Helsinki: Day 2

    The second day in Helsinki was another bright and early day. We woke up, got ready, and then went straight to breakfast at a cafe on the corner near our hostel on Eerikinkatu. Quickly we were shuffled off from there to the the rest of our day.
    From the cafe we headed on foot to the Finnish Parliament. We had a scheduled tour there where we would see the building and learn how the parliament ran. We went in, went through security, and then were in the middle of the building where the whole government of Finland was run. It was an awesome building and looked very, well, Finnish. We went through the main halls and up the grand marble steps to the reception hall. At the time there happened to be tables and chairs set up in the hall because there was a reception happening that week. It was a REALLY tall room with lots of tall windows letting tons of light in and the tables and chairs were really interesting. They looked pretty retro. Very neat twist that only the Finns could pull off at a government building.

The building was too big to take a picture of the whole thing from where I was standing. 

    After walking through the reception hall and learning about that part of the building, we walked through some more long never-ending hallways, up some more marble steps, and then were in the exact room where parliament sessions are held. It was a round room with a pretty big dome overhead with five statues lining the walls in front. Each statue stood for a different aspect of Finland. They were designed by Wäinö Aaltonen and their names were "The Pioneer", "The Toil of Thought", "The Future", "Faith", and "The Harvester."

Fun Fact! The ceiling of the rotunda is made out of sugarcane! It has better acoustics. (The inside was made of the sugarcane. It never gets rained on...what a sugary mess.)

   

    We spent quite some time sitting in this room learning about the parliament. One thing I found really interesting is that Finland allows any citizen to come watch the meetings when parliament is in session if they wish to. Finland is very open about everything they do with their citizens. There were seats devoted to the audience and journalists.

    After getting our tour of the parliament, we went outside to wait for our taxis that were going to take us to lunch. We were on the steps for a while, taking pictures, singing, dancing...you know, the usual things you do outside a government building. (So we basically put on a show for the traffic on one of the main streets in Helsinki...whatever.)

Casually being Finnish male models...

And of course...

    We caught our taxis then that were going to take us to lunch. At this point, we split up with the German students that we were with because we each had our own programs for the day (that being our own countries' embassies). We drove around all the way to the waterfront where our restaurant was. 

    Fun story time! Right when we got of our taxis, in front of us was a Mercedes-Benz convertible with license plates from... Florida. What? In...Helsinki?! Luckily we had Izzy with us who is actually from Florida. 

the restaurant

    From lunch we walked to the American Embassy. At the Embassy, we met the Finnish teenagers who were in the US this summer and last summer on the same program, just from Finland to the US. We went through security, and we were in our home country! Kind of. 

    Once inside the Ambassador's house, we gathered in his living room where we were getting a welcome presentation from the Ambassador, staff, and a former Finland US Senate Youth Exchange student from 1990 with her host family she had just reconnected with after 22 years. We also got to learn about what went on at the embassy. This year was a bit of a big deal because it was the thirtieth anniversary of FUSYE. After that we went out to the courtyard where we were having and American summer barbecue. There were also speeches to be read: one from the Finnish students, one from the American students. I got to make the speech for the Americans! And if you remember from earlier this summer, I also gave the speech (in Finnish then) at the Finnish Ambassador's house in Washington. 

    Now was the time for eating and being merry. I got to talk to so many different people including the other Finnish exchange students to America, the embassy staff, and Ambassador Bruce Oreck. And I can say I also got my third interview for the third Finnish newspaper article I was in this summer... (Click here to see it! Even though it's all in Finnish...)

Here's the group of Finnish and American students with Ambassador Oreck, his wife, and the alumnus, Bay Fang.

    After the reception at the US Embassy, we headed off to the main harbor in Helsinki (Helsingin Satama) to cath our ferry out to Suomenlinna for a tour and picnic.

    History lesson! Suomenlinna is a sea fortress made up of six islands (Kustaanmiekka, Susisaari, Iso-Mustasaari, Pikku-Mustasaari, Länsi-Mustasaari and Långören) just off the coast in Helsinki. In 1748 when Finland was still controlled by Sweden, the construction of Suomenlinna (originally named Viapori in Finnish and Sveaborg in Swedish) was started. The purpose of having a sea fortress off the coast of Helsinki was to protects against the Russian Empire, with Saint-Petersburg just East over the Gulf of Finland. Today, Suomenlinna is home to museums, ruins, summer cottages, cafes, shops, and of course large open lawns that are just perfect for relaxing out in the wonderful summer weather. Believe it or not, Finland's naval academy still occupies one of the islands of this old fortress in the original grand buildings. 

    We boarded our vessel in the main harbor and took in the views of the coast of Helsinki while making the 20 minute crossing over to Suomenlinna. 

    Once on the island, we had a few minutes of free time to walk around before we had to be back towards the docks to meet up with our tour guide. I walked around with my friends Emily and Sam for a few minutes and we headed back to the docks. 

    

You can see the naval academy here. 

    We met our tour guide and then we were off to exploring Suomenlinna! We walked around a huge circle on a few of the islands that make up the fortress. We would go over a bridge, under another, walk past old buildings and houses, and then be in one of the fortified parts.

Here's my friend Felix from Germany trying to defy the strength of copper statues. 

    Our plan for after the guided tour was to go back to an open area in the middle of one of the islands for a picnic. The picnic invited host families, exchanges students, and YFU staff from around the Helsinki area to come and hang around and just socialize in the late, sunny afternoon. But first, one of the biggest Baltic cruise ships was scheduled to pass Suomenlinna so we ran to one of the highest places we could find and waved to all the passengers. 

    The time we spent at the picnic was one of the most memorable moments of the summer. Here we were, dozens of exchange students coming from all over the world all in one happy place at one time, fitting in together as one group. I talked to so many strangers, not even catching their names, but it didn't matter. We were one big international group of people. I even got to meet a girl who was staying in Finland for the year who home was just on the other side of the border from my home, Buffalo, in Canada. 

We matched!

Now, these pictures don't do any justice to how awesome the picnic was. I didn't take too many because I was just too busy having fun.

     I would consider being on Suomenlinna one of the most happy times I had with my friends this summer. I was a night of being surrounded by my international friends and was a very special feeling. 

     And then we returned to the hostel on Eerikinkatu. The next day was our last day in Finland, and we were all facing the dread of leaving our new home already. The night was filled with some packing, and overall just a bunch of loud teenagers socializing to help keep our minds off leaving. 

There were way more students than this.