It's already 2005...

« Drinking Game: Not Suitable As A Toy For Children. »

Happy New Year everyone! In addition to my rather boring and semi-annual resolution to quit smoking, I will also add 'no trips to countries where outside the tourist compound it looks like a giant landfill' to the list. We survived, had a reasonable number of interesting adventures, took a few pictures and managed to return without too much excitement aside from wondering if all the fireworks around Helsinki, where residents ambitiously attempt to remove body parts while drunk and stupid, would hinder the plane's ability to land. I'll have an entertaining story to tell once I get some whisky to kill all that ails and some sleep on a real bed with clean sheets.

permalink Ω 31 December 2004, Helsinki

So that's what that was...

« A nativity crib from Austria, #4 on the Jouluseimet/Nativities 2004 map. I have a series of photos from the various cribs, but they'll have to wait until after Christmas. »

I am incredibly flattered that Clandestina this month selected a series of photos of mine from January's trip to Funchal, Madeira. It was difficult to choose the eight photos for the submission and, well, I just don't know what to say since it came as a nice holiday surprise. :)

For the friends who always ask if I've had lutefisk yet, the answer remains no, but I did notice a vat of floating smelly whitefish in the lunchroom yesterday which I decided was not at all appetizing and took the other entree option. Someone sat across from me with a heaping plate of the aforementioned white, gelatinous, smelly unidentified foodstuff and I couldn't help but ask what it was. I got about every third word as he explained in turbo Finnish and then, as the translation caught up with me, it dawned on me what this mystery meat was. I cautiously asked, "Is this what is called lutefisk in Sweden?" The immediate smiles and nods confirmed my interpolation. He also added that it didn't really taste like anything to which I asked why eat it? Perhaps I had missed the obvious? I then had an epiphany as to why it is the butt of so many jokes. So, yes, I've been close to lutefisk but my gastronomic curiosity is satisfied that it is close enough. :) I can send you the recipe and story about how it is made featured in today's newspaper if you like.

The office was like a ghost town after 2pm or so today. I showed the Rare Exports, Inc. Movie to everyone around to spread the holiday cheer and slack. I'll be going into the office for a while tomorrow as I know one box senses that its keepers are going on holiday and is plotting something. Perhaps I should whisper in the ether that I have a tesla coil handy should there be any shennanigans while we're away. I should load up some Morricone music to play loudly in the office tomorrow to go along with the tumbleweeds. :)

Update: Did I say ghost town? It's more like a deserted island. I somehow managed to take the wrong bus and had to go ask the driver when he took an unusual turn, "Onks tämä sata kolme?" "Ei. Sata yheksän." I must have hallucinated the right number. Much amusement and a different bus later I arrived at work without seeing a single person or vehicle. It's the festive post-apocalyptic effect.

An enjoyable holiday weekend to all and to all the return of the daylight! :)

permalink Ω 23 December 2004, Helsinki

Compliments of the Season

« Hauskaa Joulua / Merry Christmas / God Jul »

For everyone whom I would have liked to send a Christmas card to this year but didn't, Happy Seasonal Non-denominational Greetings. Well, except for the Santa and the Hauskaa Joulua bit. :) I like sending snail mail cards as it's the one time of year that I have a reason to put something in the post to everyone I know. I'm not big on Christmas, but the season does have a few bits worth having. I found a lovely tiny book about 37 pages long in Hagelstam's bargain bin a few months ago on the history of the Christmas card titled Compliments of the Season which you can read here. It's short and covers the rather recent tradition of the cards which first appeared in 1846. The book is old enough to find the writing style and language also very interesting. The Victorians are to blame for many things but they did get a few things right. I wonder what they would make of the dreaded, and usually dreadful, family update christmas letter many US families put into the mail every year. Perhaps channeling Jane Austen might improve them.

We set the date for getting the puppy; 16 January, which seems like an eternity away. The breeders have taken to calling him Jarmo which is a fine name but a bit too close to Jarkko I think as it's difficult enough at times to keep man and beast distinct in my mind. Fortunately, Jarkko doesn't shed. :)

permalink Ω 23 December 2004, Helsinki

Santa Shortage

« A fine specimen of an authentic Joulupukki, possibly exported from Finland, in the Burlington Mall, Burlington, Massachusetts in 1998. »

I found this picture a while back when digging through some old photos and I remembered watching the old guy for a while since the beard and every detail about his costume was perfect. Had I been a child, I would have wanted to believe this person was really Santa. The Sanomat today had an article about how difficult it is to find suitable Santas and, in England, kids can't even sit on Santa's lap anymore due to a paranoid frenzy over Santas getting handsy. I briefly entertained applying for a Joulupukki job on one of the cruise ships for grins, but figured I'd just make kids cry by telling them they were all going to get coal and switches under the tree. Ho Ho Ho.

permalink Ω 21 December 2004, Helsinki

You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch

« One of the greatest books for children in the English language. »

Last week I was having coffee with my coworkers and used the word 'grinchly' in a sentence which drew a completely unexpected quizzical look. Finland, and the rest of Europe, gets a seeming never ending stream of American TV, movies and, printed matter so, having been spoiled by Jarkko who has a near encyclopaedic recall for the more random bits of American pop culture, I was totally flabbergasted that Dr. Seuss had never made it this far north. I was also rather happy to find a rare chink in Jarkko's knowledge, but why couldn't that have been the Love Boat or some other lame 70s show instead of one of my most cherished authors? :)

A couple of people in the office today mentioned that the Grinch would be on TV tonight which made me nearly squeak with glee as that Christmas special, in the long tradition of Christmas TV specials in the US, still has a special place in my heart. Unfortunately, it is the Jim Carrey abomination rather than How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the 1966 animated TV edition with Boris Karloff narrating. I'm really quite sorry that anyone would have their first exposure to this charming classic with the modern version which has little of the original verse or story. Instead of the subtle, clever tale of Christmas gone mad, the movie strips it of any charm and dumbs it down so much that even the most slow of us would find the moral quite overwhelmingly obvious. I'm actually really pissed off that this movie even exists as it shamlessly savages something sacrosanct. Just imagine Jim Carrey deciding to adapt the Moomin stories....

I suspect that How the Grinch Stole Christmas and the corpus of Dr. Seuss hasn't been translated because of the difficult poetic verse and, perhaps, lack of cultural interest, but if Finland can import all the crap reality TV shows Finns can handle why not something every American grows up with and still thinks fondly of well into old age?. Finns would, I suspect, greatly enjoy the story about The Lorax with its trees and the Once-ler. The stories; their clever language and verse are a joy to read alone or aloud and always evoke memories of a time when I was younger and Christmas specials didn't suck quite so much with their overdone special effects and simplified scripts to make it mindnumbingly dull for kids.

permalink Ω 20 December 2004, Helsinki

Porn for everyone

« A smiling skull in Hagelstams Bookstore. A row of skulls depicting the Hagelstam family tree were there for Halloween and have reappeared for the holidays with festive hats and skull porn. Yes, that picture behind the happy skull is really what it appears to be. Antique porn for every fetish bound in leather. It makes you briefly wonder what kind of porn your grandfather enjoyed just before you take a fork to your eyeballs to remove the mere thought of it. »

Last year, Helsinki lost a stately old willow tree in a freak storm. The city decided to leave it be and see if it would sprout in the coming spring. In October, the stump was declared dead although enough material from the tree was saved to grow some saplings so the tree lives on. The Sanomat mentioned this week that there is now a small booklet, Vanhan Piilipuun Alla available at the Helsinki City Museum with stories about the tree and pictures over the past 100 years. Perhaps they'll plant some of the saplings grown from the dead willow in the new Kampinkeskus when it's done.

We spent all day Saturday watching all of the Lord of the Rings extended DVD editions with friends of ours in one 13-hour marathon. The movies and company were great, even if I did feel like a Hobbit towards the end of the day. The new material in Return of the King was good but it didn't complement the movie as well as the previous 2 extended editions had. I think there should be some sort of medal that one should receive for managing to make it through all 3 DVDs within an 18-hour period of time. I went to sleep with the visage of Gollum speaking like Yoda, maybe because the last time I sat through a trilogy in one sitting was Star Wars which also had a short, green creature with a raspy voice. "My pressssious you are!"

I was leafing through Deko, a new magazine that is mostly just pictures and design voyeurism that I suspect won't last very long, when I saw a little blurb about giving a fairly useless object d'art, a mini Alvar Aalto dish in the famous lake shape, a purpose by using it as a cookie cutter. I decided to give it a try and my analysis is that it is the most ineffective 15 euro cookie cutter anyone could ever purchase since the glass edges are far too thick which renders it unable to make a clean cut no matter how thick or thin the dough is. It would be much easier if someone just made a 2 euro cookie cutter in the same shape. Maybe use the dish as a cheese dip mold....perhaps there should be a contest to discover an actual useful purpose for these little tourist trinkets. :)

permalink Ω 19 December 2004, Helsinki

One of Cups, Six of Needles

« A tree of light on the Esplanade. Sadly, the snow is gone but the light remains. »

I had to hike down to the doctor's office very early today to give urine and blood samples for various tests. Joy. It took over an hour for the blood for 4 different vials to be drawn since I have evil tiny veins in my arm and low blood pressure in spite of having a salt lick at my desk. They've always been like this and I usually have to hope that the nurse won't resort to the veins in my hand which are much easier to tap, but much more painful. It tends to keep the vampires at bay but now I look like a hardcore heroin shooter with bruises and holes.

The interesting part about the urine sample drug screen is that everyone on the management/HR foodchain at work not only asked me multiple times if it was acceptable, but the nurse today even seemed apologetic. It's SOP in the US for most jobs involving computers, root and responsibility, so it didn't register on my radar at all. I was just grumpy about having to be within 100 feet of a medical office, especially when hungry, needing to pee and lacking enough coffee to make me vaguely human. I'm told the test isn't that common here yet, but it was rather curious to see how involved in the process you are made to be from watching the sample be prepared for transport, labelled, numbered and sealed in the packet destined for the lab and, if I understood correctly, I will also have to personally deliver the results of the analysis to HR. In the US, you pee in the cup and cruise on down the road never to hear of it again or so you hope.

While I was chatting with the pokémon hunting for a vein I noticed that among the vials, usually colour coded and labelled with an acronym, was an HIV screen. I've worked with human liver cells before and had regular HIV and HEP A/B screens fairly regularly so it didn't really bother me, but I thought it was an interesting contrast where the drug test is seen as an intrusion of privacy but the unannounced HIV screen was not. The US is the complete opposite as HIV screens are an extremely sensitive issue, voluntary and often anonymous. I think the blood tests are part of an overall full medical examination that I'm rather glad to have since it has been a really long time since I've had a physical and now that I'm getting older, maybe it's not such a bad idea to visit a doctor once in a while.

permalink Ω 17 December 2004, Helsinki

Ten Years and Fifteen Bucks

« Pigs are pigs all the world over. »

Happy 40th Conrad and 30-*mumble* JJ! I think we have all earned the joy of good single malts and reading pandering crap like this knowing we're too old for the target market. James Earl Jones might have been cool, but RMS? Paging Brad Kuhn, paging Brad Kuhn....:) 'Tis a pity I gave up such ancient technology as the answering machine years ago.

When I came home tonight there was a big package from my mother who sent a few gifts, a few bags of dried cranberries and load of mail from the last few months which mostly consisted of quarterly retirement fund reports noting how much money they've lost this quarter and a slew of credit card offers. In contrast, the banks in Finland will mostly tell you to piss off if you want a MasterCard unless you have a job, even with a decent amount of money in the bank and no debt, and will give you a low line of credit and make you pay an annual fee. Of course, there's nowhere near the problem of personal debt here either.

After chopping up most of those I found an envelope from the City of St. Louis which struck me as odd since I've not lived there in almost a decade. I opened it and much to my amazement I found a harsh letter for a 10 year-old $15 parking ticket. Yes, TEN YEARS. Jesus christ in a merry widow with a cat 'o nines, even criminals enjoy a shorter statute of limitations on far worse crimes than being busted by the meter nazis. Fifteen whole dollars, which is something like 5 euro these days, induced them to send a threatening letter of doom.

Our records indicate that parking tickets issued to a vehicle registered in your name are delinquent. Your failure to satisfy this matter immediately will result in the forwarding of this debt to a national collection agency and may result in additional collection fees equal to 20 percent of the amount due. [emphasis theirs]

Holy shit, I'm in for a whole $15 and the $3 for collection. I'll bet Trump never got a lame letter like this when he was in the hole for a few billion bucks and I'm getting busted for a lousy $15?! The only thing worse than the US Postmaster on your ass is the parking ticket collective, even the parking nazis in Helsinki have an Orwellian logo to remind you that there is no escape from the everseeing eye of the "Time Expired" vultures. Why can't they just send me a letter that says something like that they're sorry that it took them 10 years to notice that I have one whole parking ticket outstanding and that they'd like me to pay up instead of the dramatic language of doom? I doubt that Finland would extradite me for a parking ticket back home, but I wonder if the US Customs guys would bust me if I ever reenter the US and send me to Gitmo as a parking terrorista. Who knew living on the edge could be so easy and so dreadfully dull at the same time?

Speaking of pigs, I found out about kinkkubingo [ham bingo] today at work. Bingo makes me think of old ladies [sorry mom] in church basements obsessing on their cards to win pocket money. Ham bingo is, apparently, a Christmas tradition of bingo or a raffle for a Christmas ham. I say 'apparently' as Google doesn't turn up much and my close Finnish girlfriend upon whom I rely to keep me informed on such important bits of cultural ephemera had never heard of it. DTM has a Kalkunnabingo [turkey bingo] every Sunday with Miss Bitch but, being a former fag hag supreme, I get a little suspicious when gay clubs start raffling off meat. :) It sounds like a bit of harmless holiday fun and might even be combined with a drinking game for pikkujoulu entertainment.

And, just in time for Christmas tree trimming, the paper lomo that you can cut out, glue together and enjoy. The Lomo people also have a cute advent calendar, too. Maybe I'll send one of the paper lomos to the parking crusaders with the pysäköinninvalvonta eyeball glued onto the front of it for grins.

permalink Ω 16 December 2004, Helsinki

A Desert Christmas

« Yölyhdyt [Night Lanterns] by Liisa Kyrönseppä in the Forces of Light installation in Plague Park. »

Today at lunchtime I looked outside and gaped since it appeared like it was almost night before noon. I thought we had escaped November but, perhaps not. I noticed a light therapy lamp in the coffee lounge and had to resist the desire to go press my eyeballs directly onto the bulb. My backpack still contains my sunglasses as if I'll need them for another 5 months or so. Always prepared for solar radiation, every fleeting moment of it. :)

Since we had to cancel our Feb/March travel plans due to the puppy coming later than expected Jarkko, in a fit of desperation after finding all the tours booked between now and when the puppy arrives in January, found a trip at one of the last minute cancelation agencies in a warm, arid place during the holidays. It's funny how back in my 20s I travelled all over on a whim and didn't think anything of it and these days I am less enthusiastic about seeing the world. It bothers me that I have become so jaded in my advancing age. It is that age old equation of Money | Time | Energy/Enthusiasm - pick any two. I retain the curiosity but it is tempered by my cynicism. I had to check to see if I'd need a visa to enter the country and if anyone ever read the US State Department's consular information sheets on various countries, noone would ever leave US airspace. They do make for amusing reading for those of us who live outside the US. Treat yourself to reading the language of fear, e.g. Finland;

SAFETY AND SECURITY : Finland remains largely free of terrorist incidents....

Largely free? What is that supposed to mean? No bombs but the lihakukko is a very dangerous weapon in the Karelian terrorist regime? Watch out for the drunks and their puukkos at the tram stops? There is also a section about how few cops there are in relation to the overall population. I suppose that living in a police state would make you uncomfortable visiting a place that doesn't have guys in fatigues and AK-47's hanging out in airports and on street corners. We're going to a place where we are warned that there is a lot of 'soccer-inspired violence' and evangelical christians are given a quick ride to the airport. :)

permalink Ω 15 December 2004, Helsinki

Tuomaan markkinat 2004

« Warm glögi at the St. Thomas Market which, judging by the price, is lacking vodka. A few pictures from Tuomaan markkinat 2004. »

Christmas markets are always a lot of fun if only to look around and eat food that could harden the arteries of the most healthy person on the planet. The novelty from last year had already worn off and many of the same vendors returned this year, but there is always something you either missed or see in a different way no matter how many times you visit. The afternoon was very grey and gloomy and the market was quite crowded which made for a challenge to get a coherent set of photographs. It's as if November got pissed off over the cold weather and the snow and has taken over in December so we have warm, foggy, gloomy days instead of cold, crisp, snowy days as we should.

The highlight of the afternoon had to be the Santarchists careening through the market and surrounding the 'real' santa while singing and drinking beer. :) The theme of most of the products in the market tend to be practical items of clothing or housewares. I'm not really sure if this is aimed more at tourists or at the locals since some of the products are labelled with "Finland" as souvenirs. In the US Christmas markets I've been to, the offerings tend to be a lot more impractical, aside from the food, with lots of gaudy holiday trimmings for the home.

The polenta dogs were back this year and I really wish they'd be available at the grillis for late night snacks. Jarkko bought a kääretorttu, something that looks like a Hostess Hoho only without the "chocolate" coating, filled with buttercreme, and is the size of a yule log. It could kill a diabetic if they stood too close to it, not to mention the borderline heart cases on a low cholesterol diet. We also got a lihakukko, a meat variation of the fish varieties of the rye crust enveloped lard and meat loaf which is then baked. It's delicious in a i-can-feel-my-arteries-hardening-while-i-chew kind of way. :) Mmmmm....

permalink Ω 13 December 2004, Helsinki

Shuffle

« I've always wanted a discoball for the livingroom.... »

My muscles still ache from the sähly game on Thursday but sleeping late did wonders for restoring my cognitive abilities somewhat after a week of feeling rather dull. I need to stock up on ben gay and start getting to bed before 1am. We found out on on Friday that we won't be bringing the new puppy home until the 16th of January instead of the 2nd as we had originally hoped due to the import restrictions. *sigh* The timing wrecks our holiday in Sri Lanka that was scheduled for March since it would be too soon to leave the puppy with a sitter so I guess we'll buy one of those sun lamps and pretend we're somewhere tropical instead.

I'm still getting more email from freaks in the US, the best quote from them this week was "How would you like it if we made fun of your country, tried to influence your elections? If you hate it, we love it. That is why Bush got re-elected." which amused me considering that the person couldn't have possibly read much before invading my inbox. I just can't figure out why people are doing this and I'm wondering if there are some church groups or something who are told to search the web for people who voted for Kerry and harass them since the email often comes in bunches. Bizarre.

Random linkage: Photomo's Egypt series is really well done and Finnish Nature Photos for the look of Finland outside the cities.

Random thought: The bar known as Con Hombres has a sign outside that says that it's a gay bar. Aside from the name, the beefcake logo and the rainbow to drop the big hint, is the sign really necessary? I wonder if some of the clientele complained that it wasn't obvious enough or something. Perhaps piping showtunes through speakers on the sidewalk would be a more subtle calling card. :)

Janne mentioned a meme earlier in the week that, given my sleepy daze from the week, entertained me last night a lot longer than it should have. The idea was to set iTunes on shuffle and pick the first 10 songs it played. I have a lot weirder mix of musical genres than I had previously thought.

• Jucundare jugiter - Lumen Valo
• Raised Up Family - James Taylor
• Wait for the Magic - Al Jarreau
• Voçê Vai Ver - Joao Gilberto
• You'll Have Time - William Shatner
• Wasted Time - The Eagles
• This House is Empty Now - Elvis Costello and Burt Bacharach
• Let's Do It (Let's Fall in Love) - Louis Armstrong
• Bananeira - Bebel Gilberto
• Harry Flowers - William Orbit
• It's Only Love That Gets You Through - Sade
• 1975 - Paul Oakenfold
• Missing - Everything But the Girl
• Destiny - Zero 7
• Night Life in Twin Peaks - Angelo Badalamenti
• Halcyon + On + On - Orbital
• I Grieve - Peter Gabriel
• Not Tonight - Al Green
• I'm Not in Love - 10cc
• Soon I'll Be Loving You Again - Marvin Gaye
• You'll Be Dead Soon - Ernie Cline
• I've Seen All Good People - Yes
• Blue in Green - Miles Davis
• Walking the Night - The Style Council
• Spybreak! - Propellerheads
• The Nearness of You - Norah Jones
• 8-3-1 - Lisa Stansfield
• Shout - Tears for Fears
• Only You - Yazoo

permalink Ω 12 December 2004, Helsinki

Breathing hard with a big stick

« Santa visits Tallinn and longs for the days when kids wished for world peace instead of new computers. A collection of photos taken with the Lomo, Leica and the Horizon panoramic camera in Tallinn 2 weeks ago. »

Since the Christmas musak and tchotchkes begins sometime in October it would be Christmas every 5.5 days, or thereabouts, if it was spread throughout the year. I'm not sure if a pikkupikkujoulu once a week would be preferable to the 2.5 month binge on holiday cheer the world seems to go nuts over, but it might be more relaxing. Christmas is just too damn manic in a manic time of year. It's no wonder it drives people to drink.

I might also register my disdain for the plastic tree the resident association put up in the common area this year. Granted, last year it crapped needles everywhere but that might have been due to putting it up over a month before Christmas next to the radiator and never watering it. Plastic trees just bring out the grinch in me.

I managed to survive my first game of sähly [pronounced SAH-loo with a short a and breathy h.], a.k.a. Finnish floorball. As a former Catholic school girl who was once a vicious player of field hockey, a game where 11 repressed teenage girls in skirts entertain their homicidal urges by running around with hardwood mallets while chasing a billiard ball and whacking each other in the legs, I was somewhat disappointed by how tame the game seemed. :) Not one coworker tried to shatter my kneecap with the lightweight plastic stick the game is played with. Of course, I'm about 20 years out of shape for competitive sports so it's a good thing that we weren't armed or dangerous. The guys at Nokia House in Boston had a team, but they took it seriously and never invited me to play which, judging how much like an oaf I was this evening, was likely a wise choice on their part. Regardless, it was a lot more fun than I thought it would be and I'll have to go find a good stick of my own to play with sometime soon. Even being a n00b, I still didn't look quite so, uh, goofy as the Arkéomon which seems to be the, just guessing here, the sähly team for the archeology department at U of H. Well, ok, I probably did only I didn't have to wear the suit. :)

permalink Ω 9 December 2004, Helsinki

Some things are too hard to describe

« M.A. Numminen. Imagine Tom Waits if he had done beat poetry, children's songs, looked vaguely like Colonel Sanders and spoke Finnish. »

We celebrated the Finnish Independence Day on Monday by going to a concert with friends. Neither they nor Jarkko could find the words to explain M.A. Numminen and, frankly, the description above is about as close as I can come to the truth. :) Any guy who can sing a song called "Talvisota [Winter War] Rock" with lyrics like "Go, Stalin, Go!" has a sense of irreverent humour I can enjoy. If only he would have had a smoke in one hand and a whisky in the other it would have completed the image. The performance was terrific and his band really knew how to swing, too. The second act was Matti Servo who I can try to describe as The Beach Boys get a Wurlitzer and go Las Vegas Lounge...in Finnish. :) It was a real Finnish cultural experience. I felt like a freak at work though when I mentioned how much fun I had at the show and either got a blank stare or a half-joking description of Numminen sounding like a rooster. Most great cultural icons and even not so great ones tend to generate strong like or dislike, don't they? :)

I also have to admit that I went to see the new Bridget Jones movie over the weekend and enjoyed it. :) The movie was a lot better than the book and Renée Zellweger really brings Bridget to life. I see so much of my own life in hers; the dinners with the smug marrieds when I was single, the talent for always saying too much or the wrong thing, feeling slightly pudgy, and otherwise feeling like an idiot or a 3-headed alien most of the time. Of course, there were two hours in which to enjoy Colin Firth who I wish someday would get a role that would really challenge his acting skill as well as light up the screen with a smile now and then.

permalink Ω 8 December 2004, Helsinki

Arriba! Arriba! Sofa Sofa!

« Petteri "isä" Suomalainen and Jere "poika" Alenius disguised as Cheech and Chong selling sofas in Finland. »

Being an expat, sometimes it is not the differences rather the similarities between your new home and the old that are the most curious. Behold the sombrero dudes above who were featured in an article in today's Helsingin Sanomat about their weird commercials ranging from Mexicans to Sherlock Holmes and Watson to genies on a magic carpet. About 30 years ago, there were 2 Jewish appliance salesmen in St. Louis, the Slyman Brothers, who starred in their own disturbingly cheezy commericals of them sitting on top of the arch and waving. They were joined by Steve Mizerany who would run into trees while on roller skates or dress like a boozing pervy Santa for the annual "Christmas in July" sales. Two guys offering debt consolidation services also had some really funny cave men commercials with boobalicious cave girls sitting on their laps. The heiress of these pioneers is Becky the "Queen of Carpet", a rather corpulent lady in a shiny satin gown and tiara flying around the arch on a carpet.

These guys are a touch of home, even if it is freaky to turn on the TV late at night, suddenly see two Finns dressed as Speedy Gonzalez and wonder if I'm hallucinating. The continuity director forgot to send them somewhere for a tan as they are the most glaringly white Mexicans I've ever seen. :) They mention in the article that commercials that don't get talked about are bad/not as effective and, well, I've not been able to blot out the Slyman Brothers after 30 years in spite of the electric shock therapy so I would have to agree. I hope they try dressing up as Vikings sometime soon as that would be really amusing and show a sense of humour a little closer to home. :)

permalink Ω 5 December 2004, Helsinki

Keeping up with Finnish or Buffer Overflow

« Sticker art girl with a long neck. »

I managed to survive the first week at work. There is always a period of feeling awkward and exposed when you first start working somewhere as you get to know the people you work with and find your way into the daily routine. The work is very familiar even though I'm a bit rusty in places and there are products in use that I've not worked with before. I have some large datacenter experience that might be helpful as well. The most challenging part of the job is, and will likely continue to be for a while, keeping up with conversations and meetings in Finnish. I understand quite a lot, but I have to concentrate on everything that is said. My vocabulary isn't all that great, but even if I only get half the words, context will usually help me figure out the rest. It's like working a cryptogram in real-time. My coworkers have been very nice in speaking Finnish to me even though I'm sure they find my replying in English somewhat annoying and, hopefully, I'll get over my self-consciousness about speaking Finnish sometime soon. Most of the people speak English very well which makes it too easy at times to be lazy. I keep hoping I have a Thirteenth Warrior experience and just start speaking it at some point and quip "I listened" when asked how I learned it. One person has such a perfect American accent that had he not said he was Finnish, I would have pegged him as being from somewhere in the Midwest. I hate that when people who aren't from the US have a better American accent than I do. :)

The atmosphere of the office reminds me so much of WU and BBN that I feel pretty much at home already. Everyone is some sort of academic who found their way into computing. I had to stand up and introduce myself at a meeting on my first day where I was told I had to describe my hobbies lest I be asked about them repeatedly. It seemed a little odd until I started to figure out that people really do value their hobbies and are interested in yours as well. I was really excited to meet a coworker who is involved with a student photography club and lab since I didn't want to build my own darkroom with an enlarger or buy one of the new photo printers since they generally suck at B&W printing. I'm also going to try and play sähly, Finnish floorball, with the company team once a week. I'd better look up the word for "incoming!" before hitting the arena. :)

Perhaps one of the most obvious differences between working in the US and here is the general approach to the amount of time you spend in the office. At BBN, 80 hours wasn't an unusual week and if you were on call, 100 or more. Here, people go home at a reasonable hour and I've yet to notice anyone sleeping under their desk. You're even expected to take your holiday time. What a novel concept! I had 5 or 6 weeks of holiday time per year when I left WU, but I never really had the chance to take it so that I had a giant check for 16 weeks of accrued holiday time along with my last paycheck. Holiday time works a little different here as you accrue time much like you do in the US, but you need 6 days of holiday time to take a week off from work. I am told this is a vestige from the 60s or thereabouts when the workweek was 6 days rather than 5. The employee manual also had some interesting holiday tidbits such as a day per annum for moving house and if your 50th or 60th birthday falls on a weekday you get the day off. I have a few years to go before that happens. :)

And, the breeders have supplied us with 2 more pictures of puppy cuteness. :)

permalink Ω 4 December 2004, Helsinki

Be careful what you wish for...

« Valotalo by Jouko Kärkkäinen in the Forces of Light show in Plague Park. »

So, in one of those cases of 'be careful what you wish for', I have joined the ranks of those who wake up in the darkness and find their way to an office somewhere in the metropolis. It always sucks being the new person having to ask where the coffee, bathroom and coke machine are as well as having that dazed and glazed look as you're trying to remember the names of everyone you were introduced to. There is no shortage of stuff to do so I doubt I'll be bored. I'll have to try to keep from inflicting pictures of puppy cuteness on everyone, too. :)

On one of the metalink sites yesterday morning I noticed modern pooch which is a new doggie blog that could be a bit of light entertainment. On the side of not so light entertainment there is finland for thought [or lack thereof], the new blog by the inimitable "Mr. X", the American Libertarian who, unsurprisingly, finds plenty to gripe about in Finland. I encourage the Finns to abuse his lack of clue with enthusiasm. :)

permalink Ω 1 December 2004, Helsinki