Mother was complaining that I haven’t updated my blog so here we go. I kind of decided that blogging is more for holidays; as I write another a bit more official about the Russian market at work. Well, it’s not horribly serious either, more like an experiment how blogs work as a corporate communications tool.

Enough of that. I was actually just guided to my compartment in the grand express train; the night train from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Seems pretty posh. Well, not like trans Siberian first class, but nice and comfy. When I was standing on the cold platform almost middle of the night outside the dark train I was briefly wondering if I have done all the right choices in my life. And if my life would have been different if I had married the first girl who wanted to make babies with me.  Strong maybe. The lady in the train didn’t speak a word of English, but showed me my bed, and later on brought me some instructions in English. Works fine. And as I’m writing this to kill time, I got a room mate, “Dobry vecer”, that’s as far as my Russian goes.

So if this is more like a free time blog, maybe I cover couple of weekends (that much my memory can cover). The previous weekend I was in Finland, there was one babyshower (or whatever that is for boys), and one 40 years birthday party. Just by accident our account manager from Microsoft was on the same plane on Friday, and as I owned him one sightseeing tour from Moscow I took him out. We saw some of my friends, and then had a short sightseeing walk, visited some bars and surprise surprise ended up in Lost & Found for couple of beers . Next day I took him to verkkokauppa to see how they sell MS products there, for a lunch to Seahorse (my favourite restaurant in Helsinki) and for a walk by Kaivopuisto.

After that taken care of a short nap, and then to see Hannes. He had a dinner booked in Macu. As tradition goes we ate, drank and smoked some cigars.  Around ten we got to the 40 year part of my friend Harri; he had a sauna on Esplanadi with loads of old friends from Tampere (and some new from Helsinki), so we sat in sauna and timetraveled  back to the day. This kind of events are so much fun for me, as I’m such a foreigner in any country these days. I’m glad my old friends still keep in contact, and now it’s of course easier as Finland is just some hours away.  We went to some wine bar, then to Kalle, and drank like there’s no tomorrow. I managed to get to meet two nice girls and they came for an after party to the sauna; I had saved them from some harassing men by telling that I’m their brother and that they just want to have fun tonight.  The story grew spectacular as we together described our not really existing childhood to everybody who was not aware that I had little sisters. So we drank the night away, told thousands of stories and on the “morning” I had a horrible hang over, but I felt somehow refreshed as well.

This weekend we were sampling some food in a new Leningrad restaurant in St. Petersburg, well, on Friday, that is. I was with our law firm, our marketing company ceo, one university person and there was also one guy from some new media company. Nice place, good food. We left the place and went to really funny disco called XXXX, it’s like the bars in Tampere, just drinking and dancing and having fun. No girl business, mostly local people. Some other friends were there as well, from the construction business, so we had a few beers and showed our disco moves. The sheriff and the box (hell no, just kidding). Fun. Saturday was another dinner, when I managed to wake up, in Park this time. It’s a nice Italian next to the church of spilled blood, a different team this day, banking, meat production. law and construction. I had a nice pizza and then met with Jari, we met with some Russian friends, but just for an hour or so over a cup of tea. Sunday was sports, I tried to start running in the gym, but maybe a bit too fast as my heart has been pumping like hell after that. We had sushi with Ivan, I got finally some home internet working and I was configuring my gadgets to interact. Also bought some champagne glasses. That’s the free time I have had =)