Yep, back in Helsinki...
It is a bit like fleeing, but hey, considering the circumstances it was the right decision. Umeå is like a ghost town in summer. And being there alone is like... being alone in a ghost town... I was staying in a little room facing a blind wall, on the back of the student union building. (Even Tommy who has been member of the student union for 6-7 years had heard about the room but never actually seen it!). No phone, no computer. A bit too much of an overdose of loneliness... Besides, it is not very handy to be looking for a job when everybody is on a holiday. Really, everybody was 'out of office'...
So, yesterday I took the ferry to Vaasa and the train to Helsinki.
It was a 'mistake' to go to Umeå at this moment, I could have known that the situation would be like this (although it was much worse than I could have imagined). Making a mistake, though, is a great opportunity to learn. I chose this, I chose to take this step whatever the outcome might be. So, I chose this experience this opportunity to grow, and I learned from it. I like to look at it in this way. I took a big step going to Umeå and I can be proud of having found the courage to do that. I was there for a few days, drew my conclusions and made a new decision based on them, and can be proud of making a difficult but wise decision.
It were a few tough days. Oh, I faced so many deep and dark feelings. Emotions I have to say. Physical expressions of thoughts, tricks of the mind. It was hard to be confronted with a panicking mind. It was like a cat climbing up the curtains in a veterinary clinic. Creepy! That is the most important reason why this experience was in fact a success: It reminded me that I have to meditate. I know that is the only way to find peace, looking for it inside. Still I allow myself to get sucked in to the drama all the time. This was emphasized by passages in Conversations with God Book 2 which I am reading. They happened to pop up at exactly the right moment. (Those things happen all the time, so that they are getting hard to ignore!)
In other ways this was a good experience. The problem with this moving to Sweden was that the decision is based on old knowledge, I hadn't been in Sweden for two years. Of course I always enjoyed being in Sweden and it hasn't been of my mind since I ever set foot on Swedish soil, but how should I know if that was still valid for me when I hadn't been there in such a long time. So, I got to taste a bit of Sweden again, of the life in Sweden.
Then I met some great friends in Umeå. I don't mean to claim their friendship, but I just experienced them like friends. Sussanne & Falko, Jocke & Karin, and Tommy were so very nice on open. That was just great. Jocke & Karin took me with them to pick cloudberries and invited me over for dinner. Jocke loaned me his guitar. Susanne & Falko offered me to live in their apartment in August. Falko imediately gave me keys to a bike when I visited them. Tommy helped me out with Jocke's guitar when I left. :-) It is just very nice to realized that there are some great people around in Umeå.
The old man on the boat... The are no buses going anymore from the ferry to Vaasa. So you have to arrange a taxi at the bar on the ferry. You can then share the taxi and the costs. I was discussing it with the staff and there was nobody to share a taxi with. The guy started suggesting that I could walk (40 minutes, 30 kg). And then al of a sudden this old guy popped up out of nowhere and said "I'll give you a ride, just come with me when we arrive". Nothing more, just that, it was settled. So beautiful, so perfectly simple. These are those moments I mean. It can hardly be a coincidence that this old man pops up at exactly the right moment on a 4-hour boat trip. And typically it was an old man.... I don't know....
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