I found this in a Book i bought from Beirut last summer in 2008 and it was funny back then. When i look at it again, i cant stop myself from laughing! Is it true that nothing changed since 1870 in there. It seems so …
This Scanned page below is copyrighted to the Ping Project 2007.
P.s: I am employed now again, if you are reading my older posts but sorry i haven’t had the time to keep this blog updated! maybe …
Maybe it is not that bad that i became unemployed last weekend! now, i can concentrate on writing here 
I think so! It never paid to run a blog, at least in our case but who knows.
The second option would be to stand in front of the Finnish parliament with a sign saying give me a job! I don’t think it works either, The robots land tend to be as harsh as it can. Unfortunately, I cannot complain and say i am alone in this case. me and many others are in the shit trouble of the unemployment, since the Wall street boys have decided to ruin the world.
Unemployment in Finland stand at above 10 % now, the situation cannot get worse, or maybe this is just the start. Finns and immigrants are suffering, I wish I can say I am not being hired now because of my little language barriers or my foreign background, alas i can’t! Finns too sit home and wait for the mercy of the system.
Anyhow, lets not be too dramatic. I have had an excellent summer here in Helsinki, was all Havenish. It was too true to last though … but i was lucky to get the chance to do what i like again. Nobody knows! what chances that experience could open. I can’t ignore that i enjoy doing any work in the customer service field! Socializing with people I guess comes from the Lebanese blood, we are sociable, happy, clownish, and as i have heard, all what we do in Beirut is dance and party to our graves. That’s our reputation!
Back to Helsinki, the weather is getting gloomy. I have lots to re catch, maybe a small holiday, definitely cheap one and hitch-hiking will be involved for sure. but it will be a change, i cannot see here sending CV’s and waiting for the mercy of someone to open his inbox and reply to me. it’s not going to happen between a day and an other!
Finland, has been a good country. a Fair one, so far! what pisses me the most in our safe Haven, is the fact that we feel too safe sometimes and we forgot the reality of the harsh world. I always had a title for a book about Finland **Instability inside of the Bubble** It feels here sometimes so good, so like life standards are awesome, and we have a good system, but we can’t ever be sure. ever, of what tomorrow hides!
Now, lets get over with the Drama. I am unemployed, and this gives me a chance to write, explore the world and nag! nagging a part of the Finnish culture i have learned to abuse
Cheers from dark,cloudy,Helsinki!
Let’s face it, i am not truly a blogger anymore.
Sounds like the real world and including that Facebook took over every drop of my time in the recent month, not to mention my new working place.
Summer 2009, was and is still full of surprises though while am writing this note now, it is raining in our beloved Helsinki.
Since June 1st, i started working in a new place on night shift basis, which means i live totally the contrary of how people do, I take the metro on the way down while the people take the stairs on the way up.
The benefit of such a choice, would be working for few nights then having long holiday’s that could last for few days on a row, where in the last weeks i had the chance to visit Vimpeli, where Maiku’s parents live.
The lush green of the summer and the lake was truly peaceful as an exit from the city’s busy life (as if Helsinki tends to be busy, i guess its the most quiet city in the world, not to mention the 5th best place to live), We had a traditional sauna experience and the cats enjoyed fooling around and going away for hours and coming back for diner.
The best part of Vimpeli, is the popular famous addictive Baseball, where all the village come to the stadium to watch the games, imagine a village of 3000 and the only thing they do is superpesis as they call it, this side of Finland is something. I usually think of Finns as quiet,shy and nice but the devil come’s out when a game start, it is even to die for . On one of the game, a lovely fan had a heart attack and even sadly died on site!
The events of the summer, including a train trip back with 2 crazy cats, nagging about how did we even take them back in train and not a limo. Pinja our beloved elder cat spend hours moaning and making horrible sounds!
A Dangerous Havenish Summer it was! Now that it is over, i look at the storm aka winter getting ready to hit us with it’s magic.
Regards from the cold north again!
I can’t say that this new blog of mine has been very active recently but i surely got my reasons for that! Work, Work, Life, Work and etc …
I have been writing few drafts from events like May 1st and then work, life, house, pink wall and other stuff that occured like starting my new job on Monday where i will work again back in my field as a Front Office Agent. It feels so good to be back to the hotel industry, i have always loved it!
Anyhow, not much has been happening. I turned 27 2 days ago and Finland had a beautiful sunny May and it sounds like the summer is gonna be good to us. Let’s wish so …
I promise to write soon and update you with the adventure’s of May and the coming back to Finland and the culture shocks of a freind of mine visiting Helsinki for a week. There is definitly lots to laugh about !
So keep checking, and the next time i have a hangover i will for sure write it all.
Now, it’s time to head to Korkeasaari
We just came back yesterday night from a lovely holiday in the Finnish countryside, even if it was a very tiring one due to the huge number of tasks to be done and all the family activity.
The Finnish countryside, based on my 3 years experience here was the same as it has been! not much change in general.
Finnish Country Side
Finnish Countryside
Sun sets on Vimpeli's lake.
We had the Easter holidays and we spent lovely time with Maiku’s family.
My post here mentions the people in that village, I always felt like an alien in there, specially on Saturday night when you head to the bar which feels like from the 1960’s and where all the eyes are scanning a new visitors.
It’s a small village called Vimpeli of around 3000 population and where everybody knows everybody, which means that i am known as the son in law of Maiku’s parents and that am a foreigner. Good so far!
One of the major event that take place in Vimpeli during the Easter holiday is the witch kicking, we don’t kick witches literally, what the people do is to make huge fires in the fields to kick the bad spirits of the witches. And here it was supposed to happen that Saturday of Easter!
Vimpeli's traditional easter fires
I get this call from the family that we are going to watch the KOKKO fire’s and I get myself all ready for the big event that is a part of the local traditions, as soon as we make it to the relatives of my beloved wife’s which had a huge fire, there was the famous Makkara and Olutta ( Beer and Sausages) for the celebration, as is the case of every day of holiday, alcohol is a must use during day’s of rest!
Kick the witch!
Now the people that ignited that huge fire were super sweet but they suddenly reminded me of a book by a Finnish author named Arto Paasilinna that i have been reading called (Hurmaava joukoitsemurha) or in French as i read it (Petits suicides entre amis) , the story has nothing to do with the fires of Vimpeli, but the characters of the people were nothing less then the ones in that book. It was hilarious; my description is not accurate though until you read it!
Distant, friendly, drunk but still friendly, interested and curious and most of all trying all the time to show their culture and brag about their adventures in this part of cold north.
A burning Bear!
My trip did not end with this experience of course only, i had the chance to join my father in law in the adventure of ice fishing which is our yearly common hobby, where you have to open holes in the ice and fish, but then you might be really lucky if you find any fishes, I wasn’t on that day! But since I mentioned the event, I will explain a bit the concept:
- You have to get your equipment ready and walk to the frozen lake where you start walking on the frozen ice.
- You have to know the right spot which until nowadays i didn’t figure out why my father in law still insist on this spot after 3 years of unsuccessful fishing (it must be a tradition) and then you got to calculate the distance from the grandmother house to the house, some GPS navigator wouldn’t be a bad gift for my father in law I guess! Might save us some time!
- You got to the dig the hole with a tool and open the ice then throw your fishing tool and sit and wait until you either freeze to death or get a fish which wasn’t the case this holiday!
- The last step is when everybody back home is expecting you to come back with a few fishes for dinner and you are empty hand and totally ashamed, then the idea of running to the nearest supermarket and buying a few fishes is not bad!
Me trying to fish! as if ...
Tools for icefishing
That was mostly the Vimpeli experience, in my next post i will be writing about some of our daily life back here in the cold north.
Sasi from Vimpeli.
P.S : Please do not copy or reproduce these pictures without asking permissions.
I have been running this blog off and on since July 2006 and maybe before…
Unfortunately during a last update of wordpress i managed to do some error of deleting the whole site and wasn’t able to recover except some posts from the database.
I will share below my last posts that i managed to save and maybe this will be a fresh new start for me to write about my life experience here in the cold north after living my youth in wild warm Lebanon.
Meanwhile, until i start posting anything new from the ideas in mind to show the world the Scandinavian culture and specially to show to my dear Lebanese friends how it is to be here and be part of another world. the small details that make big difference and also i think of this blog as a method to show my Finnish friends and family what i learn and see from their country.
Stay tuned!
JaD
This was a collection from the blog before the database went totally burned. The posts have the dates below them.
Mar 22
A month ago, we came back to Finland and change came after our trip of 10 month, we have been going thru dramatical times trying to reintegrate in one society and living the end of the harsh winter and the start of the great spring.
Well the cold is not over, we still have 2 to 3 C temperatures daily and it’s getting a bit sunnier day after day now.
Marika has been looking for a job back here, but the economic crisis which GW Bush has left us as heritage has reached even the northern part of the Globe and its affecting Finland. No job! same applies for me.
Thanks to my last boss i got my job back there though everything feels like a drama sometimes, every business in suffering directly and indirectly and it doesn’t show as there is a way out because simply nobody knows how to deal with it.
A sneak peak at Finland after a year, shows that not much have changed, life is still super organized to extremes sometimes and it sounds like the society still suffers from loneliness.
As for me, I am integrated for sure and proud of being part of this country since things just work here, everyday there is something new for me and there is something i compare to Lebanon and see the good and the bads.
I hear a lot a lot about the news from home and think of it often, Lebanon is a beautiful place specially my home town where my dad garden keeps coming to my internal vision. I was not a nature guy, but when you live in a place where everything is frozen for 6 month and the only thing you eat is fruits and veggies coming from Spain or Italy, you start to remember places like Rechmaya where everything grows, from peach trees to onions and mint. You remember how my mom, used to pick the mints and the tomatoes straight from the garden to the salad dish. That’s the beauty of Lebanon, it’s nature but unfortunately we do not preserve it, we do not recycle there, we do not care.
Finland and the Arabs is my next Blog title and i will be writing a small overview about Scandinavian way of thinking v/s Arab and Middle Eastern way of thinking and many of the integration issues that faces us daily here in Finland. What makes us the land of the chaos and the land of the misery and what makes them so advanced.
Keep tuned!
Sasi from the flee market with the Power Girls.
Feb 19
It has been 10 month since we have first hit the road to our unknown destination and now we are back!
Back, did not mean any peacfull time for us since i have started working and Maiku is on the search to her path also. It’s really cold here, been now -7 to -11 all the last 10 days.
I have missed Finland so much, it is peacfull quiet and easy place though life tend to be hard to make your income and it’s not an easy task.
I wish i will be able to post more and soon we will post more pics from our trip and blog posts and maybe a lovely ending post on maikusasi.com before we turn it into our routine daily life blog. or maybe next trip soon ?! nobody knows …
Jan 2
To all of you!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2009 from Bali in Indonesia.
Wishing that all of you will enjoy their holiday’s and maybe you will see more postings from in the coming year 2009!
Kisses and Hugs.
Dec 7
After the amazing trip in ancient Egypt, I decided to go to Beirut for a week to visit my beloved parents and get some visas issued for SE Asia.
We arrived to Thailand around 3 weeks ago, it has been nothing less then an amazing experience. We love it! I fell in love with the nice people, the laughing faces and the giggling girls.
Everything burst with life here, the outstanding beaches to the white sand to the jungle.
We will be for Christmas and New year’s celebrations in Bali it seems so more beach, more fun 
Keep updated to www.maikusasi.com for more news of our trip!
Nov 8
Seems that our trip gets much better with time.
We are now in Egypt and it has been 6 month on the road for us. We have decided to head to south east asia after touring 3 countries in the middle east and getting a bit fed up from the hassle and my beloved Maiku’s eagerness to head to thainland ASAP.
So i will head to Beirut to fix some hanging things and spend few days with parents then will follow Maiku to Bangkok.
Egypt, can’t be less fun then it is well it si a bit of all. Museums, Egyptian god’s and the rest.
Time to go Maiku wants her facebook
Oct 18
It is a new experience me, sleeping otudoor has never been done in my life. And here we go again with Maiku traveling in the Middle east, we are now in Jordan in Aqaba and it’s been a few days since we are relaxing in this small Bedouin Village Camp a very easy going place.
Here, you can sit and relax and enjoy your time around the camp from swiming to snorkling to diving to just relaxing and using their free wifi, it seems to many like a paradise. well, more or less it is for the people that are for example living in Finland now in the +5C (not trying to tease anyone). Oh here comes my dive! she was diving all ove the red sea and enjoying watching old tanks.
you can know more about our current location in this small heaven by checking on the website of www.bedouin-hotels.com and on www.diveaqaba.com
I know these are short posts but my energy is going mostly to www.maikusasi.com!
Sep 25
We are back on the road!
After a long stay in Beirut, we decided that it was time to continue our trip and discover new world’s, be nomads and discover new cultures and destinations.
So bags are packed and trip goes on!
Read more about our trip details and follow our route while we cross thru the crusader’s lands to Salaheldine fortress to Petra and to the Pyramids.
Find more about our trip in Syria, Jordan, Egypt on www.maikusasi.com
Aug 29
Lebanon can really show you the differences of society classes, the cigars, the fake boobs, the huge lips and full make-up girls of downtown Beirut that have linked their lifestyle with freedom and democracy of the west.
A bunch even claimed that if you wear a Prada or a Gucci that means you are linked to the west and support a certain political party! Yellow just wear trash as it seems to some people’s mind, maybe they do not know that they real Gucci’s are also made in fake in the Yellow people’s land:)
But still I believe it isn’t all in vain, things will change in the future. People will go back to their sense and evolve. I came to a conclusion that people did not really want it to turn like this, they just wanted the same like Georgia’s freedom and democracy example. Wonder who’s helping Georgia’s now?! Where is the west, If they can’t save Georgia, will they save Lebanon from it’s bigger neighbors.
I write this article just to let you have some hope and give a bit of motivation to come to Lebanon, that truth is that regardless of how this community turned into, there is good. What is the good being done?! Where is the good?!
I do not know, neither see myself but it exist. Maybe the good old tradition, maybe the good food but there must be something that still makes Lebanon special.
After all, why would you blame a young generation that was raised having an extreme rich lifestyle based on the support from immigrants that plunged yearly thousands millions of Dollars and Euros from African diamond business, to telecom business, to war and gun raising in certain places on the planet to their relatives and family that just care about SHOW OFF, about CLASS, about SNOB, about taking everything first world countries have and living it to the EXTREME. They do not take human rights and environment care, they just take the nice cars concept and etc… In 2006, before i left to Finland i had applied for a job in Abu Dhabi just to go and make more money like most of the expats but today i praise myself for making the wisest decision in my life by going to a country like Finland instead and living with my Maiku. Tell you why?!
With Maiku, i have learned that humans are more valuable then money, i have learned that we are all equal and that we do not need to have big cars and huge bank accounts to be happy. That, maybe just reading a book in the park equals a huge party in Sky Bar And to top it all, i have learned, the real meaning of freedom and lived it, to do what I want really without caring about the say of my friends or the opinions of others. I have learned that history, education, books, reading, writing, being honest are keys to make a better future for the generations to come.
Now after 2 years, I came to a conclusion that I do love my homeland for the history it has, for the sweethearts of the old ladies that make Kibbe and excellent Tabboule, but i do not want to live ever again in it. I will be leaving out of here soon and will try my best never to come back here. It has been to stressful to live and adapt again to the system here, a system based on connection and classes of humans and rich and poor to a sick extreme.
Damn it! The Lebanese do it always to the extreme.
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Jul 15
After our trip in Europe and living in Finland for the last 2 years, I came to the conclusion that nowhere on earth is like Lebanon, of course, am talking carrier wise and hospitality sector.
I wanted to write this article to introduce the “a la libanaise” way of doing things. In Lebanon, you have 2 kinds of sectors, private and public sector and the gap between both is huge. The public sector, is a corrupted, non-organized, chaotic sector and the most hypocrite side of it is that they claim (the newly or old elected government) claims that they are on the path to reforms.
Funding for reforms from EU and US and other GC has reached its peak but where are these funds that have pledged to the Lebanese government? As a Lebanese, see no progress in any sector. Electricity cuts still go on in on daily basis, some areas even do not get electricity for more than 6 hours daily. And the business of owning a generator to cover a few blocks might get you rich. There are even a few persons ( and I do not mean companies ) that run cable tv service, internet service, generator service in the same blocks and these people do not belong to any company and do not pay taxes neither there is any control over them .
The system goes by the fact that if you have money, you can be a king! The Lebanese situation is frustrating for many people living here; the locals are suffering from the rise of prices. The expensive lifestyle and the demand of a society that claims to be modern and take as it’s idol the west, but shame that people take everything in a contradiction, if you were D&G it is not for the sake of buying quality labels but for the sake of showing off to your friends and surrounding that you are something or you are better than the rest of the people.
The frustration and despair of the local middle class (that is basically non-existent) or that have immigrant is shocking, People are dreaming to go abroad, the dreams of becoming a citizen of a first world country or going to the GC where job opportunities are higher is everyday’s talk. One of my friends when I came back goes and tell me “Jad, there is no more guys in Lebanon” I cannot find a descent boyfriend.
And since I work in the hospitality industry, I can see on daily basis Lebanese immigrants or non-Lebanese men visiting to get engaged or to get to know more their future wife from Lebanon to say.
I went too far maybe with explaining the conditions of life here, but since I am back here temporary or maybe permanently, I figured that it is nice to put a small overview on life in Beirut. Now coming back to our private sector, the private sector suffers deeply from the old systems and the non-advanced way of adapting to its progress by the Public sector. The progress shown by the company that are Lebanese owned is amazing, Lebanese companies specially in fields of F&B, hospitality, industries, architectures are all now based in UAE, KSA, KW and Qatar. These companies from Lebanese origins are now a core in the fast progress of the gulf. Lebanese, have invaded these countries to say. Lebanese banks have opened branches all over the Arab world in a plan to attract investors and rich Arabs.
Lebanon benefits highly from Dubai, Doha and other countries and fortunately this is what keeps it stable financially regardless of the unstable political situation that it has been suffering. The shame and I say shame is that Lebanese people living here do not benefit from these steps. The law of the jungle still rules in Lebanon, regardless of all the promises of reforms and promises of a better life for Lebanese citizens that have the biggest asset for their country, the successful immigrants abroad.
In my opinion, Lebanese didn’t change much after 15 years from the civil war, there is huge reconstruction, huge investments and loads of money being plunged here but unfortunately it is not distributed equally and it supports the massive corruption run by the Media and politicians. I will remain in Lebanon, for the few coming month and will keep u updated how will the tourism industry will do and how will this promised summer after the Doha accord will benefit or take Lebanon into stability and prosperity.
Thank you for reading and my apologies to my readers for not posting more frequently.
JaD
Write soon!
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