a wrap-up coming soon. i'm thinking a couple different entries might cover it. see you soon!

an afternoon dip

wappu--may 1--is labor day in europe, but also a huge student holiday in finland. first year technical students in tampere are dipped in the rapids in celebration, complete with parades, placing a hat on a statue at midnight, and lots of crazy finns.

ready for business

student parade

getting ready....

in the rapids!

the lady and her crown

spring is here

and the finns are out in flocks. i wonder where they have all been hiding? i decided to wander around the suburb i live in and see some of the far reaches one this beautiful day--

the lake is starting to thaw

the water tower, or a giant mushroom

the swimming hall (i'm not lying. it's underground. a loooonnnggg elevator ride down)

mämmi

bon appetit and belated happy easter, celebrated in the way of the finns.

across the border

so a few weeks ago, i put differences aside for an afternoon and cooked a lunch for everyone with...a canadian. we compromised and made a salmon dish with pototoes (a compromise between his canadian and my alaskan family).

here are his photos:

chop chop chop

the meal pre-preparation

alain avec le poisson
hugo doing the honors--amazed faces (sugar on fish!?)

getting ready to chow down

dublin blossom

londontown

hyde park

westminster abbey

covent garden

the view from st. paul's

an old and new city

more and more

the dubliner

a quick trip to dublin--a favorite, i could definitely live there. not to mention it was a nice GREEN, SUNNY break from finland's snow. for more photos, see here and here.

i got to see ben!!

the finnish gang minus angel (photographer)

temple bar

stephen's green

oscar wilde

crazy st. patrick's day parade

christ church

dublin

rauma

during the same trip to pori with my landscapes class, we also visited the unesco world heritage site of rauma. it's an old medieval village with the crooked streets and everything (quite unusual for the young country of finland). i really liked the variety of colors throughout the streets. unfortunately, the church was locked (as seems to the standard here in finland), so i did not get to go inside.

a finnish lesson

because i am eager to find distractions from my paper-writing, i will continue the mini updates. here is a song we listened to in my finnish language class during one of the first lessons...of course, we also sang along with it. a small group of us aspire to learn the words to this legendary finnish song and sing it at the karaoke bar in the city center before our time here is over...

side note: "hän" means "he/she," but is not exclusive to either gender.

kyykkä

since i have a few moments, i'll share a little finnish culture. a few weekends ago, tampere university of technology was host to the 'world championship of kyykkä.' while the object of the game is to knock over the other team's wooden pins, what it really means is drunk finns (equaling talkative finns), naked drunk finns running around the ever-present sauna, tech student overalls (i'll post about those some other time), and other such shenanigans. you can learn a little more here and here.