This is not a blog post

We have been exceedingly lazy on the blog front this year. If you are reading this via Facebook (as it posts as a note there automatically) you may not realise there are also so my tweets (via Twitter) on this page ... well occasionally.  Luckily Sähkötonttu doesn't have a Twitter account.

You could always read 'Jees Helsinki Jees' while you are waiting, which I only recently found (when doing a search for Jonathan Glancey's critique of the new Musiikitalo in HS - 'kone ilman sielu') ... how have I missed this cool blog until now?

And now a list of things we haven't blogged about:

• Elections
• Spring
• Metalligrafiikka courses (etching)
• Keramiikka course (wobbly pots and other lumpy objects)
• Finnish indie-pop music (Rubik, Regina, LCDMF)
• Spotify
• Radio Helsinki (finally a radio station I can live with)
• Musiikitalo
• Työ

Sporadic sausages

via mtv3

Posting here seems to be getting more sporadic and sparse as time goes on, partly because we are well into the repetition zone as we get closer to kaksi vuotta (what is there to say about Vappu that wasn't said last May day for instance); and also because staying at home sitting in front of the computer trying to design kitchens/extensions/invitations doesn't throw up a lot of insightful or exciting moments. Also I have realised that a lot of my posts are picture led - i.e. an excuse to show off whatever randomly appeared in front of my camera, just be glad you don't have to see the full slideshow. So if I haven't been out somewhere with my camera I don't seem to come up with much to post about.

Not to say nothing is happening. Since the last blog post we have bought a flat, had our 4th client/project, bought a bonsai tree, had a name day and killed my Xbox360 (the dreaded red ring of death). The latter is probably a good thing as will stop me being tempted to play Fallout 3 instead of looking at Finnish building regulations. Now I will have to talk to the bonsai tree instead. (It's called Bernard).

About the most interesting thing going on here just now is people panicking that they won't be able to buy nakkia and perunasalattia for their vappupäivä picnic due to striking/locked-out food sector workers - I imagine if the 'Suomi sausage shortage' goes on much longer the Finnish government will have to declare martial law to prevent rioting when Finns realise their summer barbecue will have to be vegetarian.

Still here...

Logs in the snow: From Lapland - Winter 08/09

Yes we are still here.

A combination of moving flat, being busy at work/starting a company, laziness, and a lack of ideas has meant a hiatus in blog posts. Neither of us want to blog about work stuff so not much to talk about and less 'spare' time (as I can use my Xbox360 now when I'm bored...............). At least we're getting a white christmas.

Maybe the new year will bring some inspiration?

What to do?

Chirp chirp? From Around Helsinki - Autumn09

I know - I'll join the Twitter bandwagon. Then I can not post anything for ages on that too...

Well that was 5 minutes wasted, now what?

Pumpkins and mitre joints

Well the new seasonal header image from the Linnänmäki Valotkarne kurpitsat photo seemed appropriate for the weekend. You won't be surprised to hear that Konna has bough a mini one to make a lantern from.

With Konna busy at work and me busy preparing for a new 'project' not much we can write about at the moment... except that as Konna is ironically doing project information in English (again) she keeps asking me what the English for such-and-such architectural term is, either by description ("you know one of those metal bars that presses the timber down" which turned out to be a compression rod/bolt) or by it's Finnish term - "what's Haapa and Terva Leppä - they are good for sauna's as they don't have much pihka - and I need to say make jiiri corners".* Usually after a bit of head scratching, leafing through dictionaries and quizzing wikipedia (suomeksi ja englanniksi) we work it out. Maybe I should start an English-Finnish Architectural Terminology Dictionary website/wiki...

*That's Aspen, Black Alder, Resin/Amber and Mitre joints, in case you were wondering.

Timeless expressions

My other half has noted that I make LOADS of spelling mistakes when I write (in English that is - as not sure he would find the Finnish mistakes - yet!)... This was also pointed out to me by a good friend in Uk (who thinks that her spelling is perfect... and that everyone lives in a perfect world of spelling!!!) - My response is: 'Annetaan kaikkien kukkien kukkia' (=Let all flowers to bloom) and continue blog writing even with not so perfect language skills :) A colleague of mine here in Finland has pointed out to me many times that I should write a book (ha ha - there you go you spelling chekers!) and has already figured out the name of the book & my writer name. It goes like this: Imperfect life of Joan Coupé. So if one day YOU - English friend of mine in Uk walk along the street & see Imperfect life of Joan Coupé in the window of Borders, be happy as the book is for you :) Check all you want - there will be millions of spelling mistakes - unless the editor has managed to find them all!

This brings me to (who knows how) the image above - Timeless expressions, which is the Aalto exhibition at Vellamo Maritime Centre in Kotka and to the story told on a short film re: Aalto's pants... 'Usually Aalto wore quite elegant black shorts at the summer place of the family when some visitors (even reporters & famous folk from abroad) came around. One day he was wearing dirty, baggy trousers when some important visitors were scheduled to arrive to the Muuratsalo experimental house. The wife of Aalto's pointed out this (which might have been a mistake) as Aalto is said to have started loudly protesting against this making a point that he wore exact same pair at the Paris World Fair many years back... also taking (used) handkerchiefs from his pockets throwing them around in front of the visitors saying that he used the handkerchiefs at the fair too'. Nice... So be careful before you comment on other peoples spelling as I might start throwing deliberate/random midtakes everywhere and your time will go in correcting them! HA - there you go.



Models of Aalto's small houses made by students - I can spot Villa Mairea in there... + my friend's face - can you?

P.S. It's worth your while visiting the exhibition if you are near Kotka anyways this summer. The film is funny & informative (but shown on a miniscule screen). The models are interesting too... Otherwise the usual is on show - Remember though that Sunila is very near Kotka, so pop in there too.
P.P.S. I spelt Morrissey wrong - hmmm...

Pure Laziness

Can't be bothered to post really, but I will update the header with this months image... these things are everywhere this time of year.

The competition is in by the way... so Jonna gets some now (competition on the blog that is)

Oh and I got a 5- on my level 7 Suomen Kieli the other week, despite getting everything wrong.
And level 8 is buggeringly hard.

If you know what I mean.

Partisiipit, ihana...

I'm really going now, move along, nothing to see here...

Time flies when you're having fun

Danger - Architect at work... via

What is it with architects and deadlines?

Somehow it is 10 days since our last post, although it only seems like last night. I have several things I want to blog about (including horses & cows, blood pancakes, not cycling, dentists and other random things) but we're in that mad 'draw-up' zone trying to get our Europan 10 competition entry ready, working 12 hour days redesigning everything for the n-th time, redrawing it, redesigning it again, drawing it again, re-reading the brief, starting it all again.... Having the world's worst rickety, uneven table as a drawing board, no network, flaky software and only an A4 printer (also very temperamental - rather like it's owner) doesn't exactly help. Mind you the set up is still almost as good as my last office...

The observant amongst you may be wondering why I making a big deal about this as we still have exactly a month to go, however my course starts on Monday (oh bugger I have to revise for that too), and we have Juhannus in between, and I need to get a 3d CAD model of the whole site finished next week so we can work up some perspective views then work on the written part. While Konna will only have to draw everything else! If we were doing this in an office I would hope there would be a few more hands.  Lucky it is 'only' three A1 boards... (and 10 A3's, and 2 CD's) ... and we can't even publish it here until after the judging - in January!

things you should and shouldn't know

I've just discovered (while idly skimming through my Sitemeter stats) that our little unfocused blog has been picked up by 'this is FINLAND' published by the Finland Promotion Board as one of just five blogs (so far anyway) of 'recommended' reading on Finland, along with our fellow ex-pat architect Lewism. So heipa if you have just arrived in confusion from there. One of the others is the Finnish foreign minister's blog... which isn't so surprising once you see who produces the site. Nice Aalto vase inspired logo too.

I wonder if we come under the 'things you shouldn't know' category the site's strap line mentions?

Pikku hiljaa

Pikku = small

Hiljaa = quiet

'pikku hiljaa' = slowly

Yesterday we moved back to Mellunmäki (Lit: noises-hill) from Itäkeskus (east-centre), where we have been flat sitting for the last  six or seven weeks. (Actually it is much quieter here). Internet access was a bit spotty there (which is one of my excuses for the paucity of blogs) but mainly it was the novelty of unfettered access to a leather sofa in front of large, new TV with cable, a recorder, DVD and Xbox hooked up to it that distracted me in my spare time. Since we don't have sole use of the (old) TV here, and it doesn't have the peripherals I expect to be spending more time with my laptop again.  I've also go a few posts I started writing but didn't finnish to catch up on, so expect a spike in activity from hölynpöly towers...

What to blog?

Minus Thirty! From Lapland - Winter 08/09

No, I didn't throw myself down the stairs (or go skiing) and end up in hospital for two weeks.  I was more serious about wanting to write amusing and interesting posts, but since I can't think of any it will have to be the usual rubbish...

We have also been busy post holiday: we have moved (temporarily), I've worked on portfolio, been to Europan 10 launch, started new Finnish course, applied for a job and had an interview (don't think I'll get it though).

Lappi was fun, although quite expensive.  Apart from getting to see my Mum and sister, my lasting memories will probably be seeing -32°C on the thermometer (and going out in -30°C to experience what happens when your nose hairs freeze..., walking across a lake, husky sledging, and meeting woolly hungarian pigs (Konna's favourite I believe). No northern lights though, so will have to try again sometime.

The whole thing was quite an adventure for my Mum, although she claims the most worrying experience thing wasn't artic temperatures, galloping reindeer, sauna habits or Kittilä airport's snowy runway.  No, it was me, driving in Helsinki in falling snow, and with 10cm on the ground. Thanks Mum! (Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned I'd never driven in the snow before setting off... hmmm.) 

1000/100

Sometime today we should get our 1000th visit (according to Sitemeter anyway, as we are on 998 as I write this) - well if you are not all too busy buying your christmas turkey/joulukinku and last minute gifts that is... 

Of course we haven't really had 1000 visitors in the last 6 months (please file under lies, damned lies and statistics - I'll explain in the new year sometime) and I doubt you've been here more than once a day each (once a week? once a month? Gee - I wonder why we bother sometimes...) which would mean we would have at least 7.6 readers at the most anyway. 

I was hoping this would also be our 100th post  - but too many people are googling himmeli and joulutortu at this time of year, so the thousand has come up a few early on the 95th post. So much for synchronicity - maybe I should change the title to 998/95.

Kiitoksia kaikille...

Joulukalenteri

Selection of joulukalenteri at Stockman

The traditional 'adventtikalenteri' or 'joulukalenteri', created first by the Germans, consists of two pieces of cardboard on top of each other. Twenty four doors are cut out in the top layer, with a number ranging from one to twenty four on each. Beginning on the first day of December, one door is opened each day, counting down the days remaining until 'Joulu Aatto', from twenty four to one... Familiar to all of you I'm sure (however some of you are used to the 25 door -system)... Get into the habbit of checking this web site every morning and Finnish Christmas wonders will be brought to you!

P.S. Is there Santa Claus himself behind the calenders doing some Christmas shopping for the Mrs Claus?

Word clouds

Since I'm in the business of nicking ideas from other people's blogs at the moment (see the 'Yearbook' photos below) I thought I'd do this one now.  You may have seen these around in various forms: 'word clouds' in which the bigger the word the higher frequency it's use in the text. So just a kind of graph really. Wow, I managed to make them sound really boring, and they are actually kind of fascinating.

Anyway, these are made using Wordle and represent the blog to date... 

 

above, left to right: July & August.

top: the whole darn thing (well July to September anyway)

Have you tried switching it off and on again?

I've just come home from 'the course' to discover SiteMeter has broken due to the botched upgrade/downgrade over the weekend, so has not recorded any visits to the blog for today. Not quite in the same league of screw up as the Apple iPhone/iPod 2.0 software and MobileMe, but still... 

What really bothers me is that I'm bothered about it at all... why was I even checking SiteMeter now anyway? Am I getting obsessed with finding out who is looking at the blog (or at least guessing from the logs)? And finding it funny how Google sends people searching for 'Mölky', 'Seinijoki Town Hall', and 'Sataa sataa ropisee pilipilipom, pilipilipom' to the blog? Is this sane behavior? And is it 1984?

---

PS: You (oh imaginary reader) should read Mike Walsh's last post on cars/pedestrians in middle Finland by the way. Having been to Seinijoki myself I can confirm his observations - and even worse coming from London!

In a stew

Not quick enough, from Around Helsinki

Perjantaina me menimme Korkeasaarin kissojen yön.  Sää oli kylmä...

I am in a bit of a quandary*. I feel I should try to write more in Finnish to push my meagre Suomi language skills along - but if I do (on the blog at least) then two things will happen:

1. All the English speakers will wonder what on earth I am talking about (assuming it's untranslated); or should I say non-Finnish speakers, as it seems the vast majority speak better English than I'll ever manage with Finnish;
2. All the Finnish speakers will die of boredom from such exciting posts as Eilen minä menin kauppassa ja ostin... (Yesterday I went to the shops and I bought...)

I know I could always keep a separate Finnish journal, but blogging is more fun.  Of course the big assumption here is that anything I have previously written in English is interesting in the first place.

I was supposed to cook a 'traditional British sunday roast' today for Hiiri and Konna. I ended up cooking a stew instead, because ignoring a sense of foreboding I went to the local K-market, on Hiiri's insistence they did lots of cuts of meat their and of course they had nothing resembling a joint of beef, pork, lamb or a whole uncooked, un-marinated chicken that I could use. Quelle surpise. My fault for not considering that Hiiri has never had a British roast so wouldn't really know what I was after. Anyway, apparently there is a specialist butcher in Hakenemi, so next weekend...

Hmm, that ended up a 'I went to the shops and didn't buy...' post.  What was I saying about blogging the mundane?

---

*Konna: no, no, no. I'm not in a big hole in the ground where stone is dug up from.

From Arts Night to Dark Knight

even the statues get into the spirit of Taiteiden Yö

You would think that with all this time on our hands there would be lots of time for writing blog posts, but there seems to be so much going on at the moment I hardly know where to start.  I haven't written about Sibelious concert hall, Koli hiking or some incidents at Kesälahti; or our tour around WeeGee centre in Espoo; and already we are going off again to Kotka next week. Obviously getting distracted by Facebook has nothing to do with it.

Last night in Helsinki was Artist's Night (or Art Night or Night of Arts: Taiteiden Yö in Finnish anyway), basically a bunch of free, loosely 'arts' related events in the city. This ranged from a concert for 30,000 in Senate Square, free entry to museums and galleries, book signings and poetry readings, supposedly themed around 1968. And (for some) an excuse for a Friday night piss up. We took in the Anton Corbijn photography exhibition at the Taidemuseo Tennispalatsi (Tennis Palace Art Gallery) - probably best know for his work with musicans such as U2 and Depeche Mode, and says himself that he started photography as a way into the music world to meet his heroes back in the 70's.  We then headed over to the Finlandia concert hall, taking a peek at the huge hole in the ground that will be the new Musiikitalo (music house) on the way past. This is coincidently another famous product of the 70's, for a free (although shortened) backstage tour around Alvar Aalto's masterpiece (without any of the Carrera marble cladding dropping off and hitting anyone). This is in effect a listed building, which causes some problems for the management dealing with imperfect acoustics (the ceiling of the main concert hall being replaced, leaking roofs and the aforementioned marble cladding (replaced a few years ago) as well as the entrance being moved from the original front some years ago - which is due to be rectified in the next few years. In fact this will all sound eerily familiar to those familiar with the travails and renovation of the Royal Festival Hall (south bank centre) in London.

Finlandia talo

After our daily architecture fix, and a quick lohikeito (salmon soup) on the terrace, we walked through the busy streets, glimpsing various musicians, performers, dancers (in shop windows) to the Akateeminen Kirjakauppa (Academic Bookshop) - part of the Stockmanns department store, reputedly Europe's largest (in terms of number of titles at least, with over 450000) and, as it happens, another white marble Aalto design, with it's atrium and inverted, crystalline, roof light.  Here were various book signings, readings, and 15% discount on paperbacks until midnight. So while Bore & Pikka had Fingerpori books signed I picked up Bad Monkeys (Matrix meets Silence of the Lambs according to the blurb); and considering a paperback might cost €14 (about £11) any discount is well worth it!

Skirting the packed Senate Square we ended the night with a beer/cider by the harbour.

Back while we were in Tennispalatsi (and I was surfing facebook on the free wireless connection there) we picked up tickets for Dark Knight, so we'll find out tonight if Heath Ledger's final performance is as good as everyone says.

We'll be right back after the break...

Mini-mökki, Vaasa

We're off again - to Kesälahti then Koli for a couple of weeks of mökki (cottage) and camping - so probably no more posts for a while... Unless we find a campsite with wireless Internet! (And even then no pics as we'll be working off my iPod). But before we go we've been literally inundated with requests - okay just the one then - to know a) how to pronounce Hölynpöly; and b) how to leave comments...

a. My best representation is "Herlewen-perlew"; but any better suggestions welcome

b. Just click on the 'comments' link at the bottom of each post. If we don't go mökki höperö in the meantime, I'll catch up with them when I am back!

Miksi hölynpöly? Why fluff and nonsense?

This blog is an open diary of our time in Finland, mainly for family and friends to know what we are up to.  Think of the posts as a mixture of postcards, scrapbook pages, idle jottings, and the like; some serious, some not, some sarcastic, some fictional. I will also occasionally inflict my bad Finnish on these posts, so in advance I will apologise to any of my Finnish hosts who may be reading - anteeksi!  However I will let the Turtle 'Konna' apologise for herself for any bad English/Suomea she might perpetrate when she posts...

Let us know what you think.