Back in Finland...end of one story and a beginning of another!

Life after the year in MN

I've been here in Finland for almost 6 months and it feels like I left New Ulm a couple of weeks ago. A lot has happened here too and some moments to mention are; summer vacation, beginning of a new school year, weekends with friends, badminton competitions, birthday, cruise to Stockholm and a trip to Netherlands. I think I have finally settled to the normal life here.....the culture shock here is over :D

Today I received some cool stuff from U.S.A and it made me think of all the great moments during my year in NU. I think I have to end this story here and have another one in Suomi or somewhere else. There are many adventures to come and the year in New Ulm won’t be forgotten. The experience was something that I can be proud of and remember forever. I have so many good friends from the states and I will try to keep in touch with them a lot :)
Finally, here are some pictures from summer/fall/winter 08’ in Finland.

Niklas Harki


The End

Summer, Black Hills, Friends......

Hello Hello !

After the weekend with all the graduation parties it was time to go on our last big camping trip. We drove the entire ay from New Ulm to Rapid city in South-Dakota. The drive was about 11 hours. On the way we stopped in Mitchell for the only building in the world made out of corn (Corn palace) which works as the Civic center in Mitchell. We drove also past the Missouri river. They have the famous Lewis and Clark trail there.

When we got to the Black Hills we unloaded the cars at Custer state park. We had our tents ready and everything was set up until it got dark. The next morning we did the wildlife loop with Buffalo and other animals. It was too foggy to do the hikes so we went to the Wind cave. It was really cool to hear all the stories and how the place has changed etc.

The next day we got snow and it was chilly out. We decided to drive all the way to Hills city and see the Rocks and Bones exhibit there.

When the weather got a little better we figured it was better to do some hiking before it starts snowing again. We hiked up to Harney Peak which is the highest point between Rockies and Pyrenees. On the top of it we couldn’t really see anything because there was still so much fog in the air but it was cool to do the hike still.

Next morning our plan was to go and visit the Chapel in the hills which is a copy of a famous Norwegian wooden church.

The full day in the Hills we spent on Needles highway and Mt. Rushmore. It was an amazing sight to see everything when the sky was finally clear. Mt. Rushmore in the evening was beautiful and it was nice to hear the story behind the whole monument and the history of the workers etc.

On the way home we drove through Badlands which was like the Grand Canyon In the middle of South-Dakota. We also stopped at a place called Wall Drug which offers tourists everything, and a little more :D

The trip was fun and Håkon’s parents were with us on this one too so it was pretty cool to see how they liked everything.

After we arrived we had some graduation parties again and then later we had a bonfire with friends on Håkon’s last day before he left. Håkon left on the 2nd of June. Peter flew 40 minutes before Håkon back to Sweden. We ate at Timber lodge steakhouse before they flew from Minneapolis airport.

During this week I have tried to clean up my mess in the room and started to get everything ready for going home. Still the most important thing has been spending time with friends. I’ve tried to spend as much time as I can with them. Today I have 10 days until I’m going away. There is still a lot to do and hopefully the time will be a lot of fun.

Niklas Harki

....AND WE ARE DONE!!

GRADUATION!!!

NUHS CLASS OF 2008!!

We had our graduation ceremony at the New Ulm civic center 7.00pm on 23rd of May! It was a great time and the speeches people gave made me remember so many good times! This year has just been amazing and now it is all coming to an end...

We have still some time left and actually just today we had our gradation party and we have plenty of other people’s parties to go into :) There are parties all the way until June. It is great to see all our graduates going their own ways to colleges and so on…..As we go to our home countries.I have to say though that studying with our friends in a college would be so much fun!!

I will definitely be back in New Ulm and maybe, who knows, I'll study in a college in USA :D

So, this blog post just told the basic outline of what we have done, I'll do a bigger report when we get back from Mt.rushmore. I'll put a lot of pictures though because a picture tells more than a thousand words :D HAHa, also kind of tired because we have had so many great things going on during the weekend :)

CLASS OF 2008!!! -WE ARE DONE!!

Niklas Harki

School is over!!!

Last week in School!

Last week we did many things for the last time in NUHS. We had our last Track practice, last choir concert and finally 21.5(Today) was our last day in school! We don’t have any school left now.
I ran the last time in Track practice last Thursday and it was fun to do it because I felt like I was really done with Track. I returned my team jacket and pants. I also had to give my gym locker away a little later….
On Friday Håkon had his birthday and we had a lot of people over to celebrate his big day! We watched movies and talked about random stuff for many hours.

On Saturday it was time to attend some people’s Graduation parties. I went to two of them and had fun in both. I was amazed by all the effort that’s put on those parties with the pictures, food etc. On Saturday evening I went to Madelia to hang out with friends….
Sunday morning we left to Hanska. They have a Norwegian celebration every year. Later that day I went to the last choir concert and then we continued to Applebee’s for Tyler’s birthday. We had so much fun with the big group of people!

Monday and Tuesday went fast with organizing pictures and getting everything ready. We stayed up late both days and Tuesday night I had to watch a movie for credit in World History. Today we had quite a relaxed last day with some tests and a buffet in International foods :P The food was really good! Tomorrow we will have our Senior breakfast and then practice for the graduation ceremony.

I’m ready for new adventures after High School!

Niklas Harki

10 days to Summer vacation and Duluth Trip

Hey!

Last week we had fun with friends and school felt kind of nice because we knew that there isn't that much left. I also had another field trip with German class to the cities and we played handball and Hung out at Ty's before leaving to the North :)

This weekend we spent 4 days in northern Wisconsin and Minnesota. We drove first to Spooner and continued all the way up to Duluth and a little further away to a lighthouse up the coast. We spent a day with our host family’s parents and other family members. The first day we took a canoe and went down Namekagon river. We ended up falling in the water in the middle of the river because we hit a tree, hahahah :D The river is really shallow so it was easy to get back into the canoe but the water was a little cold still.

On Sunday we woke up earlier for the trip to Duluth. The drive to Duluth was really cool already and you could see that summer is coming! Nick drove us all the way to Split rock lighthouse and Gooseberry Waterfalls :P In the spring there is a lot of water in the fall so it was a good time to go there. I enjoyed the views!! I will put a series of cool pictures from the falls and lighthouse on this post. Gooseberry falls and Duluth are on the shore of lake Superior, The biggest fresh water body on earth!!

Niklas Harki