Day 41 Aurora Borealis, aka Northern Lights

Witnessing the incredible Aurora Borealis, also known as the Northern Lights, did not happen on Day 41. In fact, I have left Lapland and is now in Helsinki, but I feel that seeing the Aurora Borealis is such a wonderful experience that it deserves an entry of its own, so here it goes...



On New Year's Eve, also our last day in Lapland, we decided to try our luck again by hiking for more than 20 mins (in the cold) into an open but dark area to see the Aurora Borealis. Just as we were finishing up our New Year's Eve dinner, there was a loud noise at the door and everyone was shouting that there was a tint of green in the sky. We decided that it was time for the Northern Lights to show, so we immediately added a lot of layers of clothes and headed straight to a dark area.

(Photo: On our way to the dark wilderness.)

And oh man, it was unbelievably amazing.

(Photo: Aurora Borealis in all its glory.)

The Aurora Borealis can be seen in any places (as long as there was one in the sky), but it would be better in a dark wilderness. So as we were walking into a darker region, it seemed like the Aurora was getting stronger and stronger, greener and greener and welcoming us along the way.

(Photo: See how the pattern changes?)

(Photo: This photo was only taken seconds after the photo above, and already, the pattern changed! How amazing is that!)

(Photo: See the tint of red above the green?)

As we got to the dark wilderness, the view was just awesome. It did amazing things to our eyes. If you stare at it for longer period, it changed from green to a bit pink then green again. The Aurora Borealis was never the same at anytime. It formed different patterns, different shapes, different colours, different intensity, different contrasts with the sky and with the surroundings. It was just amazing seeing the nature like this.

I don't think anyone can capture the beauty of the Aurora, nor should they attempt to do so. Because the Aurora is so much more than just green lights or any colour of lights on the sky. The camera can never capture my eagerness to see the Aurora, nor my excitement to see it, nor my amazement when seeing it.



Seeing something as pretty as this also makes me realize that there are so much in life than I don't know. I am not talking about academics, finance, economics etc, I am talking about the nature, how does the nature react the way it does, and how many more incredible phenomenon I have yet to experience.

well, I am officially listing 'seeing Aurora Borealis' as one of the things you have to do before you die.

Day 27 Late-night ice-skating in the woods

Today was another tough day at school. I did not have class today, but my group for Investment Management class decided to meet and go through the assignments. We met at around 2 pm and discussed the freakishly ambiguous assignment questions till 5 pm, 3 hours straight!

One funny thing though, one of my group members, Thuy, need to be on duty in the gym from 3 pm till late, so the rest of us went with her and we did our assignment in a tiny little security guard cabin next to the gym.

(photo: this is the little security guard cabin I am talking about.) (photo: the three of us all stuck into the little room.)

After the meeting, I met up with Barbora and did some grocery shoppings. Interestingly, we went to the cheapest and the most expensive grocery markets here in Helsinki. The cheapest is LIDL, and the most expensive is a store called Eko market.

(photo: Ekomarket! So who shop there? health freaks and well... yea, health freaks, and er... maybe those that support fair trade because they have a lot of fair trade products. I have a feeling the HK Oxfam Shop that I worked in long ago wants to do something like this.)

After the Ekomarket and the grocery shopping, I went home. Just as I thought I would call it a day, Kol and Woonghee asked if I wanted to go for ice-skating with them. Since I got my ice-skates, I would not miss any opportunity of skating!



Late-night ice-skating in an outdoor ice ring is something I have never done before, but now that I have done it, I think I really like it! This outdoor ice ring is in the middle of the woods and is really really huge, it took me about 4 mins or so to go around the ice ring once, it is probably 4 times the size of any shopping mall ice-rings in Hong Kong!

Looking at the trees that surrounds this ice-ring and feeling the icy air around me is just one of the most amazing experience there is in life. You feel as if you are gliding through, the trees moving backwards, and when you look up, the sky is just so dark and purplish blue.

I am officially recommending this as one of the things that you have to do before you die: Go late-night ice-skating in the middle of the woods in Helsinki winter!

Day 18 I JUMPED INTO THE ICY WATER! TWICE!

Jumping into the icy water did not happen on Day 18, but I feel that this is such an important event that I have to put it into a whole new another topic.

Yep, I did it! I jumped into the icy water! HELL YEA! I have seen people doing it before, I have seen those travelling channels showing it before. But I never really think I would actually do it, still, I did it and I am so freakishly proud of myself! BOOYA! I have a feeling that I am going to brag about it, er. like FOREVER in my life. Seriously, for those who haven't experienced below 10 degrees Celsius Hong Kong people, this is like a suicidal act. They will be so impressed by this, and I am seriously considering enlisting it into my resume. My resume would read: 23 Jan, 2010 Tanya Tse Jumped into icy water in Helsinki, Finland. Land temperature about -25 degrees Celsius.

So how did it happen?
Well, at about 12 am in the morning, we decided to go into the Sauna. So I went, along with like 20+ exchange students, crowding the Sauna room. Seriously, if you were there, you would have thought you were in a gas chamber or something, the Sauna was way too crowded. Then, after 20 mins or so, I felt that I couldn't take the heat anymore, and I ran all the way to the icy lake, they have already dug a hole near the lake, so I went into the water.

Surprisingly, it wasn't extremely cold, my feet however, were freezing. So numb that I couldn't really feel it as I ran back from the lake to the Sauna room.

Dissatisfied with the first experience of entering the water (because I thought it wasn't cold enough), I waited for a good long 15 mins, then I went again to the lake. This time, fully immersing my HEAD into the icy water. And that is DA REAL SHIT. You feel that you cannot really breathe because it was so shockingly cold. I think my adrenaline went high and I felt so good afterwards.

(photo: This is the icy water hole. They specifically dug it for people to jump into it after the Sauna. It was so slippery at the edge that I slipped like twice, and cut my foot =.=!!!)

(photo: I am so proud of myself! I think this is like a once-in-a-lifetime experience here, I am so glad that I did it!)