Wednesday, 30 April 2008
Apology to the Stolen Generations
On 12 February, 2008, in the words of one facebooker "a brave man walked into Federal Parliament. Two hours later, a great man walked out." I couldn't help wondering what Mikko would have made of that day. Part of him would have been proud, I think, that his adopted country was finally redressing old wrongs, although he would also be adamant that Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's apology to the stolen generations was long overdue: after all Mikko signed this petition in 1999, and for nearly a decade kept this photo of Nicky Winmar "lifitng his jumper and pointing to his tummy" on his wall. Australians have a lot to learn from other countries' treatment of indigenous people: including Finland's respect for the traditional ways of life of the Saami people (in English, we know them as Laplanders). Nevertheless, I was proud to be an Australian that day, and I think the Finn would have been proud too.
Monday, 21 April 2008
The Mikko Sikstrom Memorial Fund
Okay, so this is coming late, and somewhat out of the blue for some folk... some of you may recall that after Mikko's death, in consultation with Matti and Meri, a sum of money (some $66,000, approximately 40,000 euro) was donated to the Leukaemia Foundation of Victoria. This is the organisation for which Mikko shaved off his hair to raise money in early 2004 (see before and after pix, below), in their annual "shave for a cure" campaign. During his life he raised about $1000 (600 euro). We thought long and hard about appropriate ways to perpetuate his generous spirit, and honouring this very positive aspect of his life seemed to be the most appropriate. We hope that you agree.
In memory of Mikko's beginnings in Australia, at Mallacoota in the far east of Victoria (600 km Melbournesta), these funds were allocated to the purchase of a residential unit so that people suffering from leukaemia could have a home away from home when they needed to travel to Melbourne for treatment, and be surrounded by family and familiar things at such a scary time. This is actually the first property of its kind that the Leukaemia Foundation has ever funded in Melbourne, and this is something of which we can all be proud. Finding an appropriate property has taken a very long time, and in the end our fund has been combined with others in order to provide an appropriate premises. However the purchase has now been made, and you can read about the recent opening ceremony here: http://www.leukaemia.org.au/fileadmin/dl-docs/booklets/Carer_Autumn08.pdf
I am hoping to see the unit when I return to Melbourne for a visit during May, and hope to have more news for you then if you wish it.
In memory of Mikko's beginnings in Australia, at Mallacoota in the far east of Victoria (600 km Melbournesta), these funds were allocated to the purchase of a residential unit so that people suffering from leukaemia could have a home away from home when they needed to travel to Melbourne for treatment, and be surrounded by family and familiar things at such a scary time. This is actually the first property of its kind that the Leukaemia Foundation has ever funded in Melbourne, and this is something of which we can all be proud. Finding an appropriate property has taken a very long time, and in the end our fund has been combined with others in order to provide an appropriate premises. However the purchase has now been made, and you can read about the recent opening ceremony here: http://www.leukaemia.org.au/fileadmin/dl-docs/booklets/Carer_Autumn08.pdf
I am hoping to see the unit when I return to Melbourne for a visit during May, and hope to have more news for you then if you wish it.
Sunday, 20 April 2008
A little bit about me
Okay, so if you're reading this and know who Mikko was, you know who I was.
When he died, one of the hardest things for me to figure out was what I was supposed to be going forward. Mikko was my first husband, and I can say (with no disrespect to Anthony, with whom I now share my life) that I will never love anyone with the intensity and ferocity and sometimes-all-consuming-desperation that I have felt for "the Finn".
At the time he died, that marriage had ended in practice, although it endured in a legal sense. In daily life, Mikko had become the friend I saw more often than any other, who ran a late night bottle-o around the corner from my home in Carlton, who rang me three times a week to go for pizza, a glass of wine, a movie, a chat. He was the bloke I'd swing past to see when I needed a break from writing my final papers for my masters, and who rang me in those final weeks to say 'there's a new publican at Dan, and he's proper Irish. We gotta go - it's gonna be great again'. We still fought at swordfighting training and traded tales of our respective romantic adventures. He was the bloke who would walk me home and still have awkward moments, because sometimes each of us would forget that we weren't in a marriage any more, and 'nearly' hold hands, or kiss.
Whatever he and I had become, he was my best friend, and I miss him. I know I'm not the only one and my grief is, in many ways, no different to anyone else's. But he continues to dominate my thoughts. So much. So often.
I spent most of 2005 in a state that I can only describe as 'never very far from tears'. In 2006 I moved to the UK, found peace and a new level of reconciliation in our beloved Wien, finally saw Helsinki in the summer, and learned what it is to exist long hours from the place your heart calls home. Even now, three years on and still living 10,000 miles from Melbourne, surrounded by people who never met him, it often takes but a moment and an unwitting word to conjure up memories of happy days, or gutwrenching confrontations, and always that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach when I'm reminded that he's not just 'not here' in Oxford, he's 'gone'. Hot tears flow thick and fast when I'm alone - on a bus, or by the Thames, or under my doona at night...
I'm trying, with all my heart and soul, to make this blog a record of the thousands of ways in which he changed the world for the better. If it inspires one person, or changes one life, I'll be pleased.
Invariably, sometimes it's just gonna be about the loneliness, which I live with nearly every day. But what can you do? If any of us gives in and follows him, all we do is prove him right. And it will never be all right with me that Mikko found this world such an awful and terrifying place that he had to take himself from it.
You were bright and brilliant - and right about many things, rakas Mikko. But leaving the world was not one of them. I hope that, wherever you are, you know that now, even though these days you're in a place where it no longer matters.
aina,
Gigisi
When he died, one of the hardest things for me to figure out was what I was supposed to be going forward. Mikko was my first husband, and I can say (with no disrespect to Anthony, with whom I now share my life) that I will never love anyone with the intensity and ferocity and sometimes-all-consuming-desperation that I have felt for "the Finn".
At the time he died, that marriage had ended in practice, although it endured in a legal sense. In daily life, Mikko had become the friend I saw more often than any other, who ran a late night bottle-o around the corner from my home in Carlton, who rang me three times a week to go for pizza, a glass of wine, a movie, a chat. He was the bloke I'd swing past to see when I needed a break from writing my final papers for my masters, and who rang me in those final weeks to say 'there's a new publican at Dan, and he's proper Irish. We gotta go - it's gonna be great again'. We still fought at swordfighting training and traded tales of our respective romantic adventures. He was the bloke who would walk me home and still have awkward moments, because sometimes each of us would forget that we weren't in a marriage any more, and 'nearly' hold hands, or kiss.
Whatever he and I had become, he was my best friend, and I miss him. I know I'm not the only one and my grief is, in many ways, no different to anyone else's. But he continues to dominate my thoughts. So much. So often.
I spent most of 2005 in a state that I can only describe as 'never very far from tears'. In 2006 I moved to the UK, found peace and a new level of reconciliation in our beloved Wien, finally saw Helsinki in the summer, and learned what it is to exist long hours from the place your heart calls home. Even now, three years on and still living 10,000 miles from Melbourne, surrounded by people who never met him, it often takes but a moment and an unwitting word to conjure up memories of happy days, or gutwrenching confrontations, and always that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach when I'm reminded that he's not just 'not here' in Oxford, he's 'gone'. Hot tears flow thick and fast when I'm alone - on a bus, or by the Thames, or under my doona at night...
I'm trying, with all my heart and soul, to make this blog a record of the thousands of ways in which he changed the world for the better. If it inspires one person, or changes one life, I'll be pleased.
Invariably, sometimes it's just gonna be about the loneliness, which I live with nearly every day. But what can you do? If any of us gives in and follows him, all we do is prove him right. And it will never be all right with me that Mikko found this world such an awful and terrifying place that he had to take himself from it.
You were bright and brilliant - and right about many things, rakas Mikko. But leaving the world was not one of them. I hope that, wherever you are, you know that now, even though these days you're in a place where it no longer matters.
aina,
Gigisi
A little bit about this blog
If you are reading this blog, you've either found it by accident, or like me, you still sometimes randomly google the name of someone we all loved and lost because you find it hard to believe, even after nearly 4 years, that he really isn't here.
It seems impossible that someone who touched as many lives as Mikko did, and who changed so many people for the better, could leave such a little dent in cyberspace. Creating this blog isn't supposed to exactly remedy that, and it isn't supposed to become some kind of shrine, just a way of keeping some of the best of him in the world. I think that sometimes what I find hardest about him being no longer here is that there's so damn much he's missing out on: from the huge world events (he would have been flattered, I think, to know that he shared an obituary page with Yasser Arafat, but desperate at more recent turns of events between Israeli and Palestinian forces, and the ongoing occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan) to the celebrations of his friends: the degrees awarded, babies born, new partners, new jobs, new countries we call home.
I hope that anyone who wants to will share thoughts and memories, the things that fill you with a warm glow because you know he would be so proud to know the things you've done, and maybe even a little about the days that still sometimes ache so much.
My grandfather used to say that no-one is truly dead while even the last person in the world who knew and loved and remembered them is still here. I like to think that I prove him right every time I tell someone that.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
