Thuis Is Overal - China en Hong Kong

Hello everyone! 

A couple of weeks ago, I organised with my AFS chapter our second country-afternoon. This time Liz and Anran talked about their native land, respectively Hong Kong and China. They presented she general facts about their countries and also talked about the differences between them. 

After the presentations, we ate, of course. Anran had brought some appetizers and rice dishes. Liz took care of dessert. We had enough food to feed an army I think, but as a real AFS'er would do, we ate and ate and kept eating. With all that eating, everybody still got to take some food home. In other words, we had way too much food but now we can all laugh about it. 

Tampere

During my stay in Finland, I also went to visit my host families and friends in Tampere. Emilia, my host sister, and I took the bus together from Helsinki. Our (host) dad came to pick us up at the bus station. We went straight to the school in Ylöjärvi where our little sister Milla's wanhat/prom was going to take place.

Emilia and I had our wanhat (read more about it here) together two years ago, so we had lots of flashbacks and fangirling moments. It was nice to notice that I actually remembered most of the steps, the wiener waltz is forever engraved in my memory, and this year's 'oma tanssi' (the students' own choreography) is too. Everyone, especially Milla of course, looked so elegant and fancy! I loved being able to experience the wanhat again, but from a different point of view and without my feet hating me. I also took the opportunity to catch up with some of my former teachers and friends.

On Friday and Saturday, I took some time to walk around in Tampere, take pictures, do some shopping - I finally bought a Muumin book! - and feel nostalgic. I also visited an exhibition with my friend Samuli, you can read all about it here. And of course, I took time to catch up with all the lovely animals, and (crazy) host siblings. 

Helsinki

Hello everyone!

As most of you know, I went back to Finland recently. This time, I took the plane to Helsinki instead of Tampere which gave me the opportunity to visit Finland's capital for a bit.

I arrived on a Wednesday afternoon, Emilia, my host sister, was so sweet to pick me up from the airport. We then went to the city where I met my friend Sofia, who was my AFS councillor while I was on exchange. Sofia and I walked around in the city as the sun was setting. The city and the sky were beautiful, it was a very good day to take pictures!

In the evening, Emilia, my host sister, and I went out to meet some friends. We went to the Kaisla Beer Room where I saw a great opportunity to promote the Belgian culture. It's always fun to share something from your home country while you're visiting your host country! 

The next morning, I went to university with Emilia! She had a Finnish-German translation class and I thought I'd see how it all works there. I noticed the atmosphere is much more relaxed, and the groups are smaller, which, according to the teacher, gives more opportunity to make interesting exercises and not only focus on the theory. 

Emilia and I then took the bus to Tampere after class. On Sunday afternoon I was back in Helsinki though, and I took some time before my flight to walk around the city again, in daylight this time, and to have a coffee with my host brother, Juhani. 

Älä Kerro!

Poster of the exhibition

While I was in Tampere I took the time to visit the exhibition Älä kerro in Kahvisalonki, a small cafe owned by Jari Partanen. He has been organising small exhibitions for almost 13 years. During this time, he has noticed that each exhibition brings in a new audience, which brings a nice contrast and keeps the cafe alive. He is particularly pleased when an exhibition, such as this one, brings in younger people. Jari says he trusts the artists to picture important discussions well, and is very pleased by the positive reactions. Helping out artists is a nice advantage too.

Jari Partanen, owner of Kahvisalonki

This month's exhibition was organised by Tuula Mäkelä and features pictures by students of the Ikaalinen College of Crafts and Design including one by my friend Samuli Björkling. All the pictures deal with secrets and how to handle them through language and proverbs or through art. The works are made using different techniques: digital drawing, aquarel, photo manipulation, etc. and they are for sale in case you want to help out young artists.

Samuli Björkling

Samuli's picture shows a man about to be killed by an Iron Maiden (torture machine from the Middle Ages which has spikes coming closer and closer to the person in order to stab the person) if he doesn't share his secret. Samuli says that he wanted to make a dark composition because people often expect him to make cheerful drawings. 'I wanted to go further from my comfort zone and try something new', he explains. Samuli took this exhibition as an opportunity to show a different side of him (and succeeded). People seem shocked to see this difference in Samuli's work but that was the point. Upon hearing the positive reaction from people, Samuli says 'it feels good, we've done something right and it's nice we haven't upset any people despite the darkness of our work'.

When I had looked attentively at the pictures, I noticed there seemed to be some common themes, such as torture and animal rights, and had a message to society. This was apparently unintentional but, as Samuli says, it is funny to see how people influence each other, just by sitting close to each other. Samuli is glad to notice there are good artists in his group and that they all support each other. This proves we cannot always know what influences us, maybe secrets burden us more than we think, maybe that one work of art left a greater impression on us than we thought.

So if you have some time to spare, please do check out the exhibition and the following links and consider supporting young artists:

http://bjorklingsamuli.wix.com/portfolio

https://www.facebook.com/SamsamArt/?fref=ts

https://www.facebook.com/sasky.fi

4 reasons I love Christmas in Belgium

1. Christmas with the whole family

Every year, we get together for lunch/dinner with my mom's side of the family. This year, it was our turn to host. Our living room was especially repainted for the occasion so my parents spent a long time cleaning the house (I was excused since I am recovering from an injury). My job was to take care of the decorations (more on that below) and wrap the presents. 

Before the family arrived, my parents and I were quite stressed but it all worked out really well. We received many compliments on the food, and on how good our house looked, which is very nice! Plus, my parents enjoyed the fact that we worked as a team, and everyone helped out. 

2. Christmas food

Who honestly does not love Christmas food? My parents made pumpkin soup, deer with mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce. For desert, we had a typical Belgian bûche de Noël, and I made joulutorttu (a Finnish pastry, I just had to have a bit of Finland). It was absolutely delicious! 

3. Christmas decorations 

As I mentioned above, I, with the help of my parents, decorated the house. As every year, the fun started with untangling all the knots in the garland of lights. I have been doing this for years so I have perfected this skill, I used to do this in an hour, but this time it only took me 20 minutes (#ohyeah) to untangle 21 (!!) meters of lights. Even though we did not have a real Christmas tree (my parents have learned to resist my nagging it seems), our decorations looked very nice so the Christmas feeling hit me quickly and hard! 

 

I am wearing my study outfit here, so you can see I take this very seriously. Lol! 

4. Christmas markets

As in many European cities, Brussels and Ghent have a big Christmas market every year in december. I love to walk around there although I never buy anything because everything is overpriced. I just enjoy the atmosphere and take pictures of the lights. 

 

 Brussels

 Ghent