18.3.2020 – Nokisuu

I’ve had that song as an ear worm now for several days and it’s driving me crazy.

I’m still on sick leave all of this week. Next Monday I should go to work even as our whole house is closed and there’s no classes for adults except the Finnish courses for immigrants and their reading and writing lessons so we are quite alone there.

All the museums, theatres, schools and libraries are closed as of today until April 13th(?) but since I work for the city we’d find some substitute work if we can’t go to our workplaces. At my work we are planning to get ready for the summer as our library will be getting an interior make up with some refurnishing and there’s lots of things to get rid of or clear and the book depository in our cellar should be re-organized too. (I just can’t work there because of my work-related asthma and it’s a shame since it’s such a meditative place to be.)

Atm I’m not very keen on getting back to work especially since my boss sent a message yesterday about the three of us should work out how to do our jobs in our minuscule library and not be on the same space all of the eight hours. I wonder how that will work out.

Hubby is working from home and youngest one too.. except now he is chatting with his friends. Every hour or so there comes a message from their teachers about homeworks. Yesterday he crumbled about English teacher wanting to have an online-class next Tuesday at 9am. It’ll do him good.

They’ve also got home economics, art and PE teachers’ lessons and homeworks in the digital apps which I find interesting.

Well, I’m planning to do some sewing or something and not just sit here. In the Finnish message board I visit was panic still going strong and it gets tiring. I’m not very panicked since all of this will pass. One way or other.

Yesterday I felt pretty good after a week indoors so I decided to take a walk. I’ve been feeling a bit nauseous in my head probably because of the hospital medications still so I haven’t done any long walks.

I’ve lived around here about 5 km radius all my life except first 6 years when we lived in the city centre and yet there’s still places I haven’t been to so I decided to tackle one such place and headed to nearby sandpits.

The sandpits were created in the 60’s when the big building fever hit and sand was needed for concrete for the blocks of flats. Those apartment houses were later inhabited by country people moving to city workers and the suburb was one of the most seedy in whole Helsinki and still the people there are suffering of more unemployment and less education than other areas.

But back to the sandpits. When I was a kid the sandpits were a no-go, they were full of dirty water, kids had drowned there and they were full of old cars and other junk until in the 90’s they were just used as a park but still not a very favorable place to go to. In 2018 both Helsinki and Vantaa decided to do something since the area is on both cities concern and the residents wanted more possibilities to outdoor activities there. The water was tested and the pits were cleaned of decades of junk thrown there and now there are three small ponds for people to swim and enjoy beach with firepits and one pond is reserved for dogs to swim. They are very popular on hot summer days and since you can’t park your car there people walk or bike which makes it safer.

On the other side of the ponds is a small forest and swamp which is a conservation area and I walked through it and enjoyed the firs and pines and moss. I was quite alone even though one of the busiest highways is just about 500 metres away, you can hear it very well and there’s also the candy factory where I emerged from the woods.

After breathing the forest air deeply I walked home, all in all I walked about 5km and an hour and when I got to our street Sirius was on our neighbour’s roof and I asked her to come home with me and she did.

The last pic is from this morning as a blue tit was teasing her and she dropped one of the flowers from the windowsill.