ALIVE IN FINLAND.

And the weather blows. That's why I am taking the time to update my blog on the internet at the hostel in Helsinki.

Interesting how Emma and I did not realize that Helsinki is an hour behind St. Petersburg, so when we thought we only had a half an hour left until our room was ready we actually had an hour and a half. So now we're sitting in the lobby on hard wooden benches watching the Olympics (so far we've seen men's synchronized diving and men's team fencing) and waiting for our room because we both need to nap so so so badly.

We met up across the street from Ploshad Vosstanaya last night at 8:30pm to look for a bus to take us to Helsinki. This was easy as there are about five billion options all hanging out there, basically begging us to choose them for our trip. We picked one, kind of at random, but it turned out to be a good one -- the played Legally Blonde 2 (which is not a very good movie) in black and white on the bus, which kind of loses some of the very pink affect of the film. We were able to sleep a little, at least I was, but we definitely spent more time stopping and getting on and off the bus than actually traveling, in my opinion.

The border crossing took us forever, of course, but not as long as it did the time I crossed with Mom, Nunni & Puppy in 2005 as we didn't have to wait our turn in line as long because we crossed at 1 in the morning instead of 1 in the afternoon. We did cross at the same exact location though as we did last time. At first I was certain that all of these stations must look the same and I was probably just going crazy from sleep deprivation, but then I confirmed the stamps in my passport and felt better about my memory still being fully functional.

Throughout the whole ride there were these two funny guys sitting behind us speaking in English together that clearly was not either of their first languages. My favorite thing that one of the guys said was, "If you're laughing in Finland it means you are drunk, American or an idiot. Or maybe all three." Also, during one of our many passport/visa checks when a Finn or Russian official would get on the bus and walk down the aisle, I commented that the guy didn't even actually look at our passports, and the man behind me said, "It's not the looking that's important. It's the following of procedure." He was more entertaining than Legally Blonde 2.

We got to Helsinki at 5:30am -- well, what we thought was 5:30am -- and got off the bus to a murky sunrise wondering when stores would actually open. When we were looking into the windows of a recently closed McDonald's to see what their hours are, an older Finnish woman approached us to ask if we knew why there was so much trash all over the ground. Our replying that we didn't know turned into an hour long conversation. I am still not sure if this woman was completely right in the head -- she was wearing a headscarf covered in a design of realistic puppies and a huge trench coat -- and she told us she had just spent all night at the Grand Casino observing "anthropology, ethnography, linguistics, art history and sociology because a casino is the ultimate place for that." She told us the casino closed at 4am but if we wanted to go later to observe -- "And only observe! Don't lose your money!" -- she gave us vouchers she had to gain free admittance. She then suggested we eat cheesecake at this fancy restaurant near by. She was actually really helpful though and told us all about the tram systems and where the ferry terminal was and even offered to walk us to our hostel though we declined this offer as politely as we could; she clearly just wanted some company to talk to. Emma and I were just in total culture shock though that someone on the street a) spoke English, b) spoke English flawlessly, c) wanted to speak to us at all and d) was helpful.

Our culture shock continued when we saw a little truck come by to clean up the trash on the street and wash down the sidewalk instead of a 95 year old hunch-backed babushka with a straw broom. And then we went to a cafe in the train station because it was the only thing open at that hour and could not believe our eyes to see that they had out large pitchers of cold, still water that you could take for free...... ?!? What is this place?? I see why Americans in Russia love to come to Scandinavia for little vacations, while the Russians typically think Helsinki is boring. Everything here is almost too clean and too easy and too polite. It blows my mind. One of my favorite features of this beautiful, clean city is all the cobblestone and the fact that the crosswalks are not usually made of white paint on black asphalt, but of black and white cobblestones in alternating stripes. I love the details of work like that.

We checked in at our hostel but our room wasn't ready yet, so we spent some time wandering. Emma and I found the church that Mom, Nunni, Puppy & I had our picture taken in front of at the end of our Scandinavian Capitals tour in 2005. We also went to the Museum of the History of Helsinki, though we couldn't understand why it was closed when we got there right when it opened at "9:00am." We had a snack and then returned and wandered around a museum that, for once, had a logical flow and an artistic lay out and wasn't full of taxidermied animals covered in dust in florescent lights. We also went to the arts and craftsy little market by the shore and I made some purchases of things I really don't have enough of such as bags and jewelry. What was amazing though was at this market I found the VERY SAME MAN from whom I purchased that carved wooden Sagittarius pendant in 2005 that I love so much and wear so much that I actually brought it with me to Russia and it is sitting in my room right now. I wish I had worn it on the trip (I almost did!) and then could have showed this man and told him about how I bought it three years ago and wear it all the time ever since. What I did do though was buy another two pendants from him -- another wooden carved one of a face and a long one of reindeer antler carved with Finnish symbols. It seemed appropriate after a fate like kind of moment.

Anyway, then Emma and I got caught in a downpour after drinking some hot chocolate at the market and decided to head back to the hostel because it was almost time for our room to be ready.... but not quite.... and so here we are now.

I think tonight is going to be low key because we don't feel like going out really. I just want to curl up in bed with a book and read and sleep because, hey, this is my vacation after all.

Maybe I'll update again sometime along the trip, but just thought I'd let you all know I am alive.