so anyway, something interesting to write about now.

now i am just going to tell you more about my time in finland and just whats going on in my life. but first i want to say one thing, you guys all stink. you guys all are the one blog reader(s) to not rule them all!! i asked over a week ao for E-mails with your name, where you're from and a picture of yourself, and i would then pick the one blog reader to rule them all. well i knew my blog wasn't that interesting but come on, i was hoping for more E-mails, i mean, like, at least, maybe, ONE!!! i feel quite personally insulted by the fact that no one E-mailed me, that makes me the on blog reader to rule them all, but i guess i already am, because i, of course, have read every single post, even the deleted and edited ones. so anyway, i am now asking you once again, the adress is chrisjohnclark@juno.com, just E-mail me your name, where you are currently living (just the state/country will do), and if possible a pretty, pretty picture of yourself. and then you will win the honor of being the on blog reader to rule them all, if i pick you. if for some reason i get 500 hundred E-mails (never gonna happen) then i will pick whomever i know best, but if i only get a few (most likely) then i will figure how i pick who i pick later. so send those E-mails, send 'em to chrisjohnclark@juno.com, GO NOW!!!

but anyway now you want to know more about my life. or maybe you don't, but i'm writing about it anyway. so anyway last week, monday, i went to finand. i first drove up to tallinn, and then the adventures started. for some strange reason, literally just after getting into tallinn, while waiting for a red light the in the car , the car did something really stupid, it stopped working. let me explain a little bit that that this is not surprising, our car is a bucket of bolts, it sucks, it's crap. i'm surprised it's still alive as much as it is, it should be dead. but somehow it survives, if anything is a miracle that is. so you get the idea, crap car, not surprising it stopped. but anyway so the car stops at this red light and for a minute we sit there, my dad keeps messing with it, we're all praying it'll start, we have a big truck behind us, all that fun. so finally a few minutes later the truck driver comes out and asks what's going on and, because my whole family is like freaked out i became the translater and quickly said "anna andeks, auto on, uhh.."(hesitating looking for the right word)"...auto on, nagu, surnud!" or in english "sorry, the car is..uh...the car is, like, dead!" so feeling very proud of informing him that the car was dead i was very surprised when a minute later the car started again for no aparent reason. so for a minute the car worked great, we went forward for a a hundred or so yards and then the car stopped again and my dad coasted to the side of the road and just couldn't start it again. so he jumped out of the car and ran to a gas station to get some gas just in case the problem was we were out of gas, which he said of course wasn't the problem. it was the problem, ten minutes later the car was working fine again.

so anyway after that fun little thing we drove over to the boat terminal and with five minutes to spare we got our tickets and jumped on the boat. the boat trip was really freaky for one reason. the whole time i kept seeing ghosts. no, this has nothing to do with the fact i was stilling feeling sick at the time. and no, i don't mean "ghost busters" or "BOO" type ghosts. i mean memories. we were on a viking line boat that i had been on many times before with my friends on the mission team. i had sung kareoke with my friends in the kareoke bar here...we had taken over the dance floor in the dancing bar and danced a mssion team dance here...i had defended my good friend Evelin when some drunk guy had hit on her in the bar here...so many memories. as i walked the boat the whole place seemed so empty, so dirty. the whole trip i just moved from place to place sitting and being bored. the whole trip i really missed my friends. because, no offense to my family but, traveling with a family compared to traveling with my best friends on earth is a big difference, and traveling with my family sucks.

but anyway after getting to finland the training principle, Peeter (yes i'm on first name terms with the training principle, i rule!!), came and brought us to our hotel were we stayed for the night, which was pretty fancy for me, i felt very special staying in this hotel and getting to watch cabel TV, all these things that people take for granted are very, very special for me. and then then early next morning after a quick breakfast we ran (we had to run, we were late) to the bus and got on the demonic bus that we would be on for the next four hours. the whole bus trip i slept and and listened to music, two of my all time favorite things, but still the trip was torture, i was stuck in the back with Christian Kalme, the most spoiled brat in all of Estonia, who wouldn't quit bugging me. first he wanted my mp3 player, then he wanted me to give him some candy and couldn't believe i didn't have any, and then he wanted me to do this and that and the other thing, to which i promptly replied: NO, GO AWAY!! which he did eventually. so as we traveled through finland on the demon bus, picking up more and more salvationists, most of whom i knew from mission team trips, i once again felt the pans of missing my friends. so then after a long time traveling we did the most amazing thing, we stopped!! there was a nice rest area were we stopped and chilled, and i got to eat for the first time in two days, i had three bites of donut, which when feeling sick usually isn't a good choice for most humans, but once again that fact that donuts make me feel good when i'm sick made me think i'm not human. and then i saw it, walking through the store i saw a little thingy with books on it, i paused and looked at the covers and read the names. and then i freaked out. sitting next to each were two books from series i would love to read. they had two books from the Ranma 1/2 anime series and one book from the Inuyasha anime series, both that i've wanted to read for a while. and so, with my heart beating rapidly in my chest i reached out and picked up Ranma 1/2, opened the cover and...finnish, no, not finish, finnish!! the whole stinking thing was in finnish!! so quite annoyed by the anime pleasured being denied me i put down Ranma 1/2 and picked up Inuyasha, opened roughly to the middle of the book and saw a really cool picture, Inuyasha with his big sword out, fighting some one and yelling something to Kagome, i looked to read it and...it said something like this "hei, nyt bla bla shikon no tama bla bla bla, bla bla, bla BLA!!!" the smelly crap was in finnish!! so in extreme annoyance i walked out.

so after i was safely back in he bus and having Evanescence sing away my worries i contemplated the sad fact that even Inuyasha and Ranma 1/2 were in finnish, it really does suck. the idea of reading about a half human, half dog demon, and reading about people who whenever they get water spilled on them turn into something funky, really appealed to me. even more than Fruits Basket where people turn into animals when hugged (i didn't know that happened so often until i watched this with some buds in Tartu). so anyway i finally arrived in the place where we were going, somewhere in the vicinity of Pori, and did the basic get the room keys, put the bags in the rooms, say hi to every one and then finally ate lunch. after that i reported to daycare with the kids and commenced work. it was fairly simple. basic translation between Russian, Finnish, Estonian and English, which because it was all those languages i barely know it was extrordinarily basic, it was basically telling the Russian boy, Anton, a good loud "NYET!!" every time he would hit one of the other kids, and telling the Finnish ladies every time an English speaking kid needed to go to the toilet, because of course i know the all important way of asking how to go to the bathroom in any language, just point to your butt and make farting noises. no, not really. but i did know how to tell them which kids needed the toilet.

so anyway that was the next few days, eating, watching brats, and sleeping. but there were a few highlights. one nice thing that happened was i played frisbee with my friend Yuri, the Helsinki multi-cultural corps(main language:Russian) officer, because his corps has a "ultimate frisbee" team. you know ultimate frisbee right? thats the sport where they combine american football with frisbee. well this corps actually has a ultimate frisbee team that is pretty good, so Yuri taught me how to chuck a frisbee like an expert, so look out now if i'm ever mad at you and have a frisbee handy i'll kick yo butt. and another interesting thing that happened was one of our Brazillian friends came up and leaned over my mom and in his deep voice said "YOUR FAMILY IS.." "AHHH!!" said my mom, who for some strange reason always gets freaked out by when some one sneaks up behind her and, especially if it's someone with a deep kinda freaky voice(no offense). so he just informed us that our family was the best known to him because he reads my parents blog. now i don't know if he reads my blog, but whatever. we had fun joking about it later though, joking about what something scary he might have said. my favorite was "your family is the eternl enemy of my family, i am sworn to hunt you down and kill you" which for some reason makes me laugh but anyway.

but the biggest, most interesting thing that happened was this. for the first time in forever i was ot the oly perso there who was over 15 and under 20, and as an added bonus, it was a girl! and as a super plus, she was American!! the Henderson family, who are Russian/American (don't ask) had gotten a helper to come from America, because since they have five kids, all under ten, it is helpful to, well, have help!! so she was there and was in childcare with me most of the time helping take care of the kids. we didn't talk much but i am now very exited that there is another american young person in estonia who is newer than me!! i love it when other people are new because then i look smart, but the truth is i can never look smart so i defeat the purpose anyway. but anyway, that was the basics of the week, i hve a heck of a lot more to write about but i'm tired now, so i'm going, bye!!