Sometimes I complain… It’s usually about the Finnish weather. Or the Finnish people. And I think in a lot of cases I do have the right to complain *grins* But this post isn’t a complaint. It IS about the Finnish weather, and about Finnish people, though.
We spent the weekend in the summer house in the Finnish wilderness, on the border of civilization. I love that. I love to go back to basics, where all the luxuries of today’s society stay behind, and you get to relax without all the stress of the city in your head. The quietness, save for the buzzing of the insects, the chirping of the birds, “old-fashioned” wooden sauna (for which you have to chop some wood into small pieced first, because the big logs don’t catch fire out of the blue), mowing the lawn, violently letting yourself go on the man-high weed with a scythe and of course the cheers from the Olympics coming out of the TV.
Owwait… Hang on…
Right… The TV… Ok, in the time of the Olympics we’re allowed that little bit of luxury. But really, usually the tv stays off. There are better things to do 😀

But this is not really about that either. We were talking weather and Finnish people.
We were visiting the Better Half’s relatives in that area. She hadn’t seen them in many, many years, and it was my first time, I’d never met them before, and they’d never met me before. Complete strangers to each other, that’s what we were.
See, if you are that to someone down here in Helsinki you’re being avoided like the plague, basically. But up there, on the border of civilization, people are actually much more civilized than in the big city. It almost reminded me of home, where you greet people in the street, even if you don’t know them. Where you can look at each other, look each other in the eyes on the street, without getting a look back asking “What the f**k do you want from me?”
We were invited in as if we were living there. Got the grand tour around the house, were to stay for dinner AND sauna (and a swim afterwards in the lake, about 40 paces away from the sauna), but before all that we were taken out onto the lake to catch our own dinner. Now THAT’s the kind of unconditional civilization that I like. No questions asked -well, of course, a lot of questions asked, but you get my point- and you’re showered with hospitality. The kind of hospitality that has seeped away into the sewers of individuality in the big cities (plural here, because it’s not just Helsinki in which you find this kind of behavior).

And the place… Oh my dear… That little piece of paradise. And that with the weather we had during the weekend…
If I’d have a dime to spare I would be gone from here in an instant, press the pause button on time and stay in it forever…

I’ll say no more…

D800, ISO100, 1/125 sec @ f/8, Nikkor 14-24mm

D800, ISO100, 1/125 sec @ f/11, Nikkor 14-24mm