INGRID (ENGLISH VERSION)

JOURNEY WITHOUT A DESTINATION

2023 was the year, that I could, at last, say that I had been happy with my life. I was surrounded by lovely people, as firstly I was still visited by my friends and my parents and secondly I was living with Anna and Ingmar. At the same time, since mid-October, I had started getting involved with the play, which I hoped would be staged during mid-2023. The transcription was now complete. I was planning to come back from the journey in the Caucasus and then, start rehearsing with the theatre group.

In mid-January, I met Collins in Rhodes island, in Greece. Although it was winter, the Mediterranean climate wasn't that cold for me, as I was used to the Scandinavian winter. In Rhodes, we hopped on a boat and reached Bodrum in Turkey. I really loved Turkey and its music, however, I was getting extremely pissed, when everybody was trying to bargain with you. Honestly, in Turkey, people were forcing you to buy anything, even if in the end they let you pay only 1 euro. Collins and I rented a car, as we had to reach the Caucasus. We had very interesting discussions all the way. As I have mentioned before, Collins characterised herself as an atheist and a Marxist and she used very powerful arguments to support her opinions. I was an atheist too, but I can't say I was a Marxist at all. My grandfather, Lauri, was a Communist, though not exactly a Stalin-friendly one. In general, my grandfather's kin had the tendency to be really altruistic, in the sense that we are all equal with one another, that's why we have to love our fellow man. Whatsoever, my grandfather's brother was a priest. Thus, when you see two brothers, and one of them is a Communist and the other one a priest, then there's some connection to it, even though Communists also often are atheists, just like in Collins' occasion. For my own part, I was always inclined to left-wing beliefs and until 2023 I was supporting Communism, exactly because I was highly influenced by my grandfather. I had also composed a relative song in our first album. However, I can't say that I had real knowledge about politics at such a young age. However, when I read a specific book, I realised that there are instincts and tendencies. That's why, not everything is a social construction, but indeed human nature plays a very important role. And of course, part of human nature is our own tendency to compete, as selfish and wicked as it might sound.

At some point, Collins told me that she really likes Greece, as she knew that my father had a Greek origin. She also told me that, whenever she drives in Syntagma, the city centre of Athens, she likes listening to Vangelis' Heaven and Hell. I smiled. Was she joking? It was me the one who liked doing this as well. I knew that Vangelis was a Greek musician, that's why, whenever I would be driving in Syntagma, I would play Heaven and Hell in the car!! I told her.

"You have diverse musical preferences", she answered.

We collected music from several villages in Turkey. I was impressed by the fact that Collins could speak Turkish and Greek. I could also speak Greek, but not Turkish. I knew only some words. However, Turkish had a common system with Finnish, which was my natural language, as both languages were agglutinative and also featured a vowel harmony. Only that, as I was told, both features were much more complex in Turkish.

A few days later, we went to the Caucasus. Or we....climbed, because, in order to get there, you need to climb the mountains. There were villages with a tradition, dating to antiquity. Their music was polyphonic and still remains pentatonic. And people were so hospitable. They didn't speak English and of course, we couldn't speak Georgian -- because now we had already reached Georgia. They had a very special way to produce wine and scientists believe that this is the place which is producing the most ancient wine on the globe. Anyway, I have to say that, even though I am a huge fan of wine and I know a lot about its production, I've never in my life tasted such a delicious wine as the Georgian. Furthermore, they were cooking a delicious cheese pie, which I also learnt to make myself.

So, in February 2023, I returned to Norway with a lot of material in my hands. I believe that this was the most meaningful fieldwork I'd ever carried out. Although we didn't travel to any other countries than Turkey and Georgia, I think that the material that we collected was enough. I didn't stay long in Norway, as I went on a small trip with Nancy in Northern Britain. Although she was living in Yorkshire, she had a cottage house in a place, called Borrowdale, which was located in Cumbria.