New Year in FINLAND

On Wednesday we ('We' being myself, Kostya, Masha, and Shurik for those who care) drove eight hours (2.5 of which was getting through St. Pete traffic jams) to Espoo, Finland, which is right near Helsinki. It took us about an hour to get through the border. On the Russian side we had to get out of the car and stand in line in FREEZING weather for about 40 minutes. It was around -15 Celsius. When we got to the Finnish side of the border we got to go inside a nice warm building and it took about 10 minutes. Or maybe less. Yeah, Finland is a bit more aware of things like personal comfort and hypothermia.

FINLAND is so cool!! I have never been here before and we will still be here for two more days. Temple, a freak mall shooting about a kilometer from where we're staying...good thing we were at the temple and not there, moose crossing signs all over the roads here, hours in a Finnish sauna, running around in the snow wearing practically next to nothing (Don't be shocked...it IS Scandinavia), an almost empty water park where the vast majority of everyone there was Russian, McDonalds (Finland is country #11), a really fun New Years Eve dance with kids from the church here, fireworks in the freezing cold at midnight, and still so much more fun to have!!!!

Meeting a lot of the Finnish YSA last night was fun. They all look like they just stepped out of some eclectic fashion magazine. Their hair was along the lines of 'I might look like I just got out of bed, but actually I spent hours sculpting it into the perfected form you see before you,' and their clothing was along the lines of 'I look like I just stepped out of 1988 but actually all of these clothes have designer tags on them and my left sock cost more than everything you are wearing right now.' Yup, my pullover on sale from the Gap and new Skechers just didn't measure up. But they are all super cool and really nice! and we're going to another crazy party with them all tonight! (Crazy by Mormon standards of course, which means that we'll have a ton of fun and still be able to remember it all tomorrow.)

More later!! Finland rocks!!!!