A blog about Tenerife, Linedancing, Food, Shopping etc.

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Tuesday, December 30, 2008







Year 2008

Oh what a year it has been! I went back to read and remember all what
happened and now I have made an overview.
It's good to blog because then you can go back and see
what happened during the year.
I have never brought a year to an end in this way before, having a clear overview about everything that happened.

January
The year started with a catastrophe.
The tiles on the wall in the bathroom suddenly started coming down.
I was scared that the whole wall would collapse and
prayed to God when I went to bed that
we would wake up alive in the mornings.
He answered my prayers and we are still alive!


February
I got a nice surprise and a prayer answer again when my drivers license and health insurance card suddenly arrived in the mailbox.
The cards were stolen in January when we went
on a shopping tour to Sta Cruz.
I prayed that the thief would have a guilty conscience, and
send the cards back to me, and that's what happened.


March
The police came to Lewinski and took our signs and it cost
150 Euros to get them back.
We released a new CD.


April
We went to El Hierro for an absolutely needed vacation.


May
We visited the neighbor island La Gomera with
our friends Mick and Frances from England.


June
I was terribly burned one day on the beach and couldn't almost
wear any clothes.


July
I became ill and the doctors thought I had Chronic Bronchitis.
I had to inhale a powder twice a day but it didn't help.
After a lot of treatments I got to know it was only a reflux illness.


August
My son Mattias and his girlfriend Pia visited us.


September
Not much happened. I was only shopping and eating nice meals.


October
The guests were complaining about the restaurant were we played and
we started looking for a new one.
It was cold and windy and the restaurant were in a need of a renovation.


November
We decided to move to Oasis mango and Theo, the owner of Lewinski, decided to start renovating the restaurant and told us to come back when it's ready.


December
A really dark month.
Our marriage went through the worse trial ever but we survived and
came out alive but with aching souls.
In the same time many of our friends died one after an other and I got
chock after chock til I just felt i can't take anymore.
First Ray died, then Alf died, then Christers wife and child died, and then John got heart fibrillation and ended up in the intensive care here on Tenerife.
A positive thing though was that my sister Carola and Calle came to visit. They are still here.
We also released our new CD this month.




When I look at the key it has been some bad things happening during the year, but it's easy to just remember the nice things and that's what I will do.
I think 2008 was a nice year anyhow and I think I have got a lot of new experiences that I maybe will have need for in the future.
I see the life like a school or a travel that is planned by a higher power, God.
There is a reason with all that happens and if you try to make an influence yourself, buy walking your own way, it will just mess everything up.
The best thing is to just relax and live your life and try to do your best + be nice and generous to people around you, and then God can lead you in peace and victory and he gives you advantage in all circumstances you face.

God is good and he ask us all about our hearts desires.
Everybody have got heart desires, but many people choose to bury them and they never let them become real.
Be brave! Do you know your hearts desires?
Reveal them to God and he will make them come through in the right time.
It starts with you!
Would it be the will of God that you will miss out your dreams and live a boring life?
No! God is for you and not against you!

This will be my motto for 2009.
I will think about my hearts desires and lift them up before God.
Happy New Year to you all!
Love and XXXooo
Susanne

Monday, December 29, 2008

A short one


I am in a hurry now.
Need to have a shower before we go to work and I don't know what outfits we are going to wear tonight and the time is running...
Serious problems! like you see...
I feel so sorry that I haven't got much time to blog and that's why I do this short one now.
You see, I can't continue this evening without writing a couple of words first...
Without doing it I will think about it the whole night long and then I maybe loose the lyrics when I sing.
Promise to blog more again next year.
I have started working on an annual report that I will publish as soon as it gets ready.
Have a nice evening!
By the way...To all who continue asking; Oasis Mango is full booked on New Years eve!

Thursday, December 25, 2008

Christmas Eve

Sorry, I don't blog much right now.
We are so busy by doing a lot of things and I very seldom get time to sit at the computer, which maybe is good. Blogging is like a work and I think it's good to have like a small break from it every now and then.

It was raining cats and dogs here on Tenerife yesterday but we had the dinner out on the balcony when it was still quite warm.
We started eating at 4 o' clock in the afternoon and were finished about nine. Guess if we were stuffed!
Then we went out on town to a karaoke bar and Carola and Calle did entertain us by singing.
Oh, how fun we had! We got back home around 2 o'clock in the night.


My sister Carola before we went out on town.


Calle on the karaoke stage.

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Merry Christmas to you all!


Please, click on the photo and the snow start
falling and you can hear the music.

10 000 Visitors!

Oh, It has passed 10.000 visitors!
I have been very busy and missed it out!

Carola and Calle (my sister + husband) have arrived and we were with them yesterday before we went to work in the night.
Today I have been running around every where buying stuff for the Christmas dinner we are going to have in our home tomorrow. I found quite a lot and tomorrow night we are going to eat and eat and eat...What else can you do on a Christmas eve?

Before I always blogged in the nights when we got home from work, but now I have started to go to bed earlier, and I don't sit at the computer at all in the nights anymore.
There's a risk that I'll stay up until late if I start up the computer so I have chosen to not do that at all.
Today I woke up already at ten o'clock and I think it's nice to get more time in the daytime.

We have been playing at Oasis Mango the last three nights.
It has been very quiet in the whole town and the streets have been empty of tourists.
We have had about 40-60 guests per night and that's not bad when you think about the situation, but the Christmas tourists arrive now and we hope it will come up a little bit more this coming week.

Have a nice evening!

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Sunny Tenerife


I know my sister and her husband become happy when they read this.
They arrive tomorrow and will stay a fortnight.

We have got the sun back today.
It's the first day for over a month that Tenerife has no clouds at all!
It's +22 degrees and we start defrosting again.
I hope this weather will stay over the two coming weeks, at least, and it just will be perfect.
We start playing tonight and I will soon dive into the wardrobes to look for outfits.
Have a nice evening!

No glögg = No Christmas!


It's nice to have friends.
Our friend Catharina from Sweden, who lives on Tenerife, gave us a bottle of homemade Swedish glögg today.
It's a hot Christmas drink and we many times have it with Swedish Anna cookies and blue cheese. Oh, it's so lovely!
It's extra nice to have it now when the winter cold has hit us.
It's now only 14,5 degrees outside! Inside about +20.
Every now and then we have to get under the quilt in the bed to get up the heat but it's okay. :-)
I am just so happy we are not working out on a terrace right now. That would be impossible!

Thursday, December 18, 2008

It's winter on Tenerife!


Ann-Mari, a lady from Sweden who lives here on Tenerife in the winter time, gave me these two Swedish home furnish and decoration magazines.
She's an angel! She many times bring me her Swedish magazines after she has read them.
She has also been baking a loaf of bread to Clas tonight!

I like to watch all the pictures in the magazines. Every time I re-read an issue I find new small details in the decorations that I haven't seen before.
I will soon tuck myself into bed and just enjoy all the pictures.

We had the dinner in Las Americas tonight and it's so cold that we both got stiff bodies even when we were dressed in winter clothes with jackets and everything.
It would have been nice to wear gloves but we didn't think about it before we already were out on the street and then we were too lazy to go back in to get them.
It's so chilly that the bones are aching even when I'm not a rheumatic person.

I remember when we lived in Florida 1996-97.
One Sunday morning it was only +16 degrees.
Our pastor was so excited when the church became crowded.
He thought nobody would go out when it was so cold.
We thought at that time that +16 is quite warm. But now, when we have been living here on Tenerife for many years, we are the same.
When the temperature goes under +20 we hardly can't move anymore.

Clas checked out the temperature now and it's only +15,1 degrees outside!

Remember to bring warm clothes if you are on the way to Tenerife.
It's winter here now! Or you could say it's similar to what it is in April-May or August-September in Scandinavia.
It's probably snow up on Teide! The vulcan got the first snow about two weeks ago, but I don't know if it has melted away or if it's still there.
The mainland of Spain has also got a lot of snow.

Sometimes the tourists are very obstinate.
We saw people, walking around in Las Americas tonight, only in shorts, T-shirts, and barefooted in sandals.
They will for sure catch colds or at least get persistent coughs. Don't they?
Maybe it's hard to accept that it's winter here when you have payed a lot of money to get to the summer. Poor tourists!

I hope we'll get a sunny day tomorrow. Then it can be up to about +23 degrees.
Clas says we maybe need to bring in the herb plants, that are out on the balcony, before we go to sleep... Good Night!

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

We start again!


We have decided to start playing again Saturday 20th of December.
We have got guidance from a friend and now everything is much more clear.
Some re-priorities need to be done, to cut down on the stress,
but we will make it when we now know about it.
We both know it would be too stupid to give everything up so easy
and we will also try to heal our marriage and start over again.
Nobody knows if it's gonna work but we will try anyhow.

Monday, December 15, 2008

Sing and play together?

We have got many e-mails the last days.
It's nice to know there are people who care about us.
Some people have asked if it could be possible for us to continue our country venues here on Tenerife and told us to think about it. It means to work together as friends!

We say we are friends and that's what we are now...But what about if it doesn't work?
I don't like to start up, and give everybody a hope, and then stop again if it doesn't work.
That would be like to start the whole process from the beginning again , and I feel it would be more than I could bear right now.
I still feel depressed. But I also understand that I have to make a decision as soon as possible.

Clas had contact with Oasis Mango yesterday and they think it would be nice if we could start the 20th of December.Then we have been off for 15 days.
They have adds about our venues in two different papers, and they also have employed a girl to just do PR about our nights towards the guests at their other 7 hotels here in Los Cristianos.
It costs them money every day and people come to the restaurant to see us and we are not there.
It's a big dilemma we have caused by this.

I think everything would have been easier if we wouldn't have been so much on display through our work.
To lay down a work of this kind is not made so easily when it's a lot of other people involved too. It's not only about us, our bussiness and work. It's also about business and work for other people.

Clas says we can try and I have got like an exemption until tomorrow to think about it.
We Finns are known to have "sisu" and to go on even in hard times...but it's a difficult decision for me to make so shortly.

We will now watch the Mama Mia DVD.
Clas got an idea that we need to do something else to just divert our melancholy thoughts. I think it's a good idea!

Sunday, December 14, 2008

My dream right now

The Abama pool, Tenerife South.

We were sitting and talking about how it is to live on Tenerife and then we got a revelation that many people seam to be boring about their monotony life here.
They do the same things every day and it's quite boring when you think about it.

The tourists who come to the island do a lot of things.
They visit the zoos, walk in the mountains, travel around the island, are on the beach, sit and watch the other tourists, listen to the foreign languages, feel the smells, booze the different cultures here, enjoy the different cuisines etc. They spend quality time while they are here.

Many who live here have built up their own systems how they spend the days.
They go to the same bar, drink the same liquid, meet the same people and eat at the same restaurants. That's all they do!
Many are so bored that they don't have much energy to change the patterns.
When they are really bored they in addition take a drink to cheer up and many become alcoholics when they need cheer ups in the morning, in the middle of the day and in the nights.
That's how the life is for some of the people here! (Not for everybody!)

We have also been living a boring life.
Every time we have been driving by car up to Santa Cruz I have felt so blessed when I have understood we are on Tenerife in real.
I have enjoyed the forty five minutes drive, when this is the only time I have had time to look around and just sit and enjoy the landscape.
In between these travels I haven't almost noticed that we are on a paradise island.
You spend the most of the time inside the town and you get so used to everything that you don't appreciate it anymore.

Now I would like to somehow alter my habits so that I can enjoy Tenerife more.
It's not easy to change habits but I would like to use the time in a better way.
These are some things I think about:

-To go earlier to bed and get up earlier in the mornings.

-To not eat out all the meals when that is the most boring you can do.
I am so tired of the restaurant food that I don't know what to eat anymore.

-To go out and just have a walk without running in and out in shops. More country walks!

-To just sit down sometime and look at the sea and the boats in the harbor.

-To just sit in the sun and feel the heat...etc.

I just feel I would like to get into a more healthy and less stressful life and leave all must do:s behind. Nobody will yet give thanks to me for all the ambitions I have had, the day I die.

I don't have to learn a lot of new songs every month!
I don't have to know all the new linedances!
I don't have to wear new outfits every night or every time I go out in town!
I don't have to have the perfect makeup and new made nails every day! Etc.
I like to have it and I can have it, but it takes too much time!

It's time to re-plan the priorities.
I don't promise anything, but this is my dream now.
Oh how nice it would be to just sit down and read a book!

Clas says he will do the same. The life is too short to just waist it away.
We like to lay down our "luxury life" so that we can start living the real luxury life!

The New Solo Album

Much better

We both feel much better today.
Clas is now at Oasis Mango talking with the manager.
It's really a shame that we have caused them all this.
If they knew it they, of course, wouldn't have asked us to come and play.
But who knew it at that time?
They now loose money when we are not there and they don't have any music at all.
How many tourists like to spend a night in a restaurant without entertainment?
I feel ashamed when I think about it and think we have shocked them as well.

For the present I'll remain on Tenerife

I have been thinking a lot.
If I just can find something to do on Tenerife I will continue living here.
I have lived here for four years now and it feels like my home. I like this paradise island.

We have signed the divorce papers today. We got them from Finland over the internet.
It's the court of appeal in Helsinki that takes care of our case when we live abroad.
It really feels like the devil is laughing.
But the bureaucracy is slow and we first get a reconciliation period of six months, which maybe is a good thing.

Somebody called us and thought that Clas has been abusing me or been into bed with somebody else. That's not what has happened!

We have been talking a lot and we have decided to stay as friends however and I hope all we know will be friends to both of us in the future. Please, don't take part for anyone! We are friends!

We both know that we have had a tough time when we have been working too much and because of that we have somehow flipped out and lost our normal foundations.
When you like your work you don't notice when it's too much. It just goes on and on, and in the end you grow weary and you can't think clearly anymore. Then it's easy to start doing things you normally never would do to just try to put a golden edge on the existence.

It's sometimes quite a stressful job to be an artist. Specially when it goes into full swing.
And I know we have been into a kind of luxury life, like it felt, where you could have a little of everything that was offered and we haven't been able to resist and evaluate the offers.
We have just enjoyed the sweetness, feeling we can have whatever.

Many musicians here on the island feel the same and some use drugs and stuff to try to make it.
We are both afraid of drugs ( nobody of us have ever tried) and we try to make it by own power instead.
It's quite tough to play six nights a week like you do here in Spain.
(A working-week is six days here).
Normal artists maybe have 2-3 venues per week when they give a show of about 1-1,5 hour, but we play 3 hours every night.
But I don't like to complain about it. I like it and so do Clas. This "work" has been like what we were meant for.

Thanx to all of you who have been sending e-mails and who are praying for us.
Without your input it would have been much worse. It's nice to know there are friends and somebody who care.
We both agree that this is the worse that ever have happened in our marriage.

I wish Clas and I could continue together like you all wish.
But I still need healing in my heart and i can't make any decisions when I´m not sure if it will work.

Thursday, December 11, 2008

Christmas decorations 2008

I suddenly remembered I have promised to show some
Christmas decorations from our balcony.

Please, click on the arrow to watch the video clip.

Sorry!

I think I have shocked some of you with the message in the last post.
I was stupid when I told about it so quickly.
My first thought were that I leave immediately and I like to give you a hint about what's up when some of you maybe would be surprised to discover we are not playing when you come to the island.
We also get a lot of mails from people who ask where we are gonna play during their stay on Tenerife and I thought it's better to say like it is so that people know.

I am not so shocked anymore and I will take some days to sort everything out.
We have been together for 17 years and then you just can't run away.
It's a lot of practical things to sort out when you are up to a divorce.

I will not tell you what has happened. If Clas like to do it himself it's up to him. I have no revengeful feelings.
I am just surprised when he always have been telling me that we are the luckiest in the whole world and that he loves me. But times can get a quick change like it seams.
Why are some men so stupid? I am sure he didn't think about the consequences of this!

Please, remember us in your prayers. We need all support we can get right now.

The CD will be done

Clas is working on the design of the CD cover.
He has decided to make the album ready anyhow.
That's nice.
Maybe not many people will get to hear it but it can be a memory for ourselves.
The ones of you who already have ordered and payed it, will receive it in the mailbox when it gets ready.

We tried to talk last night but it wasn't easy when he was thinking about how to save our relationship and I was thinking about how we can arrange everything practically.
Maybe I have come further in my thoughts than him.
But today we both understand it needs to be a miracle now, at least, to save our marriage.
It's really tough, but we will survive.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

The New CD

All the singing is now done and Clas started doing the mixing yesterday.
I am in a very sensitive mode right now and I started crying last night when I was listening to the songs and the lyrics.
Almost every word is exactly what I feel and what I am into right now or have been into recently.
I didn't know it when I picked the songs, nor did I know it yet when I was singing in the studio, but things have happened now and 99% is like a fulfilled prophecy.

I have got two shocks this week.
The first one was Ray, who died, and then I got to know an other thing that I can't tell you about now, but that has made my heart breaking into pieces.
I don't really know where to go from here, like I sing in one of the songs.
I have to look at tomorrow and not the past, like I sing in an other song, but it's not easy.
My life is really tough right now but I will try to keep on blogging every now and then.

Sunday, December 07, 2008

Sad News



Oh, I have been so shocked and sad.
We got to know a friend of us suddenly had died while he was sleeping at home in the night.
First I couldn't hardly believe it but now I understand it's true.
He looked so happy when we saw him a couple of weeks ago and you could never have thought that he only had got two more weeks to live.
He always had a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye and that's how I will remember him.

Friday, December 05, 2008

Home decorations

Many would like to see how we live here on Tenerife.
It's quite often we get questions about how we live and where we live.
People are also brave enough to ask how much our apartment cost and how much money we get in per month.

It's only Scandinavians who ask. People from other nations never ask when they think it's a too personal question. For them it would be the same as asking how much somebody have got in the purse.

Some of our guests during the past years have also been thinking you can't make a living by working in Spain and they have asked with a skeptical voice if we have got anywhere to live.
Do we look like we are homeless?
Other dream about moving to Spain and they would like to see how a long term apartment looks and hope to be invited to our home.
We know the most of them will never move anywhere.

Believe it or not, but many people in Spain have got nice homes.
They have nice furniture and nice cars and they maybe live in a higher standard than some people do in other countries around Europe.

We can't invite everybody we know to our home when we have got to know thousands of people the last years, but we have got a home.

Would you like to see some of the decorations in our home?
Please, click on the arrow to watch the video clip.

9000 Visitors!

9000 Pictures, Images and Photos

Who is the number 9000 visitor?

Congratulations! Pictures, Images and Photos

Vacation 6-12.12

It's Friday and our day off again.
But we are not going to be off only for one day this time but for a whole week!
We'll be on vacation until Saturday the 13th of December.

No, don't believe we are going to rest! We'll work a lot, but keep the nights free.
We need to get the new CD ready before Christmas which means a lot of hours in the studio.

I don't know how much time I get to blog during these days. Hopefully some time every now and then. But it's not much to blog about when we just sit and work with the headphones on.

Sunday or Monday my singing will be recorded and it will take the whole day when I sing all the songs on the CD. Clas don't like to sing any songs this time and decided to make a CD only with me.
After the singing is ready the mixing and mastering job also have to be done before the CD is ready to be printed.

Clas has already made a record sleeve by using a photo of me that is about four months old.
The style of the sleeve is nice but I don't like the chin on the photo and I'll have to get new photos for him to work with as soon as possible.
Oh, I don't really know how to get time for everything! I wish the day had 48 hours!

Tomorrow night we are planning to go to Scandic shop to listen to Carina and Lasse.

Wednesday, December 03, 2008

Fred Olsen ferry on steady ground

We have got a new tourist attraction in Los Cristianos now!

Last night something went wrong with the Fred Olsen ferry Bonanza,
that goes between the islands, and it sailed in high speed straight up
to the shore in Los Cristianos.
It was about 170 passengers on board that had to be evacuated.

I have many times before lost the breath when I have seen the ferry
arriving and I have said they will one day get a grounding.
They often speed into the bay and in the last minute they start reversing
in full speed into the harbor so that the machines make a terrible noise and
the water is bubbling like there was a volcano under the water.
The trick didn't work last night and the ferry continued to the shore.
The captains seams to like to make a show of their
arriving and this time it came true!
To be honest, this is not really a surprise.
The captains at Silja Line, where I have been working for many years,
are very careful and they move the ferry slowly meter by meter to be sure
it will not hit the edge of the harbor.


Here you can see where it stands parked now.
The CostaMar hotel and the Gran Arona hotel in the background.


The Police have put out their bands to try to avoid the tourists
getting too close and there was a terrible smell of fuel.

The yellow pipe to the right of the ferry is there to collect the oil leakage.

Christmas time is coming to town...

We bought this reindeer and sleigh in Finland last year.

Sorry I don't get much time to blog now.
Like you probably already guessed we are busy preparing for Christmas.
It's a lot of cleaning work, shopping, decorating,
Christmas cards and gifts etc.

Last night the government held the inauguration of their street ornaments
and I think that made the Christmas decorations
legal for all the inhabitants too.
I will show you more photos of our decorations later.


Fish meal

We got fish for dinner the other night at Oasis Mango.
The plates are always nice decorated.

My Cowboy.

Monday, December 01, 2008

Christmas preparatory


Sorry I haven't had time to blog or be on the internet for a couple of days.
I started cleaning the balcony yesterday.
It was a hard work when I had to take down everything first from the walls.
I finally got it ready today.
Then I had a shower and went out on town looking for Christmas ornaments.
I found some and Clas has now started decorating.
It will look nice when it's ready but we'll have to drill quite a few holes in the walls to get it up, which means we'll have unnecessary holes every here and there on the walls after Christmas.
But that's a problem to solve later on...
I have to hurry now...
Have a nice evening!