M is for meaningful words

I have seen this nice meme in many blogs and decided to give it a chance too. Villapeikko gave me an M, so here are some meaningful words that begin with it.

Mom

My mom is a very important person to me. We are alike in many things, and not in the bad sense. Even though I live far a way from her and my other relatives, they are an important part of my life, and always will be, wherever I am.

Mummi

Mummi is how we call our granny in Finnish. Mummi is 92 years old and still lives alone, knits socks, crochets curtains and cooks and bakes for everyone. And she so witty – she can probably invent something clever to say to someone more quickly than I do (I blame my birth place – in my region people are known to be slow, and where she comes from people are known to be very quick, witty and funny).

México

México (pronounce it as in Spanish!) is so many things to me. It’s my second home country, no doubt about it, and my actual home. México means the possibility to be with the man I love and do what I want right now: my research. I don’t know if I will stay here for the rest of my life – but I know that I’m very happy with my life here now. I have learnt to love the country, its rich culture, its nature, its smells and colourss and all its variety, and the people too, generally so friendly and nice. I have learnt lots of things and the country has changed me (I think for the good more than for the bad). Of course there are lots of problems too. The poverty, the corruption, the violence, the insecurity, the racism and other kinds of discrimination… Sometimes reading the newspapers seems more like reading a novel of Kafka rather than reading the news. There are many things I can’t understand and many things I wish were different and will hopefully change some day. I could rant about the Mexican politics for a loooong time (which I’m not supposed to do in public, though, thanks to the Constitution that states that foreigners can’t take part in politics).

Milky Way

I love astronomy and cosmology. The space has interested me since I was a little girl. If I was a little better in maths, I might be studying astronomy. Not that I couldn’t study it now – I could, and would probably be OK in it. But as astronomy is a passion, I don’t want to be just OK or good in it. I would have to be excellent. So I never even tried to study it, and prefer to have this interest as a hobby. I’m still always looking at the sky, and could spend hours watching the stars, moon and planets and Milky Way. By the way, I think the Finnish word for Milky Way, Linnunrata (Birds’ way or route) is much more beautiful than the English version.

Memory

My doctoral research is about social memory. My thesis is about how past human rights abuses are remembered and treated in Chile and in Mexico. I still love my theme after working with it in my Master's thesis too, so I guess it was a good choice. Sometimes it can be really hard to read about all those awful human rights violations (even when committed in the past), but it helps to remember how important the theme is.

Mother Nature

The nature has always been very important to me. I need to get in the forest every once in a while. I think that's one of the toughest things for me in living in one of the biggest cities in the world - I can't get to wander in the nature as much as I would love to. Luckily there are some forests even in the city, and besides Mexico City is greener than you would think. (The picture is from Finland.)

Making things

I could get crafts in this list after all, ha! I love making things: knitting, making jewelry, drawing, painting... but also cooking and baking. And I would love to learn to make more things with my own hands - wood and metal work are something I want to learn someday. Actually, if I just could, I would make almost everything myself. In my family handmade things have always been valued. Maybe that's why I was very impressed when boyfriend first time said that someday he would like to construct his own house.

Morning light

I love the soft light in the summer mornings in Finland, right after the sunrise (Not that I see it a lot, but anyway). The light in general is very important to me and I can get a bit blue or depressed if there’s not enough light in my home. I always have the curtains open during the day to be able to have daylight in the room and to watch the sky. I love to observe the different tones of light at different times of the day and in different places. I can still remember the light in Chilean Patagonia. It was as if the sky was closer to the Earth there, as if you could touch the sky if you reached a bit more, as if the light was raining down…

Miles

I love travelling. My parents always took us children with them to their trips to Europe, and I guess my travel bug is from them… Travelling and getting to know new places is fun. And you don’t even have to travel very far; sometimes a travel in your own city can be an adventure. I also like travelling in the bus or in the train. Watching the scenery that passes by can sometimes be even better than getting to the destiny. I like flying too, even though it’s not at all ecological. But at the moment it would be impossible to travel to months in a ship just to see my family once in a while.

I could write about other M words too, like moral, mediocrity, and meanignful job, but I think my list is long enough as it is. Who knows if anyone gets even this far...

Aaaaand the winner is...

Thanks for the comments, everyone! I found many new blogs I'll be visiting again. The winner of the contest was drawn with a traditional method (sorry for the blurry pics, it was a bit dark already when I took them):

Rachel O, send me an e-mail to colibridreams[at]gmail.com and leave me your address so I can send the painting for you when it's ready. Tell me also if you want your turtle to be natural coloured or if I make it with your favorite colours.

Just because it's a good day and I got an idea for a polar bear yarn painting, purple-power is going to get hers too! So, send me your address and a small painting might appear (no wishes for this one though, I have the idea very clear already - but it will include your favorite colour too).

I can't tell yet when you will get the paintings, as I still have some (ok, quite a lot) Christmas knitting to do. But I'll try to make and send them soon.

And Perttu (my dear brother), if you really want a yarn painting, I'll make you one... some day. But probably not with Eero in it.

For all those who didn't win this time, you can always check other contests... Alpaca Farmgirl is having many give-aways, including giving away this beautiful yarn. You can win other things too.

One year and one day - a blog contest!

I have been writing this blog for one year and one day now. (Yes, I did notice my blog birthday already yesterday, but was just too busy to even think about writing!) It's a quite long time, and has passed so quickly. That's why want to have a little contest to celebrate the ocasion. Just leave a comment in this post and tell me your favorite animal and colour. I'll make a little yarn painting (about 12 cm x 12 cm) for the winner of his/her favorite animal. You'll have until next Monday to participate! (You can leave a comment in English, Spanish or Finnish.)

These last weeks have been very busy with the studies. I have made various presentations and the University, written essays and tried to advance in my researh too. Of one presentation I'm particularly proud of: a short afro dance show my dance group made. Yes, you read correctly. I have been taking an afro dance class this semester and I love it. But when the teacher told us we had the chance to make a public presentation, I had my doubts. I'm not really that good at sports, so my first thought was: "Me, dancing afro in public??? No way!" Especially because our group is very small, so every one really would stand out.

But then I thought again. It was a great challenge. I don't feel shy speaking in public about my research, but even the idea of dancing in public made me nervous. So I decided I had to do it, just to overcome my fears. It wouldn't really matter if I would look stupid or if I couldn't keep up the correct rythm. I would do it or myself.

And so I was one of the six persons of my group dancing in public. I'm so happy I did it! We weren't perfect, but I think no one noticed our little mistakes, because we were so happy and had lots of energy. At least we got lots of aplauses. I felt really good afrterwards, even though I think those were the quickest 4:30 minutes of my life (the presentation seemed to pass so quickly that I was almost disapointed when we had to stop dancing).