Have you unpacked your things? Good. You came to live in Toppila. How is it? It might be calm and familiar like the sea behind your new apartment, but also cold and creepy like the night that is waiting to come and stay. Let’s try to imagine the day of your arrival.

It’s a Sunday, late October. Where are you? You have seen from the map that you are a little far from downtown Oulu, but there is a big park behind the street. And so? You put your jacket on and you go. Finally out of the apartment. The first thing to do is to go to the seaside. It’s almost evening. A light blue autumn evening. You walk to the west, maybe the sun is setting down when you step onto the grass of the park. A small river is carrying some yellow leaves, and you watch them floating away. The fresh air makes you feel good. Simple. Now a hill is quite high. A small effort, but it’s worth it. When you reach the top of the hill you stop. You have to. The sea is there in front of you. It waves calmly. It invites you to come close without fear. And you do it. The water now reaches your feet and you wonder where that wave came from. You ask it yourself but you know it. You are that wave. You came from somewhere that now you cannot see and you reached Oulu. Toppila.

Now you turn back. The light of the day is dying. You remember that your room is empty. I mean completely empty, not even the light on the roof. You decide to go to the big shop called Halpa-Halli (cheap hall) and find a candle. That shop sells everything you need, from underwear, through razorblades and löylykauha, to all sorts of food. But it’s Sunday. It’s closed. In front of the Cheap Hall you see a Kioski, a kind of small shop. After picking up a tiny frozen pizza you ask for a candle and the clerk tells you ei romantikkaa, I’m not romantic. However, she gives you a pen as a gift when you ask if she sells them. You rush back to your room hoping that the sun will stand still. But after a few pages of the colorful Arto Paasilinna the large window of the room is not anymore able to let the light come in. So you feel lost. It’s seven and you are surely not sleepy. No light, no candles. You go to the kitchen and turn on the light above the sink. No chairs. I can stand, you say to yourself proudly. But after a few pages of the charming book your neck begins to hurt. You remember a little wooden step in the sauna, bring it to the kitchen and sit to continue reading. At nine you put the frozen pizza into the oven. Ten minutes. The smoking dinner is there ready to be eaten. You take the ovenpaper off carefully, but the pizza flips away from the paper and ends up in some hole. It disappeared! The oven ate your pizza! You try to understand where it could have gone when you discover a draw under the oven. There lies your food. You watch it pathetically. You look outside, the dark sky teasing you. Your stomach rumbles. You eat the pizza with mouth wide open and eyes tightly closed.

So this is Toppila, you think while biting. Calm as the waves of the sea, silent as your empty room, unpredictable as the tricky oven. It makes you feel like crying, but you find yourself laughing.