Let's try to make things readable, shall we?
Work
Starting with the easy stuff. I'm still working at the same company. It's going to be six years in May and it's impressive for me because the longest I lasted in a company before that was 20 months. Go me. I still hate it here. Things have been going from worse to worst for the last three years or so, and the only reason I haven't quit is that I'm still hoping to move to Finland in the reasonably near future, so no point in looking for a new job. I get along with most of my (50 or so) coworkers and have very close friends whose support I couldn't do without, but the management has become a farce and I don't feel valued at all. Oh well.
We moved offices in October and it was a very difficult time for everyone (no internet for the first few weeks, can you imagine that??) and the new offices are in the middle of nowhere, in a place where several assaults (and possibly rapes) on women have supposedly happened in the past, and the nearest metro station is called "The executed" (the correct translation should be "executed by firing squad") so it didn't bode well at all. Now people are more or less used to it. I like it because the commute to our old apartment is much shorter than before, so it gives me the excuse of staying there away from my family more often than I used to. Another positive thing is that my office is pretty big (though there are only glass walls separating offices, so everyone can spy on everyone else) and I have a nice view on the sea... and the mental health hospital right across the road. Oh yeah.
Relationship and visits
We are still soldiering on. Some days are better than others, but I like to think that we're doing well overall given the circumstances, and that we are strong enough to overcome anything. Other days, of course, it seems like the universe is intently working against us and it's all hopeless, but we try. We've had two great visits. First in October, when I went to Finland for twelve days. It felt way too short, of course (I die of envy every time I see posts about people staying with their SO for the entirety of their visa, three months or more. Wish I could pull that off) and it didn't feel like we had enough "us" time as we spent quite a bit of the visit at his parents'. But that was fine too. I got to meet Tommi and Jaana's baby daughter, whom they named Iina (pronounce ee-na) as well as relatives of Jaana's and friends of Timo's that I hadn't met yet.
Second visit was a five-day trip to Germany in November, during which we got to visit Stuttgart, and also attended our regular music festival in Würzburg. Had a lot of fun there, hung out with our awesome German-American friends (a couple that started out as a LDR, met on the same forum Timo and I met, got married and have now been living together in Germany for over ten years) and ate lots of great food.
Coming back home was very painful and naturally I started planning my next visit the minute I landed here so I bought my June plane ticket in November
Wasn't at all relishing having to wait over 200 days to see him again, so we planned a little trip to Vienna in April (I mentioned that around the forum, so it shouldn't come as a surprise), which isn't too far away now. Family
Things are quiet, but not as quiet as I'd like them to be. My younger sister (who is 26) got engaged in November, then both religiously and legally married in December, to her boyfriend of five years. She is still living with us, though, because in my country, religious and legal marriages don't count until you throw a huge, expensive party to which you invite all the people you love, and lots of people you hate. It doesn't make much sense, but that's how things are. For the religious ceremony, we had to host 50 members of his family in our not-so-large apartment and suffer their obnoxiousness with a smile while they showed everyone in attendance the presents that they brought for the bride (because why not be tacky?). I hated every minute of it but I'm glad it's over. I'm planning on writing a blog post about local wedding traditions so I will give more details about my sister's event. However I will leave you with one last detail so that you'll know what kind of family my sister is marrying into: The box that contained my sister's engagement ring also contained the receipt from the jeweler's. Yep. Classy.
My sister is being a bit of a bitch to me, saying that it's because she's the one getting married and doing things "the right way" (meaning I'm not) and yet I get away with everything and get all the attention. So there's that.
We celebrated my nephew's third birthday and he's as adorable and belligerent as ever. Still hasn't started talking properly but I think he's just lazy and knows that we understand the few words he bothers to use, so why learn to talk? He can count up to a hundred in three languages (Arabic, French and English), recognizes whatever letter or number you put before him and loves to say them out loud. I think he has a future in accounting.
Sensitive stuff
As far as my mother is concerned... I did write about that letter she sent me (the third, I think) in July, didn't I? Well, anyway, it was a re-hash of all the stuff she'd already said, begging me to break up, telling me I'm wasting away my life, etc. I never bothered to respond to it. I think the reason I didn't blog for so long was that I was going to do it right after answering the letter, and the more I procrastinated about the letter, the less I was inclined to blog, and then I forgot about both things. My mother probably took my silence for a sign that I had broken up with him and was resenting her for it. She didn't say anything when I traveled to Europe, and didn't bring Timo up again.
Until last weekend. We were alone at home (I bought a plane ticket for my father to travel to a neighboring country he used to live in, so he could visit friends) and she came into my room and handed me another short letter and left me to read it. Basically it was asking me if I had broken up with him, if I had come back to reason (adding a couple of lines that hit home, about how I should already be having babies by now and by wasting the precious fertile years I had left, I was making a huge mistake. Touché, mom) and then telling me about her friend again. Remember her friend who tried to set me up with an ugly dude and who was being really really bitchy about it? Well, my mother apparently admitted to her that I was seeing a Finn (though she made up some bullshit about him having distant origins from my country, because that makes it slightly less unacceptable) but that she was adamantly against it, so this friend started HARASSING my mother about this guy, again, telling her that if I only agreed to meet him for coffee, I'd probably forget about all this nonsense. The nerve.
I told my mother to tell her friend to fuck off and that I never want to deal with any of those people ever again. I also told her sorry, but I haven't broken up and I won't just because my mother wants me to. She started crying, I started crying (out of anger, really) I told her that she was going to have to leave me alone about it, that I didn't want to talk about it anymore, that she has three other daughters to worry about (she doesn't accept this argument, though, because I'm her "favorite") and that I didn't want this to ruin our relationship because goddammit, she's my mother and all I want to do is love her and cherish her but she's making it pretty damn difficult for me. We kinda made up. And a day later she made me promise never to leave the country without her consent, and I agreed. I mean, when I leave, I definitely will let her know
So that's the situation. Still more or less the same as it was six months ago. The difference is that now I know I can't leave before my sister's wedding (which should be around the end of the year) because if I do, I'd be barred from it, and as much as I hate that bitch right now, I do love her and want to be there for her special day. After that, the most likely (and only) way out is telling them my mother company offered me a job on Finland and I'm going to work there for a year, max. And then I wouldn't come back. My mother would know what's up, but I'm hoping she'll value my life and safety over her duty of telling the truth to my father. So that's how things stand for now.
I obviously haven't covered everything that's happened, so I might go back in time in my futures blog posts. Cheers
Mlle: I'd really appreciate a comparison between the two cultures in that regard, so I'm looking forward to your remarks
Zeph: I'll be 31 in 10 days. I do hope you're right, but it's been keeping me up at night. I really want to have children with my SO and I worry that I won't be able to.