As always in life, "soon" comes much later than the worst expectations.

Things changed again, a new semester started and eventually I found it was time to write.

Part 1 - Verschiedenheit

Vaasa is a nice city - at least it appear

s so when covered with snow. It is much more heimlich than Lahti to me, I like the happier accent they have, rather different from the dull etelä suomi accent. I loved the casheer that greets you with a "hej då".

Same goes with the university; a very small university as student number, though with the services and location of a prestigeous university (for italian standards). Freed

om of subjects and lots of entertaining activities for students. And how much is the fee? 0.00€

Now some trivia that non-finnish reader may find interesting - if there are any!

Cold related trivia:

- your nose: when temperature sinks below -10, you will feel it. Or actually you won't feel at all. With such temperatures, I experienced l

oss of sensitivity and, after longer exposition, a little pain in the exposed parts. Moreover, the steam naturally produced by breathing needs shorter time to get liquid. Actually, after some time outside, I found water coming down my nose all the time.

 

- The ghosts: smog produced my vehicles, for some reason, doesn't fly away, but remains for quite some time close to the ground, between 0 and 30 cm approx. These small cl

ouds move close to the ground, and move as other cars approach; they stirred my immagination and to me they look like smoke ghosts.

- The day when the snow melted in Vaasa I f

elt as if everything had changed. Roads looked different, and people felt "closer".

- There is an entire road in Vaasa city centre which is warmed, so that snow never covers it. 

Non-cold-related trivia:

- Not only Finnish students love to drink and

 sing ominous songs while they do it: they also wear overalls in such occasions. I know that students are sometimes called "the workers of knowledge", but isn't this a too lit

eral interpretation?

Part 2 - Ma maison c'est la meilleur, car elle a une porte e des fenetres...

A new semester has come. Study again, lectures, and some of them are even pleasant. My last semester it appears to be... for the time being; of the future I do not know!

I started writing a short essay called "Pride is Prejudice" which by the way has nothing to do with Jane Austin. We had another D&D session and we are waiting everybody to be back, for the "incredibly funny thing" the master has promised us weeks ago.

The world is sinking down at hyper-speed; world economy is crumbling as a dead golem.

I don't like to boast, but I said it. Who has

 known me for some time knows that since when I was 14 I am expecting a world catastrophe, showing the crazyness of the whole system we built. Social Darwinism is the exc

use european (and therefore also american) race* has used for a long time to justify aggression and violence towards other people, and now it seems we europans have totally failed with this economic system. Schade. Perhaps people will learn how to "feed on dry tubers" or perhaps not. Nothing in the universe is stubborn as a human being.

Myself, I find much pleasure in books, lectures and games. Useless things are the greatest creation of human mind. Nobody but us could create the Beowulf or Blackgammon.

And now, to pamper your eyes, a random picture.

History loves to get stuck in linguistic facts

"Real history loves to get stuck in linguistic facts"

Munin hails you from the far north... "so near to the north pole" as grandma said.

Actually I'm still far far away from the northpole. I can't surprise you with 'Vönderful pictürs vrom Vinlant' because I don't have the cable to download them on this laptop. They'll come soon.

I'm in Lappeenranta - which is NOT in Lapland, and it is NOT snowing - suffering from early awakenings caused by the "midnight sun" which happens to be at 4AM and there's no curtain to stop it. It's true: finnish houses are great to bear the cold dark winter but completely unfit to the summer - which is, as you may not believe, just wonderful.

Finnish summer is not just warmer but the antithesis of the winter. The days are warm (not lately... but in general they are) but not too hot, which allows you to stay in, out, wherever you want. Sometimes in Italy it's so hot that you can't really go out or at least not enjoy it.

If the day is not warm enough for you, you can just stay in sauna, which hot temperatures and incredible moist would please the pickiest tropical reptile.

The sun shines almost all the time, giving you freedom of performing any activity at any time of the day - except sleeping.

Lappeenrant (Willmannstrand) happens to be on the biggest lake of Finland - or so they say - which continues, through an artificial channel, straight to Russia. The border is only at 30 km from here; for this reasons, the city, even though very small, is packed with russians, and pretty much everything is written both in finnish and russian - no swedish. The buildings and the city are small but prettier than most of the finnish cities. It's a nice place.

Lakes are very pretty and always accompanied by tiny foresty islands. The weather is completely crazy, alternating thunderstorms with sunshine, but I heard that it's the same in all europe. And what about the food crisis? It is giving me the creeps, aren't they exaggerating? First it was a bad year for agriculture and now all the prices - even dairy, meat, chocolate, drinks - is overpriced.

Well anyway, I came to think about houses.

What are our houses really for? Are they a place for fitting human beings, feed them and make them sleep in warm beds or something else, a temple to some pagan deity?

I'm thinking of all the rooms locked, left there "for some special event" or "so that I don't have to clean them everyday". Are our houses some temple of self-worship, of esteem-wanking, to show ourselves our little amount of glory and wealth, not to show or to use? Are they some complex political instrument to promote our image? Are they a den of vanity, furniture and appearance, or a safe place for people, steady or traveling, a shelter for friends, to offer them a bed and a warm soup in the time of need?

Take care, Munin.