Given that nothing of note has happened to me here (i.e. I've been at work, and Saturday night I went for some beer and played minigolf) this series can continue. I've already elaborated on some of the more difficult points of adapting to life in Finland for the foreigner, but one of these points has received considerable media exposure over the last couple of years. A quick look at Maslow's triangle of essential human needs will reveal that in order to live one needs communication, sunshine, clothing, sex (I've had another visitor to this site from Austria on that very subject), and the odd trip to the pub/Tallinn. This blog has covered all of those subjects and now the final issue, I'm sure you've all guessed, is food.
The Finnish culinary scene has come under somewhat of a microscope in recent times with both Silvio Berlusconi and Jacques Chirac having a good poke. The truth is though that the quality of food in this country, much like that of the women, varies enormously, from immensely tasty to downright dangerous. Firstly, one of the first things I ate in Finland - Mämmi. At this point even the Finns shudder, despite the fact that practically all of them eat it. It's an Easter "speciality" which everyone claims to hate, yet nearly everyone eats it anyway, just because that's what you do around Easter. It looks like crap (literally) and also tastes quite similar, even when, as the natives do, you absolutely drown it in cream. It looks something like this. Other appetising dishes include those made of blood - for instance sausages, small pancakes, and soup - as well as pea soup and a sausage which is so low on meat that, according to EU directives, it's actually a pastry. Sadly, most things don't actually taste of very much and it seems that this is because of some kind of Northern European healthy reflex which sees it absolutely impossible to get anything in the supermarkets which are not free of this or low on that. Add to this the fact that every person in the country is allergic to something (lactose, gluten, sugar, fresh air, you name it) and the task of finding something decent for the ordinary, unallergic, uncomplicated eater becomes rather more difficult. Getting a decent cheese in a shop, for instance, takes good luck and a decent map of the supermarket, and finding milk products which are not low-fat/lactose free/reduced calcium/in powdered form/etc. also takes quite a bit of dedication to the cause. I've also read that spices are not really used in Finland because of a traditional belief that they were harmful to the consumer's health. And in a country with such a high intake of alcohol that's quite amusing.
However, let's surprise you all here with a few revelations. Finland produces, in my opinion, far and away the best strawberries in the world. Strawberries !! You wouldn't expect them here and I thought it was some kind of joke the first time I saw them in a supermarket but they're bright and red, juicy and tasty and you don't buy them in a bag which says "reduced beta-carotene" or "vitamin free !". Secondly, anyone heard of a cloudberry ? They're strange little things that look like raspberries except that they're orange, and they don't taste like anything else I know. Finns make great cakes out of these and, for that matter they make great cakes out of most things. Anyone had beef jerky ? Well a Lappi speciality is reindeer jerky. Moose sausage is also pretty good and I've also eaten a moose curry, which wasn't bad. Moose steak is eaten with lingonberries, which is also tasty. The Lapps also have some kind of oven cheese which squeaks on your teeth when you eat it, and also tastes of something. Sadly that's the only cheese you can buy here which really tastes of anything at all, but it's a start So unlike what Chirac and Berlusconi seem to believe, the situation here isn't really all that bad. Going to a restaurant isn't something to be feared if you're going to eat Finnish food.
For some reason though, foreign restaurants in Helsinki are useless. The Chinese restaurants are pretty tasteless, and nothing much else exists. When a Moroccan restaurant opened last year, I went with watering taste buds thinking that I was actually going to eat something which was knowledgeably spiced, and came out thinking that it sucked. Fast food is expensive and, even after a heavy Finnish night out, tastes pretty crap. I guess part of the problem is that the largest immigrant communities in Finland are (at least this is what it seems to me, it's not backed up with statistics) Somali and Russian. Neither are exactly tasty food paradise and makes you wish that more Arabs, Indians, Chinese and Mexicans could be imported here. They would then be encouraged to start up decent restaurants instead of dodgy imitation chain restaurants.
Going to the supermarket is even more frustrating unless you live to eat ready-made things straight to the microwave or the oven. Go to a supermarket here and try to find something simple, like chicken for instance, and you'll see it's impossible !! Chicken in marinade, chicken soup, lactose-free chicken, all OK. Plain, untainted chicken breast, sorry - no can do. I won't go crying about it too much though, even if I do cry myself to sleep every night over the fact that I haven't eaten merguez for months or that to make a poulet yassa I have to deep clean the marinade off the chicken legs. I suppose the Finns go to Western Europe and complain that they can't find rotten fish, Mämmi, cloudberries, low-fat bacon, or lactose-free lactose. This is what intercultural dialogue is all about.
One more thing I'll stand up for Finland in is the following. When Chirac criticised Finnish cuisine, he did it indirectly by stating that Britain was "after Finland, the country with the worst food". This is not true. OK, Finnish food is on the whole quite tasteless, but comparing it unfavourably to British food is simply unfair.
Jul 12, 2008
A couple of small thoughts
A couple of small thoughts in no particular order.
Firstly, since writing the article "Sex sells" I've had 4 visitors who have come to this site specifically having gone to Google and searched for sex-related themes - one from Israel, one from Iran, one from the United Arab Emirates and one from France. I think that's a reasonable amount, given that this blog doesn't contain any porno or erotic literature or whatever. Maybe I should continue the research and write a steamy story and see how many people click onto me then... As a further sign of this, M has told me she doesn't read Teppo M's blog any more, the reason being that he isn't writing it any more. The reason for this ? His story has been bought out by a publishing house and a company planning to make a movie about his story. Yup...
Secondly, I have been quite negative about Finland and Finns so far in this blog. This shouldn't be taken in the wrong way - I know many very nice and friendly (and even talkative !!) Finns here and I think the country is one of the most beautiful in Europe, even if it could probably do with having a mountain or 2 to break the monotony. I like to entertain though and the truth is, like it or not, that taking the piss generally offers more opportunities to have some cheap fun than saying how lovely this or that is. So, yes, I am presenting this country and its inhabitants in an unbalanced way. It's not to make everyone hate you, my fellow residents of this frozen wasteland, it's just to try and make people smile.
Firstly, since writing the article "Sex sells" I've had 4 visitors who have come to this site specifically having gone to Google and searched for sex-related themes - one from Israel, one from Iran, one from the United Arab Emirates and one from France. I think that's a reasonable amount, given that this blog doesn't contain any porno or erotic literature or whatever. Maybe I should continue the research and write a steamy story and see how many people click onto me then... As a further sign of this, M has told me she doesn't read Teppo M's blog any more, the reason being that he isn't writing it any more. The reason for this ? His story has been bought out by a publishing house and a company planning to make a movie about his story. Yup...
Secondly, I have been quite negative about Finland and Finns so far in this blog. This shouldn't be taken in the wrong way - I know many very nice and friendly (and even talkative !!) Finns here and I think the country is one of the most beautiful in Europe, even if it could probably do with having a mountain or 2 to break the monotony. I like to entertain though and the truth is, like it or not, that taking the piss generally offers more opportunities to have some cheap fun than saying how lovely this or that is. So, yes, I am presenting this country and its inhabitants in an unbalanced way. It's not to make everyone hate you, my fellow residents of this frozen wasteland, it's just to try and make people smile.
Hey Rastaman !
First up, an explanation for the lack of text recently. I moved house, had the flu, got a new job, and then spent a week working it. I'm now a tester and translator for mobile phone video games, spending my day translating simple phrases from English to French and then playing games for hours on end, surrounded by computer geeks. And they actually pay me for this ! It's great.
Now, onto the main idea. Looking at the title of this entry - it's not only black guys with dreadlocks who have this said to them. It's also white guys who go around with either necklaces or bracelets with red, green and yellow on them. You'll usually be drowned in comments with mock Jamaican accents like "Rastafari !" or "De colours of Jomaaaica maan !". If you say this to me, then you'll expect quite a bit of a lecture back in return. Red, green and yellow are not the colours of Jamaica - look at the flag. It has black on it, and also has no red on it. Look at the flag of Ethiopia instead, or the flag of numerous other African countries. These other countries adopted the colours of Ethiopia as a sign of pride in and respect for Ethiopia, which was the only country in Africa to successfully resist colonisation. The Rastafarian religion is Jamaican, as is reggae music. The colours associated with them, however, were adopted from Ethiopia and their God is Haile Selassie I, former Emperor of Ethiopia, seen as the chosen leader of the black community given that, in the 1930s when the Rastafarian movement began, Haile Selassie was the only recognised black head of state in the international community. Rastafarianism teaches that the black population of the western hemisphere was stolen from Africa and must live as close as possible to African ways while awaiting their return to the continent of their roots.
Anyone who's listened to reggae will know they go on about lions a lot - this, again, comes from the fact that the Emperors of Ethiopia claimed descent from the Queen of Sheba and the Israelite tribe of Judah which had a lion as its symbol. Given that these guys then went on to rule Ethiopia, they referred to themselves as the Conquering Lions of Judah. Haile Selassie had loads of lions in his garden as pets.
Another line I heard a lot is "reggae singers go on about Zion ! They want to go to Israel !" which is not true either. Zion as a concept is a utopia or a promised land. It was a word which indeed came from Jewish lore, as a hill in the area of Jerusalem has been called Mount Zion for several millenia. Obviously, as a consequence, history has placed Zion in the Jewish context given their status as a population in exile for those few millenia and the Jewish yearning for the promised land has been dubbed Zionism. Rastas, though, refer to Africa in general and a historically independent Ethiopia in particular as their zion, or promised land.
It doesn't stop there, however. After I went to an interview a few weeks ago wearing them, M warned me against doing it for any high level job. Not because it would come across as not being serious, but because I would be assumed to be a pothead. "What ??!" I enquired. She told me that this is what these colours are associated with here. So in Finland it's not even associated with a country with which it shouldn't be, but just places me into a serial waster category, which is even more interesting if depressing. I'm sure this happens in a lot of other places too, although Finland does have quite a strange fixation with weed. Having grown up in a country where you can see people sitting around in the capital's main square smoking up freely in the summer, it comes as a bit of a shock here when you roll a cigarette and people look at you curiously and say "joint ????". And it happens a lot too. Sure, everyone jumps to conclusions, but to assume I'm too much of a joint smoker to do a job properly just because I happened to buy some beads in Senegal (whose flag is red, yellow and green) does seem to me to be pushing the boat out a bit too far.
So, to recap, given the strong identification of Rastafarians with Ethiopia, the colours that crop up in Rasta culture are the same as the ones which crop up in Ethiopia. So when you see me with these necklaces, drop the Jamaican accent. I've never been to Kingston and I got these necklaces and bracelets in Africa. Also, less than 1 in 10 Jamaicans is Rastafarian. So even if these colours are loosely linked to the religion and the music, they have nothing to do with the country. Thank you.
Now, onto the main idea. Looking at the title of this entry - it's not only black guys with dreadlocks who have this said to them. It's also white guys who go around with either necklaces or bracelets with red, green and yellow on them. You'll usually be drowned in comments with mock Jamaican accents like "Rastafari !" or "De colours of Jomaaaica maan !". If you say this to me, then you'll expect quite a bit of a lecture back in return. Red, green and yellow are not the colours of Jamaica - look at the flag. It has black on it, and also has no red on it. Look at the flag of Ethiopia instead, or the flag of numerous other African countries. These other countries adopted the colours of Ethiopia as a sign of pride in and respect for Ethiopia, which was the only country in Africa to successfully resist colonisation. The Rastafarian religion is Jamaican, as is reggae music. The colours associated with them, however, were adopted from Ethiopia and their God is Haile Selassie I, former Emperor of Ethiopia, seen as the chosen leader of the black community given that, in the 1930s when the Rastafarian movement began, Haile Selassie was the only recognised black head of state in the international community. Rastafarianism teaches that the black population of the western hemisphere was stolen from Africa and must live as close as possible to African ways while awaiting their return to the continent of their roots.
Anyone who's listened to reggae will know they go on about lions a lot - this, again, comes from the fact that the Emperors of Ethiopia claimed descent from the Queen of Sheba and the Israelite tribe of Judah which had a lion as its symbol. Given that these guys then went on to rule Ethiopia, they referred to themselves as the Conquering Lions of Judah. Haile Selassie had loads of lions in his garden as pets.
Another line I heard a lot is "reggae singers go on about Zion ! They want to go to Israel !" which is not true either. Zion as a concept is a utopia or a promised land. It was a word which indeed came from Jewish lore, as a hill in the area of Jerusalem has been called Mount Zion for several millenia. Obviously, as a consequence, history has placed Zion in the Jewish context given their status as a population in exile for those few millenia and the Jewish yearning for the promised land has been dubbed Zionism. Rastas, though, refer to Africa in general and a historically independent Ethiopia in particular as their zion, or promised land.
It doesn't stop there, however. After I went to an interview a few weeks ago wearing them, M warned me against doing it for any high level job. Not because it would come across as not being serious, but because I would be assumed to be a pothead. "What ??!" I enquired. She told me that this is what these colours are associated with here. So in Finland it's not even associated with a country with which it shouldn't be, but just places me into a serial waster category, which is even more interesting if depressing. I'm sure this happens in a lot of other places too, although Finland does have quite a strange fixation with weed. Having grown up in a country where you can see people sitting around in the capital's main square smoking up freely in the summer, it comes as a bit of a shock here when you roll a cigarette and people look at you curiously and say "joint ????". And it happens a lot too. Sure, everyone jumps to conclusions, but to assume I'm too much of a joint smoker to do a job properly just because I happened to buy some beads in Senegal (whose flag is red, yellow and green) does seem to me to be pushing the boat out a bit too far.
So, to recap, given the strong identification of Rastafarians with Ethiopia, the colours that crop up in Rasta culture are the same as the ones which crop up in Ethiopia. So when you see me with these necklaces, drop the Jamaican accent. I've never been to Kingston and I got these necklaces and bracelets in Africa. Also, less than 1 in 10 Jamaicans is Rastafarian. So even if these colours are loosely linked to the religion and the music, they have nothing to do with the country. Thank you.
Jun 19, 2008
Life in Helsinki Part 4 : The Travel Industry
The issue of travel has come from a potential event which didn't actually happen. The idea of going on a cruise was floated (sic.) last night, but it never really got off the ground. To 99,9% of the world's population, the word "cruise" conjures up images of cocktails, evening socials, outside swimming pools on deck, luxury cabins and sunrises in the Bahamas. To women with an active imagination, it also conjures up images of a short, dashing Scientologist who appears in action movies. The remaining 0,01% of the world's population, however, are Finns. The word takes on a slightly different meaning here. There are 2 choices from Helsinki - you get on a very large boat and go over to Sweden on an 18-hour-each-way sailing, with a potential stop to do nothing much in the Åland Islands on the way; or you go to Tallinn in Estonia which takes around 3 hours each way. There are no palm trees, no outdoor swimming pool and ladies in ballroom dresses don't sip expensive cocktails while chatting with gentlemen in tuxedos. The idea yesterday was to hop on a boat at 9pm tonight, return to Helsinki tomorrow afternoon, and in the mean time go over to Tallinn.
The first surprise to the outsider is that "going over to Tallinn" on this cruise, for a lot of people, does not actually involve going to Tallinn at all. The boat sails over, docks in the harbour, and people stay on the boat and get drunk. This is encouraged by the ferry companies and on this particular trip, even though the boat arrives in Tallinn at midnight, no one would be allowed off the boat until 8.30 the next morning. The advantage for others is that, given that people go on these boats with the sole aim of getting trashed, astronomical amounts of money are spent on booze. This drives ticket prices down and you can get over to Stockholm and back for as little as 25€, and to Tallinn for 10€ return.
The majority of people who disembark at the other end will go to the closest shop, stack up with Estonian price vodka and cigarettes, get back onto the boat and start drinking again, stopping only when the ferry arrives back in Helsinki. When the time comes to step back onto Finnish soil, you see a gang of Finns lined up like cattle in front of the door with trolleys specially designed to hold the maximum allowance of cigarettes and vodka. After they have smoked and drunk everything, they book another cruise to Tallinn. It's quite amusing and quite depressing at the same time.
Despite the enormous size of the boats (most of the friends I've had over to visit have been so amazed by the scale of the beasts that they've taken pictures of them) there really isn't all that much to do on them. The boats to Sweden, for instance, are on about 12 floors - mostly car parking spaces, cabins to sleep off hangovers, restaurants, bars and a nightclub to get pissed in and a duty free shop to buy booze and cigarettes in, and lines and lines of one-arm bandits and poker machines, seemingly to encourage kids to lose their money. Add to this the fact that the aforementioned bars and nightclubs are crap, and you suddenly find that joining the cattle in the duty free shop and getting sauced up and facing the prospect of wandering around Stockholm hungover isn't such an unattractive idea after all. In fact, it's almost compulsory to do so in order to divert your mind from jumping off the deck and swimming to shore just to give yourself something to do.
During the course of the trip, you'll probably see most, if not all of the following :
- A bunch of students dressed up as superheroes or wearing stupid wigs on a stag night
- A middle aged man/woman in a severe state of emotional decay, with the possible presence of tears and a consoling friend
- Someone wandering aimlessly along the cabin corridors, drunkenly staggering from one wall to the other
- Groups of people standing, not talking to each other (see most other posts for further details)
- A balding man in a suit desperately looking for younger female company
- Someone asleep on the floor
The slightly richer Finn takes these trips on Silja line, which is more expensive. I've never been with this company so I'm unable to comment on it but I'd imagine it's a higher class example of exactly the same thing. The much richer Finn will generally go on a package tour to Thailand, lie on the beach and come back with a tan and, in the case of single men, a wife. A Finn who goes anywhere else has undoubtedly declared him/herself to foreigners as "not the typical Finn" and, in my opinion, this isn't so far from the truth.
So to you all I would suggest the following - indulge yourself in the Finnish travel industry, hit the boats, go on a "cruise" - It'll probably be one of those things you'll be happy you did but won't be jumping to do again...
The first surprise to the outsider is that "going over to Tallinn" on this cruise, for a lot of people, does not actually involve going to Tallinn at all. The boat sails over, docks in the harbour, and people stay on the boat and get drunk. This is encouraged by the ferry companies and on this particular trip, even though the boat arrives in Tallinn at midnight, no one would be allowed off the boat until 8.30 the next morning. The advantage for others is that, given that people go on these boats with the sole aim of getting trashed, astronomical amounts of money are spent on booze. This drives ticket prices down and you can get over to Stockholm and back for as little as 25€, and to Tallinn for 10€ return.
The majority of people who disembark at the other end will go to the closest shop, stack up with Estonian price vodka and cigarettes, get back onto the boat and start drinking again, stopping only when the ferry arrives back in Helsinki. When the time comes to step back onto Finnish soil, you see a gang of Finns lined up like cattle in front of the door with trolleys specially designed to hold the maximum allowance of cigarettes and vodka. After they have smoked and drunk everything, they book another cruise to Tallinn. It's quite amusing and quite depressing at the same time.
Despite the enormous size of the boats (most of the friends I've had over to visit have been so amazed by the scale of the beasts that they've taken pictures of them) there really isn't all that much to do on them. The boats to Sweden, for instance, are on about 12 floors - mostly car parking spaces, cabins to sleep off hangovers, restaurants, bars and a nightclub to get pissed in and a duty free shop to buy booze and cigarettes in, and lines and lines of one-arm bandits and poker machines, seemingly to encourage kids to lose their money. Add to this the fact that the aforementioned bars and nightclubs are crap, and you suddenly find that joining the cattle in the duty free shop and getting sauced up and facing the prospect of wandering around Stockholm hungover isn't such an unattractive idea after all. In fact, it's almost compulsory to do so in order to divert your mind from jumping off the deck and swimming to shore just to give yourself something to do.
During the course of the trip, you'll probably see most, if not all of the following :
- A bunch of students dressed up as superheroes or wearing stupid wigs on a stag night
- A middle aged man/woman in a severe state of emotional decay, with the possible presence of tears and a consoling friend
- Someone wandering aimlessly along the cabin corridors, drunkenly staggering from one wall to the other
- Groups of people standing, not talking to each other (see most other posts for further details)
- A balding man in a suit desperately looking for younger female company
- Someone asleep on the floor
The slightly richer Finn takes these trips on Silja line, which is more expensive. I've never been with this company so I'm unable to comment on it but I'd imagine it's a higher class example of exactly the same thing. The much richer Finn will generally go on a package tour to Thailand, lie on the beach and come back with a tan and, in the case of single men, a wife. A Finn who goes anywhere else has undoubtedly declared him/herself to foreigners as "not the typical Finn" and, in my opinion, this isn't so far from the truth.
So to you all I would suggest the following - indulge yourself in the Finnish travel industry, hit the boats, go on a "cruise" - It'll probably be one of those things you'll be happy you did but won't be jumping to do again...
Jun 12, 2008
Sex Sells
It's gone 3am. I tried to sleep for 3 hours and gave up. Insomnia is something that isn't new to me so, even though it still bugs me, I look for the positives. Amongst them is that the hours spent lying around in bed can be used to think various thoughts. With Euro 2008 in full swing it's obvious that football will take up a lot of my cerebral wanderings but, as wonderful as it is, it can only take up a certain amount of time. The weather's gone bad here and so mosquitos and bikinis (c.f. previous entry) are nowhere to be seen, and so my mind has to go further for inspiration.
It came to my attention a few days ago that a guy in Finland, known as Teppo M, has written a blog called Sataa Naista (One Hundred Women). My Finnish isn't good enough to really get much of it but from what I know, it started with his breaking up with his wife and subsequent frustration that he wasn't getting any action. A drunken bet with a friend of his led to him waking up the next morning with a 10.000€ wager that he could sleep with 100 women in 1 year, and his blog chronicles his efforts. A look at the site leads one to two conclusions : Firstly, the blog is in Finnish, and therefore can only be reasonably read by Finns living here (of which there are just over 5 million), foreigners abroad who can speak Finnish (who I'd imagine are quite negligible in number) and Finns in the diaspora (who I'd imagine are also quite negligible in number). Secondly, the guy has received over 500.000 visits to a site he used at the beginning and was active on for only 3 months. All in all, from this lesser used site, he's had 2000 hits a day since he began. This compares with 1,95 a day for me. Call me a cynic, but would so many people be reading if he'd aimed to drink 100 different beers in a year, back 100 winning horses in a year, complete 100 Rubik's cubes in a year or, to go for something as difficult as he has, to learn to speak 100 languages fluently in a year ?
There's nothing really groundbreaking here - Internet + Sex = Readership isn't exactly a formula which would have Fermat or Einstein spinning in their respective graves but, at times where I can't sleep, it's a symptom of society's state which I'm interested in. I'd imagine that people read this kind of site for the same reason that they watch Big Brother or read about celebrities' secret confessions in glossy no-brainer magazines - to satisfy the voyeur inside themselves while safely at home which they'd generally deny the very existence of to the outside world. Here's something that might surprise all the same - and above all, it should surprise guys who have been trying to weave their magic in nightclubs - a survey has revealed that 25% of European women get drunk in order to increase their chances of getting sex !!! Having spent my fair share of nights out and about, I find that statistic extremely hard to believe. In my case it's certainly worked - the majority of my "conquests" I wouldn't have touched with a barge pole if I hadn't been drunk - but had I known what was coming those nights I'd probably have been on the lemonade instead.
As a closing statement to this subject, I'd like the wish Teppo M the best of luck. Having been single for more than a year while I've been here, women (read: people in general) in Helsinki's nightspots are generally antisocial or completely battered. Neither of my two successful sleazes here have been Finnish and even Ross, the man who gets all, failed here. It ain't easy.
And in order to keep you all interested and reading - I'm on 12 so far. That's an average of 1,5 a year since I started.
I'm off back to bed.
It came to my attention a few days ago that a guy in Finland, known as Teppo M, has written a blog called Sataa Naista (One Hundred Women). My Finnish isn't good enough to really get much of it but from what I know, it started with his breaking up with his wife and subsequent frustration that he wasn't getting any action. A drunken bet with a friend of his led to him waking up the next morning with a 10.000€ wager that he could sleep with 100 women in 1 year, and his blog chronicles his efforts. A look at the site leads one to two conclusions : Firstly, the blog is in Finnish, and therefore can only be reasonably read by Finns living here (of which there are just over 5 million), foreigners abroad who can speak Finnish (who I'd imagine are quite negligible in number) and Finns in the diaspora (who I'd imagine are also quite negligible in number). Secondly, the guy has received over 500.000 visits to a site he used at the beginning and was active on for only 3 months. All in all, from this lesser used site, he's had 2000 hits a day since he began. This compares with 1,95 a day for me. Call me a cynic, but would so many people be reading if he'd aimed to drink 100 different beers in a year, back 100 winning horses in a year, complete 100 Rubik's cubes in a year or, to go for something as difficult as he has, to learn to speak 100 languages fluently in a year ?
There's nothing really groundbreaking here - Internet + Sex = Readership isn't exactly a formula which would have Fermat or Einstein spinning in their respective graves but, at times where I can't sleep, it's a symptom of society's state which I'm interested in. I'd imagine that people read this kind of site for the same reason that they watch Big Brother or read about celebrities' secret confessions in glossy no-brainer magazines - to satisfy the voyeur inside themselves while safely at home which they'd generally deny the very existence of to the outside world. Here's something that might surprise all the same - and above all, it should surprise guys who have been trying to weave their magic in nightclubs - a survey has revealed that 25% of European women get drunk in order to increase their chances of getting sex !!! Having spent my fair share of nights out and about, I find that statistic extremely hard to believe. In my case it's certainly worked - the majority of my "conquests" I wouldn't have touched with a barge pole if I hadn't been drunk - but had I known what was coming those nights I'd probably have been on the lemonade instead.
As a closing statement to this subject, I'd like the wish Teppo M the best of luck. Having been single for more than a year while I've been here, women (read: people in general) in Helsinki's nightspots are generally antisocial or completely battered. Neither of my two successful sleazes here have been Finnish and even Ross, the man who gets all, failed here. It ain't easy.
And in order to keep you all interested and reading - I'm on 12 so far. That's an average of 1,5 a year since I started.
I'm off back to bed.
Jun 6, 2008
Fashion Review - 2008
Remember that 6-lane road I used to look at out the window ? These days it's been replaced by a small suburban car-park. It's hardly more inspiring but it's been absolutely drenched in sunshine over the last couple of days. According to the weather on TV yesterday I could stand up and say "I live in the hottest large European city aside from Athens, Istanbul and Malaga !". I wouldn't have believed a word of what I said but there we go. So, summer has arrived in Helsinki, finally. This unexpected situation led me to dig through my considerably small wardrobe to see what summer clothes I had. T-shirts are never a problem in this country as you have to wear 4 or 5 of them, ten months of the year. Besides those though, I discovered, I had one pair of shorts and no summer-friendly shoes. Having put on these shorts and promptly burnt a big hole in them with a cigarette, I came to a conclusion. It was time for me to go out and do something that has split the sexes more than anything in recent history - probably aside from the release of the Sex and the City movie - clothes shopping.
Anyone who knows, has known, has seen, or has vaguely heard of me will very well know that I'm not on the peak of the fashion iceberg, nor am I anywhere above the surface of the water. I am sitting on the ocean floor, chilling with the octopuses and platypuses, attempting to act as if fashion didn't exist or, if it did, was pointless. Now that I was forced to go and buy a pair of shorts though, I had to stare this issue in the face. Having perused shops all the length of Aleksanterinkatu and explored, in increasing states of desperation, the entirety of the Forum and Kamppi shopping centres, I sat, exhausted, on a pavement and rolled myself a cigarette with shaking hands, drenched in nervous sweat, dreaming of a utopian society where we could all walk around naked like our ancestors did without having to care what a bunch of fashion designers think we should all wear this year. My choices were, by and large, to pay large amounts of money for Hawaiian flower shorts, or to pay large amounts of money for a pair of 45-year-old-man-on-safari-in-Tanzania shorts. As I prepared to enter what I had decided what would be the last shop of the day, I noticed the greeting by the escalator:
FLOOR 6: Administration
FLOOR 5: Menswear (and outdoor Womenswear)
FLOOR 4: Womenswear
FLOOR 3: Womenswear
FLOOR 2: Womenswear
FLOOR 1: Womenswear
My mind went back over the nightmarish 2 hours I had just endured, and came to 2 conclusions. Firstly, a window on the 5th floor would be good to jump out of in case I didn't find anything apart from flowery shorts or safari shorts here. Secondly, I noticed a slightly familiar theme here. And it's not that I want to suggest that things are imbalanced at all, but... doesn't this seem slightly imbalanced ? All through the day, as I now realised, I'd been shoehorned into 3 square metres with one other bored looking guy staring at 1 pair of jeans, 1 pair of safari shorts and 2 t-shirts with ridiculous, meaningless slogans on such as "I slept on the Virgin Island - St. Thomas V.I." and "Archipelago of Tuamotu - Live the Dream" while the women wandered around an area the size of a small country wondering which of 847 designs of blue bra with red straps they should buy.
At some point, in Benetton, I found the bedside table housing mens clothes and on it were a screwed up pile of T-shirts, apparently backing Youssou N'Dour's project to grant microcredit loans to small enterprises in Africa. One caught my eye - it was green, decorated like the back of a Senegalese minibus. I liked it. I bought it. That I had made an impulse clothes purchase in the first place showed how desperate I was for success. A little something in my bag that said "you COULD have had a nap, yes, but you've got something now." It was a consolation, however small. So for you Africa lovers, you people with more money than ideas or you idealistic people who want to give a helping hand out there, go to Benetton and buy an "Africa Works" t-shirt. They're funky and they give guys on desperate shopping trips something to be slightly happy about. And as a good supporter of this project I'm going to reach out to everyone here so, to all you White Supremacists out there - go to Benetton and buy these t-shirts. If they have more money it'll stop them coming over here right ? You know it makes sense.
In the end, I dragged my panting, suicidal self up to the 5th floor and, after trudging past the usual assortment of crap, found myself in desperate man heaven - a pair of shorts which I could actually wear and cost less than 80€ !!! I grabbed them, kissed them, bought them, and walked out of that shop to have the coldest, most welcome beer I have ever had.
There's something very liberating about the summer though, even if it only lasts about half a week in this country. Walking around in hard-earned shorts and sandals and not feeling the onset of frostbite just feels good. Sitting outside and having a beer in the sun doesn't feel good because of the beer, or because you're warm - it just does because you CAN do it. Maybe it's the rarity of the situation in Finland which makes you treasure it all the more. Lying around in the park surrounded by girls in bikinis doesn't feel good BECAUSE they're in bikinis right ? It's because they are liberated isn't it ? Don't get me wrong, I'm a great admirer of the unclothed female form as well... Or maybe I'll just give up there. I'm a perve and I know it. And I'm proud.
Summer brings big football tournaments as well, although it also brings mosquitos. Summer is when you like to spend money arsing around, although you hate being locked up at work instead of out in the sun. It's a season of contrasts, although I'll happily take bikinis, football and sunshine at the expense of mosquito bites and being locked up at work sometimes.
Finland being Finland, of course, I must interrupt my daydreaming on these wonderful topics and go to put my shorts back in the wardrobe (or indeed the cellar.) The weather report indicates that in a few days it's going to get cold again. Alea iacta est.
Anyone who knows, has known, has seen, or has vaguely heard of me will very well know that I'm not on the peak of the fashion iceberg, nor am I anywhere above the surface of the water. I am sitting on the ocean floor, chilling with the octopuses and platypuses, attempting to act as if fashion didn't exist or, if it did, was pointless. Now that I was forced to go and buy a pair of shorts though, I had to stare this issue in the face. Having perused shops all the length of Aleksanterinkatu and explored, in increasing states of desperation, the entirety of the Forum and Kamppi shopping centres, I sat, exhausted, on a pavement and rolled myself a cigarette with shaking hands, drenched in nervous sweat, dreaming of a utopian society where we could all walk around naked like our ancestors did without having to care what a bunch of fashion designers think we should all wear this year. My choices were, by and large, to pay large amounts of money for Hawaiian flower shorts, or to pay large amounts of money for a pair of 45-year-old-man-on-safari-in-Tanzania shorts. As I prepared to enter what I had decided what would be the last shop of the day, I noticed the greeting by the escalator:
FLOOR 6: Administration
FLOOR 5: Menswear (and outdoor Womenswear)
FLOOR 4: Womenswear
FLOOR 3: Womenswear
FLOOR 2: Womenswear
FLOOR 1: Womenswear
My mind went back over the nightmarish 2 hours I had just endured, and came to 2 conclusions. Firstly, a window on the 5th floor would be good to jump out of in case I didn't find anything apart from flowery shorts or safari shorts here. Secondly, I noticed a slightly familiar theme here. And it's not that I want to suggest that things are imbalanced at all, but... doesn't this seem slightly imbalanced ? All through the day, as I now realised, I'd been shoehorned into 3 square metres with one other bored looking guy staring at 1 pair of jeans, 1 pair of safari shorts and 2 t-shirts with ridiculous, meaningless slogans on such as "I slept on the Virgin Island - St. Thomas V.I." and "Archipelago of Tuamotu - Live the Dream" while the women wandered around an area the size of a small country wondering which of 847 designs of blue bra with red straps they should buy.
At some point, in Benetton, I found the bedside table housing mens clothes and on it were a screwed up pile of T-shirts, apparently backing Youssou N'Dour's project to grant microcredit loans to small enterprises in Africa. One caught my eye - it was green, decorated like the back of a Senegalese minibus. I liked it. I bought it. That I had made an impulse clothes purchase in the first place showed how desperate I was for success. A little something in my bag that said "you COULD have had a nap, yes, but you've got something now." It was a consolation, however small. So for you Africa lovers, you people with more money than ideas or you idealistic people who want to give a helping hand out there, go to Benetton and buy an "Africa Works" t-shirt. They're funky and they give guys on desperate shopping trips something to be slightly happy about. And as a good supporter of this project I'm going to reach out to everyone here so, to all you White Supremacists out there - go to Benetton and buy these t-shirts. If they have more money it'll stop them coming over here right ? You know it makes sense.
In the end, I dragged my panting, suicidal self up to the 5th floor and, after trudging past the usual assortment of crap, found myself in desperate man heaven - a pair of shorts which I could actually wear and cost less than 80€ !!! I grabbed them, kissed them, bought them, and walked out of that shop to have the coldest, most welcome beer I have ever had.
There's something very liberating about the summer though, even if it only lasts about half a week in this country. Walking around in hard-earned shorts and sandals and not feeling the onset of frostbite just feels good. Sitting outside and having a beer in the sun doesn't feel good because of the beer, or because you're warm - it just does because you CAN do it. Maybe it's the rarity of the situation in Finland which makes you treasure it all the more. Lying around in the park surrounded by girls in bikinis doesn't feel good BECAUSE they're in bikinis right ? It's because they are liberated isn't it ? Don't get me wrong, I'm a great admirer of the unclothed female form as well... Or maybe I'll just give up there. I'm a perve and I know it. And I'm proud.
Summer brings big football tournaments as well, although it also brings mosquitos. Summer is when you like to spend money arsing around, although you hate being locked up at work instead of out in the sun. It's a season of contrasts, although I'll happily take bikinis, football and sunshine at the expense of mosquito bites and being locked up at work sometimes.
Finland being Finland, of course, I must interrupt my daydreaming on these wonderful topics and go to put my shorts back in the wardrobe (or indeed the cellar.) The weather report indicates that in a few days it's going to get cold again. Alea iacta est.
May 30, 2008
"I Endorse Bloody Massacre" Says Celebrity Chef
Living as we do in a world populated by a lot of quite frankly stupid people, you get used to reading stupid things. However, the following link is of a stupidity which is quite impressive, even by conservative American standards, which are obviously quite impressive in the first place.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7427206.stm
Ridiculous eh ? But wait, there's more ! The Boston Globe report quotes her as saying that "The keffiyeh, for the clueless, is the traditional scarf of Arab men that has come to symbolize murderous Palestinian jihad, popularized by Yasser Arafat and a regular adornment of Muslim terrorists appearing in beheading and hostage-taking videos, the apparel has been mainstreamed by both ignorant and not-so-ignorant fashion designers, celebrities, and left-wing icons."
M has one. Should I get concerned ?
I'm waiting for the next wave of news to come out of the states in its anti-Impending-Apocalypse paranoia.
"Man arrested for growing beard"
A homeless man was arrested for growing a beard yesterday, reports the Squagmattavilleport Times. Bruce McFleas, who lives under a bridge, claims he did not have access to a razor. Local residents, however, have claimed that McFleas' disgusting mass of facial hair could drive their children into the hands of radical Muslims.
or even....
"African American arrested, caught red handed reading book"
Well what ? It could have been a Quran, or a bomb-making manual. And it's better to be safe than sorry isn't it ? And given that he's black, he could be dangerous.
Finland of course doesn't have this problem. Given that no planes have been flown into the World Trade Center in Helsinki, there is no such paranoia. And I can spend the evening outside despite the fact that I, very much like Osama bin Laden, have two arms and two legs.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7427206.stm
Ridiculous eh ? But wait, there's more ! The Boston Globe report quotes her as saying that "The keffiyeh, for the clueless, is the traditional scarf of Arab men that has come to symbolize murderous Palestinian jihad, popularized by Yasser Arafat and a regular adornment of Muslim terrorists appearing in beheading and hostage-taking videos, the apparel has been mainstreamed by both ignorant and not-so-ignorant fashion designers, celebrities, and left-wing icons."
M has one. Should I get concerned ?
I'm waiting for the next wave of news to come out of the states in its anti-Impending-Apocalypse paranoia.
"Man arrested for growing beard"
A homeless man was arrested for growing a beard yesterday, reports the Squagmattavilleport Times. Bruce McFleas, who lives under a bridge, claims he did not have access to a razor. Local residents, however, have claimed that McFleas' disgusting mass of facial hair could drive their children into the hands of radical Muslims.
or even....
"African American arrested, caught red handed reading book"
Well what ? It could have been a Quran, or a bomb-making manual. And it's better to be safe than sorry isn't it ? And given that he's black, he could be dangerous.
Finland of course doesn't have this problem. Given that no planes have been flown into the World Trade Center in Helsinki, there is no such paranoia. And I can spend the evening outside despite the fact that I, very much like Osama bin Laden, have two arms and two legs.
May 29, 2008
Life in Helsinki Part 3 : The Art of Communication
Learning Finnish is not the key to communication in Finland.
It can be helpful of course, particularly when you get out of the big cities (or, more accurately, big city. Or even more accurately, big town) to where the rural natives have never seen, heard, or know the concept of a foreigner. People in this thriving megapolis, however, do speak English - sometimes in a very funny way too - so the ignorant foreigner can come here and be understood. As I've tried to learn Finnish, and speak it more, I've come to be understood less. When, eventually, someone does understand me, I don't understand what they say back to me. A very constructive relationship with the natives, as can be seen.
What is more important is learning how to speak. That is to say, learning how not to speak. For having a conversation here is quite a difficult task. People may find you arrogant if you speak too much, and I find them boring if/when they speak too little. The key to this is realising that talking is not actually all that important, but giving weight to your words is. Asking someone a long, complex question and then sitting around for half an eternity while they stare into space and finally utter "yes" does get quite irritating but it's also something you get used to. Just like the tramps on the trams, waking up to find the city covered in smoke from some Russian forest fire or people thinking you're too drunk to think straight just because you happen to offer them a beer. On one particularly animated night out in yet another of Helsinki's über-lively nightclubs, a guy came and set next to me in order to inform me that he was very happy that foreigners should choose to live in Finland and to enquire as to whether I was enjoying my stay in this country. Awkward conversation followed and I don't think the guy said anything other than "yes" or "no" to me for the rest of the conversation. Then I met a guy from Angola and things went back to normal.
The exceptions to these awkward conversations are few and far between. There are :
a) Bizarre Finns like M who actually like talking just for the hell of it. Other people are generally intimidated by members of this category.
b) Drunk Finns who are as talkative as anyone else on the planet. These sentences are often short and basic in terms of grammar and sophistication, ("Fuck you", "I'm so drunk !" and "Where is the afterparty ?" are regular phrases one can listen out for) but can still be a breath of fresh air.
c) People from Karelia and Savo regions who are apparently extremely rude because they occasionally interrupt other peoples sentences, an offence which is punishable under Finnish law. I have never met any such people.
d) The old men in long distance trains' restaurant cars who argue about whether or not Finland should have invited Germany to occupy it during World War II. These old men always have someone to argue with as it seems that, no matter how many old men there are and no matter who they are, there always seems to be at least one from each camp. And, as in anywhere in this country which involves a long period of sitting down somewhere, these characters soon metamorphose into category b).
Communication as a topic was chosen today for a simple reason - I lost my mobile phone yesterday, again. Doing so the day after applying for a job possibly wasn't the greatest timing but this happens. It's annoying though. Especially in this country, where 98% of the population owns a mobile phone. My boss sends me my shifts by text message, you call someone when you lose them in a pub instead of looking around for them. In the last place I lived here I paid for the laundrette with my phone, and my parents send me text messages to remind me to reply their emails. I play Snake on the tram when I'm bored, the list is endless. But, you could ask, why in a nation of so few words do so many have mobile phones ? For some reason, Finns speak an incredible amount on their phones. From the greeting "Missä sä oot" ("where are you ?" which for some reason everyone asks - who cares anyway ? It's not like you're going to talk to them face to face) until the ending "Joo, kiva, mooooi" ("yup, nice, bye", which is just as common) people are gossping for ages about how ugly Leena's new handbag is or how Pekka was shagging Annukka AGAIN or how little they remember from the party last night. Strangely, I've seen lots of people who have obviously gone to cafés or bars together and are both sitting at the table..... writing text messages ! I used to think they were just on crap dates and ignoring each other but I'm beginning to suspect they're actually conversing through SMS just to make the whole experience that little bit less difficult. God only knows what these people do when they're stuck in an elevator together or having sex or end up in a pub without a phone OR a television. I'd imagine life is planned so that none of these things really happen.
In public life, of course, things are different. If you want something from a shop or a bar, you have to ask for it. And given that, in general, you won't have the phone number of the girl behind the counter or the guy behind the bar (guys also work behind counters here and girls behind bars, but it seemed overly elaborate to point this out) you have to ask for it, in words, face to face. Fear not though - words have been rationed in these cases as well. I lost the habit of saying goodbye to cashiers a long time ago as the result you'll generally get is a bewildered face before they compose themselves and say goodbye back. "Could I please have a pint of your finest ale, sir" has been compressed into one word - "Tuoppi." This means "pint". I could imagine going into a bar in France, leaning over the bar and declaring "pint", and I could just as easily imagine getting laughed out of there again. Still, less chat with the barstaff does leave you more time to sit in silence with your mates !
The conclusion of this story ? I picked up a new SIM card this afternoon. I can live, work, and talk again. Hallelujah.
It can be helpful of course, particularly when you get out of the big cities (or, more accurately, big city. Or even more accurately, big town) to where the rural natives have never seen, heard, or know the concept of a foreigner. People in this thriving megapolis, however, do speak English - sometimes in a very funny way too - so the ignorant foreigner can come here and be understood. As I've tried to learn Finnish, and speak it more, I've come to be understood less. When, eventually, someone does understand me, I don't understand what they say back to me. A very constructive relationship with the natives, as can be seen.
What is more important is learning how to speak. That is to say, learning how not to speak. For having a conversation here is quite a difficult task. People may find you arrogant if you speak too much, and I find them boring if/when they speak too little. The key to this is realising that talking is not actually all that important, but giving weight to your words is. Asking someone a long, complex question and then sitting around for half an eternity while they stare into space and finally utter "yes" does get quite irritating but it's also something you get used to. Just like the tramps on the trams, waking up to find the city covered in smoke from some Russian forest fire or people thinking you're too drunk to think straight just because you happen to offer them a beer. On one particularly animated night out in yet another of Helsinki's über-lively nightclubs, a guy came and set next to me in order to inform me that he was very happy that foreigners should choose to live in Finland and to enquire as to whether I was enjoying my stay in this country. Awkward conversation followed and I don't think the guy said anything other than "yes" or "no" to me for the rest of the conversation. Then I met a guy from Angola and things went back to normal.
The exceptions to these awkward conversations are few and far between. There are :
a) Bizarre Finns like M who actually like talking just for the hell of it. Other people are generally intimidated by members of this category.
b) Drunk Finns who are as talkative as anyone else on the planet. These sentences are often short and basic in terms of grammar and sophistication, ("Fuck you", "I'm so drunk !" and "Where is the afterparty ?" are regular phrases one can listen out for) but can still be a breath of fresh air.
c) People from Karelia and Savo regions who are apparently extremely rude because they occasionally interrupt other peoples sentences, an offence which is punishable under Finnish law. I have never met any such people.
d) The old men in long distance trains' restaurant cars who argue about whether or not Finland should have invited Germany to occupy it during World War II. These old men always have someone to argue with as it seems that, no matter how many old men there are and no matter who they are, there always seems to be at least one from each camp. And, as in anywhere in this country which involves a long period of sitting down somewhere, these characters soon metamorphose into category b).
Communication as a topic was chosen today for a simple reason - I lost my mobile phone yesterday, again. Doing so the day after applying for a job possibly wasn't the greatest timing but this happens. It's annoying though. Especially in this country, where 98% of the population owns a mobile phone. My boss sends me my shifts by text message, you call someone when you lose them in a pub instead of looking around for them. In the last place I lived here I paid for the laundrette with my phone, and my parents send me text messages to remind me to reply their emails. I play Snake on the tram when I'm bored, the list is endless. But, you could ask, why in a nation of so few words do so many have mobile phones ? For some reason, Finns speak an incredible amount on their phones. From the greeting "Missä sä oot" ("where are you ?" which for some reason everyone asks - who cares anyway ? It's not like you're going to talk to them face to face) until the ending "Joo, kiva, mooooi" ("yup, nice, bye", which is just as common) people are gossping for ages about how ugly Leena's new handbag is or how Pekka was shagging Annukka AGAIN or how little they remember from the party last night. Strangely, I've seen lots of people who have obviously gone to cafés or bars together and are both sitting at the table..... writing text messages ! I used to think they were just on crap dates and ignoring each other but I'm beginning to suspect they're actually conversing through SMS just to make the whole experience that little bit less difficult. God only knows what these people do when they're stuck in an elevator together or having sex or end up in a pub without a phone OR a television. I'd imagine life is planned so that none of these things really happen.
In public life, of course, things are different. If you want something from a shop or a bar, you have to ask for it. And given that, in general, you won't have the phone number of the girl behind the counter or the guy behind the bar (guys also work behind counters here and girls behind bars, but it seemed overly elaborate to point this out) you have to ask for it, in words, face to face. Fear not though - words have been rationed in these cases as well. I lost the habit of saying goodbye to cashiers a long time ago as the result you'll generally get is a bewildered face before they compose themselves and say goodbye back. "Could I please have a pint of your finest ale, sir" has been compressed into one word - "Tuoppi." This means "pint". I could imagine going into a bar in France, leaning over the bar and declaring "pint", and I could just as easily imagine getting laughed out of there again. Still, less chat with the barstaff does leave you more time to sit in silence with your mates !
The conclusion of this story ? I picked up a new SIM card this afternoon. I can live, work, and talk again. Hallelujah.
May 20, 2008
"I'm Still Alive"
Recent times have been dominated by late mornings due to laziness, late nights due to work, general lazing around, productive working on my thesis (seriously !) and, as time has gone on, spending more time buried in the Lonely Planet guide to Iran which M and I got from the library a few weeks back. Looks like a great place, full of interesting stuff, suitable for our budget (which is a diplomatic way of saying "dirt cheap" and we can fly into Turkey and out of Armenia in September for next to nothing. I called the consul in Helsinki yesterday who seemed to suggest that getting a visa would be an absolute breeze. I'd like to think I believe him. In any case, the trip seems to be getting off the ground although, without any flights booked, it's tempting fate to write that. I'll do it anyway though, 'cos that's just the kind of guy I am.
Last weekend I played golf. It's the first time I've ever done it and before I never really saw the point, thinking of it as a lazy man's sport. Having spent an afternoon on the greens (or, more usually, in the trees trying to dig my ball out of a rut of tree roots) I still think it's a lazy man's sport. However, I've realised that, as a lazy man myself, I quite like it. The fact that it was 27 degrees and sunny did no harm at all to this pseudo-sport's impression on me, nor did the fact that I came joint first out of a group of myself, M and her parents, both of whom play it regularly. The stiff arms I had to put up with for three days afterwards was a small price to pay and I'm tempted to do it again.
I'm also quite a fan of golf of the crazy variety - M and I have a bet going. We play a game every couple of weekends and whoever has the most wins by the end of the summer gets a steak dinner courtesy of the other. After 2 games, I'm 2 games up. Golf doesn't get any better than that.
Other than Iran and golf, there's nothing much really going on. The foreigners in Finland are sitting around waiting for the summer to arrive, and the Finns are happy that the summer has already arrived. The Africans living here, I'd imagine, are probably waiting for the end of the winter. Tomorrow I'm going to write some more thesis and then go to work. I'm sure this is not what life is supposed to be like but, given that it's not -25 and that I don't have to plough my way through 2 metres of snow to go anywhere (like my extremely exciting visit to Pasila library to get some books today) I'm happy to put up with it until something more interesting comes along....
So for now, as the Iranians would say (and will say to me in September, inch'allah) Kheyli mamnum and khoda hafez....
Last weekend I played golf. It's the first time I've ever done it and before I never really saw the point, thinking of it as a lazy man's sport. Having spent an afternoon on the greens (or, more usually, in the trees trying to dig my ball out of a rut of tree roots) I still think it's a lazy man's sport. However, I've realised that, as a lazy man myself, I quite like it. The fact that it was 27 degrees and sunny did no harm at all to this pseudo-sport's impression on me, nor did the fact that I came joint first out of a group of myself, M and her parents, both of whom play it regularly. The stiff arms I had to put up with for three days afterwards was a small price to pay and I'm tempted to do it again.
I'm also quite a fan of golf of the crazy variety - M and I have a bet going. We play a game every couple of weekends and whoever has the most wins by the end of the summer gets a steak dinner courtesy of the other. After 2 games, I'm 2 games up. Golf doesn't get any better than that.
Other than Iran and golf, there's nothing much really going on. The foreigners in Finland are sitting around waiting for the summer to arrive, and the Finns are happy that the summer has already arrived. The Africans living here, I'd imagine, are probably waiting for the end of the winter. Tomorrow I'm going to write some more thesis and then go to work. I'm sure this is not what life is supposed to be like but, given that it's not -25 and that I don't have to plough my way through 2 metres of snow to go anywhere (like my extremely exciting visit to Pasila library to get some books today) I'm happy to put up with it until something more interesting comes along....
So for now, as the Iranians would say (and will say to me in September, inch'allah) Kheyli mamnum and khoda hafez....
May 4, 2008
Life in Helsinki - Part 2 (The Vappu Special Issue)
Dear Fans, Enemies, Randomers.
It's been a while, and for that I apologise. I could come up with some ridiculous excuse but the bottom line is that I just haven't sat down to empty my mind onto a screen since April 19th. Fear not though, I am today seeking redemption.
Two events have taken place in Helsinki since then. The first was rather predictable, given that it lands on the same day every year. April 30th and May 1st were a celebration of Vappu, the name given to Labour day here. The second was slightly less predictable, given that we are subject to the evil temper of the northern European climate up here. The sun is shining !!!!!!!!!!
Firstly, I'll explain to you, in a nutshell (or in a pint glass), what the concept of Vappu entails. Like many countries in the world, Finland is ironic in its honouring of the workers of the world, by declaring the day a bank holiday. This, in Finland, is the green light for students, workers, and general human beings alike to pour out into the streets and parks of the city, and proceed to get royally drunk until late at night. Like last year, my boss had given me a shift until around midnight so I did the honourable thing and took a pre-mixed bottle of viina-cola to work and cracked it open as soon as I got out the door, joining M amidst the amassed throngs of partiers getting sauced up in a park. I call it a park - it's actually a cemetery where the Finnish victims of the Great Plague are buried. Anything goes.
Another feature of Vappu is the wearing of overalls. This is reserved for students (although no one really goes around enforcing any type of rule so if you're not a student any more you can, in theory, get away with it. Just.) and each all-enveloping jumpsuit is coloured and designed differently according to what school you're in. Mine is red, M's is green. She could find hers, borrowed a red one off a friend, and was absolutely horrified that she would be going out to Vappu identifying herself as a chemist. We got home around 5am, went to bed, and M woke me up at 11 by planting a can of cider onto my face, and off we went again ! Went to work at 3, pretty tipsy, got off work with a free bottle of wine from the boss and started again. Drink, work, sleep - that's Vappu in a nutshell. It's fun, and probably scares the crap out of tourists who find themselves in Finland on that day by accident, but probably useful that it only happens once a year...
The second event, as I've written, is the emergence of the sun over the weekend. This leads to another couple of typical Finnish activities. Firstly, crazy golf. The courses are dotted around the city and I've always liked that. Secondly, something which the Finns love nearly as much as beer - ice cream. Anyone who comes will be amazed by the amount of ice cream on display - life is normal here but decorated by ice cream. So for example, when builders are taking a break from work, they won't be standing around smoking a cigarette like in other countries. They'll be standing around, smoking a cigarette, and eating ice cream. Businessmen will walk around in suits, briefcase in one hand and ice cream in the other. And Finns, given their immense knowledge of all things cold I'd imagine, make some seriously good ice cream. In a few weeks two more features of the Finnish summer will arrive. Finnish strawberries (yes, really !!) which are big, juicy and tasty, and Finnish mosquitos, which are also big and juicy. I love the strawberries, the mosquitos love me. What goes around comes around. In conclusion, as short as it is, I like the Finnish summer. And I'm going out to enjoy it now.
It's been a while, and for that I apologise. I could come up with some ridiculous excuse but the bottom line is that I just haven't sat down to empty my mind onto a screen since April 19th. Fear not though, I am today seeking redemption.
Two events have taken place in Helsinki since then. The first was rather predictable, given that it lands on the same day every year. April 30th and May 1st were a celebration of Vappu, the name given to Labour day here. The second was slightly less predictable, given that we are subject to the evil temper of the northern European climate up here. The sun is shining !!!!!!!!!!
Firstly, I'll explain to you, in a nutshell (or in a pint glass), what the concept of Vappu entails. Like many countries in the world, Finland is ironic in its honouring of the workers of the world, by declaring the day a bank holiday. This, in Finland, is the green light for students, workers, and general human beings alike to pour out into the streets and parks of the city, and proceed to get royally drunk until late at night. Like last year, my boss had given me a shift until around midnight so I did the honourable thing and took a pre-mixed bottle of viina-cola to work and cracked it open as soon as I got out the door, joining M amidst the amassed throngs of partiers getting sauced up in a park. I call it a park - it's actually a cemetery where the Finnish victims of the Great Plague are buried. Anything goes.
Another feature of Vappu is the wearing of overalls. This is reserved for students (although no one really goes around enforcing any type of rule so if you're not a student any more you can, in theory, get away with it. Just.) and each all-enveloping jumpsuit is coloured and designed differently according to what school you're in. Mine is red, M's is green. She could find hers, borrowed a red one off a friend, and was absolutely horrified that she would be going out to Vappu identifying herself as a chemist. We got home around 5am, went to bed, and M woke me up at 11 by planting a can of cider onto my face, and off we went again ! Went to work at 3, pretty tipsy, got off work with a free bottle of wine from the boss and started again. Drink, work, sleep - that's Vappu in a nutshell. It's fun, and probably scares the crap out of tourists who find themselves in Finland on that day by accident, but probably useful that it only happens once a year...
The second event, as I've written, is the emergence of the sun over the weekend. This leads to another couple of typical Finnish activities. Firstly, crazy golf. The courses are dotted around the city and I've always liked that. Secondly, something which the Finns love nearly as much as beer - ice cream. Anyone who comes will be amazed by the amount of ice cream on display - life is normal here but decorated by ice cream. So for example, when builders are taking a break from work, they won't be standing around smoking a cigarette like in other countries. They'll be standing around, smoking a cigarette, and eating ice cream. Businessmen will walk around in suits, briefcase in one hand and ice cream in the other. And Finns, given their immense knowledge of all things cold I'd imagine, make some seriously good ice cream. In a few weeks two more features of the Finnish summer will arrive. Finnish strawberries (yes, really !!) which are big, juicy and tasty, and Finnish mosquitos, which are also big and juicy. I love the strawberries, the mosquitos love me. What goes around comes around. In conclusion, as short as it is, I like the Finnish summer. And I'm going out to enjoy it now.
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