Teitur

It is often good to remember that our struggle for happiness is a universally shared human struggle both through time and space.

As such many helpful things have been written on the subject and many strategies formed.

To help you form your own and to get through your individual complications reading a little about all this body of thought often helps, whether it gives you a fresh perspective, a new idea or truly leads you to breakthrough :-D

As a central issue in philosophy, literature and other humanistic disciplines the breadth of choice is surely much, but one short primer on the consolations of philosophy I’d like to recommend is Alain de Botton’s book of the same name.

It’s nicely written and very accessible. If nothing else it is sure to lift your mood :-)

This is of course one of the most important things in life, tied in to all other motivations and aspects of life.

I’m pretty happy now, but of course this is one of the constant goals. Mostly I want to be happy because of the fulfillment of other central goals such as “do well” and “do justice” but sometimes it doesn’t hurt just to smile for the heck of it!

- It just lifts your mood - scientifically proven! ;-D

Anyway, Teitur means happy .. so I guess I should be!

This one has been touched by His his noodly appendage!

Hear the revelations!

“It has been privately revealed to professor Huxdane that an asteroid killed the dinosaurs”!

I was told the apartment we’ll be taking in Helsinki will smell a little like old people, I automatically changed this to little old people and imagined that these would linger as ghosts we would have to live with.. With the strong connection of smell and memory it is only fitting you can have smell-ghosts :-)

I still hope we can banish them! O_O

I could only be there for a day. Would have liked to go and help more but we didn’t have time. I found it was really nice though.

It was a dig of a Knights Templar castle in Franken which wasn’t important enough for the national or international community to give much of a damn about it so it had taken some time for them to get around to it. The ruins had been there in the forest for decades with kids climbing around in them before they decided they’d go ahead. So since the project only got funding for one or two archaeologists it was mostly run on the work of volunteers from the history society which had pushed for this work to begin in the first place.

As I found it a very pleasurable activity and nice to be a part of something like that I would have wanted to stay for longer.. The company was also good, all there were nice people. Most of the volunteers were recently retired men but there were a few young people too. I found the old guys quite nice and cute and they were really enjoying themselves :)

When we were there we helped by scrubbing the artifacts. So we can’t say that we really did any “excavating” but we did get a really good look at what they found :)

When I’ll come next to the village where it’s located I’m still afraid they’ll have dug it down again for conservation!

I’d like to put more people’s noodles to work and introduce them wonders of pastafarianism. It is such a delicious thing!

On a totally unconnected note, now I’ve also joined the Icelandic Ethical Humanist Association and the Icelandic Atheist Society.

We need to up our evangelizing and fund raising so that we may build the world’s first voyaging pirate ship church of the FSM!

Ramen!

.. but now I have to look out for it more than I used to. With my new job and recently increased caffeine and sugar consumption in connection to it and the fact that I’m sweating some liters while working I really have to look out for this now if I am to keep my strength up!

I’ve also had goals related to this for a long time I’ve wanted to put under this one as sub-goals..

I definitely need it for my new job.. if not coffee I’d need some other upper!

It’s still a shame, since I was pretty close some time ago..

This job is still just on the verge of what I can handle for now. I’m waking up much earlier than I used to and I’m exerting myself much more too. We almost never stop and I’m on my feet the whole day lifting heavy stuff!

I love it – but it’s hard!

Maybe I can give it up when I’ve adjusted a little more to the job.. for now I need my boosters I’m afraid.. Got to keep up my fighting spirit!

Having worked as an assistant in the vaccinations of travelers for seven years and also not liking heat (meaning anything over 20°C (68 ºF) or so), bugs and unjust culture I can say that extended stays in large parts of the world do not interest me the least bit. I am however very interested in both nature and culture and would like to experience and make my own in some small way, and with respect, some of the many great places of the world.

I have always been fascinated by exploration and find it one of the most enjoyable things I can do. I love the feeling of discovery and the enjoyment of taking in and experiencing things. I hope to keep such an open mind and a love for the world. The feeling of flow is the feeling of life. Stagnation is death.

Not being overly poetic, the love of exploration does in fact lie quite close to my heart. My father and his brothers all had the same inflection and in fact all worked in cartography as young men. To take the point further one became a professor in geography, another a geologist and then my father became a specialist in travel- and preventive-medicine.

As soon as I could walk I was climbing mountains with him and learning about the land. Whenever I stay somewhere for some time I explore thoroughly everything around. Cranny, street and neighborhood.. and neighborhood after neighborhood it’s time I move on onto the bigger picture and onto my cultural and geographical neighborhood of Europe and Canada. Getting to know it decently, trying to understand it and perhaps making it in some small way mine then is the task of the day.

In time more will follow, but for now I think some of the contrast will be lost if I do not have a decent comparison.

I also don’t want to ruin the joy of discovering the subtle differences between these places by placing them in comparison with something radically different just now. All will come in time.

Am taking drawing classes in the evenings and will be till next summer. Need to build up skill and a folder for my application to architecture..

Incredible how all evening classes line themselves at the same times of the same days.

Despite the heat we decided to continue and managed to do a truncated version of the eastern Europe part of the trip.

In fact I’m quite happy with the outcome in general. By taking a short break between the two parts it in fact became two trips like I wanted originally. It also just gave us the energy to enjoy the rest better.

And apart from this trip being pleasant I think we gathered experience and will be better set for our next trip. We also scouted out some really nice places to visit again :)

The exploration will continue..
This viking hasn’t gone to rest…

I’ll be back! ;-)

I´m afraid it´s just too hot in the south for us!

We´d like to visit the places we planned to but I´m afraid it’ll have to wait till it’s a little bit colder!

So it’s back to Scandinavia and the Baltic countries for us now :)

Starting tomorrow and going this route. The longest stops will be in Kraków, the Rhine Valley, Barcelona, Croatia and Istanbul

:D

I better be.. I’m flying tomorrow!

This is going somewhere I guess.. My father (whom I live with till the end of the month) is fearing he’ll have to stop drinking the muck too since there’s nothing left but tea-drinkers around him :-)

I’m really starting to understand my girl’s sensitivity to loud noise, damn this thing is bothering.

I should be free of it before I go though

I’m looking forward to not be working in the afternoons and be able to take up Aikido and other interesting things again :)

I better start practicing my ukemi!

Of course it’s almost impossible to organize such a big trip to a full extent beforehand and you have to be flexible.. but if we could contact more people and book more cheap trains we’ll save ourselves a lot of money..

I’m still afraid we’ll end up with something quite unorganized! :D

There are plenty of places where this has been going on for ages. Taverns, hostels and cafés are often quite open for example.

Many travelers don’t want to be burdened by junk they’ve read during their travels and leave stuff at hostels for others to enjoy.

It’s often the same in café’s but with the added bonus of a starting stock of books from the owners and their friends. You should of course ask before taking something; the proprietor might not want to give you anything until you’ve earned their goodwill. They might also just not want to give that specific one away. ((you could of course trade for it though :)). Of course the books might also just be there as props, a nice background to make you feel at home as you’re ripped off.

I’ve also heard about such open libraries / book exchanges in public libraries. In Skagafjörður for example they have this table in front of the library where people can leave pulp and lighter works. Saves a lot of effort keeping tabs on the junk :D

Anyway.. there are billions of free books out there, as it should be of course!

...

I’ll be giving a bunch away soon. Maybe I’ll list them with this bookcrossing.. I guess it could be cool. At least it’s a good idea, though terribly romantic :D