My Summer in Finland: Week in Kulho

Jarno picked me up at the bus station last Sunday after my exciting weekend in Tallinn. We drove straight from the bus station to a boat ramp on the island of Satava. We got in a sketchy boat and drove to the summer cottage the Salminens had rented for the week. Kulho island is right by Kuusisto, in fact we could see the island when we took the boat to the grocery store. Kulho has no roads and is only reached by boat (you could swim if you were a fool).

Kulho is to the left of Kuusisto

Here you can see our cabin to the right and the dock and sauna by the water .

I didn't have wifi but was able to use Jarno's ipad one night to show their friends where Minnesota was. We had guests over almost every day. Sanni's birthday was on Friday and her grandparents and aunt came for strawberry shortcake. On Saturday a family with 5 kids (one was at camp) came to our cottage for some swimming and sauna. Both parents had been exchange students in the US. The mother was in Kansas but came to MN for a week and the father was in Texas. His English has a southern accent to it. The parents were really nice and invited Sanni and I to go waterskiing with them this week.
The cottage itself wasn't very fancy. The bathroom was a outhouse and had no shower. Luckily the sauna had a hot water heater so I could wash my hair with that. I slept on the couch that was actually more comfortable than my bed here. There was a tv which was used to watch trashy American tv and a stupid French show. Sanni and I watched Dance Moms, The Real housewives of OC and Tough Love. The French show was called "Foudre". I'm not sure what the show was about but there was a boy "Alex" who kept trying to put the moves on "Alice" but she kept saying no. There were dramatic flash backs of Alice making out with a blonde guy in the river and Alex going after whaling ships in Antartica. His little boat hit the whaling boat and the sea became dramatically red. Another show we watched was "Uusi Päivä" which is a Finnish show. Uusi Päivä is Degrassi + Love Actually + Days of Our Lives + Finnish Language. It's a favorite show of the girls but makes even less sense to me than Foudre. The only thing I like about the show is the character Tomi because he is so dang cute. Like a puppy. I watched an episode of That 70's Show but no one else got the jokes.
On Wednesday we all (including Sara of course) rode back to the car to take a drive back home to water the plants and go to the big super market. At the super market I showed Jarno the American section. We bought "Minnesotan Syrup" and "Fluff (marshamallow). He loved the syrup so much he put it on all over our ice creams. That was a first.
Every day consisted of sauna and swimming. Not much to report about that except the sauna took 4-evvvveeerrrr to heat up. I still have not done naked sauna.
On the island of Kulho is a old reform school. The school isn't very big but is visible from the sea. Anna told me that it was a very abusive home. A movie was made about a boy who went to the school called "The Home Of Dark Butterflies". The movie was actually filmed at the school as far as I can tell. I must find a free version online with subtitles. Anna says that it might be true, some things are for sure like the abuse and that a family opperated it.