When winter hits you hard, the Wandering Writer can still dream

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You don't know what it means winter blues if you don't live above the 60th parallel north. You might not really grasp the feeling of seeing the length of the day reduced to a max of five hours with an almost constant cloud curtain to prevent any sunshine.

Usually, this would be the time when I pack my summer clothes and plan my escape route to the southern hemisphere. Now, with the pandemic hitting its third wave, I don't even have any idea when it will be possible, and the feeling is that of being trapped into an eternal night.

According to the calendar, there should still be three months to the time when the day's length will reach a reasonable length of 9-10 hours from dawn to dusk.

To make things worst, it seems like also for this year we won't have any snow to brighten up the days. Even in the most northern part of Lapland, the snow has hardly made a consistent layer (at most 5cm in the northernmost part of Lapland).

If we can call this a consolation, there won't be any disappointed tourist coming to our country to enjoy the beauty of a white wilderness. Still,  having no tourists means a big loss for regions that live almost exclusively on that income.

Yes, we won't be happy enough the day when a vaccine will be delivered among the population, and whenever it will be available also for me, you can bet your ass, I will be the one in the first line.

What will I do once I have the vaccine? Legit question, I will immediately book a flight to Italy and a couple of holidays for the darkest periods of the year. The Wandering Writer can't really wait to be on the road again.

Because of this pandemic, we've lost the chance for our last holiday last March, and this year I also avoided taking any holiday from my job. For some reason, I preferred to remain at work rather than stay at home doing nothing. I only took one week to finish my novel, and maybe I'm considering taking another one to finalize the next one and get even with all the marketing for the Christmas period.

Initially, exploring the rest of the country I’m living in seemed the best idea until I realized that the reason why I used to travel abroad was the need for sunlight. At this point, going to Lapland for a holiday, knowing that there I will find even more darkness, doesn’t really appeal to me.

It has been a blessing that none of my family or even at the workplace had been hit by the virus, but the world is big, and unfortunately, the casualties have been far too many. Mine are certainly small troubles compared to those who have lost their beloved ones. So, please, keep yourself and your beloved ones safe.

Traveling the country

As Coronavirus restrictions force us to plan our holidays at home, the need to escape the four walls seems almost unbearable. Here in Finland, as the new cases dropped further, shops and small businesses begin to reopen their activities, although the authorities still suggest safety measures to be in place until the availability of a vaccine.

For the Wandering writer, those have been hard times, but the rediscovery of the beauties of my country made it worth spending a few words to bring everybody to a virtual tour.

Today, I'm going to bring you to a small town in southern Finland, Fiskars.

What brings Fiskars to be famous, is the fact that it has been the birthplace of the most successful and prolific factories, producing knives, scissors cutleries, and kitchen appliances. It's one of the oldest companies in the world to be still at the top of the market in the country makes it a success story.

But today, I'm not going to talk about the factory, but of the lovely place from where everything originated. The town was founded in 1649 and developed around the ironworks founded by a German gentleman, Petter Thornwärste, which also produced copper. The development of the industrial community was fast, producing, since the beginning, various devices, from kitchen utensils to transmission devices. 

The village was annexed to the municipality of Raseborg.

Nowadays, the village is an active center of Finnish art and design, with just 600 inhabitants in its center. It's a popular place for artists designers and artisans, and particularly in summer is a popular tourist destination.

The town is immersed in a quiet natural environment, and we were very lucky to find a sunny day for our visit:

A cup of coffee on the socially distanced cafeteria, at the shadow of the trees, crowned the hours spent on that charming place.

Although our plans for retiring in a warmer climate remain, I know I will miss those neighborhoods. Therefore, I plan to enjoy them for as long as I can. This means that, if you stay tuned, I will bring you some more of those peaceful and charming places.

Take care, and stay socially distanced.

Not giving up the hopes

As here in Finland Spring is considered over, at least if we're asking the calendar, the weather isn't really warming up. We certainly shouldn't be surprised about it, as I can count a few years when we kept the summer clothes mothballed until further notice. Yet, this year, also the weather forecast seems to add insult to injury, as they keep forecasting the arrival of the summer "within a couple of days."

Now, if this couple of days were indeed days and not months, I wouldn't mind.

Nevertheless, having been blessed with a very mild winter, when it didn't snow at all, the plants in my garden didn't suffer at all, and after a slow start, all the flowers are blooming once again. Due to social distancing, we won't have any garden party. Regardless of this detail, I am still glancing at my yard, wondering whether there is anything I can improve. Until last year, weed was my problem, until I saw how some bugs seem to appreciate their presence. Therefore, this year, instead of eliminating it, I've considered blending it into the garden, planting other random flowers to match.

The result is that now I have many flowers in a meadow-like garden. Today, was also one of those days when the only inspiration was to take my camera and go out, and so I have some pictures to show you.

I could get the shot of a duck's specie which is classified as endangered. It was a pleasure to see a male chasing one female on the riverbank.

On my wanderings, I couldn't take my eyes off this beautiful tree:

And on the way home, I had to stop to listen to a charming singer giving all his best to that special song:

Before entering a magical place where to lose myself:

I hope you all had a relaxing weekend and will be ready to start once again the rat-race tomorrow. Take care, and stay safe.

Night fell on Earth

It's nine o'clock in the morning, the sun hasn't yet risen. It's the darkest month of the year here in Finland.
Even though Helsinki is located in the south of the country, there is just a small chance to even see the sun. This because at half-past two in the afternoon the sun will start to set, giving space to a long night.

For an outsider, this might seem like something cool, but I can assure you that there is nothing cool once you start living here, and northern winter starts to be your normality.
To begin with, the simple biology that we need sunlight to live should tell you that surviving in a place where for a long period you won't see the sun, is strongly affecting your mood.
People in winter are less talkative, feel depressed, and constantly tired.
At the moment, we have five hours of light, and no snow to give any sort of joy to our souls. Nature is just dark, damp, and cold.
The sky is covered by a thick curtain of clouds, and it really doesn't make any difference whether it is completely dark or just dark grey.

 

Nevertheless, if you move to the city center, particularly now that we are reaching the Christmas period, the lights and the decorations for the incoming festivity, give a good reason to feel hopeful and improve the general mood.

We are just missing the snow...

Well, the recent years have brought a slight change in the seasonal plan of the Finns, living in Helsinki, and we are not having a decent amount of snow until the second week of January. This means that we need to clench our teeth, brace ourselves, hold onto each other for another month before having two main important things: more light, and more snow.

One important happening, people still follow, is the crowning of Lucy.

One week before the winter solstice, in Finland, there one event historically tied to Swedish culture: the day of St. Lucy. 

St. Lucy is celebrated as a “beacon of brightness” in the darkest time of the year. The first records of St. Lucy's celebrations in Finland are from 1898, and the first large celebrations came in 1930, a couple of years after its popularization in Sweden. Every year, in the Helsinki Cathedral, a girl is going to be crowned.

She bears a crown of candles to fight the darkness, and will walk as a bearer of the light for the streets of Helsinki:

 

She comes to remind us that within one week the days will start once again to get longer, and this means walking toward the spring. You might consider this a bit funny, but in this period, every second added to the length of the day is a great step toward the season when the sun will shine for most of the time.

With my heart full of hope, but still tired as hell, and slightly moody, I wish you all a fantastic weekend!

It's a magical world!

Today I am going to tell you about one of my passions besides writing: photography.

I believe there is a very close connection between all forms of art. In my case, the three things that go hand in hand are writing, traveling, and photography.

How do they relate to each other? Well, writing needs inspiration right? What better inspiration than visiting new places, experiencing cultures, meeting people, reading other countries' newspapers.

Photography offers inspiration. This one helps me to think outside the box, see the world from different perspectives, and clear my mind whenever I feel stuck with a page or chapter.

Here, the weather started to be quite unstable. It began with a chilling period, when we had the first snow, to the time we are now with temperatures that raised far above the seasonal average.

Despite this, during this winter, I was lucky enough to have a camera with me right when I needed it and could get some interesting shots that helped me going through the last few weeks.

Due to stress at work, I couldn't proceed with my writing, so I just got out and took a walk in the forest.

What I found was really stunning, and I spent most of the time taking shots of those crystals. 

The perfect harmony between the white of the snow, ice, and the blue of the sky (believe me, it's quite rare) was extremely inspiring. I could have spent the whole day there.

 And that was exactly what I did. Not caring about the temperature, I stayed the whole day out, to take pictures, and admire the sceneries.

I also got the chance to take a shot of a hawk, who was taking a rest on a tree, checking the food situation on his territory.

Undeniably, days and walks like this give a lot of inspiration, besides offering the chance to unwind from the stress of everyday life. 

With those images, I greet you for this weekend and wish you a great day.

As we get into the cold season.

So, what's next?
As we entered the month of October, every business in town started to theme the windows and shops with Halloween themed decoration. Also, those countries where Halloween is not celebrated and means another day on the calendar weren't missing this big chance to get some extra sale. After all, every excuse is good to sell one additional item, isn't it?
And now that we are already past the day, and we should just give more time to think about our daily life, returning to what is like without the expectation of another holiday, we seem to enter the new phase, the Christmas, interrupted by Thanksgiving day.
For Businesses, this is the most hectic time of the year because never like between October and January, they have to change their advertisement targeting.
Authors are not different, and meanwhile, we are writing our next masterpiece, we are dressing our covers and banners with themes, from the spooky to the festive, from the Christmasy to the New Year.
It's a big load of a job to get the right creatives to get something enticing and new to get a piece of the Holiday shopper's attention.

I make no difference, and as a matter of fact, I am going to do my best to finish my next novel, which seems to get longer and longer as it goes on. My longest book was my debut novel with 143k words, but I am afraid that, in this case, I will have to go over that limit.
At the same time, I am also looking around for new ideas on the creative side for promotions and banners.

Going on this way, I am afraid I am missing my favorite activity, which is observing nature and its changes during this season.
This fast-moving forward from one holiday to the other seems wanting us to speed up our time. Although, this would be rather the time we stop to think about the year that is about to end. Just like in every moment of our lives, we shouldn't be forced to switch from one season to the other in such a hurry.

It seems like the only thing important is not just to have fun during the holiday but to get prepared for the next one as soon as this one is approaching.

But do you know what?
This is my plan, I am going to spend the whole weekend almost freezing outside and risking to catch the flu, by taking pictures of the natural environment around me.
I am taking a break from writing and just spend my time outside, far from the city, far from the businesses, and far from civilization.

I am going to enjoy the calm and the natural routine of a quiet life, without stressing and hurries.
How are you going to spend your weekend?
Whatever you do, make it special!

Meanwhile in Finland...

As the rest of the northern hemisphere is suffering from heatwaves, here in Finland we had quite an unstable situation weatherwise.
With a gorgeous spring and summer that brought relatively pleasant temperatures of above 25 C, we had a mid-June and July where the short sleeves were a luxury allowed only indoors, as temperatures dropped dramatically from 25 to 10 C.
The situation started to change last week when finally the temperatures returned to the normal level of 25-30C.
Finnish people are not generally used to temperatures higher than 25C and for them is almost inconceivable to survive at 30C.

I come from Italy, my best memories of the Summer were the ones of my childhood, when we went to spend the Summer holidays to the house of my grandmother together with my cousins. My grandmother’s house had a beautiful and large terrace, which could accommodate two large families sleeping outside, but this was a choice only us kids took into consideration because it was definitely more comfortable to sleep in the bed, rather than in a mattress on the hard floor.

At those times, the nights could be quite hot, and as the days reached 35-40C, the nights didn’t go lower than 30C.
For this reason, we thought it would have been smart to place our pillows on the refrigerator during the day and sleep on a frozen pillow during the night.

Obviously, the temperature of the pillows rose quickly but slow enough to allow us to at least fall asleep on a cool pillow.

For me, temperatures of 35-40 C are something I am used to and, to be honest, I can also enjoy, so when the weather bulletin advise remaining home because outside it might reach even 30 C (which is not even a promise but an eventuality), and people start to be worried, allow me a giggle.
Today, since the temperatures might eventually reach 30, the weather forecast named this day a “sweat-inferno.”

*eye rolls*

And my mind goes back to my homeland…
Where temperatures of 42C are delighting the population… (allow me the sarcasm).
But this is how it goes, for those who are not used to hot weather a slight rise in the temperature might feel like something unbearable and the beauty of the world lies just on the differences of the earthlings.

Therefore, in this sunny, hot and lovely weather, I think I am going to wish you all a fantastic weekend.
I will enjoy the emptiness of the streets by going for a ride with my bicycle.
Stay hydrated and stay cool!

A yearly attraction: the Rhododendron Park in Helsinki

There are attractions that are mainly for tourists and others that give enjoyment to everybody. One of these is the National Rhododendron Park in Helsinki. Every year at the beginning of June, the park offers, to the eyes of the beholder an explosion of colors and scents.
And every year, people are gathering in the Park to enjoy the full flowering of the rhododendron.
In the beginning, the first rhododendron was planted there in 1975, where the city of Helsinki, together with the University of Helsinki started a project for the Helsinki’s plant breeding program. At the same time, were planned and constructed paths along the area.
There, 3000 rhododendrons were planted for research purposes, in order to create a variety that could stand the Finnish climate and produce flowers in different colors.
Rhododendron Park is the only park in Helsinki where special uplifted view platforms were built. Those platforms give the possibility to admire from a better vantage point the beauty of the blooming.
In 1996, the park was extended adding a section where Azaleas were planted, which were the result of another breeding program started in 1986. The park offers a view of many crossbreeding species.
When I arrived in Finland, in 2004, the section was quite small, if we compare it with the extension, it has reached in the late years.

Nevertheless, I considered it large enough to keep me there for most of the summer days. I was lucky enough to live just close by so that my daily strolls would have brought me right there most of the times.
As the years passed by, I have seen the park growing slowly but steadily, until the extent it has reached nowadays. I have no idea whether there are any plans to enlarge it, but since the crossbreeding project gave spectacular results, at least from the beholder’s point of view, I hope more species and colors will be added to the Park.

Personally, I hope there will be added new parts to the park as I believe you never have too much beauty, particularly when we talk about colors and flowers. Then let’s not forget the contribution those flowers give to the pollinator’s colonies.
It is an oasis of peace, where to get connected with nature and, having at hand your mosquito repellent, that is the ideal place to stop by with a book and enjoy your time.
So here is to you another reason to visit Finland, and preferably in early Summer. One suggestion, for those who intend visiting this fantastic country, is to get at least two or three weeks time in June between 1-23.6 because there are a lot of things to be seen.
This is the period with the longest day of the year, and if you push yourself to the north, you will experience the 24h sunlight.
Here in Helsinki, the length of the day during this period is of about 18-20 hours, but the nights are mostly looking like dusk, and not particularly dark.
For the longest day of the year hosting the midsummer fest (Juhannus) you definitely want to participate in the celebrations around the country. Then, of course, the Rhododendron Park, where to chill out and relax, before heading to all the music happenings around the country.

And that will be all for the moment, I wish you a great time and an awesome weekend!