Alexey Smirnov's blog

Despite the economic downturn our company has arranged a party this year as well. We have visited Jämijarvi, a cottage village north of Tampere.

As I have arrived from Helsinki to Tampere on Saturday morning, the first thing that I noticed was that it was much colder in Tampere than in Helsinki. Later on I figured out that whenever there is a weather forecast for Helsinki, the area near the Baltic Sea where I am living at the moment has much warmer temperature, usually 5 degrees centigrade more.

But the bus has arrived quickly, in addition I grabbed a cup of coffee so I did not feel cold. Upon arrival the people were divided into several groups. We were told that we would go through a number of activities. Our group has visited them as follows.

First we had to play Hanoi towers game with 5 disks. As I remembered the algorithm for solving this problem from high school the task did not present any difficulties for our team. We were able to move the disks in 2 minutes and 36 seconds. I thought we were moving pretty quickly and did not expect any other team to improve our result. However, later during the day a couple of other teams were able to do it faster, in part because they probably knew our time. But there were other people also who spent significantly more on solving this puzzle.

Next stage was arch shooting. I didn’t hit the target at all, the arrows went mostly up. However, later during the day I was able to make another attempt and it was more successful.

Then there was horse riding, a kind of break after two difficult assignments. After the horse riding we had a test drive on quadricycles. I learned how to switch the gears including the rear gear. These quads are actually pretty fast, especially when you switch to the forth gear. I guess riding on them is a bit like riding a horse because you have to hold it really tight.

Then there was a boy-scout kind of stage. We were asked to build a trap for animals. We have digged a hole and covered it with leaves.

Last but not least we tried to drive the RC cars. It was a lot of fun. We had to drive several laps trying to avoid hitting the obstacles. As our team was doing this exercise in the end, we knew the score of the previous teams and were able to improve on it.

Overall, our team finished third. Then we had nice lunch, then went to sauna. In the evening there was a concert of a rock band and after midnight there was a fire performance, a gorgeous show with fire eaters. I have posted the recording to YouTube.

Next day we were in a spa hotel and then during the afternoon we came back to Tampere. It was raining on Sunday and we were thinking all way long how lucky we were on Saturday. The weather on that day was sunny. It looks like everybody enjoyed this party with lots of fun, drinks, and food!

I have rented a furnished apartment in Eira, in the center of Helsinki. It is only a 10-minute walk from the Market Square where most of the ferries are located. It is possible to go to Tallin and Stockholm from there. Many local cruises are available as well. Then there is the main cathedral of Helsinki located at Senate Square with a monument dedicated to Alexander II. Lots of fun going on in this area 24 hours a day.

I had to deal with the problem of moving stuff from Tampere. It always seems that you have only personal belongings but when you start moving the stuff it turns out that you have got a lot. I decided to rent a car. On Friday I went to Helsinki with trunk full of stuff. After arriving to Helsinki and getting the key from the apartment rain began. It lasted for over an hour and was very strong. I used a navigator to get to the city but when I was approaching the apartment the battery ran out of power. I had no map with me, I only knew the approximate location of the apartment. In addition, finding a parking place in the center of the city is always a challenge. Because of the rain I had to sit in the car for an hour and a half. But then I got to the apartment and unloaded the stuff.

On the next day I had to do the same and that was pretty much it with the personal belongings including sports equipment and some furniture. However, as the new apartment is furnished I had to drop the furniture I bought in Tampere in my old apartment. Here are the pictures of the apartment in Helsinki. It is half the size of the apartment in Tampere but I am quite happy. As I have noticed, I have never used one of the rooms in that 1-bedroom apartment.

After that rain the weather became very nice. It is very warm and humid. I remember that last year when my parents visited me we were in Helsinki at the same time of year but I was wearing a jacket. Because of such nice weather I went on several boat cruises. Here are the maps.

This cruise goes to the western part of the archipelago. It goes past the ship building factory where the giant cruise ferries are built. Also there is Finnish high-tech area Espoo, an equivalent of Silicon Valley.

The following is Starline cruise which says that it is the best cruise in Helsinki. It goes past the islands that vikings lived in almost a 1000 years ago. There is also an island that was once a property of a Russian businessman. There is yet another island where stones were created for the Helsinki fortress. There are residential areas on this route as well as a zoo on one of the islands.

One thing that I immediately noticed after arriving to Helsinki is the greater variety of food here. All kinds of restaurants. In the city center, they are almost on every house. For example, in the building next to my apartment there is KotiPizza.

I have attended several organ concerts here. They happen almost every day in different churches. I was surprised to find out that there is an organ in almost every church here, or even two organs. I have recorded quite a lot of organ music, thus I am thinking of building a library searchable online.