Cycling in the snow

Winter daylight saving has started, so we woke up an hour later this morning, but it was still dark, and now the sun is down by 5 in the afternoon. The clouds have not cleared in two weeks I think, apart from little glimpses of blue every now and again. We are heading into the extreme winter. It snowed two days about a week ago, and we even woke up to a white neigbourhood one morning. It did not stay long, as it is not yet really cold enough for the snow to freeze properly.

I discovered this when I went cycling to university one afternoon. In January, when we came, it was constantly below -10, and so the snow has this powdery quality, it is not wet at all. Not so when it is above 0. Then snow is wet, and cold. I realised this as I set out, but for some reason obscure to me now, thought that it is not so bad, and I should keep going. Some perverted part of my brain was laughing at me all the way there. My upper legs got completely soaked, and had little bits of ice stuck to them. It took me a good hour or two of practicing for my jeans to dry. Then I had to set out again to get home, and the whole thing repeated itself. Seems even highly educated people are stupid.

Tracy has been like one of those spongey monsters that you throw in water and watch them grow to incredible proportions. She is truly 'vooruitstrewend'. Bubs - as we have taken to calling her - also loves stretching out, which is very uncomfortable, especially when she hits bone or some sensitive organ.

We visited the hospital, they provide a little tour before birth in order for the parents to get accustomed to the place. So we saw the waiting rooms, delivery rooms and the ward where you stay afterwards. The midwife also very patiently explained all that will happen before, during and after. It is really helpful to have some idea at least of where we will be going to when the big day arrives.

Work

I have some great news. I have been awarded a position with the Doctoral School of Art, Music and Theatre. This is an organisation that is funded by the Academy of Finland, and they employ people to do research. So I have a position for two years, and will be recieving a salary, including pension and medical benefits. It also probably means that we will be able to recieve some support for the baby from the Finnish state, as I will be paying tax on the money. This is a great blessing, and we are really grateful for it. There were 44 applicants, and 7 people were awarded positions, so this is a great honour for me.
God has been providing for us amazingly in the time leading up to this, and we continue to be amazed at His bounty and favour towards us. We went to celebrate by buying huge hamburgers (Tracy had a craving for Steers - which is a bit hard to fulfil here...).
Winter has truly arrived, with several nights going below 0 and the day temperatures hovering at around 10. Some sleet even fell the other day. I wake up to darkness these days, and I suspect even daylight saving in a couple of weeks will not change that.

We have a lot of things to get through, so hang on tight, this will be a fast race through the last month or two.

Tracy's parents visited us in the middle of August. We had a fantastic time with them. We went to Porvoo, which is a very quaint little town about an hour's drive from here. The old town is full of cobbled streets and old wooden buildings. We also rented some bikes and cycled about 12 km

out of town. Ann and Brian's bikes (the two of us on really nice bikes discovered afterwards) were horrible, and I am totally amazed that they got home, and still decided to hang out with us afterwards. We then spent three nights in a cottage on a little lake in the national park, Nuuksio. We cautiously got into mushroom picking. I was initially highly resistant to eating these multi-coloured, possibly life-threatening spungiforms. But I was won over, and we had some amazing meals with various mushroom dishes, and brought home bags and bags of shrooms, which have now been dried and frozen. We have a freezer full of berries and mushrooms, all free from Finland. We eat berries each morning with breakfast, and occasionally make some exotic dish. We had biltong and chanterel omelet the other day. In the picture you can see Mustatorvisieni, Herkkutatti, Kantarelli, Suppelivahvero and Rousku.

University has started for me, and has been very busy. I am doing some courses in order to rack up the credits I need. Included are: research ethics, free piano accompaniment, philosophical writing, and library skills.

Tracy is doing very well, as is the little one. We go for regular check-ups, and all the signs are very positive, with normal development. She has been very busy making baby stuff. She has made a diaper bag, some baby sheets, a sleeping bag, and has ordered material to make some fancy cloth diapers. We will try to use those instead of disposables, to save the environment (and our wallets). These diapers have microfleece and microfibre in several layers, together with waterproof outers, and are fitted for minimum leakage. It is very high-tech. She has been researching lots, and I am sure these will be the best diapers ever made.

We have been given two bicycles and I have ridden to university a couple of times, it is not so far, and very pleasant, although it has been raining, and even sleeting this past weekend.

Our bible study group has grown. A campaign was launched to get people to join groups, and we now have 9 people in total. We are studying the letter to the Phillipians, which is quite challenging but very good.

Tracy's birthday was on the 19th of September, and we invited many of our friends around here to pop in for cake and tea. We counted 10 nationalities among our visitors, which was very cool. At one stage we had some Finns, some Chinese, a Kenyan, a Taiwanese, a German, an Austrian, and some South Africans all having melktert together.

We have also had several other visitors. Carol came while Tracy's folks were visiting Sweden, and Bridget visited us just last week. It was really cool to see some South African friends, even though they are both now in England. Keep the visits coming!

To finish with, a photo of the two women in my life...

A very berry week

This past week we have really had many berry moments. We were given about a kilogram of cherries from the church food handout. They were somewhat over-ripe, so we made some jam, which is really delicious. We also went strawberry picking with the Hickey family. It was fun, I applied the biblical instruction to test all things and keep that which is good, so we didn't bring home any berries. We also went camping at Nuuksio, a large national park outside Helsinki, where we spent a whole morning picking blueberries by hand. We got about 5 litres, and have been making more jam, and also froze some for later: blueberry pies, blueberry icecream, blueberry cheesecake....

(The pictures are: blueberries on a bush, me picking, bluberry processing)

We had a friend of Kath Embling stay with us for two nights this last week. Richard is an archictect from East-London, and he really encouraged us. He came to us after a long flight from SA, and was clearly tired, but as we talked God revealed several things to him. This confirmed many things we have been feeling God say to us, and has left us amazed at God's timing and care.

We went for the 22 week checkup this week as well, and everything is going as it should at this stage. Thank you Lord! Tracy is feeling much more relaxed with these checkups, and was not nervous at all for this last one.

We also had my youngest brother, Martin, stay with us for a week on his way back to South Africa after studying one year in the Netherlands. We had a very relaxed time, playing squash, going for picknics and braais, watching rugby and playing Bohnanza. This is a really cool card/strategy/trading game, I am sure we'll teach it to you if you spend any length of time with us in the near future. We hope you find that job soon, Martin.

Our cell group/bible study has grown to 5 regular members, and we are starting to see the beginnings of a little community here. We are hoping the influx of new students in the next 3 weeks will add to our group, both Christians and people who are seeking to know more. We are also teaching a new song every week to the congregation, and some of these are sticking and becoming favorites fast.

It's a Girl!

We went for the 20 week scan yesterday, and the midwife found that everything was in order. All the measurements point to a birth on 20 November, and everything seems to be developing at the right rate. We are so happy!
She also told us that it is a girl, which is a very unusal thing in the Odendaal family. I am not sure that I know what to do with a girl.
She is moving a lot, and the midwife said she is quite an acrobat, with legs going all over the place. Takes after her mom then...
She also has the qutest little 'wipneus' (a nose that goes up at the end) just like her mom.
In the picture on top, you can just see the little fingers, and in the pic below, the lips and nose. The thing that looks like an arm is a leg - don't ask me to explain how that is possible.
If you click on the pictures they will go to full size.

It has been a while...

We have had a very eventful time, and starting with the most recent - a visit from my parents. It was so good to have them here, staying in our little flat for one week. We managed to sqeeze in a lot of touristy stuff, and walked through the whole of Helsinki - or so it felt. We also went to Talinn, the capital of Estonia, which is only 2 hours away on a ferry. It is a beautiful medieval city, with buildings dating from 1300 next to the most amazing modern achitectural wonders. It is definitely a city worth visiting. We had fantastic weather after an intitial couple of colder days (maximum of 11 degrees one day) and were able to enjoy the sunshine fully. My parents brought with them a whole suitcase of presents from various people, mostly in the form of baby clothes. We now have a whole cupboard full of the teensiest little shirts and pants you have ever seen. They are all very cute. Not many of them are white, which is good, because as my dad says, if you drop the kid in the snow, you have to be able to find it again.

On the topic of gifts, we were given a washing machine and a freezer, so now we can go berry picking and freeze some for the colder months. It will be blueberry time soon. When we got the washing machine we had to take out home insurance, which I was a little concerned about, given that everything is so expensive here. In the end, however my whole years' insurance for everything, including the building and the contents came to just over 30 euros, less than my monthly payment in SA. Obviously theft is not a big thing here...

My friend Willem invited us to their place to make some boerewors. Here you cannot buy anything like it in the shops, all their sausages look a bit like russians, with more flour in. So we spent a lovely day making and testing different mixes. We have subsequently shared some with other South Africans, all of whom are also desparate for some real wors. Seems we are all addicted.

Tracy has been much less nauseous, but is still very tired often. She was fine while my parents were here, and had enough energy to walk everywhere with us. She felt the baby move for the first time about two days ago. It is especially active when we are singing together, or praying. I think that is really cute. We are going for the 20 week scan next week.

I was formally accepted as a student by the rector of the academy at the beginning of the month. So now they cannot get rid of me (cue evil chuckle..). I have had to rewrite my proposal after meeting with a professor in Norway, who is a well known researcher in the field of music practicing, Harald Jorgensen (with a line through the o). He was so friendly and helpful, spending the best part of three days with me going over my ideas and plans. He was very enthusiastic about the project and will also help supervise parts of it in the future. I applied for admittance to a Doctoral School with the new proposal, which would mean earning a salary for being a student. Sounds like the next best thing to a real job to me. I'll hear in September whether the application was successful.

Our bible study group looks like it is finally taking off, with a 3 new people joining us recently, and one or two others showing interest. I am also meeting regularly with Willem to pray and talk, and this looks like it might grow to form a men's discipleship group. We are also hoping to start a church prayermeeting at the church office soon.

We are expecting several visitors over the next couple of weeks, including my brother, Martin, a friend of a friend, and a couch surfer from Malasia. Couch surfing is an online organisation that links travellers to hosts, meaning you don't have to pay for accommodation if you go somewhere. We have had one visitor so far, and I think it is such a good idea. You allow people to see how you live, and hopefully get an opportunity to share some of the life of God with them.

Nuuksio, Nausea and Spring

So it has been a while since the last post (tah dah, tah dah...)...

Biggest news is that my proposal has been accepted, and I am legally OK to stay here for a while. We are really grateful for the provision of God in this regard. There were some nervous moments before, where I was not sure that people believed in the project. All's well now though.

I have been keeping busy by writing papers, and having arguments in my head with the authors of some material. Some academic writing is incredible in the assumptions that people make while believing that they are making none. So I am thinking through topics like truth, life and the meaning of everything. Maybe I'll write a post with my thoughts soon.

Tracy has been feeling quite nauseous and tired, often coming home to sleep after her Finnish lessons. She has not really thrown up a lot though, just feels horrible. Her course has really gone well, and she wrote the final exam today, getting 57 out of 60. She is considering doing a third course, while she can...

She has been looking for a job on and off, but this seems more and more unlikely as the due date for the little ant approaches. She is trying at the moment to get a place at the Zoo as an english-speaking guide.

We went for a walk in Nuuksio National Park with friends from church. What a beautiful place. We went there one night to look for owls, this was much better. The temperature was about 20 degrees, and the sun was shining. Fresh growth was evident everywhere, and if we had costumes we might have been tempted by the many lakes we walked past. Spring has really arrived with a vengance recently. It is light until about 10 at night, and the temperatures have been approaching normality. Feels a bit like a cool South African winter day a lot of the time.

We finally managed to clean the windows, without risk of them freezing over in the act of washing, so we can see the view now. We also have a little forest developing in the flat, from plants donated to us by various people. The place is starting to feel more and more like a home.

I have been playing a lot of squash recently after meeting a guy from church at the courts. We have formed a group of 4 who play round robins for an hour on Tuesdays, and then I usually fit in another hour with someone else on a Thursday. Squash is not a big sport in Finland, and most of the people playing are not locals. You would think that an indoor sport like this would be popular in a place where you can't go outside for 6 months of the year...