We took the first Vietnamese lesson today. I found a teacher, Mrs Anh, who has been teaching some of my colleagues. I asked Pekka to join the class as well, and to my surprise he said why not. Well, I had heard that the language is really difficult. On the first lesson we learnt simple phrases like "How are you?" The question is different if you talk to an older woman/man than you, to a younger woman/man or to a same age. So there are at least 5 ways to ask how are you. And then tones...there are 11 kind of tones. So word "ba" (an older lady) can be written in 7 different ways, meaning different thing every time. Our teacher pronounced word "ba" and we had to guess which one of the 6 versions it was. Oh, gosh, I think Toivo will be the only one in the family learning vietnamese...

A bit chilly some days this week, but then warm again. So to our Xmas visitors I will recommend packing woollen socks and a thick coat. Another friend, Pekka´s colleague just told that they may come over in March, on ski holiday. Oops, there are now two English teachers reading my blog, Pirkko and Liisa, as I gave this address to Liisa as well. I have to say that my biggest struggle and the biggest challenge is to learn to write English, especially very formal language, which is used at UN. Speaking is always somehow easier. So I am really proud of my two friends, Tylle who is writing her own blog so fluently in English, and Olivia, who just showed me her research plan, which was also written in English! But the thing is, that I was never really interested in English at school, I did not have very good teachers either (what an excuse). Luckily I once had a good history teacher... Well, time to change topic.

The Vietnamese New Year will be celebrated in mid February. We have four bank holidays then. I will take couple of days off, and we are planning to travel to Thailand (Angela and Dave, would you like to see your godson there??). Flights from here are so cheap, and for instance to Bankok, Singpore, Kuala Lumpur etc. Some other destinations are more expensive. So, you who plan to visit us, if you just find a cheap way to get to Bankok, the flight here costs less than 100 USD.

That´s today. Looking forward to receiving mails from you all. It is so enjoyable to read them.