A chilling trend

Today, I’m paying for yesterday’s sightseeing.  I’m in Hermia, which is a suburb of Tampere, at the Technology Centre, attending the second annual review of the Digital Business Ecosystem project.  This is a three-day meeting; I’m here as a member of the project’s Strategic Advisory Board (as a result of reviewing some proposals last year), and so I’m learning a lot and meeting many people.

There are about four official EC reviewers here, and the presenters are speaking directly to them; unfortunately, I’m on the opposite side of the room, and no one is using a mike, so paying attention isn’t easy.  Add to that the fact that this is my third day in Europe, which is usually the worst day for jet lag for me, and that the meeting room is quite warm, and…well, the fact that I’m blogging probably speaks for itself.

At least the room has lots of windows, so we’re getting some natural light.  Not much, because it’s cloudy; in fact, it’s snowing lightly.  And the exterior temperature has been going down all morning; it was -2C when I left the hotel, and now it’s down to -6C.  I went out for a few minutes during the break, and the cold cleared my head nicely — but then when I came back in, the fog set in again.  Somehow, -6C seems colder than the equivalent of 21F — which is cold, but not ridiculous.  Tomorrow’s forecast, however, is for a high of 6F and a low of -4F; that is ridiculous!

No museums in Helsinki

I had set my alarm for 7am, so I wouldn’t sleep away the day, but I wound up waking up on my own a few minutes before the alarm was ready to go off.  The hotel’s breakfast was very good; I had smoked salmon, smoked trout, good bread, a good orange, and even some cereal.  No bagels or cream cheese, though.

I left the hotel about 9am, after checking out and storing my luggage; I wandered over to the Esplanade, and then to the Helsinki Tourist Office, where I discovered that most of the museums were closed because it was Monday.  But I bought a tram pass anyway, and then went to Stockmann, a large department store, where I hoped to find a hat and better gloves than I’d brought with me.  Unsurprisingly, I was successful — and the hat was even 40% off because of the big January sale. 

Properly attired, I went out into the cold again and walked to the railway station, because I had two reasons to go there.  One was to buy tickets for my trip to Tampere this evening; the other, of course, was to do a cache.  I accomplished both missions in short order, then walked back to the harbor to take a few pictures and contemplate taking the ferry to Suomenlinna.

(Don’t let the colors fool you — I had Photoshop brighten everything and increase contrast.  It was a very grey day, so grey that I didn’t put on sunglasses even though the jet lag plan calls for them after noon.)

But I decided to stay on the mainland and save Suomenlinna for another day.  So I went into The Old Market Hall for lunch.  It reminded me very much of Faneuil Hall in Boston — two hallways of shops (mostly food stalls).  I fought off the temptation to have sushi or falafel and went with a kebab instead.  Then it was back into the cool weather and a stroll over to Uspenski Cathedral, which was closed (it was, after all, Monday). 

But the trip wasn’t wasted; as I was leaving, I checked my GPS and discovered that there was a cache right at the Cathedral.  It was easy to find, but when I was ready to put the cache back, a workman had just gotten into his van right by the location.  So I took the cache for a little walk, and when I returned, the coast was clear.

I then took the tram over to Senate Square, only to discover that I’d been there before — it’s the site of the big Lutheran Cathedral where the cache I found last night is hidden.  So I got back on the tram and went to Töölö to do yet another cache.  And to go visit the Sibelius Monument, which was a few minutes’ walk away.

Getting there was more interesting than I’d expected — I left the beaten and plowed path, and found myself on a layer of ice.  And then I found much more of myself on the ice; no harm done, though, and I picked myself up and started walking more carefully.  I got to the monument at the same time as a busload of tourists — I’m not sure where they were from, but they were speaking a Slavic language.  I was comforted when I saw them slipping and sliding around, too!

By this time, it was getting late (or at least it felt that way — it was only 2:30pm, but it was pretty dim), so I took a tram back to my hotel, picked up my luggage, and trammed to the railway station, where I took the train to Tampere and then walked the half-block to my hotel,  the Scandic Tampere City Center.  My room is smaller than the one I had last night, and doesn’t have much in the way of storage space, which will be a little bit inconvenient.  But it’s warm and has heated floors, which are both nice attributes in this climate.  It also has a nice, if over-heated, fitness center, which I suspect I’m going to need to use a lot on this trip.

I had dinner in the hotel restaurant with one of my colleagues on the project and should meet the others tomorrow (they’re staying at a different hotel).  Tomorrow is going to start early, so I think I had best stop now!