Seeing the sun in Finland...

As promised in my facebook status, I'm going to write here about my ScaLDS moment. As you might know, I attended the Scandinavian Leadership Development Seminar 2007, together with 16 fellow Swiss @ers. Usually in AIESEC, there are certain things or events that leave such a remarkable impression, that they just stick in our head. It can be a discussion with another member, a session delivered in an extraordinary way, gossip spread on at the conference or a moment of personal reflection.

Surely, there were many highlights at this conference, one important one being the time I spent with the other Swiss delegates and the special Swiss Scandinavian conference spirit we created. The one moment, I'll probably never forget in my life was, however, one I experienced on my own.
The last night, for AIESEC conferences this means: Official Dinner. Dress up nicely, have a nice dinner and then a nice party. Just everything in a nice way. Usually, these nights take a long, long time. So I thought, I have to be ready to leave at 7 in the morning anyway, so why go to sleep and potentially oversleep and miss my bus...? So I thought, I'd just have a night without sleep and get my rest on the bus to Helsinki and on the flight back to Switzerland.

So what to do? The party was kind of over and after-parties were either fading away or I wasn't invited to them. So, since it was getting morning I decided to take a walk in the Finnish forests. I walked across a path that after a few minutes, led me to two big constructions: two ski-jump bases, a really big one and a smaller one. In the blink of an eye, it just hit me: I had to climb up that jump base. So I did, walked up the hill to the nearer base (which was the smaller one as well) and took the stairs. The whole construction was made out of wood and looked really old. Should I trust a Finnish construction from the ... I don't know, the 60's or 50's? Strangely enough, even though I'm afraid of heights, I did.

So there I was, on top of a ski-jump base in the middle of the Finnish forest. I could see a factory or power plant in the distance, the town of Harjavalta and the Hotel Hittenharju, where the conference took place, but otherwise: trees! Lots and lots of pine trees, all over the place. No hills, no mountains, no lakes... just trees. The vue: It was just breathtaking! I sat down, took my iPod and listened to my favourite tunes from this week. "Dear Mr. President" and "Trouble Sleeping".

Just enjoying the moment, I realized that I would be able to see the sunrise from that place. And really, some minutes later the sun emerged right in front of me. I concentrated on that red light bulb that came out of nowhere back there and enjoyed the fact I didn't have a camera on me, but my iPod.
Soon after it was completely risen, it hid beneath some clouds and I thougth it would be time, to try to get down this wooden thing I had climbed. Slowly and always holding on to the rail with both hands I managed to get down. Alive. When I was up there, looking down through the manufactured branches that held the construction together, I thought all this would fall down any minute. It didn't and I had the possibility to see the sunrise as probably no one else at this conference ever had. This moment was one of the strangest of my whole life. The whole arrangement of pine trees that seemed kind of "cold" assembled with the warm shine of the sun rising back there on the horizon. And all this mixed with some great music. What a way to start the day...

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The aftermath: I went back to my room and finally fell asleep anyway, luckily Paul woke me up in time to get to the Bus...;)

"Dear Mr. President" - P!nk