Thursday Evening, May 12, 2005

We had a couple to the apartment for dinner at 5PM. After we finished eating we watched hockey. We were probably the only people in Joensuu who didn't know that World Championship hockey was on television. It may well be that when we extended the invitation the husband was conflicted. In any event, we get great reception here and were happy to watch hockey with them. Cooking is a challenge on several levels. The oven is small. We have limited utensils and dishes. And converting recipes from US to metric is an ongoing challenge, but since everything turned out well I guess the mathematics was correct. Also, have to get the oven temperature right. I just cook everything at between 150 and 175. Seems to work. The last issue is locating ingredients for the American recipes. My serving dishes are the plastic cartons from various foods we have purchased since arriving. I did buy some matching plates and bowls at CityMarket. The only glasses we have are 1997 Finland Hockey glasses. So we used paper cups. David made swiss cheese macaroni. I made applesauce cake in the only baking pan we have.

After our guests left, we went walking by the lake and have posted a couple of pictures to show you how gorgeous it is. The sun is setting now around 10PM but the light remains until almost 11PM. In the mornings the sun rises after 4PM but it starts getting light an hour before. All this light is very energizing. Wonder what the reverse of this will be like in the winter.