I have been doing things that unfortunately I have not been able to share with you
so I'm hoping that having this page would kinda make you feel that you were there (ya right huh?)

A day in my life...
Tampere, Finland - March 2001

I didn't get much sleep last night..woke up at 3 am, tossed and turned and almost tried to punch my face just to knock myself to sleep. Freakin' jet lag, my meeting's at 8! I went swimming this morning, I was the only one there. The place had glass walls so the background was just falling snow - so pretty. I jumped in the pool and thank goodness I wasn't a guy or I'd be suffering from major shrinkage. Man, haven't they heard of heated pools?! Oh I forgot I was in Finland. I tried to stay in hoping I'd get used to the temperature. After 5 minutes, I couldn't take it anymore. I ended up going to the sauna. Again, I was alone. The meeting started promptly and ended earlier than planned. The hosts had some evening activities for us and we were all curious what it was. It said on the itinerary that we will be in the middle of nowhere, to dress warmly and bring swimsuits. Say what? They didn't say much either even after we asked them for more info. So okay, we don't really have much choice. I had no plans on my palm for that evening anyway… A bus picked us up (40+ people) and took us, umm, somewhere. The driver dropped us off somewhere in the woods. We hiked a little bit through snow and stopped at a cottage not too far away. A big guy, I guessed our keeper for the evening, welcomed us. He divided us into 5 groups and were given complimentary hats and scarves (color-coded by teams, how thoughtful) and announced that we will be playing 'reindeer games'. He led us into the cottage and were served some food. We had lunch like a couple of hours ago, my goodness, I've been eating so much here. After snacks we were led outside again to start the games. The first game is to stack some crates on top of each other, one volunteer per team will have to get on top of them while they stack them. Of course I wasn't much help 'coz I'm the shortest in my group. The person who can get on top of all the crates and stand with arms open gets the points for their team. We didn't win. For the second game we were led down the hill and we soon found ourselves on some really big space of land. We were on a frozen lake. The game was to kick the ball the farthest and the trick is to do 'air ball' 'coz the snow will stop the ball from rolling. Again, my team didn't win. The third game was hockey golf. We didn't win. The fourth game was relay running in snow shoes. We didn't win. The fifth game was the most comical one. We had to do about 10 turns with our foreheads against a ski pole and run. It's so funny, people were trying so hard not to fall that they were running to the side, missing the goal. It was freakin' hilarious. Of course, I fell, hehehe. Oh yeah, we didn't win. If it ain't obvious yet...we lost!! We have an excuse! We were inappropriately dressed. One lady was in high heeled boots, I think some of us suffered from frostbite, blah blah blah. Anywayz...after all that we were served dinner and alcohol and for the rest of the night (until 11 pm) all we did was chat, eat, and drink alcohol with colleagues. I thought it was nice 'coz I thought these people were going to be uptight judging on how they were during meetings. Oh my goodness, they're so cool!! There were some language barriers but after a few glasses of wine and beer, they all sounded the same, and miraculously, they all made sense, hehehe!! We were all dropped off at our hotel (we were all staying in one hotel) and my boss (I think he's had a few too many drinks already at this time) called me and wanted me to join him and another colleague to try this drink that he had been bragging about earlier. Okay, fine, he's buying anyway. He had been talking about this pear brandy that he loves so much that he said I had to try it. And I did! Oh man. The amount you get is equal to a shot but it's served in a wine glass. Oh man, it smelled good but whoah, it's pretty potent. I only did one glass and went up to my room and made my daily phone calls home. Imagine having all that wine and beer (and not to mention food!!! My boss and other coworkers were betting me hundreds of dollars to finish a punch bowl full of this wonderful pudding like dessert, ya right!). I think I got over my jetlag that night!!!