15 CHA CHA CHA (EN)

 

Finnish sunset? AGAIN?!

The time in Tampere is actually over now: I am currently on the ferry on my way from Turku to Stockholm, after saying goodbye to my favourite people in Tampere last night and having the wonderful company of Annika, Dani and Noa on the platform this morning. The fact that the three of them walked with me to the station at 5:30 in the morning to say goodbye - just thinking about how sweet that is makes my eyes water again. I have indeed cried a lot this morning, and there is more to come. I didn't sleep at all last night because of the emotional chaos inside me - although thanks to the Ice Hockey World Championship in Tampere and the sunset swim with Jeannette (the sun currently sets at around 10:30 pm) I didn't go to bed until 1 am anyway and should have been beyond tired after the last few days.

Käärijä = spirit animal!

Finland absolutely did not make it easy for me to leave. Since Wappu, the weather has been almost consistently bomb, and especially the last few days it's been T-shirt weather! This last week in Tampere I was somehow indestructible - I had really, really much energy. Both physically, emotionally and mentally. It still feels like an avalanche of wonderful experiences that I'm buried under right now, somehow trying to dig myself out to see what actually happened. Since it's spring in Finland, the days feel like they have more than 24 hours - partly due to the length of the day, of course, and partly due to the density of experiences.

STUPID TOURISTS IN HELSINKI <3

In any case, this last week in Finland was accompanied by ONE song, namely the Finnish contribution to the Eurovision Song Contest. CHA CHA CHA, that is. The song has shaped the whole semester abroad, but in the last few weeks Käärijä's shirtless-neon-green performance was really omnipresent. Annika, Dani, Jeannette, Thomas and I became especially aware of this when we arrived in Helsinki on Friday, the day before the ESC (and before our relay race there!): CHA CHA CHA balloons, statues, dressed in Käärijä's signature outfit, and sure enough, the song was played, sung, clapped, hummed everywhere. Since Annika and I have a distinct passion for warbling (Ballermann) hits (HELIKOPTER 117!) to ourselves (much to the chagrin of Thomas), Cha Cha Cha quickly became our relay anthem. And it definitely contributed (besides Dani, our multi-function fanboy) to the fact that Team Waste of Make-Up did so well! All four of us ran really top times. I really enjoyed the marathon atmosphere and am now very motivated to sign up for a half marathon this year. My fitness level has been on fleek since Finland, so that has to be used. :D Well, back to CHA CHA CHA. After a great Friday and Saturday in Helsinki (our Air BnB had a clean, well-equipped kitchen! Fluffy carpet!!! Working appliances!!! Scissors with plastic covers!!!) we went back to Tampere for ESC watching. Public viewing in Tampere is excellent these days, as the ice hockey world championship is taking place there at the moment and the whole city has been upside down since then anyway and everything is geared towards providing a brilliant fan experience. As we know, it wasn't enough to win the ESC - but the brainwashing with CHA CHA CHA still continued.

Team Waste of Make-Up on the way to Helsinki City Run! While running my part of the relay (13.5 k), I realized how much of a beauty Helsinki is. :)

Half asleep, Jeannette and I visited the Suolijärvi sauna on Sunday for the last time (at least for me, Jeannette, the lucky one, is staying in Finland for a while longer). In early summer temperatures. The sauna therefore took a back seat in favour of a swim in the lake (cosy 10 C° water temperature) and relaxing on the wooden jetty in the sun, with a view of the Finnish forest (which is a similar colour to Käärijä's top, so we're back to the topic of CHA CHA CHA). Pure holiday feeling. In the evening, in the Pinja kitchen, it was German-speaking dinner for the Wasties! Well, actually it was an Austrian dinner, we served Kaspressknödel and Kaiserschmarrn. Garnished with Ballermann hits and two (ironic) Maniacs, aka Annika and me, going crazy. We were able to win even more fans, see video. And of course we listened to CHA CHA CHA again!

But that wasn't enough, after dinner we went out again to watch the sunset at the lake... And it was the most beautiful sunset I have experienced in Finland so far. Not only because of the look, but also because the Wasties were there. We were all pretty wound up (sugar shock from the Kaiserschmarrn), just goofing around, doing gymnastics, flipping stones into the water, just messing around and thus making the inner child happy. :) There were very liberated, weightless and unforgettable moments that evening, which luckily were captured photographically. These days felt a bit like the days after high school graduation, when everyone from the year group was still together and partying every day before being scattered all over the world. But just with a few more years of life experience compared to A-levels. I was the first of the group to leave Tampere, and over the next two weeks the rest will be on their way. We will see each other again, that's for sure. But saying goodbye to this daily togetherness is incredibly difficult for me... Well, we are creatures of habit.

L'ultima cena?

And now yesterday was the last day. So intense again. A last morning run. Yoga on the promenade for the first and last time. Lunch in the cafeteria, a bit of bureaucracy in the library. At home, a packed suitcase and a room that I have at least tried to breathe a little of my personality into over the last few months. Yesterday I gutted my Pinja room and returned it to its vroni-less, neutral hotel room state. Somehow, though, the 413 in Pinja still feels like my room. And it will probably remain so in my mind for some time to come. I already had to fight tears several times during the day yesterday, but I kept putting myself back in the present moment. In the evening I went out again, to a bar for public viewing. Ice hockey, Finland against Sweden. Revenge on the Swedes who "stole" the ESC victory from us and CHA CHA CHA? A little bit. Unfortunately it didn't work out, Finland also lost in ice hockey yesterday. But in the end I didn't notice much of the game, for several reasons it was rather unimportant for me. I was just too much marveling at the last weeks' bliss.  And besides, Jeannette and I just went for a sunset swim in the middle of the match. Which was wonderful and invigorating! The water was icy, of course, but it was so nice to feel your body warming itself up again after the swim, and to gaze at the sunset. I was overjoyed at this moment last night, lying on a wooden bench in a bikini, looking out at the water and everything was just perfect. And at the same time, on the horizon, the departure that would take place in a few hours was becoming more and more apparent.

Why already now? Now, when every single day has been so wonderful? I would have loved to cancel this ferry I'm on right now. Just extended it for a few more days. But it would only have postponed the whole thing, not cancelled it. And running away from challenges has never been my thing. But yes, it is scary to approach the concept of "settling down" again after this life on the road, which I have actually been leading more or less since the beginning of 2022. To be honest, I'm a little afraid of being reduced to the label of "exotic-beautiful bird of paradise" when I return; I have found myself again a little more through these travels. Sounds like a standard traveling-spirit sentence now, but it's true. As with so many people, almost three years of the pandemic have left their mark on me. I know it won't hurt me to settle a bit. Finland was my medicine to cautiously instil a bit more consistency again, to recharge my social batteries because they were running on fumes far too often. But there is still so much to process, all the encounters, adventures, personal learnings, academic insights, emotional highs and lows that were unleashed with a trip to New York over New Year's Eve 2021/22. And yes, that requires a little more consistency instead of piling more items on the "to-process" list. To look when something is stirring inside me, and not to flood myself with more external stimuli to distract from it. Well, right now I'm feeling the need for sleep. And to write a bit of a diary, because even though this blog is very personal anyway, there are some things that need to be treated with discretion. ;) 

In this sense, bisous bisous,

Vroni