Category: travel

Roses

It was only when we passed the Helsinki Botanic Garden on one of our bike rides that I realized that I didn’t see roses that summer. It is not like I was not allowed, the Chicago Botanic Garden and many of the city’s smaller rose gardens are open to the public. It just didn’t happen. And when I saw the blooming roses, I wanted to come back and on feet and enjoy them.

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Biking in Helsinki

We biked a lot :). Biking is one of my favorite things in Helsinki, but now it was even better. Since I got my very own bike here, I didn’t have many opportunities to ride it. This time, I rode it every day. And not only because the weather was cooperating, but also because Boris made it a habit for himself, which I was also happy about. I used to nudge him into doing some physical activity daily, and now for the first time, I do not remember since when, although the gym is still closed, I exceeded my move goal every day.

The biking routes were exciting. The first time, I didn’t even try to take pictures. THen I asked Boris if we can do multiple stops next time, but I could not tell in advance where I want to stop, so I only took a third of all the pictures I wanted :). I tried a couple more times, but I still didn’t capture a lot, like four swans, very close to the bike path, or mounted police :).

But whatever I got, here it comes.

First day, first ride
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Eyes And Travel

 do not think I wrote in detail about my last eyes-related updates. After my visit to the LensCrafters, things only got better. Fist, I got my multifocal eyeglasses. They work almost perfectly, which was especially important during my air travel. It was the first time I traveled without any worries about the contact lenses and them being in my eyes for way too long. The only thing I find slightly inconvenient with them is that the reading part of glasses interferes with going down the stairs and looking in the direction of the floor in general. 

Also, I tried the multifocal contacts, and that was a life-changing experience. It’s very close to what I was hoping to achieve after the cataract surgery. I still need the reading glasses, but only when I type or look at a really small print, and then it is +1, not +2.75. The doctor reduced the strength of both my glasses and lenses, which helped a lot. 

What it has to do with my travel? First, as I said, I was able to travel in glasses. Second, it is unbelievable how many more things I can see now! 

I am still learning to use my vision, still learning to look both further and closer. I was biking a lot all these days, and I was way more aware of my surroundings than before. 

Also, although I still have my double-vision, it is now localized to a very specific distance. It’s precisely the distance where I need to see the cars in front of me, so I still need my driving glasses. But first, I think that now the prisms can be reduced, a second – now I feel that this can be corrected. 

My all eyes ordeal started when I went to the doctor to correct my double vision. After all these surgeries, I thought that I do not want to do anything for a while. But now I think that it may be a good time to try to fix it. 

More from Suomelinna

The sea
A swan family

Suomenlinna Pictures

Our traditional trip on the ferry to the Suomenlinna Fortress

The panoramic view of one of my favorite places on the island
And my favorite Suomenlinna residents 🙂
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Air Travel During Pandemic

In case you are wondering how it is to travel in these crazy times, here is how it went.
The First Terminal of ORD was pretty empty. After the check-in line (which was long but very socially distant and everything), I went to the TSA, and there was nobody before or after me. They have glass shields in front of each officer, and they asked me to take the mask off for just a couple of seconds, and then I went to have my luggage scanned, and I was also scanned, all as usual, just very fast since there is no wait.

There were very few people in the Terminal, some cafes open, others closed. I didn’t get any food because I was still feeling nervous and could barely eat since morning.

The notoriously long Lufthansa boarding line was also shorted, although the aircraft was far from being empty. They left the middle seats unoccupied, and also there was almost nobody in the first and business class. But more of the other seats were filled.

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How It All Started

On July 10, the new EU regulations regarding border control were announced. It was already expected that the US would be banned from entering Europe. When we talked with Boris about it the next day, about the fact that for many countries, the doors are now open, I asked him whether he checked for details at the Finnish Border Control site and whether I should check, and he said – no, it will be just one more reason for me to be sad.

So I didn’t, but on Tuesday, July 14, I decided to check it, and to my surprise and amazement, I found out that some restrictions were relaxed. The website said that now not only families of EU citizens can visit, but also families of Finnish permanent residents can visit. I emailed Boris immediately, and Wednesday morning, we talked, and he asked whether I am coming next week.

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I am in Helsinki

And I can’t quite believe it. It was not going to work, but it worked. It feels like a dream, but this dream is going to last for a week, and I can’t ask for more.

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Chicago. Summer. Happiness.

Today, the whole Riverwalk was open, I didn’t have to get up and down, and was able to walk all the way from Michigan Avenue to LaSalle

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June 1995. Our Trip to Poland. Part 2

I have no pictures from that trip. None. I didn’t own a camera, and whenever I tried to use other people’s cameras, the pictures would turn out horrible, so I was 200% convinced I will never be able to produce a single decent shot. Taking pictures, processing films was way bigger deal back then, so I never even asked our hosts. Waldek took these two pictures at home, on the next day after our arrival. 

I haven’t seen Dowgerts for five years. We barely heard anything from them except for that unbelievable humanitarian flight in December 1991 (I need to go back and check whether I wrote about it).  

Back in 1990, Waldek was a laid-off pilot. His wife Marysia was a school teacher (and I got to know her because she was a part of the teachers’ delegation to Leningrad in 1989). When I talked to them on the phone before coming, they said, “They have lots of news,” They will tell all about it when I come. The news was revealed to us immediately after they met us at the train station: Marysia was now a school principal, and Waldek was a Mayor of Pruszcz Gdanski! 

Now, they owned a car, and Waldek drove us home (as usual, everybody except Anna got seasick). The apartment was the same, but they were talking about getting a bigger and better one. Their older daughter Anetka was 17, and the next day she took us to Gdansk. She didn’t speak Russian. My kids didn’t speak English, so I had to translate their questions each time they wanted to ask something. And when Anetka took us to the city museum, and the kids had some questions, I had to translate their questions into English to Anetka, she would translate them into Polish to the museum personnel, and then the answers were translated twice 🙂  

She also took us to Mariacka Cathedra, and we climbed all the way to the top. Funny enough, Anna Climbed all the way up by herself but was scared to go down, and Anetka brought her down in her arms. 

We talked a lot. There were so many new things around, Poland has changed a lot since 1990. They showed us videos from the school plays, and it was mindblowing. They had videos with Disney cartoons. They had Legos. They had a huge collection of figurines from KinderSurprises. Anetka was talking about going to study in America. All of that was from a different universe. 

The next morning, we were ready to go to our destination – a vacation house at Krynica Morska.

My historical posts are being published in random order. Please refer to the page Hettie’s timeline to find where exactly each post belongs and what was before and after.