Mansikkoita

Bo and are about 21 hours into a 24 hour feast. I am very excited to eat. Nothing sounds better to me right now than food going into my body. Smells have been intensified. The Finnish guy next to me was just eating some pastries with rice pudding inside and I could smell every molecule of them. I was salivating. And now they are drinking beer and wine and even that sounds like a decent way to get full.

What prompted this fast? Estonia. We were very unhealthy in Estonia. We drank quite a bit of alcohol, due to the fact that every time we met of a group of people we were offered drinks and we didn't want to be rude, and were constantly eating due to the fact that things were so much cheaper than in Finland. So after several days of Estonian decadence we were more than due for a cleanse.

To break our fast we have decided to eat only fruit. We bought melons and strawberries and grapes and all of it sounds semi-divine right now. One thing in Finland is you weigh your own fruit and the machine spits out a label showing exactly how much it costs. I scorned this at first but now I love it. It makes you feel like you work there, which means you feel slightly productive. Plus the girl at the cash register promised to only speak Finnish to us starting tomorrow. Or rather she will speak English but we will speak only Finnish. Because she wants to practice our English.

I am excited for the program to start tomorrow and I am excited to make new friends and go swimming and go sailing and go fishing and go skateboarding and have a good three weeks in Savolinna. It all starts at tonight at midnight with a bushel of strawberries. It's going to be great.