Hyvää Joulua kaikille!

Joulukortti 2010 © Arkkitehdas / Mark Davies

  

Happy Christmas, Hyvää Joulua, God Jul, Frohe Weihnachten, Joyeaux No el, Feliz Navidad, j.n.e and similar Juletide Greetings from emmdee, konna (and the tonttu) at hölypöly

Lost Posts: TdS day 6 & 7

Kirkkovene / Church boat at Sulkava - photo by konna.

Something I forgot to mention earlier (and as she hasn't even read, let alone posted to, the blog recently she didn't notice until now) all the photos during our 'Tour de Saimaa' (TdS) cycling trip were taken by Konna and not by me as I didn't take my 'big' camera - and even though they are on my Picasa album rather than hers (well if I had waited for her to do it... said the pot of the kettle). Anyway, moving on...
 

Lost Posts: TdS day 5

If you use enough sauce you can't see the fishes looking at you

Viides päivä: perjantai 5. heinäkuu, Savonlinnasta Sulkavaan (noin 44+ kilsa)

Day 5 of our summer Tour de Saimaa, in which we...

• Get immediately lost on leaving the campsite by trying to find a postbox
• Have novelty of clouds and showers (but still 27°!)
• Encounter the odd mosquito as we enter the forest... and some trickier gravel roads
• Roads and amount of bugs get worse; Konna is struggling on the short but sharp hills - I am unsure if she is flapping her arms to get up them or get rid of the insects that seem to prefer her to me

V**** jääpuikut

Jääpuikut

  
Moika perkelet! Ha-ha säkhö-tonttu on takaisin!!!

Lyön vetoa juuri ne hitto bloggaajia oli päässyt eroon minusta. No nyt ne löytää sen ole niin helppo päästä eroon nykyajan tonttu, joka voi käyttää internetiä. Höpsis-Blogi on hakkeroitu taas. Jos teidän laajakaista ei ole niin paska voisin löytänyt teitä aikaisemmin.

Niiden web-cam näen §*#%* valtava jääpuikkoja ja jopa isompi pelle katolla ilman turvaköyteen. Typerä.

Kyllä, kusihousut sähkö-tonttu on takaisin! Ihminen tottuu kaikkeen, paitsi jääpuikkoon takamuksessa (se ehtii sulaa enne kuin tottuu...)

Kallio snow globe

Kallion kirkko yesterday

   

It's a bit strange writing about summer (see lost posts - like you can miss them) when even in Kallio it is like being in a snow globe recently.

Lost Posts: TdS day 4

The view of Olavinlinna being spoilt by some cyclist: Kesä10 - Lost Postcards

  

Neljas Päivää: Savonlinnassa (vielä 16km pyöräily)

Day 4 (a so-called 'rest day') in which we:

Saimaa steamboat

• Washed some clothes and left them to dry in the blazing sun
• Freewheeled down the hill into town
• Had an icecream
• Took a tour of Olavinlinna (Olaf's Castle) where the opera festival is held (and heard singers practicing as we go)
• Almost broke my neck trying to walk up/down uneven stone spiral staircases in cycling shoes
• Had a fancy lunch on a shady terrace and another icecream
• Sat in the park while eating an icecream
• Took a steamboat cruise

Lost Posts: TdS Day 3

What is that stupid piece of plastic for anyway?

I'm guessing that reading all these overlong Lost Posts of summer / cycling tour blogs is almost as hard work as writing them, so in the interests of speeding things up (so there is a chance they are done with before next summer) I'm changing to a more abridged and less windy style. You hope...
___

Kolmas päivä: keskiviiko 7. heinä: Kerimaan Camping:sta Savonlinnaan (noin 35km pyöräillä)

Eduskunta

Luckily Finland has a substantial paper industry: Winter 2010

A couple of weeks ago we did one of those touristy things you never seem to do when living in you home country/city.  In this case visiting Suomen eduskuntatalo - Finland's parliament building.

A Rare Finnish Export?

"Just before the first snow of winter falls, professional hunters begin their work. The long process of tracking, hunting and transforming this king of the forest into a finished product is a time consuming process, but the final outcome is a reason to celebrate" Rare Exports Inc. 

I first came across the Rare Exports short films about five years ago in London at a Finnish film festival at the Barbican. In amongst the subtitled darkness of Louhimies' Paha Maa ('Frozen Land' - although paha literally translates as bad or evil) and a brace of painterly and bleak yet comedic Kaurismäki's* (such as Kauas pilvet karkaavat or 'Drifting Clouds') were two short interlopers directed by Jalmari Healander revealing the 'real' story behind Finland's most famous seasonal and rare export... (which can both be seen here)

Lost post 6: Tour de saimaa day 2

Kerimäki kirkko - big in metric and imperial dimensions

Lusto (in a less sunny 2008)

So to continue from last time in our 'lost summer blogs' series...

Next morning was another scorcher, and as we had a short leg and a whole day we started off with a detour back to the Lusto suomen metsämuseo forestry museum which has a loop of the cycle route around it's arboretum.  As we had visited before (well worthwhile by the way considering the importance of forestry to Finland and to understand the hardships people went through in the past working the forests) we only stopped for postikortit, kahvia ja pullaa. 

Dear (secret) santa

One of our family (pre)-Christmas traditions is the writing and exchange of Christmas lists.  It never really occurred to me until recently how potentially strange it is for a grown man to be writing a list 'for santa' still, although these days it is an email that goes to Mum and siblings.  We don't think it strange, quite useful in fact to have a few hints, especially when you don't see each other much, but Konna has always found the whole thing odd and refuses to write a list for herself (and looks oddly at whatever item I have suggested to some member of my family). On the other hand she usually agrees or even buys herself, her present from her Mum, and is certainly not above heavy hints to me. At least our way there is some element of surprise...

antigravity wax and red carpets

Up is the new down for wax drips in Finland

Yesterday was itsenäisyyspäivä (independance day) - and is understandably a special day in Finland.
This leaves me with two questions:

1. Why do 2.3 million Finns (out of 2.4 million TV households) celebrate by watching linnan julat the most boring television event imaginable? (Live coverage of a queue of 1800 overdressed people arriving for a party...)
2. What do they put in the celebratory sininen ja valkoinen candles? (See picture above). 

Any scientific/rational solutions for either would be appreciated...

lost post 5: tour de saimaa (day 1)

Postcard from Punkaharju via 

  

As you may have gathered by now, we (by which I mean I) am doing a catch-up series of 'lost' posts about what we did last summer. A very late back to school essay if you like.  Anyway in the last episode our heroes were about to embark on an epic trip around Finland... well, a bit of cycling and camping around the north-west corner of Saimaa anyway...

1. päivä: maanantai 5. heinä: Helsingista Parikkalaan (junalla) / Parikkalasta Punkaharjuun (pyöräillä)

Joulukuu

advent candle

If you are a regular reader (hello Mum!) you might remember that we did a blog-a-day joulukalenteri (advent calendar) on Finnish Christmas/Jule traditions a couple of years ago. Hardly the most original idea ever, but amongst our most highly 'read' posts (all those finnish kids googling joulutorttu and himmeli...)

Konna and I did talk about doing something similar again this year but here we are 1. joulukuussa... But hey, it may be snowy and -15°C outside, but you can read our 'lost posts' of summer instead, and remember the +30°C and sunshine.


So, notice anything different today?