How do you see?

Juno.

I heard first through friend's friends friend that it wasn't worth watching,
and so to avoid uncomfortable situations I didn't go to see it.



But then after seeing some previews I became
more suspicious and watched it anyway. And loved it.

Simpe and not. Black and white with shades and shadows.

I found Juno very pro-life, pro-love, pro-long term
relationships. It raised a good lot of questions
and thoughts and without pointing
one's finger at obvious things it managed to come
across deeply philosophical. And entertaining.
It was somewhat shortest 90minutes in recent
box office hits.

I can recommend it to anyone who thinks
that they can understand and process
idea of possible consequences of (premarital)
sex and that all things and decicions that
people do in movies are not maybe ones people would do
in real life. We turn sometimes to do better,
sometimes worse. :)


After watching Juno I felt like it would be
really good to have some kind
of christian data base or reliable source
to find out what movies are really worth of watching.
My brother then helped me to find
http://www.christianitytoday.com/movies/
and after reading couple of previews of
movies I had seen I think this site is worth
visiting once you are pondering whether
to go to movies or not.

I do not write this to baby-sit, but I personally think
that I don't have to see everything and rather watch or
listen something what I honestly enjoy.
"Everything is permissible"—but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible"—but not everything is constructive..."

fever.

All who wander are not lost.
- J.R.R. Tolkien

I tell them I am from a country that no longer exists. They believe me.
- Leah 'The Poisonwood Bible'

One might think, for example, that
one cannot claim that one is from another country
other than where one was born. Identity is not as
simple as that. Identity cannot be calculated by a
computer with sufficient background and demographic
information. Identity is formed and collected over a
lifetime, and what goes in and what doesn’t is decided
largely based on feelings. Where one sees connections
to others, places, and objects, one identifies.
- Unknown

Maybe that's all family really is. A group of people who miss the same imaginary place.
- Andrew Largeman, "Garden State"

The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.
- St. Augustine

The real voyage of discovery is not in discovering new lands but in seeing with new eyes.
- Marcel Proust

Traveling in the company of those we love is home in motion.
- James Henry Leigh Hunt

The higher the mountains, the more understandable is the glory of Him who made them and who holds them in his hand.
- Francis Schaeffer

Now the LORD said to Abram,
"Go forth from your country,
And from your relatives
And from your father's house,
To the land which I will show you."
- Genesis 12:1

---

shame on you.

Unlike in many other places around the world,
here in Finland we are not used to hearing bad
or incomplete finnish. Even for the time being
non-native "bad" finnish speakers hardly exists.
You either speak finnish as your first language,
mother tongue or then you don't speak it at all.
Even most of our swedish or russian speaking
minorities fit in these two categories.

That's the way we learn for speaking a language,
it's either fluency or keeping one's mouth shut.
And we Finns have no problems with quietness,
- companionable silence.

Proudly we explain to our foreign friends
that the secret of our close to fluent english
is tv-programs that are not dubbed, so we
are used to listening foreign languages from
early age. By the same token we are perfectly
unused to hearing fragmental language,
regardless of the language.
(With one particular exception: when finnish
politicians are forced to speak our second
official language swedish in television interviews
or programs - and how do we laugh at them.)

When our immigrant population grows
incomplete finnish will become more common.
We will have new dialects, exotic loanwords
and hilarious situations. But most of all,
maybe variety of incomplete finnish speakers
will encourage us native finnish speakers.
Maybe then we will dare to use those four to five
different languages that most of us have mugged up
at school for years. Even though we wouldn't yet be
fluent.



(freely revised and translated from Joanna Palmén's column,
"Suomalaisten loistava kielitaito" Ylioppilaslehti 2/08)

facts and figures.

"i have a dream."

Had some kind of age crisis maybe when realised that many of
my childhood friends are turning 25 soon. It sounds really old
but isn't so, is it? :)

Then i began to list all kind of odd figures of my life, numbers don't
tell you much but are just interesting.

I have..
...been at 29 countries
...used 5 different email addresses
...studied 7 languages at school (finnish, swedish, english, french, german, portuguese, russian)
...been at school for 19 years, (3 of them abroad, 5 in university level) and been in 9 different schools
...moved 17 times
...over 6000 photos in my computer
...donated blood 3 times
...2 sisters and 1 brother
...owned 4 bicycles and one car
...lived in 9 cities
...5 seasons of gilmore girls and 4 seasons of friends on dvd
...been north from the arctic circle and south from the tropic of capricorn
...owned 3 nokia mobile phones, currently nokia 7370
...

Too much information?

just.

It was so dark outside,
no single star on winter sky.
I could have screamed to stars
but as there was none
i just whispered to
diamonds glittering on snow
Why.

Shadows are not black they are blue.
I wish it would even storm,
it would be more calm on the inside.

"...was sure by now that You would have reached down
Wiped our tears away, stepped in and saved the day.
But once again, I say amen and it's still dark."

(Casting Crowns - Praise you in this storm, edited)

I choose to trust your promises,
even i can't see
to read
them in this darkness.

Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path. ps.119:105


And i heard silent but strong voice replying:
For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the LORD that hath mercy on thee. isa.54:10

bambi rock climbing on ice

Oh, these days of deep shadows and brilliant highlights.

I had rendering/sketching class this afternoon, thus the comment above.
Rendering/sketching is fun but my brain seems to refuse
to produce anything 3d,i read it, understand it but create
- no. Whether it is cause or effect of
my orientation to 2d graphic design instead of 3d
product design i'm not sure.

This morning I left home wearing nice high heel boots, only to turn back after few hundred meters to return and change to some reasonable footware in this case good ol' adidas superstars (no subliminal advertising). Morning had been one of those clear moments of vanity and i had felt like dressing to impress... Well overnight, the setting had changed again and everything had frozen. Weather is so balagan (cool hebrew word, means befuddled, screwed up, in disorder, awry, silly, in a whirl,...) these days, temperature can change +/- 10 degrees celcius every second day. Not complaining it just means that you have to have full repertoire of wardrobe available, not just wintere but also autumn and spring clothes. :)

Walking to and from school is also quite adventurous these days thanks to rapidly changing weather conditions. I choose to take shortcut path through forest and it means crossing little ditch/swamp area and climbing/sliding down deep slope. Mornings like this, after rainy day when everything has frozen up, it is more, let's say, interesting when climbing up "the slope path" could be described as bambi rock climbing on ice.
Note: again I'm not complaining about the weather, just saying it makes life even more unpredictable. And walking to school is extreme sport.

Well that was only introduction as i had logged in to blog about something completely else, but as i kept on blabbering for so long, just want to leave this one verse to you to reflect on:

"Above all else, guard your heart,
for it is the wellspring of life."Proverbs 4:23


edited 11:15pm, coming home from school today was a bit of adventure again, it had snowed fresh 5cm moist powder snow on top of the ice. Only option to keep digtiny and not to fracture any bones was to sort of ice skate and slide the slope down on all four :) yes i had snow in my shoes, in my hat, under my coat ... refreshing one could say.

Synchronizing Beat and Breathing.

If madness is the new sane.
Sometimes, when making choices i feel like loosing what i have had left of my mind.
Up against hard cold facts my own intuitive choices shake but stand tall with their back to the wall. Few days ago I was clearly shown in black and white the consequences of my former decision as sort of closing of the accounts. Side i had chosen appeared - ...white? - spacious, open, uncertain, even intimidating, challenging, adventurous, full of options. Not predictable. Even foolish. Choosing to live life to chase the way and will of God.
For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 1.Cor.1:18

To choose invisible.
You can't see the wind, but you can see the effect of the wind. Greek word pneuma means both breath, wind and spirit. My prayer is to be the effect of the Spirit.
This yearning relates to sense of freedom, a freedom to journey.
Have you seen the movie called "Chocolat"? In the movie leading lady Vianne (Juliette Binoche) senses "the north wind" and feels that like her family's tradition, it's time to pack up things and go, move further. I know this sounds crazy, but every now and then, i feel the north wind calling. I can hear it's beat. It used to be escaping but i think things i used to escape have been dealed with. Do you rather escape or conquer?
The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit. Joh. 3:8

To live requires to hear beat and to be able to breath.
Heart beats. Heart is often underestimated. Heart is essential. King Solomon is remembered as the wisest man ever, and it wasn't because of the size of his brain. Rather, when God invited him to ask for anything in all the world, Solomon asked for a wise and discerning heart (1 Kings 3:9). Would you excuse me for using "hearing the beat" as a metaphor for knowing? As knowing by heart. Deep, justified, warranted, well-founded, well-grounded knowledge flowing from deep inside which leads to deep insights.

To hear the beat is to know when to jump.

To jump requires courage. To not to lose heart when you need to trust invisible. One's courage increases by experience and by learning (to trust). To trust the great unknown, to trust invisible. To trust to learn, to learn to fly. I wonder how flying would feel like breathing, something so natural. One day i will live as i was meant to fly. Not trusting to myself but the great I am.
"...the LORD God formed the man The Hebrew for man (adam) sounds like and may be related to the Hebrew for ground (adamah) it is also the name Adam (see Gen. 2:20). from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being." Gen.2:7

Life is a battle (you get beaten sometimes) and a journey (sometimes it's beauty takes your breath away). Be blessed.