I'm a traveller.

Hello!

Remember my "...andthatswhoiam" -posts? They can be found under the tag being myself. I used them as a method of therapy, because I struggled with situations when I had to introduce myself or tell someone about myself. It clearly helped because I actually went to a job interview last Friday!

But I haven't actually shown you all the pictures that I chose from that website last autumn! So now I'm going to tell you a little bit more about myself.

I love travelling. I want to see everything. I feel like the best thing to spend your money on is to travel and see all the different places and meet people who come from different backgrounds than you do. It will widen your views and help you grow as a person. You will get memories that you'll never forget. It will help you become less materialistic and you'll start to appreciate your experiences more.

Travelling has probably always been my favourite thing to do. I'm from a small town, but it does have a travel agency. I used to go there and carry a copy of all of their brochures home. I loved looking at all the pictures and dreaming of all the places I could go to.  Unfortunately, my mum's idea of travelling was to catch a ferry to Sweden, and to stay on it and head back home straight away, without even setting a foot on the ground. Once I was old enough to travel, I cached one of those ferries and went to see what Sweden really looked like.

I'm the exploring kind of traveller. I find it hard to just do what the tourist guide book tells me. I want to find out things myself. I might go to the tourist information to get a map, in case I get lost (which unsurprisingly happens quite a lot), but my favourite activity is to just wander around aimlessly in a new city. I've never been on a beach holiday, because I think I'd find it difficult to just lie there getting burned, when I could be exploring all the suspicious side alleys and getting to know some interesting local people.

Did I ever mention that I'm a big Doctor Who fan? How many TARDIS-themed things have you noticed on my blog? The whole concepts of being able to travel through space and time really fascinates me. There must be more out there. And there is a reason why I ended up with a degree in Archaeology. But I'm stuck in this time and our planet. Which really isn't that bad after all. Exciting things are happening in our time, with all the digitalisation and equality movements. Scary and awful things are happening too, and there are many places I don't even want to travel to at the moment thanks to their political situation. But there's still at least half a planet left which I could and would like to explore.

I strongly believe that understanding the language of the place you travel to helps you get more out of the trip. The more you understand the language the more you understand the culture. And vice versa. Travelling is also the key to learning languages. When you need to find a Burger King in Spain, you suddenly can understand those instructions in Spanish. Or at least I found my way to the Burger King. I also learned to pronounce it the Spanish way.

I've never been to Asia, but I've got really interested in Japanese, Korean and Chinese cultures recently. I thought that Japanese might be the easiest Asian language for me to learn first, so now I've started planning a trip to Japan. It will happen once I feel that I've learned enough Japanese to get the most out of that trip!

I have a funny feeling that the only reason why I've watched all of the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit films is the fact that they are shot in New Zealand. That's one place I would really love to travel to. Originally, I wanted to spend an exchange year there, but it never happened. It's the furthest place on Earth I could travel to, which probably makes it even more exciting.

I have lived in a couple of different countries. I've lived in England and Germany for a month, and in Finland and Scotland for years. All of those countries have a place that feels like a home to me. Sometimes I meet people in Scotland who hear that I'm a foreigner and ask me "so where's home?" They think it's a cunning way to phrase the question: "where are you from?", but I always find it a little bit insulting. Do they mean I'm not welcome here, and want me to go back where I came from? I don't want to go back. I want to find a place I belong. The question is also difficult, because I find Scotland to be my home just as much as Finland is. I'm from Finland but I live here now. And I'm not sure where I want to move next. 

But okay, my home is in Europe. For now at least.

Finnish people don't make friends easily, which is kind of a problem. I have, however, met amazing people from all over the world. I wish I'd find it more natural to open up to people and actually make life-long friends and to stay in touch more.

I've always thought that the best cure for depression is to go travelling. I've never felt sad or depressed while travelling. Everything in this world is just too amazing, to feel depressed. Depression is like being stuck. If you don't realise that you're free to go and do anything, you will feel depressed. If you ever feel suicidal, just sell everything you own and use that money to go travelling. As far as possible, and you might find the reason to live again.

I love learning to get to know this planet. I want to explore my options before I decide where I want to settle down to. I feel that there's no point feeling miserable with my life, if I don't want to go and see how people live elsewhere. Maybe there's a place that is more suitable for me than the place where I'm now? And if not, there's nothing better than that feeling of coming back home.

P.S. Here's a map of the places I've conquered so far.

It's fairly Western Europe centred so far, but I'm working on it.

I pinned these places on the TripAdvisor app on Facebook. And then I mangled it a little bit on Paint, because I hate the way Google Maps stretch the North. Unfortunately this app doesn't have all the places I've been to. I'm especially sad that North Rona is missing. But according to this app, I've visited 17 countries, which is 13% of the world. That sounds like a good start!

I honestly, don't know where I'm going next. But I like to keep my options open.