Washington D.C. and Arriving in Finland!

Thankfully, I handled myself very well in the Detroit airport! Those who know me well know that I am infamous for getting myself lost anywhere. Me and Will Sollish, the other FUSYE Michigan student, flew to Washington D.C. together on a very small plane. We met the other 12 FUSYE students at American University and holy moly, everyone is so nice! I loved talking to them and the other 13 Finnish FYAP students, but I sounded like a heavy smoker because of my sore throat... The three day long orientation included a visit our state's senators. Me and Will visited and talked to Carl Levin and he was very nice, which was a great surprise. To Will's disappointment, we did not have a chance to meet Debbie Stebenow. What a shame. 

Sadly, I did not meet Senator McCain. Maybe next time.

After that, we all walked to the Finnish Embassy, a beautiful and eco-friendly building with an interior that reminds me of the room designs from Ikea. All of the American and Finnish students grew much closer as we helped each other learn about our home countries. We had the chance to speak with the Finnish Ambassador, Ritva Koukku-Ronde, who gave a great speech about representing our country and what her job was. The dinner reception was wonderful. Some of the YFU CEO and the staff was there, including Katie and Elizabeth, two counselors who helped me from the moment I began my application. One of the most favorite parts of the orientation was the walk back to the dorms from the Finnish Embassy. It was a beautiful 30 minute walk with some of the American and Finnish students and I am happy to say that it was the moment I grew so much closer with all of the students. The last day of orientation was tourist day! We walked all around the Washington D.C. monuments and took many pictures. The Finnish students left early and it was very sad to see them go. However, we all know that they will have a great time living in Colorado! 

We visited the YFU office and staff and had our presentations there. We were grouped by our application essay topics, with most of them being on education. Our presentations were very interesting. The other education group played a little joke and drew a bunch of nonsense graphs and explained that they proved that education was beneficial to society. However, in the end, they explained how American has a "eat and regurgitate" information education system where no one thinks, and that the fact that they could present nonsensical graphs proved it! It was crazy, but everyone laughed, thank god!

When we arrived in the airport, the fact that we were flying out of the country finally sinked in! All of the FUSYE students buzzed with excitement with the sound of finally going to Finland. Our flight flew out from Washington D.C. to Reykjavík, Iceland and lasted 5.5 hours. From there, we would transfer to a flight to Helsinki that would last 3.5 hours. I love Iceland. I've fell in love with the place, the music, and their people. The Icelandair planes were amazing. Some of us fell asleep, including me. But when I woke up in the last hour of the flight, I had a horrible bloody nose! I ran to the bathroom and tried to stop the blood, but it just kept coming. I felt horribile about getting the bathroom covered in blood! A very swet flight attendant and a doctor who was on board helped me clean myself up and told me that it might have been from the dry air on the airplane. The nosebleed lasted for more than an hour. Thankfully, my nose didn't start spewing out blood on the plane to Helsinki! When we transferred flights, the other FUSYE students surprised me with a birthday card! They wrote me very sweet birthday notes inside and it really made my day. It made me realize how lucky I am to be in Finland and that I'm not missing out on anything by missing graduation back at home. I love all of the FUSYE students so much!

For the first two days, I lived with Elizabeth's (a FUSYE student and my American University roommate) host family. Their house was very beautiful and was situated right next to a lake. I lived with Elizabeth's host mom and dad, her older sister Tea, little 10 year old Teemu, and their three amazing dogs. They were huge lovable shepherd dogs whose fur felt like blankets! Our family never had dogs, but I found out that I wish we had. They were nice and playful! Rellu, Rikki, and Akseli (I hope I'm spelling that right) were three bundles of happiness and fur that I wished I could have played with for the six months I'm in Finland. I quickly found out how different Finnish people conversations are from American ones. I made the mistake of interrupting a family friend and was returned with a sudden silence and stares. Finnish people are great listeners and are not used to making exlamations like "oh, I see, okay" throughout the conversation. I hope that I can learn to be quieter person after living in Finland! We visited Tea's 20 year old pony which was not small by any means. We saw the other horses and walked though the trail with her pony. The trail was beautiful! In Michigan, I never had the chance to walk through a forest, so it was especially amazing for me. For the rest of the two days, we talked and ate food that surprisingly wasn't that different from American food. I also had a chance to walk the dogs with Elizabeth and her host mother! I truly loved the family and the dogs. I really hope that I have an opportunity to visit them before I leave to the US because I love them so much!

Prince Akseli loved to lick my leg, the floor, and anything that moves.

 Rellu loved to play fetch! He's one big bundle of energy!

I loved all of the dogs, but Rikki was my favorite out of the three. He's so fluffy, I'm gonna die!

I just arrived in my other temporary host family's apartment! I will be staying with them in Espoo, a city not far from Helsinki, which is where we will be having our week-long orientation. I have a temporary host mom and dad, little 9 year old Niilo, and the grandmother Leilla. From the car ride to Espoo, I could tell that the parents are very kind and nice! I truly enjoyed talking to them over dinner and the rest of the day and I know I'll have a great week here.

Made by master chef, Niilo!