Flying High Like a Childhood Dream
A book, a kite over Bogotá, and a possible good omen.
When I was a kid, me and my older sister Jenni saw a kite in some TV show for the first time.
My four-year-old brain nearly exploded. “You mean you can make a thing out of paper that will just fly in the air?”
For some yet unexplainable reason, it was the most incredible object in the entire world to me.
My Mom eventually listened to our enthusiastic pleas and bought Jenni and me a kite. I do remember my sister hogging it, and I vaguely remember trying to build one for myself.
It didn’t matter, though. What we didn’t know was that it’s basically impossible to make a kite fly in our little ol’ hometown. There’s little wind, especially the strong, high currents you’d require.
I guess that’s why we never really saw any kites in the sky in Lahti back then.
Of course, we were sorely disappointed. After running around the yard with our sad kite trailing us on the ground for a couple of days, we let it go, and it probably ended up in the trash not long after.
But I never forgot about it.
When I was about 17, I found the Finnish author Kjell Westö and his renowned novel Kites over Helsinki (Drakarna…
