy autumn - first autumn alone.


I don't really listen so much music nowadays. When I lived alone, I used to play a lot of lp's and cd's. Now it's just occasionally in the car. No wonder that my music taste has deteriorated. Not to mention that I would know what's hip or cool in the music scene. I don't. I'm turning into my mom and listening to old tangos.

*Lyhyt oli kesän ihana aika, muistot jälkeen jää*
This was from Finnish tango "Punaiset Lehdet" - Red Leaves

The dog is sleeping under the table, perhaps I should do the same and go to bed.

Sudden deaths

It always stops you, when you hear that someone you know has suddenly died.

Last week I heard that Mr Pentti Vainio from SAK (the biggest labour market organisation in Finland) had died in the helicopter crash near Tallinn. Today another sad message, a chief economist of Nordea, Juha Ahtola had died in cancer.

I remember Mr Vainio as a colourful person, who was very direct in his words. A true trade union guy.
I knew Mr Ahtola better, I shall miss him and his clear explanations and views of the near future of Finnish economy. Media lost a good commentator.

Helicopters and fears

A Finnish helicopter crashed today down in the sea in its way from Tallinn, Estonia to Helsinki, Finland. There were 12 passangers in the helicopter and now they all lie in the bottom of the sea.
A helicopter belonged to a company called Copterline. It was carrying 12 passangers and a crew of two. Six passanger were Finns, two Americans and four Estonians.

I've been always afraid of flying. I would never fly with a copter and I don't like aeroplanes either. I tend to keep my eyes shut during the landing or the take-off. This accident just proves the point. They can fall. They really can.

Car music meme

I got this meme from Elena. It reminds me of getting a new cd player to my car. My car (or ours) is a Volvo, which I really like.

Name three songs that remind you of a car trip you have taken.
* Judas Priest: Turbo lover
* Bonnie Tyler: The total eclipse of the heart
* Mari Laurila: Aja hiljaa isi (Mari Laurila's children song called Drive slowly daddy)

Name three songs that are best heard in a car.
*Nirvana: Lithium
* Michelle Shocked: Memories of East Texas
*Ozzy Osbourne: Dreamer

Name three songs with cars in the title or lyrics.
Tracy Chapman: Fast Car
Smiths: There's a Light that never goes out (including a double decker bus and a ten ton truck)
Deep Purple: Highway star

Art exhibition in Sysmä

We were in the countryside last weekend. The parents of my husband have a summer house in Hollola near Lahti. It was so relaxing to row on Vesijärvi lake and go to the sauna, which is heated with wood. On the Saturday evening we played a card game called Skibbo with my parents-in-law. I didn't win at all.
Sunday we went to this art exhibition in Sysmä called Suvi-Pinx.
There were a lot of paintings from a Finnish painter called Markku Laakso. We thought his style was like Akseli Gallen-Kallela meets porn magazine Jallu. A lot of naked women, men from Lappland, Elvis - all this in national romantic style with a a hint of socialistic painting. Interesting, but definately not our style.

My favourites in the exhibition were Esa Riippa and Matti Lampi. Matti Lampi comes from Liminka.