Travelog for: Josie

Hyvää kekriä, äiti! (Happy halloween, mom!) 

Here in Finland Halloween with ghosts and bats is a rather young phenomenon, mainly noticed at kindergartens. There is no tradition of kids going to trick- and treating in funny costumes.

Here is an older tradition, called Kekri or Köyri, although it of course has the same roots with halloween/samhain.
In Finland the whole month of November was the month of death.  The finnish name Marraskuu means that, "Month of death", and that was time when the dead family members came back home, and they were served trough whole month - given food, took to sauna and told news. 

Kekri was a celebration with lots of drinking and ritualized loose sexuality.  We were skipping the last thing in the list.



We wanted to carve lanterns too, but the pumpkins here are so expensive, that we were using oranges and tangerins instead! 



I think they came up quite ok, and besides, when the candles were lit, they spread wonderful citric smell around. 



Our kekri celebration consisted mainly of eating good food in the light of our grinning citruses. 



And of drinking and singing an old finnish kekri song.  Over and over again.




"Yksi kaksi kolme neljä,          "One two three four, 
anna iloinen olla!                  let be happy!
Jos suru tulee                        If the sorrow comes
niin anna hänen mennä.        let him/her go.
Paarmat ne laulaa                  Horseflies are singing
neljä hiirtä hyppelee              four mice are jumping
kissi lyöpi trummun päälle      the cat is banging the drum
koko maailma pauhaa!"        the whole world is roaring!"






Then we were dancing. 



And having a somersault competition.  Many somersault competitions



And then I don´t quite remember.. 



I just remember Tuli  telling us of the finnish "trick or treat" custom at Kekri - it was the adults and adolescents going round in traditional costumes, aping animals such as billygoats or cranes and behaving in obscene ways towards everyone, asking boost from neighbours, threatening otherwise to "break down the owen".

We were going to do that, but I don´t remember if we did. 






Hugs from your little wild dog,
Josie 

My name is Josie and I am a tiny dog living in Berlin.
I think it's my time now, to see some new places and meet lots of new friends!

Today I left my home. It's my first journey. I'm taking part at the GTVT. I'm so excited!!!
All my new brothers + Crawfish + Mr. Furrington cuddled me a lot. I think Cheeks doesn't want to let me go.
Heidelberg, I'm coming!

Dear Mum

Greetings from Heidelberg. I've safely arrived here but had to spend the weekend in my envelope because nuriayasmin wasn't home. However, I was greeted by some very friendly ToyVoyagers and the cat Sammy was also curious and insisted to pose for the photos with us. He wasn't interested in the candies I had brought with me, though, so I shared them with the other TV's only.





Bye,
Josie

Hello Mum

One of my host's new TV's, Lola Rabbit is leaving us today. She will travel to the north of Italy.



Bye,
Josie

Dear Mum

When nuriayasmin returned home from the post-office, she held an envelope in her hand: Another ToyVoyager had arrived. It's a cute coloured rhino called Tamina.





She had brought a beautiful cat postcard as a gift for nuriayasmin with her which we all admired.



Bye, Josie

Dear Mum

Today I visited the city centre of Heidelberg. It was a warm and sunny day. Here are my photos:


The Church of the Holy Spirit


The Town Hall


Karlsplatz


The Bridge Monkey


The Old Bridge


Geese near the river Neckar


More geese and a view down the river


Spring is in the air ...


The Old Bridge with the castle in the background


Looking down the river from the Old Bridge


Looking up the river from the Old Bridge


Looking to the castle and the city centre from the Old Bridge


The gate of the Old Bridge

Warm regards,
Josie

Dear Mum

Today the weather was absolutely beautiful and so I went to Neckarsteinach, a small town near Heidelberg which was founded in the 12th century. It's called the city of the four castles because the ruins of four castles from the Middle Ages are situated in the mountains close to the city. One of the castles is owned privately and still inhabited, the others are just ruins and were abandoned 200 - 300 years ago. So we took a walk along the river Neckar, had a look at the castles and walked in the forest. It was really great and it was so warm that nuriayasmin sat down at the banks of the river and read her book for an hour while I just enjoyed the sunshine and watched some ships pass by.





















Lots of love,
Josie

Dear Muim

Today Ohkwari left us for France. We all told her good-bye and wished her a good journey.





Bye,
Josie

Dear Mum

Today I visited Worms which is one of the oldest cities of Germany. It started as a Celtic settlement and was then conquered by the Romans. Its cathedral was built in the 12th century. In 1521, Martin Luther was declared an outlaw by the Edict of Worms. The city is also home of the Nibelungen Saga. Worms had a large Jewish community and the Jewish Cemetery is one of the oldest in Europe. However, during Reichskristallnacht in 1938, most of the Jewish quarter was destroyed and nowadays there's only a small Jewish population living in the city. Worms is situated at the river Rhine in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate.

Unfortunately nuriayasmin had forgotten to recharge her camera's battery before we left so we could only take a couple of photos.

Well, I actually fulfilled one of my life missions as we travelled by train but due to the problem with the camera we didn't take a photo so I'm not sure if it counts.


The Martin Luther/Reformation Memorial


The Cathedral


Remains of the wall which used to encircle the whole city


One of the dragon statues which can be found all over the city to remember the Nibelungen Saga, with the river Rhine in the background

Bye,
Josie

Dear Mum

This morning we said good-bye to Voi Nam who will travel the European Toy Voyager Trail. His first host lives in Italy.







Then we accompanied nuriayasmin to Mannheim which is situated about 20 km away from Heidelberg. We passed palace which is nowadays a museum and home of the university.



After nuriayasmin had finished everything she had to do in town, we took a walk along the river Rhine. Just an hour because it was rather cold and windy.

















Lots of love,
Josie

Dear Mum

Today nuriayasmin's daughter had her wisdom teeth extracted. It took about an hour and as we weren't allowed to enter the operating theater, we spent some time at the Botanical Garden which is situated close to the clinic. We saw some interesting and beautiful plants and flowers. Hope you like my pictures, mum.















Greetings from Josie

Dear Mum

I tried to play with the cats but they're both very lazy and sleep most of the time.

Sammy looked up at least.





Shelley just told me to leave her alone and kept on sleeping.



Bye, Josie

Dear Mum

About a month ago nuriayasmin's rabbit Lola died and her son Krümel stayed alone here. Nuriayasmin decided she doesn't want to have a new rabbit and as Krümel shouldn't stay alone, she looked for someone to take him and found a nice woman in Seckach whose female rabbit was looking for a partner. So this morning we checked Krümel's transport box and then accompanied him to his new home which meant a journey of about 75 minutes by train.







Keep fine,
Josie

Dear Mum

Today was nuriayasmin's only day off this week and as the weather was really beautiful we made another excursion. This time we visited Hambach Castle near Neustadt/Weinstrasse in Rhineland-Palatinate. The castle is known as the birthplace of modern Germany because it was host of the Hambach festival which took place in 1832. On that occasion, over 30,000 people from all ranks came together to protest for national unity and liberty. Even though the festival had no immediate results, it's nowadays seen as the "cradle of democracy" in Germany.

We didn't take the direct way to the castle but chose a small hiking path from where we enjoyed some stunning views on to the surrounding mountains and the city below. Unfortunately it wasn't allowed to take photos at the exhibition but we learnt a lot about German history.















Last not least we posed for the obligatory group photo:



Lots of love,
Josie