Onward!!

Neither my body or my mind have quite grasped that not two weeks from returning from a constant -15 or lower, I’ll be jetting off to the heat of southern Africa. I’m not a complete newbie to the place, but the last time I was south of the Equator in Africa was around ten years ago. It might be high time to go back. I’ve got all my required vaccinations, I’ve changed currency (crisp new US Dollars are actually quite nifty, but don’t look like real money at all to me) and all that’s left is one day of work. Oh, and packing.

I’m on the fence with shoes (trainers or walking boots?) but will definitely be wearing my new sandals, considering they cost an arm and a leg. It’s really not the time of year to be buying warm weather gear. The number of t-shirts to take is a little less certain, and I guess all depends on how tight I want to ram my rucksack. I’m probably overpacking, considering there’ll be washing facilities etc. What else do I really need? The pair of jeans I’ll be flying in, the hoodie I’ll be wearing, and a button-up shirt or two for evening meals, right?

List for last-minute panic-buying: Insect repellent and a copy of Private Eye. I guess that’s it.

I never used to be into winter weather. When people in the UK ask me what Finland is like in the winter, my first response has often been “awfully cold”. But now, when all of Finland is blanketed by snow and gripped by proper frost, I’m really happy about it. Though the nights are long and dark, the full moon and stars shining off snow make walking around at night magical. Visiting a friend’s house last night, we discovered that before parking the car we had to take shovels and clear the driveway of 40cm of snow. It made getting into the warm house even more rewarding.

Walking the dog this morning, in the stillness of fifteen degrees below zero, all this came to me. What’s changed to make me feel so excited at the prospect of a good few hours trudging through snow, or to wish for a good, clear, cold night for New Year’s? A share of it must be proper equipment and a feeling that putting on that extra pair of thick socks doesn’t take any more time or effort. Another part must be down to feeling a need to appreciate nature, even in this petrified and still state, livign among the urban pulse of London most of the time. And of course, having a mere four hours of proper daylight, you get a feeling of wanting to make the most of it.

And then, of course, getting old. Has to be.

A year ago I was gearing up to spend the Christmas holidays in Peru, on the other side of the world. It was a lovely experience, and I loved discovering things about the country and its fascinating culture. But this year, gearing up to go back to Finland for the first time since April, I am feeling extremely expectant and nostalgic at the same time. It’s like I feel like my year should end in certain surroundings, in the biting cold of sub-Arctic air, in the enveloping darkness driven away in pockets by light streaming from windows and cast down by streetlights. It’s a largely monochrome world, except where filled with colour by human activity.

London is dark too, but not in the same way. I keep thinking to the last several years aside from 2008 when I’ve spent the holiday in the house I learned to think of as my childhood home, messing about with my brother and sets of old video games and things. The smallness helps, the familiarity and the feeling that upon my arrival everything is as I left it. So much changes in my life, and there too, but enough stays the same for me to consider it home, I guess. I don’t think of many places in my life like that.

The last week and a bit (and next week too) have really been rather extreme with engagements. I’ve had work parties to go to and still have to make an appearance at one, and have met some lovely-seeming people at Christmas-themed house parties. I also did an absolutely outrageous thing with some friends and spent 15 hours in Paris seeing Rammstein for the hell of it, before doing my day at work the next day, feeling only mildly out of it. Despite of how much fun it has been, I really feel like it’s time to take a breather, some time out and just relax. Read a book. Play something silly on a computer. Listen to, I don’t know, some jazz or something.

I’d love to add “start living healthily” but that’ll have to wait until the inevitable and thoroughly expected home-cooked Christmas food is out of the way. I really was inspired today, at a party where most people were either serious about their Kung Fu or Capoeira. I don’t know if I’ll be trying either (though I was being thoroughly persuaded by an Italian girl who actually trains at the LSE) but I’ll definitely be doing something come the new year. So I guess that’s my promise, clichéd as it may be.

Until then, I’ll be obsessively checking weather forecasts and looking at silly things like weather cameras like the picture above, which allow me to live the diving temperatures from a distance, and reminisce about childhood car journeys taken in the night, with the yellow streetlights sweeping rhythmically over the car. In other words, I’ll be missing home.

Seeing Eddie Izzard at the Wembley Arena was an experience. The stage was kitted with the scripts of various world religions and seemed huge for one man to take and control. He must have guts to do what he does, and he did it well. Though I wasn’t in stitches with laughter, he was very good and on occasion surprisingly profound, tracing the history of civilization and the so-called progress of life itself. The way he built up the show was really well done, using characters and pieces of “dialogue” (of course entirely performed by him) to arrive at what was, for me, a surprising, environmentalist message. Considering the Copenhagen Conference on Climate Change kicks off today, it was a timely reminder.

I most enjoyed the linguistic humour he had going on in the second half, with his play on Latin word endings having the audience going “quod the fuck?”. The show-ending piece about the environment, the Moon and God(’s non-existence) tied everything together in a wonderful sentence: “If humans have left the Blue Thing, and gone to the Gray Thing, you’d think that the guy would be there to congratulate the beings he supposedly made in his own image, saying ‘Very fucking well done’. We’ve lasted the twentieth century, let’s see if we last the twenty-first.”

A recent quandary in my life concerns how I’m going to spend tonight, a Friday night.

I’ve been invited to a book launch on a topic generally of interest to me through my studies. It’d be a chance to network, I suppose, though I don’t really know what sort of people will attend. Still, a couple of presentations summarising various chapters of the book (so I won’t have to, you know, buy and read it), some wine and chatter wouldn’t be too bad. I’ve known about it for two weeks and was happy to put my name down as attending at the time.

On the other hand, I’ve also been invited to a charity wine tasting evening tonight. It’d go well with my running haute cuisine theme, what with having dined at Chez Bruce last night. It’d probably be with a completely different crowd that I would most likely feel underdressed at, even though I’m planning on getting home after work and changing. Still, mingling and having some wine (I’m not sure if it’s a course or just a reception) doesn’t sound too bad. So, I remain undecided. Obviously I’m down as attending on the book launch and wouldn’t like to let anyone down, but … argh. Suggestions on an electronic postcard please. Please? It’s doing my head in. Oh woe is me.

And how was Chez Bruce? Rich, yet very, very tasty. Extremely intense flavours, in combinations I would never have thought of. I was really glad I’m not in the least bit fussy about food. Not badly priced either, considering. Must be one of the cheaper Michelin-starred restaurants around. I’d definitely recommend it, though only for a specifically planned night out. We went with a bunch of friends, a bunch that grew over time as we planned it. I glowed all the way home to North London though, just happy on a few glasses of wine and belly full of intricate cooking.