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Helsinki, Finland - August 27-30

(Bill)
We took another 1 hour discount plane ride from Stockholm to Helsinki, Finland. Helsinki is a small city with a much different feel than I had expected. I had expected more of a Russian influence in both architecture and people, but didn’t find much of that anywhere. The younger people are definitely more on the grunge, punk rock side with lots of colored hair, fishnet stockings, leather, and piercings. The architecture is a mix of old and new. The old appearing to be maybe from the early 1900’s and the new being extremely new, signs of the recent strong economy thanks to Helsinki being a technology hub for Europe. There seems to be a lack of historical monuments and museums compared to other cities we have visited. Not really sure why this is.

The weather has turned cold again with highs in the 60’s during the day and lots of rain.

On our first full day in the city we walked to a few churches – one orthodox church from the early 1900’s and one church built into the rocks in the middle of the city from the 1960’s. They were both listed in our guidebooks and the visitors handout as “can’t miss” locations. My opinion – no need to rush to Helsinki to visit these two monuments. Maybe the most interesting thing we saw were two weddings at each church. They were both very small and subdued compared to what we are used to in the US.

The walk back to our hotel was great, next to the harbor, across a huge beautiful promenade, down streets filled with great restaurants, boutiques, and art galleries. It showed me that the city has something to offer tourists beyond its proximity to Russia.

That night we went to a traditional Finnish restaurant. I was determined to try something local so when I saw the reindeer steak I was sold. The steak was great, very sweet and tender but a bit stringy. I had expected it to be gamey but it wasn’t at all.

After dinner we went to a club with an ice bar, something Victoria and I both wanted to experience. The ice bar was nothing more than a huge freezer with see through walls looking out into the club and room for about 12 people. Despite the size, it turned out to be a lot of fun. Before you enter you have to put on a thick, Eskimo looking coat and gloves. Victoria had to change her heels into moon boots. How fashionable! When you go in you understand why. It is about 10 degrees inside and with a shaved head I was freezing. We had a lot of fun inside the ice bar drinking Finnish vodka (Finlandia) and chatting with a group of Finnish guys and a few tourists. At one point Victoria had met a group of CPA’s working for KPMG in Bermuda and pawned them off on me. BORING! Gee, thanks Victoria.

Bill and Victoria’s Russian Visa Fun – Stage 2:
So, it’s not over. Not even close. Decide that you still want to go to Russia because for some reason you just want to and you are committed at this point, find the Russian consulate in Helsinki, Finland, walk there early on Monday morning before it opens with all of the aforementioned visa application forms and accompanying exhibits, see long line already formed while approaching the area where you think the consulate may be, finally reach non-descript, dark Russian consulate and realize the long line is there waiting for you to join, wait outside of consulate in the uniform line for the consulate to open, once the consulate opens watch the line turn into a mob with people who speak Russian jockeying to the front and people who don’t, ummmm us, trying to figure out what is going on, wait, wait, wait while people who press the intercom button and talk to the guard in Russian are let in, wait, wait, wait while other people cut in line and a guy who obviously had taken way too many steroids and spoke only English tried to cut in line and almost got the whole mob to turn against him, wait, wait, wait while the steroid guy talks loudly about his next fight in the UFC, laugh hysterically in your head, wait, wait, wait until you are in the front of the line and the stoic Russian guard says something in Russian through the loudspeaker and opens the electric gate, go in because you just assume you should, what do you have to lose, have the guard come out and tell you, in Russian of course, to go back and wait in line but think he may just take you away to Russia forever for no reason, wait, wait, wait until finally you are let inside the consulate, enter the consulate, have the metal detector go off but notice that nobody cares, notice that there is no funky, circa 1960’s electric number machine thing, notice also that there is no visa interview rooms with smoky glass doors and images of people behind them, try to find something written in English, find a line that says “visa” in English, wait in the line, get to the front of the line and meet with the visa application girl, this time she is not scary, have her review your application and send it to the Diplomat for his stamp of approval, wait, wait, wait for them to call your name, they call your name, be nervous, go meet at window with the un-scary application girl, find out application visa approved, have the application girl tell you to shell out an arm and a leg to get it done the same day, smile, breathe, say fine, have the application girl tell you to go pay at any bank and come back to pick up your visa and passport, leave the consulate and set off the metal detector again, have nobody care, go to the nearest bank, have the nearest bank tell you they only take cash, wonder to yourself if you could just give them your arm and your leg as payment, laugh inside your head, say lots of things to yourself that shouldn’t be repeated, have the bank tell you that a cash machine is right down the street, breathe a sigh of relief, thank the bank profusely, go to the cash machine, insert your ATM card, have the machine tell you it is not receiving foreign cards, say lots of things to yourself that shouldn’t be repeated, walk a mile to the next nearest cash machine, insert your ATM card, insert pin, take out an arm and a leg, think to yourself that the machines should actually have “arm and leg” as an option, laugh to yourself, go back to bank and pay, stop for a caffe latte, take the bank receipt to the Russian consulate, try to cut in line because you think you know what you are doing, have the rest of the line yell at you in Russian, put your American tail between your legs and go to the back of line, wait, wait, have a new stoic guard let you into the consulate with minutes to spare, get your visa and passport from the un-scary visa girl, have her tell you to “have a nice trip to Russia”, think to yourself that her comment is kind of funny considering what you have been through, think to yourself that you have somehow accomplished or won something, smile and thank the un-scary visa lady profusely, leave the consulate and set off the metal detector again, have nobody care, breathe!

(Victoria)
The step-sister of Scandinavia is how Finland is often regarded. In fact, we were told multiple times in Copenhagen and Norway, as if they needed to clarify: “Finland, well is different.” It is on the Euro, unlike its neighbors. It is flat and without the beautiful skiing mountains of the others. And it is the only one whose language is not understood within each country. Yet, it feels as if poor Finland has gotten a bum rap.

Helsinki is a small city that possesses a quiet charm. It is a city surrounded by water where wharfs, sailboats, and marchinery sit together. It has ornate 19th century buildings alongside sleek glass modern structures (somehow it avoided the tackiness of 1970s architecture). Winding cobbled streets to get lost in and yet a sense of city planning. Tree lined avenues, Parisian-style promenades, parks, cafes, and multiple squares that are filled with pink-haired punk youth. Hip minimal designer restaurants paired with traditional fare: reindeer, pigs knuckle, perch, smoked herring. For the record, I tried a tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, miniscule, tiny, tiny piece of reindeer. No, I’m not ordering a steak next but I was curious.

The Ice Bar was hilarious! The very first thing we noticed was that the Finnish have no rhythm. I don’t mean a few people were bad dancers or the guys were a bit shy about dancing. I mean the dance floor was packed, the songs playing had a clear beat, and absolutely everyone was off – men and even women...it was as if their hips had been programmed differently. There was the token guy with an enthusiastic arm flailing raindance routine, but most people just plain could not dance. Bill said he felt like John Travolta all of a sudden.

Once we tired of people watching in the night club, we headed to the Ice Bar. Bill and I had to wait in line to get into this freezer-size establishment. We had to adorn fuzzy full length coats, gloves, and I got the additional moon boots. It all made for a great conversation piece and we immediately met lots of folks who wanted to chat – although it may have been the complimentary “grapefruit” drink we were handed. We did meet a group of friendly Finnish and had a great time chatting. They were very concerned about our opinion of Finland and were stunned to know we came there on purpose. From them we learned that the Finns are required to learn both Finnish and Swedish in elementary school and that all street signs are in both languages. They also then learn a third of their choice – usually English – when in high school. We made our way home around 4 am laughing about our experiences.

(Oddities or Things We Noticed)
Greeting: ”Hey, hey.”

The Finnish are friendly, but a bit subdued. As everyone threw rice at the newly married couples there was the occasional whispered “yeah”, but no enthusiastic cheering or clapping – except for the boisterous Spanish tourist who also seemed to notice the lack of hurrahs.

People speak very quietly here. I constantly felt as if my voice was booming, but then Bill was continually saying, “Huh, I can’t hear you.”

Small wine pours that are measured precisely with a wine measurer. Had to order “doubles” for an American style pour.

Much less expensive here.

Finnish sounds really different from any language I’ve ever heard. It is less harsh than Norwegian, but not quite Latin sounding. We could not make any connection to any familiar Latin-based words. Even wine was unrecognizable and we can usually decipher that one!

Stockholm, Sweden - August 21-27

(Victoria)
Stockholm is a bustling, diverse city, both of which immediately stood out to us after having been in the much more sedate and border stringent and less liberal Norway. It felt a little strange as we have not been in any thing this large or crowded in weeks.

Stockholm is a lovely city that traverses over bridges and between thousands of islands…some even claim over 20,000 make up the archipelago that eventually crumbles into the Baltic. It is hard to get a true sense of this city in just a few days as each area has its own distinct personality. In fact, within mere blocks the personality of the area seems to change. We spent most of our time on the peninsula of Skeppsholmen where the park-like atmosphere houses several museums and overlooks the marina; Gamla Stan or Old Town which is now filled with hip stores and restaurants; and the lush island Djurgarden which is home to Skansen, a huge open-air museum with a fabulous little zoo. And, we spent one day walking the entire city.

One of the highlights was definitely Skansen. I got to touch a reindeer's antlers (fuzzy) and a baby reindeer licked my fingers!!! I have mixed feelings about zoos, but there were tons of baby animals so I took that as a healthy sign. The baby reindeer walked right up to me and let me touch his downy fur. He was adorable. We also got to witness the feeding time and saw brown bear with three cubs, lynx with kittens, and even moose, much closer than when we saw them in the wild in Norway. It was a really fun way to spend a drizzly day.

(Bill)
We took a plane from Bergen to Oslo (1 hour) and from Oslo to Stockholm, Sweden (1 hour) - two more of our cheap airline finds within Scandinavia. Stockholm is a huge city built completely on islands. There are literally more than 10,000 islands that make up Stockholm. The city was definitely the largest and most diverse we have been through since leaving New York City in early July. For me it was kind of strange to be thrown back in the middle of a busy city after having spent many weeks in relative seclusion in Norway. But in a way, it was nice to feel the energy of a real cosmopolitan city again. I wouldn't say Stockholm was the cleanest city we have been through and there is definitely a noticeable pollution price being paid by the environment to keep all of the people moving from island to island throughout the city.

The weather was noticeably warmer in Stockholm compared to Norway and Denmark with highs in the mid-70's and a little rain.

On our first full day in the city we took a wonderful 5 mile self guided walking tour from island to island through many of the main parts of Stockholm. From the city center of Kungstradgarden with men playing chess on life size chess boards next to a large, sunken public meeting square, through the long, touristy outdoor shopping mall, along the water and over a bridge to Stadshuset and the large church-like town hall, back over a bridge to Gamla Stan, the oldest part of the city with tight, stone laid streets lined with shops, galleries, and cafes, over a bridge and past the impressive royal palace, over another bridge and another bridge to Skeppsholmen dotted with museums and parks, back over many bridges to the hip, young area of Sodermalm where we stayed.

On another day we took a ferry 15 minutes to the island of Djurgarden. The island has a large, Coney Island style amusement park, which we avoided like the plague, and many museums and parks. We went to Skansen, a huge outdoor park filled with traditional Swedish homes and buildings and an impressive zoo. The zoo was extremely interesting as it housed some animals we aren’t accustomed to seeing in zoos - moose, elk, reindeer, and wolves to name a few.

Bill and Victoria's Russian Visa Fun - Stage 1:
So, this was an experience that I will NEVER forget. First, decide you want to go to Russia because you are going to be in Helsinki, which is mere hours from St. Petersburg and you think how easy it will be to get there, look in the guidebook and realize you need a visa but assume that will be an easy enough process (why would any country make it difficult for us to visit), book a hotel in Russia, prepay for the hotel in Russia, do more research on the visa process and realize it may be a bit more involved than you first thought, print out the Russian visa application for US citizens from the Russian consulate website, call the hotel in Russia and get an invitation and voucher faxed to your hotel as the visa application requires, have the hotel tell you they will fax an invitation and voucher application to your hotel, wait for fax, wait for fax, call the Russian hotel because the fax doesn't come, have the hotel email it to you instead, wait for email, wait for email, get email, print out invitation/voucher application, fax completed application to Russian hotel, go have passport photos taken to accompany visa application while waiting for Russian hotel to send official invitation and voucher, spend lots of time filling out the Russian visa application, spend lots of time making copies of all of the forms, find out where the Russian consulate is, take a bus to the consulate, be very proud of yourself for pulling all of this together, get to the non-descript Russian consulate, find out the Russian consulate is only open 9-12 Monday through Friday, look at your watch, realize it’s 3pm on Thursday and you are leaving for Russia on Tuesday, say lots of things that shouldn’t be repeated, get back on the bus, go back to hotel, have a glass of wine, breath, go back to the Russian consulate the next day, this time early in the morning, have the scary Russian guard buzz you in to enter the consulate building, take a number from the funky circa 1960’s electric number machine thing, wait in old stale waiting room with 20 other people, be nervous, very nervous because you think the Russians are going to take you away forever for no reason, notice that the three visa interview rooms with smoky glass doors and images of people behind them remind you of an old police interrogation chamber, wait, wait, wait for one of the scary interview rooms to buzz with your number over the entrance, go into the visa interview room, close the smoky glass door behind you, become one of those images behind the doors, look at the scary visa application lady behind the bullet proof window who you think may call the scary Russian guard over to take you away forever for no reason, be told by the application lady that the form you downloaded from their site and spent hours filling out is the wrong form, say lots of things to yourself that shouldn’t be repeated, be given a new form by the visa application lady, go outside and fill out the new forms, go back inside without waiting and get good vibes from application lady, think to yourself that this may actually work, have the application lady look at your departure date and tell you that Stockholm doesn't do express visas which you need because you are leaving for Russia in five days and have already paid for your hotel, say lots of things to yourself that shouldn't be repeated, start to feel blood boil, go home with tail between your legs, pout, pout, pout to your wife, ponder Russian trip, receive email from Russian consulate in Helsinki, Finland indicating that they do same day visas, decide not to give up and rather put yourself through more visa fun! Oh, don't think we would stop here. We're committed and determined. They can't keep us out. To be continued...see Helsinki, Finland for Stage 2.

(Oddities or Things We Noticed)
Greeting: "Hey"

Swedish sounds much softer, more Latin-based even though Norwegian, Danish, and Swedish are all pretty much the same.

Apel = Orange; Epel = Apple.

Coffee by George, Coffee by RCoffee, Coffee by Wayne...Coffee by just about everyone.

Frapino = I was once again able to get my blended iced coffee sans ice; it was more a cold foamy coffee, but my addiction can be met.

Very hip fashion here - like L.A.

Ah, fresh salad!!! An avocado, a real avocado!

Computer Problems (Ugh!)

Somewhere between Finland and Russia my laptop decided to die. Thus, it is making it much more difficult for us to create and update our blog. Hopefully we will have the laptop back up soon or will have a replacement. For now the updates are going to be a bit more sporadic.

Right now we are in Reggio Emilia, Italy, about an hour and a half southwest of Milan. We arrived by plane into Milan from Scandinavia on September 4. We have rented a small car and plan to drive from the top (Milan) to the bottom (Sicily) over the next month. We are really enjoying the culture, food, wine (much cheaper than Scandinavia), architecture, history, hospitality, and simple way of life that Italy has to offer. We are also enjoying the freedom that a car is providing us.