The story thus far...
Finland is not a communist satellite, it is a part of western Europe and shares its prosperity. The shops are jammed full of beefsteaks and LP records, frozen food and TV sets.
Helsinki is a well-ordered provincial town where it never ceases to be winter. It smells of wood-sap and oil-heating, like a village shop. Fancy restaurants put smoked reindeer tongue on the menu next to the tournedos rossini and pretend that they have come to terms with the endless lakes and forests that are buried silent and deep out there under the snow and ice. But Helsinki is just the appendix of Finland, an urban afterthought where half a million people try to forget that thousand upon thousand square miles of desolation and Arctic wasteland begin just a bus stop away.
*********
Or so says Len Deighton in "Billion-Dollar Brain".
It is actually one of those quiet cities, and if one of the professors at the lab is to be believed, Finland is the most law-abiding country in Europe, with the kind of atmosphere that readily lends itself to a very boring life.
Remarkably well-ordered though, the "well ordered provincial town" is. From people waiting at zebra crossings till the pedestrian light turns green to using their bus cards to pay for their ride, with little or no supervision. In my apartment in KannelMaki, you hardly get the feeling that you are in the capital city of the country that gave the sauna and Nokia to the world. Yet, it takes just a 10 minute train journey to the city centre in one of the trains from the station 30 metres away from my place to realize that the hub is elsewhere. This place is alive.
With Stockmann, purportedly one of the largest department stores in Europe, choc-a-bloc with people to Big Mac adorned by the PYT customers, to the Versace showrooms, it seems just the place to take a beautiful marathon runner for a date.
But we shall reserve that for another post.
ABout 10 kms away from KannelMaki is another area called Otaniemi, an outrageous € 3.10 by bus no 512A or a less outrageous free ride by bicycle, which houses the sprawling campus of the Helsinki University of technology or the TKK(TeKoKo, as it is called here). Picture perfect lawns with sunbathing students lead you onto the TML, the lab where I shall be spending the next two months. The first thing that greets you on entry is a very comfortable rise in temperature from the bone chilling winds that seem to blow ceaselessly.
The second thing that greets you is the aroma of coffee, one of my favourites, perhaps second only to a very strange brand of perfumes that every Finnish woman seems to use without fail, one that leaves the air redolent and wafts temptingly for some time. In through another door, a couple of feet to the left is the room I share with Anton Alstes and Bing Zhou, and for the majority of the time have to myself,
since the other two dont turn up all that often.
A Linux PC that performs quite well with the occasional temperamental tantrum that is unique to Linus Torvalds' creation, a coffee room for the lab alone and a set of very amiable professors and Masters and PhD students make the day quite peaceful.
Lunch with the continental food at the cafeteria is usually quite nice, with the salmon, seita ( a Finnish fish), chicken stew, et al having been quite delicious, with only the beef stroganoff being a little off-key for me. A well ordered salad adds the vitamin content, I presume, and there are plenty of varieties of bread to go with it. Finns, I think, have rice and boiled potatoes as omnipresent parts of their meal, and if I have any space left, they fill it.
**********
Back at the apartment, though, its the spanish armada that lights up the nightlife of a town where the sun sets around 11pm and rises by 3 am!!! With almost half the population of KannelMaki being from Spain, you can trust them to party every night, be it a birthday or a farewell. And while its a little difficult getting your message across, a couple of tries usually suffice.
Sangria, dont know if i spelt that right, is apparently, a typically spanish drink with wine, vodka, and fruits. QUite the best I have had so far. The French, it seems, dont like it too much, and they bring along their own wine, seasoned from the vineyards of Rennes. Hence, I am getting to be quite the connoisseur in these matters, and learning bits and pieces of the languages as well.
**********
Friday's lunch was a laboratory trip to an Indian Restaurant, where we all feasted on murgi and gosht. All very well, and it was the lunch where I managed to get hold of a digicam as well temporarily, for a couple of weeks till I can buy my own. Will upload photos tomorrow of the lunch. They be on the university's internal server.
Friday night was a farewell party for Onza, again spelling i know nothing about, guy from the Czech Republic. And was followed on Saturday by one for 3 spanish guys(2 guys and a gal, that is).
Photos coming up in a few days, soon as i get hold of a USB cord.
Helsinki is a well-ordered provincial town where it never ceases to be winter. It smells of wood-sap and oil-heating, like a village shop. Fancy restaurants put smoked reindeer tongue on the menu next to the tournedos rossini and pretend that they have come to terms with the endless lakes and forests that are buried silent and deep out there under the snow and ice. But Helsinki is just the appendix of Finland, an urban afterthought where half a million people try to forget that thousand upon thousand square miles of desolation and Arctic wasteland begin just a bus stop away.
*********
Or so says Len Deighton in "Billion-Dollar Brain".
It is actually one of those quiet cities, and if one of the professors at the lab is to be believed, Finland is the most law-abiding country in Europe, with the kind of atmosphere that readily lends itself to a very boring life.
Remarkably well-ordered though, the "well ordered provincial town" is. From people waiting at zebra crossings till the pedestrian light turns green to using their bus cards to pay for their ride, with little or no supervision. In my apartment in KannelMaki, you hardly get the feeling that you are in the capital city of the country that gave the sauna and Nokia to the world. Yet, it takes just a 10 minute train journey to the city centre in one of the trains from the station 30 metres away from my place to realize that the hub is elsewhere. This place is alive.
With Stockmann, purportedly one of the largest department stores in Europe, choc-a-bloc with people to Big Mac adorned by the PYT customers, to the Versace showrooms, it seems just the place to take a beautiful marathon runner for a date.
But we shall reserve that for another post.
ABout 10 kms away from KannelMaki is another area called Otaniemi, an outrageous € 3.10 by bus no 512A or a less outrageous free ride by bicycle, which houses the sprawling campus of the Helsinki University of technology or the TKK(TeKoKo, as it is called here). Picture perfect lawns with sunbathing students lead you onto the TML, the lab where I shall be spending the next two months. The first thing that greets you on entry is a very comfortable rise in temperature from the bone chilling winds that seem to blow ceaselessly.
The second thing that greets you is the aroma of coffee, one of my favourites, perhaps second only to a very strange brand of perfumes that every Finnish woman seems to use without fail, one that leaves the air redolent and wafts temptingly for some time. In through another door, a couple of feet to the left is the room I share with Anton Alstes and Bing Zhou, and for the majority of the time have to myself,
since the other two dont turn up all that often.
A Linux PC that performs quite well with the occasional temperamental tantrum that is unique to Linus Torvalds' creation, a coffee room for the lab alone and a set of very amiable professors and Masters and PhD students make the day quite peaceful.
Lunch with the continental food at the cafeteria is usually quite nice, with the salmon, seita ( a Finnish fish), chicken stew, et al having been quite delicious, with only the beef stroganoff being a little off-key for me. A well ordered salad adds the vitamin content, I presume, and there are plenty of varieties of bread to go with it. Finns, I think, have rice and boiled potatoes as omnipresent parts of their meal, and if I have any space left, they fill it.
**********
Back at the apartment, though, its the spanish armada that lights up the nightlife of a town where the sun sets around 11pm and rises by 3 am!!! With almost half the population of KannelMaki being from Spain, you can trust them to party every night, be it a birthday or a farewell. And while its a little difficult getting your message across, a couple of tries usually suffice.
Sangria, dont know if i spelt that right, is apparently, a typically spanish drink with wine, vodka, and fruits. QUite the best I have had so far. The French, it seems, dont like it too much, and they bring along their own wine, seasoned from the vineyards of Rennes. Hence, I am getting to be quite the connoisseur in these matters, and learning bits and pieces of the languages as well.
**********
Friday's lunch was a laboratory trip to an Indian Restaurant, where we all feasted on murgi and gosht. All very well, and it was the lunch where I managed to get hold of a digicam as well temporarily, for a couple of weeks till I can buy my own. Will upload photos tomorrow of the lunch. They be on the university's internal server.
Friday night was a farewell party for Onza, again spelling i know nothing about, guy from the Czech Republic. And was followed on Saturday by one for 3 spanish guys(2 guys and a gal, that is).
Photos coming up in a few days, soon as i get hold of a USB cord.
posted by Lancelot @ 7:34 PM
2 Comments:
At 2:52 AM,
Anonymous said…
hey..gr8 yaar....
sitting on my apartment-mate's comp who is not here....read all ur blogs tht u wrote after the hols began....gr8 to c such a wonderful description ....
my place is not big n I haven't seen ne big malls yet :(.... but the population of the fairer sex is well ...ahem.... i loved it wen they talk about "those" things in grp get-togethers..he he....
it happens only outside India....!!!!
carry on....
At 3:26 PM,
Rashmi Patel said…
keep posting. Don;t get to hear much from that part of the world. :)
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