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Helsinki? Hell yeah!
Having had no sleep the night before I left ( i was too nervous I was going to miss my mini cab), it would suffice to say that I was slightly tired when I got to Helsinki, but there's no rest for the wicked, as my friends Outi and Jukka (twin brother and sister) have been showing me a good time here in Helsinki with all of their friends.
On Friday afternoon, Jukka and his friend/Outi's boyfriend, Hannu, picked me up from the airport. I had a little bit of trouble with immigration because they were a bit confused as to why I had a 90 day Schengen Visa in my passport, that started on 7th of August (for my dutch working visa), but I had arrived on the 24th of July. Anyway, not to worry, the nice man let me into his country.
We subsequently got something to eat in Helsinki's town centre, after catching a bus in, and then met another one of their friends, Matti for a couple of drinks.
I wasn't quite sure what I thought about Helsinki when I first got there. Having no knowledge of the city (I have this really bad habit of doing no research of the city I am in until I get there. I wonder if this is the right way to go about travelling? I suspect it might not be.), I wasn't sure at all what to expect. I only had a broad understanding of the history of Finland with their connections to Sweden and Russia. I'm heading out in a little while to check it out more, and form more of an opinion on it. I can comment at this stage that it's green; very very green. Alpine trees, wild rasberries, and lots and lots of foliage. It's beautifully fresh.
Well, one thing is for sure, I learn everyday that I am more naive than I actually think I am. My first expectation was that I was going to be visiting the land of the nordic supermodels, where every single person roaming the streets was going to be a super chic, super hot, blonde, tanned, insert scandanavian steroetypes in here... . After knowing Outi, and Jukka, with their pale blonde hair, and blue eyes, slender frames, and seeing photos of their partners and friends, I was sure that the nordic gods had balanced out their curse of the weirdest seasons known to man, with blessings of a lifetime of always looking like they had effortlessly stepped out of an Armani catalogue.
"You shall see light for 24 hours a day in summer, and then, never again in the winter. But you will all have the faces of angels and bodies that will rival the most renown marble sculptures in all of the art world."
Not everyone looks like them. They just look like... people. Brown hair, red hair, green eyes, brown eyes, tall, short, fat, skinny, Finnish people.
Outi and Hannu threw a little dinner party for me at their apartment on Friday night, and we drank cider, wine and scotch until the wee hours of the morning, before waking up on Saturday a little bit worse for wear.
Hannu, Jukka and their guy friends from their home town (and one of the girl's this year!) were having their annual golfing tournament with their hometown crew, a tradition that stems from about 7 years ago. They headed off for some friendly competition, and Outi and I met some of her girlfriends for a picnic (in the summer everyone takes as much opportunity to head out and bask in some sunshine as much as they can, because come winter, it's "see you later sunshine, hello endless darkness and freezing cold" - thus the picnic here is as common as a barbecue.), before we headed off to do some (alcohol) shopping for our big Saturday night. Because it costs so much to drink here, everyone drinks at home before they go out, so we stocked up on cider, wine, and lemonade for the Pimms that I had bought at Heathrow.
After the golf tournament, the boys have an after party, to be organised by last year's previous winner. This year, the winner this year (and last year), Eric, rented the basement floor of his office building, which just happens to have; a sauna (or three), an olympic sized lap pool, a gym, showers, a kitchen, and a den for drinking. Riiiiiight. We got there at 9.30 pm, and the light was just dying, but still very clear. The sun doesn't set until about midnight here.
I asked if it these were built here so that Eric and his colleagues could have lunch and sauna in their lunch hour. Everyone laughed, and said while the Finnish love their sauna's, that wouldn't be common, although a lot of Finnish men do business in the sauna. Apparently most office buildings have them.
"So, I'd like to buy your accounting firm, and merge it with mine, I'll see to it that no redundancies are made, and the two companies merge seamlessly as one. Let's discuss prices, however, in the meantime, throw some more water onto the heater thingy will you? Ahhh, feel the steam...."
Just after we arrived, Jukka was keen to put on some sausages. Just sausages. No bread, or onions or anything, just sausages. Oh, and mustard from a tube.
Jukka and Outi taught me a saying which is the equivalent to the English saying "Piece of cake."
The Finnish saying is "Easy sausage." I understand why now. There's a massive culture for sausage here. More on that later.
I met all of Jukka and Outi's awesome friends, Vendla, Eric, Sini, Esco, and Kata. The best thing about being here at the moment, is that everyone has been really nice and interested in getting to know me, and it feels really nice to be able to get to know a really great group of friends. Luckily for me as well, they share my twisted and dry sense of humour, which I thought was really interesting, since I'm on the other side of the world, perhaps I expected them to not really get me?
We then headed out to find a good compromise where the boys could drink and talk, and the girls could dance. Perhaps it's a universal thing, but the good old irish pub seemed to do the trick. I can't remember the name of the pub, but it was "something Malone's."
We were out in the beer garden, and just chatting, and this guy came up to me and asked me if I was Australian. I was really surprised, and we got to talking, and it turns out he was from Bendigo. What was more surprising is that his accent was very much part british, part scandanavian, there wasn't a hint of an aussie accent in his voice at all. I had to leave the guy with his Finnish girlfriend afte a few minutes, because the liquor license had changed and at midnight, I couldn't drink outside. I think I was saved by the liquor license, because he was about as interesting as 3pm reruns of 'Different Strokes' during school holidays.
I am ashamed to admit, that the night ended with me rocking out to a rock cover band that were playing Bon Jovi, and ACDC. Oh, the shame. But such a good time. When we left the bar at 3am, the sun had already risen again. Light was breaking.
Walking to the bus station, Outi decided to get a hotdog, and everyone concurred, except me. I stood in line and realised everyone was getting 2 sausages.
"Is that normal here?" i said, looking around and inspecting everyone's hotdogs.
"Yes." Jukka said, walking to the hot dog man and placing his order
"But why? Why do you get 2 sausages? I don't get it." I asked. Jukka shrugged.
The hot dog vendor looked at me in a bored way, and looked me straight in the eye.
"Because one is never enough." he said in a totally deadpan voice.
I just looked at him, and looked at Jukka, and pissed myself laughing.
I would think a few horny girls out there might agree with him. One sausage is never enough. That's why shows like Jerry Springer and Ricki Lake exist. Perhaps my confusion at such a notion of a double sausage hotdog proves that I will never be one of those girls.
Yesterday, everyone woke up late. Outi and Hannu woke up at 4pm, and then we decided to go on another picnic near the ocean, where Jukka met us later. Bliss!
We were there until about 9pm, when it started to get a bit darker and cooler, then we walked home along the bike track and paths in the suburbs. Outi called out to me because she had found a wild rasberry bush. We picked some to eat along our walk home. What a great day!
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