Monday, January 12

Auo died a year ago today. We all took the day off from our respective school and work.

Sometime over the weekend Olivia and Irma had had a chat on Facebook and out of that came the idea of a gathering to celebrate Auo’s life.

At 18:00 a group of people who had known and loved Auo gathered at our house. Päivi and Jana came, as did Antti, Jyrki and Aron, and Dan, Tusita and Christa. Mirja from across the road popped in as did Tarkku. Irma’s mother arrived and best of all Auo’s friends: Olivia, Niilia, Silja, Katja and Sirkka.

At 18:20 we went outside. I wrote Auo’s name in the snow and the girls illuminated it with outdoor candles, parallelling the puja we did in Kovalem. We saw on Facebook that Anu and friends had lit the sky candles on the beach today.

Now Auo’s name is illuminated and we are standing in the cold watching and chatting. Soon we will go in to eat home made pies, and other goodies that Irma has prepared.

We will see that Jutta has posted photos of the candles in her house, and we will learn that there are candles in Chile, England, India and Thailand.