Very good Saturday

I've had a really good day, and I've started to feel a bit more comfortable. I can now buy cigarettes in Finnish (valkoinen Marlboro). I'm learning new things to say every day at the moment. We've also done lots of nice things today. We met Jussi's sister, Saara, and her husband for lunch. I've met them both before and they're really nice. We went to an Italian restaurant near their house, which Jussi says is his favourite. It was quite nice, the pizza I had was huge but really good. After that we picked up some more of Jussi's belongings from their flat, then they came with us so Saara's husband could see our home.
When they left we just hung out here, then at 11pm we met Jussi's friends Emma and Tommi for a few drinks. Apparently we're also having dinner with them tomorrow. It's nice to see more places in the city, and to be getting a social life here. All of this despite having a huge hangover from last night. Oh my god. If you've ever watched Pasila you'll understand a Phil Collins hangover.
Also I'm staying up really late because I'm still 2 hours behind. It's 2.38am now, but I feel like it's 38 minutes past midnight. Last night I only had 4 hours sleep. The plan is to get healthier and happier here, so I really should start eating and sleeping properly. Although tonight Jussi and I shared some Finnish potato wedges that I bought the other day. They were really good, they tasted like the McCains ones. I'm starting to adapt, and I'm trying my best to speak Finnish when I can. My friends in England have all been really supportive and encouraging, I feel like I can manage here.

Yksi olut, kiitos

I've been out tonight and ordered all of my drinks in Finnish! Which is definitely an achievement. I fooled 5 bar staff. By the way, the title of this post is "One beer please..." That's how Finnish I am.
Maybe this is just a drunken bad mood rant but I'm gonna do it anyway...
This sounds retarded, especially as I've wanted to move abroad since I was a teenager, but everything here is so foreign! I know that's obvious, but I'm having such a hard time because I don't understand shop signs, products in the supermarket or the language generally. Even the doors have strange locks on them that confuse me, and the traffic being on the wrong side confuses me too. Also many Finnish people seem to have a lovely habit of continuing to speak to me in Finnish, even when I've made it clear that I don't understand. It's not that they can't speak English, they just don't want to. After all, this is apparently quite a racist country. Jussi told me earlier that even though my spoken Finnish has an obvious foreign accent it's very fortunate that that accent is not Russian. I have no problem with Russians but the Finns certainly do.
I'm just a bit upset. It's early days and everything's brand new, so I probably shouldn't give up all hope just yet Also Jussi isn't being very sensitive to the fact that I'm confused, scared and disorientated. I think he's trying to encourage me to do things for myself, and therefore learn, but I just don't have the confidence yet.
This is a nice city, and I don't want to quit, but right now it feels very tempting. It's not that anyone's rude to me, I just feel freaked out all the time when I'm in public. I almost had an orgasm earlier when I manged to cross the road by myself! I really do want to learn Finnish too. It's always pissed me off when people come to England and make no effort to speak our language, so I really have no right to come here and not make an effort to speak their langauge. My Finnish is very limited so far, and I don't know how to write anything, only speak, but I'm proud that I'm trying, especially as it's a very complicated language.
I hope I'll feel better. I only got here 27 hours ago so I guess it's fair that I'm confused. I just feel so stupid and incompetent all the time. I don't want to give up and go home but I'm certainly tempted.

Day one...

By popular demand, here is a blog about my time as a Johnny Foreigner in Finland! So here I am, sitting on a lovely green rug in my new flat. to be honest, it's so cold outside that I don't want to leave the house. Unfortunately, Jussi (my delightful boyfriend) is very insistent that I should explore. Hmm.
I got here at about 1am this morning. My journey was a complete nightmare. All was going fairly well until I got to Gatwick, where it transpired I'd bought a plane ticket for the day before! There were 3 seats left on the plane so I managed to get one, whilst putting a lovely £260 dent in my credit card. Which I have no idea how I'll repay. Fuck you easyjet. I rushed back to check in with my new ticket, and then discovered that my luggage was 24kg over my baggage allowance! And to take said luggage with me would cost another £230...
Then my credit card got declined. I did very well resisting the urge to cry. Not so well resisting the urge to shout "Fuuuuuck!" However, I called my beautiful, brilliant, perfect mother, who paid the extra money over the phone, got myself checked in and rushed off to security, paranoid that I wouldn't get to the gate in time.
Thankfully, after that the journey went very smoothly. Aside from the fact that the flight was filled almost entirely with Finnish families, complete with their out of control, screaming little darlings. But I survived, found Jussi at Helsinki-Vantaa and we went for a drink by the train station.
Then we were faced with a 2 hour train journey to get to Turku. And for some ridiculous reason, Finnish trains have no luggage racks! Which is very frustrating when you've spent all day carrying around 44kg of crap. I was getting tired and snappy, and hadn't actually eaten all day.
We arrived in Turku after 1am, it was 0 degrees, and it would be an understatement to say that my mood was flagging. We dropped the suitcases off in our new flat and wandered into the night again in search of food. This is where it gets interesting.
We found a kioski (a burger stand) and Jussi bought some crazy chips, deep fried with chunks of sausages! Apparently that's very normal. It was far too meaty for me but I found it fascinating. I just had normal chips, and even those were covered in salad and sauces. I think I'll like Finnish chips...
Eventually I got to bed, and today I had a slightly strange trip to the supermarket. It might become a problem that I don't understand what most of the food is...