Yikes. I haven’t written in a while, because half of my life moved to Germany. Half of my time I will now spend in the beautiful Rhine Valley = wine, castles, carnival and cheerful mentality + Drachenfels (dragon’s rock), Rolandsbogen, Bonn & Siebengebirge (the seven hills) in walking distance, Düsseldorf and Cologne just down the river a few miles. The Cologne Cathedral, the third largest in the world, was actually partly built with rocks from the “seven hill” area, but they stopped the stone quarry to protect the landscape from 1880 onwards. The Dragon’s rock ruin and mountain was already bought by the then still Prussian government in 1836 to prevent its destruction.

It get’s cold in the Rhine Valley as well and there are dragons to be tamed…

…and lots of nice little cafés to be explored. During the summer I continue to work as a tour guide in Helsinki (that’s the plan for now…) = 22 hours daylight, lots of tourists, the smell of sea air & fish and practicing the Finnish language. It’s not exactly multicultural living, it’s half & half cultural living. When moving back and forth between two cultures, each time it feels to me as if I am changing the software in my behavioural computer. Keep a straight face and my mouth shut in Finland versus smile and talk in Germany, so people don’t feel intimidated…