So it’s almost the middle of March, which technically should be the first month of spring. Day is longer and warmer, more sunny days, birds chirping and the ground starts to spurn into life. NOT YET. At least not in Finland. Believe it or not, it snowed (?!!) today after a week of hiatus and once again the ground is covered by snow. And temperature in the past 2 weeks have averaged around -8C with one evening at -20C!

It’s winter still, except less gloomy and darker. And that makes A LOT of difference. If I have to choose between gloomy dark winter days and sunny winter days, I’d choose the latter anytime cos’ the former is seriously depressing. The looooong winter months actually don’t surprise me as it’s pretty much the same when I was in Vilnius, Lithuania 10 years ago. The thing I didn’t expect, probably, is the fact that I’d relive the experience (of long winter) again.

But to count my blessings, the birds are indeed chirping and the sun is out

So last week we were mostly in Joensuu, the city where Blue Eyes originates from. Blue Eyes had work appointments and I tagged along. Joensuu is situated on the eastern side of Finland and according to Blue Eyes, people are generally friendlier there. The city is a lot bigger than Hameenlinna and it has a university campus too. I took the opportunity to take some shots of the city during one of the sunny days. Here are some of them: