Sauna Open Air 2013 @ Ratina, Tampere \m/

From the very first moment I set foot on Finnish grounds it was a sure thing that I'd go to Sauna in summer! After all, it's one of the biggest Metal Festivals here - and it was a blast! (despite some complications concerning my ticket, which happened to get lost in the streams of northern waters >.< )

So on Saturday I left the house all geared up for headbanging non-stop and went to the festival area, accompanied by Mizuki (kyaa, so great to have you here again!! /(= > v < =)/ )

Háha that guy on the left side sort of photobombed us xP

Super big thanks also to Mizuki for the most awesome Japanese birthday presents!! <3 ありがとうございました！

-----------------------------------------------------

And after meeting Children of Bodom... ( >:P dear David, from the very beginning you never had a chance to win this bet)
...it was Egokills and Stratovarius that heated up the two stages. I've never listened to these bands before, so I didn't know them, but they did quite a good job:

Next was Children of Bodom's turn. Yeah, one of those that I was definitely looking forward to and they offered nothing less than a breathtaking concert:

We were standing pretty close to the stage and suddenly people were forming a moshpit pretty much around us xD

They were then followed by Opeth and Finntroll. We decided to get some water and sat to the stadium seats while Opeth was playing their first songs. Thanks to the fact that Finnish people often aren't all crazy about standing in the first rows at gigs, it was quite easy to still get rather close to the stage again.
Finntroll's gig was like a huge party and take a look at the awesome makeup and the fancy elf ears:

Last band of the day then happened to be Nightwish. Hearing this and that opinion about Floor Jansen to replace Annette, I was really curious about this one. Some say that it sounds like Nightwish again, because her voice resembles more Tarja's, while others think that it can't be good anymore without Annette - and after all, Nightwish was the band that introduced me to Metal music, as they were the first one I ever listened to. Nightwish was clearly focusing on playing more of the older songs, which was in my eyes the best decision, since Tarja's pieces fit her voice a lot better than Annette's, but after listening to them live, being carried away by the melodies and memories and even having sent shivers down my spine at +25°, I cannot possibly say that Floor is unfitting for Nightwish:

Plus they had flamethrowers and fireworks at the end!!

At the end of the day we were all done and happy to fall into our beds to gather energy for the second day.

Mizuki left to Lehtimäki and I went again, this time with my Au Pair girls Thirza from the Netherlands and Anna from Greece.

Next band playing I didn't know either, only a friend of mine recommended them to me - here we go - Stam1na:

It was kinda crazy to see the stage decorated Hawaiian-style and then the band entered dressed in these hula skirts and started to play fast Finnish Thrash Metal xD

Next in schedule was Hardcore Superstar, Rock from Sweden. Compared to the previous ones, this band was playing music from an entirely different genre and it was all the more an interesting change in the day.

At some point, they decided that they'd need some girls on the stage. In order to fight against this lack, they picked 2 girls from the crowd, called them on stage, drank with them and then let the show go on with the two of them still there xD

And there were Sabaton and Volbeat. Kiveen really recommended me to see Volbeat live and that's what I did - truly great! As for Sabaton, just as expected after the gig at the end of last year in Pakkahuone, they were probably the most enthusiastically welcomed. Once again, it was proved that Tampere people love the band as much as Sabaton loves Tampere and it's citizens. 

And with that, one of the most exciting weekends that I've spend here in legendary Tampere came to an end.   If by any means it's possible, I will come back next year to rock this festival once again! \m/

Vappu \(^o ^ )/

Vappu - celebrated on 31.04.-01.05, it's kind of a special celebration here in Finland - it doesn't even exist in Austria, so it was something totally new to me :D

I was planning to go to a gig in Helsinki on April 31th, but in the end, as I was sitting at the train station, I followed my inner voices and decided to celebrate Vappu properly and in Tampere with my friends. I could have joined the party in Helsinki, but it just felt sort of wrong to go to any other city but my second home town that day. And it was one of my best decisions ever made!! :D The night was amazing and the day that followed felt just crazy after experiencing Finnish people throughout the cold, calm winter xDD



First off, I met some Au Pair friends one of our favourite local bars - Raideri. :D
we had some drinks before going to the centre, where all the people came together around midnight to sing some sort of hymn, shower in sparkling wine and crown the "Suomen Neito" statue with a traditional students' hat. - but that was just the beginning of the night! ;P

we had some more drinks, enjoyed the happy, drunk party people all around and then we parted ways - the Au Pair guys went to meet another friend of theirs and I went to another cool bar to meet some of my finnish friends :D so the party went on at "Jack the Rooster" and everyone was just succumbing to the spirit of Vappu, an extatic night indeed :P

The next day, 2 giant cranes reached the riverside of Tammerkoski to follow another special Tampere tradition - the baptism of the newcomer students xP      

Awakened from Winter Sleep ...^^

Hello there!~

I'm sorry for having been so inactive lately. I was quite distracted by a lot of events going on, followed by a lot of thoughts. Therefore, I've also got a lot of stories to tell again ;)


mmh, I guess the first thing I'm gonna talk about is the weekend that a friend came to visit me. She happens to have a lot in common with me, though we host quite different personalities: we're both Austrians, both doing EVS in Finland and, surprise, surprise, we even got the same name! I was really happy to see her again after the last Mid-Term camp, she's a great listener and I had a few thoughts and stories to share with someone that gives me the feeling of knowing what I'm talking about and understanding my point of view. She stayed at our house and we spend a lot of time in the city centre, the Moomin Museum, at the observation tower and in a certain nice coffee - haha, when was the last time you were sitting 6 (!) hours in a coffee? xDD

Talking about Austrian people, I also received visitors from home! - my mum, my sister and my godfather :D it was just a short stay, practically 3 and a half days to spend here and we arranged a lot of program so as to see as much as possible during that time! One day, I let them explore Helsinki, another one I introduced them to my precious Tampere and the third one, we took a cruise to Tallinn. We had a lot of fun and it was great to see them again! In some way, it felt like they never really were that far away, but still it was different to meet them face to face instead of skype conversations.
They were all joyful themselves, looking forward to the end of my project in summer and my return to Austria, and as much as I'd liked to deny it that time, I fought with mixed feelings about this. Of course, I'm missing them and want to spend time with them every now and then, but after staying almost a year in Tampere, it has become like a second home to me and I don't really want to let go of it just yet. That's why I'm seriously considering to stay as an Au Pair and then deciding next year, if I want to qualify as a kindergarten teacher in Finland or in Austria.
It's a fact that right now I'm full of pride and happiness if I look at the life I'm living now. I feel like I'm exactly where I want to be, doing exactly what I want to do. I've listened to a lot of opinions telling me that it might just be the life in a city itself that attracts me so much, but I'm confident that I wouldn't feel the same in just any other city, because it's not only the opportunities, but also the way of living, the country's identity and the people that have charmed me to this point. This is just the beginning of a thought that needs to be developed further, but my interest has been awakened and caught, so I need to decide carefully and always keep in mind that one thing that every opinion of those I talked to comes down to: "I need to decide whatever makes me happy right now."


And there's more :D recently, I've spend more time with the other German-speaking people in Tampere itself, with the Au Pair girls from Germany. Speaking in suddenly so much in my mother tongue again, has completely confused my mind and it's actually still hard to flawlessly switch between these three major languages that I'm using here xD
...but I really enjoy being with them. Yesterday I spend the late afternoon in the park with Christin. She's been here longer that me and she's also gonna stay longer. The sun was shining and I can confidently announce now - spring has reached Tampere! :D the snow is gone, sunrises start at 5am and it won't even think of going down before 10pm. People have become more lively, sitting at the riverside with drinks and friends, street musicians take out their drums - it seems somehow different from what I've experienced in this northern city up to now! :D

....and it feels only a little strange going out to a bar, while the sun is still high up in the sky xDD

For me, Tampere has just become a little more charming these days... :)

I've also been to 2 more gigs - "Toxic Rose" played at Jack the Rooster and once again, I saw Archie from "Santa Cruz" at an acoustic gig at Amadeus Bar ^^ wonder when I'll finally get to see the whole band xD

Easter and Tallinn ^.~

Heii!

First of all, thank you for more than 2.000 awesome pageviews!! *o*/

Today, I have a lot to tell about the Easter weekend ;D
I met up with many people and I:

- saw some Austrian friends again
- took a cruise to Tallinn
- had dinner at the Hard Rock Café
- received an Easter surprise package from home
- took part in a drinking game with Norwegians
- played CSI Miami in Finland's National Museum of History
- visited an Exhibition about Japanese Textile
- defeated Czerni at "Angry Birds" in the Museum of Design
- drew the "Imperial and Royal Eagle of Austria" on some friends' wall in Helsinki


It was quite stressful at times, but really fun!


...so Thursday morning I took an early train to Helsinki, from where I went to Tallinn by ship - together with David, Kristina, Thomas, Lukas und Anzi from Austria!
David and Kristina are currently studying in Jyväskylä for a term, while the others came to the north for holidays. Anyways, I hadn't seen either of them since the beginning of the new year, so I was looking forward to the trip a lot and as expected it was great, though they were running sort of a bet, whether I'd regret coming along or not (due to crazy behaviour xD ). In the end there was one moment that I honestly felt vicarious embarrassment - just 5 words: "Helsinki tram" and "bad Austrian songs". Aside that, it was just awesome and Tallinn is a really beautiful medieval place!

When we returned to Finland's capital in the evening, we had dinner with 2 more Austrian friends that had arrived meanwhile - Sophie and Czerni - at the legendary Hard Rock Cafe!


Friday afternoon, I went back to Tampere, where I spend the following night. In the morning I received an Easter surprise package from my parents :3 lots and lots of chocolate and a few more things - thank you!!!


Later on Saturday, I took another train to Helsinki and met my friends again, this time staying longer ;)
We decided to be culturally active for once in a while and visited the National Museum of History. It was really interesting (actually been a long time since I last visited a museum... :) )
As we were walking from room to room, we ended up finding these huge table platforms with touchscreens, displaying information about whatever was to be shown inside the room. It was obvious what came then: playing CSI Miami xDD haha, if you go to that museum once, don't miss that!!


We rented a room in a hotel near the port and ended up playing a drinking game from Jyväskylä ;D (guess you can imagine what Finnish drinking games are like :P ) after some time 2 Norwegian girls knocked on our door to ask if they could participate! I cannot help but say that Norwegian totally sounds like French! :O and they were telling us about Norway - that, to them, Finland and Sweden are so "CHEAP" !!

Sundays are Sundays everywhere, so there wasn't really much to do, but we found another museum that was open, so we went to see an exhibition about Japanese textiles in the Museum of Design and it turned out to be really interesting!
There, we also found some tablets to play Angry Birds and of course we didn't miss the chance ;D

Each day, we became less and less people, as one after another flew back to Austria and on the last evening, there were only Sophie, Czerni, David and me left. Sophie and Czerni were still residing in their hotel and David and me were couchsurfing at an apartment in central Helsinki. Our hosts were really nice and we had a lot of fun together. They had a guest book and also a wall where visitors could write or draw anything on. That was the point where David jokingly challenged me to draw the "k.u.k. eagle" of Austria, but I was like:

...and this is how it turned out to be:

So, after a really active weekend, it was also relaxing to come home on Monday and have some more hours of Easter holidays before going to work again. :)