It's time to say good bye to the civil service center. The whole 4-week-long education period is now done and what a month it was: I learned about first-aid, self-conscious skills, relationships, mental health, violence, and about the history of weapon denial in Finland. I also made couple of really good friends one of them being the exact same guy who incidentally sat next me on the bus on the first day when arriving into the civil service center in Lapinjärvi.
Previous posts you might want to check out if you're not familiar with why and what I'm doing the civil service for.
My Civil Service #2 - First week in the education center - The worst is already behind
My Civil Service #3 - The civil service center in the middle of a peaceful countryside
My Civil Service #4 - Mindfully increasing my life saving skills
The civil service center in the village of Ingerman, familiar from my earlier posts, is part of the Lapinjärvi so now I decided to take a walk to the Lapinjärvi village center which is only a half an hour walk away from the civil service center.
The small center of the village basicly forms around the main road:
"How do you know you're on countryside? People stop by the store with tractors."
An interesting thing I realized was the fact that over a year ago I had bicycled through this exact same road when I biked to my friends summer cottage. I actually cross the the topic of the same bike trip on my #manifestchallenge post of Day 3 so read it if you're interested in it.
By the main road through Lapinjärvi village there are basic services:
A bank...
...a dentist and grocery store...
...an insurance company on the left and health care facility on the right.
There is also a cafe and workshop store which I suspect providing handcrafts and furniture.
A church tower and the church behind, around whom the village has been originally built.
A cemetery on the yard of the church.
The "famous" restaurant-hotel Goose just outside the Lapinjärvi village in which the civil servants get wasted every Wednesday. I'm not even kidding; on the last Thursday a few people had a really bad hangover and I only heard stories of the evenings events. On the education period Mondays are free if one has a civil service place already, Tuesday and Thursday evenings are occupied with sauna. On Friday night people are already at home. Wednesdays on the other hand are completely unoccupied and how "coincidentally" the hotel restaurant is open on Friday, Saturday AND Wednesday
You guessed right, from the swarms of geese invading the Lapinjärvi lake filling the air with their cackling.On the walk path to the Lapinjärvi village I noticed a few messages left by former civil servants:
On the middle:
By bike to Goose and back. What a civil service!
On the bottom:
You can do this [the civil service]. Soon you don't have to shoot anybody.
Another one just outside the civil service center on a lamp post:
Civil area. Passage forbidden from militarists.
So has the education period ended and it's time for a new beginning: I'm jumping to my work service itself right on the next Monday on the 16th of October. And that shall last until 30th of August 2018 when I'll be a free man!
I'll keep updating on my civil service but more unfrequent posts should be anticipated on the first weeks when my situation stabilizes in the work service job in Vantaa city's drug services.
If by some chance there is a fellow young Finn male who is pondering on military and civil service I can definitely recommend the civil service based on the education period!
In the end I want to give a big thank you for the people and the education and everything else that made my stay in the civil service center so enjoyable!
See you later!
