If you love photography but feel overwhelmed by the sheer volume of your images, you’re not alone. Over the years, my photos have piled up into what feels like a towering photo mountain. Now, I’m about to climb that mountain to select the very best — the gems worth printing, sharing, and preserving. During the…
Carrying a Sauna in My Pocket: A Memoir of Finland’s Warmest Tradition
Most Finns have their own sauna stories to tell. Here are some of mine. As someone born in Finland, I see the sauna as much more than just a place to sweat. It’s a space for relaxation, reflection, and rootedness— a tradition passed down through generations. Sauna is where babies were born, the sick were…
What makes a friend feel like home? And are you also that friend to yourself?
When we live across cultures, we meet amazing, diverse people. Still, forming lasting, true, or like-minded friendships can be hard. So much depends on our history, personality, location, language, role, life stage, and luck too. keep CONNECTING with an open heart During my 14 years abroad, I’ve found friends in all sorts of places: our…
10 fun language learning techniques I’ve tried: what works (and what doesn’t)
Languages open doors to new places, perspectives, connections, and possibilities. But learning a language is tough—especially without daily exposure, like through family or work. There’s no one-size-fits-all when it comes to learning a language. In addition to more common learning methods, you can spice up the learning by combining your interests. How about singing karaoke…
Our Overnight Stay in a Traditional Mountain Lodge in The Alps
The Spitzmeilenhütte stands at 2087 meters above sea level in St. Gallen, Switzerland, about 70 km from Zurich as the crow flies. It’s a bit better equipped than many other mountain huts but still offers the experience of staying in ascetic setting surrounded by mountains. We booked our stay there already in the spring for…
Why I love being in nature? 11 reasons to get outdoors
While I was creating an illustration of “The Great Outdoors”, I started to think more about why I like being outdoors and why nature is so important to me. I share the reasons and the illustration here in pieces that make up the whole picture in the end. I wonder if you can relate to…
Art can inspire change and action to improve the environment
Each of us can promote the wellbeing of our environment. In addition to our daily choices, we can influence by creating art that evokes emotions, thoughts and actions. I introduce here two environmental art projects that are close to my heart. Both of them were made years ago, but they’re still relevant and even more…
Diving Into the See of Wanderlust
The term Wanderlust originates from the German words wandern (to hike) and Lust (desire). Today it’s mostly used in connection with traveling – however, Wanderlust can have much broader and deeper meanings, and it can even serve as a life philosophy. Here are some examples of what and how. Upside Down artwork by Sibylla Walpen. The Bernese Alps in…
The ‘Stranger’s Freedom’ and 10 ways how it manifests itself
We know that life abroad comes with difficulties. For example, we may have limitations that the locals don’t have, and we may miss people from our country of origin and sometimes feel like we don’t belong. But the other, bright✨, side of the coin is the freedom the foreignness can bring (of course depending on…
Find a treasure trove beyond routines and achievements
Habits and goals can be the cornerstones for maintaining focus and moving things forward. However, nowadays we talk so much about them that we may forget there’s much more to life! If we are always doing things efficiently with goals in mind and our days revolve around rituals, we can start to feel exhausted, restricted,…
Abroadland 