We spent the mornings with our individual host families today.  So, Liisa and I woke pretty early and she took me to the local Pori cemetery to see a mausoleum built by a very wealthy businessman in 1903 when his 11-year-old daughter, Sigrid, died.  He commissioned a famous Finnish architect for the structure as well as a very prominent painter for the frescoes.  

Next, we drove to Reposaari to eat at a very local, traditional Finnish coast restaurant.  The food was served smorgasbord style and we had great fresh salmon, "white fish", and baltic herring prepared four different ways including salt cured, curried, and with a tomato sauce.  Baltic herring is a TRUE specialty here and we're not sure how we feel about it as a group.  Only a couple of us have been willing to try it - it's not bad, but it is quite small and has so many bones (that are soft and one eats), that it's hard psychologically to eat.  The taste, however, isn't bad - just pretty salty!  It was a bit of a shame because Liisa saw an old friend who offered the two of us to join with friends and sail back to Pori on their private boat.  That would have been amazing, but we had arrived by car and there was no way to get the car back home and we had to be back to Pori for the events with too little time.

In addition to saunas, it seems that all Finns have summer cottages and we have each been fortunate to visit those of our respective hosts.  Liisa and I visited hers to find two birds in the front room flying repeatedly into the glass windows.  We finally managed to free the birds and enter the cottage.  The pic below shows the cottage, and she had another matching building housing the sauna and shower facilities, as well as a third on the water - traditionally for boat storage, though she doesn't currently have a boat, so now housing mower and other necessities.  The view from this location was amazing as was the amount of time, effort and labor that Liisa expends to keep a fabulous garden at the cottage!

Tonight, we all attended a Finnish baseball game.  This sport is quite different from our national pastime!  The pitcher in the picture is the guy in the black outfit - he tosses the ball straight up into the air over the white disc on the ground.  The batter runs into the area and hits the ball.  The batter's three strikes were at first confusing as he has the option of which ball to run the bases - if he hits the ball, but doesn't like where it goes, he can take it as a strike and hit another - even if it's in fair territory and not a foul ball!  The base pattern is different - yes they have 1st, 2nd, 3rd and home, but they are not in a diamond, and the bases are HUGE chalk areas they only have to stand in.  There isn't a home plate so the batter only need cross the baseline across the entire width of the field to tag home - basically it's only beating the ball, and no skill on the "catcher" (he's the same guy as the "pitcher" to tag, etc.  The players don't "tag up" either - again, having the choice to run - not often in a force out situation.  There is a back line boundary so a home run isn't possible - in fact we never saw a batter get more than a single since the field is quite a bit smaller.  We did see a couple of steals so that was exciting.  It's much faster paced than American baseball - they play four innings, take a break and play another four innings.  It poured rain on us a few times, but we enjoyed cheering for the local Pori/Ulvila team though they lost to a much more experienced team. 

Chauffeur-Lynn Goldberg

Sorry it has taken so long to post this weeks blob, but we are running out of fumes!



  Monday May 17th- We woke up this morning to the news that Oklahoma City had been hit by an enormous hail storm, the size of grapefruits.  Amy Scott and I unfortunately received some roof and window damage.  I hope the rest of you in Oklahoma City were not hit too badly.  This mornings program began with a short walk from Suomalainen Klubi to City Hall where Matti Korpinen was gracious enough to accompany us.  Our program speaker was Esko Karra, M.D. who spoke to us regarding combination plans for social and health organizations with in the Pori area.  We enjoyed his presentation and respected his honesty when asked questions on Finland's health care system. ( I will not go into detail, but it sounded similar to some of the current issues we are facing in the U.S.). 
  After our presentation at RC Telja we all scattered to our afternoon programs.  Lynn and I departed from Finnish club in style driven by Matti Korpinen in his 1964 Silver Cloud 3 Rolls Royce to Polartherm Oy, Luvia.  We met the president of the company and were given a presentation and tour of the facilities.  After our visit Lynn was fortunate enough to be able to drive us back to Pori, Matti sat up front of course.  Lynn was a safe driver-see picture.  
  When we returned to Pori, I had the pleasure to meet with Ragna Valli, D.C.    We chatted over coffee about the history of chiropractic in Finland and how she faught to practice here over 30 years ago.  Dr. Valli presented to me with a book on the history of chiropractic in europe and demonstrated some of her treatment techinques.  I was honored to have spent time with her, she is certainly a pioneer in the chiropractic profession-see pictures.
  After our programs we all returned home to our last night here in Pori.  We will miss everyone that has been so gracious here and hope to continue meeting more wonderful people on our journeys ahead. 

Lynn Goldberg,Pasi Anittila,Paavo J. Sorvakko (President of Polartherm),Robynn Poortvliet.

  This morning we had our final breakfasts with our host families and then met at the Hotel PumpuliEnkeli to say our goodbyes and head to the town of Pori.  Saku was gracious enough to drive us, but he kept looking down at his phone and driving too fast, which was making us all car sick.  For those of you that are not familiar with the roads in Finland, they are very winding.  Lynn kept telling him to watch the road and to slow down, but he did not understand her English that well so Aimee pulled out her translation book and told Saku, in Finnish, that he was making us ,"Nauseous".  Saku understood and drove us there safely in time to meet Seppo Niemisto and Matti Korpinen at the Suomalainen Klubi in Pori.  We presented our district to the RC Pori meeting (Suomalainen Klubi(Finnish/Swedish Club)).  I felt our presentation went smoothly and the club enjoyed it.  Amy Scott spoke french with a gentleman from the same small town were she had studied in France- small world!  
  Our afternoon program began at The Satakunta University of Applied Sciences.  We were given a brief tour by Seppo's wife, Pirjo and then met with Viveka Hoijer-Brear, The Senior Lecturer and International Relations Coordinator at SAMK.  We were given an informative overview on the Finland Health Care Education System and she answered many of our questions. 
   After our program all of us met back at the club and we were introduced to our new host families.  I have to admit I was a little nervous at first meeting our new Pori families, especially after we had such a wonderful time with our Forssa families, but everyone is just as warm and gracious here and we are settling in just fine. 
  My Pori family, Petri Nieminen, his wife Erica and their 3 children Mikael-14, Linnea-12 and Ellen-7 had prepared a wonderful meal for my first night in Pori. We started our first coarse sitting on the front porch enjoying the 30*C temperature with an assortment of toasted bowl shaped crackers with drizzled garlic and red peppers paired with herb cheese balls that fit perfectly inside the crackers- Yummy!  Then we had malt bread with a fine layer of Wahhabi dressing, sliced smoked salmon and sprinkled dill-Yummy2.  To drink we had mango-pear cider (alcohol).  For the next coarse we moved to the backyard, were we sipped Riesling on the porch that over looked the river and ate asparagus drizzled with olive oil, shaved Parmesan cheese and garlic bread (to soak up the olive oil)-Yummy3.  For our main coarse we paired a mixed green salad with an eggplant-red pepper relish along with seared lemoned white fish-Yummy4.  For dessert, well I was so incredibly full that I skipped it :(  My pants are already becoming too tight from my previous week in Forssa! 
   Later that night, Petri and I took a taxi to meet the rest of the girls for drinks at Westin.  We grabbed a table and watched some of the hockey game, but there was a creepy guy that kept standing right behind us, so we decided to move our venue to Cafe Antone, which I really liked.  It was another sports bar minus the creepy guys.  After the game we went to a club called Cabaret that featured a half time show of burlesque women dancing.  That was interesting, not in a good way, LOL.  The jet-lag started to catch up with us so home to bed we went.    I hope my first blog didn't bore you all too badly.  Please forgive my grammar and spelling.  Thanks, Robynn :)

 THE AHLSTROM EMPIRE
Here you see a photo of some of the buildings we visited today owned by the Ahlstrom family. You may ask who are these people and why post about them? Let me tell you in short, Antti Ahlstrom was a self made country business man, who took great risks in the early 1820's and became very wealthy through shipping and lumber production and later in 1870 bought a millwork. He chose to add the the surrounding area places for workers to live, to have recreation, church and school and other activities. All within walking distance of their workplace. Sound like a familiar business plan to anyone?
Anyhow, the Ahlstrom empire, as I have called it, expanded for several generations and today is still a 70% family owned corporation, which has several companies represented.

ABOUT ONE OF THE COMPANIES....
A. Ahlstrom is the company which keeps the historical museum within the old millworks and also has the museum of Villa Mairea.

The grandaughter of Antti Ahlstrom was Maire Gullichsen and she is noteworthy because she married Harry Gullichsen, studied art in France, brought modern art to Finland, collaborated with her friends Alvar Aalto and his wife Aino to build an amazing modern home in the 1938 which we visited, Villa Mairea. www.villamairea.fi

Anyhow, check out the website and for those who will not, just know that in the home it has "extra Picassos" in storage for when they feel like changing the art work, as well some of the most amazing design I've ever seen. Open floor plans, furniture designed by the Aalto family, and many pieces of art by  "personal friends" of the couple, names we only read about.

We all left quite impressed, inspired and pleased to know that the Ahlstrom family of great wealth and success still use the home today to vacation together, all the while still sharing their home as a museum

We rose early to another fabulous spread of breakfast.  Robynn and I stayed together with our host, Heidi, a gracious hostess and a good cook!  Our first night, we arrived to Forssa and her house a few km out of town in Matku to have a great chicken lasagna, ham and cheese quiche, salad, and brownies.  In the mornings, we have tea, coffee, milk, OJ, yogurt with muesli, grain bread, cheese, tomatoes, cucumbers, and turkey - we love Europe!  We live with a 160-pound Pyrenees dog named Ninni (see picture!). 

This morning, we met the rest of the group at 9:00am and headed to Humppila Glass Factory - where we saw an artist blowing glass, and shopped at some specliaty boutique outlets including Finland's most well known female boutique,  Marimekko.  Thankfully, we got some items at a decent price and tax free!  Following the shops, we had an American hamburger at a local resto. 
We had the same driver, Saku, for several days in Forssa - he's a 19 year old student who doesn't speak any English, but has been great to accompany us anywhere and seemed to be a great sport - apparently even volunteering to chauffeur us around. 

This afternoon, we went to one of Finland's national parks on a lake - wow it was gorgeous.  We walked around the lake and were pleased to see that our host, Jaako and our driver, Saku, were waiting for us through the forests with champagne!!!  We had a lovely toast on the bank of a river with a breathtaking view.  Some of us dipped our legs, and it was freezing!!  We ventured to the visitor's center in the national park where a guide gave us a tour and explanation of life in that bog.

Following, we headed to the local airport to take a tour of the surrounding area by air!!!  When we arrived at the TINY country airport, we found about 40 Finnish police officers using the long and non-trafficked runways as a track to test/improve their motorcycle skills.  They were doing road tests on their bikes - practicing chases at high speeds in populated areas.  Jaako is a pilot of a small Cessna and took up some of the group members for a flyover of Forssa and surrounding areas.  A Finnish pilot approached us in English - Heidi says it was odd for a Finn to open conversation like that, so we think he might have thought Robynn was quite cute - which isn't a bad thing as he was himself!!!  We learned that he is a commercial pilot for FinnComm Air (regional airline) - it was his day off and he was there with another pilot flying gliders.  Aimee and I were lucky to each have a glider ride with him (Pertti) over the area - we didn't go as far out as the others in the Cessna, but we got some fabulous pictures of the many lakes, and it was a once in a lifetime opportunity!!!  The scariest part was the very serious overview of how to exit the plane in a parachute if we lost control.  Going up in the tow plane was very interesting!!  I got lots of laughs, and some pictures, of Pertti ever-so-delicately and politely trying to strap Aimee into her parachute harnesses as she wore a dress!  Our glider flights were longer than anticipated because we had such a great time!  Pertti had warned us that we'd each likely vomit since it was our first glider flight, so we were pleased that we didn't! 

We rushed from the airport almost one hour late to a great dinner that Jaako and Heidi had arranged at Marshal Mannerheim's Hunting Cabin.  If we understood teh story correctly, he was a Russian Marshal who was integral in Finland gaining independence during the Winter War - he was sympathetic to them and urged them to fight.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Gustaf_Emil_Mannerheim
This was a very unique dinner with good food - and it was quite entertaining because we reenacted as if we were dinner guests of his so we ate his menu and the owner-host told us of his story with many DON'Ts while a guest at Mannerheim's cabin - including a) no elbows on the table b) not leaving the table before cognac and coffee at the very end c) not speaking of work at the table, etc.  The menu was:
Gronvall's cocktail - a specialty drink with strict instructions on how to raise glass
Karelian pastries with a mixture that was butter and scrambled eggs (better than it sounds!)
Filet of lamb, potatoes, and cauliflower and broccoli
***the owner made the best homemade mint jelly any of us had tasted (no creepy food coloring to make it bright green as at US stores!!)
Red wine
Dessert - pancakes with cloudberry jam and whipped cream
Port
Cognac and coffee (the cabin had some really great metal cognac "stands" to heat our cognac to appropriate temperature to drink.

We left the hunting cabin with very full stomachs and were again given a great surprise!  Our hosts had arranged for a private showing at a new boutique featuring high-end European designers.  This boutique is in an old house that has been refurbished and is in the middle of the forest in the middle of nowhere!  The owner allowed us to shop and try on specialty items for a bit - apparently the store has only been open for one month!  We all helped Jill pick out a great item for her son's wedding festivities this fall!

One of the best things about Finland is the daylight - it doesn't get as dark as we're experience back home, but it's daylight until very late with it not getting dark until after 11pm.  Unfortunately, this means that we have a tendancy to stay up longer than we'd hope!

So far, we're doing pretty good on updating our blog every day.  Today was a PACKED day with the Somero Rotary Club and we had a great time!  Today was Ascension Day and a state holiday in Finland, so all businesses were closed, except for the those the Somero Rotary club arranged to meet with us :)

We started the day off with some shopping at Somero Pellavakeskus - The Linen Centre.  After shopping, we went to the forest to watch some forestry.  It was amazing to see this $1 million machine cut and process 20 year old trees in less than 15 seconds.  The hippie inside me almost started crying!  But the cool thing about Finland is that for every tree they cut down, they plant 3 more trees.  Trees are Finland's "Green Gold".

Next we were treated to the home of famous Finnish writer, Kaara Utrio.  Mrs. Utrio was a very gracious host and treated us a complete tour of her home and printing business, all complete with a glass of champagne!  At the end of our tour, she presented each of the GSE members with one of her books (in English, of course!). 

After the tour, we walked a few hundred yards to the Red Waterlily Resturant (Ravintola Punainen Lumme).  We were treated to another traditional Finnish dinner of boiled potatoes, smoked salmon, homemade sausage, salted Baltic herring, sweet potato casserole, lettuce salad with cucumbers and tomatos, fried Pike fish, salted ham and a few other delicious dishes I'm forgetting to mention.  The meal was completed with a sour cream dessert with fresh blueberries, cloudberries and lingenberries (my favorite!) and coffee and tea.

We took so much time for lunch (did we mention that we Oklahoma girls really like to eat?) that we weren't able to view the old wooden Lutheran church in Somerniemi until later that afternoon.  Instead, we went straight to Hiidenlinna.  Hiidenlinna is one man's dream home, take a look at the pictures to see for yourself.  The owner did not speak any English and from what our Rotary hosts relayed to us, he was fond of telling dirty jokes that "didn't translate from Finnish". We also saw our first critter after arriving...Robynn stepped on a small snake.  Amy also had her own scare with a snake...a small, crooked wooden snake

Our time at Hiidenlinna didn't take as long as planned so we went back to the old wooden church in Somerniemi.  This was a gorgeous church that was more than 200 years old.  It's crazy to think that this church was twice as old as the state of Oklahoma! 

Then as true Fins, we ended our day at the sauna by the lake at the Somero parish camping centre in Siikjarvella.  The sauna/locker rooms were split for males and females.  And in true Finnish tradition, we did sauna the proper way.  After you get nice and sweaty in the sauna, you walk into the lake for a quick dip in the frigid water (today is was around 40F) then go back to the sauna to warm up and repeat as you feel necessary.  I'm not gonna lie, that water was COLD! but the feeling you get when you return to the sauna is really great.  Every Finnish home has it's own sauna.  When the winters get so cold, it's one way they can stay extra warm.  Also, the mixing of hot and cold is one way to really relax your body.  As I felt the sweat droplets slide down my body, I realized that Americans could really take a lesson from the Fins and take an hour or so twice a week to de-stress and relax. 

I've already decided that if/when I can afford to build my own home, it won't be complete without a sauna.  You're more than welcome to come over and sauna with me, but please bring your own towel or use a disposable butt towel to keep your germs to yourself :)  Oh and traditionally, men and women do not sauna together and suits are optional in your own home sauna, hence the reason for separate sauna facilities!

Lynn

Forssa, our first city.
A city committed to a few important things, as we learned yesterday. We learned Finns pay taxes comparable to ours and benefit in Forssa by receiving free college, subsidized art education for all ages, subsidized daycare, subsidized medical care. Forssa, is known as the best medical system and most comprehensive in all of Finland. More about that to come.
First, our whole group met and toured the local polytechnic school, which is like a college level technical school where they learn trades like nursing or engineering. Next, we went to the art school next door and made some great screen printed bags. We had lots of fun and all of this is housed within a wonderful old building which was originally home to a textile factory and mill which was the first true industry of Forssa.
Then we split up into our professional visits.
Lynn and Aimee visited the nursing school and the Psychiatric Unit of the Hospital. We had a tour of the inpatient and outpatient unit as well as the detox for drugs and alchohol. You will all be happy to know that though smoking is outlawed in all public places of Finland you can still smoke if you are inpatient in the hospital. WOW! Additionally, we were able to sit with a doctor and some nurses and receive a presentation on the healthcare system here in Forssa and ask many questions. It was very interesting!

We left OKC yesterday, May 9 at 12:35 p.m.  The Iceland volcano erupted again earlier that day, leaving us with a slight uneasy feeling that we might be diverted around the volcanic ash, or like some unlucky travelers, be half way to our destination and be forced to turnaround.  Good thing for us, we didn't experience either of those situations. 

Lesson #1 compliments of Delta: "Do not put any unapproved materials in the back seat pockets."  Weird. We reached Atlanta around 3:45 p.m. and proceeded to find some grub at the airport Chili's. We should have known that we were off to a bad start, when our server, Swan, brought Jill the chicken enchilada soup instead of the potato soup.  That just started a whole chain of bad juju.  After a round celebratory "1st leg journey" drinks, we proceeded to our gate. 

Our flight from Atlanta to Copenhagen, Denmark, was delayed from 6:30 to 7:45.  We saw quite a few crazy characters waiting for the plane to Denmark.  Some dudes with crazy facial piercings and tattoos from Pain for Fun - Body Extremes were probably the most extreme.  When it was finally time to board, people were antsy, crowding the boarding line when it wasn't their turn to board!  Our plane was very big; our seats were five rows from the back of the plane (closest to the restrooms).  We enjoyed an onboard dinner of chicken and veggies, salad, roll, brownie and complimentary wine :)  The flight wasn't too bad, not too many turbulence.  The girls who took the good sleeping pills enjoyed a more restful sleep than the other girls who took the over the counter sleeping pills - note to self - take good sleeping pills next time!

We arrive in Copenhagen, Denmark, almost two hours late.  We missed our connecting flight to Turku.  After being corralled like cattle up the escalator to the customs agents, we learned that we had been standing in the wrong line.  We needed to be in the line for connecting flights.  We only had to pass our carry-on lugguage through the x-ray machine.  Poor Robynn had her bags entirely unpacked by the security gal.  After reaching the TransferCentre, the lady behind the counter had the audacity to tell us that it was our fault that we missed our flight to Turku.  Nevermind that Delta didn't leave Atlanta until two hours late!  We spent the next 3-4 hours trying to find an alternate method of transportation to Turku.  Amy called American Express and that lady rebooked us on a flight to Helsinki.  The catch was that all of us would be on the 3:15 flight except Robynn, she was booked on the 5:10 flight.  Those this was not an ideal situation, it was the best we could get so we went with it.  Go figure, our flight to Helsinki was delayed too.  The four of us (Lynn, Aimee, Amy, Jill) said our goodbyes to Robynn and boarded the Scandinavian Airlines plane for Helsinki.  The air steward walked through the cabin, counting the available seats.  We could see 3 empty seats and hoped that he would get on the phone to tell the lady at the gate to bring Robynn on the plane, but he didn't.  But then, to our amazement, Robynn walked on the plane!  We cried shouts of joy to have all our team members together again. 

Fast forward an hour flight and another timezone and we land in Helsinki at 6:00 p.m. Helsinki time (10:00 a.m. Oklahoma time).  While in Copenhagen, the agent made Jill aware that her baggage claim ticket didn't have Turku as her bag's final destination, but assured her that since getting a new ticket to Helsinki, that her bag would follow her there.  Wrong!  All of our luggage arrived but Jill's.  Our Rotarian host and driver were very kind and drove us back the 80 miles to Forassa where we met our host families.

Amy and Robynn went back to their host family's house to enjoy some baked goods.  Aimee and I went with our host families to Subway for some authentic American sandwiches.  Jill went with her host family, though I'm not sure what food was involved in her stay :)

Overall, it has been a great day (besides Delta losing Jill's luggage and not automatically booking us to another Turku flight).  I'm almost certain that all of my team members have showered and are probably in bed by now.  We are meeting tomorrow morning at 8:30 a.m. (12:30 a.m. OK time).  The locals assure us that we'll recover from our jet lag very soon :)
Lynn

Our team has spent the last few days at various district conference events.  We met the inbound Finland team (Tapani, team leader; Katja, Emmi, Jani, and Jyrki) on Thursday evening at the Rotary BBQ  and have truly enjoyed getting to know them.  They graciously sat with each one of us and helped us learn and speak our Finnish introductions (thank you!).  Friday was the club luncheon and Saturday evening was the International Cuisine Party (check out the Rotarian sing-a-long to Bohemian Rhapsody on our Flickr page!).

It's been great talking to the inbound team members about what Finland is like, what the weather is really doing and whether it's proper to decline pickled herring. The inbound team won't return home until May 29 and we've already started planning for a reunion in Finland during the last few weeks of our stay there.

In case you feel like picking up a second language, here are some important Finnish phrases that my new friend, Jyrki, has taught me:

thank you = kiitos
cheers = kippis!
beer = olut/bisse
where is the restroom = missa on wc/vessa/naisten huone
no = ei
yes = kylla/joo
can I have some water = saisinko vetta
can I have some beer = saisinko oluen/bissen/olutta
water = vesi
good morning = hyvaa huomenta
good night = hyvaa yota

Lynn

I was reading the English version of the Helsingin Sanomat and came across a great article! 

http://www.hs.fi/english/article/Southern+Finland+promised+the+best+of+the+May+Day+weather+/1135256449513

It looks like we're in for a treat!  I'd like to see these skylarks and cuckoo birds they keep talking about :) 

Here's another site for the birds of Finland: http://www.birdphoto.fi/
Lynn