Estonian Day No. 70.

Well... Saturday. I stood up quite early so that I wouldn't miss anything, and I didn't. Ilona stood up about half an hour later and made breakfast. The first thing she told me was "did you know that your mother and Eva called at midnight? They sang for me!" She seemed to have enjoyed that a lot. Then she happily and excitedly took my mother's package from the mantelpiece and sat down, only to jump up again at once to answer her phone. While she was receiving lots of congratulation, I went to get my presents for her and brought them down. Finishing the call, she decided to keep the best for the last and opened several other letters first. She was really happy reading Eva's letter and laughed when she read the first sentence of my mother's one and asked me "did you tell her this?" - it was in Estonian. I frankly answered that I hadn't and then remembered that she must have copied it from her own birthday card that I had sent her. Ilona thought that this was really funny. And everybody was very (!) happy when she pulled the Lindt chocolate out of the envelope. :D

not this one (it's far older and more used), but it looks the same

Well, she liked my presents too. I had found the DVD "Dorian Gray" and bought it since Janika had recommended the book - and unwrapping it, Ilona told me that this book had been her favourite during her university time. And when she found that pretty old book I had finally managed to buy - you can't imagine how relieved that guy in the shop was! - she liked it, too. I had decided on "Nils Holgerssoni imelik reis läbi Rootsi" (Nils Holgersson's strange journey over Sweden), which was pretty and old and kind of worn out, but still nice. And Ilona said she had read the story once or twice a long time ago, but she didn't own the book and was happy to have it now. And she appreciated receiving some more chocolate. :D

Later, Rainis and I helped to make the cake for the party and had a lot of free time afterwards. The party started sometime in the evening. Lots of guests came and I tried to be polite and sit around with them and got really frustrated after some time. Being at adults' parties is never easy for young people, especially when they're the only young people there (except some 6-9-year-olds running around). So after about two hours of staring somewhere and trying not to look too depressed and bored, Rainis took me upstairs because Ahti had asked him to do so to cheer me up. Juhani joined us and Rainis decided to make me speak only Estonian. So far there was no problem, but when he somehow refused to speak slowlier and wouldn't even have me ask for explanations of different stuff in English, I got even more frustrated. I mean, I am trying to learn, I really am, and I may not be perfect, but I am good. And speaking is really hard. So whenever people don't understand that (or refuse to listen to me when I try to explain it, because I can explain it only in English and not in Estonian, at least not when I become passionate with fury and have to keep calm somehow at the same time), I'd like to cry. Really. Same happens in several situations that are based on the same problem - the language.

Some time later, Rainis and Juhani left to visit some friend and I went downstairs again to join the party. Some people had already left and when I sat down, the discussion suddenly settled on me. When they asked Ilona stuff about me, she told them to ask me themselves. And thus they did. Sometimes Ilona still had to interprete but all in all it went quite well and I felt welcome and wanted and home again. This feeling had never really left me, but it's hard to keep it in mind when so much different stuff is going on. They all said that they had thought me to be really serious and severe and humouless which turned out to be wrong once I was involved in their discussion. Soon afterwards the topic changed again but I didn't feel as lost as I did before. When the guests left at about 0.15, I was chatting with Iris via FCBK about change of cast of Tanz der Vampire and about Alan Rickman. I went to bed at about 1.30 a.m.

I woke up on Sunday because it was so bright outside - compared to how bright days usually are in this time of the year. I thought about going on sleeping, but I didn't want to miss everything that was going on, so I stood up. Checking the time, I realized I had already missed the better part of the day - it was 12.33! I had slept for eleven hours and felt really relaxed. I called my mother later, since there were so many people at home now (my mother, my little Estonian sister Eva, my oldest sister Evi, my brother Henry and my brother-in-law Keith) that I thought it might make most sense to call that moment. But somehow calls are easier to make when you have only one person to talk to, and after having superficially chatted about several stuff, Evelyn said she didn't know what to talk about anymore, and we finished the call after not too long a time. Eva talked to Ilona for some minutes and that was all. It was okay but unexpected, and all that somehow hit me. I mean, I haven't been home for two months and nobody knows what to talk about?

Afterwards, we visited Ahti's parents and went to Lõunakeskus where Andreas and me watched some 4D-short-movie. That was funny: all the people around us were screaming, and even I had to work on keeping calm and not breathing too hard, while Andreas was complaining about how boring and unexciting it all was. He's a freak, and I like him for that.

Then we bought a new headset. That excited me and I could hardly keep calm all evening while my brothers were using the computer. So when I could use it, I tried to look normal although I was really burning with curiosity to find out whether skype-ing would be possible or not. It was! And talking to my beloved Jasmin for 1h 26min 42sec was the best thing I had done in what seemed like a lifetime. I laughed freely and slagged with her over several people and chatted about senseless and unimportant stuff - long story short: I lived again as I had used to live with her. And that felt so liberating, you can hardly imagine. I knew again what I had missed in all my time here. I mean, I love minu elu Eestis, but without Jasmin it's sometimes hard to manage.

This morning, I told Ilona what I need for trying to make the potatoe soup. We'll try cooking it together, which I had asked her for since I don't want to do it alone, and afterwards I'll go to Tartu and meet Leonie, then stay the night at her home and spend a day in Lõunakeskus together tomorrow. That's gonna be a lot of fun!