Good ol' days

My building looks like this from the outside and the red square is the window to my bedroom :) As you can see, the building was not built yesterday. This becomes a lot clearer when you come inside my castle. The elevator makes you feel like Humphrey Bogart is just around the corner - or - running the actual elevator, as some strange post-acting retirement job. The elevator is "fra før krigen" as we say in Norwegian, "from before the war". And when we speak like this there was really only one war; WWII. This is not something out of my imagination, there is a plaque posted in the elevator with the year 1939. Enjoy the images below and envy me my Humphrey B lifestyle - I am of course Lauren Bacall........

Becoming a true Finn.....

There are a few things that you 'must' do just so that you can say that 'Yes, I have lived in Finland'.
One of these things is without a doubt sitting in a wooden sauna and hold on as long as you possibly can. Here is the sauna some class mates and I went to on April fools day - just to make a point :)

A typical sign of when you most likely will start running for the door any second is when yet another Finnish guy throws water on the sauna stones. The temperature gauge shows 120+ degrees celsius, your ears feels like they will fall off any second, and your skin is telling you that tiny needles are poking you everywhere.

You run out - and there, much to your relief is the ice covered lake! Aaaaw, bliss.
So, here I am - in lake Näsijärvi.