Minä Rakastan Suomea

A Note about Reading This Blog

2008-09-30T21:41:00.004-06:00

My husband Rob and I went to Finland for two reasons: first, to visit my parents, who are serving as the first temple president and matron, and second, to revisit the country and places I'd come to know and love during the three years our family lived there while dad was mission president.

To follow the trip chronologically, start with what looks like the last post ("On our Way"). When you reach the bottom, click on "newer post" for the next one in the series.

Some posts build on one another and refer to previous events or terms, so if you plan to go through all couple dozen of them, I recommend doing so in the right order.

On the other hand, if you just want a general overview and a look at a few Finnish photos, then the order probably doesn't matter so much. (I couldn't remember the events properly or write about them backwards, so you're stuck with this format.)

Another note: For the handful of people out there who read (and remember) my second novel, At the Water's Edge, several posts include references to it and pictures of locations significant to the book, including the "Elephant Rock" and my old school. They're all labeled, so if you're interested in seeing just those ones, you can pull them up specifically.

Thanks for dropping by! Leave a comment or two so I know you've been here.

Final Thoughts

2008-09-30T21:41:00.001-06:00

We left Finland with nearly twenty pounds of Finnish chocolate (and licorice and other candy), jewelry with the Finnish gemstone Spectrolite for me and the girls, cool Finnish knives for Rob and our son, and a boatload of memories.

I don't think there's ever been a period in my life where I've used the words, "I remember . . ." so many times in such a short span. They popped out constantly. It could be something as simple as driving along the highway and something sparking a memory, eating a familiar food I haven't tasted in two decades, or smelling a building or hearing a sound.

At times, I felt like the character Chuck from the TV show when he gets flashes of images and information firing in rapid succession from the intersect embedded in his brain. (That link is a montage of his "flashes." Ignore the obnoxious music.) For Chuck, the trigger for a flash is seeing the face of a bad guy or significant object.

During our trip, anything familiar sent off a flash of events and memories I'd often forgotten about, one firing after the other. It got emotional and overwhelming, but at the same time, it was wonderful to have so much come back like that.

Even the scents of the outdoors felt right. At first, I wished we could have come in the summer when it's warmer, but after a while, I was glad we were there as fall began to settle over the country. Not only was it more beautiful with the changing leaves and the pihlaja trees heavy-laden with their bright red berries, but the rain and cool air released scents I'd almost forgotten about: the fresh forest smells, the mist in the air, the tang of the wind coming off the salty water in the harbor.

In the end, I would have loved to stay longer, but we hit all the major locations on my priority list, ate all the important things and visited all the critical places, so I can be content. Some places aren't recorded in photos, like the mall (featured prominently in my book), our Finnish lunch at IKEA, and a few other things, but reading this blog gives a very good overview of what we did while there.

The time spent with my parents was precious. I'll treasure their generosity, all they did for me and Rob during our stay, and all the hours we spent together.

In the end, I felt that at last I was able to take a visit "home."

I wonder if I'll ever go back again.

Mom & Dad & the Temple

2008-09-28T16:54:00.000-06:00

The day before we left, Rob and I had the opportunity to participate in a session in the temple. It was a sacred experience for me, something I won't elaborate on here, but one I'll never forget.

After I returned to the women's dressing room, a worker came by to ask whether I was going to the next session. (Patrons often do session after session, since coming to the temple isn't that frequent of an event for them.)

We ended up talking, and within a few minutes, several other workers had joined us. I got to hear wonderful things about my parents from these lovely women. I know my parents are amazing people, but hearing it from other people makes it particulalry special.

As much as I miss them and wish they were here for my kids, I can see just how needed they are and how important the work is that they're doing. That, and I know they have a little over a year to go. I can last that long.

The entire temple experience was rather emotional for me. At one point, one of the sisters told me, "You look like your mother when you cry."

That's something I'll take with me forever.

The Olympic Tower

2008-09-28T16:49:00.000-06:00

Helsinki hosted the 1952 summer Olympic games. Back in 1980 when we visited for the summer, we swam at the Olympic pool several times.

The Olympic tower itself. Very cool to see. The ride up in the elevator is less cool. (Yes, it's the claustrophobia kicking in again. I'm such a wimp.) Most of the pictures below are from the top of the Olympic tower.

Several of the Olympic venues, including soccer fields.

A great view that shows the colorful and beautiful city below.

Looking out over Helsinki. I think the tall building in the center is Kalliokirkko, seen better in this post.

View of the train tracks leading into the station.

The kids have a Finnish puzzle at home from Grandma and Grandpa. It features famous images from Finland, and one of them is this statue of Paavo Nurmi, an Olympic runner. We had to stop and take a picture for their sake. I ended up being silly in the process.

Uspenski Cathedral

2008-09-28T16:45:00.000-06:00

Here's a landmark I'd seen dozens of times but never entered until this trip: The Uspenski Cathedral, which, unlike most of the other churches we visited, is Russian Orthodox. (The others were Lutheran.)

You can tell the difference between Lutheran and Orthodox churches pretty quickly. The Russian Orthodox are far more elaborate with icons, gold, etc. They look more Catholic than the Lutheran ones.

The Mission Office

2008-09-28T16:40:00.000-06:00

Time for another blast from the past: the mission office. The whole time I was there, it was much of the same thing I'd been saying for the whole trip: "Remember when . . ."

This is the street level and the Church sign out front. Just inside the brown gate there are the chapel doors (visible in this post). Go up a floor, and you reach the mission office.

As soon as we walked inside the building, Dad paused and said, "Smell that?" Boy, did I. It was the same smell as it had been for decades. I still can't get over how powerful scents are for evoking memory.

The interior has been totally remodeled since 87. Here I am standing in the doorway of what used to be Dad's office as mission president. It's now a room used for community outreach meetings and teaching investigators. The table on the right was where the elder who was Dad's secretary had his desk.

Here's Dad in his old office, sitting roughly where his desk used to be.

More community outreach stuff, looking at the room from the old office door. This area used to be where the office elders had their desks. Now, instead of elders, missionary couples work the office, and they do so in rooms down the hall to the right, an area opened up during the renovation. I think it used to be part of the office elders' apartment.

Inside what is now the mission president's office. Dad's explaining a map that shows the Finno-Ugric languages. (Language nerds like myself love this kind of stuff.)

Laid to Rest

2008-09-28T16:38:00.001-06:00

This is the grave of my grandfather (Rudolf, or "Rudy"), his brothers Teodor ("Teddy") and Oskar, and a sister-in-law (Teddy's wife).

The cemetery is gorgeous and so well-maintained.

Espoo Cathedral

2008-09-28T16:32:00.001-06:00

The Espoo Cathedral was something none of us had seen before. Rob had found them in a guide book and thought that seeing it would be neat. It was.

This plaque honors men from the area who served and fell during World War I.

Above and below: interesting frescoes on the ceilings and walls.

The frescoes at a distance, looking toward the entrance.

The cemetery just outside the cathedral. The Espoo area was originally settled by Swedes, so most of the headstones have Swedish rather than Finnish names on them.

A monument to those who fell when Russia invaded Karalia, which used to be part of Finland.

Sabbath

2008-09-28T16:31:00.000-06:00

Mom and Dad know me so well. Even though the temple is in a different ward's boundaries, they knew that come Sunday, I'd love to visit what was my home ward during those three years.

Observations:

The brick paving the parking lot looks paler than I remember it. Either it's faded from a pretty pinkish to nearly gray-white, or I'm not remembering it correctly.
For rain downspouts, there used to be huge chains coming down from the roof that were then attached to concrete blocks on the ground. As weird as they were, it was a bit sad to see that the chains are gone and the chapel now has actual downspouts.
The interior looks the same as it always did, although some rooms are now being used for different things. The Young Women room and bishop's office have swapped locations, for starters.
I could practically see little ghosts of me, my sisters, many of the missionaries we knew, and several events (a wedding, a Halloween party put on for the English class kids, chatting with elders in the hall, a baptism . . .).
While we lived there, Bishop Eklund presided over the ward. Today it's Bishop Eklund . . . the son. Who was in Young Mens when I was a Beehive. How trippy is THAT?

Dad used to tell us girls that if we didn't speak Finnish at home, that eventually we'd forget it. I used to think, Right. I'll forget how to breathe, too. Lo and behold, several years later, it did start to fade away.

Sitting in sacrament meeting, I suddenly remembered why I fought the idea of speaking Finnish at home, at least during the mission. I could understand most of what was said by the speakers when I concentrated really hard. But if I let my mind wander for even a second, I'd lose it. And by the end of the meeting, my brain was nearly fried.

Back in the 80s, after spending a full day at school concentrating . . . HARD . . . on the language, my brain was little better than cottage cheese. I'd forgotten what that felt like. During the mission, when I came home, I just had to rest my brain. But dang, I do wish we'd spoken Finnish when we returned to Utah.

After church, Dad took me and Rob inside the temple to look around. The reverence Dad has for the temple is palpable. The temple itself is easily the most gorgeous one I've ever seen the interior of. And the entire place is infused with the Spirit in a way that I'd never felt before, even inside other temples.

On our way out, I teared up. I didn't want to walk back out. I could have stayed there for hours, just soaking up the feel and the beauty. But alas, all things must come to an end, and I knew I'd be back in a few days for an actual session.

The Laukkanens, some old family friends, came for dinner. We played some table games and chatted, and then we called it a night.

All in all, a great sabbath.

A Night with Katri & Antti

2008-09-28T16:16:00.000-06:00

First things first: As part of school picture day in Finland, we had the option of paying a little more for a "kaverikuva," or a "chum" or "pal" picture. Katri and I did that twice, and here's the shot from 1985, when we were eleven:

Kaverikuva revisited, 23 years later:

During our trip back, seeing Katri once wasn't enough; we had to spend more time to together. She and her boyfriend, Antti, were generous enough to invite me and Rob over for dinner.

We had a great time talking and eating and just spending the evening together, talking books and music, catching up, and having a great time. One delightful discovery was a chess clock sitting atop the bookshelf: the same one Katri and I used when playing chess way back when!

(I'm still thinking I need to ask Katri for the recipes she served us . . . although, um, anyone know where I can get pike perch in Utah? Man, it was good.).

After dinner, Katri took me and Rob on a walk through her neighborhood while Antti went to get a car. It was a gorgeous area.

Katri showed us this piece of, er, art. It's auditory art, I guess. It's got a recording of announcements from the airport that come out of a drain. It's titled, "But I'm leaving."

Okay, then . . .

Here we are acting eleven again at Karhupuisto ("Bear Park," as evidenced by the statue).

The Kallio church as visible from Karhupuisto.

Antti picked us up at the park and drove us to back to Espoo, where my parents met us outside the patron housing (the yellow building on the right) and showed Katri and Antti around the temple grounds (in the background).

One of my favorite pictures from our trip: Katri and Antti in front of the temple.

They're such a great couple, and I'm so glad that I got to meet Antti and get reacquainted with Katri!

Seurasaari

2008-09-28T16:08:00.000-06:00

Yet another location from my book. (You can tell many of the things that impacted me as a kid, because they show up in it.) Here's me with Dad on the bridge leading into Seurasaari, which is an outdoor museum. It has lots of historic buildings and other structures brought from all over the country.

We brought bread and trail mix to feed the animals. The ducks and even some swans gathered around real quick when they saw us throwing bread into the water.

Not far into the park, we had birds following us. On a lark (no pun intended) Rob decided to try feeding them to see if they'd come. Several birds came and ate right out of his hand!

We had several squirrels following us as well, especially this little guy. He ate plenty that we dropped in front of him, but he seemed so comfortable around people I thought he just might eat from my hand. Waddaya know!

Dad and me strolling along the paths.

A neat fence: simple to construct, yet effective. Once we noticed them at Seurasaari, we noticed them in other historic locations we went to.

A tree that is protected and is considered a landmark of sorts because it's got a giant ant hill inside.

Hanging out by an old cabin.

I decided to use this picture as my computer wallpaper for a while. It's so pretty, and it's very Finnish. You can't go anywhere without seeing colorful flowers in windows, and seeing them inside a historic building has just that much more flavor.

A windmill.

A close-up of the windmill's construction. I can't even imagine how long it would take (not to mention the craftsmanship involved) in making this kind of thing.

An old wooden swing.

What food storage looked like for northern Finns long ago: high enough so bears and other animals couldn't get to it.

Weird natural phenomenon here: a perfectly round cut-out filled with water. As you can see, it even has its own sign announcing its bizarre presence. A close-up is below.

Seeing My Aunt

2008-09-28T16:07:00.000-06:00

My Aunt Amanita and her husband, Vellu, took Rob and me out for dinner one night. Afterward we went to back to their place for dessert and conversation.

After so many years, it was nice to see her again and have a chance to catch up!

Suomenlinna Fortress

2008-09-26T06:57:00.000-06:00

Suomenlinna (Finland's Fortress) was near the top of my list of "must see again" locations. It's an island fortress built in the early 1800s, a 15-minute ferry ride off the coast of Helsinki. It was built by a Swedish king as a defense against Russia but has been used for other military purposes since. Some retired military families also live inside the fortress, in refurbished apartments. During the winter, a van service brings people back and forth instead of the ferry.

We got a kick out of this sign. You probably can't read it, but under "Regulations," it describes things that are not allowed on the island (among them: littering, entering private homes, drinking alcohol, and such).

The last item on the list? Probably not something you see on many signs:

No cycling on the ramparts.

I love this place, which is one reason it plays a role in ATWE.

Looks almost like a Hobbit hole . . .

Cannons pointing out toward the water.

Storage areas. Near the cannons, so I'm guessing they're magazines.

View of Helsinki from the island. The tall green spire on the left is the National Museum.

Another view where you almost expect Hobbits to show up.

The dry dock. One end opens to the ocean and fills with water. Then ships come in and the water is drained out so the vessels can be worked on. It's very old, but it's still in use today.

One of the old buildings. Looked like it was a storage area for food and/or animals.

Here's a long fortress area where soldiers would fight from. There are tons of little alcoves along the passage where they'd gather.

One of the alcoves. The slits in the wall are where they'd stick out their rifles to shoot from.

Neat to see the different layers of building. You can tell what's older and what was added later based in part on the building material used (stone versus brick).

The Suomenlinna church. Note the "fence," which is made out of chains and old cannons.

Walking through one of many tunnels. It was interesting to see "library" and other signs along the way. This is really a community embedded inside a national monument.

It was quite cold and windy the day we visited. We had a while to wait for the return ferry, so we dropped in on the island's little grocery store. We got some drinks and snacks. I picked a bottle of Pommac, a soda I'd all but forgotten about.

With my first sip, a flood of sensations and familiarity once again came over me. Good stuff, that Pommac!

City of Naantali

2008-09-26T06:54:00.000-06:00

As we left Turku, we decided to stop off at Naantali, a quaint town with lots of old architecture and plenty of character. Above is the cathedral.

The cathedral in the distance. Like nearly every place in Finland, there's water and a harbor. A lot of wealthier people sail boats here during the warmer months.

Even though it was cold, we had to stop off at a snack booth for an ice cream treat!

The Naantali cemetery. Once again, my creative juices were flowing. It looked like the classic graveyard, with plenty of stories behind it.

Mom and Dad walking along the harbor. Bright-colored flowers like the red ones here were everywhere. Many streets were barely wide enough for a single car to drive down, and the houses were quaint cottages, authentic buildings with bright colors and personalities.

It was a fun stop, even if we did have trouble trying to find a place to park!

Turku Castle

2008-09-26T06:46:00.000-06:00

Finland has several old castles, and this is the one I remembered best, Turunlinna. (Cool round wall on the left, huh?) The castle is 700 years old, although (if memory serves) it was used most during the 1500s.

Tell me the pictures above and below don't look like something out of a movie. I swear, the entire time we were there, I could imagine stories and characters and all kinds of fun stuff. I wanted to write a story set right there.

Above: writings and pictures that were once painted over and later restored.

Here's the dungeon, made all the more eerie by the silhouettes of weapons.

Here I am with Dad on the other side of the dungeon. Look over the railing and see where the prisoners were kept—along with a round hole with a seat in the stone that was used as a latrine.

A "fun" bit of ambiance above . . . fake rats in the prisoner cell.

Some of the brick structure. There were a lot of gorgeous rooms, many used for state visits and banquets.

Several chests like this are on display with amazing carvings and cool hinges.

A banquet room with a tapestry. Many walls had tapestries like this along with paintings of important figures from Finnish history. Many of these big rooms are still in use today for wedding receptions and other important events.

Here's a fun shot of old meets new: Standing on a modern staircase in the middle of the castle tower with the original old stonework for walls.

We had to go through several of these old "hallway" tunnels and staircases. They're dark and narrow . . . not the best thing for someone with mild claustrophobia.

Above: the castle chapel, where occupants came to worship.

We walked into a room and found this funky mannequin in the corner, which startled us. A few minutes later, we went to a different area, where there was another figure next to the wall. I was reading aloud from the tour booklet (rather loudly), and when I glanced up, realized that the figure was a real person. I think I yelped. Rather loudly.

Some of several wood carvings. Many of them were religious, others looks war-like.

This room was originally a shooting range. It was later used as a banquet hall, and finally turned into a bigger chapel. The elaborate booths on either side are where the (Swedish) king and queen would sit.

Turku City

2008-09-26T06:41:00.000-06:00

One of the places outside Helsinki I had to see again was Turku, which was a place Rob had read about in a Finnish guide book and also wanted to see.

It's one of the older cities of Finland, as it was the capital before Helsinki was. It's so pretty.

One of the first places we walked to was the outdoor market, or tori.

We walked around the city quite a bit.

Above is one of the more modern building in Turku, the new library.

On our way to see the cathedral in the distance.

The Turku Cathedral houses the first Bible written in Finnish. (Didn't get to see that, however.) Several military figures are buried there, and the building has a lot of beautiful stained glass and murals. As a worship service was going on at the time, we couldn't take pictures inside.

For some bizarre reason, the usually blue and pretty river was brown. We're guessing it was due to construction upstream. But the sides of the river were still beautiful!

There's a separate post about the biggest attraction we visited in Turku: the castle there, Turunlinna (which I suppose is redundant, as it means, "Turku's castle").

Sight for Sore Eyes

2008-09-26T05:00:00.000-06:00

During the three years my family lived in Finland, I attended the public school. It was difficult, but somehow I made friends even though we didn't share a common language, at least for the first year until I learned enough Finnish to get by.

Katri (left) was the first person to invite me to her place to play. We walked to her apartment (featured prominently in ATWE as Sister Henderson's) and did our best to communicate by passing a dictionary back and forth.

We soon learned that chess is an international language, so we played a lot of that. I also borrowed books from her mother's collection of Agatha Christie novels (in English! The sweetness!).

Katri and I have kept in touch over the years (now in English, alas . . . my near-fluent Finnish from '87 is now sadly lacking), and I absolutely had to see her when we visited.

To my delight, she arranged for another dear classmate, Leena (right), to join us. I'd been out of touch with Leena for years but had wonderful memories of times together.

After we came home, I dug up one of class picture from '85. By a twist of fate, all three of us are standing beside one another in the same order as in the picture above:

Seeing them both again was wonderful and a definite high-point for me. Leena brought along her son Mikko, who was about 8 months old. She also has a three-year-old, and it was fun to talk about mommy things like potty training and sleepless nights—topics we most certainly didn't have to talk about when we were eleven or twelve.

Katri treated us (me, her boyfriend Antti, and Leena) to a sightseeing cruise around Helsinki. It was absolutely beautiful, in spite of the wind, and we had a great time catching up.

Afterward, Katri and Antti took me out to dinner, and we finished off the evening with desserts from the Fazer cafe. (Holy YUM!!!)

Rob went back to the apartment to sleep off some jet leg, so he wasn't there for this part. This means that it didn't even occur to me to take my camera out of my purse during the cruise or dinner. Brilliant. Fortunately, Rob was there at the initial reunion, so we have at least one picture.

The Suurkikko Cathedral

2008-09-26T04:45:00.000-06:00

The Suurkirkko ("Great Church") Cathedral is easily one of the most recognizable buildings in Helsinki. It's right in a central area with government buildings, the harbor, the outdoor market, and more.

In front is a statue of a Russian tsar from the time Finland was a Grand Duchy of Russia. Memory fails me on which tsar this is.

At the base of the stairs, a university building Mom once worked in.

The view from the top of the Suurkirkko stairs, looking out over the government buildings.

Inside Suurkirkko.

A statue of Lutheranism's founder, Martin Luther. The Lutheran church is the predominant church and the state religion.

The organ.

Pews and candles. Every church we went into had candles burning.

Above the door: the all-seeing eye.

And So It Began

2008-09-26T04:34:00.001-06:00

This is the door leading into the Neitsytpolku Ward chapel in downtown Helsinki. On the other side is where Dad was standing when this gorgeous blonde walked in and he first met Mom.

This is inside the train station, where Dad ran into Mom after first meeting her at church. He seized the moment and asked her to get drinks of juice together.

Dad had served a mission in Finland some five years previous and was chatting with some of the current missionaries.

As he went off with that knock-out beauty, he called out to the poor guys who wouldn't have a date for months yet, "Eat your heart out, elders."

Downtown Helsinki

2008-09-26T04:00:00.000-06:00

The train station is one of the most recognizable pieces of architecture in Helsinki:

Above is the end line of the commuter trains at the train station. We rode these a lot. The temple and patron housing are technically in Espoo, which is a short, 12-minute train ride away.

Esplanadi is one of the prettiest streets to stroll through.

One of several statues in Esplanadi featuring national heroes. Many of them represent literary figures. We walked past this one several times. Honestly, no clue who he is. But isn't the landscaping gorgeous?

Mom and me. This is the end of Esplanadi as you enter the dock with the kauppatori (the open-air market) and many official buildings. The area has a classic look to it (maybe because it's historic . . .), so it's been used as a setting as a governmental court plaza in some historical movies.

(Love the cobblestoned streets in this area! They're just visible in the center of the photo where the sandy park area ends. More pictures with the cobblestones below.)

Mom pointed out the irony in how much people pay for fancy granite counter tops . . . and the Finns walk and drive on the stuff. To be fair, the entire country basically sits on a giant piece of granite.

The harbor. A Silja Line ferry ship is visible on the right. We took these kinds of ferries across to Sweden for youth temple trips, only we boarded in Turku, not Helsinki.

The criss-crossing tram lines through the cobbled streets.

The Havis Amanda statue right by the tori (market) and the harbor. The woman the artist was with, a model, came under public attack. The statue is her in the middle, with the seals on the outside spewing water that doesn't touch her. They represent the gossipers and naysayers and how their words couldn't touch her. A close-up shot of the center is below.

Seeing the Finnish flag flying in the background brings me joy.

Another statue with the Russian-Finnish connection. Note the two-headed eagle at the top. Also the bright colored buildings in the back. Everywhere you go, whether it's downtown Helsinki or in the countryside, you see bright buildings like that.

Again, it's probably because of the long, dark winters. Gotta liven things up. That, or the fact that everything the Finns do is pretty. They're very aware of how things look. Nothing's just about function.

In the back is the Russian Orthodox church, known as the Uspenski Cathedral. We went inside later, so it'll have its own post.

The kauppatori (market) is in the foreground. Lots of fresh food and goods to buy. This is where we purchased gifts for our girls.

Fresh fish for sale at the tori.

Boats pull up to shore to sell fish, potatoes, and other foods.

Near the open-air market is the indoor one, the kauppahalli. (Think Pike's Place in Seattle.)

In addition to all the other yummy things available in the kauppahalli, of course Mom and I were drawn to the Kultasulka booth. Translated (do I even have to say it?): Golden Chocolate.

Above is the "Great Church" or Suurkirkko, which is in the same centeral area with these other sights but has its own post.

The National Museum

2008-09-26T03:27:00.001-06:00

When I think of the Finnish National Museum, this is what I think of first: the frescoes on the ceiling when you first walk in, reflecting scenes from The Kalevala. (Like many aspects of Finland, I used them in ATWE.)

Above: The center scene is the hero Väinämöinen fighting off an attack from the Mistress of the North that results in the sampo being broken and falling into the sea.

To the right you can make out a bit of the forging of the sampo, a mill that provided all the things that made life good: salt, wheat, and gold. When it broke and fell into the sea, it continued to produce salt, which is why the ocean is salty. Parts of it washed up on the southern end of Finland, which is why it's supposed to be the best and most prosperous area.

Above: Center image is Ilmarinen doing one of many feats to win the Maid of the North: plowing a field of snakes.

To the left is the creation of the kantele, an Finnish instrument. In the stories (and in the painting), Väinämöinen's men caught a massive pike and used the jawbone to make the kantele.

The entire building is beautiful, from the turret and bear statue outside to the stained-glass windows.

A reconstructed cabin with how people lived long ago in the area.

A model of traditional Finnish clothing/costumes. No idea why I have that weird look on my face.

Probably one of the most famous Finnish paintings, this represents the maid of Finland and the two-headed eagle of Russia trying to rip the law from her hands. To say that Russia and Finland have a rocky history would be an understatement.

Another painting from The Kalevala, only one we'd never seen before. It's where Ilmarinen has been killed and his body torn apart, and his mother goes to the river of the underworld to rake up the pieces. A bee comes that brings him back to life. It's an eerie picture (although you can't really see all his body parts floating around in the photo). So well done.

Rooms and rooms were filled with fancy artifacts from the past, many from the era where Finland was a grand duchy of Russia. Note the tsar's throne to the left.

Very old and beautiful wooden chests below and cabinets above. With the dark, long winters here, it's no wonder, really, that the people use bright colors to liven things up. They were intricate and amazing to look at.

Some fun grandfather clocks (and one grandmother clock—note the arms and shape of the one second to last), again with bright colors.

A rather obscure bit we found: an idol fishermen used in hopes of a good catch after their church burned down. Apparently when it didn't work, a monk threw it into the ocean. But when it washed up elsewhere, the people there caught lots of fish and kept it as good luck.

Now that's a fun book shelf!

Ainola: Sibelius's Home

2008-09-23T16:46:00.000-06:00

A short drive from Helsinki is Ainola, the home where Jean Sibelius lived for much of his life with his wife and daughters. It's named after his wife, Aino, and means, "Place of Aino" or "Where Aino is."

He built the house in this location on purpose so he'd be away from the city but still close enough for business. It was near Aino's brother's place (an artist), and back then the house had a view of a lake.

The woods have grown taller, so you can't see the lake from the windows anymore. And in typical Finnish fashion, you can hardly see it from the highway running parallel to it. Even though the lake's only a few yards away, the trees are so thick that for a good chunk of the drive, you can't see the water at all.

I'd visited Ainola before (whether during the mission or in 1980 when the family visited for the summer, I'm not sure), and I remembered parts of the home and area. But I was surprised at how much I didn't remember.

We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, which is a pity, what with all the neat things in there.

The one thing that jumped out of my memory the moment I laid eyes on it was a painting over one door. It was just as I'd remembered it. The story connected with it is probably what made it stick with me.

Sibelius had synesthesia, and in his case it meant that sounds had colors. This particular painting has a lot of bright yellow in contrast to a dark background with blacks and reds. He named the painting after the sound he heard in connection with the yellow: D major.

Why I didn't remember the bright green fireplace a few feet away from the painting that he said sounded like F major, I'll never know.

Sibelius had six different ash trays for cigars, and Aino could always tell what mood he was in depending on which one he used. We thought it'd be a great idea for me to have six different chocolate dishes on my desk so Rob might have a fighting chance at knowing what mood I'm in each day!

Sibelius insisted that his rain gutters be made of wood instead of metal because wood sounded more pleasant when rain hit them.

The tour guide said that Sibelius required silence to work, and his daughters weren't allowed to make noise or (especially) play the piano while he composed.

I've heard the same thing about other artists, writers, and painters who are or were fathers. And I couldn't help but think how differently mothers who try to produce art have to manage things. (If I needed absolute silence to write, I'd rarely get a darn thing done.)

One nice thing was how much the tour guide emphasized Aino's role in Sibelius's life, how her support enabled him to produce his work, and how without her, he probably wouldn't have gone far.

Apparently in his old age, he became heavily self-critical and published little. He even burned some pieces he'd worked on for years and years. There's one big piece at least that is still unpublished, because he didn't think it was ready for the public, so people are respecting that.

Above is the exterior of the Sibelius family sauna (a fixture of any Finnish home), along with one of several wells on the property. A sauna needs its water!

Inside the sauna house, with the bathing and changing rooms.

The stove in the sauna.

Old buckets, stools, etc. from the sauna house.

An ingenious way to heat bath water: after the water gets hot in the tub, ladle it into the trough at the top, which then runs into the tub, located on the other side of the wall.

Another well. (And Mom and Dad.)

The graves of Jean and Aino Sibelius, located on the sunniest part of the property, in front of Aino's apple tree.

The Sibelius Monument

2008-09-23T15:45:00.001-06:00

Here's one of the few pictures I got of Rob. He spent most of his time faithfully recording our trip with the camera while I soaked it all in. But at the Sibelius Monument, I insisted he get in a shot.

The monument is for one of the most (if not the most) celebrated composer from Finland, Jean Sibelius. Above is the part that looks like organ pipes in the air. It's really beautiful.

Nearby is the sculpture showing his face.

The inscription is in three languages: Finnish on top, Swedish in the middle, and English on the bottom. In English it reads:

Monument to commemorate the composer Jean Sibelius (1863–1957)

The piece he's most famous for is "The Finlandia," which is a national patriotic song of Finland (comparable to "America the Beautiful" or "Battle hymn of the Republic" in the States, but not the national anthem).

The tune is now used in the LDS hymnal with different lyrics as "Be Still My Soul." Every time I sing it at church, I'm brought back to Finland. (And I have an urge to sing the real words in Finnish!)

I tried to find a spot where there's a clip of the music online, but couldn't locate one. However, I did discover that "The Finlandia" has been used on movie soundtracks like The Clone Wars and Die Hard 2.

Somehow, that seems so wrong . . .

On a whim, we trotted across the street to another park to see this statue, which shows a moment from The Kalevala, the book of Finnish mythology. The woman in the statue is Ilmatar (queen of the air), and I believe the scene is connected to the creation of the world. (The bird lays an egg on her knee, and it breaks apart to form various parts of the world. I think.)

The inscription above says it's from the Kalevala and was given by Leo and Regina Wainstein in 1959 to the city of Helsinki.

Church in the Rock

2008-09-23T15:21:00.000-06:00

The "Church in the Rock" or the Temppeliaukio Kirkko is so very Finnish in many ways, not the least of which is the fact that the walls are blasted right out of the surrounding granite. It was designed and built by two brothers and finished in 1969.

The massive roof is made of coiled copper and is magnificent to look at.

The dozens of tall windows that surround the copper let sunlight stream in and reflect off the copper on the balcony. In the center above, you can see some of the mineral and water seepage that comes right through the rock.

The acoustics are amazing. Michelle got to perform here as a kid with a choir group. Here you can see the organ. Up front is where orchestras perform.

Roihuvuoren Ala-Aste

2008-09-22T20:08:00.000-06:00

The next thing I just had to see was my old school. Next to the mission home itself, it's the place I spent more time than anywhere during those years. It's where I learned Finnish, made friends, learned to knit, and so much more.

In a country that generally pays close attention to creating beautiful things, it's rather strange that my school is such an odd-looking thing:

I had the same classroom, classmates, and teacher all three years. Our room was on the second floor, the one on the far right. You can see the ramp we walked up and down each day to get to class and to come out for recess. Just walking up the ramp and running my hand over the wood brought back a slew of memories.

Something that caught me totally off-guard was the moment I opened the door. The scent of the school washed over me, and I felt transported back in time. It smelled just as it had the first day I walked in those doors with my father (who was with me there again) when I arrived, scared and knowing no more than a couple of Finnish words . . . and the same way it smelled my last day there, when I had made dear friends and now knew the language well enough that I sometimes caught myself thinking in it.

The classroom door was locked, but at one point someone opened it, and I peered inside. I'd forgotten what the curtains at the top of the windows looked like, but there they were. The exact same ones as when I attended 21 years previous!

The halls now have green paint, which is a change. But looking down through the windows at the gym was just as it had been. I think the curtains even looked the same, pushed aside in spots in the same way there were then.

The lunchroom. The tables are different, and they now serve from the other side (you can see the set-up on the left, where it used to be on the right), but it still feels and looks much the same as it did. I can remember in detail the green color of the tables and where our class table stood.

Walking down to the lunchroom felt like old times. I could almost see my classmates lining up and peeling back the foil of their milk cups. I remembered my first weeks there, when the kids try to trick me into thinking the food was scary stuff. One boy, through another student who knew English and translated, tried to get me to believe that the rice was ant eggs!

I tried the door to the handwork classroom, but it was locked. Here it is, though: behind that door, I learned to knit, embroider, and much more.

Walking back down this hall brought back more things I'd forgotten about, like a verbal reading test I took on the other side of that sliding door. (I remember thinking how silly it was to test me on reading aloud when I couldn't even speak the language I was reading in.)

I found a photo on the wall of the current faculty. I didn't expect to see my homeroom teacher or even my other teachers (handwork, music, P.E.), and I didn't. I found out later that dear Mr. Hämäläinen (below) passed away somewhere around ten years ago in a skiing accident.

These look like the same wooden beams we played on two decades ago. Two teams line up, and the front person in line of each tries to knock the other person off balance and off the beam. The idea is for one team to get all the way across the beam, inches at a time. I don't think any team ever won, but it was great fun, and I got pretty good at defeating opponents!

During our time in Finland, President Ezra Taft Benson gave his challenge to "flood the Earth" with the Book of Mormon. Our stake asked each ward to pass along a certain number of copies, and our Beehive class divided it further. Each of us were to give out three copies and to tell someone the Joseph Smith story.

I went to school with three copies in my backpack and a flurry of butterflies in my stomach. By a stroke of fate, we ended up spending part of the afternoon outside, with many of the students playing Finnish baseball and others just playing around. I ended up at the top of this blue play structure with three friends, and there felt prompted to tell the story.

Although I knew Finnish relatively well at that point, I spoke clearer and with vocabulary I didn't know. By the time I was done, quite a crowd of girls had gathered around. One asked, "Is that a true story?" which led nicely into being able to bear my testimony. I gave out all three copies when we went back to class, and one or two more the next day.

Here's our 1985 school picture. Landy, the stories I could tell . . .

I'm in the middle row, second from the left. For more about the girls flanking me, read this post and this one (or just read them all in order, and you'll get there).

Oh, and the boy trying to convince me that the rice was ant eggs? Bottom right in the Bruce Springsteen shirt (does that date this picture or what?). My interim translator, a boy named Christopher (or Tofferi, as they called him), who'd lived in Ireland and knew English, is on the bottom row, second from the left.

I was about to mention my girl friends specifically, but that would pretty much take up most of the class. Sniff.

The Elephant Rock

2008-09-22T19:07:00.000-06:00

From the mission home, we walked down to the beach and over to what my sisters and I named "The Elephant Rock" because of its vague resemblance to an elephant head.

The water is higher now than it was in the mid-80s, so the "face" and "trunk" of the rock, which face the water, aren't as visible as they used to be. But you can still see quite well the outline of an elephant's head and ears from the back.

I have many memories about the Elephant Rock and time I spent on it gazing out into the water. The area around it looks like a big lake, but it's actually an ocean inlet with peninsulas and islands in the way.

My second published novel, At the Water's Edge, got its name, in large part, to the Elephant Rock and events placed at it. (I posted the cover in the side bar so you can laugh at how truly inaccurate it is.)

When I walked out over it, the moment felt reverent. For years I'd imagined myself coming back and walking across it, and here it was. I kept whispering to myself, "I'm here. I'm really here." That was just one of literally hundreds of moments during the trip where I got choked up with emotion.

In addition to the rock itself, other items in photos taken there include a huge water tower to the west that looks remarkably like a UFO and birds (ducks, crows, and even a swan).

Harmaapaadentie 6

2008-09-21T19:11:00.000-06:00

Monday, September 8 was devoted to major trips down memory lane, in particular the Marjaniemi area of Helsinki.

First stop: The mission home

The Browns, the current mission president and his wife, graciously let me come and poke my nose around the place and reminisce. Walking into that house was the first of many times where memories rushed over me in a wave, things I'd forgotten or hadn't thought about in two decades.

In the picture above, I was looking at the spot on the yard where my sister Michelle and I built a snow fortress one winter. It had three rooms, windows, chairs, and doors. It was quite the production.

Below is a picture of me in the bedroom I claimed as mine for much of the time we lived there. I'm inside the closet where our older brother Mike hid one afternoon, hoping to startle Michelle as she walked in. Instead, Michelle innocently closed the closet door—effectively locking Mike inside.

Instead of letting him out, 8-year-old Michelle panicked and ran to Mom, asking what to do. Mom laughed her head off, figuring it served him right, as Mike had locked me and Michelle into the closet of another room for a couple of hours earlier that week. She didn't let him out right away.

Another Mike story involves the stairs. As you can see below, they're made of wooden steps attached to a metal frame, so there's a gap between each one. Mike was known to hide beneath the stairs and reach out to grab your ankle as you went down. This resulted in the person coming down either a having heart attack or slipping and falling.

Many a night, well after Mike returned to the States, I walked up or down those stairs certain that something was hiding under there ready to grab me. Good times.

Here I am with Mom outside the sauna in the laundry/wash room. The tile is completely redone, but it's still the same room, and the same sauna, where I spent many an hour.

Each morning I ate breakfast at this counter with my sisters as we looked out on the street. One record-breaking winter, it got so cold that there was a good layer of ice on this window. In the background you can see part of the dining area where we ate dinner and fed missionaries arriving in the mission and heading home.

The Friend magazine did a "Friend to Friend" piece on me while we lived there, and one of the photos they used was of me on top of the big gray boulder that the road is named after, doing a silly pose. Here's the shot scanned from the actual magazine (my school picture is in the corner):

The boulder is still there, but now a house is built on the site behind it, and there's a fence in the way. This is the best reproduction we could do of that original shot. (Okay, so I forgot how exactly I'd posed. Sue me. Close enough :D)

Summer is my favorite season in Finland, but fall has its beauties and charms, among them the bright red pihlaja trees (mountain ash, I think, in English), laden with berries. These ones were around the mission home, but they were all over the city.

On Our Way

2008-09-21T16:28:00.000-06:00

We flew out of Salt Lake City airport on Saturday, September 6, stopping off at JFK and then catching a connecting Finnair flight to Helsinki.

Observations:

JFK is a funky, difficult-to-navigate airport.

The food there is ridiculously overpriced.

But they do have decent reception, so we e-mailed the kids with Rob's iPhone.

Vermont chocolate (found at JFK) is quite good.

When rain is coming down hard thanks to Atlantic tropical storms and hurricanes, planes are delayed.

When twenty planes are delayed, you may sit on board, waiting for take-off, for a good hour and a half. Not fun when you've already had a 4-hour flight that day.

It was a riot to listen to the captain's announcements in Finnish and actually understand the gist of what he was saying. The fact that he was telling us that it would be another 45 minutes of waiting, however, wasn't so fun.

Suddenly I stopped understanding the captain, and I wondered if my Finnish was really that bad. Then I realized that duh, he was now speaking Swedish. He went on to give the same announcement in English . . . after I'd just explained to Rob what was said in Finnish.

I sat next to a delightful Finnish woman named Päivi who lived in New York. She was intrigued by the fact that I was obviously American and yet also clearly understood the Finnish PA well enough to translate it. After a few hours in the air, we began chatting.

I told her about how long it had been since I'd visited Finland, how I understood some Finnish but no longer spoke it all that well. (My Finnish was pretty fluent—if accented—back in 87.) After discussing Finnish delights such as salmiakki, Karjalan Piirakoita, and how I make pulla for my kids every Christmas, she declared that I passed and am indeed Finnish enough. Yay!

After we arrived in Helsinki, she vanished for a few minutes, then reappeared from an airport gift shop with a box of salmiakki-flavored chocolate for my kids. With great dedication, I managed to not open the box until we returned to the States. (If you know how good Finnish chocolate is, you must be impressed.)

She promised to look me up online, and I certainly hope she does.

Considering we'd left JFK so late Saturday night, it was nice to land Sunday morning within an hour of our original arrival time. But then we waited at the luggage carousel for a long time . . . and only my luggage arrived. Ah, the joys.

Poor Rob had to make do without a change of clothes and much of anything else until the next day, but fortunately, his suitcase came on the same flight on Monday morning. Phew!

The highlight, of course, was seeing Mom and Dad at the airport. What a sight for sore eyes! I wanted to hug them both and never let go. We drove to their apartment at the temple's patron housing and had a great meal with the very Finnish lohi keitto, salmon soup. Ahhhh.

We rested and chatted, and that afternoon took a walk around the temple grounds. I love how the trees make the temple seem almost nestled in the Finnish woods. The landscaping is gorgeous, and the temple itself . . . wow. The workmanship just on the exterior is stunning. Some of the designs on the door and windows are very Finnish and hearken to designs from the Kalevala, the Finnish mythology and folktales. (We went inside on another day. More on that later.)

When I looked up and read the words you find on every temple, only in Finnish, Herralle Pyhitetty. Herran Huone, I got a serious lump in my throat. There's a part of my heart that belongs in Finland and can only be touched by Finnish. I felt like this was where I belonged.

By the time we headed back to the apartment, however (inside the patron housing, above), my vision was getting those tell-tale lines and fuzzy, moving edges that can mean only one thing.

Fortunately, I'd brought along some of my migraine prescription, so the headache didn't hit as hard as it could have. (I'm sure it was triggered by exhaustion and the whole biological clock thing being thrown out of whack.)

Mom rubbed my feet. Dad and Rob gave me a blessing. I have to say, even though a migraine wasn't the best way to start out our trip, feeling like a little girl again, and having my parents take care of me was such a comfort.