A Surprise Visit

11-16.11.2011

England vs Spain football game and see some of the top players or baby shower?

I've never been to a baby shower, I wouldn't be home for Christmas, which meant I wouldn't see the big tummy of my sister-in-law at all and feel the baby kick. And I needed some fresh air, peace and quiet, so a visit to Finland it was. It had to be a surprise as well, since I wanted to see how it would work out with only my father knowing that I was going there.

It was a bit stressful since I would have either been ringing my mother's door bell after midnight or stayed the night at my friend's place in Tampere and get home the next morning. My friend had to go to work early so the latter didn't work out.

But let's get back to the start of the trip. Just getting to the airport here in London takes ages. First you have to take the underground to get to the right bus stop, which takes 40min or so and then the bus to the airport which takes about 90min if the traffic jam isn't awful. And it seems that RyanAir in London is the only one, which really follows the 100ml in your hand luggage rule. No one checked them in Eindhoven or Dublin. So you can imagine there were a lot of people including me, who had to wait for a longer time at the security check due to those +100ml bottles. Time was running out for the gate to be open. I got there on time to just remember that it's RyanAir; they're always late with boarding.

That's when I also remembered that hearing people talk Finnish at airports isn't the prettiest thing to listen to. You also know when Finnish people are on the same plane with you is when a woman orders 3 beers. I'm used to that, but imagine the steward thinking 'tea' first and going 'oh my God' after hearing it correct the third time.

My friend was at Tampere's airport to pick me up, for which I'm thankful for and also we haven't seen each other for almost 1½ years. We had less than an hour to catch up and pick up some food, before I got on the train to home sweet home.

I can't believe I went on for a year in The Netherlands without visiting home, and now not even 3 months had passed by in London, I was already leaving the city. Wonder what the reason could be for that...

Anyways walking from the train station to my mom's place was refreshing; once again the fresh air, the peace and quiet during the night. I was back in a city which sleeps. My home.

Coming up with the plan how to make my mom open the door was last minute and goes as follow; basically I just called  the home phone, and told her that a friend of mine had left a package outside her door that she needs to take it inside.

You can just imagine her reaction when she saw someone standing outside her door in the dark. Worst case scenario was someone being hospitalized. Either one of us.

On the next day Saturday it was time for surprise #2. My mom called my brother to ensure they were at home. They had a peephole on their door and I had to cover it and hope they'd still open the door. My brother's reaction was 'Hui, what are you doing here?' and my sister-in-law 'WHAT?!' when she thought she heard my voice.

That was the end of secrecy! And I think the surprise worked.

The plan for the evening was to go to a Thai party. All I remember was the spicy food and the everlasting beauty contest.

the buffet table was 4x bigger than this

beauty contest judge

On Sunday our church's nun had made lunch for us. That meant a lot of salad and pork for me! Salad because English people eat shit and pork, because of my Muslim landlord. Was too full to eat much later at the baby shower, also felt really tired but still enjoyed it.

my sister's comment on fb; 'jaleh... shouldn't you be in london??' 'oh my lil sister... full of surprises'

no vacation without thinking

 And I was glad that not many came to ask how everything was. Now I understand my sister, who never wants to meet with anyone when she comes to Finland. Explaining the same things over and over again..

Start of a new week meant also a visit to school. Talking with my teacher of next spring and the future in general made me less distressed. The fact that on our first year only 2 out of 50 passed the computer skills test and being told that's it's not compulsory to pass, then later on our last year told that it is, made me really angry and stressed. Just think that not getting the 1 study credit meant no graduation, but luckily there wouldn't be a chance for that. Also hearing that being uncertain of the future is completely normal, eased my feelings. The main tip was not to be hungovered during a day off, but.. Hahahah.

In the end when she told me that when you're in your thirties your highlight of the day can be a wildlife documentary on TV. That's when I started to get worried of the future again.

A German friend of mine, Sarah who was also in The Netherlands with me was doing her exchange in my school was the only friend I met with. Or actually the only person I told that I was in Finland. I didn't say goodbye to her when I left for London, and she's leaving soon to LA to be best friends with Christina Aguilera so I had to meet up. But of course when your at school it's inevitable to run into school mates.

After answering many questions we went to Coffee House (Dutch people like to think it as Coffee Shop), and Sarah complained of me buying ice cream during that cold weather. Which leads to the fact that if you need to complain about something, go to a German person. They're professionals in that field.

They feel you, they understand.

I had a good time catching up with her, and I'm glad she's fallen in love with Finland and Jyväskylä. I hope to see her in paparazzi pictures with Christina.

Being more relaxed now, I wanted to spend the last days doing nothing, but to listen to the latest album of Arcade Fire and watching the short movie 'The Suburbs' based on the album. The theme fitted those moments, since it's all about childhood and changes in life; my brother and sister-in-law were just packing their stuff to move to another city. Last chance to be at their student apartment. So at the same time I came at a bad time, as people were yelling at each other and feeling stressed. It was like I brought London with me. Hmph.



Another thing I was glad of was the chance to play the air guitar to the whole Nevermind album, if you read my Nevermind, you depress me article, you'd understand. You'd also realize the funny moment when I left their apartment for the last time, I got my birthday gift in advance;

Seven years late. But still love it, and now for the first time I officially have two copies of one album.

The most pleasant thing though was to feel the baby move a lot on my last day! We were thinking that he hates me, because he didn't move at all during the other days, even though I yelled 'HALOO' to him ;) But he warmed up at the last moment!

Glad I didn't go watch football.

Ps. this is my 97th blog post. 100 is up soon. Any ideas what I could write about? You could either leave a comment here or in In Jallu's Words Facebook page.