Concluding the year 2017

Now it’s time to sum up the year 2017. To me it has been full of experiences and also year of expanding my territory. I will sum it up with series of photos taken this year.

My everyday territory has expanded quite a lot after telling my neighbours about Anukatariina. I’ve walked a lot, driven by my new bicycle, taken sunbaths, gardening, picking berries and mushroom…  and feeling free to be what I am!  

My trips have also been numerous in different places:

                         Stockholm

                  Madeira

Tallinn

                                     Poland

                                   Viljandi Estonia

                              Saimaa district

                 

                      Athens

My night life has not been as active as it used to be. That is probably because my daily life has been so busy, both as Anukatariina and in my male mode.

                               At the theater performance

 

Getting my first trophy for the best costume of the evening

My belly dance society has become closer and more important to me. We have done many other things in addition to training and performing: sewing club session, visiting the performances of other dance studios, having our own night activities and having fun with friends that have become so dear.

My political life has been extremely full of incidents:

  

Lecturing about diversity of gender and discrimination at work places,

                             acting for better name bill

                            and trans law,

      discussing about better interaction between police and LGBTI people,

     

             supporting sisters in Helsinki and different parts of Finland,

      constructing our dressing room at Seta office,

  

taking part to Pride happenings,

starting the career as the vice president of Dreamwear Club and representig it in Seta assembly,

meeting foreign people to talk about situations in their country,...

  opening the Transgender Day of Remembrance happening at the stairs of the Parliament House
               

My most personal political act was my decision to tell my colleagues about Anukatariina.

  

This year makes me feel I’m living full life as Anukatariina, at least far fuller than I could even dream about some ten years ago. I want  to thank all the sisters who have made it possible and wish them happy and prosperous new year 2018!

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The Decisive December 2017

December 2017 started like winter would come. And then the snow melted a day after it has fallen many times in turn. In snowy days it was lovely to walk in the forest and enjoying the fresh snow white nature.

                                                In the snowy forest

December 2017 also was very important for my coming out as Anukatariina. I told about me to my nearest colleagues and they responded with joyful comments and warm hugs. I even visited my work place as Anukatariina a couple of times. The first one was in my regular place and I met some of my nearest (or should I say dearest after such an incidence…) and we hugged again. The second visit was in another place. I noticed the colleagues there looked at me somewhat confused and I’m not sure if they identified me – at least I didn’t introduced myself to them.   

                            At the work place for the first time

I use to bake some Christmas pies for Dreamwear Club pikkujoulu and I this time I naturally had the same idea. Unfortunately the office of Seta had been constructed and they had thrown the owen away. So instead of baking I had to buy the pies. Anyway the pikkujoulu was very warm hearted with lots of music and deep thoughts.

                                         The bought Christmas pies

As always my oriental dance performance was also in December. The choreography was Fuego with somewhat Spanish flamenco ingredients. Our leader wanted to show something to watch and the result was very furious with colors of flames. I had quite few own rehearsal sessions so I wasn’t very sure of my readiness. The result was I invented some new mistakes instead of the ones I was afraid of. Luckily I did the worst mistake in time so many of the audience thought it was meant to be so.  

You can see the result here.

                                                      The finale pose of Fuego

I still had one pikkujoulu left: Marinka wanted to have one with her dance students because she is going to Spain at least for a year. So we met still a day after the show to chat, eat and drink something and, of course, dance. The music available was a collection of old choreography musics. Each time the music was familiar some of us tried to remeber the choreography. It turned out I’m not good in remembering the old ones. But it was fun anyway. The schedule of the dance studio is not good for me so I had decided to take another. So in the end of the evening we hugged each others for farewell. Anyway some days later I decided to continue the same studio: The arrangement options for another alternatives were not better and I was very happy to be able to go on with my old dance friends.

                      Dancing with my dance friends.

                                             Hugs with Marinka

My Christmas arrangements were a bit smaller i scale than they use to be. There were a bit fewer visitors and we decided not to do anything too much. Another thing was I had a wrong week day in my mind as the Christmas Eve so I had a day less to fuss.

                                My specialties from the oven

                                        The Christmas dinner with relatives

The Christmas day I went for a walk in the forest again. The snow had mostly melted and then frozen to very hard and slippery mat. I went to one of my favorite places by a tiny beck where I found wonderful icy works of art above the water.

                                          At the beck

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My notable November

My November 2017 was full of important things for me. It also was important for many fellow trans people as well.

The most important thing for all was the name bill. 

The initiative was full of discriminating features in spite of our statements to officials and politicians. We had a campaign organized by many national trans organizations and the Finnish Amnesty International. Before the bill passed the parliament our campaign organized a happening where the members of the organizations told about the discriminative features of the bill and what these would easily lead to. We invited members of Parliament to hear of us but there was only one present. She claimed the bill is the best they could get in the political conjunctures we just now have – there are too many populists and conservatives in the Parliament just now.

The member of Parliament Johanna Karimäki (The Green Party) at the name bill happening

The same week I had a call from the Ministry of Justice. The official claimed the bill is far better than we have assumed in our campaign. For example the possibility of having both man’s and woman’s name is not mentioned at all, but it is not forbidden, either. So she claimed there would be a possibility for intersexual and non binary people and transvestites to get such a name if the identity is indicated somehow clearly. That kind of interpretation was new to us and of course we were delighted. The bill was discussed twice in Parliament and in the end of November it passed. So we still have a lot of work to help the ministry make instructions to the officials. There are some horrible examples in name change situations where the officials have seen the opportunity to be very severely discriminating.

The other thing was TransHelsinki happening. The name bill happening was a part of it. The other was a half day seminar where I also told about the current situation of the name bill. And of course there also were much more interesting presentations on other issues. 

                                        At the seminar

After the seminar we had an instant idea of going to eat somewhere. Because of the Pikkujoulu season we didn’t find any free restaurant table in reasonable waiting time so we ate Indian fast food – which was delicious anyway.

                                         After the seminar with friends

The TransHelsinki is always around the 20^th of November, the Transgender Day of Remembrance. It is a remembrance day for trans people round the world during the year. This year the number of known cases was 325. We had  a committed happening on the stairs of the House of the Parliament. I opened it with the president of the National LGBTI organization Viima Lampinen. 

                             Opening the TDOR happening with Viima

                                                        

                                                      A choir singing Imagine

There were some music and lots of candles. The names of the murdered people were announced. The weather was terrible with heavy wind and lots of wet sleet. The members of Parliament were invited but again there was only one. The reason was the day Monday when they use to go home district to do their political work there.

Back home. I had a wide-necked hat to keep my glasses clear during the opening of the TDOR

 The same day 20^th of November was very important to me also in other way. I had told my boss about Anukatariina earlier in November. This day I told about me to my closest colleagues. It was a success, they were very delighted and hugged me warmly. We instantly made a plan for lectures about me and the multitude of gender to the students we teach.

              

Actually this kind of education is not new for me. In November I lectured about the issue to sexual therapists. My part took an half an hour but they wanted to ask me lots of questions and it took 45 minutes.

As a vice president of the Dreamwear Club I took part of the representative assembly of Seta. This time it was held in Mikkeli, a small city in eastern Finland. This time there were no difficult issues to make a decision.

                                      

                                 With Kristiina and Tuija at the representative assembly 

The local organization had organized the Mikkeli Pride at the same time. It was the first time for it, but there were 350-500 marching in the parade. It also was my first Pride parade in dark daytime – the dark starts there before 4 p.m. this time of the year. The hilarious people had all kinds of light with themselves to oppose the darkness – both the physical and mental ones.   

                                       
                             The Mikkeli Pride stage, Iina Särkkä opening the parade

The Dreamwear Club marching in the darkness

The crowd at the Mikkeli market place

                              With Andy and Tuija at Mikkeli Pride Afterparty

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Relaxing in Athens

The last month has been too busy to write any blog so I report my adventures with quite a long delay.

In mid October we spent some days in Athens. The fall has been quite dark and rainy so it was really nice to see the sun and enjoy the warm weather. And we had the both indeed, the temperature was over 20 celsius in daytime and over 15 celsius even in evenings.

We had booked a hotel recommended by Anette, a friend of my spouse. It was sort of alternative to normal commercial hotels on a hill near the center of Athens. It was rather modestly equipped but it had a nice terrace with a view straight to the Acropolis hill.

To get to the hotel we took a taxi at the airport. The taxi driver had serious difficulties in finding the way to the hotel – he obviously had never been there. My rather heavy suitcase has been damaged during the trip and it had only three wheels. The taxi couldn’t drive to the last narrow street to the hotel. So I started to push the suitcase along the steep street. But as I only started doing it the suitcase was taken by the young man who appeared to belong to the personnel of the hotel.

                                                           The damage 

The neighborhood of the hotel was a bit shabby and the walls were covered with political graffiti. The people we saw were mostly young and looked like students, including the staff of the hotel. Sometimes we stopped to chat with people in the streets. We also noticed some black buses and policemen with extra equipment here and there. We heard there has been some clashes with police and tear gas has been used during the time we were there. Afterwards we heard the area was regarded as a no go area and not even a part of Greece! It seems it applies only to police and politicians, not us.  

                                                The stairs under our window

Our first trip in the city was to see the sunset on the Mount Lycabettus with Anette. We took a taxi and the funicular railway to get there. From the top we could see the whole Athens and see the sun go down with a colorful spectacle. 

                                                  On the top of the Mount Lycabettus                        

                

                                   The sunset seen from the Mount Lycabettus

We walked down the hillside to the city to get the first Greek supper with Anette.

                                              Street food after the Mount Lycabettus trip

The next day we had a guided walk in Athens historical places. We had a very devoted guide Stavros who had very much information and interesting philosophical views – and naturally including some Greek patriotism. We started from Syntagma square to see some males in a skirt – this time I had pants. The main destination was of course the Acropolis hill and museum but we also saw the Zeus temple and some other minor historical places and parks.

                              This silly walking must have been an inspiration for John Cleese...

                                  

                                                           The Zeus Temple            

                                          On the Acropolis hill

                  Substituting the sixth goddess while it is given back by the British museum. 

                  The Greeks have waited for it to happen some decades....

The third day was for swimming and sun bathing. We took a tram to the coast and chose a little beach with tiny egg-like stones. There had been a oil tanker crash in September and we were worried if it is possible to swim at all. But the water was clean and bright so we had no problems with that. Only later we noticed there were tiny droplets of oil in the stones that made our towels a bit black and brown spotted.

                                                         Swimming

We spent some hours and swam some times until my skin informed me it was enough – there were so little tan left from the rainy and cloudy summer.

The fourth day was for some extra history walking, including the Panathinaikos stadium. The other thing was shopping. It seems my zeal of shopping has decreased and I mostly had items for my grandchildren in my mind.

           The last breakfast at the terrace of the hotel

The next day was for the departure. I had accustomed to the friendly climate of Athens and had some technical and emotional difficulties to adjust myself for getting the car from the chilly car park. But maybe I got some sun rays as a souvenir to have energy for the cold and dark Finnish winter.

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