Happy times :)

I went to the doctor today for the fourth time this a week and finally got some good news: I'm getting better!! Whoop whoop! :) I just need to get rid of my cough and take it easy for another week, no biggie, right?

Avicii - Levels Skrillex remix

I was supposed to get a lot of things done today but after coming back from the doctor, I took a nap. Which ended up being 4 hours :D :D God damn it!! So finally after waking up, I've been busy packing my stuff and getting ready for tomorrow. I'm gonna have breakfast with my two nurses here at the residence and go to the airport to pick up a very special guest who's staying for a week ^^ 

:)

We're staying at a hotel in the city centre right by river Liffey and the Temple Bar area and I'm so excited that I can't stay still :D Ohh, I have so many nice plans! And tickets to the Smurfit Ball 2012 on Thursday 1st of March!!! ;) Can't wait!

Project recovery

I wish I could post you guys about some cool trips with a blast of nice pics along the way. But no. Since Friday, my longest trip has been to the kitchen in the end of the corridor and back :D Or actually, to the doctor’s around the corner in Carysfort Avenue.

I’m gonna be on sick leave for a week at minimum and I’m now down with 5 days out of 7. And I’m bored as hell :D I really need to focus on keeping my bum in the residence so that I’d get better as soon as possible, but it’s hard because I don’t even have fever anymore. Anyway, I have to try my best because I don’t want to be sick at weekend when an important visitor arrives in Dublin <3

So what have I been doing for the past five days?

Sleeping like a baby around the clock

Watching all episodes of my favorite Finnish tv show - Usko, you can do it!!

Skyping with friends for hours

Saving my brain capacity for next week when I should be back in business :D

Getting.. ehmm.. creative?

And most importantly: been taken good care by my friends here :) Thank you!!

I'm anxiously waiting to get better, because next week should be fun! I have all kinds of plans and all I need is to be ready for their execution :P

Sunday in Howth

Today we decided to make a day trip to the village of Howth, which is about 30mins away from Blackrock by train. We heard that Sunday would be a good day to go there because of the market, but it turned out to be quite modest. Anyway, we circled around the marketplace for some time and the girls found some delicious snacks to take away with them, focaccia bread, olives and sun dried tomatoes. I was really tempted by the chocolate but managed to keep my hands off of them ;)

Managed to resist the chocolate!

Veggies

The harbor was quite lively considering its small size and there were lots of people on a sunday sail or walking at the harbor. We walked to the end of the dock and enjoyed the sea breeze :)

Cute sailing boats

Howth harbor

Hehe it was windy :)

Sunday sailors

We heard that there are a lot of seals in Howth but didn't get to see any, bah. After walking around the harbor we climbed up the hill to the old part of the village and had coffee in a cozy local coffeehouse and started our tour along the cliffs.

Mocha & Latte

Warning signs everywhere for a good reason!

So finally we got to see a glimpse of what Ireland is known for - the breath taking coastline with rocky cliffs and green fields. Simply beautiful. And slippery!! There were no fences or any other equipment to guarantee the safety when walking along the narrow paths at the hills, so I was trying to be as careful as possible and stay away from the edges.

The lighthouse

Up on the hills

Loved the color of the sea water

Imagine slipping here and rolling down the hill..

Busy paths

On our way back to the village

I took all the pictures with the camera that I have in my cell phone so you can't really see the beauty of the cliffs in these pics.. :/ I decided to make a short video clip, but doesn't provide any help in that matter. Oh well, at least it makes a clear point of me being scared of the heights :D

Wappu 2012 in Helsinki, YES please!

As a result of a looong, careful consideration.... YES, I'm visiting Helsinki at Vappu! Booked a flight from Dublin to Helsinki on the 26th of April and will be staying in my home city over the weekend, hooray! :) The day for my return will be confirmed later on when I get information about my exam schedule. But now it's time to make magnificent plans for my stay ;)

Tickets booked!

After the trip to Cork, me and the other exchange students have had lots of ideas about traveling in Ireland. We have a two-week break in the beginning of March and during that time we wanted to go around the west coast of Ireland, which is supposed to have a breath-taking scenery. No specific plans have been made, though, and I heard yesterday that people will be going back home etc on week 10 and travel in Ireland only on week 11.

Suddenly I had a free week in the beginning of March - and zero plans! And it's coming up so soon, oh no! I started checking flights to Europe, namely Paris, Copenhagen, Rome etc. where my dear girls are on their exchange. And ended up calling a friend who's luckily starting to get bored in staying in Paris only :D So we came across with this idea to go visit London instead of visiting each other - we both want to see something new! I've been to London when I was 16, but it was a very short visit and I didn't even get to see any major attractions. Since then I've always wanted to go back, and for my Parisian friend, this would be the first time there! So BOOM we booked tickets to London and decided that we should stay there a bit longer than just a weekend since we both have time. I hope that others can join us for this trip too, even if it would be just for the weekend or a couple of days during the week. We will be enjoying our time there from Wed 9th til Sun 11th anyway <3

Love at first sight

100% silk and light as air <3

Now just a thin black belt, clutch and high heels and I'm ready to go  ;)

Fighting against the Irish winter

Today I went downtown with a friend with some serious shopping in mind. It's been so god damn cold and rainy here during the past few days that I really had to buy some warm clothes. I really thought that it's not gonna get much colder than +5 degrees so I left the winter clothes in Finland. Fail. I've noticed that I have chosen to stay at home several days in a row lately even if everybody else had had nice plans and invited me to come along :D Creepy eh? :D

So today I put an end to this and decided to buy a really warm jacket and gloves. There were still heavy discounts in all the stores even though it's Feb already and after several hours of pure hunting, I made some really good bargains. And was able to leave loads of nice dresses and shoes in the stores. Whoa!

Winter jacket from Diesel and something that wasn't on my shopping list.. :D

Leather gloves and a cute belt. And a bag from Zara. Needed them all. Really! :D

I'm glad that the fake fur in the jacket's hood doesn't show in this picture. It looks ridiculous, like a rat that got beaten big time. It's thin and a weird shade of grey, doesn't look anything even close to the real thing :D I'm changing the fur when I get back home, that's for sure. Mom? ;)

Making of... Fisu!

I've told my friends in dublin that Finns have a lot of variations of their beloved vodka. Actually Kossu, to be precise ;) And I just love the look on everybody's face when I tell about the making of Fisu - washing machine style, of course. I've never tried it on my own, putting the ingredients in a big plastic bottle and let the bottle roll in a washing machine for half an hour in a mild temperature, say 40 degrees. I didn't try it this time either.

0,7l of (bad) vodka, 3 bags of Fisherman's Friends

I poured two or three deciliters of vodka to a kettle and heated it up, then mixed in the three bags of Fisherman's Friends and let it melt there niiiice and slow ;) We didn't want any of it to vaporize, haha.

Too excited I guess, since we forget to turn the stove on at first

Once we got the to the right temperature, things started to happen

After the candy melting process, we poured the rest of the vodka in a plastic bottle and this delicious stuff in it too. Eww..

Some clever ideas for doing this without a mess

Turned out to be an epic idea

Worked so well this far but then we spilled quite a lot of it on the floor :D In the end got the stuff mixed and poured it into the glass bottle. I already feel sorry for my friends who have no idea what is waiting for them on Saturday :D

...and done!

Yks kaks pulloo, kolme neljä kalloo, kaks pussii Fishermanii puoleen litraan kossuu! ;) - Fisuu by Elastinen & Timo Pieni Huijaus

A regular day in class?

Not sure if it's kindergarden or university that I go to? :D We had a lecture today on supply chain management and it was about production lines; how productivity, variance in demand and efficiency of the different parts of the line affect the line's total performance. So what we ended up doing was demonstrating a pizza production line with dices and pawns :D

So first you throw the dice to see the market demand..

Then start producing the pizza.. 20 rounds..

And see how many you got delivered in the end and how much of the demand you lost thanks to inefficiencies :D