Time to go.... (Richmond Hill, UK)

It start to be time to pack things and head back to Finland. UK has been fantastic place, very educating and very "gentle" to our family. We will miss this great country and hope that we can shortly visit again. We will keep on missing all our old and new friends and your place will remain in our heart forever... I took this picture from our window. we have lived in Richmond Hill and picture is to west, showing what kind of beautiful evening views we have been lucky to enjoy :)

Portobello Market, Notting Hill (London, UK)

You can found fantastics places from London. One of the interesting places to do different kind of valuable foundings is actually Portobello Market... lots of antiques, items you can collect, eateble items (kebab, sushi, etc), lots of bakeries and lots of other valuable stuff. We actually only visited because of movie "Notthing Hill", as per the bookstore as well as "Hugh Grant's" apartment are there... I am not that interested about Hugh Grant (even he is one of the best British actors), but more or less Julia Roberts :)

Duch Pancake House (Holborn), London

This is some interesting place I was introduced earlier during March 2008 by Bajith, Assaf, Brandan and Jonathan. It was awesome, what kind of food Dutch persons can eat, so pancakes were interesting.... of course very positive experience, and you probably dont end up being hungry after eating. Now I had possibility to visit with family, which is of course interesting experience. Service was excellent and when I was hanging around with camera, one staff member kindly took a picture from us.

Hackney Town and Shaolin Monks

One thing, I have always wanted to see, is Shaolin munks presenting their amazing Kung-Fu presentations... unfortunately those has not been in Scandinavia with me during same time (to be honest, I am not sure if Shaolin Munks has been ever in any Finnish speaking countries. Now we found out just co-insidently, that there was one presentation in Hackney Town, so in that sense first task was try to figure out, where the heck was Hackney Town.... and after we found that, it was easy.

After great performance, we found Hackney Townhall (I guess) and kids loved of course lights, because that remained them from Finland

Tai Pei Restaurant, Waterloo (London, UK)

Well. I had some interesting possibilities earlier to see how rugby thing is working and get also brilliant company from local friends Duncan and Jowel. Here Manta is walking from left, Jowel in back Duncan is wrestling with my daughter (she alwaus is fighting with someone) and Sarkku, Manta's cousing was visiting during extended weekend... I was lucky enough that focus was done by camera, not manually by me...

Rugby: England vs. Pacific Islands (Twickenham)

I guess it was pretty much after Faversham hop festival, when new old friend Duncan sent me text message asking are you interested to see some rugby. This interesting sport has been more or less been only partly clear to me, so why not. He booked tickets already 1.5 months beforehand and I was pretty happy to see some interesting game. On the otherhand, when there is someone sitting next to you, explaining what the heck is going on, it is actually much easier to follow game. Also background information helps better understand whole big picture. Interesting game, but even more interesting night after bar after bar after bar.... you know ;)

British Museum (London, UK)

Once again, one of our family's favorite places... or actually Lassi's favorite place. He loves Egyptian stories, hieroglyphs and study sargofags. Sitting 2 hours on the floor, copying everything what he can see. During that time, when Lassi was doing his "studies" with Mom and Taru, I was visiting otherside of British Museum with Laura. We ended up to see fashinating history from Africa continent.

Choi Kwang Do (Richmond, UK)

Our family started Choi Kwang Do in Richmond at the end of January 2008. After tight evaluation of different martial arts, we selected this, as it was only martial arts which was completing every persons requirements in our family. Kids wanted some freedom of practise their martial arts, not following tight rules and regulations, but more or less learning by doing (playing). On the other hand, Manta didnt want to concentrate for competitions, but wanted to learn something by doing more or less together. I personally twisted my knee badly, so I wanted some safe martial arts, without jumping and also with prior to use hands maybe a bit more than legs, as kicking was containing some risk of repeat my injury (which didnt actually never happen). On the otherhand, it is nice to get doing something with full power, so in that sense only some lightweight practises was out of the guestion. This has been great stop for stressful days a couple times a week and gradings has been passed. in The picture, kids has yellow, but currently they both has yellow senior already. Now we just need to wait, that someone is bringing this art to Finland as well :)

Jameson Whiskey Distillery (Dublin, Ireland)

We visited in Jameson's Whiskey Distillery. After the very interesting tour, we got some whiskey tasting, after that we actually had lunch in distillery. both whiskey and food was superb!