We recently visited a friend who moved to a small town near the Russian border called Parikkala. It was great to see her and her family, but it made me realise more than ever that life is about the choices you make: I would never be able to live outside of Kehä III here in Finland, and that trip confirmed my view.
Tag Archives: finland
Nortec Collective in Stockholm
A few weeks ago we were fortunate enough to visit Stockholm, to finally see Nortec Collective live. Nedless to say, we jumped around like crazy and enjoyed the gig immensely, especially since instead of Banda samples they actually had live musicians backing them up (who played an encore of their own). We even ended up backstage with them after the gig, and naturally welcomed them to come to the Helsinki Festival whenever they could.
It was a very welcome pause, and it was nice to see that Stockholm still looks the same. An interesting note was that everybody spoke to me in Swedish (even though I had a tejana on most of the time), while that seldom happens in Finland with or without funny hats.
When the news hit you personally
Those who follow news about Mexico might know that on the same night Barack Obama was elected president of the United States, there was a very dramatic tragedy in Mexico City, as a small airplane carrying the secretary of the interior of the country crashed in the middle of the business district. The news was quite tragic, but that was it.
Then, I started hearing some more personal accounts. My brother-in-law works in the area, and the plane crashed 12 metres away from his office. He saw everything, and was quite shocked by the time he got home. Understandably, I was quite upset when I heard about it. Then I found out that a friend of mine was injured and is in hospital, and am frankly still in shock.
My prayers go to her and her family.
Municipal elections in Finland
After a couple of months of campaigning, the municipal elections in Finland took place yesterday. The main outcome of this democratic exercise was a general shift to the right in this country, where both the centre-right and populist right parties won more seats in municipal councils across the nation.
Especially the wins by the Perussuomalaiset, or True Finns, are rather troubling for a guy like me, as many of their candidates have openly expressed racist attitudes. I might sound a little paranoid, but I believe in this country, I’ve invested in it and I cannot bear the thought that 1 out of 10 people in the bus or the mall would like to kick me out of this country just because I look different, even if I’ve contributed to this society too. Sad.
PhDs cleaning toilets
I was reading this article in Helsingin Sanomat, and was quite amazed by the following passage:
The Sokos Hotel in Pasila has 12 cleaners, only one of whom is a native-born Finn.
“It is surprising”, Thors says.
Aila Forsström of the cleaning company Sol, says that 80 per cent of the 550 cleaners employed in her district have foreign backgrounds.
The cleaners include engineers, PhDs, , kindergarten teachers,
bookeepers, teachers, dental nurses, interpreters, and one ballerina.
Just think about the amount of untapped potential in that list.
Reminded me of this study by the Ministry of Labour, where they discuss the adaptation of Finnish society to the presence of immigrants here. I read it on my last holiday and left me a little uneasy. Furthermore, the situation won't improve with the current economic downturn.
Don’t you love days like this?
European Day of Languages
The funniest part of this event is that I probably understand more about Europe and Europeans than your average person hereabouts. After all, I’ve studied their languages and cultures for many years, and have lived here for a few.
There were two very interesting tidbits for me when they had this stand in Kamppi: I could read and understand more than 8 squares in this poster, which was surprising, and I was able to fill their test on European languages with full marks in under 2 minutes… and I’m not even European.
Mexican Culture Week in Helsinki
Finally the Mexican Embassy here truly put a programme together for Independence Day, and there was a whole week of activities last week related to Mexico and Mexican culture. They did have the traditional reception for the Mexican community here, but there was also a piano concert, exhibitions of folk dress and art, workshops on Mexican dance, architecture and the experience of Mexicans in Finland, and they even brought a famous Mexican chef here!
There was some interesting cultural exchanges during the period, as the video below of local student choir Ylioppilaslaulajat shows:
I even ended up singing at some point, LOL… 😉 Kudos to the Mexican Embassy, and I hope they organise these kind of events again.
Russian ska in Helsinki: Leningrad
Ленинград (Leningrad) are a Russian ska band that I knew previously, and visited Helsinki a month ago. The gig was excellent, as you can see below, even if I didn’t understand a word.
Finnish nature
One of the advantages of summer in Finland is that you can get in contact with nature. In a visit to the summer house we even found deer.