The Great Explorer A.E Nordenskjöld…

…was the first man to prove that it was possible to sail through the Northeast Passage from Europe to Asia on the icy waters north of mainland Russia. Global warming could mean that the route discovered in 1879 becomes more usable in the future.

Today the Finnish explorers name is still heard very often in Helsinki as the capital’s top ice hockey team HIFK plays its games on an arena that is commonly called “Nordenkjöld street ice hall.” (There is also another team in Helsinki for those who find Nordenskjöld too difficult to pronounce)

Read more from wikipedia

• Adolf Erik Nordenskjöld
• Northeast Passage

Earlier photos of Nordensköld street ice hall

• Exterior
• HIFK poster

The Grumpiest Man In Town…

…at Aleksanterinkatu street.

Even the Railway Guys Are Wearing Hats…

…now that it has been colder than normally in October/November.

These Helsinki icons at the Central Railway Station were created by Emil Wickström and there are two others just outside of the photo on the left. The statues are called lyhdynkannattajat (carriers of the lanterns).

During the past years VR railway company has used them as animation figures in their advertising. The green hats are also part of their advertising campaign.

Carrying the Weight of the World

Kohottava voima (Lifting power) by Matti Haupt.

Helsinki City Art Musem has an excellent website about statues and monuments in Helsinki. Especially their map of statues has been very valuable for this blog as I can quickly find information about a statue that I’ve shot. So far I’ve found info about every single statue just by its location on the map.

We Shall Lose on the Football Fields…

…we shall lose on the volleyball courts, we shall lose on the ice rinks, we shall always surrender.

Yesterday was not a good day for Finnish team sports. Both women’s football team and men’s volleyball team lost their European championships games by a very small margin. And men’s ice hockey team lost to Czech Republic in a less important tournament.

The statue is Athlete (urheilija) by Erkki Toukolehto. Also known as wounded/injured athlete.

Finland – The Javelin Country

The days are long gone when small Finland was an athletics superpower but there is still one sport where Finns haven’t given up – the javelin. Finnish men have won seven olympic gold medals and women one. In athletics world championships (started in Helsinki 1983) we have 4 + 1 golds.

Today Tero Pitkämäki is defending his Osaka gold medal at Berlin athletics world championships. In a typical Berlin final there are no Finns and one would be rare but in the javelin final there are four.

Many Finns are also very knowledgeable about the best javelin throwers of other nations. When they are competing in Finland, they probably get more attention and support than anywhere else in the world. Today Finns are watching closely what Norwegian Andreas Thorkildsen is doing and earlier it was the incredible Czech Jan Zelezny who got the most attention.

The statue is Tellervo, daughter of Tapio (Tellervo, Tapion tytär) by Yrjö Liipola. It’s often also called Diana because Tellervo in Finnish mythology is the equivalent of the Roman goddess of forests.

Arvid Mörne

I’m quite sure that I belonged to the majority of Helsinkians who had no idea who is Arvid Mörne – a person notable enough to have a statue in one of the most valued districts of Helsinki.

The Swedish speaking Finn was a poet and he also had an academic career in Finnish literature. I was not able to find much about him in the net, not even in Swedish, but apparently his works were mainly influenced by socialism and the nature in the archipelagos.

The Flag Day of Finnish Defence Forces

Kukkula 13 (Hill 13) by Lauri Leppänen in front of Katajanokka Casino - which is actually a restaurant.

Today is the flag day of the Finnish defence forces. Although it is one of the eight official flag-raising days, it is very easy to live through the day without noticing anything special.

The day was chosen because it is the birthday of C.G.E Mannerheim who was in charge of the military during the most crucial moments of independent Finland in civil war and WW II.

The flag in the photo is a regular flag that is not used by the military.

CDP Theme Day 2009 / June: Feet

These feet were made for running: 9 olympic gold medals, 3 silvers, numerous world records.

Long distance runner Paavo Nurmi is considered one of the best olympians of all times. Before WW II long distance running was not dominated by Kenyans or Ethiopians: It was dominated by the Flying Finns.

In my opinion his most amazing achievement was done while he was preparing for the 1924 Paris olympics where 1500 meters and 5000 meters were run during the same day on a very tight schedule. Finns believe that this was intentionally done so that the Flying Finns would win less medals. In Helsinki at Eläintarha track Nurmi made an experiment whether he can run both distances using the olympic schedule. After it he was very confident: He had just ran new world records on both distances! It’s needless to say that he also won both distances at the olympics.

Nurmi was a pioneer in training methods but he was also banned from the 1932 Los Angeles olympics because of allegations that he was a professional athlete.  In 1952 Helsinki olympics Nurmi ran the olympic torch to the stadium and lit the olympic flame that was on the ground level (there was also another one at the tower).

On his 70th birthday Finnish broadcasting company wanted to interview Nurmi. He didn’t like the media much so he said that he must be inverviewed by the Finnish president. The interview was done.

Click here to view thumbnails for all participants

Boxing WBA Heavyweight Title Match Cancelled in Helsinki

Nyrkkeilijät (boxers) by Johannes Haapasalo. Uuno Pitkä and Armas Wilkman have been boxing at Hakaniemi since 1932.

WBA heavy weight title match between Nikolai Valuev and Ruslan Chagaev was supposed to be held today in Helsinki. The match was cancelled only a day earlier “after Chagaev was unable to fulfill the Finnish Boxing Federation´s medical requirements.” If you believe what the Finnish media writes, this is not a very normal cancellation due to medical reasons.

Today is also the last day of school here in Finland. The weather is very nice so parks, beaches and bars will be full of youngsters celebrating the start of summer vacation.

Nikolai Valuev