Thankful in Helsinki

I realized a few weeks ago that I hadn’t left Tampere since I got here. Tampere is a lovely place and there’s no reason to leave… except that I’m a bit of a traveler by nature. I’m in a country with affordable trains and busses that can get me anywhere. I can even get affordable airline tickets that make travel within Europe almost mandatory. And, I was brought here by a fellowship that actually wants its recipients to travel and learn about Scandinavia. I was frightened by my stationary realization. I promptly left.

Luckily Audrey and Lea brought me to Lea’s summer cottage in Mouhijärvi, right around then. It was enough out of Tampere to remind me of the outside world. There was lots of travel talk at the cottage since Lea takes pride in her travels to 70, count ‘um, 70 countries. I ate reindeer and we roasted sausage on the fireplace! This is the local polar bear (from back when we used to have snow).

Last weekend I was very thankful to be in Helsinki eating turkey and telling stories with a collection of Finns and Americans. There’s a group of Fulbrighters there that talk about things like the role of feminism in Finnish translated English literature, complicated by the fact that the Finnish language does not specify gender, other than by context. Someone had just gotten back from a conference in Morocco, which reminded me that life isn’t always easy, but made me want to go there. Paula and I talked a lot about her dissertation topic, which was very hard for me to understand. It will include the role of imagination in the architectural experience. I learned that architechture is much more difficult than engineering. It was fun (and educational) to hang out with an architect in such a designer city like Helsinki. The city glistens with very stylish and classic designs… of all types of things, from teacups to skyscrapers, that had originated from Finnish designers.

Proof that I'm here:

If we must have security cameras, this is the way to do it!

Science, Art, and Leisure

I met with Minna on Wednesday to introduce her to my project and learn what she does in Rauma, in Western Finland (where the sea freezes and you can actually skate on it). Hopefully we'll work together. She'll probably do some advising with the microbial source tracking techniques. Minna introduced me to Audrey, another American... here in Tampere! We happened to have a lot in common, but even if we hadn't, we were both so excited to find another American that we still would have talked for at least four hours last night! Minna, Mika, Audrey and I visited the Art Museum, and many other tourist destinations around Tampere today.

These are views from the Space-Needle-equivalent in Tampere. There is also an equivalent non-enthusiasm among locals for going up Tampere's observation tower. I've heard several people brag that they've never been to top of the tower. I thought it was a nice view and it helped with my sense of direction challenges. I might have to go up again when the city is completely covered in snow. Unlike Seattle, Tampere changes quite a bit, depending on the season. The frozen lakes change into skiing and skating grounds. No more boats.



Just for the record: I never went up the Space Needle during the three years that I lived in Seattle.

Snowy November

White… HALLOWEEN!

Challenging.

IT was challenging.

Walking home from work, was challenging.

Through my eyes, it was snowing on Halloween. Nobody else saw it like that. Don’t even joke about that… orange and black, candy-eating holiday around here.

“You know, it originated from the pagan holiday to celebrate the dead, just like Día de los Muertos in Latin America. Except in the States, we don’t like to talk about dead people, so we dress up in costumes and eat candy instead.” I tried to explain, but it didn’t come out sounding very noble.

“We don’t celebrate Halloween in Finland. Some stores have decorations out, but it’s not a Finnish holiday.”

“Don’t you guys celebrate All Saints Day in Finland? It’s related.”

“Oh yeah, when is that again, was it last Saturday?”

No! It’s this coming Saturday. And I want to go to the cemetery and light candles and celebrate dead people, like a genuine Finnish person! My image of Finnish people parading themselves to the cemetary and partaking in ceremonial procedures on All Saint’s Day... was false.

In my Finnish class today, my instructor spent about 20 minutes telling us about the midsummer festival that happens in June. It sounded like a lot of fun. There are bonfires and music and everybody’s happy, and energetic. Though I realized this holiday of which she speaks is in June. We are in November. Alas, June is a long way off. I’m worried I might forget these new keskikesän juhla vocabulary words by June. I raise my hand (not necessarily culturally acceptable in Finland, in general we don’t ask questions in class).

“Isn't there another holiday coming up on Saturday? What happens on that holiday?” I was thinking I could learn some new vocabulary words that I could actually use. And maybe if I tried to bring it up in Finnish instead of in English, people would tell that they do something exciting on All Saints Day.

My Finnish instructor thinks for a moment and starts to say no, sorry, we do not have a holiday on Saturday. But then she remembers about All Saint’s Day. “Oh yeah, that holiday. We don’t really do anything. I think the stores are closed.” And then she moved on to practicing the numbers, sort of irritated that I disrupted the flow of things. §

Today is the day after Halloween and we are covered in snow. Even though I only live about three blocks from the University, I got lost on my way home yesterday. I got pretty cold, but I figured out where I was before my ears froze (that really happened to my friend Eija). Everything looks completely different when it’s covered in snow. And it’s not just covered, there’s at least a foot of snow! On Halloween!

My cousin Abby, who was born shortly after I left for Finland decided to go with a lobster costume this Halloween. That's the spirit!

No matter what they say, HAPPY ALL SAINT’S DAY on Saturday!

Footnote:
§ We practiced the numbers in Finnish class by telling each other our age. I’m so old that my partner couldn’t count that high yet. I had to teach him how to say 30.