Amusing ourselves to Death

Patrik has given up TV, Riina has given up TV and Maija and me have given up TV. It was not difficult We just have not bothered to get another TV since coming to Finland. We gave our old one away to Janet in Saffron Walden because it would not play over here in Finland. I don't know the reason for Patrik giving it up but it seems he has more time to burn down sheds and clip trees, smile with friends and play his favourite songs. Not having a TV gives you time for people.

How often do you go into sombodies home and the TV is on and everybodies attention is drawn to it and all conversation ceases. It used to drive Maija mad when she would want to talk to me and I wanted to concentrate on some particular programme I was watching, and you are not able to get each others attention. Watching TV seperates us.

Riina gave it up because it was consuming her life. It was always on and there was always soaps to follow, or reality TV shows like wife swapping, or Mr. Millionaire, or Big Brother, which are addictive.

When Maija was depressed she would watch TV for hours on end. Starting with old black and white movies in the afternoon, then on to quizz shows, and antiques programmes right through to the news and a late movie before collapsing into bed.

I have not had any withdrawal symtoms and I am reading books and laughing at words, which is lovely

Border disputes

Yesterday I spent half an hour digging with a Kurd called Rekar who is eleven years old, and plays for EPS, Patrik's old football team. He wanted to speak english. He gets into troubles at school. I asked him why, and he said it was because he called the Finns "suomeen homot" and I asked why he had done that, and he said because they had called him "paskat Kurdit".

I said that I had seen that some of the tool boxes on the allotment had been thrown into the ditch, and he said it was the "Suomeen skinnerit" who had done it. He then proceeded to tell me there had been an argument between the previous owner of my plot, and the old grandmother who owned the adjacent plot.

It was a border dispute. Just imagine a border dispute over a 10meter square plot of land, and not between countries. He then said that the Arab on the other side of my plot had stolen my land and I should fight to get it back. I was not interested in fighting over a few weeds. If anybody wants them they can have them.

What chance does Israel and Palestine have in solving border disputes when you can have a conflict of interests, and an eruption of animosity over an allotment in Espoonlahti.

Land is more important than gardening. Ownership and rights are the things that matter most. If I have to engage in a battle over border disputes, then it will be the town council who decides who owns what. For Israel it is Jehovah who decides and for Palestine it is Allah, and old Karl Marx or was it the French anarchist Proudhon was of the opinion "all property is theft"

Perhaps we should listen to Douglas Adams who later pointed out in The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, the term property is in common usage as a term for what Proudhon calls possession. Taken out of context, it can be an excellent way to justify stealing: "Property is theft, right? Therefore theft is property, therefore this [insert stolen item here] is mine..."

The wrist

Maija broke her wrist about three months ago. Yesterday she had the pins removed. The wrist is still wrapped up and has stiches in it. She keeps her hand in an upright position, and does not use it very much. It is very difficult for her to work with just one hand. When cutting bread she places the elbow of her left arm on top of the bread to hold it down and cuts with her right hand. She is very careful not to move it.

She has been given another 4 weeks sick leave from the doctor, though that does not mean much since she does not work. She has troubles typing, or tying shoe laces, or buttoning jackets. She has been given some time with the physiotherapist to get her muscles working again. She can not rock her hand back and forth. Her thumb has limited movement. She cannot grip or hold things which makes it impossible for her to drive the car. She has a nasty scar on the underside of her arm where they cut her open to put in a metal plate to strength her wrist. For one month they left her without a cast but with these pins still in her flesh. You could see the points of them protruding agaist her skin. She was afraid to move her arm when the pins were like his in case she would bump her wrist and the pins would poke through the skin and she would get an infection.

It looks like the rehabilitation process will be long and difficult.

Revolution

( Words : Joseph Bovshover / Music : Dick Gaughan )


I come like a comet new born
Like the sun that arises at morning
I come like the furious tempest
That follows a thundercloud's warning
I come like the fiery lava
From cloud-covered mountains volcanic
I come like a storm from the north
That the oceans awake to in panic

I come because tyranny planted
My seed in the hot desert sand
I come because masters have kindled
My fury with every command
I come because man cannot murder
The life-giving seed in his veins
I come because liberty cannot
Forever be fettered by chains

I come because tyrants imagine
That mankind is only their throne
I come because peace has been nourished
By bullets and cannon alone
I come because one world is two
And we face one another with rage
I come because guards have been posted
To keep out the hope of the age

From earliest times the oppressed
Have awaked me and called me to lead them
I guided them out of enslavement
And brought them to high roads of freedom
I marched at the head of their legions
And hailed a new world at its birth
And now I shall march with the peoples
Until they unfetter the earth

And you, all you sanctified moneybags
Bandits anointed and crowned
Your counterfeit towers of justice
And ethics will crash to the ground
I'll send my good sword through your hearts
That have drained the world's blood in their lust
Smash all your crowns and your sceptres
And trample them into the dust

I'll rip off your rich purple garments
And tear them to rags and to shreds
Never again will their glitter
Be able to turn people's heads
At last your cold world will be robbed of
It's proud hypocritical glow
For we shall dissolve it as surely
As sunlight dissolves the deep snow

I'll tear down your cobweb morality
Shatter the old chain of lies
Catch all your blackhooded preachers
And choke them as though they were flies
I'll put a quick end to your heavens
Your gods that are deaf to all prayer
Scatter your futile old spirits
And clean up the earth and the air

And though you may choke me and shoot me
And hang me your toil is in vain
No dungeon, no gallows can scare me
Nor will I be frightened by pain
Each time I'll arise from the earth
And break through all your weapons of doom
Until you are finished forever
Until you are dust in the tomb

People at the plots

Dug 2x10M last night. The good weather is bringing people out to their plots. In the neighboring plot there is a young Japanese couple. They were there with their baby who was sleeping in a pushchair with a linen cloth over the hood to shade her.

A dark skinned man with a grey beard said Moi. I replied with a Hello Hello, I somehow wanted to say I was not a Finn, but he just made a clicking noise with the side of his mouth and moved on.

The Khajastan lady who I met on the first day and was wearing a hat like a Peruvian woman passed with her husband she bowed her head down and ignored me ever though I smiled and said hello.

A man from Pakistan came carrying two chairs to take to his plot, and later he lingered by the gate looking at a wheelbarrow and looking around to see if anyone was watching. This was the wheelbarrow I had borrowed to move the manure onto my plot. With one quick movement he turned it upright and ran off up the road with it. I just hoped to God it was his own barrow and that he was not stealing it. I had visions of planting up a glorious garden and then robbers coming in the middle of the night and stealing everything.

Fifteen minutes later he returned with a table on the wheelbarrow and took it to his plot, as he passed I remarked in English that he would soon have a living room on his plot. He smiled and nodded but did not reply. I suspect he does not know English. He then dutifully returned the barrow to its position and left.

Maija came down to the plot with Tulikki we walked around, and when you have somebody with you, you realize that the place is in a bit of a state. So much rubbish in the ditches. Old bottles and plastic bags and of course the rusting supermarket trolley. I think the site has been visited by vandals since many of the water pipes have been broken and peoples tool boxes have been overthrown and tumbled into the ditches.

I just hope that it is not related to racial prejudice. I am beginning to feel like a refugee. I suppose that is how a ghetto attitude develops. You get persecuted and you then form a group that sticks together just for your own comfort and safety.

A boy arrived on a bike. He had short cropped black hair. He looked like an Iranian or a Pakistani he had brought some wood for the dark man with the grey beard. He took the wood and threw it in a hole and lit a fire. The smoke smelt good. He then burned the dried up stalks of last years sun flowers. He was a tidy man. I wish I had a hole to burn my rubbish in.

The man from Cambodia

Went to the allotment early in the morning on Sunday. Man drove up in a Berlingo. Stopped digging to talk to him. He was short and from Cambodia. He had been living in Finland for 15 years. He spoke Finnish and English. He had learnt English at church in Thailand. He said the Khmer had taught him english, this threw me abit since I thought the Khmer Rouge were all about communism and against anything western, but he explained that there were many different groups of Khmer and that Cambodia was made up of 90% Khmer tribes. Just shows you how ill informed you can be.

He showed me some special seeds that a friend had sent him from Cambodia. They were small and black about the size of a pea. He was wearing a padded jacket with a T-shirt under it. On his neck there were tattoos. I looked at his plot of land. It was neat and tidy. The beds were lovingly raised up and the earth was fine and well tilled, almost as though he had put it through a sieve. He went off into the forst and came back carrying some willow saplings to erects some structure. I wondered if it was for his magic seeds.

I decided to dig until I had a couple of beds that were 10x1.5 M. It was early in the morning so nobody else was about so I borrowed a barrow and dumped some manure on the ground as well and worked it in with a fork. The fork and spade I bought from Biltma were too short for me. But I thought that they would have been perfect for the man from Cambodia. Too much bending over puts an ache in the lower back. It would have been good if I still had my navies shovel with the long handle. It would have made the work easier.

We were the only two people working the plots. It may still be too early to do anything with the soil. It has not awoken from its winter rest. The dead stalks of sunflowers stand neglected. While digging I unearthed a few onions that had not been lifted from last year. I also found a yellow plastic marker with the word Sipuli written on it. It had been buried in the ground. The ground I have has obviously been abandoned. I bet it broke somebody's heart.

I wonder if the little man from Cambodia had magic beans and they would grow a vine into the heavens, and we could all climb it and never come back. I think not.

The seeds that he will plant will be an attempt to capture a memory, and bring back to him the taste of home. A green leaf to cook in butter and spinkle with salt and pepper. A leaf to be eaten with a laugh. A leaf to be shared with you family.

The doctor says to me that to lower your cholesterol levels then you need to exercise and you need to eat the right food. That is what the garden is for. But don't tell anybody

Digging the dirt

Maija went off to Hanko and I decided to try and get an allotment. I had received a letter from Espoo town council saying the plots were up for grabs and if I wanted one I should be in the parking lot behind Ulapatori at 9:00.

When I arrived there was already one man there. He did not look Finnish. He was small and dark and it turned out that he was from Kazakhstan... that is somewhere down by the Caspian Sea and on the borders with Russia and China. He was very friendly. We spoke to each other in Finnish since he did not speak any English.

He has applied for Finnish citizenship and once he has that he is free to move withing he EU and he plans to take his family to the UK. The reason being that it is very difficult to find work in Finland and he feels that there are more job opportunities in the UK. His 13 year old daughter refuses to learn Finnish, but is extremely interested in Learning English because she desperately wants to go to the UK.

The man from the council arrived and by that time there were about 15 people wanting a plot. It was a case of first come first server, and the little man from Kazakhstan got the chance to pick his plot. Some Finns had arrived when the plots were being given out and were digging up Rhubarb from their plot, they were giving it up. Since the plot had lots of berry bushes on it the little man decided he would have it if it was for free. He got it. I was next in line and I choose plot 20 and went to sign the papers, however just as I was about to sign the man from the council said there had been a mistake and I should choose another plot. I chose plot 9 which was near the gate and was overgrown with weeds. It will need alot of work to get it in shape.

But I want it for the exercise and to get a tan from working outside. Potatoes, onions, and lettuce are about all I want to grow. Things I can eat straight way.

There were quite a few people from Kazakhstan who had plots, and I felt a sort of kindred spirit with them. I only hope that they do not need to grow things to eat, that they are so poor that they need to put food on their table. Anyway I look forward to meeting them again and finding out about their lives and customs.

Kimmo Pohjonen revisited

In February I went to a Kimmo Pohjonen concert.. called Animator It was quite amazing. He has been referred to as a Finnish techno accordion terrorist, who indulges in an extended passage of glossolalia which sounds like a group of mad monks doing Gregorian chants, while smacking their lips and undergoing electric shock treatment.

He came out dressed like a tibetan monk and danced weird dances while playing the accordion. Very wild stuff, with strange lightshows projecting images onto his body or accordion. The accordion when it was fully extended formed a miniature film screen onto which the images were projected, and at other times he extended the skirt of his monks robe so images could be displayed on it.

The press has this to say about him



"The dude on stage is twitching, eyes clenched shut. His head's full of bugs, full of tumbling ideas, full of God knows what. In his hands an accordion writhes and shudders. He lunges into it and shark-like, it snaps back at him as spotlights skitter and flash. He stumbles forward and trips off his pedestal, a drunk electrocuted in a hailstorm of noise. Eardrums are bombarded as one man, his squeezebox, his percussionist and a few pads 'n' pedals become a torrent of mantric sonic wizardry, at once avant-garde, ancient and electro-punk." (Musik magazine, England, July 2002)

It was not all a wall of noise. At times the music was soft and angelic and he would lower himself into a sitting position with his back to the audience and then very slowly lean back with tremendous stomach muscle control and lower the upper part of his body onto the floor, all the while playing the accordion. It was like somebody falling into deep water and being dragged down by a heavy weight. He would then spread his legs and his skirt would open up and images would be projected on it. He made slow undulating movements with his accordian while lying on his back and it was if he were a woman giving birth.

At one point he lurched about the stage like a drunk man or behaved like his arms and legs were being pulled about by a drunk puppet-master, and at this point the music had its roots in primative shamanic sounds from Lapland. His face was projected on a screen. A tattooed face, but he shook his finger at the audience as if to say that the image was not the real him. A new image appeared with matrix digital letters running down it, and again he insisted that this was not him.

This sequence was repeated with a few other images and when he did not appear to be getting through to the audience that the images we were seeing were not really him, he became frenetic and violent, The images of his head changed in rapid succession on the screen behind him, and they became like a flickering fire, dark and volcanic, hellish, and the playing became demonic and at one point he strode to the front of the stage and a spotlight shot up from under his robes and gave his face a gruesome tortured expression, and at the same time a spotlight was focused directly on someone in the audience, and he unleashed this barrage of sounds from his mouth that were not any recognisable language, but were quite frightening in their intensity. It was speaking in tongues. It was harsh and unpleasant. It sounded like a curse.

I sat there thinking I am so glad I am not under that spotlight. He then moved to centre stage the spotlight shone on him again and a fresh torrent of mutalated words spewed from his mouth, and again some poor soul had the auditorium spotlight directed full in his face. Performance, that is what it was. How do you get the audience on the edge of their seats, how do you raise the tension in the auditorium. How do you get people into a state of agitation and fear. You shine a spotlight on them and curse them with demonic words.

I thought that blessing is so much better than cursing. I thought prayer is better than oaths.

He moved to the left of the stage and the spotlight shone up through his skirts once again. What would I do if the light fell on me. I would stand up. I would shout back. "Give me a break Kimmo". I would shake my head and laugh. I would tell him to be quite, and take off that silly dress, and could he please take that spotlight out of my eyes. I think that is what he would have wanted... some audience participation, but as it was the spotlight fell on a Finn and he sat quietly and let Pohjonen cover him in blood curdeling screams. Frozen in the spotlight. That is the Finnish way.

House warming party

The house warming party was at the weekend. We had

* Two big cakes from Ripa
* Bottles od champagne
* A couple of wine boxes
* Blue cheese, Pepper cheese, Camenbert, Sheeps cheese
* Karjalan Pirikka
* Sima and Pommac
* A big box of Fazer chocolates
* Coffee and Tea
* A yellow submarine

We received flowers and house plants, cutting boards, glass bowls , a tea maker, baskets and lots of welcoming cards.

We invited lots of people from our past. I must have been like mixing oil and water but somehow we managed it. Maija and Riina stayed up until midnight the day before maing a submarine out of cardboard boxes. They painted it yellow. I designed the periscope. The kids enjoyed it, but half way through they began to jump on it and got pretty wrecked. At the end of the evening Christopher and me jumped on it together and we threw it out into the rubbish bins. It had served its purpose.

It went better than I had expected, since our bathroom is still not working. I had to gather everything up from the hall and dump it in the bathroom and then tape the door shut so noone could get in. If anybody wanted to go to the toilet then then had to go downstairs.

Grass is the handkerchief droped by the Lord

Went to the Library in Iso Omena yesterday and got myself a library card. Things are more advanced in Finland than in England. You get a library card with a barcode on it. You pop it into a machine and tap in your secret pin number. You then slide the books you have selected over a barcode reader and the books are checked out in your name. A receipt is then printed out telling you when the books are due back. When you return the books you just pop them trough another scanner and place them on a conveyer belt and the disappear into a hole in the wall.

It is a sort of self service library. I picked up some books of Poetry. There was not much to choose from but I did get Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass, and I was struck by the line

Grass is the handkerchief droped by the Lord

To me I imagined a rolling plain with grass streaching for miles and miles, and vast expanse of green. I thought of the ladies at court, who to draw attention to themselves drop their hankeys hoping that someone will notice it, pick it up and return it to them.

I suppose all of nature should declare the glory of God, when we see it our attention should be drawn to him.

First Visitors

On Sunday we had our first visitors to the flat.

Pity the bathroom has been ripped out and they are drying it out with some heater, and the small bedroom is still a mess with boxes. Still the living room and kitchen and main bedroom are looking OK.

I inspected the bathroom and I noticed there was a patch of wetness on the floor on closer inspection I noticed there was a leak coming from one of the pipes. So there we have it a classic situation. They bring in this expensive equipment to dry out the floor and at the same time they have a leak which wets it.

I found the stop-cocks and turned the water off, and as a results we did not have any water over the weekend. We phoned to tell them about the leak but all the advise we got was to put a bucket under the pipe and stop the water from falling on the floor. Seems they are not really interested in what is going on in the bathroom, and they tell us the drying will have to go on for a week, and I can not understand why.

If they are going to put in underfloor heating then I expect they will have to spread wet concrete so what is the point of drying the floor out?

Riina and the kids will be coming at the end of the month, at this rate I wonder if the bathroom will be finnished in time.

Trains in Madrid bombed

Yesterday 190 people were killed on trains in Mardid. The work of terrorists. Having no TV and not listening to the radio ment that I did not find out about it until this morning.

Somewhere, a man, in the depths of a snowy forest, does not know that this tragedy has happened. He chops his wood and eats his soup, and the snowflakes continue to fall.

The footprints from his cabin to the outside toilet are covered and disappear.

Nobody in Madrid knows that this man is eating soup in the quiet of his cabin.

Puting it all together

First of all I have to unwrap all the packages and get rid of all the cardboard and plastic. What is left is metal framework, screw, bolts table tops, little plastic T shaped things, and a couple of manuals that make no sence. I will have to concentrate very hard to get this thing constructed.

Innocently I mention that I saw a clock advertised in HS for 2€ and that starts off a long discussion about Finnish quality, Finnish design, craftsmanship, beauty, costs, slave labour, exploitation, the third world, self worth, joy, form, function.

For me a clock has to perform a function and that is to tell the time. If it is pleasing to the eye then so much the better. I am not particularly interested if the clock is made out of chrome and looks like a binicle on a ship, or is contrived to function as a stool, or looks like an aeroplane, and costs the earth into the bargain.

Try reading an IKEA manual and carrying on a conversation about values at the same time. Either you are going to do damage to yourself with a screwdriver becasue you are not concentrating on the construction, or you are going to do damage to your relationship by saying things that you would not normally say if you weren't so absorbed by fitting nuts and bolts together to get an IKEA computer table to stand on its own two legs.

After 1.5 hrs the table was built and if I must say it looks damn fine. I feel like a bloddy artisan.

Ikea once again

Went to Ikea last night, and bought their Galant office desk. I had to go to the main building to do the ordering, but the tables themselves are kept in another warehouse on the opposite side of Keha III. I paid for the goods including three Vietnamese flowerpots which were green and are for some rosemary and laverder plants I have bought.

On arriving at the opposite side of Keha III the goods were waiting for me. The big bit of the table looked to big to fit in the car I told the man I could put the seats down, I opened the back door and he ripped out the luggage rack and the supporting poles, and threw down the back seats.

Hold on hold on the seats fit under the floor and they have to be dismantled in a certain order and put away. He threw out the carpets and cables and blankets and boxes and kitchen towels, and I proceeded to dismantle the seats properly. He sullenly stood in the cold night air. The front seats have to be pushed right forward when the rear seats are being stowed under the floor, and before I could draw a breath he had stared to throw things into the back of the car, and he jammed the biggest section against the back of the drivers seat so I could not get into the car to drive.

I said the biggest section needs to go against the passenger seat , since it could remain pushed forward. With much huffing and puffing he had to unload all of the stuff he had put in to make space for the largest section, When it was finally in place like a whirlwind he threw everthing else into the back of the car. No stacking carefully, just all higgilty-piggilty. He slamed the door shut as if to say there you go you car is now packed, and with many a snort and a spit he got out of the cold and back into the warmth of the warehouse.

I drove carefully home and struggled to unload the goods into the spare room. It was late when I got everything done. I drank half a bottle of red wine and went straight to bed.

Carpets and tables and chairs

Bought three woolen carpets made India. They are all the same design and are shades of green with a few squiggles around the border. Two of them go down the hall and the big one is in the living room. They are thick and warm, and very pleasent.

Bought four Alvar Aalto chairs from Artek They are white with yellow leather seats. They were expensive and that was even when we bought them as seconds.

Went to IKEA once again and got a couple of tables for the living room. They were not expensive. They were made out of solid birch, and someone in the far east has made them.

There you have it. Why do you buy chairs by a famous Finnish designer that are very expensive, but are supposedly excellent design and build and at the same time buy cheap imports from an anonymous far eastern country, becasue you have to cover some floor space in you living room.

Form and functionality. I would like a house to have only those things in it that you use. Trinkets and ornimentation are just eye candy. I want a bed to sleep in, a chair to sit in, a shower to wash in, a cooker to cook on, a refrigerator to store my food, curtains to shield me from the sun. You have to decide what you want first of all, and after that decide what it will look like, and more specifically what it will look like together with all the other stuff you need to aquire.

It usually turns out to be a mess, becasue you do not remember shapes or colours or textures and when all the items that you buy are brought together they fight with each other. Paints get retired to the basement, furniture gets moved into the attic or given away, plain stupid purchases are never used and are hidden away, or discretely consigned to the rubbish dump.

It is not an easy task. Our desires bring us pain.

Weekend madness

Ripa has a birthday. Maija has a fever. Maija is supposed to visit Riita and meet up with old friends. Raisa says Chris will come and collect the table and chairs and bookcases at around 12 o'clock. Twelve comes and goes and no Chris. Maija calls up Riita and says she can't come. Postponing an event that has already been rescheduled. At one o'clock I phone Raisa and ask where Chris is. He has not left home yet. I have to be at Ripa's at two.

I decide to load all the chairs into the Yaris. I can carry a couple of chairs at a time. I go out and leave the door open. Maija tells me to shut it cos she feels vunerable with the door open. I put down the chairs. I close the door. I pick up the chairs walk to the front door, and put them down again and open the front door. I pick up the chairs and walk to the car. Open the car doors and remove the car seats and put in the dining room chairs. I lock up the car and I go back to the house open the door and Maija says close it because she feels vunerable. I close the door.

I repeat this sequence of events four times until the car is loaded. I am not in the best mood what with all the lifting up and putting down of chairs, all the opening and closing of doors.

Christpher calls and invites us for a meal at his house at seven. The Emma awards are on and it could be that Juhani will win an award for the Jazz musician of the year.

Maija feels better and decides to come to Ripa's with me. We deliver the chairs to Raisa and then drive on to Korso. We have difficulty finding Ripa's place. I say it is one way Maija says it is another way. In reality it is somewhere in the middle.

We eat cake that Ripa has made and Ripa reads about Bilbo's party from the Lord of the Rings. We applaud and shout. It was moving and sincere, but I have to get back to Raisa's and pick up Chris and go back to Espoonlathi to get the bookcases and the table. Maija does not want to leave. I want to go since I have promised Chris I would pick him up at five. Maija arranges a lift with the Kalmaris and I leave. I calculate half an hour to Chris, half and hour to Espoonlahti, half back to Chris's and half an hour to Terhi. That is a couple of hours and if I am luck I will just get into Christophers for the presentation of the Emma awards.

It nearly goes according to my calculations. I arrive 15 minutes late. They have recorded Juhani winning the Emma. We have a white wine. I make a salad. Christopher cooks some peppered steak, and we drink a fine red wine with it. For desert we have ice-cream and a good desert win. I fall asleep on the sofa, while the others watch Will Smith in Independence day. I wake up past midnight and it is time to go home.

We get lost trying to get to Keha II. We come to a T-junction and one direction points to Lippajarvi and that is where Maija wants to go. The other points to Kirkkonumi and that is where I want to go. Maija says Kirkkonumi is North. I say Kirkkonumi is in Espoo and Lippajarvi is in Vanta. I take the Kirkkonumi road and hit Keha II and I feel justified though I don't say anything. It is past one o'clock in the morning when we arrive home.

I open the car door for Maija, I undo her seat belt. I hold her arm to steady her on the icey road to the house. I open both doors to the house, and we go straight to bed.

I was happy that I had eaten the best steak in the world at Christophers and drunk and excellent red wine. Tomorrow will be a new day.

Delivery day

Got up early so we could drive from Juhani's house to EspoonLahti. It was a rushed job. I thought the delivery van would be there before we arrived. Indeed when we got there a man was already at our door. He was waiting for the truck to arrive. I rushed down to the LippuLaiva shopping centre and tried to buy some strong brown paper to lay down on the floor so there would be less of a mess to clear up from the snow being trawled in off the street.

I went to Soumalainen Kirjakauppa, and they had just the stuff I wanted on a great big roll next to the cash register. The woman behind the desk was looking at some book, and I waited patiently for her to look up so she could serve me.
She kept on reading.
Come on come on the truck will be arriving and I need to get some paper down on the floor.
She sniffed and ignored me
How long can I wait for her to ask if she could be of service to me.
She licks her finger and turns a page on her book
She knows that wet snowy feet are trudging over the floor of our newly waxed parquetrey
Finally she asks if she can help me
I say I want to buy 2o metres of paper off the roll in front of her desk
She smirks and says we don't sell that paper
I wonder if I should ask her if she gives it away for free... instead I just turn on my heel very fast and walk out of the shop. I was not going to give her the satisfaction of turning me down again.

I went to Timmari and with much pulling of the forelock and grovelling I managed to buy a whole roll of paper for 5€ went back to the flat and laid it out on the floor and taped it down. The delivery man arrived and he looked just like Pat... Riina's husband. Close cropped hair with a little blond quiff at the fron just like Jimmy Summerfield. With his mate who was an off duty fireman who was doing a bit of moonlighting they had the truck unloaded in about three hours. Maija was scurrying after them picking up small stones that had come off the soles of their boots. Arrrrrggh the price you have to pay to have a wooden floor.

Maija wants to give our book cases and table and chairs away to Raisa... and there was Ilona thinking that the table and chairs would be handed down to her as an heirloom. I defrosted the fridge freezer and after a search for my tools from among all the stacks of boxes I struggled to put up our bed so we could have a sleep that night. I managed to get the bed put together again but I did not fancy staying in that mess for the night, especially when there might be a warm meal waiting at the Aaltonens. Maija and I argued about whether to stay or go. She wanted to stay I wanted to go. Finally went decided to go and I went to the shopping mall to buy some beer to have with our meal at the Aaltonens.

I bought a 6-pack of Newcastle Brown ale and paid 14€ for them... TEN QUID for 6 bottles of beer, and each bottle having only 33cl... I felt shafted at the checkout, I should have bought a couple of bottles of wine instead.

But now in the end the beer was really good with the herring, and I was happy I had bought them.

Titles added to Blog posts and time stamp changed to European/Helsinki

Worked on the Template to put in TITLES and a new time stamp which is European

I mentioned before that when you move house you have to inform the local magistrate, and I thought that I did that succesfully over the phone. Well I got a call from the Espoo town council to say that since I am a foreigner then I have to go in person and inform them that I have moved. I went there on Wednesday.

They told me I should also take my passport as proof of identity, and my ETA card as proof that I have permission to be a resident, and my marriage certificate to proove that I am married to a Finn. I arrived at the office at 16:17 and they were closing up. The official closing time was 16:15. They would not let me in.

I went back on Thursday in good time and filled in a form. They asked me if I was renting a flat and it was with a certain degree of relish that I said no, I have bought a flat out-right. Though now that I think on it when I was reading through the fine print of the housing association one of the by-laws that was written there stated that under no circumstances, could any of the flats be sold to a foreigner. So I suppose that puts me on very unsure ground, if they ever want to thow me out for playing Rory Mcleod to loud.

It is strange that if you do not get full cooperation in everything you want in your life then you become paranoid. I have written to NMKY about an insurance claim for Maija's broken arm, but nobody has got back to me on the matter. Good Christians do not claim insurance they suffer in silence. Christians never make claims to insurance companies since then they become a bad risk and their premiums will be raised.

Charlie Brown got it right in the song when he said "why is everybody picking on me?"

Britania -> Harriss -> Texab -> Victor Ek

So I get an Email from Thomas in the UK. Here is what it says

Dear Mr Harper,
Thank you for the emails. I am sorry for the delayed response. I have left a
message with Ola Lundvall of Texab, to call me in the morning, to confirm
delivery of your goods for 20/21st Feb.
If you would like to call Texab, you can reach them on +46(0)8 556 975 04.
I will email you once I hear from Ola.
Kind regards
Thomas Wicks

Texab and a SWEDISH telephone number that sounds promising NOT!!! I suppose everyone in the UK thinks that Scandinavia is just one big country and Finland is really Sweden with the people speaking a different language.

Well I phoned up Texab in Sweden and they said that the delivery of the furniture would be done by Victor Ek, and it would now take place on Thursday 19th sometime in the morning. I suppose I now have to get in contact with someone at Victor Ek and find out if they know what is going on.

Phoned Victor Ek and they say the delivery will take place tomorrow. There is 70 cu metres and depending on how much help we need unpacking it could take from 4 to 8 hours to get everything in place. Maija is worried about the wooden floor that it will get spoiled by men walking in with wet and snowy boots. I guess I will have to find some roll of brown paper from somewhere and tape it to the floor. Etola in Tapiola should be the place to go and get stuff like that.

Received an Email from Riina today saying I worry too much.