Elias investigates: Porkala, Swimming and Work

For the first time I'm home alone after coming back from Glasgow. My parents are in Wasa on our summer cottage and Titus is on the Etno Festival Faces. My plans for today are to go to the municipal library and borrow books about photography. Then I'll continue to Lidl to relive Glasgow. The building is identical and the range of products is quite identical. After, I'll make some music and write more. Sounds like a good day, to me. Now follows a story of the week that's gone built up in a slightly different way. It's going to be more about the pictures. By the way they have found water on Mars. I read it.

2.8 Woke up today 9. I slept for as long as I wanted. I was certainly in need of that. I had breakfast with no butter. I red Hufvudstads bladet and Helsingin Sanomat. The former is the major newspaper in Swedish and the latter is the Finnish. Now it's 10:50 and I continue.

25.7 On Friday last week I worked a normal day. Nothing special or worth mentioning, nor can I remember what happened. After work however I most definitely took the train home. At home I hanged in front of the computer for a while. Wait now I remember, I didn't go go home after work. I met Jan 3:45. We sat down in the park in front of the parliament and wrote down words and strummed chords. We were making songs. The sun was shining and a man came to ask if he could sit down and join us. From our unsure looks he could see he wasn't very welcome. We wrote down some ideas. After an hour or two we ate some food bought from a supermarket sitting down in front of the train station and talked about Jans incoming wedding whilst eating sweets. It was warm and sunny in Helsinki.

Then I took the train home. I hanged in front of the computer for a while. I dug for worms but the soil was too dry. Around 8 I started biking. The destination Porkala to our summer house, 15-20 km from our home. It's situated on the cape of Porkala, which was leased to the Soviet Union in the 1950´s. They needed it for closing the Bay of Finland and thereby protect Leningrad. Therefore you can find old Soviet Union remains in the area. Bunkers, canon, fortresses, airfields, spoons, furniture. I found an elk skeleton when I was seven. Fascinating history indeed.

After an hour of biking I reached Porkala.

There were Isak and Jonna and their friend Dennis. They were eating and I sat down. It was pasta. The bay was quiet and the water flat. From the kitchen table you can see over the whole bay. With the windows it's like being outside and inside in the same time

They bay is usually in the evening like a mirror. The water was surprisingly warm 20-22 degrees. Wonderful for swimming. Dennis is inspecting the shore before entering the sauna. We had a sauna after dinner.

Saturday 26.7. We woke up in the morning already around 8-9. We looked like this. We had breakfast and enjoyed the warm air on the front porch. The white chairs my father found on dump. About an hour later Titus arrived. He also biked like me from Jorvas to Porkala.

This is the sauna. I like the light coming in from the small window. From the thermometer you can read the temperature in the sauna. Garments are dried conveniently in the sauna.

Titus har arrived. He is rowing and Isak is fishing. Here the day is getting warmer and the sun is higher.

The day trip we made was very short on Saturday. We rowed with our flat bottomed rowing boat (this word I found in the dictionary) for ten minutes to the other side of the bay and walked into the woods. Here you can see us returning from the woods. To get a good green colour during the day in bright sunshine is impossible. Luckily there were a few clouds sailing in the sky. You can find rabbits, elks, bears and roe deer in the woods. We didn't see anything.

However Titus finds a skeleton. If you know what animal it is, tell me.

After the hot hour in the woods it's nice to swim. From here you can jump very well. It's around 4 meters high to jump and it's great fun. Jonna and Isak on the cliff, Dennis in the boat and Titus in the water.

Examining the water and the bottom to see it there are stones or shallow areas in the water. It's easy to get paralysed jumping into unknown water.

Titus is the first to go.

And Isak was second.

From the swimming we continued further out. Behind Titus and the horizon 30-40 km away is Estonia and Raul Potisepp. This place is awesome when gails are whipping the cliffs and stones. There are some very nice waves to swim in.

After the walking, swimming and rowing we were hungry. Isak is frying salmon. We also had beetroot and potatoes and courgettes. Everything delicious. Isak is a highly qualified chef.

2 minutes before eating. Titus is weak of hunger. I can't make up my mind if I like the light or not from the evening sun.

Titus and Isak after the Saturday Sauna. The yellow foreground to the deep blue colour of the sky is nice.

27.7 Sunday morning breakfast. Dig in! It was a very lazy morning. The sun had been so harsh with us the day before. We were a bit mashed.

Isak redesigning the sail for our flat bottomed rowing boat in the kitchen. The B&W setting givs a nice archaic feeling. Repairing sails is not from this day.

Titus and Jonna struggling to get up. The sea air makes me tired.

Here we have sailed further out on the cape of Porkala. There are a lot of these green algae. They are not poisonous, but there or other ones which our. Take you Finnish government for supplying us with algae.

From here on I have no pictures. We continued rowing to the other side of Porkala Fjärd. We swam on the Obbnäs side, where the base of the Finnish navy is. We ate crisps, sweets, water melon and hard bread(sockerskorpa). We rowed home around Sandön (Sand Island). At home we ate beefsteaks fried on the open fire frying pan. With potatoes. After dinner we cleaned everything in an hour or so. Then Isak and Jonna drove there car home and me and Titus biked. We were home after a nice weekend in Porkala. It was like true hot summer. As I remember the summer of my childhood. Now I am going to Kyrkslätt. I'll be back 6:43 pm

Hello, it's 6:43 I've been to Kyrkslätt and its library and Lidl. I cycled around 2 from Jorvas to Kyrkslätt. It's a nice way. A way I've biked unmemorable times. To school, to work and just for fun. Today I biked for a reason. On the way I got very nostalgic. I passed through Hindersby, where I remember Rolle and me walking when we were around 14 chasing Suski, Elli, Emmi & company, and Kyrkvalla, where I always biked when I went to school. I was struck with the same kind of melancholy that Margo Martindale felt in Paris Je T'aime. I didn't think much of Kyrkslätt at that moment.

I continued to the Library. There things improved for the better. I met Teta and talked with her. I read some good Swedish newspapers, camera and computer magazines. I borrowed books about photography and a couple of sides and a bundle of photography magazines. I spent nearly two hours absorbed in the stuff above. The church bells were ringing at one time. Around three I biked to Lidl. It was very sad to be in Lidl. I suddenly recalled I wasn't there with my family; Andrea, Fernando, Marco and Samuel. I walked around slowly and tried to figure out what to buy and what Glasgow was like. It was the strongest injection of Glasgow nostalgia so far.

I biked home with my biked encumbered with food, drink, CD's, magazines and books. I arrived sweaty home. I prepared dinner and read a bit of Moby Dick and Doris Lessing, also photo magazines. For fertilising new ideas. I ate and then read more and now I am here going to continue writing about last week.

28.7 Monday. This was a new day of work I worked the day and went then home. Me and Titus did something I cant remember I'm sure.

29.7 Tuesday. On Tuesday I worked normally until 4.30. Then I walked to the train station and met Titus. We bought some food. Estonian pancakes(haha), ice cream, and nectarines. We took the train to Parkstad and in the train I dropped some crumbles from the ice cream on a lady. She looked very affronted. In Parkstad we met and we went playing football. We were four boys and five girls. It was a good game. We took the train back and were home 10:15. We ate at Hesburger on Böle train station.

30.7 Wednesday. I worked from 9 to 4 and took the train home. In Jorvas were Titus and two of his friends Sara and Mia. I ate pizza they had made. It was delicious. Then I made a beginning of a good song. Its coming. Then Sara cut my hair. I was very grateful for saving money. Barbers are a waste of money. Then we went swimming to Hvitträsk and had a look at Hvittorp, again.

Here the sun is coming from behind and a flash is smashing their faces. Looks nice. Adviser: Jonas Tana

Walking on a path leading to the cape. The three creates something extra although trees are very common.

Coming up from the water gives this very oily look.

Hvittorp

Hvittorp. The light on the pillars is very warm.

More of the evening sun. It's very hard to catch. It gets too yellow.

Another one.

31.7 Thursday. On Thurday, I worked, yes. I went home back a bit earlier. I talked with Kai and he suggested we would go to Noux where his summer house is. So he drove here and we ate a courgette dish with macaronies, made by Titus. Then we drove to Noux, which is a beautiful place. There we met Kai's parents and we swam. We found a cliff. Now we could jump around 5 meters. It was fun. The lake is very deep, 20 - 30 meters. After we ate ice cream and went home.

Traffic, I detest traffic. Still its interesting.

High houses flashing

Kai steering

Evening sun on 30 m deep lake. More yellow light

A balance between light and dark was difficult

Kai coming up

Titus and Kai

Kai's new roof

The roof in detail

Their awesome sauna

Inside

1.8 Friday. I worked and finished a big project with Jonas. After lunch we took our cameras and went to the roof of the parliament. We wanted to take pics of the partial Solar Eclipse. It didn't work. You needed filters I didn't have. I took some other pictures instead. Some of my colleagues. From work I took the tram to Isak and Jonna. There we ate pizza. Before eating me and Isak went to second hand shop called UFF. There were only clothes for women. We left and ate pizza. It was delicious with mushroom, courgette, feta cheese and spinach. I was home in Jorvas 9:15 and spoke with Maria and went to sleep.