As you may've noticed, I finally decided to upgrade to the new blogger and all that comes with it. As the new template develops the links will (finally) be expanded and bugs generally worked out. After a hiatus, I plan to get back into publishing here as time allows. Thanks for staying with, and please continue passing stories and news along to me! jekjact [at] yahoo.com
Student from the US with a Finnish heritage returning to the homeland as often as possible. Blog of what happens while I'm there, and what happens while I'm away.
Something has me a little bit confused. This is going to require a bit of explanation though.
Finland has a sort of mixed presidentialist/parliamentarian political system. Up until the 2000 constitutional ammendments, the president was quite a powerful figure. Now the president is mainly a figurehead for the republic, and is politically involved mainly in issues of foreign affairs.
Most of the rest of the powers invested in the executive in the US fall in Finland to the Prime Minister, that guy over there on the left, Matti Vanhanen. He and his cabinet of ministers take care of domestic issues, and other general political matters.
Now, here is where the mixture of systems comes into play. The president is directly elected by popular vote (since Finland has abandoned the eletoral college system similar to that used in the US). The Prime Minister, like in your run of the mill parliamentary government, is elected internally and generally comes from the party holding the most seats in that body (unless you're in Germany apparently). I'm not yet certain how Finland Parliamentary elections work, but from what I can gather it's a hybrid between list voting and individual. Since I am giving a presentation on this next Wednesday, I suppose I should start reading up on the subject. In any event, Finns do not directly vote for the Prime Minister in the same way that they do the President.
As you've read previously here or elsewhere, this year was a presidential election year in Finland. Matti Vanhanen was among the list of candidates for president, however he didn't make it past the first round. In fact, Vanhanen finished (it's hard to remember to type only one "n" in that word;)) third with 18.6%, behind Niinisto with 24.1% and Halonen with 46.3%.
Now that all that's out of the way, here's my question: How can a guy so influential in the Finnish political scene, maybe the most powerful person (it seems to me like the prime minister is more powerful and the president is more respected only out of tradition- correct me if I'm wrong) perform so poorly when he's directly voted for or against by the Finnish people? The numbers aren't even close! And what does this poor performance mean? Are the Finnish people so happy with the job he's doing as Prime minister that they don't want to let him out of that spot? Would they like to see him out of that position too, or if prime minister was voted for directly would he earn that office? It's difficult to know, and considering the debate between the democratic-ness of presidentialist vs parliamentary forms of governance, Finland hybrid could be an important case study for comparitive studies.
As I began anew my study of the Finnish language from text I came across the webpages maintained by Fred Karlsson at the University of Helsinki. On this page he lists the 2,253 possible forms a Finnish noun can take. Yes, that's right. A single Finnish noun may be in one of 2,253 conjugations/forms/tenses/whatever depending on the intended meaning. Maybe tomorrow after I learn all these I'll let you know about verb forms... or adjectives.... and I bet you can't wait to hear about the Finnish gerund!!
Friday I left with a couple of the girls from my second host family (they now live in Helsinki) to make the 7 hour trip to Iisalmi, the place I called home during my junior year of high school. Returning can be described as nothing less than an awesome experience. It was eerie, for sure. Everything was almost exactly the same. One new shop was built, two shops changed locations, but everything else was exactly as it had been the day I left, exactly as the map I've travelled through in my head many times since showed. It was very reminscent of "A League of Their Own," and I felt the whole time like Madonna's "This used to be my playground" was playing in the background.
Friday we arrived rather late. I visited for a bit with family #2, the B's, then headed over to say hi to the 1st family P. I walked back to the B's from there, wanting to see the town by foot. It was a bit longer walk than I remembered, but nice nonetheless, especially after having been in a car much of the day. When I got back to the B's, my friend Kartsa was there with his fiancee who just happened to be the best friend of one of the girls I had driven up with. Kartsa speaks english better than I do, so he and I started talking a "mile a minute" not realizing that no one else had a clue what we were saying until they asked us to speak finnish or slow down. After so long though, it's only expected. After coffee and the breads and desserts that come with it Kartsa and Hanne left and I headed to the sauna. The place was familiar, yet bigger than I remeber. That boxed room with its wooden benches and miniture plastic figurines is a place I'd spent much of my time during the core of the Finnish winter, the time I'd lived with this family.
Saturday was the day I thought I was going to explode. The day started around 9. I had a small breakfast, then we headed to see my host dad's new vet clinic that he'd set up since I'd left. It was unbelievable. That's about all I can say about that. The change from the small practice he had when I was there to this new teaching clinic is just incredible. After that we headed back to their place for an early dinner/late lunch with salad and breads, of course, and beef filets with sauce and blue cheese mushrooms.
From there I headed to meet my relatives in Finland who I was lucky enough to meet when I was here last time because they too were living in Iisalmi. There we had an amazing salmon and salads and breads and cooked vegetables. Desert was cloudberry yogurt... my first time having cloudberries since coming back to finland. It was great to see them again, though unfortunately their children were away at school. I'll hopefully see them soon. After visiting a bit and seeing a couple home movies of my cousin in the army drum corps (army service is require from all males in Finland), we had coffee and cakes. If you're keeping track, that's 3 meals in 2.5 hours.
I left straight from there around the corner to my first family's palce. Many of the aunts and uncles and grandfolks and cousins had assembled for an evening of feasting and visiting. The evening started with salmon and various cocktail foods and moose, beef, pig.... salad, breads, and a lot of other foods that aren't coming to mind at the moment. Seeing everyone again here was (as in the other cases) just an extraordinarily special experience. After dinner, we had fresh cloudberries and vanilla sauce, and a blackberry mousse along with some cloudberry liqour that my host mom had made herself. It tasted great. I looked at some pictures and spent some time with the host siblings and cousins and then we had coffee and carrot cake and cookies. Add those 3 meals to the count. Around 9 it was time to head back to meet some friends and get ready to go out. When I got back to the B's place a third salmon was waiting along with Karelian pastries and a variety of other things. Already busting at the seems, I ate as little as I could while still being polite. That evening we headed to the local "Irish" bar for a few, then over to the local disco. I ran into some old friends from school, along with the girl who was one of two partners for the Vanhojen tanssit. Again, just a great experience to see everyone, but maybe not as interesting for everyone else.
Sunday we headed back to Helsinki pretty early. The whole weeekend was much too short, which is why I am headed back Thursday:)
More interesting posts coming, I promise, but now I finally have work to do... for better or for worse.
Taken from the car somewhere in the 3 o'clock hour during the drive back to Helsinki from Iisalmi. The Finnish sunset lasts a long time, and the sheer number of colors the sky can turn during that time is amazing.
The gloves are off. Today is the second round of elections here in Finland, a runoff election between the top two performers in the first round. When I was visiting in Iisalmi this past weekend my first host family had an extra TV which they are letting me borrow, so I have been able to follow the coverage as the polls close. The candidates are both at the YLE TV studios, just down the road from me. On the way back this evening about 2 hours ago we drove by there and I saw everyone in the studio lobby (it glass walls to the outside.. In the US that would never happen. Probably not secure enough or something along those lines. The results should be in in about an hour. Otherwise, look for my post about this weekend tomorrow (it'll be another long one). I didn't take as many pictures as I should've but you can see those that I did take in Flickr.
Step outside the front door of the main building of the university of Helsinki and this is what greets you. Helsingin tuomiokirkko, The Helsinki (Lutheran) Cathedral.
This past weekend I went to Saarijärvi to visit some friends of mine from Iisalmen lyseo back in the day. From left to right, Heini, Tarja, me, and Tiina. These are some of my girls that I used to have wild fun times with when I was here with Rotary. Heini came to the states the year after I'd been in Finland, and she was randomly placed in Ohio about 3 hours from where I live, so I was able to see her more recently than Tarja or Tiina, but it was still awesome to see everyone. I was also able to meet a lot of cool new people in Heini's life- her boyfriend Janne, and her friends Antti, Tuomas and Tinia.
Here's me and Tinia trying to figure out what Tarja is grabbing so firmly. Apparently it's round, but that's all I know.
And here are the guys- Tuomas, Janne, Antti, me.
So the weekend went sorta like this:
-Thursday night I had a meeting for a special program organized by the Erasmus Student Network at the Helsinki University and Helsinki University of Technology Student Unions. The point of it is to make mixed groups of internationals and finns so we can all hang out together and so everyone knows at least a few people on a smaller scale. The group I'm with is pretty awesome, so it'll be nice to see what we end up doing. So far we've got an appointment each Thursday to meet up before the ESN night at the bar I mentioned before. Last week was a good time. The music was pretty bad... really bad actually... but I did get to hear me and KJs song, K-Maro "Femme like you." It was a special moment. I missed the last tram home and had to walk a bit of the way in some pretty bad weather, so that was unfortunate. I need to figure out the night trains I think, since there's no night bus here.
Friday I got up early (6am!!) to catch the train to go see the ladies. I had only gone to bed at 3, so I wasn't well rested, nor recovered from the previous night. I dragged myself across the bridge to the railway station and bought my ticket. The train was running late, they announced after I'd stood 15 minutes on the freezing platform, so i went back in for a bit. They announced the trains arrival again, so I went back to the platform, but the train that came was the wrong one. I was only wearing tennis shoes, so my feet were absolutely untolerably cold. (It got to -37 this weekend in Jyväskylä!). After doing this a few times I went back to the ticket clerk and asked what was up. He said the train had already come and gone, which was news to me, but he graciously exchanged my ticket for the next train. I decided to use the two hours in between to get a decent pair of warm shoes. Unfortuantely this meant I had to trek back to my place. Now normally I'm an advocate of whoever it was that said when you start worrying about comfort over fashion you're just getting old, but ultimately I had to realize that it would be much more stylish to wear my boots than to loose my toes to stupidity.
Eventually I got on the train, and the rest of the trip there was pretty mundane. When I arrived in Saarijärvi, it was to a surprised Tarja (Heini and I agreed it would be best not to tell her I was planning on coming). It was SO GREAT to see them again! We went to the store for food, then headed back to Heini's place to cook it. We spent the time catching up while Heini did the dishes and Tarja cooked. After we ate Heini wanted to go swimming, and after a little convincing I agreed. The swim hall was quite nice, and as it was my first time in a sauna since coming back to Finland, that was pretty awesome as well. It's such an amazing experience, and one that deserves a post of its own later on down the road. Also remind me to mention how the sauna culture makes Finns much more comfortable and healthy with their bodies. We ended up crashing at Janne's place that night because none of us wanted to go back out in the cold. Honestly, can you blame us?
Saturday we slept in. Tiina came a little later on in the day, after we'd run a few errands and such. Saturday night, however, was reserved for partying and a trip to the local "bar." (I use the term very loosely- though great fun, this place isn't exactly a club as I am used to.) After a visit to Heini's sauna, and a few moments outside in the -37 degree weather wearing nothing but a towel (:-D so much fun because you steam like a piece of meat taken off the grill and held in the freezer- plus, look at those muscles!!), we got the party started. It was mainly just a bunch of the normal party craziness, topped off by a drinking game in which Heini made a rule that you couldn't use any variation of the first person pronoun- so in English no I/my/mine and in Finnish no minä/minun/minua/minut/minuun/minutta/minuna/minulla/minulle/minulta/minusta/minussa/minuksi/and so on. This is a much easier feat in Finnish, since verbs function just as well without the minä in a normal sentence. Minä olen mies means I'm a man. Olen mies means I'm a man. Sadly you can't just say "am a man" in english and expect people to know what you're talking about. If anyone got drunk this night, that rule would surely be the reason why.... of course... The time at the bar started off in an amazing way. After that... well it was still fun anyway, just not quite as prime as it started out.
As is often the case, Sunday was a day for everyone to recover from the previous night's festivities, so we just kept things low key, watched some tv, chatted about life, and hung out as such. Sunday the weather thankfully began to thaw, but it was still less warm than one would like it to be. While hanging out at Janne's place again, we got the camera out once more, but this time for video. Below is an awesome video of heini and tarja demonstrating their awesome english skills. (actually they're just being silly and the speak english better than I do, but still it's soon to be a classic watched in classrooms across the globe (when finnish becomes required study everywhere), so you should take your chance for a sneak peak).
I hope you enjoy!!!
Monday was nothing more than the bus/train trip home, classes week two, and a meeting showcasing many of the international groups at the university. This morning I was running late for class, so there was no filming going on when I walked by the windows. shucks! My registration was finally processed today, so I was able to get library and computer network access (score!), so now I have to do some real work (damn). Oh, and to all of you at Brown- I have 6 candles burning right now, and it's not gonna cost me $600 if the inspector comes round:-P
This week's forecast: Thursday an innercity rivalry: Jokerit vs. HiFK in the Finnish national hockey league. It's gonna be awesome. Headed there with the Behm's (my second host family) and my/their friend Jukka. Friday we're all then gonna drive up to Iisalmi to see the town. I'm sure there'll be the faint sound of Madonna's "this used to be my playground" playing as we drive through the town and I see all my old friends. Unfortunately not everyone I want to see will be there this weekend, so I'm going to take the train there next weekend. It'll be great to be there so much, but the trip is a pretty long one. Nonetheless, it's gonna be such an amazing thing to head there both times! And of course you'll hear all about it right here, in a vivid multi-media experience.
I'm back in Helsinki, working on a post from this weekend. Until then check out the pics I uploaded to Flickr. I'll put pics there til i reach the limit, then figure something else out. Look for the full post tomorrow.
I was told that at the coldest, today windchill factors put the temperature at -44. Considering the fact that I still can't feel my toes, I'd believe it. Exposed skin is a bad thing, but I couldn't find any good way to completely cover up my face, so I was left power walking from place to place to keep damage to a minimum. And I'm still going out tonight. hah! We have the International Student "buddy groups" kickoff, followed by the ESN international student night at Baarikärpanen, a local pub. The best thing about it is that happy hour is from 22-23.00, ergo 10 to 11PM, and beer/cider is but a single euro. In any event, the thing that I most enjoyed about today was watching people walking along the street. Every time one exhales, a blast of condensation, breath smoke if you will, hits head on. Walking along the road people look like steam locomotives, sans tow. Of course after smiling slightly about this observation my face froze like this and I looked like a maniac the rest of the day, but it was worth it.
In other news, today began the class I've been most looking forward to. It's taught by a guy named Burkard Auffermann. Last spring he came to Brown and gave a seminar of which I was one of a handful of particiapants. I went up to him today to see if he by chance remembered me. I was quite surprised by his response. "You were the guy sitting over to my left side." I didn't think this guy would even remember being at Brown, let alone the place I was sitting while he gave his lecture. We had a good conversation then (longer than I've had with any professor previously anyway) and it was awesome. I'm so glad to be taking his class (Finnish Foreign Policy). I'll learn a lot, and I'm not afraid to ask questions, for once.
Tomorrow I'm catching a 7 am train to Tampere, then Jyväskylä and ultimately a bus to Saarijärvi to see my friends Heini, Tarja, and Tiina. I CAN'T WAIT to see them all again. Heini I saw in Ohio about 3 years ago, but the other 2 it's been about 4 years. I won't be updating this weekend then, but (if Heini is the same as she's always been) expect pictures and wild stories when I return!
LOST is the latest series from the US to get imported to Finland. This picture is taken at the Main Railway Station in Helsinki. The escalators you see head down to the subway. The compass points on the floor are a popular meeting place. On weekend nights the goth people like to hang out in this area. The underground walkways between many main buildings in Helsinki are quite extensive, if one knows the proper stores to cut through and such (a big help today, with temps at or below 0F and windchills -20F). But I digress...
The real reason for this post is to discuss the completely imported ad campaign Finland seems to be using to promote Lost. Now I'm not gonna lie, I haven't missed an episode before coming here. It's my guilty pleasure, and I'm gonna miss Wednesday nights with Steph watching it:( But posting builboards this size all throughout the metro tunnels is a bit much. I have never seen such advertising in Finland, even for the most successful movie in Finnish history which just hit theaters last weekend (75 copies, every theater sold out). The movie is called Matti, and it's about the famous Finnish ski jumper Matti Nykänen. All that movie has is a few posters around town. Why is all this necessary if you are making a quality product?
Alright, so I talk about the weather more than I should, but it's genuinely cold here, and you all should feel my pain and understand why I don't think it's all that cold in Rhode Island or Ohio. Right now, as I am getting ready to head out for class, it's 5F/-15C. With the windchill that number drops to -14F/-25C. My weather report from a couple days ago said the low was 6F but we should still reach a high of 21F. Not gonna happen... So much for being spoiled!
I added a button from theweatherchannel so that I don't have to talk about how cold it is everyday. It doesn't display in Celsius though, much as I'd like it to.
I'm very proud of myself- I spelled bureaucracy on my own before I checked the spelling on dictionary.com. My spelling is quite horrible, but I compensate in the grammar department hopefully.
So, as you can see, I gave the blog a new look. I wanted to have something a little less round, with a better color scheme. This layout is much easier for me to tweak, and it displays things correctly. The only problem is that the comments are pretty inaccessible. In case you were wondering, that gray number next to the post title is where comments go. Now go leave one. Otherwise though, it's much less busy and not as clashing with everything else. Lemme know what you think while I decide whether or not to keep it.
Today was the second meeting of the same class as yesterday. Nothing new there. Today, however, the class was held in the morning. En route to the Economicum I have to walk through the square known as Lasipalatsi, or Glass Palace. Incidentally, this is similar to the American Rockafeller Square, where the filming of the Today Show takes place. The difference is that no one in Finland is that eager to get on TV that they go stand outside the window behind where the anchors are sitting. This is exactly why I was surprised to look up into the bright lights shining out of a window and see the morning news anchors sitting at their table and fair few cameras pointed in our direction. In the country less than 2 weeks and already I made national television. Rock on!
This is the window. YLE is the station, and there you can see a couple of the green chairs. I was right where those guys are now, walking by then looking up all of the sudden in a very dumbfounded manner. But enough about my SUPERstardom. I'm sure now you'll all be tuning in to catch me every Tuesday morning on my way to class.
If you hadn't guessed by the title, my regisration still hasn't gone through. After class I headed to student services, they sent me to my department. The International Relations coordinator just started yesterday, so she had no idea. I waited about an hour during this time, then saw the guy who is in charge of acceptance and everything. He definately cheered me up a lot, and gave me a temporary certificate so I can at least get reduced priced meals in the student cafes and such. But still no library card (ergo books), computer sign on, etc. He's gonna email me when he sees that they processed my stuff so that I don't have to go there every day. Finally, a really helpful person! After that I tried to use the certificate to get my metro card, but they needed something else from the citizens registry so I had to walk all the way across town in the middle of hella windy snow storm to get it, then walk back and again sit and wait. Eventually I got it, though they wouldn't give me the half off student discount because I'm not here a full year.
After that I was pretty spent so I headed home and tonight for the first time I actually did a bit of real cooking for myself. I mean, I just boiled water for pasta and heated a curry sauce, but it required the oven, so that's a plus to this point. It's been bad, so I really need to start trying things and being a bit more brave.
My proper cell phone has now been turned on as well, so I guess the deposit was processed. Now it's all text messaging, all the time. I'm gonna be a machine!! If you want the number just ask, though there are probably easier and cheaper ways to call from the US, for example. But I'd love to hear from everyone!!!
I should've known it was too good to last. To the right you'll see the weather forcast for Helsinki for the next 5 days. Weather has been near 30 every day since I arrived. But, sigh, look at that. Highs of 31, 30, 21, 8, 8... gahhh. It's what I expected all along, but I was so spoiled..... And Friday I am going to visit my friend Heini about 4 or 5 hours north, so that means it'll be even colder.... Poor me. At least I'll finally get to use all my cool winter gear:) It's just such a quick change!
But enough lamenting about things to come. Today was my first official class here at HY (helsingin yliopisto=University of Helsinki). Actually, it wasn't official, but I went anyway. As my adventures earlier in the day had proven, my registration has STILL not gone through, so I am not able to register for classes, access the computer or library network, or do anything really. I'll check again tomorrow I guess. I wish this would hurry up though, since I don't have to buy textbooks (they're all available at the library... yeah social welfare system), I can't do any reading until I can get into the library. And I don't have anywhere to go in the odd between class hours. At this point I only have one class a day, but I have been heading to the city early anyway, so it'd be nice to have somewhere to warm up in between my explorations.
As for the class, today and tomorrow I have Economics and Politics of European Integration. It meets for 2 hours a day on these two days, for the next 6 weeks. It's a basic EU studies course, so it'll def. provide the basis for what I needed to get from my studies here. It's a great place to start. The class was quite full though, and I'm not sure what will happen if we continue to be oversized for the room...and since i haven't preregistered.... but we'll see I guess. The professor is a visiting professor from the University of Tampere, also in Finland. He's a published author on the subject, and quite the expert. He spoke English with a heavy accent, and it kinda made time pass slower since I was thinking the whole time how I could've said what he said in two hours in one. (I can't wait until I can start taking classes in Finnish...) Nonetheless, a class I'm glad to be taking, taught in a format I'm very familiar with (Power pointall the way).
So tomorrow I'll enjoy one more 30 degree day, class early, then try and figure out this registration thing once and for all! Wish me luck....
So it looks like it wasn't as big a run-away as thought, with Halonen getting only ~46.3% of the vote. What's that mean? There'll be a second round of elections between her and the 2nd place finisher Sauli Niinistö of the conservative party(~24%).
The newly designed banner has now been made into a link back to the homepage from any page on the blog, as it should've been in the first place. You may have to hit the refresh button for it to start taking effect though.
The polls are now open, and soon Finland will know whether or not Tarja Halonen will take the election in one round, or alternatively if a second round will be held. If Halonen doesn't get a majority of the vote, the second round will be held between the top two performers. She's running against 7 other candidates, but it looks like at best they could prolong the election, but not win. At the last poll she had nearly a 30% lead (something like 51% and second place with 23%).
The actual system of voting is quite different from in the US. As the ad from Heidi Hautala of the Green Party demonstrates, all the political ads in Finland proudly display a number from 2 to x, x being the number of candidates plus one because no one is assigned the number 1. These numbers are randomly assigned to the candidates. Then, when one goes to the polls on the Sunday of election day (or the Sunday of the week before election day for pre-voting if you are unavailable on the actual day), in order to cast your vote you simply write the number of the person you'd like to vote for. At first glance this system seems flawed, as the numbers 9 and 4 can look quite similar. The Finns general write there number different than the average American, though, so this hasn't been an earthshaking problem. Plus everyone basically knows at least this time around that when in doubt, the vote was for 9, Tarja Halonen. Could you imagine, in the US for example, a 30% lead going into election day!??!
So, it looks like Blogger changed the way they do business and got rid of that annoying old way previously used to post pictures. Now it's much easier to use their interface to do so, but unfortunately there's only 300 MB of space per account for pics, so I'm not sure how long that'll be a fix to my prob. For now, anyway, this is much better.
The dial up box is still annoying me though.
Oh, and I decided to stay in tonight but I still didn't want to start trying to figure out my class schedule. That's for tomorrow. So instead I designed the banner above. What do you think?
Alright, so this is kinda creepy, but with stephanie i was able to find these links to webcams. I'd seen one of them before, but i didn't know about a lot of the rest. These cams are all in the Aleksandria learning center at the university of helsinki, aka the main undergrad library.
Helsinki, University of Helsinki, Aleksandria Learning Centre
Helsinki, University of Helsinki, Aleksandria Learning Centre,
Helsinki, University of Helsinki, Aleksandria Learning Centre, 1st floor
Helsinki, University of Helsinki, Aleksandria Learning Centre, 2nd floor
Helsinki, University of Helsinki, Aleksandria Learning Centre, 4th floor
I got these from the page http://www.pcuf.fi/~mtiainen/eurocam.html which also has a lot of cams around the city. I've been on at least 4 of those without knowing. If you wanna see me live, maybe I can plan to be in the library at a preset time;) Otherwise, use the cams to fulfill your voyeuristic fantasies.
So I figured it might be helpful to give you some frame of reference for places I may talk about. I know it's not super clear, but hopefully you can figure out some of the places. The red dots are the towns I thought deserved highlighting. They may not be the biggest or most important, but they're the ones I'll mostly talk about.
So I hate to whore my friends out, but I'm having some computer problems that maybe some of you have answers to, so I'm asking, PLEASE tell me how to fix the following, if you know.
#1 As you can see I've switched to thumbnails. This is not optimal. Generally I use imageshack to host my pics, but the resize function either isn't working, or it isn't doing what I want it too. I need to make the images smaller in their dimensions, not pixel or other quality. Is there an easy way to do this so I can post pictures at a size bigger than thumbnails? What am I missing?
#2 My internet connection... I had to change a lot of settings I'm not familiar with in order to get onto the broadband connection here. I have the instructions i can transcribe if needed, but anyway, the side effect of all this is that now I get that stupid dial up box popping up every now and then. Worse, it automatically launches AOL and I can't connect to any pages until after I've closed AOL. I don't want to simply delete AOL in case that causes further complications, but I don't want to have to wait for it to launch so that I can close it every five minutes either.
Thanks in advance. I appreciate your contribution to my sanity.
It's hard to believe yesterday was only Friday. My sense of days is so messed up right now. Hopefully classes starting will help me figure that out, though i doubt it sense at least right now it looks like i'll only have class on wednesday and thursday, 2 hours each day. It's pretty awesome.
So, yesterday my Finnish friend from Brown came down to Helsinki (she's been up in Tampere visiting family). It was awesome to see her, in Finland nonetheless. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of us though! Anyway, we walked around the centrum a bit, visited a coffeeshop, and caught up on life in general. She got to hear me complain about all the problems and delays I've been having with the university... haha hopefully that wasn't too boring, and maybe it was even useful, since she is considering coming here to study next year. It was still pretty awesome to have someone familiar here.
After that I jumped on the tram to go with my friend Petra to go see another friend from Iisalmi who I haven't seen since I left. From left to right, Hanna, Petra, Hanna's boyfriend Villu, and me. The head Villu is holding is some creepy Hannible-esque flower pot or something. It was weird.
First we met up at Villu's parent's apartment in the city (they live in Lahti, I think) and had a bit to drink. Two beautiful girls. What's a guy to do?
Then we jumped on the tram to head downtown for the concert. We hadn't finished all the alcohol, and we were gonna be waiting in line for a bit, so we brought it with us.
The band we were there to see is called Zook. The warm up act was this awesome guy named Johnny Kenya. He, apropriately, played Kenyan music. Zook is a rock type band with 3 finns and one foreigner. I'm not sure where he's from.
As it turns out, my friend Hanna is a pretty smooth talker. She walked up to the stage guy, worked her magic, and next thing I knew we were backstage watching the show from there, standing with the band between sets. It was absolutely amazing! The music was pretty good, they played really well, and I had an all access pass. Yeah, a good time overall.
After the show we had about 6 minutes to catch the bus or we'd have to wait an hour for the next one. I decided to stay at my friend Petra's place again so I wouldn't have to wait and because I haven't yet looked up the night bus info. We ran accross town, making it just in time. When we got to Petra's place I was asleep before we'd even finished making my bed. Petra must've tucked me in, cause I woke warm and cozy under blankets. Another great day in Finland.
It's about 10.30 and I'm waiting for my daily sunlight quota, so until the sun decides whether or not to come play today, I'll write a bit.
Yesterday was an interesting day. I started out the day just going walking and exploring the area I live in. I thought it would be good to get familiar with it. This proved to be a good idea, as you'll see later on in the post if I remember to loop back.
This is a Finnish sidewalk: Normally it's a lot worse, but this has been a mild winter and it actually rained yesterday. I don't understand how it can rain in Finland in January. Anyway, the place where I was last time still has a few feet of snow and no rain. Helsinki is just weird I guess.
This is the view from my balcony. Not as much Central Park as I would like, but still quite nice.
This is a road I walked over while I was out walking. Nothing special, but you can get an idea of the architecture and maybe see some of the car styles.
I live in Lansi-Pasila (West Pasila). The word right under it is the Swedish word for Pasila, as Finland is a bilingual country.
This is a bird for Stephanie to ID. The pic is bad, but right under the wing there's a blue stripe. They're almost like crows, but not quite.
If you run out of the little blue pill in Finland, this is where you go. (Pfizer)
So those are bad pictures for the most part, but it's something. The quality of the pics will increase as I stop feeling like a tourist and accordingly don't mind looking like one.
After walking around and taking these pictures I went with my second host-family-sisters AnnaMaija, Katri, and Saara to the second largest shopping mall in Scandinavia, Jumbo. I've been to the largest one [Itäkeskus] many times, so it was nice to see what else they had to offer. By US standards it isn't so large, but for Finland it's massive. I got some real groceries, and today I will probably try to actually cook something for myself. Yeah, it's weird, but they have grocery stores in all the malls too. For the record, I prefer Itäkeskus to Jumbo, especially since it's just off the metro line and Jumbo is a drive, in Vantaa. Both are nice though.
After that I had to quickly get ready for the ESN (Erasmus Student Network) welcome party for the international students. I threw on some clothes, and jumped on the tram. It picks me up right outside my door, so it's pretty awesome. I got a little lost because I wasn't sure where to transfer to the second tram (I had to walk around the corner to the other line's stop), but eventually I got there. We had a pregame party at some apartment common room where there was an airhockey table and foose ball and the like. This preparty was just for people in the Faculty of Social Sciences. It was much easier to mingle here, and of course everyone was getting drunk too. I finally disclosed to my tutor that I know finnish by speaking with this guy Matti in Finnish. They were asking about why I chose Finland and such, and I just decided to tell them in Finnish. I had previously said I'd start talking in Finnish next week, but I thought I'd just put it out there for them ahead of time. They laughed at the way I talk because I speak a dialect of Finnish that is maybe comparable to a Cajun accent in the US. Pretty backwoods anyway. The problem is that I only recognize that I speak that way on some words, so I'm stuck speaking strangely I guess. It's alright though, no biggie. But yeah, at this preparty I spent most of my time with the Finns and not getting to know the international students. I'm in Finland, after all. Then we went to the bar they had rented, Club Ooppera. On the way there one of the girls from Holland had a few beers she needed finished, but no opener. I carry a bottle opener on my keychain, so I helped her out, and we each had a couple of beers while in transit to the bar. By the time I got there I had had 6. I got another inside, and then I bumped into Matti again. That was my downfall. He had just decided that he wanted to get plastered, and when he saw me he decided I should do it with him. Having already drank 7 beers I was feeling good enough already, but I conceeded. The bar was serving specially priced Finnish drinks, so I couldn't really pass it up. He said he'd get the first round, and I'd get the second. I agreed, only to find that his idea of a round was a couple shots each. We were drinki Salmiakkikoskenkorva, which I love (try saying it when you're drunk), but, well, it's a lot of alcohol. Four "rounds" later I was done. I mingled with some of the international students, then headed outside to catch the tram home. Alas, I had just missed the last tram home, so (this is where walking earlier in the day came in handy) I had to walk home since I don't know how to use the night bus system yet, or where they pick up. It was about a 30 minute walk at 3 in the morning I think. Luckily I wasn't feeling any of the cold. When I got home I made a snack and got on the computer. Then mom decided to call.... haha that was awesome. I talked to her for a bit then went to bed. Surprisingly, for having done beer before liquor, I'm not feeling half bad. Later today Jarkko is gonna come and install the light I think. Fun stuff. Anyway, i think it may get light soon so I'm outta here to shower and get on with the day. Leave comments to let me know you stopped by! You don't have to register or anything!
Hello everyone, and greetings from Finland!!!! After a bit of a bumpy ride and settling in, I am finally set up at my place somewhat (enough to have this internet connection, so hopefully I will now be able to keep you regularly informed of my doings in Finland. A lot has understandably happened in my first 5 or 6 days here, so I try to write the highlights and keep it coherent.
The flight was about as expected. I had a sinus cold, so adjusting to the pressure was pretty harsh. To top it off, there was a young family on board with two small children. The parents proved themselves less than considerate when the had an argument with 3 flight attendants about their luggage before we even took off. It only got worse... The two young children seemed to be in a screaming contest in all but perhaps 2 hours of the flight, each trying to be louder to get more attention from their parents. After about 2 hours into the flight though the seatbelt sign was still on i had to get up into the overhead bin and get my advil. I did, however, resist the temptation to order a stiff drink (i.e. coffee and kahlua, scotch, vodka tonic), all of which were complementary (or complimentary, I'm not sure which?). I knew it would make me feel worse in the end. On the way back, however, look out plane bar!
Once I got here, only one of my expected friends (Heli) was at the airport to greet me. I was saddened to learn that my friend's grandmother had died the previous day while I was in flight, so there was a slight change of plans, but nothing major. We went to this friend's flat (Petra), as I still stayed with her, and I was amazed how together she was all things considered. If it weren't for her tired look, I never would've guessed that anything had happened.
The next day (Saturday) I got my cell phone and met Petra's sister Pauliina and her fiancee Jarkko. They are both awesome people and have helped me out a lot. Jarkko let me borrow his old phone so i don't have to buy a new one, and the last 3 days or so he has been going around with me helping me open a bank account, look for furniture, sign up for cell phone service, and just get around the town in general. He has been a great help, and I am not sure what I would have done if it weren't for everything he has done. One big thing: When I rented this place they said it was unfurnished. That was fine, as I had no other option. What I didn't understand or expect, however, was that unfurnished meant that I didn't even have a light in the ceiling, just some cables hanging down. We went and got a lighting kit, and Jarkko is installing the light for me, being the handyman that he is. We tried to put it in last night, but there were some problems so he has to rig it some special way. I guess we'll try again either today or tomorrow. I'm tired of being in the dark all the time.
Otherwise, my flat is nice. I have two Finnish roomates. I've hardly spoken to either. This is normal. They both seem like pretty awesome guys though. My room is twice the size of my room at brown, but i have maybe 1/16 of the amount of stuff to fill it. I need to put something on the super white walls.
I completed an orientation course at the university from monday-wednesday. It was alright. Pretty informative, though because I'm not rightly and exchange student and instead just a visiting student, there are a lot more things i need to do that were done for the exchange students. For example, they were all registered for courses. I wasn't able to register until monday, and now i have to wait until tuesday before i can register for classes that start monday. this is a problem. It'll work out somehow though, I'm sure. I still have to look at classes and such, as many i had previously chosen are now cancelled.
I think that's the bulk of the boring orienting myself stuff. I missed tons probably, but I'll fill in any important details later. Like how awesome the transportation system is, once I get registered for classes and can get my student card and helsinki travel card anyway. Just a few things I found amusing or thought some of you might appreciate, then I will leave you to get on with the day.
-I was hurried the other day and didn't have time to search out a proper cafe, so I popped into *gasp*mcdonalds*/endgasp* for a quick bite. It's actually much higher quality food here. Anyway, I thought it was hillarious that while I was eating the normally children's oriented radio that plays through the speakers was spinning house/techno music. Beebopping while I ate. awesome.
-Aaron, while exploring yesterday I found the perfect accordion shop, just off the number 8 tram line. We'll go when you visit:)
-Two nights ago I went to a grocery store to pick up some things. The typical sidewalk in Finland is a sheet of ice (i'll try to get a picture). While I was standing at the corner waiting at a crosswalk a huge wind came (it was a really windy day, more than any day in providence or columbus ever was). Slowly at first then more quickly I started sliding along the ice, being pushed into the street by the wind. I had to grab hold of the pole with the crossing button on it soas to not get blown into the street. It was funny, after I secured myself from being blown into "rush hour" traffic.
-And maybe Rahim will appreciate this most of all, but you all will get a chuckle I'm sure. Just after my friend Petra yawned and made the yawnning sigh noise Jarkko said, "And she said," the translation of "that's what she said" into finnish. I thought it was hillarious, anyway, but then again I always think that phrase is. So is your mom.
Next time hopefully there will be pictures. I had a small problem formatting my memory card so i lost all the first pictures I'd taken, but it's no big deal.
So yes, LEAVE COMMENTS, EMAIL ME, keep in touch. Let me know I should keep writing this, at least.
I miss you all, and send my warmest wishes (you know it means something if i am willing to part with some of my much needed heat;))
In finland, and safe. Staying with my friend Petra. More news and maybe some pics soon )if i take any!! Until then, :-). Oh, and could you please circulate this address cause I didn´t send it out to everyone i should´ve before i left... so anyone you might think interested in hearing about my travels... thanks steph, et al.
Tomorrow, after all the trials and tribulations, will finally see me on my way to Finland. I just found out yesterday that I am leaving tomorrow (when the visa arrived i booked the first possible flight), so the last two days have been hella busy. i'm sure it'll all pay off in the end. unfortunately for the next week or so i'll drop off the face of the earth and be completely disconnected (a scary thought!) but i will be back asap, and i'm sure i'll find some wireless places and such to write a few words. The first night or two will prolly be spent with a friend or former host family, orientation is on monday, hopefully i'll be able to move a bed and such into my place shortly thereafter.
Something has me a little bit confused. This is going to require a bit of explanation though.
