Posts from the Road…
March 19, 2001 – Helsinki, Finland
At last, a proper keyboard!!!
Today finds Helsinki to be sunny and still on the chilly side. I like to consider that I am built of stronger stuff than someone from Iowa or Delaware. However the combination of wind and temperature makes one less inclined to do outside things. Around noon today, the temperature was -6 centigrade with the wind from the northwest at 5 meters a second. That makes it about -80 F with the wind blowing about 67 miles an hour. No wait, that’s right. I need to divide something here. OK, it is about 22F with the wind at about 11 mph. Doesn’t seem so bad when you put it like that, I guess.
Yesterday, we went to Suomenlinna, a fortress built by Sweden on islands in the Helsinki harbor. It is another one of the many UNESCO world heritage sites we are hitting on this trip. Helsinki’s growth as a city is tied to the construction of these fortifications. Prior to this, it was a town of about 1500 persons. Less than 60 years after construction on Suomenlinna began, Helsinki became the capital of Finland.
Ice still covers the harbor here. The boat out to the fortress pushed its way through the ice with a low grinding sound like putting Brazil nuts in a coffee grinder. Looking out the back of the ship, you could see the ice floes fill in behind us, removing any indication that the ship had ever passed through.
Our families would be very impressed by our productivity this morning. We got up, saunaed, showered, ate, mailed things from the post office, got our Russian customs forms, and exchanged money – all before 10:30am; a practice run for tomorrow. The 6:30am train to St. Petersburg is painfully early.
The sauna was quite a nice way to start this day. Felt really good after a shower. I also felt warmer from the inside, instead of just warm on the outside (if that makes any sense). Good preparation for hitting the outdoors. Saunas are very popular here. The story is that Finnish troops serving with the UN build saunas wherever they are stationed – even in the desert.
Another good remedy for the cold here is coffee. Finland is one of the biggest coffee consumers in the world. What makes it especially nice is that they serve it in soup bowl sized cups almost big enough to bathe in.
I have a whole page of trivia to share, but I will spare you. Tomorrow, we are off to Russia!
p.s. Finland is the only country to fully repay its World War One war debt to the US.
March 19, 2001 (Day 12): Helsinki, Finland: Eurohostel – 10pm
Morale: good. I am as ready as I am ever going to be for Russia.
We had the sort of morning that would shock anyone who knows us. By 10.30am this morning, we were awake, sauna-ed, showered, and fed. In addition, we had also been to the amazing Helsinki Post Office to mail home a package of souvenirs – including the incredible sweaters we got in Estonia – then to the train station to obtain Russian customs forms (in English), and to the ATM to get more Finnish Marks. It served as a dry run for tomorrow. The 6.30am train to St. Petersburg is going to be hell.
As if the nature of this trip was not unusual enough, I am trying to do more things outside of my comfort zone. Today’s adventure was to sit naked in a hot, unventilated room with my fellow man (actually “men”) – what the Finns call “sauna.” It was only less uncomfortable than working in Germany over a hot summer, a country where they do not believe air-conditioning has a place in office buildings. The sauna was an eye-opening experience. After I showered, I felt a lot cleaner and much warmer. The best way to describe it was like being warm from the inside out, as opposed to wearing a jacket which tends to warm me from the outside in. The experience left me much better equipped for another day in the cold.
Sightseeing
Between coffees served in bathtub-sized cups, we took a bus tour of the major sites in Helsinki – outside in the cold. Curiously, one of the ten languages for the tour was Latin. It did not help me out much, but I am sure it was a relief to the mitre-wearing chap in the back. While billed as an “Expert Sightseeing Tour”, no experts were identified during the entire tour – not even at the University. I suspect it was feeding time at the Social Sciences pen.
We visited the Temppeliaukio Church (a.k.a. the Rock Church) – an impressive space blasted out of granite with a ceiling made of copper wire, making it look as though the building has crashed into the earth from outer space. The acoustics are impressive and it doubles as a music venue. The tour also took us to a memorial to Jean Sibileus, considered one of Finland’s greatest composers. While the monument looks like a lot of silver organ pipes, the artist drew inspiration from Finland’s forests.
Fun facts
Today’s healthy dose of useless information courtesy of the tour:
- Finland constructs about 60 percent of the world’s icebreakers – useful on the Helsinki morning commute for about eight months of the year.
- Finns have more mobile phone numbers than fixed phone numbers.
- Fifty percent of the population has library cards.
- Finland is officially bilingual: students learn both Finnish and Swedish in school.
- Faberge is buried in a Helsinki cemetery.
- The Helsinki city plan was modeled on St. Petersburg and Tallinn.
- “Onion” domes on Russian Orthodox churches represent flames.
- There are 5 million people in Finland and, the story goes, 2 million saunas.
A bit of laundry was in order. We managed to have everything washed and mostly dry by 1800. We laid out everything that needed to dry before tackling dinner. A little packing when we got back and then a beer to relax.
Tomorrow: Russia.
Excerpts from Anna’s journal included. All factoids based on 2001 data, naturally.
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