Mad respect to An Post
The national Irish post, An Post, is kind of the same as Posti is for Finland. It takes packages and pretty much everything else from point A to point B.
But now for the exciting part. An Post's idea of point A to point B has been converted to taking a 30 kilometre distance to a whole new level. They've been taking the package so far 300 kilometres. Passing by the final destination by like 4 kilometres. But instead of stopping by, they took it like 100km further, then back and past the final destination again. Now I'm excited to see where it ends up next. My money is on Cork and Galway!
And then comes everything else
So as I promised on Monday, I'd update my blog again this week. And this is happening right now. I've had a "hectic" week and I haven't been able to write anything that would have made sense. But after a 3 hours nap after work, I feel a lot better and my thoughts actually work on their own.
So it's weekend and that obviously means that the liquor stores are more popular than ever during the week. Instead of what we have in Finland (Alko) with all the vodkas and other liquors, here we have Off Licence. It's sort of a same thing, but the difference in general compared to Finland is that in Finland you can get alcohol from any convenience store up to like 4,7% and if you want anything stronger, you need to go to a liquor store. And you can't get alcohol after 9pm from anywhere (officially). Here you can actually get for example wine (red and white) from SuperValu with alcohol up to 13% or so. I don't know for sure what the limit is, but for example the SuperValu store just across the parking lot from my place doesn't have any beer for sale which I think is quite amazing. They do have a whole corner dedicated to wines, but nothing else with alcohol. Of course excluding deodorants :D And here for example the Off Licence store next to SuperValu is open until like 10-11pm.
For example Slovakia and many other countries back there have hard liquor even at gas stations and you can actually get them 24/7.
So anyway, I've been settling (am kind of bored of using that word so often) in and it's looking a lot better now. I do need to make a phone call to ESB which is the main electricity provider here in Ireland to resolve the issue of not to charge me like 300 euros for something I'm not agreeing to. It's a policy of them that if you don't want to use direct debit for billing, then you need to pay a 300 euros deposit. Idiotic, but oh well... I did sign up for the direct debit instead earlier this week, but still their online billing site says I'm due 300 euros by the 4 of October. So I need to call them and sort this out.
As for the apartment, and the payday getting closer and closer, I'm eager to get my hands on some new stuff here. Sure I'm not able to get all right after my first pay, but at some point for sure since I'm hoping to have my computer etc shipped over here and then get some furniture. My initial plan is to get at least a new couch (or just a 2nd one), a computer desk, a TV stand and something else that I haven't really figured out yet. For some reason I'm not really a fan of the carpet floor here as it tends to accelerate my allergic reactions at times. I do vacuum my place every now and then, but I'd need to do a thorough cleanup for the whole place at some point. I just don't have the tools or the mentality to do that :D I did do some vacuuming the other night and it does feel a bit better. But I'm not dying here or anything if I don't do it for lets say 3 weeks or a month :D
Another thing I don't like about the place is the hot water system. I mean you actually have to heat it up first before you can use it. And having an electrical system with bills and all that, it eats energy to heat up the water which then shows up in the bills too. I'm no expert on these, but if there's something I hope for, it's an electric shower and preferably the whole water system. I don't know if it's complicated to install or if it costs shitloads of money, but at times getting up around 4:40am just start heating up the water for your shower can make you swear a little bit. And since I don't have a dishwasher, I also need to heat up the water to do the dishes. Plus the worst thing is that I don't even know how to use the stupid timer for the heater nor do my two neighbors. Even the landlord was a bit like what the heck...
I need more clothes, that's what I need money for! Being here over a month with no paycheck from work yet has really put my financing plans in new light when you need to use 4-5 different shirts until you need to wash them. I've two jerseys here (Liverpool and TB Bucs) but those are not allowed at work due to company policies :(
So I've been giving a lot of thought to what I'm going to do with my remaining days off from work. We're supposed to use them by the end of this year so I've basically 3 months to use all 7,5 days. Naturally Christmas is something to always think about, but the fact is that the flight tickets are damn expensive. With 400 euros return price it's a no go so naturally I'm considering just to stay here and save the money for a TV or something. And the reason is not just the price, but the fact that I'm planning to head over to Rovaniemi in late March for this exchange student+tutor reunion. That ought to be a one big party! Then on the same trip, I will stop by at my parents and friends in Tornio as well. A week off minimum is my plan. Had a look at the plane tickets too and they're somewhere around 200 euros which is not that bad. Depends on how you want to go there really. Surely playing around with Ryanair and waiting at the airports can reduce the price significantly, but I've always been the kind of guy that wants things done properly without the need of being bored at some airports. Efficient I think is the right word in this situation. But we'll see about this whole Finland vacation thing later on :)
One big topic here and with everyone coming here from abroad is smoking. Ireland was I think the first country anywhere to ban smoking indoors in public places such as bars, pubs, restaurants... At the time it felt a bit stupid, but now after having it in Finland as well for years I think it's a tremendous. After a night out your clothes don't smell like shit and the air at bars and pubs is much cleaner. Plus it's refreshing to go outside for a smoke. The Irish are big smokers and the prices of smokes here are really high. I mean whereas a pack of Marlboro in Finland is about 5 euros, here it's more like 8 or 9 euros and I think in Slovakia is was around 3 euros. I don't know for sure as I don't smoke that brand :) But in a long run, that will make you consider quit smoking due to financial reasons. I personally don't smoke too much and in the summer, I only smoked maybe 5 packs over a 3 month period which is little. Here I've been smoking more or less 2 packs a week and even 3 but I also know it's mostly the work and the new place. As soon as I feel more comfortable, I will at least reduce it.
In other news: Ireland got Google Street View recently! When I got here, it hadn't been made available even though the cars had been going around in mid 2009 already. So it took Google around 1,5 years to do the whole thing and get it live. But it's fantastic and helps a lot with knowing where everything is and how it looks! I even found my own home from it :P
Finally, due to my website backend (WordPress) version being rather old, I'm planning to get the new one and while I'm at it, revamp the looks of my website. I did some work on WP layouts in my thesis and then in another course during my thesis and I've a pretty good idea how it works. I'm not sure what the WP3 version did to all this so I might need to figure out how it works first if I'm going to customize anything. But we'll see... I'm in no hurry and I don't mind using some other themes taken from the internet. I just don't have the time to start studying the whole thing and it takes time to design a layout as well. With working from 6am to 3pm and going to bed around 9-10pm, you don't really have much time or the energy to do any of that:)
Anyway, that's it for now o/
My blank memory
It's time to update some stuff again and I swear, I had so many things to mention here and yet every time I think of typing those things down on a note or to my phone, I just forget or am too lazy to do it. Now I'm just sitting here thinking what I was supposed to write about. How stupid is that...
So anyway, work's good. I'm not going much into details as there's not much new to tell. I started working on last Tuesday with the other Finnish guys and we get a taxi every morning paid by the company from in front of our doors. It picks all three of us around 5:30am and we're always about 15 minutes early. Which reminds me that today we actually didn't have a taxi. I went outside at 5:20 as the taxi is usually in front at that time and I waited around 10 mins until I noticed that we're supposed to be picking the second guy already so there must be something wrong. So I called the local taxi company without knowing who actually takes us to work. Turned out that the company I called to doesn't even usually take us to work and instead it's some other company. Well anyway, this local company takes us to work for 5 euros so it's no problem, but since I didn't have the 2nd guy's phone number, I just called the 3rd guy and told him that we'd pick him up. I tried to persuade the taxi driver to pick the 2nd guy as well, but he didn't want to go and "just stand in front of the house in case he's not there at all". So we didn't pick him up at all. But we got to work and due to our poor financial status (pay day in 1,5 weeks), I had to pay the whole 7 euros for the taxi. The company better pay me back... with interest :P
Oh oh oh! I got to tell you about this though... I went to Dublin city center on Saturday with a couple of my Finnish co-workers. We got stood up by the 4th guy, but that didn't really matter. We went to this place called Woolshed and oh man I got to tell you, it's awesome! It's a sports bar so you can imagine that they show sports. But they are something else to what I'm used to :P
There's like a 200 inch screen on the wall in the middle of the place and unless you're blocked by the poles around the place, you can see it. Also next to it is a somewhat 120 inch screen as well which on Saturday showed a different event compared to the big one. Oh and if you're blocked to see the game, no worries. There are... let me refresh my photographic memory... 8 LCD TV's around the two floor bar. And they also offer food, to my observation until around 10pm!
So you know... I was just thinking and also checking out already. What if I had a Saturday off, the English Premier League had games on that day, Liverpool was playing and I felt like "having a few"... You get where I'm going with this? ;) I was thinking of going to Woolshed on 20th of November. I think the games in EPL were Man City - Arsenal at 12:45, then some other game, I don't care, then Liverpool a game and after that it's already around 8pm. I like it :D
Definitely something worth trying some day! And you know me, I rarely turn down football and beer together if there's also food available :)
Also I didn't manage to sell my desktop so I'm trying to have it shipped over here as my laptop is already pretty much overdue with its lifeline. The screen is flickering every now and then plus there are some weird things happening as if the graphic adapter was giving up. But hopefully I'll get the desktop here soon so I just need to get a monitor and a desk for it all. Problem is that the shipping costs are huge and I'm talking like 120 euros. Plus I'm a bit afraid the whole thing will be broken once it gets here. I've heard some horror stories about computers being shipped over and them arriving in smaller sizes due to whatnot being crushed and becoming useless :(
Also am hoping to get my xbox360 here as I just had my Madden 11 three days before coming to Ireland. So am kind of gutted not having been able to play it. But as I get my tax returns in December, I might be getting a TV here (I don't have one at the moment). Will do wonders for my house to have something more than myself and a laptop here :D I had a Norwegian co-worker stopping by on Friday for a couple of beers and since I've nothing to do here, we just sat in the living room for a good 45mins. Sure girls do that every now and then and I didn't mind that as we talked about stuff. But you know a TV, music or something would be nice to have in case of visitors! :D
So I have my eye on this offer at Curry's for a 37" Samsung Full HD TV with a very nice TV stand included for about 600 euros.
So what else... I should start writing down on these things I should write about. Maybe it's just the 6-15 working hours that are drinking the juice out of me. I now there are shitloads of things to tell about, but I think this update already reached its peak and "maximum" length.
But I'll write something more later this week, I promise. I'll make that list even just to motivate me :D
On a more personal note
I've been here for 3 weeks now so I reckon it's time to see where I stand right now and how things are going more on a personal level. Not that the previous posts haven't been from the same level, but a bit more detailed perhaps.
First thing that people think of when they think of Ireland, is the weather. At least usually, so lets dig into that one first. Sure I've been here during the autumn season so it's pretty much the same everywhere, but then again it also usually changes the same way when we talk about winter or summer too so just to give you an idea what I know about the weather here:
It's raining. At the moment it's raining and it's been raining every day the past week or so. When I came over there I didn't see a drop coming down for about a week and I was honestly a bit amazed by that. Sure enough the locals told me that this is very unlike from the Irish weather, but it was nice when we had plus 20 degrees and sun was shining like it was still summer as it should be.
Then came the rain and it has been raining pretty much every day. Some days had heavy rain and light rain all day and some have had just light rain all day. Despite the rain, I comfort myself with the assumed fact that there's no snow during winter, which I hate quite a lot after living in the North for close to 30 years. And it's also not supposed to be so cold over here either. Minus 5 degrees might sound bad to some, but that being the lowest temperature you usually get here during winter time, I think it's no biggie. Someone like me coming from -15 to -30 degrees most of the winter time, it makes me consider about buying more shorts and t-shirts.
I went out on Friday with other Finnish pals and had a lot of fun. Sure enough was raining, but that's a whole another story which I pretty much covered in the previous chapter. Next day though, I woke up and was barely able to stand on my left foot. For some reason, be it the drinking and the partying or not, my foot must have somehow been twisted because I can barely bend my ankle while walking. It hurts like hell when I do that, but when it's resting, it's just fine but I still can't bend it like I should. I figure there are two possibilities for this...
A) I twisted my foot at some point on Friday, but can't remember shit about it or it just didn't hurt when it happened
B) All the walking to work, back to home and in work has caused some sort of a stress to my foot. I mean the HP building is huge and me being such a lazy dawg, I don't walk too much and with the left knee fucked up, it may have caused my left foot to strain a bit or something. I mean my right foot is fine, as always.
It's so funny that everything that happens to me, it's always my left leg. I've never had problems with my right leg. My left leg instead had the knee spiral problems since teenage football times, ACL injury back in 2007 and with the ACL surgery just being a knee spiral surgery, it's not fully healed and I'm pretty sure there's still something quite wrong with my left knee. So I just hope it's not something that projects to my whole left leg.
So anyway, a doctor here is around 50-60 euros from what I heard and 3 times a year the company is supposed to pay like 30e for each visit. So it's a bad deal I reckon, but I will give this foot a few days to see if it passes by. I don't feel like going to my boss after 2 weeks at work that my leg hurts, can I get a sick leave... boohoo.
Also today at work I discussed with my fellow Finns about the remaining holidays from work. I'm supposed to have like 9 to spend before the end of the year so naturally spending it in Finland with my family during Christmas sounds like a natural option. But then again, considering the flight expenses from here to Northern Finland... It can be quite a hefty pile of money. I'm talking like 25% of my monthly salary so it's quite a lot to be honest when like 40% of it is going to rent already.
So I was thinking that I have like a couple of options that I've figured out so far:
A) Fly to Finland for Christmas and spend the holidays over there in -20 degrees before coming back here.
B) Take a Ryanair flight to for example Fuerteventura in Canary Islands for about half the money I'd pay for a trip to Finland and spend my holidays under a palm tree or something with my shorts on drinking nice cold drinks.
C) Stay at home over here and save the damn money and use it for something else.
And to be honest, I'm seriously considering the 2 latter options. Not that I don't love my family, but I'm sure they understand that this is an option where as everything else too. I'm planning to travel to Northern Finland in March anyway so I don't see it being much big of a deal. Sure it's "holidays and you must come", but lets be realistic here for a moment. I've been here for 3 months when it's time to book the flights to Finland and I've had 3 paychecks by that time. Everyone here keeps telling me that it takes like 5 months to settle down decently over here and to get yourself financially organized. So I must admit that I'm a bit uncertain about having the money to travel forth and back in December already without running into financial trouble.
I'm sure you're all wondering about how my job is... Well since it's a job, I'm sure you're all also very well aware of the fact that the companies like a bit of privacy for themselves so I can't go much into details here. Instead I will just give out the bits and pieces :)
Toni's work course 101: He works as a technical support agent for a company called CPL located in an HP building (not working for HP though) in Leixlip, Ireland. The first 3-4 weeks are basically just training to get to know how things work and what's going on around the place while settling down (hence the previous titles in my blog). TSA job is pretty much about answering e-mails and phone calls from customers while logging their information and trying to solve the issue(s). It's not a glorious job, but I think it's one of those jobs that you either suit for or you don't. Sure it depends a lot on the attitude, but it's in everyone's interest that you keep your head cool and try to do your job until you're just fed up with it and want to move on. Which happens quite a lot in this job, no matter where you work. Some are here just for the money and then get off to a vacation in Thailand. Some are here to get work experience before eventually finding a better paid job elsewhere. Myself? I think I'm more looking for both experience and work experience. The career opportunities here are very good though so you don't have to spend years and years answering phone calls either, you can actually climb up the ladder and that naturally makes everyone happy.
Now to my apartment. Last and final chapter, I promise :)
I pay 700 euros for the apartment and it's around 60 square meters. It has a living room, a kitchen, bathroom and a bedroom. It's (almost) fully furnished and the bed is a double size so me being a single guy, I like it (for sleeping purposes you pervs!) :P
But a few things have crossed my mind, flaws you might say, that need some repairing or attention:
- The toilet seat is a bit loose from the other side. So I hope to get it fixed before I some tiring morning or evening after a night out go to toilet to take a crapper... I accidentally crush my balls with that thing. So I got to get that fixed asap. It's also very uncomfortable to use when the seat is going from side to side.
- I don't understand why warm water has been made such a big thing here. In Finland and even in Bratislava I was used to just turn the damn handle that said HOT and you get at least warm water. But here you apparently need to heat it up first and that's just... from the middle ages to me. I don't know how things work related to this, but if I have to get up 20-30mins earlier to get hot water from the shower, it blows. The timers are hebrew to me. It has no logic at all and nor did it have to Irish people either.
- Water heater or the kettle... Doesn't work. I just saw an opened junction box on my desk last week and figured the landlord might have tried to fix it, but it's not working so I wonder what it was for or if the landlord just forgot it. Haven't seen him, but I heard he's a really nice guy and 82(!) years old. So I got to give props to that o/
- Internet connections are shite. My neighbors upstairs got one from UPC, but apparently I can't get it from them. I don't know why, but that's what they said. Now I'm considering Vodafone at the moment which I reckon is the next best thing (though far from UPC in price and quality). Also the damn landlines... Every ISP (Internet Service Provider) here offers phone deals with the internet connection. So yes, the landlines here are still used very much. I haven't used one for like 10 years so you can imagine how much this seems like the dark ages to technology jackass like me.
That's it, now this is the last chapter after all. But I'll keep it short. Take care everyone!
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