And the winner is…

…Sauli Niinistö who becomes Finland’s first conservative president since 1956. He replaces the popular, Social Democrat president, Tarja Halonen in March.

I’m still not completely clear what the role of the president is in Finland as it seems that unlike say in the US, the executive functions of government are performed by ministers. Apparently, the job is largely a ceremonial one, for example hosting a big shindig on Independence Day.

Coming myself from a country where the head of state is always conservative, as well as being unelected, the idea of the president being from the right-wing Kokoomus (National Coalition) Party doesn’t sound too many alarm bells.

As for Mr Haavisto and his supporters, I think they can be more than satisfied with a result which, after the success of the populist and anti-immigration ‘Basic’ Finns in parliamentary elections last year, has restored many people’s faith in the Finnish electorate.

In a vane attempt to follow Pekka Haavisto’s successful use of social media, Instant Kaamos is now on Twitter: @instantkaamos.

Finland makes up its mind

Today’s flying of flags in Finland was rather overdetermined. Not only is it Runeberg’s Day – of which more later – but it’s the day for the second-round election for the country’s president. The frontrunner Sauli Niinistö of the conservative Coalition Party failed to secure more than the fifty percent on the first ballot which would have immediately given him the lease on the presidential palace for the next six years. More surprisingly, the runner-up did not come from the Social Democrats – who have held the presidency since Urho Kekkonen left power in 1982 – nor from the Centre Party whose Paavo Vayrynen came third, but from the Green League.

Pekka Haavisto is a former UN peace negotiator and opted to do social service rather than go in the army in a country where military service is still obligatory. Much has been made of the fact that he is gay and in a registered partnership with a hairdresser from Ecuador. It has even been suggested in some quarters that his sexuality would make relations with Muslim nations more awkward, to which others reply that no one suggested that having a female president might make things tricky with, say, Saudi Arabia.

The outcome, in terms of who’s going to win, seems to be in little doubt, with two thirds of advanced votes being cast for Niinistö who is the odds-on favourite. All the same, the remarkable success of a politician from what has previously been seen as a relatively marginal party may be a sign of a changing political landscape.

Meanwhile, Finns returned home from the polling stations to enjoy a Runerbergin Torttu, a rather tasty flour and breadcrumb cake. The cakes were the invention of the wife of Johan Ludvig Runeberg, Finland’s national poet, whose day is celebrated today. Runeberg, who wrote in Swedish, penned the words for Finland’s National Anthem Vårt land (Our Land or Maamme in Finnish). The tune is also used by Estonia for their national anthem Mu isamaa, mu õnn ja rõõm and so, in a way the song celebrates not only Finland’s multicultural heritage but also its international connections.

Some have apparently argued that Sibelius’ Finlandia, performed here in a rather beautiful flashmob version in Helsinki Railway Station, would make a better national anthem. But on this issue, as on that of who would make the best president, this blog remains diplomatically  neutral.

+++++ UPDATE  ++++++

With almost all the votes counted,  YLE reports that Niinistö will be the next president with 62.6 per cent of the vote. All the same, Haavisto has reason to be pleased with the result. In Helsinki, he took almost 50 per cent of votes cast.

Seasonal #2

Covering of snow

lies effortlessly silent

on the frozen sea.

Light at the end of the tunnel

Some confusion this morning in the Instant Kaamos office concerning the news carried by Selkouutiset of the end of the kaamos in Northern Finland. Apparently yesterday, the sun showed it’s face again in Utsjoki — Finland’s most northerly municipality –   for the first time in 51 days, bringing the period of polar night to an end.

There’s quite a difference within the parts of Finland that fall inside the Arctic Circle. In Rovaniemi, for example, sitting just about on the circle, it is only on the day of the winter solstice that the sun doesn’t rise.

But when I checked the Gaisma site, it seems that Utsjoki will today enjoy a day nearly an hour and a half long. This does not compute. Any suggestions or explanations, however implausible, will be warmly welcomed.

This blog supports the blackout by Wikipedia against legislation passing through the US Congress that would limit internet freedom. For this reason, today’s links are Wikipedia-free.

The wanderer’s return

I come back to Helsinki to find that the Winter still disappoints with a measly one degree above zero. As I step off the plane onto the tarmac, my foot finds slippery sleet-water on top of ice, and I fall on my new case, painfully pulling a neck muscle which still hurts.

I’m back just in time for the start of my new Finnish course (“Once more unto the breach dear friends!“). It turns out to be a toughie. The seemingly most able teacher gives us an assessment test and the comprehension text – which seems to be something about the financial condition of the postal service – is otherwise incomprehensible to me. And I can’t quite bring myself to just randomly tick the multiple choice questions in order to gamble on getting at least 25 per cent.  Having taken courses provided by Helsinki Summer University which are almost exclusively about pumping you full of Finnish grammar, I think I do OK on that part of the test, but less well on finding the “dictionary forms” of declined and conjugated nouns and verbs. Time will tell if I’ve been too ambitious in choosing this higher-level course.

After a remarkably long and deep sleep I awake to the darkness of the kaamos, on a day with temperatures happily a couple of degrees below. And with Mrs Kaamos, still on GMT, sleeping late, I sip green tea and look across the rear courtyards to the lights of the office building opposite, wondering what it must be like to go out to work in the dark, and come home when the sun has long set.

[Haven't found a better pic for this post yet. Do pop back later and I'll find you one.]

Seasonal

Helsinki autumn

bracing ourselves for the cold

coming of winter.

Dark Forests

Helsinki City Art Museum has pretty much got Finland covered this summer. If you’ve seem the City — and there is only one city that feels very much like a city — and if you’ve seen the forest, then you’ve seen pretty much everything — except the lakes of course. And the sea. And then there’s the islands. But apart from the lakes, sea and islands, and I suppose the smaller cities and towns, Finland is it’s forests and it’s capital city.

In The Golden Forest, Ritva Kovalainen  and Sanni Seppo show views of forests in Finland and Japan. At the centre of the exhibition is an installation, The Wishing Tree by Reiko Nireki. A new sapling grows out of a tree trunk. Followers of Shinto traditionally place a branch in the stump of tree used to make a boat to express gratitude and reverance.

Hannes Heikura’s Dark Zone is a series of prints in black and white, mainly black. Anonymous figures are caught in various streets of Helsinki with the title giving the place, date and time. And while many are taken in daylight, in Heikura’s world, it’s always night. It’s hard not to suspect that some of the shots are posed — they are so perfectly composed. A hoodied figure stands by a wall, an end of Lasipalatsi in a sea of apshshalt, a lone skateboarder, Heikura says these are just the everyday streets and everyday people we pass without noticing. But once seen through his lens, they tell their stories of loneliness and beauty.

The Golden Forest and Dark Zone are at the Helsinki City Art Museum (Helsingin taidemuseo) until 4th September.

Doom, gloom and maybe one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse thrown in

I can’t say they didn’t warn me. But this is a Winter that is breaking records like nobody’s business and to the disgust of taxi drivers, Helsinki City Council is having trouble coping. Perhaps it’s the fact that it’s always so warm in our flat but every time I go out I still feel outraged by a cold wind that bites so hard you want to have it humanely destroyed. My fault for being too mean to buy a proper winter coat I suppose — the cheap anorak I bought in Oxford Street just ain’t doing it.

It’s not the length of the nights that gets to you but the darkness of the days. Every now and again, you catch a glimpse of a low, steamy sun but mostly the best you get is little more than a dim twilight. At least the discovery that a local bar offers a very good pint of Fullers ESB provides some welcome relief.

The lighter side of darkness

A second traditional Winter in Finland gives us a fairy-tale Christmas  up in the wilds of Kainu. Thick snow encasing the trees got us asking why  we find this kind of scene so beautiful. I wondered how much it came down to some kind of conditioning. Brought up on storybook images of snowy landscapes, experiencing it for real is like entering a childhood dream. Perhaps a people who had never seen snow, the Pirahã of the Amazon Rain Forest for example, witnessing such a scene unprepared and for the first time, would find it just plain spooky, threatening even.

So for want of any available evidence, I turn to a fictional case, that which takes place in Tove Jansson’s Moominland Midwinter. Moomintroll wakes up during his winter hibernation and unable to get back to sleep goes out into an unwelcoming dark and cold world. At first he undergoes  feelings of melancholy and even anger at the sun that refuses to rise above the horizon. Always lurking in the background is the gloomy Groke, who sits on the Midwinter bonfire to warm herself only to extinguish it completely.Some suggest that the Groke (Mårran in Swedish and Mörkö in Finnish) is Jansson’s symbol for Nordic Melancholy. In fact the whole book can be read as a journey through malignant sadness.

The Groke

But it has a happy ending. Eventually Moomintroll finds a way to accept  Winter in the midst of a blizzard:

Not until then did Moomintroll notice that the wind felt warm. It caried him along into the whirling snow, it made him feel light an almost like flying.

And here Moomintroll has his satori:

“I’m nothing but air and wind, I’m part of the blizzard,” Moomintroll thought and let himself go.

Of course, no season (of the world or the heart) lasts for ever. Eventually, Spring returns. The wise Too-ticky says,

“When the summer’s hot and green, and you lie on your tummy on the warm boards of the landing stage, and listen to the waves chuckling and clucking…”

“Why didn’t you talk like that in winter?” said Moomintroll. “It’d have been such a comfort. Remember, I said once: “There were a lot of apples here.” And you just replied: “But now there’s a lot of snow.” Didn’t you understnad that I was melancholy”

Too-ticky shrugged her shoulders. “One has to discover everything for oncself,” she replied. “And get over it all alone.”

Lost in music

Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival gives me the chance to lose myself in two of my greatest pleasures: beautiful music and natural beauty. After listening to a morning concert including violinist Gidon Kremer (photo) playing Tchaicovsky, I take a swim in the refreshing water of the lake. For a moment I pause and stare across to the opposite shore, verdant with thick pine forests.

For a moment, everything is forgotten: my work, my worries, even my krapula.