Good day, bad day

When people hear that I'm from Finland, they often ask how does it feel to live in Canada. Most of the time it doesn't feel much different than living in Finland, and my basic answer usually is "the nature and the weather are very similar to Finland, so it feels like home here, but obviously the population is much more multicultural here, which I like a lot". Then the discussion goes on either to Canadian weather ("no, I actually really like winter, I just hate the salt you guys use here to keep the roads melted") or to Finnish population ("no, not everyone is tall and blond and blue-eyed in Finland, I have green eyes and actually my hair colour doesn't qualify to blond there").

Sometimes though, it feels different to live here. It's difficult to describe in which way it's different, it just is. Those days are usually not good days, but luckily those days are very rare. Here is an example of one of those days, a piece that I wrote in August (when I was still too shy to start a blog) when I absolutely hated Ottawa for a day:

"It’s the hottest day of the summer, +32 degrees, and the whole city is wrapped in haze. I’m biking home from work in this sticky, hazy weather, knowing that “home” is about +45 degrees hot and there’s no lake nearby where I could jump and cool off. Well, yeah, there’s Ottawa River running through the city, but thanks to Ottawa’s worse-than-medieval sewage system, you don’t want to swim in that water. To swim without e-coli we have to drive 50 km, pay 9 bucks, and stay in a designated swimming area which is about four meters wide and full of kids. What if I just want to have a quick dip after work?? Where do I go??

I bike faster with a grim look on my face and suddenly it strikes me. I hate Ottawa. I hate I hate I hate. I recall all the beautiful clean lakes in Finland. If I was in my home town Hollola, it would take only five minutes by bike and I’d be in one of three small lakes. Tampere, where I studied, was surrounded by two cooling lakes. I browse through all the cities and villages of Finland in my mind, and convince myself that each one of them has a lake or a river. With e-coli-free water. My only bad swimming memory was somewhere in eastern Finland, where the water was muddy and not refreshing, but I ignore that memory. I’m sure that even that village had a hidden lake somewhere; I just chose the wrong lake or the wrong end of it.

I keep on biking, sweating and swearing. Finally I'm at home, which is hot like hell in days like today and I burst at my husband: Why there's no lakes with five minutes walk from here?!?!?!"

So, that's how it sometimes feels to live here and that's when I miss Finland a lot. But otherwise Ottawa is just like any city where I've lived, and I don't feel like I'm abroad. Which is good, since I'm not, since Canada IS my new home country. And actually, Ottawa is pretty pretty: