Thanks everyone

After everything that happened in Derry I feel like I should thank everyone for the last time:

Thank you

Paurick and Domnall

Feargal, Christinem Kristen, Laverne

Sara, Matt, Alissa, Mel

Darren, Ben

John 

Stephanie

Steven, Zoe

Mira

These and many other people made my trip to Derry truly amazing. So thank you, thank you all. Thanks to Foyle, CCA, (Sandinos) and to Hyria which without this trip wouldn't even had been possible. I hope my blog doesn't swarm with grammatical mistakes and that reading it is or was at least nice. I'm glad my blog is finally done although it was (troublesome from time to time) only a tiny part of everything I got to experience in the city of Derry, in Northern-Ireland. At least my school should be satisfied when I say: "I learned a lot."

Bye bye Derry

This was the busiest day of all. Today was the final full day in Ireland, because tomorrow we would travel all day back to good old Finland. I went to work just like always. Today I finally got to show everybody my finished book project. I and my coworkers quickly looked at them because soon it was already time for us to go to have a special farewell lunch. They really liked the pictures but in all the hurry I forgot to take them in to my flash drive. At lunch they all thanked me for working with them and said that they were really going to miss me. And of course I was going to miss them so I promised to stay in touch. They gave me a gift-card and said I should go spent it right away. So after lunch I went to buy myself black/white/yellow-dress. After that I suddenly remembered that I had forgotten to take my work evaluation handout- letter of reference-sheet. I was bit surprised when my boss said that the hardest parts of the evaluation where the negative parts of my work. She couldn't came up with any. So I said goodbye to everyone and I agreed that I would meet my boss in the evening. I would have wanted to buy something nice to my coworkers but in all the hurry, I left them a one cup of my instant noodles, with a thank you text written on it. I was always very amused when they said how good my pot of noodles smelled because while they though my lunch was yummy I thought the same thing about their lunches.

The peace bridge at night

After work I and Mira still had some things to pack and we even had to buy extra luggage because all of our stuff didn't fit in two suitcases.
We had a special dinner with our host fathers and they gave us some really sweet gifts, like coffee mug whit the text "Frothy", postcard versions of their artwork and a "Frozen" cookie jar. I was thinking if we should have gotten them something but then I remembered the Moomin potholders and Fazer chocolate we gave to them when we met them for the first time. So we had a lovely dinner which consumed of homemade pizza and crisps and a nice dessert. Soon it was already time to head to town to meet our friends. I introduced my boss to one of my friends and I was really happy when she said: "Oh I'm not her boss, I'm more like colleague." The day went so fast, I didn't even have the time to actually internalize that we were really leaving tomorrow.

Photo I took while sitting in the bus to Dublin

Unfortunately our trip back to Finland didn't go very smoothly. In the morning of departing day Mira was really sick. She hadn't been at all on our trip so I guess this was the final change. Everything from getting to the buss to getting to the second airplane was quite horrible. Mira was feeling really nauseous and I backed some plastic bags to my bag so we'd had something she could throw up in. And of course we were in a terrible hurry once again and neither of us had slept very much. But since Mira had taken such a good care of me before I though that now was my turn. So I was strong, I didn't panic even if I really wanted to. I thought of what was waiting me in Finland: summer vacation, no summer job, my friends and family, school, writing my blog about Ireland... Sigh. I and Mira had made a deal that we would come back to Derry at Halloween. Thought of that really helped me leave, because I was certain that I could come back.  

Sunday at park

Tiniest little clover~

 This Sunday I and Mira went to discover the Waterside. We wanted to see this huge park called St. Columbs Park. There was lots of children play areas, all kind of weird swings and such (which we of course had to try out) but also lots of little paths you could walk along while admiring different trees and flowers. And not forgetting all the clovers we saw, we even found a four- and a fifth leaved one. The weather wasn't perfect but at least it wasn't raining. So here's a lots of nature pictures of the park.

There was a rabbit!

 These pictures are all over the place just because I didn't have the time nor the energy to fight with Blogspot today.

Rest of the workshops

Friday 22.5: I finally got back to work. Today was studio Hato's workshop and actually the last workshop of "Design week." There was two people along with me, a woman and the children workshop-guy. The workshop was kind of about book binding in a simpler way. In a group we choose some pages that would look good together and attached them together. There's a picture of the final result. I remember kids-workshop-guy saying "See you!" to me. Unfortunately I realized that this was actually my last full week in Derry, so I had to say that I didn't think that we would meet again. So he thanked me about everything and I thanked him. It was really nice working with him and when I said goodbye to him I started thinking how I should soon say goodbye to also everyone else.

Preparations for the "OurN"

Saturday 23.5: Today was "Our neighborhood"-projects last workshop. The same man from studio Hato was there again. He discussed with our group about a book that was going to address themes that we had gone through in our last workshops. We also scanned some pages from our notebooks which had the poem and the word practices for the book. In this workshop we also made some animal mask from cardboard, for example I made an owl mask. 

Later on I even got an email from my boss, saying that my name was also put in the book. Although it was a shame that I was sick for so many days, but overall the whole Our Neighborhood/Design week was really positive experience.

This time I really am S-I-C-K

19.5 Tuesday: I didn't go to work, because I felt a little worse than I had on Monday. Most of the day I slept with my hot water bottle. I tried to eat and drink something but it hurt too much. Mira was a great friend and bought me cough syrup and some kind of natures own throat pastilles and also more juice. My host fathers were a bit worried but I guess from their point of view laughter is the best medicine. One of them made a really funny joke about my condition (I'm not sure if I can write it here, it was a bit dirty so maybe my school wouldn't like it). But when it hurts to laugh and speak the jokes don't really help. But honestly they took good care of me (once again) and I was also glad that I was able just to be alone and sleep in my room.
20.5 Wednesday: I woke up around six o'clock because my throat was hurting. While I was lying there wide awake, shedding a few tears I decided it was time to go to see a doctor. It was truly painful. In Ireland I had the worst period cramps I've ever had and now this. I tried to sleep a bit and around 9am I headed to Foyle. I thought I should ask help there and while I was walking there I stopped at a store and bought huge loaf of bread and a ready-made-salad, so I wouldn't have to make lunch to myself and so I wouldn't be there too early (Foyle opened exactly nine o'clock).
I walked straight to the receptionist and explained my situation. She was a really nice pretty, blond woman who immediately arranged me an appointment with a doctor. I even pumped in to good old Feargal. He was same as always, very jolly. He asked how I was feeling and I answered bluntly "Horrible." While Feargal looked a bit stunned the receptionist said to him that I was sick. When Feargal understood what was going on, he slammed his hand on my shoulder and hoped that I was going to feel better soon. He even mentioned that his had been a bit sick himself.
I was told to go to the hospital (or was it more of a clinic) at 12 o'clock and they emphasized that I should tell them how it went. So I took a taxi back to home. When I got home other of our host father (one who told the funny joke) was sitting in the dining room. He looked me a bit strangely when I came back home with a huge bread in my arms. I told him about Foyle and doctors and how I was going back to rest and maybe eat some bread. He said I should do that.
12:00: Everything went well in the hospital. I just had to fill out a form of  basic information about myself. Then I waited a while and was called to see a nice female doctor. She asked me how I was feeling, if I had threw up blood or things like that. I answered "no" and she said "good". She checked my ears and throat, measured my temperature while repeating "good, good, good." For a moment I was worried that everything would be so well I wouldn't get any medicine, because at that time it was hurting so badly that I felt like crying again. Fortunately I got recipe for antibiotics and was told that the pharmacy was right opposite of the hospital. At the pharmacy I gave them the recipe and they gave me the medicine, no money was needed. I was a bit astonished that the whole doctor-thing didn't cost anything. I even walked home because I was actually really close to my home. And I even remembered to inform Foyle about how things had went.
21.5 Thursday: I still felt bad. The antibiotics where really working and I could feel getting better little by little, but I couldn't help feeling mentally bad for not being at work. Mira didn't let me go to work and I was thankful for her just for saying I should stay home. I remembered our host fathers saying how we work for free and that's one of the good reasons why we shouldn't have to worry too much about working. Of course I knew myself that the best thing right now would be just for me to get better.

Week begins with painting...

Somehow these benches remind me of  the Moomin house

The logo

Since the "Design week" would officially start on Tuesday I had promised to come to work on Monday and help my boss to get the place ready for workshops. I did all sorts of things, like for example I painted some little benches from green to blue and I also painted this huge board with chalkboard paint. There was also this man who I chatted with a little bit, he was painting this cool "Design week"-logo into the white wall.  I also lifted and moved around some heavy tables which I had assembled in the morning. Now that I think about that day It seems a bit blurry, I remember working very hard but at the same time I felt a bit ill. Around five o'clock my boss asked me to come to the store with her but she quickly changed her mind when I mentioned that I felt a bit dizzy. She sent me home and I went to a store where I met Mira, I had to buy some juice because my throat was starting to get a bit sore. We finished our groceries, so we would have smt. for this weeks lunch and went to home. I just hoped that I wasn't really going to be sick. Not when the super busy workweek had already started. I was even signed up for Monday evenings "Sign painting"-workshop, but of course I couldn't go. I thought that a bit of rest and juice would make me feel better again

The chalkboard-board

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Anti-art

There would have been ”Our neighborhood”-workshop today as well but I decided to have a day off since on Monday I would have a workday. Also I had planned with Mira that we would go to local bubs art event, called “Anti Art.” Simply put you were able to draw a live model. You didn’t have to be an artist, anyone could go there and it was really enjoyable. There were two young women as models. I really like drawing live people and those women were almost perfect models. One of them was shorter and curvy and other one was tall and skinnier, they posed at the same time from about 2 to 20 minutes so you were able to choose which one you’d like to draw or maybe draw both. They had lovely outfits like for example really pretty lingerie, which were ideal to draw because you were able to see their bodies really well. The whole atmosphere was really nice, the models even walked round looking at peoples sketchbooks and choosing which one of are their favorites. The favorite also got a little award, homemade brownie or a shot of whiskey. One of Miras pieces were chosen as a favorite sketch. She was a good girl and took the brownie rather than alcohol. At the evening even our host fathers wanted to see our sketches and commented them with their usual humor. They even liked them so much that they gave us ice cream. I think it was vegan because it tastes quite funny, but it was good.
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I wonder if this post was supposed to be about art or about food?