Still playing post-vacation catchup:
What do Nokia, Angry Birds, Fiskars, and Marimekko have in common? They were all designed by Finns. This I learned at the interesting Design Museum here in Helsinki. I also learned about the Finnish designer Timo Sarpaneva who did a lot of glass designs for the company littala (or iittala) which i thought was Italian but apparently is named after a Finnish town.
This from Wiki: Timo Tapani Sarpaneva was an influential Finnish designer, sculptor, and educator best known in the art world for innovative work in glass, which often merged attributes of display art objects with utilitarian designations
He perfected a glass blowing technique that involved rubbing the hot glass with a wet piece of curved wood, creating a bubble inside the glass that is manipulated, becoming part of the design. He also designed fabrics and did many drawings. Cool museum. I love the clothing people wear here, lots of vivid colors, patterns and designs ( a la Marimekko.)
I walked to the nearby design district, visiting little shops like Lokal, where a sweet saleswoman recommended other shops and even a flea market in the area. I have been struck by how kind people are to this hot, tired, one-armed American tourist (i.e. me). One man (handsome man too) stopped to ask if I needed help as I was staring at my battered map. Later, I met a angel of sorts – a beautiful young woman with long blond hair, modeling one of her $350 personally designed orange silk dresses – who closed up her shop and led me a few blocks to the #3 tram. And gave me a hug before she left.
Helsinki room with piano
Down at the harbor, I got lunch in the renovated 19th century brick market hall at a place called Story. As my mom noted in her journal 25 years ago, “no memorable food here” but that’s ok. I am even tired of smoked salmon. I jumped aboard a 45 minute cruise around the harbor to rest and almost fell asleep. The fjords spoiled me for other ferries.
I’m on the second floor of this Kallio neighborhood apartment block.
I leave very early to tomorrow and have practiced walking the tricky 11 minute route to the airport bus stop, which I will walk at about 5 am. I couldn’t find the bus stop at first but finally figured it out this afternoon.
Staying at this Airbnb hasn’t been as easy as the others. The host is very kind but she doesn’t communicate very well and the directions she gave to her place were insufficient, as were directions for getting in. I also couldn’t reach her by phone when I had this trouble. (She later told me she can’t pick up at work.) She lives in a hidden spot that is not a bad location, once you find it but that ain’t easy. She seems to assume her guests have cellphones that work without WiFi, which is not the case for me. Next trip I will consider buying a data plan again and travel insurance. I also was struck by how cashless travel is, especially in Stockholm. If you don’t have a credit card, you often cannot do what you want to do. I watched one man be turned away at the cool photography museum in Stockholm because he only had cash. The museum refused to take it. Which is odd, because it used to be that merchants didn’t want you to use anything but cash. On two occasions, my credit card didn’t work in Stockholm, due to the merchant’s machine, not my card, but it was still a little alarming., especially since i only have one credit card. In one case, Francine had to buy my metro tix.
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Dirck and Russ went to the Vasa ship museum while Francine and I did the campy ABBA museum. We aren’t huge ABBA fans but it is a clever museum with fun interactive elements including an opportunity for visitors to perform on a darkened stage with holograms of the four band members. I couldn’t convince Francine to do it. We each auditioned to be a fifth member of ABBA by singing in a karaoke booth and having our performance graded. Not sure Francine or I made the cut.
Fun day as tourists with Francine and Russ. Nice to have them lead the way! We roamed around the old town of gramla Stan, arriving at the royal palace just in time for the changing of the guard, this time complete with a marching band. Lots of tourists roaming the narrow cobbled lanes and gift shops selling $49 T-shirts.
We decided to splurge on the smorgasbord at The Grand Hotel, which was a trip. Lots of fish, herring, meats, desserts. Once was enough, I am ready to slow down on the eating.
In the afternoon we joined most of Stockholm or so it seemed to watch Sweden vs. England in the World Cup semi finals. Francine and Russ were in the distinct minority, wearing their English football shirts at the Sodermalm bar where we watched the game outside on the street in a crowd spilling onto the street. England won unexpectedly 2-0 and the crowd was very tolerant of Francine jumping up and down in victory.
TakeBetsywithyou 