Presumed consent

On August 1^st 2010 Finland got a new legislation concerning organ donation.

Earlier you always needed expressed consent of the deceased in order to use organs in transplantations, but from now on you are presumed to have given your consent for organs to be used, if there is no knowledge of you having being opposed to organ transplantation. Here you can read more about it, if you’re interested.

In a worst case scenario, if you have stated being opposed to organ donation in a will, and even made your will known to your nearest family and had it registered in your medical files, Finland has not yet got any electronic patient record database covering all health care units through out the country, so until then, when ever that may be, people are encouraged to keep a donor card with them at all times to express their will for, or against, organ donation.

So, where do you stick it in a skimpy two piece swimsuit?

You don’t usually even carry your ID when swimming; at least I know I don’t.

Right to wed?

The majority of the Finns are Lutherans, even though not many seem to practise their religion much, except maybe when getting married and having their offspring christened.

If I have not got it completely wrong, in Finland the church and the state have been separated from each other since the reformation when Finland was a part of Sweden.

According to an interview in a newspaper the bishop of Oulu thinks that “the church should marry couples of the same sex, if Finland is to have a gender neutral marriage law”, and adds “this should be done for the church to save its’ right to marry people”.

I am here not taking any sides on the issue about people of the same sex getting married or not, neither am I talking about them being wed in the church. I am just wondering what the church has to do with the state, as they are separated, that is not married so both can go either way, so to say, if you know what I mean.

New Year with a bang

In time for the New Year's celebrations the law concerning firecrackers and fireworks here in Finland was revised, well actually slimmed down.

Earlier you could bang your works and crackers (and excuse me if anyone got the wrong idea, this was absolutely not intentional) from 6 PM all night long until 6 AM the next morning. This New Year's Eve it was only from 6 PM until 2 in the morning. Selling fireworks is also from now on prohibited for under 18 years old and minors are not to handle them and wearing safety goggles are compulsory to wear when lighting the works.

With these new rules in work I was very much interested in seeing how the festivities actually would take place in practice.

On the day itself I woke up at 2.30 AM in the morning of two loud bangs in the yard, so the hours allowed did not work out as they should have. In the evening at midnight the neighbours muted their loud festive music in turn moving out onto their balconies to advise their minors lighting the fireworks. None I saw wearing any goggles, not even the adults safely on their balconies risking the limbs and eyes of their offspring.

The lights in the yard went out for several hours as someone hit the light switch with a firecracker or something, and the pub across the street had their own fireworks worth to see. Men standing on their knees in the freezing snow without any goggles, they shot them off. Some up into the night sky but most of them along on the street, that is in the end once they got them lit, which seemed oddly hard a thing to achieve.

Anyway, about 4 AM on New Years Day morning the glass of the front door downstairs was kicked in as someone who apparently did not live in this building wanted to get in, into the wrong house, as they had lost their keys. At least that is what the shouting downstairs was about.

The result of the festivities is full of strange stories, an acquintance of a friend of mine celebrated in high heel shoes, out in severe sub zero temperatures a night out in town and was hospitalized with frozen toes with an amputation of several toes as a result...the offspring of a friend spending the night in jail..and a couple of friends found themselves in another city their were supposed to be spending the night in.

So ladies, beware of your vanity, use sensible shoes when it is freezing out! And carry indoors shoes with you instead of risking your feet and toes.

Revising gunpermits

The most controversial thing that has happened lately here in Finland, has been the sacking of the editor in chief for a newspaper.

The owners of the newspaper deny the editor in question for having been sacked for living in a lesbian relationship and claims instead that the reason instead is her dishonesty, as the editors' partner is involved in local politics and this never came up in their talks previous to hiring her.
And with a journalist being involved in a relationship with a politician, no matter being lesbian, gay or heterosexual, there is always the possibility of being biased towards your spouse. Which is all natural,

Anyway, the Finnish gun laws are now being revised and it seems that Finland is to get the most restrictive laws concerning the possession and licensing of firearms in the whole of EU. All permits granted during the past two years are to be revised and in the future two police officers will have to be present when applicants are interviewed for their permits and also a medical check will be required.

Strangely enough both of the recent school shooting incidents here in Finland, were committed with licensed firearms, and as there always are ways to obtain illegal guns, I really wonder how much impact, if at all, this new gun permit law will have on sad incidents like these as they seem to become more and more common.

Another shooting

My apologies to my dear readers.
So many sad things have been happening here in Finland lately, as well as in my personal life, that I my normal urge to blog has almost completely gone missing. I have missed the routine of blogging but have had lack of ideas, as the main reason for blogging is not to write about my personal life, but to give my own view of the contemporary life in this country instead.

Sad was the latest incident of shootings where over ten young adults were killed, shot with a handgun in their school. This was the second in a year, and for me with offspring in the same age it has been hard to conceive how much it has affected me as well, even though our family has not been involved in the incidents.

A god thing has been the activity these sad happenings have created in other schools for the students to cope giving them ways to work through their feelings of anger, sadness and fear. Sessions have been held to talk through the incidents with the students and time was made available for them who wished to talk about it.

So maybe something good will come out of these two sad incidents, eventually, even though it may not feel like it at this moment.

Watch your step

Shoes are to be registered here in Finland.

For almost two decades The National Bureau of Investigation has been planning to set up a national shoe-print registry here in Finland and by end of this year it is proposed to become reality. The police believe that the shoe-print archives could assist the authorities in solving crimes together with the already existing fingerprint and DNA databases.

Maybe watching a little CSI has helped along the way, making this fast move.

So from now on, watch where you step when off on shady business, or keep a pair of spare shoes with you at all times and be sure to rid of your old shoes in the nearest bin as soon as possible.

Come to think of it, maybe this is what we women tend to do here during the winter. We walk around outdoors in heavy winter boots, carrying our nicer indoors shoes with us in our bags, changing them when entering indoors. That means we are leaving fewer footprints, or maybe more divided footprints? Well at least mixed messages if to be interpreted with the aid of this shoe print archive.

Art or not

An art gallery in Helsinki was a couple of weeks ago raided by the police after a visitor had alerted them.

The police were informed about artwork containing child pornography and some exhibited works were confiscated from the exhibition in the preliminary investigation. The artist in question is now being suspected of having child-pornography in her possession as well as having displayed it in the exhibition, which here in Finland is a serious offence and the prosecutor will now decide whether to press charges against her or not.

Now whether her works are art or not might be the question that comes in mind first and displaying the artwork might be an offence, but if this matter of child-pornography is not spoken out about loud, there will be no public opinion on the issue. And it needs to be talked about!

When mentioning child-pornography everybody seems to be against it, and judging from that there should not be any such offenders. But this is not the reality, these offenders are often the one’s you would the least suspect such as the man next-door, the teacher, some relative or the uncle you hold dear.

Yes it is prohibited by law here in Finland, to perform sex with children under the age, the possession of pictures whether still or moving also is but you can still obtain it from the internet with no difficulty what so ever. And I am for the freedom of speech but in this case I might stretch into strongly being against it.

Kissed and told

The Finnish prime minister is today appearing in a court case as a private citizen where charges are pressed in the Helsinki District Court against his former girl friend that kissed- and told with her book about their time of courting.

The prime minister only filed a complaint against the publisher of the book and not his former girlfriend, but the prosecutor is apparently seeking damages from both the publisher and the former girl friend. The prime minister has said that he wants to openly discuss the principle at stake, that there must a limit on to how much invasion of the privacy of public figures the media actually can make, as there so far has been no precedent case of this kind in Finland.

This case is expected to could set guidelines on how privacy laws apply to public figures and it will significantly have an impact on what can be made public in the media from now on here in Finland.

Anyway, I better get going as I have my book illustrator coming to work for the weekend and need to get stocked up with some groceries in order to cope with the weekend provisions. More time for work and less time needed for shopping and cooking. Sad that our book is about our cat, maybe an illustrated book about the Finnish prime minister would have been easier and more worth the money to sell to some publisher.

No equality in Parliament

The Finnish Parliament returned to working life again as their Christmas break ended on Monday.

Despite having been on Xmas break the parliament has been hitting the headlines with rumours about female assistants and secretaries having been sexually harassed by male parliamentary representatives. Names of the representatives have of course been visible in the media but none of the allegedly sexually harassed has come forward. The president and the chairman of parliament both have condemned sexual maltreatment, and to my surprise I found out that the law on equality only applies to workers and not to representatives of the parliament. This seems like a peculiar oddity and at the same time a bad flaw in the law in these days when sexual equality is spoken about and regulated and guidelined for here in Finland in every way.

Anyway, I have been down with the most excruciating headache since Saturday afternoon and finally today it was time for my appointment with my chiropractor. I have a tendency to get my neck all tense and then the headache hits me like a sledge hammer, it is no migraine as my migraine medication does no do anything for it and ordinary painkillers only get the edges off it, and as the agonising pain can go on for day and night for up to ten days I sometimes crave for a bullet to end it all. All I have been able to do about it has been to stay in bed in my dark bedroom and wait for it to pass, counting the hours…and seconds avoiding to move and to think. And thinking is not the best thing to do, the rest of the family always enjoy the oddities that comes out of my mouth at these fortunately more rare than commonly habitual occasions of this headache.

Thinking about it right now, it seems a bit like an over drastic measure to take to end the pain with a bullet into the brain but this far nothing has helped, and when you’re there having the pain you just want it to end. This time I was lucky as I had the appointment with the chiropractor so conveniently booked, almost like a premonition. Of course his treatment was not the most pleasurable ones I have been through, and believe me I have been to a couple of chiropractors in my days, but the relief afterwards even though places still are sore and ache but I got relief from the tension, the headache lifted off.

God, am I thankful to be alive and kicking!

Helsinki expanding

The metropolitan area in the Finnish capital region is a centre of expansion and some cities in the area grow faster than others by claiming land from others.

The endlessly ongoing debate about whether the municipality of Helsinki is allowed to extend itself by annexing the south western parts of the neighbouring municipality of Sipoo will still go on despite a court ruling made Today by the highest administrative court. The court decided that Helsinki’s claim to extend towards Sipoo by annexing the disputed parts by beginning of the year 2009, same property of land the city of Helsinki apparently so far has been renting from Sipoo, is lawful and right.

As the court ruled against the result in the municipal elections held last year where 94% of the inhabitants in Sipoo were against the annexation, the ruling in the case will be appealed to the European court as this is said to be against the principals of democracy, intruding against the municipal rights to rule. The disputed property is 30 square kms, and Helsinki will right away begin their planning of the disputed land beginning with public transports and they will also begin negotiations for the sales price of the property as soon as possible with Sipoo municipality.

Anyway, the weather has not been the best lately; too warm for it to be winter so it seems we are having an extended version of autumn this winter with some days of snow in between. This is normally the coldest time of the year here in Finland. With the sky being overcast, it being all wet with the snow melting away you do not see much light either so no wonder hard to get anything done and one feels a bit depressed.

Not even the thought of it soon turning into spring makes it any better at this time…

Lighting a fire

The Mormon Church in Tampere was set ablaze and burned to the ground this weekend and it seems to have been arson but it is not the single on, there seems to have been more of them lately. The Pentecostal Fellowship church in Viitasaari burned in May 2006 and was tried to light again four months later in September. The church in Lappenranta was tried to lit up in spring 2006 and the of Porvoo 15^th century church was burnt to the ground with two more contemporary Lutheran churches and the Jehovah’s witnesses church in Vantaa in the same year.

I always wonder what it means, just a spur of the moment thing, lighting a match seeing if it catches or something against the religion, or something personal against that particular church or congregation.

Anyway, the variation in TV programmes by the end of the year can sometimes be very tedious, list of music from the previous year, various flashbacks looking back at the year gone, “How the Eurovision were made 2007” and so on, might be nice for the ones interested but some programs that have become traditions are just the utter waste of time, like the Victoria’s secret annual fashion show.

It is said to be the greatest honour to be chosen as an under wear model of Victoria’s, only the best of supermodels get there, and men are said to be the greatest fans of Victoria’s, more than women the under wear is designed for to use daily. I must confess I am a sucker for lingerie, the less of it, the better. The more luxurious silk and see-through laces the better. I enjoy feeling sexy underneath as it is my own secret that no one knows about.

I do not advertise about it as I do not dress for the joy of my husband but for my own pleasure, but I must admit it is an advantage if he enjoys my lingerie as much as I do, lighting my fire, if you know what I mean.

So getting to the point here soon, I wonder how many men really are interested in seeing this Victoria’s secret fashion show that is aid to be one of the annual highlights of the fashion world, at least according to the media. My problem here is that I do not know one single man that is addicted to seeing it, neither is anyone thrilled about the catalogue being released. Does this mean that the men I know are mature enough to not fall for as frivolous things or do they just not dare to confess it publicly? Or is it just a thing, like the Chippendales for women, a lot of talk but not much action really? Which by the way I still have missed the opportunity to see so far even though they were in Finland not so long ago.

Or maybe Victoria’s secret means, being secretly addicted to it without ever admitting it to yourself?

Happy New Year!

The New Year 2008 brings with it many changes in legislation and regulations here in Finland, as well as the normal prices annual increases.

Outdoor advertising of alcoholic drinks such like "happy hour" will be prohibited, and bulk discounts on alcoholic beverages is to disappear as well as TV commercials for alcohol are now banned between 7.00 am and 8.00 pm, and alcohol commercials won’t be allowed in cinemas when the film is allowed for under 18 olds.

There will also be a legislative reform in order to reduce the number of part time work contracts for employments longer than one month. The employees must now be informed of the basis for their part time contracts, receive annual vacation and a notice period that is consistent with the duration of their work contract.

Also a reform governing the protection of children will take place for better protection of the minor’s interests and to ensure that both children and their families have access to necessary support, to improve cooperation with officials and enable timely interventions if needed.

A raise is awaited in the price of petrol by 5 cents per litre, and diesel by 5,5 cents and Bus tickets will to rise by 5.2 percent and long-distance train tickets costing an average of 3% more. The postage is also going up and stamps will cost 7 percent unless for letters weighing less than 50 grams.

And to the joy of anyone with a mortgage, the interest rates are also set to go up.

Strikes spreading

A law allowing prevention of access and censorship of Internet sites containing child pornography came into force in Finland at the beginning 2007.

Two weeks ago the Finnish Police gave public notice to their first list to the Internet access operators and now the Internet access providers are to filter access to these sites but this will not prevent accessing these sites, it will only complicate the uploading of the illegal material of the sites here in Finland.

I have been wondering about the health and stress levels of the Valtakunnansovittelija, the national conciliator’s. He is busy with his office swamped with work at the time being and there seems to be some new strike popping up in the media all the time.

First we have the nurse’s of the Finnish health care professionals union, with their threat of mass resignations, one paper pulp mill in Tampere is going to be shut down with the employees walking out today in protest against it. The pharmacies are also going on strike on Thursday in the capital region, and if no agreement is struck it will spread to all the bigger cities around the country. The pharmacies in the Helsinki area are expected to keep open with their supervising staff at least his week.

A strike of telephone operators’ service personnel union is also alerted to begin on Thursday, this meaning that only some mobile phone operators would be up and running in the meanwhile and probably also affecting the Internet providers so the banking business through the net could be shut down. This strike also threatens to spread to all the other phone operators as well given time without an agreement. The engineers began their strike for better pay on Monday morning and the strike is threatening to spread to more employees of more companies in two weeks time if there is no agreement made between the employers and employees union.

Even the president has to cut a trip short and return to Finland in order to ratify the new law forcing the nurse’s to return to their work despite a resignation done due to the disagreement on pay rises. The president has to make a change in her travelling plans and skip her trip to a summit in the US for women leaders of the world. The law has been rushed through the voting in parliament once in the early morning hours today with a second voting about it in the parliament on Thursday for the president to sign it on Friday in order for it to become lawful in time before next Monday when the disputed resignations en masse are effective.

And with the strike of the personnel of Alko, the national alcohol monopoly, beginning on Thursday I was happy to find out that my traditional annual tasting of the fresh Beaujolais Nouveau of more than two decades still is going to stay uninterrupted. The Alko shops will be open on Thursday even with the strike, there will just be a smaller number of shops open due to shortage of staff. The opens stay open with supervising staff only so I will have to make sure which one is open to avoid any unnecessary trips driving around the city.

Wild children

Since the tragic shooting at a high school last Wednesday when at least 76 shots were fired by an18-year-old shooter, Finland’s Prime Minister considers an examination of the legislation whether hand guns should be kept at sports clubs and target ranges instead of being allowed to be taken home.

On Friday several threats or believed threats to schools were made around the country and Police in eastern Finland even detained a 16-year-old boy on suspicion of uploading a threatening video onto the YouTube website.

The debate on the issue on Internet about the shootings in school has been going on since it happened and there are discussions supporting what happened and those who are against it.

Until today I had not had any thoughts about the family of the shooter, how they must suffer. Feeling the guilt of not knowing about what was going on, not seeing it coming, the thoughts about if there was anything they could have done to prevent it from happening. The anguish of not being able to help your own child when obviously having been in distress, the feeling of being an outcast, as there is no one who can really understand what you are going through…

I certainly was a wild child, even though you probably wouldn’t realise it seeing me today.

I know I did cause my parents a lot of trouble and I even did a few things I am sure they were sick with worry and really ashamed of at the time. Today it is my time to be worried about my offspring, fortunately they have not as yet done any headless stunts as I did in my childhood, still I have had worries and not one day is like the one before and I am thankful as it keeps me young.

I remember the fear “not being loved by anyone” and the despair of “not quite fitting in with the others”, the feeling of “not having any future” you sometimes can feel, especially in your teens. So I can understand where violent acts stem from, it doesn’t’ necessarily mean you have to act upon every single one of them. You just have to stick tight and endure, grow up as they say. Still, when you grow up your trouble does not go away; it just changes into something else.

I really wonder if I am getting anywhere with this today…

This certainly calls for some more tea!

Cutting edge

A Finnish citizen has brought suit in a Russian court seeking the return of family property in former Finnish territories of Carelia annexed by the Soviet Union following World War II in the first case of its kind. Since a decision in this case is expected to set a precedent, the court proceedings are expected to be lasting at least a year and the case will be pursued as far as the Russian Supreme Court by the plaintiff.

The disputed property is a plot of land originally owned by the man's father in the city of Vyborg but Monday it was still undetermined whether the defendant is to be the City of Vyborg or the local district.
One problem that comes to my mind though, this is not the Soviet Union we are talking about anymore. Russia is a completely different country today and I really wonder what difference this case will make. No other countries have to my knowledge given back any land territories acquired in a war when sued in a court of law anywhere so why should it be the case now when it was not the same country then that it is today?

Maybe the purpose is just to make headlines, their “fifteen minutes of fame”.

Anyway, I just had my friend on the phone about a new revolutionizing knife that was advertised in TV shop, the Sonic Blade, an electrical knife with two moving blades that can cut through just anything.

I have trouble with ordinary knives, to keep my fingers out of the way when cutting and chopping so I just began to wonder how dangerous this Sonic Blade really can be, “cutting through just anything with ease” so my fingers would soon just be a memory. Cutting with plain ordinary knives requires a certain technique in order to succeed with the task at hand together with proper maintenance, that is sharpening them often enough to keep them at cutting edge and it is not really a question of raw power as they want make feasible in the advertisement.

I can only imagine the two moving blades of this lethal kitchen knife as there is no way one of them is coming near my kitchen or my hands for that matter.

So this girlfriend of mine is now enthusiastic about the knife and is considering buying one, which will be against my strong recommendations but then she has never before taken my advice against buying any junk from TV shop in earlier days. So I guess I better get her some band aids to store in her kitchen cupboard the ready at hand when needed as I don’t think this is a question of “if” needed in this case.

The end?

Shoplifting is more common in Finland than average in western European countries and most of it is done by the employees according to the newspapers. Finland is at the same time ranked high with low corruption according to research, I just wonder where the logic is. You can steal but not take bribes; do what ever you want to as long as you are not caught?

I have spent the most exhausting time at the vet’s with the elder of our cats and the prognosis is not a good one, possibly we might be with just one single cat this time next week but seeing your loved pet as poorly as it is at this time just makes your heart ache, you do not want to inflict them any more misery or suffering than necessary and an act of love is to know when to let go. Sometimes I wonder about euthanasia, we are allowed to help our beloved pet animals to go when they suffer, but if we ourselves when sober and at full mental capacity declare that we do not want to be kept alive artificially by machines then nobody takes any notice of it anyway.

I seem to be getting back to this ethics again, and the issues still has not become less hard to handle. At least now we will have one more week to prepare for the death of one of our family members, and looking from the brighter side, it might be false alarm as the vet made two different diagnoses with two completely different outcomes. Either it works with the treatment or it makes the situation worse and we will be going back to the vets for the final.

Third most guns in the world!

Apparently firearm ownership in Finland is the third highest per capita in the world, according to The Small Arms Survey 2007 done by the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva.

It is said according to the study that there are 90 guns per 100 people in the US, followed by Yemen with 61 per 100 people and coming third with 56 guns for every 100 residents in this country!
According to the Geneva based researchers, “gun violence often occurs in urban areas rapidly growing with extreme poverty creating lawless areas without effective policing”. I wonder how that applies to Finland, the urban areas with extreme poverty. I had no idea the Finns were this gun prone, but it sounds quite a lot to me. Anyway, I guess it is one person owing more than one gun, and this was not just handguns in the survey I gather, hunting rifles and shotguns must have been counted as well and there are a lot of people hunting here in Finland.

The most annoying thing has occurred, I have come down with an eye infection in only my left eye, and my left eye is swollen and it hurts to just keep it open, which would be the normal thing to do when being awake. This is an odd thing that happens to me now and then and it is only the left eye that gets infected and swollen. Guess I now have to think about getting a doctors appointment for this afternoon to sort this thing out before it gets out of hand and affects my eye sight permanently.

Copyright

A fifteen year old adolescent here in Finland has been fined for posting a video of his teacher singing on YouTube, declaring it being from a mental hospital mentioning the teacher’s name.

The District Court of Nurmes determined that the adolescent was of age to understand the consequences of his actions and how it would affect the authority of the teacher in the school. The adolescent got fined by the court with 90 euros for defamation together with 800 euros for suffered damages together with having to pay about 2.000 euros for the court proceedings.

The story has one good point in all its’ sadness, you can not publish photos or film clips without the approval of the person appearing in it if the face is to be recognized. That is why I so rarely take pictures of people or in public as they are not always applicable in any way. Take a photo in the town square for instance and post it somewhere and someone is in the wrong place with the wrong person they are not supposed to be there with at that time, then you are in trouble.

This is the reason why I strictly stick to photos of friends and family, and hardly ever publish any recognizable faces on the Net, to avoid getting into any trouble.

Anyway, now the southern most Finland has been pestered by heavy rain with thunderstorms during the mornings. Lightning has struck in people and aerials affecting the national TV and radio broadcasts and the train connections have been on and off standstill in various directions around the capital area, hindering commuters getting to work. Buses and coaches seem to have been the safe way of getting where you have planned to arrive at a given hour these last few days if you have not had your own car to rely on.

Now the weekend finally is here and a bit colder weather is expected together with rain in most parts of the country which should be nice for a change.

Senator suing Finnish newspaper?

According to the morning news, Russia is said to in the 1990’s have proposed to sell back the eastern parts of Finland, Carelia, which was ceded in World War II.

Now the a former Russian State Secretary and First Deputy Prime Minister stated in the story, who currently is a senator in the upper house of parliament, has threatened to take legal action against the Finnish newspaper that published the story “if he feels Russia has been insulted”.
According to the story, which was published in last week Finnish newspaper, “Russia was in the 1990s fighting financial problems and considered selling the former Finnish regions of Carelia back to Finland”. The paper continued by saying that the senator, an aide to the then-president Boris Yeltsin, “was to speak to Finnish leadership in the matter”. The story has now been denied by the senator saying that “no Russian leader has ever promised to return any land back to Finland in any way”, saying that “the claims were probably based on internal discussions within Finland”.

Nothing to worry about, Finland already got back some parts of Carelia from the Russians, even though it was to be inhaled in small particles by most Finns last summer during the many forest fires that kept on burning for weeks on the other side of the eastern border.

Still, the border between Germany and France has been moved so many times during the centuries that the citizens of Elsass, or Alsace are more or less both French and German never minding where their passports are issued, and Britain and France are still at war since the times of Joan of Arc as no peace treaty was written back then if I remember it correctly.

But as Carelia was such a big part Finland with large crowds of fugitives having to flee leaving all their property behind only to be relocated in Finland with no property at all, it is hard for many Finns to accept the fact that Carelia still today remains Russian and is not joined back with the rest of Finland.

Today with all that has been going on in the St Petersburg and the surrounding areas with building and construction, the modern Russia of the 21^st century having invested too much economically in the recent years to just let go of it, it seems most unlikely that Finland ever would regain Carelia, according to most Finnish experts specialised in Finno-Russian relations, and this to the great disappointment and being a hard fact to accept for many Finns both with and without Carelian heritage.

One thing right

A new study that has followed children since the 1980’s a third of all juvenile crimes are committed by adolescents that are either bullied themselves or bully their school mates. The research also suggests these same children also have had a troublesome childhood in addition to be bullying and it is suggested that these troubled adolescents should be helped before their problems grow too big.

Most citizens nowadays have their own mobile phones here in Finland and the stationary telephones are getting more expensive all the time and as we have not been using ours we just cancelled ours. The problem is now that the phone company promised to disconnect our number on July 30^th and it still is working today!

So if we now were moving, were we now to pay the phone bill for the next owners?!? I know it is summer but I think there is no excuse for such misconduct, an agreement ends on the date you have agreed upon and not when it is more convenient for the second part to end it and as it is today more a matter of computer programming than to actually disconnect the cables by hand, it should have been easy enough to have been done on the agreed date.

School begins already today in some parts of Finland and for some tomorrow as most do not begin their studies until next week and the offspring is off to the beach to celebrate this as they do not begin until next week. The weather is smashing, still to might turn out a bit too warm to spend all day in the sun but fortunately the water bottles have been early planted into the mind, no beach if no water brought with from home. Suntan lotion is another thing that I have always been reminding about and now has begun to show. Suntan lotion was already packed when mummy asked about it! So I guess this must be the other thing I have got right.