conscription and the future

In Finland, we have what's called conscription. It means every able man living here must at some point in their life enroll, either in military training, which is what most young men choose, or "civil service", which is the less popular option. 

So I'm in the army now. For either 6, 9 or 12 months, it is still unclear. This means I won't have the chance to do a lot of blogging in this time.

So... Yeah. There isn't much else to say. During the past year, this blog has suffered a lot because of changes in my personal life and situation. I've had less time to write and draw, and my priorities have been elsewhere. Right now, there's just very little opportunity to write, even if I wanted to. We get to go home over most weekends, but there is just so many other things I want to do with that very limited time, and that leaves this blog in a sorry spot.

Hopefully, once my service in the military is over, I will once again find the motivation and time to write regularly.

It seems fitting, how my last entry was my one hundredth. There is so much for me to be proud about in this blog. All the work, all the art, all the text, every last entry. Even though my motivation has faltered, not once, not twice, but numerously during these past two and a half years, this blog means nothing but dedication and pride for me. What began, humbly, as a platform for me to show my artwork to other people has since developed into something much more meaningful and important to me.

So I thank you, those of you who have followed me and read my rambles and been interested in my artwork. My fans, even though they haven't been all that great in numbers, have meant the most to me, and motivated me immensely in the past years. 

Hopefully, I will be back for the third anniversary of Onesketchist, in early 2015. But I leave no promises. There is a time for everything, but maybe the time for this blog is simply past. To cling on and write more once the passion is gone would be a dishonor to every good entry I ever wrote. Only time will tell what the future holds.

Application-Update

Well... It could have gone better!

This, along with the catastrophe of my results in the Mothertongue test in my matriculation exams, will probably leave me 1-2 points short of being accepted. According to my calculations, I have 18,6 points. For Aalto, one might need about 22,5, and for Oulu about 20. This sure as hell leaves me pretty sore.

If my essay for the Mothertongue test wouldn't have been deemed irrelevant, or off-topic, in all likelyhood it would have been worth top scores. This, in turn, would have given me the 1,6 extra points needed to get into the architecture program in Oulu.

And for my entrance exams... They didn't like my work. Or they didn't think I was worth a whole lot of points. Either way, I fell short of achieving 66% of the points in the entrance exam (Not the same 'points' as I am referring to in the earlier paragraphs. Along with matriculation exam points and points from the maths test, the entrance exam points are part of a larger formula which gives the final application-points, 18,6.), which I aimed for and would have needed. I got precisely half of the points.

So basically everything fell a bit short. In reality, it's not a huge problem. I'll apply again next year, and by then I'll have sorted out the Mothertongue exam, and by my thinking, I can't possibly perform even worse in the entrance exams next year. After all, I have to believe that I am worthy of higher points. The entrance exam was a drawing test. I should be good at it.



Anyway, the assignments we had were pretty spectacular. They can be found (In swedish...) in the link below. It's a downloadable PDF.

http://dia.fi/media/26018/valintakoetehta%CC%88va%CC%88t_2014_SE.pdf



The final results of the application are actually not published yet, but... The required points to get in don't fluctuate all that much from year to year. This years application is hopeless.



EDIT; Also, this makes the 100th published blog entry! Hooray, for two and a half years, a ton of text and a load of memories... For me, anyway :)

The importance of people

Right now, I'm sitting in a hotel room in Oulu, the city where my entrance exams are being held. I've actually been here a couple days already, as the exams span several days. 4 days, to be precise, and tomorrow mrks my last test. So far, we've drawn, painted, sculpted and built. Models and miniatures. I'll tell you guys all about it, when I get back to the equipment normally at hand when I write my entries.

It's been a bit of fun, a bit of a bore, but most of all, it has been interesting. Interesting doesn't necessarily imply that it has been exciting, or even entertaining, even though, on occasion, it has been. Quite frankly, it's been pretty boring most of the time.

During the evenings and between my tests, I've been reading, or just meandered among the many stores and shops in the city. Alone. Because I don't know anyone here, and all the other applicants speak only Finnish. I always thought I was a pretty social guy, but having to speak Finnish all the time really puts me in quite the bad spot. I've really never had any Finnish speaking friends, and, uh, even though I know I'm not at all bad at Finnish, I just don't have any confidence in my ability to go up to someone and make friends with them in Finnish. I know that may seem stupid, but it's hard enough to simply walk up to a stranger and make conversation in your own language, let alone do it in a language learnt in a classroom, in a strange and alien city.

So I'm alone. It's not bad, you know, to sit in a cafe for two hours with your favourite book. It's a good time, and I should do it more often. But three days in a row is pushing it. In three evenings, in three different cafes, I've read a whole 450-page novel. And I figure I might get past atleast half of another novel I bought at the bookstore tomorrow, while on and waiting for the train to take me home.

It's a lot of time to spend in solitude. The different human interactions I've had today can be counted on one hand. 1. Me making an inquiry as to what kind of paper we could use in one of todays tests, 2. Me explaining in a halting command of the language that I can't have cheese in my hamburger at McDonalds, because I am lactose-intolerant, and 3. Me ordering a large cup of coffee at a cafe. The snapchat-messages I've sent do not count.

It's not enough. I need sustenance in the way of social interaction. Or else I get depressed. Well, mildly depressed, at least. I've previously noted this about myself on many occasions. I absolutely need some sort of meaningful, in person dialogue. Chatting over the internet doesn't really help. I need the real deal.

Not the sort of depression that makes you really sad (Apparently, there are many kinds of depressions...), it just makes everything feel so dull, and makes me feel kind of worthless. On the flipside, it does sort of make me more creative, as I am now after all taking my time to write, which I haven't done for two weeks. Writing is another kind of sustenance. Just like reading, or drawing, they fill the void and help make up for the fulfillment that I lack in my loneliness.
Why don't I just go talk to someone on the street? I'm as capable as any, a perfectly sociable young adult, I should be able to take care of this problem quite easily. Well I don't, because I feel depressed, and that makes me repressed. (Don't worry, I'm fine! This is not some sort of plea for pity)

I just need a conversation. Just any conversation, really. It doesn't matter.

And that's interesting.