21 - Talvipäivän Seisaus

'Wintersunset' © Mikael Rantalainen

Aurinko nousee: 09.24

Aurinko laskee: 15.13

So today, the winter solstice or shortest day (in the northern hemisphere) the sun is (barely) above the horizon for a mere 5 hours and 48 minutes in Helsinki, more than 2 hours less than in London. Even at noon the sun is only 6.5º above the horizon, so usually still behind buildings and trees, even when it isn't cloudy.

Some great photos by Mikael Rantalainen of Finnish winter sunrise/sets can be found here. Makes me want to get my camera out and look for likely spots...

Strangely (as you may have learnt in your school geography lessons) the sun continues to rise later (by a few minutes) until about the 6th of January even though the days start getting longer, because of the earths inclination and elliptical orbit.

Yule (Joulu), the pre-christian celebration of the winter solstice has been long absorbed into first the christian and now the the pseudo-christian commercial holiday we have now (although a few days later) and in the celebrations of the new (calendar) year.

Apologies (redux)

Michael Fish, via

Firstly, apparently I left everyone (well my mum at least) with a bit of a cliffhanger last week because I didn't reveal the outcome of the dread suomenkielin testi.  Well I was pretty surprised to find I actually got a better mark in this one - viisi (5) - which is the top mark in the Finnish university grading system (0=fail, 1=50%, etc).  Although I did still make a couple of stupid mistakes and struggled with partitiivi/akkusitiivi objekttilause (malli: minä kirjoittan bloggin sitten katson televisiota) I pretty much cracked omaslause (to have...) malli: minulla on iso pää; nessesiivi lause (must/to have to) malli: sinun täytyy lukeä tämä bloggi joka päivä; 

I suppose I should also say anteeksi for reinforcing the stereotype lots of people have that Finland is cold all year. Before I came across that old chestnut from the days of nil point, I was originally going to write a serious post about the weather and daylight, particularly as Daylight Saving Time just ended. And if you question the advantage of BST in UK (particularly if you are in Scotland) - ask yourself what the hell is the point in Finland, except to synchronise with the rest of Europe? As this article points out (despite getting confused about GMT and UK time) Finland has plenty of light in the summer, and being in the east west half of the GMT+2 timezone (as shown on this map) is naturally half an hour into 'summer time' anyway. That is also (I guess) why the work day here is pushed to the morning - start work by 8am, lunch at 11:30, go home at 4pm.  Anyway, for anyone wanting to know about Finland's climate they can always look here and remember Helsinki (on Finland's southern coast) is at the same latitude as Lerwick whilst it's Lapland border with Norway is over 1000km further north.  For the record though: 

In Helsinki the average July high temperature is actually 22°C (which is only 1º lower than London).

The highest temperature ever recorded in Helsinki is 31.6°C. The highest temperature ever recorded [in Finland] is from July 9, 1914, when 35°C was exceeded in several places (the maximum being 35.9°C in Turku).

The lowest temperature recorded in Helsinki is -34.3°C (1987). The lowest temperature recorded at any weather station in Finland this century is -51.5°C (1999).

Now compare that to UK recorded extremes (via Met Office):

Highest: 38.5 °C 
Brogdale near Faversham (Kent), 10 August 2003.

Lowest: -27.2 °C
Braemar, Aberdeenshire, 10 January 1982 and 11 February 1895.
Altnaharra, Highland, 30 December 1995.

But enough from Michael Fish for now.

[edited 28.10.08 23:05]