Monthly Archives: November 2008
Mexico City book by David Lida
I read this book a few months ago and enjoyed it quite a bit. The video explains it quite nicely, doesn’t it?
Finnish weather
Life photo archive
I came accross this archive of Life magazine photos. I became a fan in my childhood since my parents had one or two books with pictures from the magazine (I was especially a fan of this one by Robert Capa).
I immediately made two searches: Mexico & Finland, naturally. Most pictures of Mexico are of the 60’s, around the time of the 1968 Olympics, whereas most pictures of Finland are of the 40’s, especially of the Winter War.
One of the images that impacted me the most, however, was of Viipuri, which back then looked just like any other Finnish city. I’ve been there a few years ago on my way to St. Petersburg, and let’s say that there have been a few changes after it became part of Russia.
Tampere, industrial city
A couple of good friends live in Tampere, and we visit them every once in a while. We were there just a few days ago, and enjoyed as usual.
Tampere is called the “Manchester of Finland” and pictures like this of downtown make it quite obvious. I didn’t know that the city, given its industrial past, has been an important part of Finnish history and site of key events in the Finnish Civil War.
Parikkala
We recently visited a friend who moved to a small town near the Russian border called Parikkala. It was great to see her and her family, but it made me realise more than ever that life is about the choices you make: I would never be able to live outside of Kehä III here in Finland, and that trip confirmed my view.
Nortec Collective in Stockholm
A few weeks ago we were fortunate enough to visit Stockholm, to finally see Nortec Collective live. Nedless to say, we jumped around like crazy and enjoyed the gig immensely, especially since instead of Banda samples they actually had live musicians backing them up (who played an encore of their own). We even ended up backstage with them after the gig, and naturally welcomed them to come to the Helsinki Festival whenever they could.
It was a very welcome pause, and it was nice to see that Stockholm still looks the same. An interesting note was that everybody spoke to me in Swedish (even though I had a tejana on most of the time), while that seldom happens in Finland with or without funny hats.
When the news hit you personally
Those who follow news about Mexico might know that on the same night Barack Obama was elected president of the United States, there was a very dramatic tragedy in Mexico City, as a small airplane carrying the secretary of the interior of the country crashed in the middle of the business district. The news was quite tragic, but that was it.
Then, I started hearing some more personal accounts. My brother-in-law works in the area, and the plane crashed 12 metres away from his office. He saw everything, and was quite shocked by the time he got home. Understandably, I was quite upset when I heard about it. Then I found out that a friend of mine was injured and is in hospital, and am frankly still in shock.
My prayers go to her and her family.