Three seasons and American Holidays

Having spent several months here, I’ve been able to see three different seasons, topped off with a number of American holidays, which has been great. When we arrived here in August, it was hot and humid for a long time. Whereas in Finland you are forced to dress more warmly when going outside (often even in the summer), here it was the other way around. When going inside a building you always had to remember to take a long sleeve shirt with you to prevent you from freezing. Americans love their air conditioners and after weeks and weeks of hot and humid air, I slowly started to understand why. I have never fully understood why make the buildings too cold, though. Besides the air conditioners humming in many buildings, you could also hear cicadas (insects) making their very distinct loud buzzing sound everywhere outdoors. You could certainly feel and also hear that summer was still here.

The first American holiday we got to experience was Labor Day, which is celebrated on the first Monday in September. The university staff here in Bloomington has been very hospitable during the whole semester and we were also invited to one of the university staff member’s home that day. Despite its political origin, Labor Day (and the weekend before it) is often considered the unofficial end of summer and people spend it typically having barbeques and just enjoying each other's company. The temperatures stayed close to 30C/90F degrees for weeks after that weekend, so at least in Finnish terms, the summer certainly didn’t end that day. It was particularly nice for a Nordic person like me who normally gets to enjoy those temperatures only around midsummer, if lucky.

Despite the warm weather, the leaves started to slowly change colors in October and the cicadas quieted down. You could only hear squirrels hopping on the fallen leaves on campus. The trees were amazingly colorful and especially with the sunny weather it was something I enjoyed very much. Unlike Northern Indiana with its cornfields, the area around Bloomington here in the south is quite hilly and there are lots of forests, which makes this area especially gorgeous in the autumn and perfect for hiking. You could also see fall/autumn decorations, especially pumpkins, appearing on people’s porches and in stores, and at the end of October it was time for Halloween. We were invited to a Halloween party again thanks to the wonderful staff at IU. Halloween has a reputation of being only something scary especially in other countries where people have strangely enough started to copy this American tradition, but here it seemed more like any costume party. Some people said they like to plan the perfect costume for months in advance. Many of us went and picked something from the local costume store to fit in. It was particularly fun to see all the little children come trick-or-treating as bears, Star Wars and different cartoon characters.

Very soon after Halloween the pumpkins and scary things in stores were replaced with Santa Clauses and Christmas ornaments, even though there was still one big holiday ahead, Thanksgiving. When we arrived in Bloomington in August, all of us signed up for a friendship program which matches international students and guests with local people. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting the most wonderful hosts, who have invited me to visit their home, taken me out for meals, and taught me about American way of life. They also invited me to experience and celebrate this very American holiday, Thanksgiving, with them. Thanksgiving is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November and many people travel to see their families on this holiday. Even the university closed for the whole week. It’s a day of lots of food, pumpkin pies, spending time together with family and friends, and being grateful. Experiencing this with such a lovely family was one more reason to be thankful for. As most people have the Friday after Thanksgiving off, the stores have started to use it to lure potential customers to their stores with big sales to fight over TV screens and other deals. Most people highly recommended to avoid stores on this Black Friday altogether, which sounded more appealing to me.

Now as we are getting closer to the end of the year, the days have started to get grayer and even the first snowflakes had fallen while I was out of state in November. To experience a little bit of Christmas, some of us used the last opportunity to see great performances at the theatres around campus a few days ago and went to see a wonderfully energetic musical style Christmas concert and also the ever charming Nutcracker ballet, performed by the dance students at the University.