Ok, I get easily bored. Hence the new look. It’s easier to change the blog theme than it is to move furniture around once a month. (EDIT, 6 days later: got bored of the new one. Now back to the old one! Hahhaa.)

Our fun little photo project is now officially open for viewers and fans. Be one! You can find it on Facebook by clicking THIS LINK. We have loads of fun ideas for the future, altho we’ve had a little trouble keeping up with the due dates so far. We will be better in the future, I promise! Also, feel free to leave a few ideas for assignments.

Happy about: Getting to use the word ‘hence’.
Listening to: Shinedown
To do -list for today: Buy new memory card for the camera, paint a little.
Fun links: Just making sure you’ve all seen these: 10 Things I Hate About Commandments, Old Spice man part one, two, three, and last but not least, four. (There are more Old Spice commercials on YouTube, but also a lot of parodies and fakes.)

M is watching some concert on tv, and right now Sting’s on stage. Oh lovely Sting! I still can’t quite wrap my head around seeing him live. I’ve never ever been a fan, I’ve been the basic “yeah a few good songs” -kind of listener. Then I heard his Symphonicities tour was coming to Finland and just knew I had to see it. I actually won the tickets from a radio show on the last day possible – CAN YOU BELIEVE IT? I wanted to go so bad, couldn’t quite afford the ticket in time, and DING. I was actually lucky enough to win two.

I wrote about the gig (in Finnish) earlier, and here’s the translation: AMAZING. Tears, happiness, flabbergastiness. (Is that a word? Is now.)

Anyway, back to today. I thought I’d spread some smiles – well, these made me smile. Hope they have the same effect on you:

1) For once, I could live with an advent calendar: click.

2) World’s cutest bomb squad: click.

3) A boy I’d like to adopt:

Woke up late today. I’ve been staying up until early hours for almost a week now. I just can’t get myself to sleep before 4am or so. I know, I should just get up early one morning so I’d be tired earlier in the evening. But so far, I’ve failed to do so. Anyway. Today I woke up to a nice phone call. It was about this rather fine job, photographing a few places for a firm. I hope it will pay ok, I’m pretty tired of being paid half the money I should be getting. I just sent my offer for them, and to me it seems fair. Hope they think so too.

I am a cheap photographer and I really don’t wanna be one of those asswipes who ask for thousands of euros per a day’s work just because.. I don’t even know what their excuses are. I know, I know, if I’m going to make a living out of this, I just can’t keep doing this for those pennies. I often joke about getting a manager to deal with the financial stuff and all, but frankly, it’s starting to sound like a joke less and less every day.

But yeah – I’m feeling better and better about not leaving the country just yet. It seems I’m finally getting some more work and now that I have the new camera, it’s gonna be a bit easier and the results better. Of course, it’s not the camera that decides what’s in the photos, but it will certainly improve the quality. Phew!!! I’ve been needing that for a looong time now.

More photo talk: we started a fun photo project with a few pals. We’re taking a couple of photos every week with a changing theme, and of course, since it’s something I started, we’ve already pushed the first deadline by a day.

Me and deadlines. Not always such a good combination.

So, since my trip to Italy has been postponed or maybe even cancelled, we’re back to the old layout.

It’s funny. I spent a month preparing for the trip, stressing about it every day, contacting possible hosts, buying stuff I would need (mostly for Einari), learning the language (very slowly!), reading about different cities, writing to people on TravBuddy.. Mentally, I was prepared to leave everything behind, not seeing my friends in months, I even visualized myself living in Italy permanently sometimes. I pictured myself carrying Einari and all my stuff at the airports, the tiny train stations, countryside. I was so happy about meeting new people, reading other people’s experiences from the comment fields on Helpx.net – how they’ve felt like part of the family and spent their evenings having dinner and meeting people from the nearby farms. I wanted it SO BAD.

A week before my flight I was still buying dictionaries and Italian grammar books. Thinking about all the stuff I still have to take care of.

Then I got sick. I went to see the doctor four times before they finally agreed a surgery would be the best way to deal with it and I was admitted to the hospital on the day of our flight. Before this, while I was sick, I wasn’t able to do anything. I had lots to do; not just the packing. Loads of photo editing, painting, getting a few things for the dog from the vet, booking train & bus tickets in advance. And as the days went by without me sleeping practically at all, not eating, just wandering around the apartment in pain, I started to think I wasn’t gonna make it. And along with that, I somehow gave up on everything.

In a way, I got bored with the whole idea. How is that even possible? I’ve never been to Italy, how could I be bored with it before I even went? I don’t think I was scared, absolutely not. All this time I had been just excited, wanting everything to change, everything to be new. I was sooo very bored of Helsinki and everything that’s going on here, and of course the thought of yet another extremely cold winter. The worst thing about Finland and life in general. I wrote about this all some time ago. I was so ready to go.

I’ve been thinking about it a lot, cause I’m not really sure myself what happened and why I didn’t just book the next possible flight. It would’ve been easy. I just didn’t do that. I’ve come up with a few possible reasons.

First of all, when I decided to buy the flights, I was depressed. Me and M had just decided we’re going to break up. We aren’t fighting, we’re still living under the same roof, we still like each other’s company. So I didn’t have any idea of where to go, where to live and what to do with my life. So in a way, this would’ve been the perfect moment to go when I have nothing to keep me here. I just wanted to get away and change everything. The old cliché of finding myself. I knew I wouldn’t magically turn into this happy, succesful and healthy person if I surrounded myself with new things and people, but somehow I liked the idea of shocking myself into at least trying to change everything. Like building a house by tearing the old one down to the ground. Not just decorating it in a different way. And since I am a bit of a drama queen in a way (not in a way of creating drama between me and other people, but just making my life less boring) it seemed like an awesome thing to do.

Second, I started thinking about doing things a bit differently. I suddenly realized I could now afford to buy a new camera cause I’d been saving everything for the trip. And then it hit me: why not buy the camera first, get more assignments, then save up money for a longer trip to somewhere new. If I left first, it would take me forever to get it. I probably couldn’t get any jobs in Italy and so I’d have to come back here at some point anyway, get the new apartment, work hard, and still it would take me months and months to get enough money to buy the camera, let alone anything else than the basic things I need in life.

And now, looking back at the moment I was booking my one-way flight, I can see a sad person doing a half-desperate thing when she couldn’t think of anything else to do.

But I’m not that sad anymore. I’m ok. I think I could even live through the winter – or at least one month of it. I think I can get good jobs and an apartment. I think I’ll be ok. I am hating myself just a little bit for not leaving (I’m also a bit embarrassed for telling everyone and making such a big number out of it), but on the other hand I’m thanking myself for not going when it seems leaving would’ve not been the wisest thing to do right now.

I’m also thanking my disease for not attacking me a week later when I would’ve been in the Italy countryside already..

So, that’s about it. It’s been a rollercoaster, this last month. But I think the worst of it is now over.

PS: I already started looking up farms and hosts in Ireland. And some photo schools and workshops. But I promise I’m not gonna change the blog layout to something Irish just yet… haha.

So, things have changed. I’m not in Italy. At the time we were supposed to be boarding on the plane with Einari, I was waiting to go to surgery in a hospital in Helsinki. I was very very sick for a week, but I’m a lot better now. But, even though I was never – honestly – in any serious danger (just in a lot of pain, ouch!), things have changed in other ways than just missing the flight.

I’ve decided to postpone the trip a bit more than a few weeks. I’ve got a lot of reasons, but I’ll talk about those later. Right now, I’m just gonna enjoy my (almost) pain-free time by doing stuff I haven’t been able to do since last weekend: sleeping, eating and working on a few photos and paintings that have been waiting for me.

Disappointed we missed the flight and the adventure for now, but also knowing we can do it anytime we want – all these preparations now have made our leaving so much easier on a later date.

Now wondering: should I change the blog’s name and idea back to where it was? Oh the blogging pressure. Or blessure, as Darren Hayes puts it.

Ok, I thought this blog would be about my travels to Italy and travels to Italy only. But, since snapping pictures with my camera and painting are something I’ll probably continue doing during my travels, I might as well spill some of the results in here.

My latest – “It’s in your hands”. Acrylics on canvas, 65 x 54cm.

I also painted this tiny tiny thing last night – I call it the Waiting Light. You can see it here if you’re really curious.

But that’s that. We’ll just have to see how Italy affects my choice of subjects from now on!

I got some bad news today. Well, not bad. Just a tad disappointing. The whole thing was actually so random it was more of a surprise at first, but the feeling got worse by the end of the day. I don’t know why. Something just hurt me an awful lot and I’ve had to think about things from a few different perspectives to get myself back together. I’ve had to tell myself I’m a good person, a good friend and I will be ok wherever I end up in life. (I’m just not a very good liar, I can’t seem to be able to convince myself on certain matters. I should be less perceptive. More gullible.)

Anyway.. It seems the closer we get to the Day of Leaving, the more confused I get by these messages the damn universe is throwing at my general direction. Leave, stay, leave. Stay. Difficulties with taking E with me. Difficulties with me leaving alone. Positive thoughts about staying, pulling life together. A sudden financial panic. All kinds of tiny problems with this and that, making both leaving and cancelling the trip impossible.

And then, something good finally happens! So far, I’ve received a dozen messages from the helpx.net hosts I’ve contacted, telling me they’re all fully booked until 2011, or that the dog might be a problem. But today, after all the sadness and despair, my e-mail said ping! (well, it doesn’t actually say that, but it would be fun if it did), and it was an e-mail from one of the hosts again. And not just any host! A beautiful farm / animal shelter which I had written down as “LOVELY!!” on my desperately long list of hosts I could still contact at the last minute.

And no no-no’s this time. Instead, the person writing back (Amelia) told me to confirm my arrival so we could “get organized”.

So, me and Einari are heading to Torino – the starting point of our adventures in Bootland. We have a place to stay! We are gonna take care of sheltered dogs and cats and all kinds of fun farm work together! Suddenly it feels like one of the heavy stones piled on my shoulders fell off. Thank almighty powers of random life-changing journeys: things might just have gotten a bit better.

(I’m crossing my fingers, though. Just in case.)

Here’s a picture I stole from their website – hope they don’t mind me posting it:

Oh, I love the idea of traveling with E, but the more I think about it, the more difficult it seems to be.

First of all, the whole flying with him / traveling within Italy, it’s going to be a bit more difficult with a dog to carry around. You can’t take him to restaurants or shops (well at least not in Finland, I don’t know how strict they are about pets in the Bootland) and it will surely stress him out. Then there’s the problem of having him with me, when I’m going to live under someone else’s roof with their own pets and family, and possibly with other guests of the B&B’s and hostels. Also, the health issues. There are a lot more diseases spreading, for example, via ticks and mosquitoes. He already got one shot to prevent something we don’t have in here, but have over there. I’d also have to get a few more things to try and prevent any infections.

But, then there are the reasons I am trying to get him with me. If I don’t, he can’t stay with M cause he’s really busy this autumn. And the saddest fact – I know he’s gonna miss me an awful lot. He’s all restless and almost hysterical when I’m away for one night only. What if I just disappear for a month, two, even more and he has to stay away from home with someone else than us, the ones he’s been with his whole life. His pack members. We’d both be worrying, he in his own way, me in my human way. He’s such a mama’s boy: he follows me around in the house, spends half of his waking hours close to me and of course, sleeps next to me. Sometimes I call it “the touching distance”. It’s like he’s making sure I’m not leaving by touching me with some part of his body even when sleeping.

I just don’t know. At the moment, I’m 90% sure I’m taking him. Before the e-mail from the B&B it was a full hundred.

WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?

I’m trying hard to learn some Italian on my own by printing out common phrases and hanging them on the walls, writing random words on the back of my hand and all that basic stuff. So far I’ve learned how to tell someone I’m starving, how to ask if it’s ok to bring my dog with me and if I could get some water for it. I can also ask someone where the toilet is. And I know some random words, like a domestic animal (un animale domestico), mug (tazza) and let’s go (andiamo).

I’m such a slow learner. I’ve been wondering if I could actually have a short conversation in Italian after living in the country for two years or so. Might not happen, but I’ll do my best to learn something new every day.

So, can I have some water for my dog?
Posso avere un pò d’acqua per il mio cane?

Fun fact: Milo Ventimiglia‘s name in English would be Milo 20 miles!