How did we end up leaving to Asia for a year? There are many reasons really. Since I was a kid my family used to travel around Finland like gypsies in camp sites and meet friends around the country. We were at home everywhere like hippies and loved to meet and interact with different kinds of people. This sort of mentality must've stuck to me somehow, I still enjoy meeting new people and seeing new places.
Since my family wasn't rich we never had the chance to travel abroad, until I got a chance through school to go to USSR in the late eighties, also visiting the country with my grandparents. I remember the country and the people were poor, but very friendly, at least towards tourists. I left the country with mostly nice memories. I also visited Sweden on a school trip and with a childhood friends family, again leaving with good memories.
The first trip abroad that I arranged myself with my boyfriend at the time was the most important one until then. At 18 years old we managed just the two of us in Spain. Again I enjoyed the trip. These were the times when average people didn't travel much, and when they did, Finnish people mostly travelled to Sweden, some even went as far as the Canary Islands. So these were exciting times. You had no internet or cellphone to help you out with things either. You could go a week without connecting with anyone else but just the people closest to you abroad. Well, you could use the normal phone, but that was too expensive, so I never called anyone.
The year turned to 1992, I had just met my boyfriend I've now shared nearly 21 years with. Just weeks before I met Kari (my boyfriend), me and my childhood friend had booked a trip to England for a week. That was another big trip for me, only me and my friend doing what we wanted.
Because of my good memories from trips and good adaptability to the surroundings I fell more and more in love with travelling. The biggest drug in travelling is the freedom that comes with it. I always wanted to have the freedom to be spontaneous and go where ever I want. Travelling gives you that.
As the years passed by each year we would travel to more exotic places, to places where you hardly met a Finnish tourist. Before these trips though we travelled with my dad to Greece, Estonia, Ireland, Morocco, around Finland and loads of European countries. We slept at cars, at peoples houses, even in a bit dangerous places. Like I said before, I grew up in a hippie way of lifestyle, and my dad trusted most people, so he never worried about things. And we never had to worry much. Even the police was nice to us, when my dad drove a bit too fast in Morocco. The police tore the speeding ticket and laughed.
We had great times travelling with my dad and we planned to go to Africa one day, also bringing my brother and his girlfriend there, with whom we hardly ever had the chance to travel with. I never travelled anywhere further than USSR with my brother, and around Finland. We also dreamed about going to Ireland one day with this group, as Ireland was somehow so dear to all of us. We could never explain the reason why, until year 2012 shead some light on us, but more about that later.
The most travelling I've done has been with Kari though. I've counted over 40 countries I've been to so far. It doesn't seem so much, when you think that I've started travelling already in mid 80's, but we've travelled to many countries more than once only because we liked those countries so much. Usually they were Asian countries. I had luck meeting a person who likes to travel as much as me, and we share most things together. One of the greatest things we ever did was to go on a scuba diving course in Egypt in 2001. Since that course most of our travels have taken us somewhere diver friendly;) It's a completely different world under the waves.
With my travel background there were also other things why I was always so interested in travelling. My grandparents were a big influence, they travelled the world already in the 60's, but the most memorable trips they did were to Australia, Syria, USA, and Thailand. I always wanted to follow their footsteps, their trips were, to say the least, intriguing. Later on I was happy to find myself posing in the same spots as my grandparents.
My grandparents come from Karelia, the part Finland lost to USSR in Winter War, and they left everything behind then. They grew up in a world where you just do it all yourself, so they built a better new life for themselves on their own from scratch. Most of all they loved to travel and it wouldn't have been a surprise, if they would've ended up travelling to Antarctica too back in the day when people just didn't go there. They just did what they wanted and enjoyed life. They are my heroes, and became Kari's too.
The first ideas about spending a longer time abroad than normally must've built up along the years, as trip by trip we spent more time abroad and noticed we could propably even live abroad, as we had no difficulties staying longer somewhere. The biggest thing that drove us on this decision must've been the hectic business and working life, we have both been working since teenage years, and the work amount has increased every year to the level where one starts to question the value of human life to their employers. It seems that money is more important than the health of a human being. We wanted out of this rat race, even for a year. And because we have the opportunity in Finland to take a year off with a little pay, I wanted to use that chance.
We started planning this trip more about two years ago. There were so many things to consider, paying our house, Kari's business, family issues etc, not to mention all the paper work. Some of our friends have lived abroad for a year or more, and they've all loved their time away from Finland. Finnish people are always pleased to get away from the cold and snow. So we started talking about this to friends and family, and in July 2012 I left the papers to my boss. We were supposed to leave in November, after the Firefest-festival in England, where we go every year. But in August we were hit with tragic news.
My dad was diagnosed with aggressive prostate cancer. I had to cancel the trip and stay to support my dad. He was hospitalized in October, and never came back home. We visited him at the hospital every day he was there, for six weeks. He communicated with us with his eyes on the last days and the last words he could barely say were I love you and I also told him that every day. He passed away December 5th, 2012, just three days after his 66th birthday. He never left for retirement, he was always in such a good shape that he still wanted to keep on working for a few more years. This had a huge impact on all the people close to my dad. Me and Kari felt even stronger towards leaving the working life, and because the situation with the retirement in Finland seems crazy, we felt like if we're ever going to have a retirement it is now, even for a year. And because of what happened with my dad, who always took care of his health, we felt like you never know when your time is gonna come, so seize the day.
In my dreams I dream about the trip we would've done to Africa with my dad, at least he had a chance to go there with his girlfriend a year before he passed. But how much I would've loved to do that trip with him, still just have those moments with him. Before he passed away he told us a revealing thing about Ireland. His cousin had been doing genealogy, and our family roots are from Ireland. After my dad passed away his cousin corrected it though, it was Scotland. Not exactly Ireland, but we were close;) Someday I hope to go there with my brother and maybe with other relatives as well. I'm sad that my dad can't share these moments with us. But on this trip in Asia he is with me every step of the way, he is one of the most important people in my life, who gave me so much. I'm doing this trip for his memory and for the memories we shared together on our trips. I hope we can have as great moments on this trip as we had on our trips with my dad, and meet the greatest people.
As for why we chose to travel in Asia we always liked the countries, having travelled already in Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and China. Besides the warm people, the great weathers and cheap living, the diving is good here too. So it's our paradise. The only things missing are family, friends and our kind of music. This year will also hopefully shead some light on us whether we want to live here permanently or not, maybe opening our own dive shop somewhere.
Seize the day.
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