FINLAAAAAAAAAAAAAND :]

Saturday August 9th: 5am is really early. especially when you go to bed at 1am. well, Charlie and her Mum and Dad all woke up early with me to say good bye (I said it was okay, because I am coming back after all, but they got up anyway). Charlie drove me down to the station around 5:45 and tested my knowledge (I remembered all the stations to take and switch etc). Then I caught the 5:53 train (pfft.. it showed up at 6am) to Liverpool Street and went all the way to Heathrow. Yeah, that's about an hour and a half journey. At least I found seats for the entire ride (every train and underground ride!). That was lovely. There were plenty of other passengers headed to Heathrow too. It took many a moving sidewalk before I made it from the stop to terminal 3. Then it took a bit of figuring out where to find Finnair check in. I scanned my passport at the machine and it printed my baggage tags and it was off to stand in line. Apparently Helsinki is a HUGE airport for sending people to Asia/India. Many of the people in line with me were headed to Japan, Singapore, Delhi, and elsewhere in Asia. I didn't feel like talking much. A nice elderly couple got in line behind me and I told the man about the check in for the luggage. His wife was very appreciative. They were on a group tour of the Baltic Sea area and were connecting in Helsinki. Thank goodness I made it to check in when I did. I was finished by 8am and the line had tripled in length behind me when I was leaving toward security. The nice old couple waited for the rest of their group but I saw them again on the plane (they sat a few rows behind me). The security was way more strict than Charlotte. Charlotte let my hand sanitizer through in my purse, these guys wanted lip gloss and lip stick and hand sanitizer all in plastic bags. they made the guy in front of me go find a new container for his hair gel since it was 150mL and the max was 100. Even though he had used quite a bit, the size of the container was apparently an issue. After security I hit up Starbucks (that line was insane) and a grocery store for snacks (Kinder and Cadbury!) and drinks for the flight. I'll be bringing more substantial food on the long flight home. The airplane meals are..interesting. I sat around for a bit, ate a lovely ham and cheese croissant from "Eat" and was super happy because they heated it up for me. Starbucks apparently couldn't heat up the cinnamon roll so I passed on that. Weird. I found a nice seat close to the message board of all the posted flights and waited and waited for the gate to be posted. It was possibly the closest gate in walking distance (woo) but more waiting.

Flight time! I was wondering why I had a group 1 boarding status but soon found out! EXIT ROW SEAT!!!! I had sooooooooo much leg room (there are pictures, obviously). I wish I had this for my flight home! It was really enjoyable. The flight was nice. I took a nap or two and then the lunch cart came by. My choices of sandwich were "tuna and egg on white bread" or "reindeer and cheese on brown bread." Yes, you read that right. REINDEER. The wrapper was in Finnish but Jonna confirmed. I didn't eat it or open it. I just kept thinking of Rudolph and his friends. I had some coke and chips instead. I was still pretty full from breakfast anyway and I had some scones from Harrod's in my bag. I spent the rest of the flight reading. Helsinki airport has free wifi with NO time limit. It was glorious. I found Jonna after the seemingly endless customs line. There were tons of Asians in line around me (at the "all passports" line). A person who worked for the airport came over and started talking (in Finnish) to the blonde lady in front of me. She realized she could go through the European passport line. Then the worker turned to me and started again in Finnish. I was like umm, English? She explained about the European line and then I explained that I'm American. Score, 2 points to USA for getting in the right line. I stuck out for being white and it was kind of odd. I wasn't expecting it in Finland. Anyway, got my bag (borrowed from Charlie) and found Jonna!

Jonna and I drove to her apartment which is only about 15 minutes away. WE ARE BACK TO DRIVING ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE ROAD AND IT IS SO WONDERFUL!!! We went to the grocery store (which I could have spent all day in. I think it's fascinating.) and watched FC Barcelona play a Finland team in Helsinki (we watched on the tv though) and Finland got wrecked. It was a friendly game and Barcelona won 6-0 after putting in all their subs at 60 minutes. All the airport signs were in Finnish, Swedish, and English. Then the road signs in Helsinki are in Finnish and Swedish. Outside of Helsinki and major cities the signs are just in Finnish. The grocery store had a weird collection. I found some English things (M&Ms, Ritz crackers, tampons) but the vast majority was Finnish. The Finnish word for "orange juice" is "appelsiini" which is really confusing when trying to buy juice. The pictures are very helpful! I bought apple juice while Jonna bought orange juice. We had meatballs (from Ikea) and mac n cheese (that I brought) for dinner and watched more TV. We found plenty of English programs (Survivor, Hotel Hell) and everything not in Finnish has Finnish subtitles.

It gets dark outside at 10:30pm. You can still see just fine at 10! It starts getting light at 4am and sunrise is like 5:30am. Jonna says that it is early for sunset (was 11:30 a few weeks ago). Jonna doesn't have black out curtains but it's alright, we are excellent at sleeping (ask anyone who knows us, especially our moms). We took a train to meet her friends in downtown Helsinki at a bar. Her friend had a free ticket that let two people in for free but the nice guy said to just save it for next time and let Jonna and I keep the ticket and get in free. My driver license sufficed as ID (don't want to lose my passport) though Jonna had to show him wear my birthday was on the license. Next was bag/coat check which is typically mandatory 3 Euro fee even if you don't have anything. I stood there looking foreign (so I thought) as Jonna checked her purse then asked the guy if I needed to pay since I didn't have anything (she talked a lot for me when people started talking to me in Finnish. She's probably said "she doesn't speak Finnish" multiple times now and it won't be ending any time soon. He was nice and said I didn't need to pay :] I only had my small wallet and phone (in case I found wifi). Jonna's friends have names I can barely pronounce much less spell but they're all very friendly! let's see...Thia, Nora, Mariot, and yeah, that's all I can even try to spell. Everyone made an attempt to speak English when I was nearby and I had quite a few nice conversations about where I'm from and how I like Finland so far.

How I know Jonna: She studied abroad in NC back in high school, stayed with Megan Gray my junior year. Jonna and I became good friends (prom pics, check it out). She came to my graduation from LNHS a year later and we explored Harry Potter World among other things. Now it's my turn to visit!

The music was a mixture of Finnish pop and English. Maybe Swedish, how would I know? Alcohol is SO expensive. Finland has the highest alcohol tax in the European Union at 38%. My hard cider was 6 Euros, a rum and coke was 9. Ew. Actually, everything is expensive really. Except phone plans (Jonna realized a few hours ago that her phone can be a mobile hotspot and now I have wifi to type this. She pays like 20 Euro a month for unlimited texting and phone calls plus some amount of data but rarely goes over and she can do the hotspot thing no big deal). I pay twice as much and get much less. I'll be switching carriers when I get home. Back to the bar...everyone danced on the huge dance floor with abandon. It didn't matter what you were doing as long as you were moving, even if you were just swaying a bit in place. Any effort was appreciated. Jonna and I were standing near the edge of the dance floor talking when a guy came up and started talking to me in Finnish. I stared back confused while Jonna told him (in Finnish) that I only speak English. Apparently he didn't believe her and said something to the effect of "yeah sure" sarcastically and walked away, rejected. I didn't know any of this until Jonna explained. My "what?" must have gone unheard (it was very loud) and the poor guy thought I was pretending to be foreign as an excuse not to talk/dance with him. Apparently I don't look too foreign. I'm pale and fit in! It also helped that I wasn't wearing any of my UNC t-shirts I guess. We headed back (bus this time) after finding some wifi in McDonalds where we stopped to use the bathroom. We managed to sleep until 1:30pm :] did anyone really doubt our sleeping abilities?? I woke up around 8:30 thinking it must be nearly noon, checked the time, and easily rolled over and kept on sleeping! I like it here :]