Swedener in Helsinki

I just spent one of the weirdest weeks of my life in Finland. And I’ve changed my mind about the place completely. I was right about the grimness, but it’s also simultaneously quirky and hilarious. All around Helsinki, if you look closely, you start noticing strange details in everything. For instance, many buildings have faces in them. Not random face-like patterns in the stones that you can barely make out if you squint, but actual gargoyle faces, carved into the nooks and corners of even modern structures. And there are these silver balls everywhere, hundreds of them. They must be some sort of art installation, but it feels like God dropped a handful of oversized ball-bearings and they rolled into weird places, slightly tucked behind electrical boxes, on the edge of the harbor, on median strips, nestled up against bus stops. You’ll also notice. English signs say things like “We got beef,” “drinking district,” and “so many things of everything.” Finnish ones contain 29-character words like “rakennusautomaatiosuunnittelu.” An especially strange bathroom sign indicated stalls for both female and handicapped patrons with icons of a woman and a wheelchair-bound person peeing at the same time, their streams of urine crossing in midair!

The design here is fanciful and weird, too. In such an austere-looking city, it’s a little jarring to see colors and patterns as whimsical as those of Marimekko and Ivana Helsinki in the shop windows. My first impression of Helsinki was that it’s not like Stockholm AT ALL, in fact, it seems much more Slavic than Scandinavian. But after spending a few days exploring the city in the company of Finns, I actually think Finland has a unique character distinct from both. If I had to try to classify it (and keep in mind I’m just forming this theory based on intuition and a very small amount of input), I would say it’s a place where people are externally tough, enduring, uncomplaining and quiet, but there’s a really colorful internal world of imagination, stories, and myths. I feel like Finland is exactly the setting of all the slightly twisted fantasies of childhood: there are absolutely trolls and monsters in the woods, and they will either turn out to be friendly, or they will eat you. You can spell words any way you want—extra letters just make it more fun! And you can totally name your dolls (or your kids) things like Teemu and Tikki.

So what was I doing all week in the land of elves and psychadelia? Bonnier Publishing Program, of course. We visited an internet startup, Nokia, and a couple of Bonnier companies, and worked on our entrepreneurship projects. We have a lot of work to do before presenting our ideas in May.

I really enjoyed the visit to Nokia, but my favorite part of the trip was a dinner we had at a crazy Russian restaurant. The place was ornate with pleated satin tapestry, oriental rugs and old oil paintings, and we were served a feast that included strange specialties like pickles with honey and sour cream, bear salami, and a raspberry meringue pavlova. There was a “vodka button” on the wall, and when you pressed it, a waitress would appear with a platter of icy vodka shots for everyone. I want a vodka button in my house!