Recent things

I've been a bit busy for the past few days - I'll explain why further on. Some nice things have been going on recently though.
Last night the dance theatre opposite my house put on a show as you can see from the photo. They'd placed adverts around our building to say that anyone was welcome to attend, but they held the show in the yard between the house and the theatre, so we were watching some of it from the kitchen and my bedroom. It was really nice though - a bit unusual, so that was fun.
A couple of nights ago I also found a new bar to drink in, which really reminded me of traditional English pubs, so that was cool. Actually, I've walked past it numerous times, and I always thought it looked decent, but I'd never gone inside before. I wouldn't mind going back. The interior was very comfortable and homely, it reminded me of local pubs and some Wetherspoons. It was a pleasant surprise.
The reason I've been a bit distracted is that I've met a man! He's lovely, and has restored my faith in Finnish men. They aren't all drunk and idiotic! Until yesterday he's been in Turku, as he lives in Tampere. That explains to you why I went to Tampere in the first place. One of my friends introduced us, and I'm very happy.
I'd also like to thank the universe, in it's wisdom, for suddenly producing someone I really like immediately before I leave the country! That was clever. It seems that nothing in my life can ever go to plan, but right now I don't really care. Love travels oceans and all that.
Now there's less than one month left in Finland, which makes me feel very sad. On the 5th of September my plane leaves from Helsinki. I'm thinking of this as just a temporary absence for me, and hopefully the time will fly by, as it has this year, and then I'll be back. There's nowhere else I'd rather be.
As this experience will soon be coming to an end, I'm planning to contact publishers in both this country and England, in a bid to turn this blog into a book. It has been much more widely read than I ever anticipated, and several people have recommended doing that, so I hope I can be successful.

Forte

I've been told before that I should go to Forte sometime, which finally happened yesterday. It was definitely preferable to Marilyn and Vegas, which I wrote about before. It was nice to have a girlie night out for a change, as I haven't done that for ages now. It's not the best club I've ever been to, but it's better than some of the other options in Turku. The interior was nice, and there were lots of friendly people there. I think Sunday is the really big night there, as all the bar staff who can't go out on Friday and Saturday apparently go to Forte on Sundays. Several people have told me I should go there one weekend, and I wouldn't be opposed to going again. The music wasn't quite what I like, but it was good enough for dancing, and better than in some other places where they seem to play "Selvä Päivä" and not much else.
Best of all, it was extremely cheap, and they had various cocktails. Some creepy old men bought us all strawberry margaritas. The drinks were good, the men were bad. It was a good night though, and I'm glad my friends called me else I would have just been at home being boring. However, I still find it a bit awkward when I go outside at 4am and it looks like the middle of the day. Yesterday was the longest day of the year too, so it was really weird. I'm not sure I'm going to get used to this.
Our night ended with eating burgers in the street, kindly bought for us by some friendly men. I have to say, if you've been out drinking in Turku you should go to Semi-Burger in Erikinkatu. The food is amazing, and it was pretty perfect after lots of drinking. I think I'm in love with their vegetarian burger. Maybe I was just drunk, but everything about it seemed perfect. It's a bit expensive (€4 just for a fairly small burger), but it's probably worth it. When you're drunk you don't really mind how much you're spending anyway. There was a long queue so I think it's a popular place. I'll certainly be going back.
So all in all it was a successful night with a happy ending. The occasional midweek night out is never a bad thing, so today I'm feeling rather cheerful.

Strange musical evening

It turned out that the cultural stuff was continuing today too, so the hangover did not beat me! When I walked near the river earlier there was a zip wire strung up across it, which I think was bordering on stupid, but no one appeared to fall in or get stuck in the middle.
We went to a gig on the riverbank this evening, it was free, and the band are apparently quite famous. It meant nothing to me, but Jätkäjätkät anyone? Imagine, if you will: Finnish rap that's channelling a bit of ska, with a mandolin and an accordion. It literally made no sense, but it was fun. Personally I wouldn't pay for it, but they were good. It was quite nice whilst standing in the sunshine.
Of course, because it's summer in Turku, there were some mad hippies. I've now had the experience of watching a fat, middle aged, possibly homosexual man grinding against thin air, slapping his belly, and doing some Bollywood style hand movements. That was interesting.
This particular weekend was organised by a group from, of all places, Manchester. We were informed of this by a lovely English man on stage, and I was a bit tempted to run at him screaming "Oh my god, English, English!" Thankfully, I resisted these urges. This was another part of the Capital of Culture stuff.
I'm so glad to be here, involved in all this mad stuff. Turku is buzzing at the moment, and I don't think I've seen anything like this. Maybe after winter, when everything is so dark and cold, the people here just appreciate summer and the opportunity to be outside a lot more. This city seems a lot more sociable now. I've never really felt this in any other place, and it's really exciting. There seems to be colour everywhere, and it feels like a totally different place to where I was during the winter. I've gone through some big changes since then, so maybe that's affecting how I feel. I always prefer summer, but I feel so excited this year, and I don't even know what's going to happen!

An excellent and surprising night

I was so bored and a bit lonely last night, I was worried about spending money. However, by 10pm I was talking to Emmi on Facebook, and we were both so bored and frustrated that we decided to just go out anyway. I was starting to think that, if I can't afford the rent anyway, another €40 on a good night out wasn't going to kill me. I'm so glad we didn't stay at home because I had a really good night, and now I'm in an excellent mood.
We met a lot of comedy characters last night. In Tinatuoppi various old men decided to make us to object of their affections, presumably because we were both the only women, and the only people under 50. I don't understand why Tinatuoppi has a lot of good looking, young customers during the day, and yet was filled with dodgy old men last night. We decided to leave fairly quickly. When we got outside, a very nice young man who had clearly ingested a lot of drugs invited us to go to Pori with him. Hmm. Perhaps not.
We moved on, and met two very nice ladies who love Stephen Fry. Excellent. I'm always very warm to people whose first words to me are "I like your piercing and you're really pretty." That's the kind of greeting I appreciate, as opposed to the kind of opening lines Finnish men use, such as "Beer is good" and "Are you German?" Those particular people also consider British people to have the best sense of humour in the world. The more I think about it, the more I realise that those women were definiely my kind of people.
Later we met Emmi's brother and his friends and went to Klubi. We went upstairs because the downstairs bar was so busy, and I was overjoyed to find it was EBM night! I've been wanting to find an EBM/goth club in Turku, but when I've asked others about that they haven't had any idea. I was starting to think that maybe that kind of thing would only be available in Helsinki. To be fair, this was a very small scale operation, but it was so nice to listen to that music and dance, just like I did a long time ago, before my life got a bit messed up and I was prevented from doing that kind of thing. I almost felt like I was back in Slimelight. It made me a bit sad, because I miss my friends and I miss those nights, but I think when I go back to London I'm definitely going to get back into dressing up and going out dancing like that. It used to be a pretty standard part of my social life, but I ended up losing it.
The best part is that Klubi has no entrance fee, so even if I'm completely broke I could just go there every Friday to dance! I had no idea they played that kind of music there, but I've only been there before on a Saturday, when they played quite normal indie stuff. I think there will be many return visits in store for me, and probably more dressing up. It's a shame I left most of my really nice "going out clothes" in England, as they seemed unnecessary, but I've still got some things. I'm really excited to have found this out, it was a very happy accident.
Now it's Saturday afternoon, I have an enormous blister on my heel and a bit of a headache, but I think that's a sign that things went very well last night.