Summer - with Ruu

Note (to self): these aren't always written in the order they happened, so I might get something wrong. It's enough to remember most of it for now.

Well then. Cultural differences. It's relatively common for people here to have (or at least know someone who has) summer villas. saying it like that makes it sound too impressive, though, seeing as the very very literal translation would be 'summer cottage'. Every teacher recommends the word 'cabin', but that makes me think of something even less impressive. Whatever they are, my family had one booked for a week. (Just like any other year, except we had Ruu with us. To be honest, she was the only reason I didn't just skip the whole thing; I don't exactly enjoy spending time with my family.)

Luckily, this time the place actually was as house-ish as 'villa' suggests.

Not specifically built for the purpose, but an old house. A whole house, very much livable even now. It had enough room for all of us, a nice yard with forest to three directions and a sauna by the lake. The 'beach' was... well, it could've been worse. Really. It just hadn't been visited often enough, which meant it got really slimy a few meters into the lake. Nothing dangerous, though, and it didn't get in the way while swimming. Well... not when we didn't get head first into some plant thing right in the middle of it. Still. Not poisonous.


We spent a lot of time indoors. The weather just... ugh. It was hot. Horribly so. We went to sleep late and didn't really wake up until noon. Ruu spent even more time sleeping than I did, she could sleep through the sun trying to boil us alive and take a nap later. I pretty much finished reading the book during those times. Mostly we just kept lazing around anyway; we watched anime on my laptop, read manga, listened to music, roasted marshmallows and drew. Or scribbled.

Second floor. One of the few pictures with no extra people in it. (We could climb out of that window!)

The cottage had a boat. A very basic rowing boat for up to four people. Ruu and me took off with it for a while and went to explore the nearby island... thing. It was tiny, that's for sure, but someone had made a fire there anyway. We didn't go very far, someone was cooking for us already and getting the boat to stay still wasn't easy. There was barely enough rope to tie to the tree closest to the water. We got more later when we visited our house with dad. After that, we had the chance to go further across the lake.

... That was amazing. ;w; ♥

Simple, really, but it had been such a long time since I last got to do any real exploring. We got across our side of the lake, to an inlet of sorts, went through and started looking for a place to leave the boat. For whatever reason, someone had left a makeshift raft on the shore. We followed the path from that spot and eventually got to another cottage. The old couple there were rather surprised to see two girls pop out of the woods. X'3 We asked them where we were and, following the instructions, continued along the road for a bit. We found an abandoned (or very close; the place was shut off with a chain across the driveway and the yard looked more like a meadow) group of houses and an old sauna by the lake. And a tiny frog. We turned back after a while and took another path to our boat.

It doesn't sound much like an adventure when simply recorded like this, but that's the point. Anyone else remember those old books for young boys? Books of adventures, small things made big the atmosphere? Mysterious paths, hideouts, rafts and independence?

... Anyone else noticed how no one writes them anymore?

I suppose they wouldn't be very popular. Instead, the books for that audience today are easy to read, simple, with less pages than I would have considered a book worth reading... stories of football, computers, skating and the like. Nothing wrong with those. I just wish someone would still be willing to read the old ones as well.

... you know, this isn't making any sense.

Anyway. We also watched 'proper' movies. Like Aladdin, The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Pirates of the Caribbean.

The first one is the best. The others... aren't bad, but they can't compare. ♥

Even so, we had to finish the trilogy when we got home. Meaning Ruu and me, the others stayed at the cottage for some more days. We got some time for ourselves, as well as a chance to visit Joensuu before she had to go back home. I don't even remember how that idea surfaced, but we decided to bike there instead of taking the bus.

... good idea, healthy too, but just you try to do that in that kind of temperatures fully clothed to keep from getting a tan.

Oh well, the day was pretty fun anyway. Biking back was a lot more fun in the evening, after we'd already eaten ice-cream, shopped, bristled at some drunken racist-jerkface trying to pick a fight with innocent people, gone swimming with people (including Kazume) and the sun had... well, not set, it doesn't do that in the summer. Gone lower, in any case. I wish I had more photos from that day. We discovered an area that looked absolutely stupid on maps and absolutely beautiful in person. And ducks.

Made a new kinda-friend too; I'm sorry, but I don't really know when it's appropriate to call someone 'friend'. Still, we had fun.

The next day Ruu had to leave. We met up with people, but didn't have much time to spend there. I did stay in the city after she left, though. I'd planned on going home and being miserable, but hell, why not. I was invited after all. Ended up having fun, again, we played football (bad idea), went swimming in the river in the middle of Joensuu and slid down a soap slide thing behind a church.

... What was it anyway? >__>;