Glimpses from travels
A warm and dark evening in the south
On my first childhood trips to Spain, we walked in the nearby hills in the evening. The combination of pitch darkness and warmth was new to me, and I fell in love immediately! The bushes sang and I felt, as a child of the North bleached by winter, that it was a good place for a human being to be. Since then, the longing for warmth and darkness, for the southern night, has smouldered, sometimes flaring into an unbearable yearning that I allow myself to fulfil every few years.
My first mountains in Poland
On a camping trip to the Tatra Mountains as a high school student, I saw real, high mountains for the first time. They inspired awe, exoticism, a sense of adventure, and were a joy to behold. A familiar verse flashed through my mind: 'Though the mountains give way and the hills falter, my mercy shall not depart from thee, neither shall my covenant of peace be shaken.' Only now did I understand.
Wisconsin river cruises
Another new habitat to delight summer workers in the US countryside. A wide meandering river with high limestone ledges that took you somewhere in the tropics. The thrill of driving straight into the river in an amphibious car, which is both a car and a boat.
Little Finland in Canada
When I was a student in Chicago, I visited relatives in the Finnish part of Canada. I was struck by the Finnish hawker's shop where you could buy buns, the hardware store where people spoke American Finnish between the shelves, and the cottage culture and nature, which was identical to that of Finland: white birch trees, coniferous forests, lakes. No wonder the immigrants made their home here in the early days.
Nepal and the Himalayas
Hiking in a mountain village in Nepal, on a business trip more than 10 years ago, along long steel suspension bridges was unforgettable both for the scenery and the people encountered. We learned about development projects in the villages, including support for schooling for disabled children and girls and work for children's rights. There, in the midst of poverty, I was once and for all ashamed of my clumsy, well-fed, privileged Westerner.
It was such a big experience, a leap into a completely different reality both socially and geographically, that it is perhaps still not fully articulated as a life experience, even though I had visited a developing country in Africa once before. Another somewhat similar, albeit milder, was on a bus in Chicago, when I realized I was the only white person, and in the 'wrong' part of town - realizing my own raciality and privilege simply because of the color of my skin. It's absurd. And then visiting children's homes in Ukraine and meeting HIV-positive babies at the same time as I was expecting my firstborn. I must have isolated these experiences in a box in my mind so that I could somehow live a daily life without the constant torment of the unfairness of a world I cannot change. I am still lucky to have experienced these things. But the sadness and guilt will follow me forever. The best medicine is to get involved in relief work when I can.
Mediterranean water paradises
There are some things you can't experience in Finnish nature. Like when you're thirsting for a cool drink in the mid-30s, and you find a pastel turquoise river flowing through a limestone gorge, where you can wade waist-deep for hundreds of metres! And swim! Day saved. How many wonderful things can this world have to offer?
Another place at least as stunning was the waterfall paradise in Croatia, where you could walk across rivers along forested footpaths and finally cool off in deep, unreal, bright green water - there are no words.
A third unforgettable place, a cave lake in Kefalonia, where the boat seemed to float in the air because the water was so clear. It was ice-cold groundwater, even though it was scorching hot outside. A dome curved over the top, tens of metres high, with the sky visible through a hole in the top. Magic. On the same island, I was reminded of the stunning miniature view down from the top of the mountain and the fish watching while snorkelling on the many idyllic beaches.
The Mediterranean, my secret love that I can't help but return to.
