I haven't eaten this much since the last Castanyada - Never

Now you saw how lame I'm to invent tough nuts to break. Can you even call this as a one? I bet not.

Yesterday we set the table for a huge meal. For me moreover impressive and fresh faces with pleasant,  disparate and comfortable personalities. In the end of the evening, the board was covered with empty glasses of crystals and bottles a bit of wine in the bottom, miniscule cuppas of short coffees, wrapping candy papers and skins from mandarins and chestnuts. The vocal chatting passed as soon as it has started. The full day of fascinating discussing muted to tiredness. More than that, children and I got some symptoms of flu.

This celebration was peculiar compared to what I have got used earlier but I felt accepted among the guests. I was placed to sit between my host mother and one Mexican man. I hold on a belief that we're placed with consideration. Articulately, during the evening people of course changed their places to model constructions for better interaction between them. Once a while I found somebody new sitting on the left or right side of me. Certainly, I was asked about Finland. Shockingly a surprising fact...  Topics about cultural differences, food, education, alcohol consuming, average wages and taxes. One guest - who I may hear more about and alike to meet in the future - had even visited Finland! I felt a little bereft while we discussed about Finnish nature (oh, the lakes in the east-side of Finnish maiden), smoked salmon and - surprisingly - the sauna. 

As a appetizer we were served with plates filled with tastes from three countries: Spain, Mexico and Finland. A little bit spicy jalapeños, nachos  and salsas. I had brought a smoked salmon  with small pieces of rye bread. This was gone swiftly and was hugely complimented. Along with the hosts, they used around three hours last evening in three different shops in which case one was specialized in meat. Slices of Serrano ham and full plates of salami. I was accompanied with the middle one of the siblings and with the father.  In the meanwhile of shopping I was with her carrying out my duty: improve her English skills.

  I got a little bit anxious when the children saw that I had a LSDR-camera because they immediately wanted to become users of it. This was the case with the two of the youngest. Everything went still well, even if we had to put the camera away once a while for a reason. Some pictures did really succeed and as an example is the last picture of chalice filled with Finnish candies. Those were served as a desert with the most important final afters: castanyas the chestnuts.

I cannot even recall all the food we ate. If I remember correct, they carried two oven tin trays and holy goat it had delicious looking leg cuts of goat. (Am I getting better with my figurative writing skills compared to the start.)

  Later - when the parties were over - everybody were a bit drained and wanted to clean the mess quickly and crawl under the blanked as soon as possible. I used my last bits for being for a little time with the middle one, we both laying on her bunk. Because of the language barrier, it can be somehow hard to communicate sometimes. Luckily, she is already 8-year-old and even if she doesn't understand, slowly can I try to explain using very very very simple words and sentences. One week has passed and now she understood when I said how quickly she had improved during my staying. And she said same thing to me but in my case about Castellón and Catalan. Hey, she said this in Catalan. 

Oh the possibilities here

Oh, the rush! This week has been a real hustling as first getting accustomed to the new environment and culture. The amount of kisses and food, haha! I have maybe three posts in progress but haven't had much time to finish them. Or then maybe I'm just too fusspot of creating blog post pleasing to me. I realized that I now I don't have so much time to create long, well-detailed posts. Pity.

  On Friday day I attended into my host mother's work day in primary school. This is the time of the year of Castanyada, a very traditional festival in Catalonia. Here this is kind of replaced with Halloween. I was invited to arrive for the lunch with teachers to their meeting room  to celebrate and get familiarized with teachers and the Catalan school.
   The best moment was maybe when I was introduced to the master chef on the balcony. My yawn dropped of amaze and amusement when I saw that they were grilling three-metre long sausage, but cut and wrapped in a a smaller circles. And those astonishing sized slices of bread! With that I could have covered my face to play hide and seek.

  The wide board was full of different kinds of food  related to this special day called Castanyada. Various kinds of traditional pizzas made of puff pastry, sweet pastries flavored with coconut, stone pine, citrus, etc...  This dish was called Panellets and was enjoyed with aromatic and fruity alcohol called Moscatell,  made by muscat grape.  Also sweet potato preserved in the folio wrap.

 However, the most recognizable character were Castanyas, chestnuts , witch are roasted and later wrapped in the newspaper. Commonly street vendors prepare them hot toasted and sell them on the streets. And this is very delicious.
All the children gathered on school's backyard, made a circle on the track and sang danced few songs, waving their their hands along the song. At the end, all we got wrap of chestnuts and a big piece of batter.cake and few pieces of chocolate. The idea is that parents wait children otside and when the food arrives, the family has their own moment for their kid's eating.
In Sunday evening it might be that I'll be eating one kilo as we are celebrating this festival.

Bona Castanyada!

I'm in Lleida, Spain - Living here

Hola! Que tal? My journey to Lleida, Spain, started only around one and half week ago. I have had a profile on AupairWorld which is a website for people to  inform themselves as an Au Pairs. I thougth to make a blog post about my leaving before I leave but the time was small-scaled. In reality, I got a positive request (for starting to exchange messages) on Friday. And one week later I was having my last overnight stay. On 22nd day was my flight to Barcelona.

 The same day I got the request, I also had a Skype conversation and for two hours! The conversation was with the oldest chid (10-year-old) and her mother, but she was doing something else in the background. At the end we both seemed very sure that I could come. Somehow we were kindred. On the next day we talked more and the decision was made. I would move to Lleida.

   I had finished my Upper secondary School in Finland and after that tried few kinds of jobs. In Spring, when the last application period was, I tried to enroll into University, but to be honest, I wasn't motivated to study for entrance exams. Also to get enrolled to some programs in Finland is hard. Or that's what I believe. Nevertheless, I still wasn't sure what to do with my future and what I would want to study.

Sooo... I had one week time to get all the things ready. From the start - when I was creating the profile - I wasn't even sure which country I was going to. As a criteria I put a few countries like France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain.... a vast range of opportunities existed. And then this family from Lleida appeared to be interested about my profile. Their profile were in Spanish. The mother wasn't speaking English. Three children and a city of 130.000 inhabitants. Nice.

1ª: I didn''t speak or read OR understand any Spanish (Castilian). Maybe some vague words you hear from songs by Enrique Iglesias, Shakira, Ricky Martin etc.
2ª: I'm a person who likes to talk and especially if with somebody I'm going to use a lot of time. And still 'No hablo Español'.
3ª: For someones 130.000 is much, enough or too few. For me this was unsure; do I get bored quickly because if I get to known with the city and all the people. Will I know the city like the back of your hand?
4ª : Three children. Hehe, do I even have to tell more?
5ª: This is a addition to last paragraph for a reason.  I attached a great importance to have a place where I could meet new people and get a lot of possibilities for a mass of experiences. To examine for these possibilities I opened the incredible world of Internet and started to search anything related to this certain city: Services, history, schools, communities, leisure time, people living there, living/working/study experience, Au pairs, groups....  Fairly almost nothing which made me scared about becoming to feel hermit there,

 What have I done?

Now when I'm writing this, it is the fourth day. And I have been authentically busy. And I couldn't be more happy. As a consequence, I will continue in the next post.

Benvinguda a Lleida!
Bienvenido a Lleida!

An easy recipe because its possibilities to modify to your own taste!

October usually brings pumpkins to the mind. Maybe because of their market seasonality or because the Halloween is behind the corner. Both.  Therefore I wanted to purchase one small pumpkin and use it as a decoration. But because of the small amount of meat which was left behind, I had to come up something where to use it. Few cups of coffee smoothie sounded exiting to give a try. Before getting into work, some digging for information was needed.

   Before you follow  instructions, I want you to know that feel free to change the recipe according to your own taste. I tried Internet and found recipes related to pumpkin spice, less for the raw pumpkin itself. So nothing is written into rock.

   

  The amounts and ingredients are only directive. For example, I myself used coconut flavored soy yogurt in exchange for plain yogurt. I still recommend to use mild or not strongly flavored as the coffee is the primary, and any exotic could possibly have fun combination. My honey was also flavored with ginger but I used if fewer to avoid too tangy savor.  Feel free to modify the recipe, as I said earlier.

 

  Keep in mind how strong you want it to be. In my version, the taste of coffee was more strong. So if you want it to be softer and sweeter, add more yogurt. The dairy will also make it sweeter  but more likely lightens the taste. 
  Also thinks about the texture. Do you want it to be Ruth's smooth smoothie or more liquid (I don't know what the earlier was).  
  More flavoring can be added also if you want more sweetness.

Can you eat raw pumpkins?

  What I sorted out - yes. But it can be tasteless and hard to eat or cause some people allergic reactions and because of it's fibrous texture - maybe - hard stomach as it is hard to digest.   But I myself used it as raw as I possibly could have done it (to be honest, I feel it wasn't fresh enough yet, haha!) But I didn't prepare this as it's nutritionally-dense food and contains a lot of vitamin A.
  As some maybe have heard, cooking can reduce nutritional contents. But then there is always the opposite perspective waiting behind the corner.  Maybe this depends of the ingredient and the way of its processing. If I had wanted to have it somehow handled, I would have put it into a oven for a while. I would imagine it gets a little bit sweeter in the side of warming and softening.

And If you are really interested... Stop to think this question: are pumpkins, vegetables, fruits, berries, seeds, or what.   ;)

Did you try this and did you change it to your taste? How come?
P.S. I feel like becoming like one of those mothers on their forties when they start their DIY/recipe etc. blogs, jaja

Autumn - time to update for changes

Quickly have come the Autumn. Should it be my favorite month? On the 23rd day is my birthday. I'm exasperated myself while thinking: what should I do before my 20 years. One year. Just one. Then I'm old. Not really, don't take it personal.

 I made some updates here, but still going to tangle with it. Even so I'm happy with the rolling pictures on the header.

I had some busy duties (yeah, right). To sum them up, I  have worked full-day with some gardening and building green yards. Was a great experience on my track record. But those early awakenings (at least at 5 AM) were just fraught with drowsy eyes, quick pace and just  fatigue of the body. The same and continuous tasks were painful to my body, even though I'd like to put my muscles into work and pain. Constant repetition wasn't still good for the body. On the fifth, or fourth, week, I got a real bad tennis elbow. My older colleague became concerned, because I still was young and after having some injury, it could affect later in the future. I noticed. Yet, it seriously haven't restricted my life, but I'm taking a note every time, when I'm doing something heavy, long time and continuous. After five weeks there, I quit as I got a new job proposition. Of course I agreed.

I advice you: make your workout and seriously - STRECH!

To move on from works... I'm going to Budapest! Last time I've been abroad (more than a little cruise to neighborhood country Estonia) in Greece. And it has been maybe three years ago.
 
And I can say I am, really exited. As I love to browse Pinterest - which I recommend for people, who like to seek for inspiration, ideas, tips & tricks and etc. - my "♥"-list is stuffed f.ex. with travel journals and hidden gems in Budapest. I've planned to have my own now.  And in the same time, I'll get rid of one of my big problems. So called "the fear of the blank canvas".  It's when you really are obsessed to make that one perfect line of coal or ink. Then you rub out until the paper is so futile even to look at. And then you go mad at yourself. Asserting, you may have had that situation at least once. Same thing with using new pens.

When I first heard I'm going to Hungary, my first thought was it's language, Hungarian. And I immediately found myself looking for videos of Hungarian language lessons. One wishes of mine have had to learn many languages, maybe not fluently but well. Well, after one day I realized that maybe now it's not turn of that Uralic language. Sorry Hungary from the other side of the Uralic family! Instead, I registered to one site for Au pairs and Host families. Once I was living with hosts abroad but it was a language course and for three weeks. This is something different. More rich of local culture, language and people. I have interest into some families from Spain, but I hope to get more information, as just a little time has only passed.

Choi Jeong Hwa - Happy Together

Choi Jeong Hwa - Happy Together
Free entrance to modern art museum Kiasma that day.

  

Thank you summer and its events it included.

Mid Summer Night(s)

    I loaded the sport bag with my life which I was going to need for the next week. I lived with my lovely current friend group. Two of my friends and me living in detached house while parents and siblings were gone. They were best Mid Summer Party I ever had. This week was full with feelings and i got explored my friends and myself more.                

 I met people who I hadn't seen for a long time, got many times confused about how weird, difficult, life can be. But difficulties makes its own colors for our lifetime. Distressed at the moment, but great for the later. Even vital.                                                       Now I feel like charged up for new unknown experiences. At the moment I'm trying to save money, occasionally not surely knowing for what. I'd like to make some trips abroad and I know I want to have SLR camera along. Now I have to borrow my sis' or friends'. Everything happens in their own time.

Not about camera but the taker

As I have many ideas and plans, which contain money savings, my eyes catched a sentence "while taking a picture, it's 90% up to the taker, will the photo be succeed". No, I don't mean your phone's camera is as good as SLR camera's. But megapixels are not the key which create gorgeous pictures. And while making some transform on some pictures today, information of certain pic hit my brain. I immediately heard my teacher's voice in my mind.

"Check the information of the photo so you get more base when working on Photoshop."

  My plans. Yeah, I got one to purchase a SLR camera. Last college year gave me experience with schools' equipment ans my sis' Canon 1100. But I'm not a person who usually immediately buys when wanting - I even can wait many months, gathering information, more experiences, and more and more more more information. Afterwards, when I think, I liked more transforming pictures than nowadays it is other way round. My artistic tendency may have been more to perceive of positioning, atmosphere and details. Now I have my fascination on photographing. May be blaming my friend, happily.

  So today I read maybe unending amount of articles and wiki all about even deep meaning of cameras - which probably is too deep at this moment for me. And yes, I had to drool over some qualities which only wealthy toffs have money for.  As I'm newly an amateur.

  Let me just say - even if I may sound a little bit negative now: I don't believe in PERFECT RAW PHOTOS. Well, as long as I see one.

I wanted to take this photo as an example which my friend took. And yes, that's me and my face. Nice pic I wanted to work on as I saw a good opportunity to create the upper version. Kind like from a dramatic document, eh?

  Photoshop - our savior or the devil. It usually has a negative concept, but more likely it should be seen as a opportunity to give a birth for pleasantly looking pictures. But sometimes we go a too long way. I mean, unrealistic pictures of natural body. I've Photoshopped faces at school and home. As a experience. I'm not sure could I ever transform dramatically someone's body if I knew that many thousands of young people could see and start to adore the wrong image. Conscience would be maybe in unbalance. 

  I pursue transform with lights and shadows, contrast and colors. Not smoothing and so on to make me flawless and perfects looking skinny young woman without wrinkles, double chins, bulging veins and my too big nose.

ISO 400    50 mm    f/5,6   1/60 s

  So I's like to go back to my plans: work on with my skills, knowledge and dreams. Why I want a camera, is to capture beautiful details of my life which I will meet. And see my growth from pictures, raise those feelings end memories which I got while I was working on pictures. When fighting with exposure, f-numbers and getting a right position. Maybe redouble my wrinkles while squinting through viewfinder.

Week of University exams and Helsinki's environment

Maybe some composing of words should be in place.

Maybe some composing of words should be in place.

After sudden and surprising feverish week I sat down with a cozy gap to write something and recall last happenings. Weekends with friends has breed some how traditional food-central situations. Not McDonald's or Starbucks nor food delivery service behind your door with a handsome deliver guy.
I enjoy when I can adopt new knowledge and skills about restaurant or cooking business field. And of course global and everybody's passion - food.
  Highlighting the traditions... currently our group wants to load to new like recipes, nutrition, techniques, ethicalness and beautiful settings.

In the very end we conjured up a wonderfully tasty brunch. Home-made pizza, smoothies and omelettes. Especially I like the lower picture which story is that everybody wanted different drinks. So we made four - mate cocoas and couple coffees.

When suffering from flu and fewer, I had time to learn coffe

drink recipes and how to prepare them f.ex. Café au Lait, Sencha Latte, Madha Alay. Also how to foam milk which will last!
Last but not most unimportant: my present for my mother On Mother's day.

The meal just stuffed you for so called "siesta condition" when you are just so full you can't do nothing but collapse on the bed. You have been beaten by the whopping May Day meal.


 So much happened this weekend and my mind experienced repeatedly euphoric highs. I felt like subconsciously mind gave births for unused thoughts and which I some day want to carry out.

  



As I still have a few courses at school, the teacher gave introductions to make some light painting. So we killed two birds with one stone as this was homework task and we tried something new and got plenty of fun and little moist on shoes. 

  The new page of life is taking it's turn. The scariest fact is that at that new page, there waits a whole new chapter. Such a huge one.  Upper secondary school  and joint studies with these awesome individuals, friends, are making their own paths. Many are taking their first footsteps for this something fresh and strange. The future.

"There's no kinda great authority ordering me to do what to do

 (expect mom as I still live under her roof heh)"

"Earlier I had to go to school. It was mandatory."

"At this point I maybe should know what to do with my life."

"Now I'm charging my life and what I want it to become."

"I'm so happy that I have this kind of incredible friends."

"Let's do this and that! We gotta do that also!"

"Before we get separated."

  Okay, maybe I just made it sound more daunting than I should had had. Bit by bit I've started to understand more and more about my surrounding environment. But at the same time, I really don't. Everything seems to get more intricate. But also adventurous! As I just said.

 Little by little - I start to understand how interesting adventure is the life.

The Coffee Day