Saturday, April 24, 2010

Feelings after few months in Brazil

I haven’t written for over two months and I feel pretty ashamed of the fact. I have faced the difficulty of trying to be a reporter and writing a blog at the same time as no one would buy my stories if those were already online. I’ve also had many blog texts in the pipeline but after reading the texts again I’ve decided not to publish those. Sometimes it’s just better not to antagonize certain people and in the era of social media and wide internet access I’d rather not leave a mark in the cyberspace that may affect my future plans. However, you can read my story about unequal society in Forsal website posted on February 28 (only in Finnish) and my English interview on Tero Iso-Kauppila’s blog.

The end of university

One large project ended in March 19 when I returned my master thesis about social media. I can’t describe how relieved I was at that moment. Thesis was acknowledged in the article published in the Finnish economy newspaper, Kauppalehti’s, website. Here is the link to the whole thesis (in Finnish).

This means that I can take my master diploma out whenever I want but I love student-friendly prices so much that I might keep my registration in university for few more years. I feel that I’ve studied for ages but when I see it on the other light it took less than 6 years to get a master degree. This time included two terms of study exchange and a full year of working abroad. To be honest obtaining a degree wasn’t too difficult and the entrance exam to university is still the most difficult exam I’ve taken during my studies.

Sports


I’ve found a good gym called Fema where I usually go four times a week. In addition to normal muscular training I attend spinning classes, local body pump called localizada and lambadance.



Video of a lambadance class from my gym (sorry but I’m not in this version).

During the time in Rio I’ve noticed that my love for sports, both on the sofa and off-sofa, has increased. It is always fun to watch when the best athletes compete in almost any sport even my favorite spectator sports are still football and ice hockey. So I’ve actually spent a lot of time in Rio watching sports that sounds kind of weird but I’ve enjoyed it.

My dream has always been to work on something related to sports. First I wanted to be a new Hristo Stoichkov, but my skills weren’t enough. After that came a dream of working as a top coach but I forgot it when under 10-year old children didn’t really take my strategies seriously and I saw what coaching a professional team does to people. Now I’m more interested on sports marketing and especially administration. Let’s see what the future brings with it.


Football coach Jose Mourinho before and after starting to coach Chelsea.

Rio

Only two weeks after I came to Rio there was famous Rio Samba Carnival. I sold the rights of the carnival story to a news magazine and I will cover the carnival thoroughly in this blog after the story has been published.

Finally after few months in Rio I start to feel that I know what is going around here. I’ve moved twice since the last post for a search for better housing and now I’ve finally found one only two blocks from both beaches of Ipanema and Copacabana. I’m sharing an apartment with two females. A British who works for tourism industry and a Brazilian lady, who is also the owner of the apartment. One of the most popular surf places in Rio, Arpoador, is only 300 meters from my apartment but I have to admit that I haven’t ridden any waves here yet.


On Ipanema Beach with Antti and Jeff.

There is a party in Rio every night so the pressure to go out is huge. However, I’m proud of myself by being able to resist the temptation. I've done more sports and work not needing to worry about late nights out. This has come with a sacrifice that I don’t know so many people as when I’ve lived abroad before. One party I nonetheless attended at the top of Sugar Loaf which was a lot of fun even around 4 am I found out that it was a gay party. Well, the scenery when I came down with the cable car at the sunrise was breathtaking enough to compensate.

In future I will write more regularly. The main topics before the summer are Brazil, sports and business. I'd like to hear comments or suggestions about possible topics and ideas. As my university account will be unsubcribed soon, the address that I use from now on for private mails is lastname.firstname(at)gmail.com.

Enjoy your day!

- Mikael

3 comments:

  1. You got your master diploma? Congrats!! I'll finish my studies middle of may.. Good luck for getting a top-manager job in sports!
    Actually I've the dream to be a xc-skiing national coach..
    Have a nice time in Brasil, hope to see you soon!Seb from Germany

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  2. Dude. Have you pumped a lot of iron there? In the Ipanema photo you biceps look huge..or is it all the protein from the Brazilian meat? You gotta start running more or you will become a stereotypical beefcake bodybuilder :D

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  3. Yes, it must be a combination of meat and gym as I haven't been able to run too much cause of some leg problems. But have to eat more fruits and start bicycling...

    Master diploma is one letter away so I'm done. Seb, I bet you will make your dream come true with your attitude and a bit of luck. Just don't beat the Finnish in team sprints..;-)

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