Summer trip to Carelia. part 2

Добрый день!

Just in case you've missed one of my posts here are links to all the parts of the story of our Russian adventure: Part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4.

Yesterday's post was about our journey from Helsinki to Karhumäki, but after that we still had quite a long way to go to get grandmother's place. So after waiting 5 hours in Karhumäki in the heat we took a minibus. You can't even book tickets online, you have to get them from the driver. We were quick (an advantage of being small) and got ourselves a good window seat. The trip was, well, an experience. Have you ever travelled 50 km on a rocky and dusty dirt road that is more potholes than road? Then you may have an idea of what it was like. At one point I was worried that Julius would fall out the window from all the bouncing up and down. But the kid just laughed, he thought it was hilarious, like a roller-coaster.

When we got to our destination grandmother was there waiting for us. She recognised us even though she thought Julius was a rat at first. She gave us tea and candy. Yum!

Here I am drinking tea from my favourite cup. Julius, the stupid kid, got some burns on his tail. Who climbs onto a hot samovar, anyway?

Then we shared a bowl of blackcurrants.

The next day we were ready to explore the place. We started with grandmothers old suitcases. I vaguely remember that she used to hide candy and money in them.

"Keep looking, Julius. There must be something here."

"Nope, only curtains, sheets, and other grandmother stuff." :(

We kept looking but all we found was a spider.

While we were desperately trying to find the hidden candy, grandmother was sitting on the porch eating peas. We were also invited. Eating peas isn't good for Julius' stomach. He... well, I'm not going to explain the details but it isn't pleasant...

Grandmother turns 90 soon, so she prefers to sit in the shade. I joined her.

Later I moved to a bench in the sun. Mmm fresh peas!

Of course Julius couldn't stay away from the peas...

We also said hello to my old friend Tim the Dog. I almost didn't recognise him – he's shedding his fur and that makes him look quite shabby and unkempt. But he was as friendly as always and told us all his best hunting stories.

Easy now, dog, I think you might be laying it on a little thick there.

After a while we got tired of the bragging dog and went inside again. I took some more selfies, my second favourite thing to do after eating candy.

Mirror, mirror on the wall...

When everybody in the house had gone to take an afternoon nap, we were really bored so we took the old guitar down from the wall and started play as loud as we could.

While I was playing Julius found an old sickle. He climbed up on it and started singing dirty chastushka songs. Where did he learn those?

Oops, looks like we woke up Kuzya the House Gnome. Back in the old days Russians believed in different types of gnomes and spirits. Julius and I still believe in them. How else can you explain that our candy mysteriously disappears in the middle of the night?

He was in a really bad mood so he through us out. We spent the rest of the evening on the old porch drinking kvass. It was nice in the heat.

Tomorrow you'll get even more pictures from Russia! Пока!

Summer trip to Carelia. part 1

Hello friends!

Just in case you've missed one of my posts here are links to all the parts of the story of our Russian adventure: Part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4.

It's been a while since I've told you about my travels. Now I'm going to tell you about my latest journey. Last week I went to Carelia in Russia. It was a short trip. Julius and I just wanted to say hello to my human's grandmother who lives in the countryside outside Medvezhyegorsk. It had been a while since we visited her. Grandmothers always have candy stuck away somewhere so you should visit them regularly.

To get there we first took a bus to Petrozavodsk (the capital of the Republic of Carelia). It was a long trip but at least it wasn't expensive, €30 for a 12 hour trip. Luckily Julius had one of his good days unlike the kid sitting behind us. He was screaming non-stop in Russian and Swedish. Next time I'll definitely bring earplugs... or some duct tape.

I'm so tired of that kid. I wish I had a gun...

At the border. Time to stretch my legs.

When we got to Petrozavodsk we went to the bus station to get the bus to Medvezhyegorsk. We had to wait for three and a half hours. Julius went crazy in the heat, started climbing everywhere and scaring people. I was so embarrassed. Good thing our human found a kiosk that sold freshly baked buns. That calmed him down for while at least.

Me at the Avtovokzal or bus station

Around noon we got to Medvezhyegorsk or Karhumäki as it's know in Finnish. I've already been there several times before and never particularly liked the place but after some exploring I found it quite a charming and "instagram-friendly" town. Just look at all these old and worn-down but colourful wooden houses.

We wanted to go to the cinema to pass the time but the Druzhba movie theatre turned out to be abandoned.

Me in front of the colourful train station. Notice that the sign is in English even here in middle of nowhere in the Russian countryside.

Karhumäki (bear hill) got its name from a nearby hill that supposedly looks like a sleeping bear. We didn't see any sleeping bears, though, only sleeping drunks...

It was hot as fuck, so I went to get some ice-cream. A tear came to my eye when I realised I'm famous even in Russia. They even have ice-cream named after me!

Me with my Vanja-icecream.

I didn't take any pictures of Julius during this part of the journey. He wasn't doing too well because of the heat, it was probably 30 °C and it took us more than 24 hours to get to our destination, so no wonder he was tired. I'll tell you more about our stay in Russia tomorrow. Lots of pictures, I promise!.

Do svidanya!

Sauna

Moikka!
Mitä kuuluu? (What's up?)

Like I told you yesterday on Friday we went to the sauna. Like true Finns we go once a week. We don't have our own sauna but there's one in the building where we live, and we have reserved a timeslot every Friday evening from 6 pm to 7 pm. One hour is good for me. About 3 minutes is enough for Julius

It can be a good idea to have a sauna hat to protect your brain, but I don't know why Julius is wearing one...

Every now and then we go out to cool down and have some cold beer. I let Julius have a sip too. You have to teach them while they're young.

Then we go back in the sauna.

After the sauna you have to wash off the sweat. I try to wash Julius but sometimes he is not very cooperative...

And then things can end up like this...

Sometimes we splash around in the tub with lots of foam. Julius loves it.

That's it for today, folks!

My Friday

Hello friends. How are you today? I'm not really in the mood to write about any concrete experience today. I think the unusual summer heat might be getting to my head.

So let's have a look at what I did yesterday:

I woke up and got dressed. The clothes make the monkey, right?

Then I had two fried eggs for breakfast.

I spent most of the afternoon debating Nietzsche with my flatmate Misu the Cat. It almost ended in a fight. The cat said my argument didn't make any sense and my response may have involved the word "moron". Hmm... I haven't seen her today yet. I may have to apologise for yesterday.

Then I had afternoon tea with Julius.

It was Friday which is our sauna night so Julius and I went to the sauna. I'll write another post about Finnish sauna culture at some point.

That was my Friday, folks

See you soon!

Italy round-up

Hello everyone!

Here's a post with a gloriously random compilation of pictures from our trip to Italy. We experienced so many interesting thing and I couldn't fit in all the pictures the other posts.

Did you know that our humans almost had their wallets and passports stolen? On the metro in Milan three "pregnant" gypsy women came up to them and asked confusing question about how to get to a specific station. I say "pregnant" in quotation marks because on one of them her "belly" was slightly off to the side. While the women were distracting us by pointing to the map of the metro they tried to stick their hands down our humans' pockets and handbag. Scary right? Luckily I was in the handbag ready to bite their prying fingers. They ran off after that. Haha!

Me hiding in the handbag ready to bite

Good thing Julius and I don't need to carry passports. We just travel in the luggage ;)

Talking of scary things: In Verona we stayed in a flat with really old beds. Like from the 18th century. I swear I saw a ghost and couldn't sleep.

Now for a more cheerful subject. We saw a lot of nice art. Check out this sad dude for example. The poor thing is badly in need of some candy. I feel him.

Here is a nice and summerly photo of me. This one is from Bologna.

We had randomly walked into an interesting area with lots of interesting street art. I like this kind of thing.

Grrrr...

In Milan we went to the Museum of Science of Technology (named after Leonardo da Vinci of course). The had a copy of a 16th century pharmacy. For some reason there was a climbing crocodile on the wall...

They also had a bunch of old trains and a submarine.

Julius smellt like engine oil for two days after climbing round an old steam engine.

This next picture is from the train on the way to Bologna. As the train crossed the River Po Julius exclaimed: "Alea iacta est!". He thought he was being clever imitating his namesake, but as you'd expect he hadn't been listening in history class. The river Julius Caesar crossed with those words was the Rubicon not Po... Silly kid.

In the airport on the way home we met this guy. He was very friendly.

Until tomorrow!

Blueberries

Hej på er!

As promised I'll tell you about our berry picking trip. One of my favourite things to do in late summer is picking berries. The blueberries – well, they're really bilberries but we call them blueberries – are ripe now and in August we can start picking lingonberries.

We went to the forest which is on the way to the beach that I showed you yesterday, and started picking. Or well, I started picking, Julius, the little rascal, ran off almost immediately.

Me looking for Julius

I looked everywhere

I was worried sick and spent a long time looking for him. I finally found him in a small shelter that he'd built. There he was grinning and eating blueberries.

I'm starting to think he's not a real monkey but a changeling. Maybe the forest trolls switched my kid for this little bugger at birth. That happens, you know.

Next time I think I'll leave the kid at home. He's too much trouble.

When we came home we ate the blueberries with milk. Yum!

Tomorrow I think I'll show you some more pictures from Italy.

Till then!