eirias | (no subject)

Today I sent an email to one of my favorite Finnish music groups, Ville Kangas and his band (well, OK, to be honest I only know 2 Finnish groups, but they're both great...). I mentioned that I'd seen them play about 3 years ago and asked whether there'd be any shows in Finland before I leave, in pidgin Finnish.

I got a nearly-immediate reply that indicated that this is the first fan letter they've gotten. They had a great gig THREE YEARS AGO, I remind you, and they've already released a second album. Man, these Finns are a little behind the curve on how to keep good musicians around. ;) Anyway, to my chagrin I learned that there are no upcoming gigs. Boo! BUT they said they'd keep me posted if there was ever a US tour. :)

Unfortunately, the similar email I sent to Värttinä has not yet been favored with a reply. But Värttinä are probably the most famous thing to come out of Finland besides Nokia*, so it's perhaps to be expected ;).

*OK, OK. And Linux. And IRC. How about "the most famous non-nerdy thing to come out of Finland"?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

so... they don't really qualify as "non-nerdy" then, do they?

Now I understand why I like Finland so very much.

Hah! Touché. :)

Have you ever been to Finland? It's really pretty, in a kinda spartan way. Tall, narrow trees, rocky hills, bazillions of lakes. Fields now and then.

Also, Helsinki has this network of steam tunnels under the city, purportedly established during or shortly after WWII for security reasons, and so you'll be walking in the woods and you'll see this random door in a rock face, and it will be warm. And for the sort of grown-up kid who used to daydream about spies and secret passageways, this is *really* appealing. ;) (I actually had it one better in that I used to work in the central hospital here; like many hospitals it's full of basement tunnels, only these also hook into the citywide network. Not that I ever got to sneak in, but it was still neat to know that they were *right there*.)

I spent a very happy week travelling around southern Finland with friends in 2002. If it wasn't for the long dark winters, I'd really like to live there.

I wasn't aware of the steam tunnels; they also sound kind of cool.

What part of 2002? I was here through June of that year - odd to think that we might have passed each other on the streets of Helsinki. ;)

Ah, it was actually June 2001. I'm not quite sure why I was mixing up years.

It is an amusing thought though, especially because I still don't know what you look like.