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Published: August 10th 2011
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Day 17, Sunday Monday and Tuesday, 7th –9th August, 2011
Helsinki
Let’s go shopping!!! A girly afternoon of exploring the centre of Helsinki with another cousin Mia.
Lots of other tourists were on the same quest, I heard lots of English, and other languages being spoken around me. We walked past the beautiful Art Deco frontage of the railway station, the entrance flanked by two statue figures with chiselled Nordic features. We wondered along the cobble-stoned (Luckily I didn’t wear high heels for walking in town- I would have done myself an injury) footpaths to Mannerheim street and Alexander street to look in at the many boutiques; lots of little shops featuring handcrafts by various Finnish artists and artisans, inventive and beautiful.
We stopped in at Globe Hope, a business which creates goods from recycled materials, such as a fantastic and very masculine BBQ apron crafted from an ex-army tent, complete with metal eyelets along the hem and a screen-printed pig on the front. Some other interesting wares were handbags from a combination of army tent material and hand crocheted lace, and bracelets featuring words created from old computer keyboards.
We walked past the Helsinki Cathdral, narrowly missing being
run over by a tram which seemed to come out of nowhere – here’s to my looking the right way to cross a road for a change.
There were lots of touristy souvenir shops, some selling small orthodox icons to mainly Russian tourists, lots of santa and raindeer paraphernalia, and such stuff.
Lots of Finnish designers have shops in the city: Iittala glass, Arabia ceramics, Marimakko textiles and fashion, Pentik homewares featuring finnish imagery such as reindeer, Artek, more designer homewares, Aarikka; timber decorative homewares and more. The staff are very friendly, and I noticed to my surprise that the sales assistants spoke to me in English before I even opened my mouth. Do I look particularly un-Finnish? Do I have a particularly Australian way of walking? Perhaps they overheard my accented Finnish or just picked up on my Australianness. Or perhaps it’s just the way I fumbled with trying to find the right money?
I still haven’t got my head around the cash here. I go to the auto-teller, withdraw a wad of cash, keep handing out 50 euros at every opportunity until I run out, and then get some more. Then I end up with a
wallet full of 20’s, 10’s and 5’s which I can deal with to a point, and a sh*t-load of coins. Totally confused about the coins. In Australia one looks for the gold coins to get the large denominations. Here the 2 and 1 euro’s are edged in silver. The 50’s, 20’s and 10’cents are gold, so I was always pulling out a 20cent instead of a 2 euro coin, until I gave up. My handbag would now weigh about a ton, if it wasn’t for my Aunt who took pity on me and has to date swapped my coins for notes. Twice.
The good thing is that my ordinary bank keycard works here at the auto tellers all of which are named OTTO. It doesn’t work in shops with EFTPOS, but the cash tellers are always handy. Of course Visa cards would work, but I’m saving them for when I run out of cash.
On Monday we also visited the Iittala/Arabia factory outlet shop in the suburbs, where there were lots of glasswares and beautiful tablewares. Finlayson, Pentik, and others were also represented in this complex, and the prices were much more reasonable than in the city.
I sent
home a nearly10 kilogram parcel on Monday. Souvenirs, bits and pieces and tourist pamphlets all add up in the weight department, and I didn’t fancy lugging them in the suitcase for another three weeks.
I have noticed in my travels that Finns in general support and appreciate their designers. Many homes have Arabia crockery, Iittala drinking glasses, vases and candleholders, Marimekko curtains or tablecloths and Marimekko clothing.
Yesterday we visited the national Art gallery, the Arteneum, which featured an exhibition of Finnish artists’ portrayal of Lappland and it’s people, the Sami. Interesting art pieces spanning more than a century, and displaying various techniques in oil, sculpture and printmaking techniques; traditional and modern styles.
The permanent collection features finnish artists from the early 1800’s onwards.
A visit to the design museum followed, where Finnish design in homewares, furniture and textile was traced from the 1800’s to the present and included technological design as well from Nokia. The feature exhibit was a retrospective of Kaj Franck’s designs for many notable Finnish design houses such as Arabia and Iittala.
I’ve seen so much culture in the last few days that my feet hurt.
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