Sunday picture

A photography walk in the crisp, frosty, sunny -17 C followed by 40 minutes of water running and Turkish steam sauna = VERY good feeling!

Here is a set of winter wonderland pictures: LINK. 

Then - Now

A FEW DAYS AGO:

Can you imagine the heat and brightness of the summer sun?

Can you imagine the light sparkling on the waves?

Can you imagine the warm sand under the toes?

Can you imagine the happy screams of children as they run into the waves?

Can you imagine sitting on the beach after a swim, letting the sun dry you up - without it getting cold?

Can you imagine the ice creams and hot dogs bought at the beach kiosk?

Can you imagine it?

TODAY:

Everything is truly and properly frozen. -12 C, -17 C with wind chill. But actually I prefer it that way: winter is unavoidable, so better it be a proper winter like today than either freezing, snowless and dark or just barely above zero degrees, wet, snowless and dark. Those are the other two options for winter in Finland.

And when it got cold, the skies cleared. What a beautiful day. Cold and crisp but I didn't mind the cold at all. I was properly dressed!

November Asleep

Back to Helsinki, Finland for a little while. This was a couple of days ago. The snow and the blanket of clouds made everything appear almost monochrome. A desolate feeling but oddly beautiful at the same time. On days like this, you truly see the weariness of November. The sun might, just might, come out one of these days - but only if the temperature falls below -10 C I think. Under seven hours of daylight now: the sun rises at 8.40 and sets at 3.30 pm - and a month to go until winter solstice still.

Today I've spent indoors, nursing a mild cold - but I don't mind: nasty wind and snowdrift outside. I wonder if this winter will be the same as last year? I think there was still some snow left from last year at the city snow dumps when new snow started to fall this past week. This year, for once, I managed to get moderately priced flights for the Christmas visit to my parents. Mainly it's so I don't have to sit in the train for hours, but who knows, maybe it'll turn out to be wise otherwise: last year, what with the snow and cold, the state railways had terrible trouble!

I might just end up back in the north otherwise than just for Christmas, too: my old university is looking for applicants for a three-year research post in a field that fits my research like a glove, the study of cultural interaction. I have slightly mixed feelings about it because I love Helsinki so much, but I will definitely apply because I like my old university and more importantly it would be a tremendous opportunity, not to mention a merit for the CV. The money would allow me to get back to Helsinki on weekends and holidays, too. So fingers crossed.

The sun came out briefly...

It's quite amazing how light changes the appearance of things. In a certain light the stern forms of the big concrete blocks acquire a sort of impressive heftiness. The building on the left here has an almost sculpture-like quality.

Tallinn 2

The Finns and Estonians may be language relatives, but one of the things that is very different between the two countries is that in Estonia looking feminine and beautiful is much more important. I suppose these hairdresser's shops are one reflection of this. These modest-looking hairdressers are everywhere in Lasnamäe. Most of the ones I've seen are like this: housed in the ground floor of the apartment blocks, with just the 'hairdresser' sign out front and opening times on the door; no windows with ads for the big hair product brands or photos of hair models. The long-time Estonian resident that I mentioned in the previous post said in one of his blogs that shops like this in Lasnamäe haven't changed much in the 20 years since the country's independence. I've never visited in any of them but from the outside I like them. They look homely in all their modesty.

And here, back to a general view, and from personal to impersonal in a way. I get a kind of a feeling of foreignness and of distance with the scale and weight of these large concrete blocks. An outsider's view I'm sure.


This intentionally edited dark and sombre. It wasn't much more cheerful in colour, though. I am aware of the fact that taking sombre pictures of a place like this runs the risk of stereotyping. The residents may not have the same view as this is their home, and perhaps a photographer should seek things that run counter to (of?) the common view of places like this as depressing. But I can't help an outsider's fascination with a place the like of which doesn't exist in my own country.

Tallinn

I had booked my trip to Tallinn at the only Finnish company operating on the route, Eckerö Line. That was unfortunately a mistake: it may have been partly due to the weekend, but the ship was crowded and cramped, with very few seats - no opportunity to sit in the cafe or restaurant either, due to the crowdedness. It was difficult to find a peaceful spot: if I'd sit leaning on a wall, I'd have people jumping over my legs. On the way back I especially failed in my quest for a peaceful spot: on one occasion I had a drunken bozo - French I think - disturbing my reading with a "Hello! How ya doing??". At another occasion I was forced to listen to an older lady who was swigging from her bottle of vodka at a steady pace going on an on very loudly about how marvellously she can get along with all sorts because when her husband was alive she met all kinds of fine people. With the trip taking 3 hours in one direction, it was very tiresome. This is clearly a ferry company where the idea is to get people spend as much money as possible on board: book cabins, drink and eat at the restaurants, and shop at tax free. Next time I'll take one of the Estonian ferries, Tallink or Linda Line.

In contrast, the hotel was absolutely superb and I'll certainly book it the next time I visit. Hotel City Portus is right at the port, by one of the terminals. Fantastic value for money (without my package a single room would have cost 44 euros): wonderful service and breakfast; good rooms with excellent shower. You could even book the sauna at their top floor. I also loved the interior design which was very retro pop: red, yellow, orange, white and brown, with a poster of Madonna on the wall.

As soon as I had reached Tallinn at midday and got my room, I proceeded to buy a 24 hour ticket for the public transport (a mere 4,5 euros) and headed to Lasnamäe. The cloudy weather indeed offered a suitably different mood compared to the bright days of the summer:

Here Laagna tee, the asphalt river which runs all through the area. I read somewhere that a local train line was planned to be built to run in between the lanes but like so many other things here, it never materialized. I must say, though, that I would love to visit the area on a foggy day! Those huge concrete blocks would look fantastic enclosed in mist, I'm sure.

This is my favourite of the things I found on saturday:

Very sweet and very cool I think. :-)

I debated whether or not to stay in Lasnamäe until after dark but decided against it: for one thing the wind was chilly, but more importantly it's not necessarily a good idea to wander around there alone after dark.

It was an early night for me, because in the previous night I had in vain to get to sleep early so that I'd have enough sleep by the time I had to get up at 6 am. This time, I slept like a log and was up for breakfast at the 8 am starting time, so as to maximize time. I went back to Lasnamäe for a while, then strolled around in central Tallinn for a bit, until it was time to catch the 4 pm ferry.

Whilst waiting I had the occasion to be "proud" of Finnish Tallinn travellers again: most of the people I saw with alcohol purchases had cartloads of Finnish beer, cider and long drink which are exported to Estonia and then the Finns go buy it back. Sitting beside me in the terminal was a group of 20+ girls with similar cartloads. They were talking about how incredibly drunk they'd been the previous night and how "incredibly fucking sick" they now feel. Where is the romance of travelling in that, I ask? This is an example of why Finnish tourists don't have a good reputation in Tallin. I suppose it has got a bit better at least. I came across a blog of a Canadian man who had lived in Estonia for years and years. In one of his posts he said that 10 years ago, if you went to the Old Town, you would come across a drunk Finn at every corner. And it's not the only reference I've seen!

The ferry company and the annoying Finnish tourists notwithstanding, I again enjoyed my time in Tallinn tremendously. Next time I better book two nights, however: in summertime one night would be enough but with the sun now setting at 4 pm there just isn't enough time.

More pictures later.

The sea awaits

On the evening of wednesday, after I'd got my camera back, I went to the seaside. There is something at the same time frightening and extremely beautiful in the dark, restless sea.

The sea is also otherwise relevant here, as I decided to book a little weekend trip to Tallinn. I'll be going tomorrow, staying overnight and coming back on sunday. 68 euros for the ferry + hotel is not bad. My hotel is also very handily located right by the port terminal. Judging by reviews it's excellent value, although it being weekend, I'm hoping not many Finnish drunken booze tourists will be staying there. They're predicting cloudy weather, so I'm probably going to go to Lasnamäe to see if those endless concrete blocks look different than in the summer sun.

With Canon you can!

No, I haven't become employed at Canon. I do have a good reason to agree with their slogan so far, though: Canon paid for the repair and I got the camera back fixed today, after just two days! Granted, the new camera was tempting, but my old one will do just fine until such time in the future that I can invest in one of the high-range cameras. :-)

And now, let there be light:

I posted this last year, but personally I feel it's worth posting again since there isn't much of it around at this time of the year. Light, that is. Although, this was in November, so maybe there'll be a day like that again this month! Real King Arthur tales, Lady of the Lake stuff it was.

Death of a Camera

 A couple of the more experimental pictures that I was taking lately.

Now it's bye bye camera: my camera broke on friday. It looks likely that it's a shutter problem, and replacing the shutter costs 300-400 euros - if I can't get it done under warranty. The unfortunate thing is that the warranty expired a year ago. Consumer rights leave me a bit of leeway: it might be possible to get the job done under warranty if the shutter has died much sooner than what the manufacturer says should be for this particular camera. At an estimate I have taken about 20 000-25 000 pictures, whereas the manufacturer gives 50 000 or 100 000 (depending on the source) as the life expectancy.

To find out if I have a chance at this, I have sent email to the repair firm asking them to give some estimate (also on how long the repair would take). I have also sent a message to my insurance company to find out how much the own risk amount would be in this case. 

If I can't get the repair under warranty and if the own risk amount is considerable, I need to decide whether to have the repair done all the same or to scrape the money together for a new camera. At this stage of my photography I suppose it would be sensible to upgrade. That would be about a 700 euro investment. I need to do one or the other, as I can't imagine not having a camera. You could actually say that taking photographs is part of who I am.

Dark!

Yes, it gets dark early: the sun sets at 4.30pm. It would be 5.30pm except last week saw the end of Daylight Saving time. Darktime depression, here it comes... No, I don't get it (although many do, apparently). And it's not quite as dark as this in Helsinki. The picture was taken in Suomenlinna where the lighting is not so glaring and blaring. All the firepower that's put into streetlights (not to mention neon signs and everything)... mustn't let the bogeyman in from the dark! 

I would like to think that I'm not afraid of the dark, and logically I'm not. I know that usually (in Helsinki at least) there are no people with evil intentions behind every tree, hiding in the dark. There are no bogeymen, monsters or ghosts. And yet... If I had to walk a longer, unlit stretch, I'd rather not linger. It's just... well, it's just so dark. I wonder if there is anyone in the glaringly lit cities - it's never really dark in the city - who feels truly comfortable in the dark? Were people before the invention of electric light more comfortable with the dark, I wonder? Are the native people in, say, the Amazon region comfortable with the dark? What I'm getting at: did all the technological advancement that pushed back the darkness with bright, bright lights bring the fear of the dark? Or is it some kind of an innate, primal fear that is perhaps biological, as humans do not have a sharp sense of smell or hearing or cat's whiskers to easily navigate in the dark without the help of eyes?

Anyway, it doesn't get any darker than in November, before the snow comes. So far I'm enjoying the new photographic opportunities that the dark (again) brings, but I'm sure I'll be hoping for the snow to come soon.

Quite active I've been: got back to swimming (or rather water running which I prefer); enjoying experimenting with the camera (sort of deconstructive gimmickry). I was going to not do anything work-wise for a while, since I sent off that article recently. But I already got an idea for a new article, so what can I do?

Some supremely enjoyable art experiences too lately.

The museum of contemporary art now has the exhibition of the candidates for the annual Ars Fennica award, and some of the works stunned me. I was particularly blown away by the video/programming work of the Scottish-born, Finland-based artist Charles Sandison, called "Words as the image of the world". This picture from an earlier exhibition gives an idea of it: a room with a mirror floor, with innumerable words (I read that it's the whole of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica) flowing in changing streams and formations on the ceiling and the walls, reflected in the floor. It felt like all of the nearly six billion people on this planet had been brought together in one space, all the chaos, all the languages, all the cultures. The immensity of it was almost overwhelming.

Calmer, but equally beautiful: Beethoven's piano sonata no. 3 in C: sparkling, translucent pearls of joy on the piano keys.