September 2 - Crawling into the light

Enjoying the artwork in the literature building on campus

My beauty of a bike and Ron's assistant

"The light" is referring to the Orientation Programme at the University of Jyvaskyla (henceforth known as U of J). I wish I could use a more elegant verb to describe myself other than "crawling" but unfortunately, I walked into my apartment not 12 hrs ago so I wasn't in the best state. To top it all off, I had to get up early to go sign my lease at the KOAS accommodation office. At the office (i only walked by it 3 times before finding it), I was jolted into how great my housing situation in Jyvaskyla really was. I spoke to an Italian girl who had been apartment hopping each night she has been in town. Another girl had to live in emergency accommodation which is one room with one washroom commodity, 12 mattresses and hopefully only 12 girls. It sure would be an emergency if one was forced to live in such a place. I feel ever so fortunate to have my flat with a great flatmate. Although my furniture is yet to arrive today, it will and I have no need to worry about whether I have a roof over my head tonight.
On a lighter and happier note, I met the rest of Noora's tutorees immediately after adventure at the KOAS office. There are 5 more besides myself: Kerstin from Germany, Mareike from Germany, Paivi from Germany, Annelies from Holland and Lucy from the USA. They're all great girls and we get along really well.
Our orientation programme went over formalities and introductions of all the big names at the university and we set off to do a campus tour. Noora acquainted us with our department buildings and important places to know around campus. It was unseasonably chilly today and we were all badly prepared so some of what we learned may have escaped our memory since we were concentrating on keeping ourselves warm. The lunch we had helped quite a bit as well as our stops in city center. I requested a stop at a hardware store for my internet cable (my flat doesn't have wireless which surprised me). The other girls got SIM cards from a local Kioski store which is our 7-11 equivalent.
Our first day together was made most memorable with a stop at Ron's bike shop exchange. Ron is a Canadian from the Niagra region. it was great talking to him and he was very fair with his prices. he even gave us a plant to take to our flats to make them more like home. My plant looks great on my new furniture that arrived today :D Although I was cold and tired by the time I got home, it was a day well lived.

Eating at a student cafeteria on campus

My hot lunch for only 2.60 Euro!

Our group: from left - Kerstin, Paivi, Mareike, e, Lucy, Annelies,  and our mighty leader Noora