Finnish Break

“Hit the gas Papi!!” - Kelsey Black

After 4 months of living in Finland, and two months of scheming, tonight was the night that I made my break. This was intended to be a single man job, however others had to be involved as I found them necessary to my escape. If you are reading this now, I have managed to break out of Finland to surprise my family for Christmas. 

It all started 2 months ago when I found out that I was going to get 2 weeks off for Christmas. I had purchased a large ticket earlier in the year that needed to be redeemed so I didn’t lose all 1600 dollars (long story, not important). In order to make any of this escape possible, I would have to have an accomplice from the outside arrange the flight details. I confided in Greg Walker who followed through and agreed that it would be fun to surprise everyone, and especially my mom. I have encountered minor setbacks along the way but as I am writing this post I am en route and in Frankfurt, Germany. After the ticket had been booked, the real plotting began. How was I going to lie to my mom and to everyone else for the next two months? I have never been able to do anything remotely surprising, and I couldn’t spill the beans on this. I have been telling my mom that I would only be getting 4 days off for Christmas, and that I would have to spend it with someone from church here in Finland.

Necessary steps to making my break...

1- An accomplice: Greg Walker

2- Partner in crime: Kelsey Black

3- Several Blog Posts talking about how excited I am for my Finnish Christmas

4- The interception of a Christmas present about to be shipped to Finland from the US

5- The request of an early Christmas treat package (because I needed my contacts ;) )

6- Lying on national television just incase my family happens to watch our match

7- Bus rides with Estonian volleyball teams after they beat us

8- Running with the Finnish bus system on the fly in bitter bitter cold temperatures

9- 7 hours of waiting in the Helsinki airport

10- 12 hours of waiting in Frankfurt

11- Hotel stay in New York 

12- Final Destination...Kaysville, Utah

When everything was set and the time was right (December 16th at 5:30), we hijacked the Viljiandi Volleyball team’s bus. They were traveling to Estonia and would be reaching the West Helsinki ship Harbor at 10:00PM. In order to make this work as cheaply as possible, this was the only way. Once on the bus Kelsey Black held a Coke to the bus drivers head and exclaimed, “HIT THE GAS PAPI!” (At this point I knew we had a Prison Break problem. I introduced Kelsey to this show two weeks ago and she is already on season 3. You know you have been watching too much prison break when their phrases flow out of your mouth with out even thinking about it :) I about died when she said that! I am on season 4 right now and feel like I am about to lose my best friends when the series ends. I had a dream that I was Sarah the other night and Scofield was taking me with him...hahaha We watch wayyyyy too much prison break. Hence the theme of this post.) Anyhow, the bus driver did just as he was told and made it to the Harbor in absurd timing. They were on the last ship out for the night and since our game went to 5 sets, they were cutting it pretty dang close. Their bus driver pulled through and in the nick of time they were on the ship and our real adventure was actually beginning. 

When we knew we could get to Helsinki for free, instead of paying 80 or 90 Euros we had to jump on the opportunity. Once we got to the ship harbor we ran into the problem of still being 40 Kilometers from the airport and had to maneuver our way through their tram and bus system. Of course we tried to research this before we left, but it made no sense and we knew we would be winging it. Luckily for us, there was a girl just closing her shop at the station who told us how to get to the main Helsinki Bus station. I have been there before and felt at least a tiny bit familiar to it when we got there...Like I knew what it looked like haha. First we had to get on a standing room only tram that cost 2,70 Euros (Are you kidding me?!? Nothing is that cheap in Finland...we felt like we were getting a steal). Once we arrived at the main station we were once again fighting the cold and our complete cluelessness. As two Americans stood right in the center of the station looking overwhelmed and baffled, I am sure, the sweetest lady in the entire world came up to us and asked us if she could help. We told her we needed to find the bus to the Airport, and she told us where the light board was so that we could find the information...then she decided she would just take us to the light board...then once we got out there she decided that she would just talk to the bus driver for us as well. haha She went so out of her way to get us on the right bus and heading on our way. I am so grateful for this woman’s kindness, as I am sure our escape would have failed without her, and Kelsey and I would have been found dead this morning with our faces stuck to the light board and our bodies like fragile icicles. This winter stuff is no joke here! haha Did I mention that the bus to the Airport was 4,50 Euros? So we made it from Pihtipudas to Helsinki Vantaa Airport for 7,20 Euros. I would say that is a successful travel trip, and both Kelsey and I feel very accomplished...in case you couldn’t tell ;). 

I knew that I would have LOTS of waiting time since we started our break on Sunday afternoon and I wouldn’t be arriving in Utah until Tuesday at 10:30, but since I am trying to do this as cheaply as possible, we both decided that we didn’t need a hotel and would just chill at the airport from 11:00PM till our flights at 6:30AM. To our surprise this is quite a common thing, as the benches were all filled with sleeping passengers. One man even had a blowup mattress... he has clearly done this before (We thought he was blowing his nose super loud before we found out that it was a mattress). Kelsey and I were rookies to the all night airport stay and started going crazy the longer we had to wait. We both knew it was going to be a LONG trip home, but so incredibly worth it. At 6:35AM on December 17, 2012 I had escaped from Finland, but that was just the beginning. Once out of the country, my travel started to get exhausting. I landed in Frankfurt Germany at 7:30AM and have been sitting here by myself for 5 hours at this point, and have 6 more hours till I board my flight to NYC. 

My ticket was complicated because I couldn’t have anyone following me easily. The only way to make my flight work was to fly into JFK Monday night and fly out Tuesday morning. Of course my plan once again, was to hangout in the airport over night and catch my 6:55AM flight. My sweet dad wasn’t super stoked about this idea so he arranged for me to have a hotel room once I arrive in JFK tonight at 8:00PM. If all goes smoothly, I will be surprising my mom Tuesday morning after my dad picks me up from the airport. (He is pretending to go to work like a normal day, but actually he took the day off :)) Sneaky Dad! haha He also had to intercept a Christmas package that my mom was about to send to Finland with all of my presents in it. He called her as she was almost to the post office and told her that someone from work had brought him these awesome mittens from Mongolia and he wanted to put them in the package. He told her he would just mail it after he put them in. Otherwise I would have gotten Christmas in Kaysville, and then again when I got back to Finland...not bad :) I will have a package from Rae Jean when I get back from Christmas because it didn’t make it before I left, but it will give me something to look forward to.

In my next post I will let you know how I decided to surprise my mom. I haven’t planned that far, but I still have over 24 hours to think about just how I am going to do it :)

Oh, and PS: I miss my travel buddy! I am almost positive that Frankfurt would be so much funnier with her here. She will be in Texas before I land in New York.

Merry Christmas!!