Helsinki

Helsinki and Tampere were wonderful. I loved Finland, and I really want to go back. I’d like to take Phil there, I know he’d really like it.

Hayley and I flew from Prestwick to Stanstead on the Sunday night, and we met Chris Devenney there (who went to my school but is now my flatmate, bit of an odd coincidence). Straight off the plane we headed for the bar. 2 Magners later I was feeling a little tipsy. Hayley had been knocking back the Baileys and with our lack of eating we were a little worse for wear. So we scraped together the last of our pounds and had a bowl of stale tortellini. Totally not worth a fiver, but it passed time. We spent the following 9 hours playing top trumps (both ‘celebrity’ and ‘Harry Potter’) and Hangman, Squares, and other paper games of years gone by. We sat in Costa coffee and waited in the empty airport for what seemed like weeks. It dragged on and on…..

Eventually at about 4am, Maxine, Jodie and Vikki turned up (they had been staying at Jodie’s in Salisbury). They were far too hyper for my liking but at around 6 we checked in and went and had yet another coffee in starbucks...

(Finland from the air)
The flight to Tampere was hell. I felt so so ill. I had never been so glad to land.

At Tampere the ground was covered in snow, the runway was iced up. FINLAND! We were all so excited and ran across the runway to the tiny airport terminal. We got our bags and got on a coach to Helsinki. €25 already. Public transport would prove to be expensive this week.

(Hayley and I on the Runway)

In Helsinki we met Emma who took us to McDonalds for breakfast. I still wasn’t feeling too great but it was so good to see Emma. She went and bought us a 3 day bus pass (…€20) and we sat and ate our Finnish McDonalds. Carita came and took Vikki, Maxine and Chris to her flat on the bus, while, Hayley, Jodie Emma and myself went in her car with all the luggage. We settled in to the tiny room where I would be staying in a bed with Hayley and Vikki and Maxine had 2 singles surrounding us. There wasn’t space to stand. Carita’s flat was empty. There was no food or drink. The fridge stank of rotting flesh…luckily that night we had dinner at Emma’s house, where her dad (who originates from Manchester) made us Thai curry. A decent meal at last! Back to Carita's to get ready to go out, and Emma's friend Ville came over with some black alcoholic finnish drink. It was pretty much thick aftershock. So we drank the whole bottle.

(Ville Carita and myself)
That night we went out to the Barfly in Helsinki. We met Emma’s friends, who were all lovely. We got very drunk (me on the pear cider yum yum) and danced the night away. I met a French guy whose version of ‘hello’ involved bribing me to talk with a cigarette. Interesting move, so Hayley and I entertained him for a while with our useless French, which is even worse when I’m drunk. His name was Dimitri, or Dim for short. If you ever read this, get in touch haha, you were interesting…Greek, French, Finnish hybrid man.
(Maxine and I, still bemused by Finnish....)
Emma decided it was time to leave and go get a McDonalds (wasn’t really feeling up to it myself, but okay.) However, they were shut and Vikki, Jodie and I all really really had to pee…..so we ended up squatting in the middle of fucking Helsinki, in some square with blue lights and big mounds of earth, right outside some sort of shopping center. Oh how embarrassing……..

When we eventually got back to Carita’s, she made a tiny tray of oven chips, which didn’t really help us, and then we all crashed out, sleeping for the first time since Saturday night.

Welcome to Tuesday, our first full day in Helsinki. We went and had breakfast in Gusto in the Kaampi center. It would soon be our favourite eating place. The food there was so nice, I think I had a mozzarella and pesto baguette, which was €5 and all so fresh. Healthy eating in Finland is so much easier than here. No wonder we have such a huge obesity problem. I think we could learn so much from Finland. We wandered around the shops and I bought a few tops from Vero Moda.

Emma took us to a really posh hotel for drinks, we had a bottle of champagne up in a bar on the 12th floor of this building and had our photos taken out on the balcony. The view of Helsinki was phenomenal. What was interesting however, were the toilets. They all had huge windows in them, meaning anyone could see you…doing your business. I guess they must be mirrored on the outside, cause the windows really were huge…Didn’t stop us peeing though. Then we headed back to Carita’s to get changed (the others went back to Emma’s).

We had dinner in Ville’s studio flat – 2 huuuge pizzas between the visitors, which ended in a race to finish after we split into 2 teams. Best pizza I’ve ever had!

We went out to The Club firstly, and then The Barfly again. I was drinking white Russians (they seem to be pretty popular in Helsinki, don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone drink one at home though!?). Blueberry shots that came in beautiful big shot glasses - which were quickly tumbled into my handbag by Jodie, and of course, pear cider.
(Blueberry shots - with blueberry seeds and cream!?)
The photos from this night are pretty spectacular, Ville picking Jodie and I up – don’t think anyone has managed that since I was a baby! Us pretending to be antelopes, Hayley pulling some blonde Finnish guy…yup it was all pretty eventful! It was also this night that Hayley did a forward roll into Vikki’s crotch in the taxi. Her taxi gymnastics are still amazing.

On Wednesday, we went into town for a while, then went to Emma’s house for…NAKED SAUNA!! The highlight of the trip we had all been waiting for. Of course some of us weren’t too pleased with the thought of naked sauna, so we wore swimsuits. I went in with Jodie and Vikki -“three hippos at the zoo” we declared as tiny petite Maxine looked at us through the glass. Still, we sat there for a good while and I felt like my skin had sweated out so much crap, it was fantastic. I could do with having a sauna in my house haha.

After that Emma’s dad cooked us Finnish sausages and then we headed out to the Aussie bar to meet Emma’s friends, however it was €7 for a glass of cider or €8 for a white wine, so we didn’t drink until we got the The Club, which was €1 champagne, cider or beer night! This is what we’d been waiting for!! The table was crammed full of drinks, you’d buy yourself 5 at a time, just to get drunk, as the offer was only on until midnight.

Jodie ended up buying champagne with her credit card, and Hayley chatted up the man at the blackjack table. After we managed to drink all the drinks (it was a major rush of downing glasses of champagne and pints of cider) we left to go to Swengi, a karaoke nightclub. By this point we were all fucked, Hayley walked into a sign and knocked it over, and I was worse for wear. Again. However at one point something changed and I became really upset and ended up in the toilets, phoning Phil, crying about our relationship which seems to be slipping through my fingers like sand. I remember telling him how he was the only one for me, how I would never move on and how I would always love him. Then I got annoyed and went “FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK IT!” and hung up. I’m a wonderful girlfriend…
Then Emma dragged me up onstage to sing Careless Whisper with her. Sadly, I don’t even know the words to it; all I know is the tune as we used to play it in my school band. That, combined with my drunken state, and the porno that they were playing behind the words, I couldn’t even stand there, let alone sing. So yes, I made a complete fool of myself in front of a whole karaoke bar. Nice one Mags.

Then Emma and Carita fell out, and Vikki and Jodie fell out. Ville had to walk home in the rain and yet again, the taxi cost a fortune, but we got home and we crashed out.
(Salads for breakfast - cheer up maxine!)
Thursday, Vikki, Maxine, Hayley and I went into town ourselves and had a huge salad for breakfast (yum!) and then we met up with the others and Emma took us on a tram to the Seaside where we went and had coffee in a gorgeous café. We then got the tram back into town and went to see the Cathedral (some fit kids decided to run up the steps, I however, lumbered up with Jodie). After that Hayley and I went shopping for a while and I bought presents for Magz’s 19th, Phil and my brotheim.
(Cathedral place)
We then went to Eatz, a multi-cultural restaurant specialising in Mexican and Australian food (it also had a sushi bar downstairs I think). Most of us had fajitas, which were wonderful and messy. There are photos somewhere to prove it. The barfly had a €1 drinks night and the Aussie bar had Emma’s ex Terry dj-ing at it, but we decided that considering we had a flight the next day we should perhaps for once not get fucked. However that didn’t stop me having a few pear ciders before we headed home. However, that was just the start of the night, as we began to pack. Packing with 4 girls high on Helsinki is not easy. It ended up in Vikki trying to force her repulsively smelly feet into Hayley’s mouth, and Hayley being terrified of this wall-ornament thing in the kitchen. It was a bit freaky but she really was going nuts. We ended up staying awake until about 6am, the only person who really slept was Maxine, though god knows how through all the noise.

Friday was our last day in Helsinki, we got the bus into town and then a huge double decker train outa town to Tampere. Ville came on the train to say goodbye to everyone (I hope he comes to visit, he really was a nice guy) and we set off. Tampere is further North than Helsinki so the snow was deeper and the wind sharper. When we arrived we stuffed our suitcases into lockers and went for a drink in a bar called “Home” which was designed to be a bit like a house, with little rooms with sofas where you could sit with your friends, looking like some sorta 60s living room. Very cool concept. It is here that I had my last glass of Finnish Pear Cider haha. We then went to have dinner at this really cheap Pizza Buffet place because Vikki had ran out of money (though I still had to pay €3 towards her €8 meal). It was a pretty scary place, full of weird hobo people, and it was all run by one woman. We also stole ice cream (intended if you pay an extra €2) and had a jolly good time. Our last half hour was spent in Stockman, spending our last few euros (I bought myself a small Finland mug) and then it was time to get on the bus and go to Tampere. We said our goodbyes to Emma (Jodie and I were close to tears) and got on the coach. Within half and hour we were at the airport. The next while isn’t really worth documenting, but we arrived at Stanstead safely.

The night passed relatively quickly. It took ages to go through passport control. We had a coffee and by 5am we had checked in. We wandered around duty free for a while (Agent Provocateur’s perfume is lovely – hint hint anyone…) and all the tax-free shops. Didn’t buy anything, and then finally we could board the flight. It was quick, but the strong winds forced the pilot to do some crazy landing at Prestwick. Vikki and Maxine’s flight was delayed because of the winds, but luckily, we were back at my house by 9am, Saturday morning, and straight to bed.

A wonderful holiday, which opened my eyes to loads of new things, be it about my friendships, my country or my financial situation haha.

Moi Moi!


Xxxxxx maggieinthegraveyard

London tomorrow...

13 January 2007 (backdated)

On Thursday evening I saw the two people I despise most in the world. They walked right by me, chattering away, blissful in their hideous relationship. The two people who made mine crumble, who made me out to be a person I am not. So what did I do? Nothing, I did nothing. I felt ill, thought I was going to be sick. Hayley and Magz didn’t understand. Nobody does. Nobody understands what I’m going through.

I just read a book called Clumsy by Jeffrey Brown. It’s a fantastic graphic novel I have wanted to read for a while now. Basically, it documents the lives of Jeff and Theresa, two people in a long distance relationship.

It’s the best graphic novel I have read in a very long time. Magz didn’t really like it and was laughing at it, but when I sat alone in my room, and read it just there, I realised the frailty of Jeff and how similar the relationship between Jeff and Theresa was to mine and Phil’s. The ending of Jeff and Theresa made me feel sick, cold. It wasn’t bad…but I saw sadness and heartbreak in Jeff that I feel I may be heading towards myself.

My uncle Jim died on Wednesday night. The funeral is on Tuesday, however I am in Helsinki. I feel awful about that. He was an amazing man who really loved his wife, and I respected him so much for that. His wife, Annie, fell very ill around 10 years ago and needed constant care as she could not walk or speak. She also had Alzheimer’s and didn’t recognise her family, but he cared for her himself, in their home, right until the day she died in February 2005. Her funeral was Valentines Day. I will never forget or forgive the behaviours of that day.

We are having really stormy weather at the moment; I hope it doesn’t interrupt our flights.

I met Keil in the pub last night. It was good to see him and he wished me a happy new year. He’s one person that gets judged a lot in a negative manner, but really, deep down, he is a lovely, caring young man, and I wish him all the best with his life, and his work. In one years time Keil will be a fully qualified electrician…makes me feel like a waste of space. Good luck mate.

After I come back from Finland I am going to London for a weekend. It’s Australia day and my cousin Ellen will be there.

I won’t be able to see Phil because he has a Polish girl staying with him.

Distant Dark Places

This is the start of something new. A world of pain and loss, a world where I am so alone.

On the 13th December (unlucky for some eh...) Phil and I decided to go on a break. I'm not sure how permanent this break is or what we will gain from it, but certainly I feel destroyed because my life has been poisoned, my relationship has been so damaged, by other people. I will not ever be able to forgive them. As far as I am concerned, they are dead. I miss him terribly already.

That night, Emma was going through the same thing with Tony. We drank cider, wine and vodka, hoping to numb the pain we were feeling. It worked for a bit, out lives decended into some sort of chaos with her tearing up an advent calendar, making cheese nachos and emptying a vending machine. Cigarettes were so good, and the night felt like it was ours. I hate what this has done to me, I am not who I was before. All sense of reality has been completely destroyed by the loss of the man I loved more than anyone.

I woke up in the morning with my elbow in someone's face. In all honesty I thought it was Phil at first...then I rememebered what had happened the night before. So I realised it must be Hayley since we share a bed almost every night after drinks. But no, it wasn't her? It was Emma...

We got up and were generally just lazing about, still kinda drunk after only a few hours sleep. Then we heard the cries.

Emma and I ran along the corridor to find Vikki slumped on the ground, crying. I stood there in a Burger King crown and a blanket, she was wearing her pink pyjamas. Her ankle was looing really bad, she had fallen/hit it while running away from Matt who was giving her a wedgie. We took her across to the medical center after quickly dressing, who told us to go to A&E with her. So Matt, Chris, Jodie and I take Vikki to the hospital in Matt's car. However, all the roads were flooded from the awful weather we've been having, and we had to go a really long way around. Matt and Chris dump us at the door of the hospital and we sit in the sub-zero waiting room until Vikki is seen (more than an hour). We called Matt to come and get us again, all we had was our phones and keys because we had rushed to the hospital. He was being a prick and refused to come and get us, so we were stuck in the middle of nowhere with no money or cards, just our phones. Eventually we got a hold of Maxine who withdrew money and we got a taxi home. However, because of the flooding it cost £17 to get home. We were cold, hungry and annoyed at the boys, so had not had a good day. After all that I went for a nap for hours while hayley used my laptop. Sleep is good just now...it helps me forget the reality. I wish I could sleep forever. I dream about Phil, but things are alright.

So after the hospital calamity, Hayley Vikki (hobbling about) and I went to Dusk. Free entry + £1 drinks + heartbreak = disaster.
We met up with Gavin (it was his birthday) and his friend Ros from the 6th floor, and then Grahame and his flatmate Laura came along too. Dusk was empty, but I didn't really care. Double vodkas and free shots....not much food.....i was very very sick. I think I'm in self-destruct mode. Grahame looked after me loads, I was so grateful because I really was in such a mess, crying about the Phil situ, being sick...generally a mess. But he held my hair back and wiped the tears and said all the right things. So I got a taxi home eventually after winning a fucking edible thong (it's been shoved in a drawer, never to be seen again) and Hayley being chatted up by a drug dealer while she ate his edible bra on the dance floor. Good old Dusk.

At home I proceeded to make 4 packets of noodles (for me hayley and vikki - god knows why so much).
We sat in my room and ate them off Daisy the ironing board which has now taken up home in my room (fuck knows when I'll get rid of that beast). Hayley produced 3 shot glasses from her handbag to add to our extensive collection. We both slept in my bed, as usual...

In the morning I woke up with a splitting headache and very very sore limbs. I told hayley to fuck off to her own room, my smaller than single bed doesn't really accomodate the two of us. I then slept all day until about 6pm....when hayley made me get up. She brought a chippy home and we had that for breakfast/dinner. I think by this point it is Friday evening....
Hayley really wants to go out, I do too because it's Beth's last 'night out' though I feel extremely hungover. I didn't want to go to Dusk because of the previous night's sickness...and Fubar was Cream Classics night (excellent if I'm fucked out my face, but I wasn't planning on that) plus it was £10 entry! The Beat....just nah. So Dusk it was, ladies night....but I began to feel really really really sick, and Jodie and Hayley were fucked, so by 1am I left and went over to Grahame's flat for a while, just to sit somewhere warm and chat and listen to decent music. I was there for an hour maybe, we watched Scrubs and he gave me a tshirt he got from the Cathouse for free one night, to cheer me up. That was cool. Then Hayley phoned me saying she was outside the fubar, and I was to go meet them all.......however it was just her and Jodie hanmering on the door of this food place, which was shut (EVERYWHERE in stirling shuts at like 1am - its sooo shit) so I run up to them, going "hey hey jeez calm down" cause there was police everywhere and they were screaming through the letterbox of this place.
I asked them where Beth was, they assured me with Tony. Seemed a bit weird though, she would normally stick with Hayley but for some mad reason I trusted their judgement. I tried to call Tony to let him know we were going home but it kept going on to some answerphone thing. I said goodbye to Grahame and thanked him for looking after me, and got in a taxi with Jodie and Hayley. Then I get a call from Tony: "WHERE IS EVERYONE??!" He had even lost Beth. Apparently Jodie and Hayley had left the club and told nobody. After a while of frantically phoning around (Beth doesn't have a 'cell' phone) I discovered she'd walked to Grahame's flat. He walked her back to the Fubar and I managed to get Tony to go there too and get her. He was not amused - neither was I because they had deserted Beth.
Back at the flat arguments ensued. It was probably the worst night out I had ever had. Hayley was in a mess, she couldn't walk, so lay on the disgusting kitchen floor sobbing because I was mad at her. She's too tall for me to support so that was difficult as she flopped over me in a flurry of tears. I made her noodles and then she came into my bed, after deciding she's scared of the cupboard in her room. (This is down to the story of the girl who commited suicide in the halls and stuffed her own body into the overhead cupboard, leaving herself there to die - found months later after the holidays.) Whether this is true (for I know many of the suicide ones are - there is a memorial plaque outside our halls where a boy fell to his death) or not is another matter, but it certainly freaks folk out. There is also a ghost in the flat but that's another story.
So I spent yet another night with Hayley in my bed, cramped and uncomfortable, sober. I kicked her out the next morning because her mum was coming to get her at 11. She was still drunk, but managed somehow.

That day Beth and I tidied up my room, and packed all my stuff up into bags and even bins...it was a really sad experience actually. I'm finding it hard to realise I'll be going home in a few weeks though. I saw a message on my bebo from Phil, saying he missed me and stuff, that really cheered me up alot. Made me realise that maybe all is not lost.

I came home on Sunday night, and spent that night talking to Phil on webcam. I really miss my boy.

I'm not glad to be home.
I miss my friends, Hayley, Emsulka Bumskula, Beth, Vikki, Maxie, Jodie, Matt, GC, Chris.... I miss them all even if they are assholes sometimes.

I'm trying to book driving lessons but with no avail, the guy's mobile is off.


I can't stop listening to "Set Fire To The Third Bar". It was playing in Walkabout the night Phil had called me. It was a profound moment, a beautiful moment in amongst the Rogue Traders and Girls Aloud.

So welcome to my blog. It's not my first, and I guess it won't be my last.