First 24 hours in Finland.

    Once I arrived to the Salminen's house I met the girls and Sara. Sara is such a cute dog. Her tear marks make it look like she is smiling. Jarno gave me a book called "This is Finland". It is a picture book with stories about Finland's history. We then had dinner outside. Dinner consisted of potatoes, salad, bread, mushrooms wrapped in bacon. Sanni, Jarno and Anna speak English to a extent but Venla and Aada only know numbers up to 11. We talked about which animals were in the area. Aada really likes snakes and sharks. We then had desert inside which was strawberries and whipped cream. Then it was bedtime. I'm sleeping in Venla's room but she is sleeping in Aada's.
   The midnight sun thing is true. At 11 pm it looked more like 7. I was so tired I fell asleep and woke up at 9:15 am. I think I am adjusted to the time. Breakfast was muslii (oatmeal) and butter on bread.
    This morning we all went into Turku. We went into a mall and every store was having a sale. The first store was Stadium. I understand why so many Finns are in great shape. Random placed stairs are everywhere! Underneath the mall was a grocery store where we bought a strawberry cheese cake.
     Next stop was Jarno's father's house. It is his "Name Day" today (birthday). We sang Happy Birthday in Finnish (I just mumbled). We were only there for about 30 minutes.

Garden Next to Grandparent's house.

Later this evening we had a party. I met some new friends that I'm going to hang out with tomorrow. I'm very tired so off to bed!

Frankfurt to Helsinki

   Last night I took my 9 hour flight to Frankfurt from Denver. It was my first time flying Lufthansa and it was awesome. I sat next to a kid on a class trip to Italy. He and I gripped the seats in front of us for about 40 minutes because we had crazy turbulence over the Labrador Sea. I only slept for a hour :(

Free blanket,pillow and headphone

Every seat has personal tv

Boeing Big Plane

 In Frankfurt I found my gate. I was flying Lufthansa again. I managed to sleep the entire 2 hour flight. In Helsinki I met up with a YFU person. She helped me find my bus to take me to Piispanristi .

Tomorrow I will talk more about my host family.

Denver Update

    I left for MSP Intl. at 6:45 this morning, thinking that I was going to have a hassel with all the re-booking I had to do. My mom and I arrived, checked in and went through security all within 20 minutes. That left us with about 2 and a half hours to wait. We has breakfast at Axel's Bonfire then went to the gate. The time came for me to board a plane by myself for the very first time.

    My flight to Denver was kind of crazy. Turbulence was rough for the first 15 minutes and the last 10. I was the very last row. The man across the aisle from me asked if Flight was realistic ; could someone really fly a plane upside down. Willie the flight attendant said that was not possible. Although I was in the very last row I was treated like first class. Willie gave me water,nuts,chips and pita chips with hummus. I gave the hummus and pita chips to Lena, a girl going back to DEnmark through YFU.

    Next up is Frankfurt. I'll be on the Lufthansa plane for over 9 hours. Hopefully I can sleep right when I get on so I won't be so jet lagged when I get to Germany. Once in Germany I fly to Helsinki which is another 2.5 hour flight. I will finally get to Finland around 5:30 PM (9:30 am Central time).

Today Sucks

Well I won't be going to Finland today. My first flight would be delayed by an hour which would mean I would be missing my flight to Germany. So now I can't leave until tomorrow. UGHHHHHHHHHH. I was all ready to go, we were going to be leaving for the airport in an hour and now we can't.


Today sucks.

All Ready to Go!

    I can't believe I leave for Finland tomorrow! I'm so so so excited! Everything is packed up except for electronic cords and last minute stuff like that. This morning I packed up my tennis racquet in my checked luggage, hopefully that doesn't set me over the weight allowance. (Joke <--).

My backpack is from my dad, it has a lot of pockets and has a chest strap for when I sprint from one gate to another. My carry on over-head is from Le Sportsac. It was a Birthday gift from my parents. All of the patches show either landmarks or images associated with traveling. The orange bag is from Marker. I can zip off the top side and turn that into a backpack. Both the Le Sportsac and Marker bag have wheels.

My blogs will become for interesting once I arrive in Finland and I will be trying to upload every day.

31 hours until I leave for MSP international!

Packing, Packing and More Packing

    Only 9 more days! Whoo-Hoo!

    These past two weeks have been full of shopping and packing. I tried to stay minimal when packing but realized that was going to be really hard. I managed to minimize my pants and shorts but not my t-shirts. The temp in Turku doesn't get above 75 all that much so I don't have to pack to many hot weather clothing.  All of my toiletries, host gifts, shoes and most of my clothing is going into my checked bag. In my carry on bag (overhead) will be a change of clothing, another pair of shoes and CANDY! Also a million cords and adapters.

    Currently I'm listening to "Colors Of The Wind" in Finnish. I may not be learning much but it sure does sound different.

    I can't wait to go swimming in the ocean again. It's been so long (4 months lol)

21 more days!

    I can't believe that I will be on the plane to Helsinki only 3 weeks from now. I don't know where the past 7 months have gone. I signed up for the program in December, found out I was accepted in March and finally this month I'm leaving. I return August 10th which seems far off but I'm sure it'll come fast :(  .

    Today my mom and I went shopping for some new duds. I really only own athletic type clothing so I had to get some nicer shorts and skirts. I also got some host family gifts (ooooohhhhhh). I don't want to say what they are because they might read this. How am I supposed to pack 6 weeks worth of clothing, tennis clothes and gifts into a checked bag and a carry on? That is a challenge I'm looking forward too.

    Speaking of challenges, I've been trying to learn Finnish. My phrase book is pretty helpful but I'm probably pronouncing everything wrong. Ehh I have an 8 hour plane ride to learn a language.

näkemiin