It's Åcan, not Åcannot

Two days before Åcon 8 happened, I fell and broke my ribs (which I don't recommend doing if you're going to a con). But, since I am a very dedicated fan, it wasn't going to stop me from going. It's Åcan, not Åcannot, after all.

The first stretch of the road to Åcon was taking the train to Uppsala.  I was quite immovable, but got a lot of help from strangers on the train. In Uppsala I meet up with Nahal Ghanbari, Anna Bark Persson and later next morning, Maria Nygård. Whenever we four are together, good things happen. We're currently plotting evil schemes planning Kontur while simultaniously running the Swedish tv-series blog Onda Cirkeln with Hanna Svensson and Frida Otterhag (but Frida is AWOL in Japan). We actually kinda signed on to do both of them while in Åland in 2015, so if you're ever in Åland and get an idea -- just go with it, it's probably the best idea in the world!

Thursday morning we took the ferry over to Åland. At the bus we met up with Johan and Linnéa Anglemark, Åka and Ante Davour, Jessica and Tony Elgenstierna, who're mostly all of them in on our Kontur-schemes. We spent the better part of the boat trip to Åland talking about committée-stuff. As one does.

When we got to Åland, the sun was shining, the birds were singing and the sea glistened in the sunlight. It was a good start, and it got even lovelier during the weekend.

The hotel had a nice porch where we sat outside in the sun and drank beer for most of the weekend.
Since Åcon's a semi-relaxacon this means it has a very light program track with a lot of time between items to just hang out, read, explore Åland and drink beer. This suits me very nicely, and worked well with broken ribs.

The first program item was the Guest of Honour speech, where Zen Cho talked about the cloud of ignorance and how accepting that you don't know everything can be a good thing. It was a really good speech and set a good tone for the whole con. Meeting Zen Cho was great, I was immediately star-struck when I saw her at Loncon in the panel with Mary Robinette Kowal about regency fantasy, and I'd read and loved Sorcerer to The Crown. She has a lot of spirit and a contagious laughter.

Tommy Persson and Sari Polvinen had a book-duel, next, which consisted of Sari taking the side of character-driven books and Tommy the side of books with a structure. None of these things are exclusive, yet they can of course lead to very different books. Tommy and Sari landed in the diplomatic consensus that "a good book is a good book", which is all the consensus you need, sometimes.

Early Friday morning I attended Crystal's Impostor Syndrome Workshop. I felt like an Impostor for saying I have Impostor Syndrome (which probably means I have it). It was such a great workshop, Kudos to Crystal for making time for this!

Friday early afternoon I participated in "Marvel's female superheroes" with Kisu Leikomaa, Elisa Wiik and Nahal. Some great things were said. I had a lot of fun and was pleased with the result. I had planned to be in one more program item during the weekend (Wibbley Wobbley Timey Wimey) but ended up in a couple of game shows too, which often happens when Jukka Halme is involved.

The first gameshow I participated was later that Friday, when my team fought against Zen Chos team in "Never Mind the Buzzaldrins" which was a game show where we had to guess the movie from the poster. This seemed easy enough. Except the posters where Polish and very, very artsy (read: had absolutely no connection to the movies). I, Rachel Monte and Tobias Bodlund were named team Amoeba, but quickly renamed ourselves Team Bad Ass. The other team consisted of Zen, Shimo and Merja Polvinen (I think). Their team-name escaped my memory, but not their inevitable victory.

The lovely Candy assisted the game-show host Jukka, and he was a real cutie. I sang to his honour by switching the word "Carrie" to "Candy" in Europes song. It sounded horrible. I'm going to have to make it into a filk.

Saturday meant that I was going to host my first ever panel: "Wibbley Wobbley Timey Wimey". I have always felt the urge Not To Moderate a panel. I really don't think I'm suited for being a moderator. It's just not my thing. But... A while back I wrote something on Facebook a long the lines of "Someone should host  time travel panel! I want to talk about time travel!" So, of course Sini Neuvonen contacted me and asked me to host one on Åland. (Be careful what you wish for!)

I thought that - if I'm ever going to host a panel about anything, it should be time-travel, so I accepted. I recruited Åka, Shimo and Tommy, and prepared a bunch of themes;

* Why do we need temporal mechanics?
* Destiny-schmestiny
* The Blast from the Past
* Are you my mommy?

I thought the panel went ok. I'd prepaired for it months ahead, sent out questions to the panelists and was not very stressed about it at all. Afterwards I had a lot of people come up to me and say they liked it. I hope there will be a next time!

Me and Hanna Svensson, posing with out Time Travel-t-shirts!

There were a "Romance and fantasy"-panel with Zen, Kisu, Tommy and Merja as a moderator. I'm full of admiration of Merja, she's indeed marvellous. Her Brittish accent is very good too!  Tommy quickly stated that he was the token male, and laughter ensued. It was a good panel! I really liked it!

It was followed by "History and writing" with Zen, Shimo, Vesa Sisättö, Petri Hiltunen and Sari Polvinen. It too was a great panel and they even got in a few good points about appropriation too.


The last item of Saturday was the game show "Just a Speculative Fiction Minute" and I was, again, recruited as a contestant. It was improv and that's not really my strong suit so I got out of my comfort zone real quick. It was set up so that I'd get a title and the audience would shout some directives, a theme, a genre and some elements and then I had to review or explain the story as if it was a real book. And in 60 seconds. The first time I got horror and it really, really went bad. I went about it all wrong, trying to tell the horror story instead of getting laughs. I got a few sympathetic laughs, and went with a different approach for the next few ones.

The last one was about a Russian cabaret, Swedish Sharkballs and Vulcanos, and I made up a story about Vulcans in a Russian Cabaret that was hated by the audience (that was Vulcans too), and how they showed their dislike by giving the actors the "Vulcan-Nooooo!" and then sinking them into shark tanks. Thankfully people laughed.

Mikael Teern and Johan Jönsson. Micke seems to be Johan's body guard here. He was making some kind of jedi wave, I think.

The Saturday party was a blast too. So many good friends together at one place is almost always a guaranteed fun night, but I can't stress how lovely it is to be among this exact crowd. Swedish and Finnish Fandom are the best.

Ben Roimola and his wife (sorry, your name escapes me) came up to me and said that I'd been very funny on the game shows, and I was very thankful to them for saying that, even though I felt it couldn't be true (my impostor syndrome acting up). Then Mikko Seppänen and Elisa had read my blog post about the crazy Legend of Tomorrow-theory, and we had a fun talk about that, one fellow tv-addict to another. Then we started talking about Star Trek, and Petri quoted one of the first movie, and I quoted another, and Mikko quoted another, and so on and so forth until one of the persons listening said that it felt like being on a carusel and then getting thrown off and seeing it spinning out of control.

Talking about the beauty of Star Trek is one of those small moments that adds up to the feeling of how much I belong in fandom. Having a program where people are allowed to discuss regency fantasy and romance fantasy in a serious way, is another. I've been called a fake geek girl for liking romance, but here no one judged me. I have gotten used to not even being given the time of the day when talking about Star Trek, but these people not only listen, they accept that I'm every bit as much of a Trekkie as them. They take me seriously. And I love them for it.

Also they're really funny!

My good friend and fellow punster Tero, whom obliged me when I just had to take a pic of him and tweet "The night is dark and full of Tero's". 

I totally loved the con, I loved the program, I loved the people and the atmosphere. It suited me very well. I loved the game shows, even though I felt a bit awkward at times. (And I would go up there again!)

This is just one of the many reasons I'm working on Worldcon 75. Finnish Fandom has been involved in the three greatest cons I've been too, Loncon, Archipelacon and Åcon. We need more people to meet the Finnish fandom and and experience the Finnish cons.

I'm gonna go to Finncon this weekend. I expect it to be an awesome con, too.

These hearing aids aren't just for show A.k.a. This message speaks volumes.

In July 2014 I wrote this post in Swedish after attending Swecon 2014, the Steampunk festival, in Gävle, Sweden.

I was asked to be on the program, which made me simultaneously very happy and very nervous. I’d never been on a panel before and didn't know if I actually had something sensible to say. And, of course, there's my hearing disability to be nervous about.

I was worried that I would mishear the audience questions, or mishear what my fellow panel members would say, or that I would get too tired and have a hard time concentrating during the panels. This might seem silly, but as a HoH (hard of hearing) person, you get fairly use to hearing the wrong thing, answering the wrong thing, and seeming a bit confused. People don’t see the hearing aids, they don’t see what you can and can’t hear, and I think many just assume you’re a little bit slow.

It's not a question of me being slow, dumb or unintelligent. 

I was born with a sensorineural hearing disability, caused by a damage in my inner ear. I don’t have the needed amount of hearing cells, and the ones I have are not functioning as they should. It's inoperable. I can’t use a cochlear implant. The only thing that helps are hearing aids.

Different from a conductive hearing loss which affects all frequencies, my hearing loss means I have more difficulties hearing certain frequencies, and that sound gets distorted, even with a hearing aid. Which means that I have to process sound and figure out what it means. 

The normal speaking tone is around 60 decibels. I can pick up mosts frequencies as low as 45-55 decibels. Birds chirping and people whispering is almost silence to me. I am never going to be a sneaky ninja. I could never really participate in a whispering game. Heck, even sounds in the normal speaking range is going to fall of my registry. Some consonants are very hard. In Swedish, such words as juni or juli are a huge challenge for me.

Every time I listen to someone talk, or try to participate in a conversation, I have to focus, concentrate really hard, and translate the distorted sound into words that make sense to me. I have to figure out how to fill in the gaps. This makes me tired all the time, and being tired makes it even harder to listen. Imagine if someone took away every third word in this text. Reading this might then be a very tough nut to crack! Welcome to my everyday conversation.

My brain is constantly working overtime trying to interpret sounds through my damaged inner ear. And it takes a lot of brainpower. But despite my best efforts, and hearing aids in both sides, the sounds gets distorted, or they just fall away. I usually hear about 80-90 % of what's being said with hearing aids.

On a good day.

When it's peaceful and quiet around me.

When the person talking to me is right in front of me. Like, right next to me.

Needless to say, in noisy environments like cons and such, my hearing aids and my ability to concentrate will be put to the test. It's a real struggle, one I always lose in the end since I get too tired. And it sucks.

As a kid, having the disability-talk was hard, and I was afraid my friends would stop coming around if I was too demanding or troublesome. I get that it's tiring to have to think about how you stand when you speak to me, and to talk slowly and clearly. So I dealt with it in a joking matter, my way of solving the problem without even having to explain myself. I told my friends I was a spy and the hearing aids were my spy gear. When someone said something I didn't hear, I blamed my in-ear-spy-device.

"These hearing aids aren't just for show" has gotten to be my adult-joking-thing. I like to make jokes about my condition to help people remember it.

The problem is, it's not working any more. I really need my friends to understand how this disability affects me, like every day. And I really need those of you who arrange cons to learn what to do to make things easier for me and others with hearing disabilities. It's difficult for me to talk about it since I've spent my whole life trying to Not Be A Nuisance, but this is my reality and it doesn't go away.

First of all, it's a social handicap. It's a communication obstacle. I'm having trouble following conversations since I mishear words.

As disabled, you develop strategies to be able to make the most of social gatherings. If I do go out on the town, I usually take off my hearing aids (they don't help much anyway if I'm in a noisy environment). If I'm in a coffeeshop with friends, I sit in the middle of the room so everybody is equally close to me. I also try to ask questions, summarize and confirm that I’ve heard right, and that way I catch up if I miss a few words.

My hearing disability often results in me double checking instructions, to make sure I got them right. I ask and ask again, and sometimes I have to cut in while people are talking and ask them to repeat themselves. I constantly worry about being rude, disrupting my friends like that, but if I don’t catch the phrase while it’s said, the rest of the sentence may be gibberish too. I’m constantly feeling like a socially awkward penguin because of this.

It’s also demanding for my friends, whom have to accommodate my special needs. They have to be sure to include me in conversations and make sure that I hear them. I am constantly missing the punch line in jokes, and sometimes when asked if they can repeat the word, I am told that it’s not important or “I’ll repeat it later”, which inadvertently makes me feel outside and less important. I know it’s not easy for them, and it’s sure not easy for me.

Secondly, it’s exhausting to have to concentrate so hard all the time.

I avoid noisy environments like discos, concerts, pubs, games. Sometimes I choose to attend these things, like cons, but I always know that there will come a time when I pay for the effort with physical and mental exhaustion. (All my spoons and then some.)

What can you do to help?

In social situations: 

Face me when talking.
Repeat or double check that I’ve got the important information.
Help me sit in the center so I can hear everyone.
Speak clearly, and if I ask you to repeat yourself, try to raise your voice just a tad, but mostly speak slower and more clearly.
If you have a induction loop in a facility, use it.
Microphones should always be used, and if an audience microphone is available, use it too.
Alternatively, have the moderator repeat the questions.

When I’m at conventions, I always sit in the front row. If I’m in a panel I prefer to sit in the middle. This is what works for me -- if you don’t know what works for someone else, try asking!

And how did it go at the Steampunkfestival?

Some panels went just fine, if I was placed in the center and didn’t get an audience question. Some panels worked less fine if the moderator forgot to repeat the audience question before someone answered it.

In one panel, I got an audience question and waited for the moderator to repeat it. My silence was interpreted as confusion or not having a good answer, so other panel members answered instead, while I looked like a question mark. I felt really stupid.

I had a slight problem understanding the guests of honour too. One spoke really fast, and one stuttered. It can’t be helped, I get that. People talk the way they talk. I chose to attend other program items.

One panel I listened to did NOT work at all, though. The moderator asked the audience (without using the microphone) if he could skip using the microphone. I misheard him and thought he meant “Do I really have to use the mic?” so I said yes.

When he then put the mic down and started to talk I thought he just chose to ignore me and I got really upset. I stayed and tried to listen, but got so bleedingly tired that I started crying. When the panel was over, I stepped up and said a few harsh words and then I stormed out. Not my finest moment. But I think this illustrates the importance of microphones.

Which only goes to show what NOT to do during conventions (or in general):

Avoid asking if you can be excused from using microphones. It only makes HoH (hard of hearing) people feel like a nuisance. We don’t want to make a big thing out of it. We want to have every possible help we can get without having to beg for it. And some people, like me, have a hard time asking for help.

Think about how you stand in position to the hard of hearing-person. Think about how the sound travels. Make sure you stand fairly close and facing the person.

When someone asks you to repeat what you said, don’t repeat it in the exact same tone. Take it a bit more clearly and slowly, and maybe a bit louder but no yelling. Yelling is rude.

I usually miss the first words of the sentence if the talker is turning to me or stuttering at the start, and if I lose the start I often don’t understand the context. So repeating the key words is helpful.

These tips are helpful when making accommodations for people with my kind of hearing disability. But please do remember, not all hearing problems work the same.

If you’re unsure of how to help, ask, do not assume. Don’t be scared of asking me about my hearing disability, I’m glad to see people taking an interest in how to help me. I know not everyone feels this way, though, and I’m not always up for the discussion. I suggest you proceed with caution and respect when you have questions.

I hope these tips can help people understand the ways sensorineural hearing loss works, and that social exclusion and mental and physical exhaustion is a big part of it. I hope future convention committees can take this under consideration.

Archipelacon

Last week, I embarked on a great and marvelous adventure. I set my sails to Mariehamn, Åland, to attend Archipelacon, a convention created by nordic fandom, mostly from Finland and Sweden.

I've been looking forward to this convention ever since the worldcon last year in London, where I first heard about it and immediately decided to become a member. I heard that the Guests of Honour would include George R R Martin and Malmö-based author Karin Tidbeck. Both authors are amazingly good with words, I've read and loved all of their work. The other Guests of Honour were Johanna Sinisalo, the finnish author of "Not before sundown" (and writer of Iron Sky). The fan Guest of Honour was Parris McBride, who also happens to be GRRM's wife. Gary K Wolfe, also a long time fan, was the academic guest of honour. This was a really impressive list of GoH:s, but it wasn't just that, that made me want to go. I also wanted to hang out with the finnish fandom that I'd met in London. Who would say no to a four day long party with the finnish fandom!?

The journey

Since I live so far away from Åland, and the ferry from Stockholm left around 7 am, I decided to travel up to Stockholm the day before the con started, so I could arrive to Åland with the rest of the fans by thursday noon. So, the adventure started on wednesday morning with me and my friend Frida (she taged along for her first convention!) taking a plane from Malmö, spending the day sightseeing in Stockholm. We saw Gamla stan, SF-bokhandeln, ate some really delicious sushi and ice cream, and Frida found a store that had her nickname (Farraw) on it.

Since we were in Stockholm a day early, I had ordered my loyal subject the Stockholm fans to come to a pre-con-party. And so they did.

Bellis, Pebbles, Karl-Johan, Herman, Henrick, Karl-Johan, Hulda, Therese, Michael and Tommy met me at Monks, and later we were joined by the amusing brittish author Ian Watson and the lovely spanish translator Cristina Macia whom I met last month at Fantasticon in Denmark. It was a happy reunion, and a great way to kick off our Week of Fun with Fandom!

Henrick and me, on the way to the con, traveling by ferry to Åland.

Early thursday morning, slightly hung over and dead tired, we huddled off  to Värtahamnen and to the Baltic Princess. Me and my friends managed to get a few more hours of sleep in our cabin on the ferry and 5-6 hours later, we arrived at Mariehamn, checked in to our hotel Arkipelag and rushed over to the registery.

First impressions

Some things struck me during the con as unusally well organized. First of, the committee of the con seemed happy and relaxed, the registration went by in a flash and we got beautiful and well thought out programme and badges. The venue was spacious, with a high ceiling, glass doors to let the sun in, and the first floor had long stands of books and a chocolate stand. It was all centered around a lounge and a veranda (next to the sea) were fans met, drank beer and hung out.

The hotel where I slept was in crawling distance, the food market and the mainstreet was just around the corner, the bar at the venue was full of tasty Åland-beer (yum, Stallhagen Delikat and Baltic Porter!) and the staff was professional and good, and they selled easy-to-carry sandwishes. Never once did I go hungry, thirsty, or got lost from my friends, or had issues with noisy areas. And that is really, really good, since I have a hearing disability and can't really cope with noise. They could not have chosen a better spot.

The programme items

The convention started with an orchestra playing a song from Skyrim, and then Johan Anglemark and Sari Polvinen opened the convention ceremoniously with the guests of honour on stage. It was short and to the point. I didn't recognize the melody from Skyrim since I'm not a gamer, but I liked it all the same anyway. Frida was ecstatic. The ceremony took place in the main auditorium, which was a huge room and I felt sure everyone of us would fit in there if we wanted to. That meant that the most popular programme items would never have queues, unlike the worldcon London where we queued most of the time. As a Swede, I should be fairly used to queuing but it's really boring and I don't want to waste time waiting. When there's only four days of con I want to make the most of it.

Some memorable items on thursday's programme was "Nordic Weird" with Karin Tidbeck and Johanna Sinisalo. They talked about what genre they write, and what started their writing careers. Both agreed that neither of them have actively thought of them as weird fiction writers. Johannas readers mostly don't even find her by seeking out SF or fantasy. Karin said she just don't care about what genre she writes, and just focuses on seeing were the story goes. Karin started writing at a very young age, influenced by Tove Jansson, and Johannas writing career started while she was very active in finnish fandom. It was a good panel and I especially liked Karin's speech about what she wants to explore as a writer. The idea that reality is very thin, and that something lurks in the shadows and in the cracks, shaped her as an author and as a human being. It tickles my imagination.

The moderator Jukka Halme (who's name you all should know by now because I'm his number one fan) asked if their genre could be a sort of Janssonian fiction, and if there's something in the water that makes nordic countries write about this kind of things. Karins response came quickly: "It's the pickled fish."  And Johanna: "The light summers and dark nights." Karin also explained that other countries are drawn to her fiction because of the melancholy thing, which seems to be an aphrodisiac. Take heed, Nordic authors!

Another memorable thing on thursday was the orchestra playing songs from different sf-movies, which was ah-maaa-zing! More of that, please!

Quinsonitus playing Deep Space Opera. Photo taken by Henry Söderlund.

On friday, I went to four panels and sat for an hour in the Alvarfonden second hand bookshop-room, selling books and chatting with people.

The program items I saw was "Worlds of Water" which was a presentation about the Viking Age in Åland, "Life in fandom" with George R R Martin, Parris McBride, Gary K Wolf and Johan Anglemark as a moderator, "Zombies, Necrophiles and Spiraling Penises" by Torill Kornfeldt, and last but not least "Mad Scientists" with Torill, Anna Davour and Helena Kiel. I'm kind of shocked that I went to so few items, and in retrospect I'm sure I've missed a lot but I had a great time on the veranda, drinking beer and hanging out with my friends.

Bellis, Henrick, Johan, me, Frida and Marie-Louise. Picture belongs to Luke Smith.

The programme item about the Viking Age was really interresting, and the archeaologist Kristin Ilves was a good speaker. She talked about geomythology and explained that the nordic mythology of Ragnarök, and the fimbulwinter leading up to it, can be the result of an extreme weather phenomenon that happened around 536-545, and that early writings tell about some kind of meteor striking the earth, causing a blue sun and really cold summers. Readings indicate that sulfuric acid is found in the Greenland ice from that time, also indicating that there might have been some kind of volcanic eruption some years earlier.

Life in fandom was really awesome.I love these meta-panels about panels and life in fandom, and how the community has evolved over the years. Parris and George talked about how they met in a sauna in a convention in the seventies, which was cute and amusing. George also said an interesting thing about how fandom's been in the pasts that I hadn't thought about: When your family buy you books for christmas, they would mostly get it wrong since they don't really get you and sff. But in fandom in the sixties, seventies and eighties mostly all fans had read the same books and had great discussions about them. This was like your second family. That sort of thing is hard to do nowadays that the genre has expanded. But as common denominators go, nowadays you can be sure that you will find someone to talk to about your favourite tv-shows. And I still feel like fandom is my OTF.

It was interesting to hear about Parris experience as a woman in fandom in the early days when women wasn't that well represented in conventions. She had do endure sitting in a panel about "Women in sf - do we really need them?" for seven years. Archaic. She made a joke about helping to socialize a generation of fans who didn't really know how to talk to women. (Sometimes, I feel that way too. But that's something I'll save for another post.)

After that, Torill held an awe-inspiring and crazy presentation about the way animals and amphibians behave, mate and are designed. She's done this presentation before in swedish and the rumour of how fun it was had already spread to Finland, making it insanely popular. We completely filled the room, the floor, and people stood against the wall and in the doorframe. We were so many fans that we almost couldn't close the door. I talked to my mum the other day, telling her about Torill and her plans to go to Sibirien and visit the russian scientist whom wants to create mammoths, and mum was like: "Someone should make a movie about her life." I'm agreeing with mum, and adding "someone should give her the nobel prize, just because."

Mad scientists; Torill Kornfeldt, Anna Davour and Helena Kiel.

The last panel of friday was held by the awesome swedish scientists and fans Torill, Åka and Helena. They were funny and clever about the way scientists are depicted in films and litterature. Helena made the conclusion from Dante's Peak and Tremors that geologists are the sexy ones. Torill was unhappy with the biologists in Prometheus, whom seemed to be slightly to naive for their occupation. They also asked and answered very important questions:

"What would it be like if mad linguists ruled the world?"
"Just look at XKCD.com."

I LOL:ed. A lot. :D


On saturday, I listened to Maria Turtschaninoff, Kristina Hård, Petri Hiltunen and Johanna Sinisalo talk about "Trolls in nordic SFF". They all have different takes on the troll mythology, some have beautiful trolls (more like faeries), some have ugly ones, some trolls like treasure, some are more like seducers. The authors all consulted books, historic texts and nordic folk lore which gave them inspiration for their trolls. Sinisalo and Hiltunen often refer to their work as "troll punk" which I totally loved. (I must learn finnish so I can read Hiltunens graphic novels!) They talked a bit about tropes with trolls, that they've been used as cautionary tales for young women so they won't follow a beautiful stranger into the woods, or so they won't think the grass is greener on the other side. It has also been used as a way to talk about postpartum depression, as a way to relate to having children and becoming estranged to them. In the age of christianity, the devil took the place of the trolls, and so the cautionary tales lived on. The authors today often use mythological creatures as a metaphore for cultural and ethnic differences, and Petri Hiltunen explained that he's bringing evil trolls to the mix as a metaphore for greedy business men. Fascinating indeed!

Another item on my list for friday was at the library in Mariehamn, which was open for the public. What a great idea to show the public what we do and make it possible for them to sample a bit of our culture and happenings. A good way to find new fans, too!

In the library I listened to Torill (again, I seem to be stalking her!) talking about "Reality's Jurassic Park"and about extinct animals and what they have meant for us and for the nature. She talked about the passenger pidgeon and the auroch, and the thought of creating mammoths again through elephants to help the Sibirian tundra grow colder, which will help the environment. Torill was brilliant as always, and made everyone laugh, and also made us think about the world we live in and how we treat it.

Later on I listened to the english version of "Karin Tidbeck's guest of honour interview", where I made an awkward attempt of asking a audience question to Karin but then realized I hadn't thought it through, so noone could understand what I was asking. Afterwards, I hid in my hotel room for a while so I could sulk it out in private and go "OMG I'm so awkward!" until I got over it. I didn't remember anything that was said in that panel, due to the sheer trauma of the embarrasment, so I went to the one in swedish on sunday. Where I sat quietly.

The sunday interview I really, really liked, since it went deeper into the books and Johan Jönsson and Karin had such a funny, relaxed style. Karin joked a lot about the fact that she doesn't like her books being labeled dystopian, but then accidently said that they were dystopian and had to rectify it by calling it antiutopian.

Karin explained more about creating her novel "Amatka", and that she really liked the idea of a world reacting to language. Of course, then she had to clean out all kinds of metaphorical language, parables and stuff like that, which was a difficult job. There are so many interesting things said in that interview, but I'm going to have to narrow it down to one thing I want to highlight as very good: she wants to write about people whom suffer from mental illness, because these people exist in the world, and she wants them to have a part in it in her books. That was great, since I feel very strongly about the issue and feel that we need to hear these peoples voices and break the stigma that surrounds it. After all, depression is something about 50 % of human kind suffers from, it is a huge part of the human condition.

But now I'm getting ahead of myself. Lastly, on saturday, I sat in Alvarfondens second hand bookshop again, this time for two hours. It was a great way to meet new people, one of whom was Alexander Hallberg, Sveroks chairman and fellow nerd. We talked about creating associations (unifications?) and bringing people together, something we're both passionate about. And I sold some books, too.

On sunday, I went to two more panels except Karins interview, and then there was the closing ceremony. It all went by too quickly! *sobs*

The second item of the sunday programme was the panel "Translators and writers", moderated by the lovely Johanna Vainikainen, whom have the most soothing and pleasing voice and a relaxed and nice contact with her panel members. Listening to her moderating the panel was a joy in itself. The authors and translators were really good speakers too, Ian Watson and Cristina Macia make a fine pair and are funny to listen to. They are married, and like to tease and joke with each other, which is really entertaining to watch. Tanya Tynjala is a peruvian author and translator, but speaks and has translated to french too. Also in the panel was Karin Tidbeck and J. Pekka Mäkelä, both sf author, and also translators. Karin has translated her short stories collection Jagannath. I learned much about translating, about how different it can be from translator to translator depending on the publishing company, the pay, the amount of work and the level of collaboration with the author. And there are different styles of translators too. They had a good discussion about if a translator should translate word for word, or though for thought? Can there be nuances where the translator interpret the book, in the spirit of the author? Cristina felt the translators job is not to rewrite the book, and she has a more direct word for word approach. Tanya said her goal is to make the english reader feel the same as the spanish reader, to try to feel the voice.  Both had good points to make on the subject.

Cheryl Morgan, Tanya Tynjala, Ian Watson and Nini Neuvonen.

The discussion continued in next panel, "Science fiction and fantasy translated into english" were Cheryl Morgan took the helm of moderating Ian, Tanya and also Sini Neuvonen for an hour and a half. The panel was very informative about different translated works, and Cheryl Morgan mentioned she will post a list of the books mentioned, so I will try to get a hold of it and link it to this post. They talked a lot about the struggle of getting books translated, and mentioned "Finnish weird"; a impressing initiative made by the Finns, where they had fans translating their favourite Finnish writers. After that panel, I ran to the finnish bookstand and bought the magazine.

One point made about translated work is that the english speaking population has a tendency not to read translated work as there is so much written in their own language, and Cheryl Morgan asked the question "How do we encourage people to read translated work?" The question remains unanswered, but the panel gave a lot of good book tips which hopefully will help build some bridges.

The closing ceremony was a very fine thing, filled with applauds, hugs, and the guests of honour gave their thanks and said that they were really impressed with what the Archipelacon concom had done. GRRM encouraged everyone there to vote for Helsinki in 2017, and said that if they win the bid, he would be there in 2017 along with Connie Willis, Scott Lynch and the rest of the gang.

(I have voted, have you? Ask me how!)

The Finns are really good at this stuff, and I am thoroughly amazed by them all. I have made so many new acquaintances this weekend, and have gotten to know the Finns I met at Worldcon a bit more, and I miss them all terribly already, along with my fellow swedish fans.

The parties

Ah, the parties, What can be said about the parties? The parties were great! The Åland summer is very much like the summers in northern part of Sweden with the never dying light and the silence. Only, not as quiet... We had a pool! And karaokee! And I've even heard rumours about skinny dipping. Dammit guys, next time you have to tell me! ;)

"Look, the book matches the pool!"

The nights where bright and full of warmth from infrared heating. And full of mad scientist-laughter, Brotherhoods without banners, pool parties, singing, fezzes... Just an amazing buzz of people.

There were some really enthusiastic people singing Queen-songs in the karaokee-corner, and there were Jukka Halme and his evil gang, taunting me with the song "spiderpig" because I was scared of a humongously big evil spider of doom that hung in a fine thread from the ceiling. Jukka Särkijärvi and I stood shaking of shock and terror, hugging for comfort, until Karl-Johan Norén saved the day by smashing the spider with a pad. A brave man, that Karl-Johan, risking his life against the beast to save us.

We heard the drums in the distance, and saw Cthulu rising before us, from his watery grave.

We had a standing joke about me and Frida. The second day, when I had introduced her to a bunch of people, Frida was saying how she felt I was very much like Barney Stinson in "How I met your mother" with "Haaaaaave you met Ted?" and she was Ted. Not a bad comparison. (Although I'm not fixated on suits and getting laid.) But I do like magic. Frida mingled and got to know people and had a great time. It warmed my heart to see my best friend getting to know all these amazing people in my life and enjoying their company and the con too. Frida says that my hobby is to collect people, and I think the best thing about collecting people is when you're able to bring them together, and when they like each other as much as you like them all... it's like magic.

Another funny thing is when someone came up to me and accidently called me Frida. (That's how much they liked her. I'm starting to get jealous of her.) Later, Torill accidently called me Frida, and then I myself accidently called Frida Fia. (That was really weird.) Suddenly I had an identity crisis, which I confessed to having on twitter. That caught the attention of Tero Ykspetäjä, and all weekend long he enabled this crisis by said "Hello Frida!" to me. Thanks for that, Tero. Really. I'm gonna send my therapists bill to you. :P

Evil Tero!

I had a really great time, to which I owe many thanks to my very wonderful, understanding and good-for-waking-me-up-before-I-overslept-room mate Anna Bark Persson, and to our gang of Frida, Maria, Markus, Nahal, Veronica, Arina, Kristina, Hanna and Jan. We had a lovely dinner on sunday at Dino's were we squeezed together in a small booth and talked about the convention and other things. We also think we have figured out what killed the auroch. (Smoking is bad for you! What do you think, Torill? Could the aurochs have been nicotine addicts?)

I have made some big promises during this con, and all of them I intend to keep. I made a solemn vow to learn finnish when Jukka Särkijärvi started learning swedish, and to make a convention in Malmö the year after Nahal does one in Uppsala. Seems like a good plan. About learning finnish: I've actually downloaded an app and spent the better part of this weekend trying to learn words. Olisi. Jollekin.Työskennellä. Maito.

They say that learning another language is good for the brain, and prevents getting alzeimers, so I'm being healthy too. (And also it is good when wanting to read finnish sf-litterature).

There have been a lot of fans from different countries at this convention. But I started thinking, maybe, we're all from the same country; the fandom country. We speak the language of SF but have different dialects, and we don't let that hinder us from connecting and making friends. Frida's soon traveling to Japan for an exchange year, and will be seeking out the japanese fandom. The brittish fan Luke Smith has begun to learn swedish. Some Finns are talking about coming to Swecon and I'm definitly going to Finncon next year. And maybe Åcon. And maybe Eurocon in Spain, which will be in november 2016, hosted by the lovely Ian and Cristina! (Maybe I'll have to learn spanish too.)

There are so many things to be said about this convention, and I could talk about it for ages, but I think I'll just end this here before it become a novel. My very last words will be  an echo of Jukka Halme's eternal wisdom: Fandom is love.

Science-fiction & Fantasyhelg i Uppsala

Bilden är lånad från Kontrast hemsida.

Ni har väl inte missat Kontrast? Jag kommer vara där tillsammans med Socialistsimon och Feuerzeug samt säkert en massa andra fans. Join us and together we shall be... awesome! :)

Kontrast 2012, årets Swecon, är en science fiction- och fantasykongress som äger rum 5-7 oktober på hotell Gillet i Uppsala. Tre dagar fyllda av föredrag, paneldebatter, intervjuer och diskussioner om science fiction och fantasy. Medverkar gör bland annat Mats Strandberg, Sara Bergman Elfgren, Joe Abercrombie; författarna till  "The Blade itself ", "Cirkeln" och "Eld". De är tre starka skäl till att besöka kongressen, men personligen ser jag extremt mycket fram emot att träffa några av de härliga människor som jag träffat på Eurocon 2011, uppsala-gänget självt.