More of Finland

First meal in Finland at Stadin Kebab. For 4.95 euros, you get the kebab. It has lotsa veggies and unbelievable amounts of meat. My fav man!

30-12-05

Woke up at about 10am but the sleep was not very smooth. ZM is a snorer hahahaha... WOke up several times too cos the air here is very dry and I feel thirsty all the time. Must have a container of water exposed to the air in the room so that the air will not be so dry.

Anyway after a 12 hour sleep, we were all refreshed. So off we went to the town centre again, with an aim of doing a spot of shopping to make us more "local" as well as to visit some places of interest. We took a long walk to the city centre to save some money, but in the end, we gained more than the saving of money. The scenery on the way was beautiful! We saw the frozen lake in the middle of the city and took a few pics (pics to be uploaded!!!) and it was there that I first fell down. (I´ll pass whoever wants the video thro MSN when I get my own net access, it's damn funny!). We also went to the National Museum of Finland, but we were more interested in taking pictures than the actual heritage of Finland, so sad! LOL.

Frozen lake in Helsinki. I dunno if we can walk on the lake. Probably not yet. Anyway, Jan and Feb is supposedly the coldest months.

The National Museum of Finland. We took some nice pics inside.

What equipment Finns use in the past century. Quite amazing that they had a vacuum cleaner way back.

Don't I look like the statue?

Next we went to the city centre to do some shopping. THe day before we were just browsing through and we saw many good buys. so we decided to look at soem clothes tday. Also the other aim was to make ourselves blend into the crowd as our clothes were like those of TKKs* in Singapore. Damn toot lor.

Looking like toots. No one wears yellow in Finland except for the Vartija (Finnish for policemen, I think). But the parkas served its purpose. Can you imagine I was sweating inside that in -5 deg C? Ok, cos I was lugging some shopping bags.

So after settling my bank stuff, we headed for H&M and Zara and spotted GOOD BARGAINS! Stuff that were retailing for hundreds in Singapore (according to shopping experts Miss Tan Wei Ling and Mr Chen Zhengmin) were selling for incredible prices (like 50 euros) in Finland. It was a crazy sale indeed. OMG so we wanted to buy everything but had a limited budget. WL was roaming around the whole shop looking for the cheapest and best buys and so were me and ZM. In the end our efforts paid off as I got 1 new beanie (2.90 Euros), 1 new jacket (49.90 euros), 1 new pair of shoes (49.90), 3 pairs of Puma socks (4.90), and 1 silk boxers (5.90). Wahahahaha!

Finally I learnt the power of retail therapy from the real shopping king and queen (ZM and WL). Patricia Mok and Bryan Wong count for nothing man. Wait till you go shopping with them 2, then ZM says this is damn nice la, dun believe ask WL, and she will go like MUST BUY! so cool! It´s so worth it! How to resist you tell me? Especially when I´m already sitting on the fence. Their tastes are very similar, but I can say that they have good taste too. My shoes aer indeed very nice. N my beanie I picked myself, it was such a steal for 2.90!

All our new shoes. Looking good?

After shopping I could go out into the snow without my parkas. I am finally acclimatised (really? dunno yet lah.) to the weather here. Or maybe today wasn´t too cold. Either way I´m happy today. I finally understand shopaholics´love of shopping.

After all the shopping, my hands were aching from holding all the shopping bags. Bought some food back to cook for dinner. Must save money for more shopping!

SHOPPING ROCKS!


*TKK =tiong kok kia (china man). Known for their lack of fashion taste especially when dressing (in Singapore).


31-12-05

SO far we´ve been in FInland, we´ve been seeing many people with broken legs (probably the result of skiing accidents? or plain carelessness when walking on the snow). It´s amazing that they still bother to come out when people like us find it hard to walk even when our legs are perfectly fine. The snow (or rather crushed ice, think walking on ice kachang) makes the ground really slippery and it didn´t help that I was wearing my new shoes which had absolutely no traction for walking on snow.

People here also look real sharp in their dressing and it´s as if Helsinki were a mini fashion capital of sorts. Real cool looking people and the girls here are very pretty. And yeah tall too. I´m like below their average height.

Pics of the Helsinki City Centre. Looks better than Orchard Road eh? PAP can pick up a few tips by going abroad and taking some pics like mine.

Anyway, I shall start on the day proper. Today we had 3 new friends coming in from Singapore, Jinfu, Ivan and Dai Da (dunno if i got his name right, he introduced himself to me as Mike). They took a cab in instead of the bus, which means that they didn´t have the walk of their lives. LOL.

So after settling their stuff, we brought them out for shopping. But they didn´t buy anything (what a waste) and in the end we just bought a lot of groceries back for the night as well as for New Year´s Day. Most shops are closed for today so yeah, we had to cook our own meals.

All right the pic's aint perfect (try shooting a perfect picture when the temp's like -2 deg C), but you can recognize me anytime in my cock yellow jacket.

Not exactly a fulfilling meal, but it's our effort ok! Pasta is so easy to cook, we aint need no brains to cook it.

At night, after our hearty "home cooked" meal of pasta and sausages, we went to see fireworks. People were setting off their own everywhere, so there were explosions all over town. We went to thé Senate Square as well as a super pretty church near the Square. But the place was right on top of a hill so the wind was blowing and it was DAMN DAMN DAMN cold. I was hiding behind a pillar. HAHA!

One of the most pretty churches I seen. It's overlooking the Senate Square in Helsinki. I think it's a Lutheran Church. 97% (or thereabouts) of Finns follow the Lutheran faith.

After taking pics it was still very early (lke 9pm) so we went in search of a bar to drink. We found the Sling In Bar and I had Hard Core Sex (not what you think) there. The others had tamer drinks. After gulping down my drink I was hiccupping like mad. HAHA shiet.
Kippis! (Cheers in Finnish)

After all that, we were tired (and it was very cold too) so we decided to go back to the hostel. DUH it was before midnight, and yeah I spent my first overseas New Year´s Eve counting down in the hostel. Myself. The rest were fast asleep. How cool.