My name is Janne and I live in Helsinki, Finland. I have spent most of my life in this city, although I did live for one year in Malmö, Sweden, as an exchange student. Except for that, I have travelled quite a lot. I will not list all places I have visited, but some that I will never forget are, for example, the Wadi Rum desert of Jordan, the village Žabljak in Montenegro with its surrounding mountains (and hiking in them) and Blue Mountain on Jamaica – just to name a few. I do also love travelling in Finland, especially Lapland and the archipelago, both of which are just amazingly beautiful. As you probably can guess, I am something of a “nature person”, I like hiking a lot!

But I my interests are sprawling – as a balance to nature, comes culture. I like art in all its different forms and have dabbled in several of them. I like writing (and reading!), drawing (I even had an exhibition last fall, which was a great experience) and I play bass guitar in a band as well (because of covid-19 we are in something of a hiatus right now, though).

I also like meeting people, although I might be something of a “social introvert”, as I like being around people, but I can also be a somewhat shy and quiet person. I am very fond of animals, but I do not have any pets. My family had a couple of dogs while I grew up and I like taking care of dogs or cats of friends every now and then.

Other interests include cooking and watching movies. Sometimes, when I have time, I can spend a couple of hours in the kitchen preparing something special. One of my favourites is summer rolls with satay sauce, another one is lasagna.

I have here tried to give you something of an image of me through my sparetime interests, not my job, as I don’t like defining people through what they do for a living. I am, however, very enthusiastic about my job, especially as it is a new one. And I am also excited about this course! But maybe I’ll write more about that another time.