And so after the Open Day, what next? As it happened, the Music Centre is right next door to Finlandia Hall, a quite significant building for those of us in the international relations field. It is here where the Helsinki Accords were signed in 1975, in an attempt to bring some semblance of peace between the East and West during the Cold War.
It is also a great example of the work of Alvar Aalto, he is to architects what Sibelius is to musicians...
Unfortunately, being Saturday, I wasn't able to go inside for a look, but outside was grand enough.
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| Seems every town has one now |
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| Majestic building |
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| Coincidentally, the name of one of Sibelius's most famous pieces |
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| Down the drive way |
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| A view across the stairs |
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| Sits on a lake, and across the way is the amusement park, Linnanmaki |
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| Bold |
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| Softened by the park |
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| Converted nearby former residences |
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| Autumn leaves, already |
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| Near Finlandia |
Opposite the Music Centre, is Parliament House, so naturally, what was a psephologist to do...?
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| Big Parliament |
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| Close to the entrance |
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| Relief map |
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| The closest this psephy gets to a parliamentary selfie |
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| Base rock |
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| Kallio, best find out about him since I'm staying in the district named after him (or so I thought, apparently Kallio means 'the rock'; Kallio the man/statue was at various times President, Prime Minister and Speaker of the Parliament, a rock in a way I guess) |
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| Streetscape, waiting for the bus |
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| Another parliamentary peek |
Back downtown, and though I hesitated at the seeming 'triteness' of it all, I decided to play full-on tourist and eat the Jean Sibelius set menu at Kapelli, a cafe/restaurant where the man himself liked to enjoy a meal (and cigar, I held off on the latter). I was even seated in the older bar section so imagined the place in the time of Sibelius as I worked my way through a full three course menu...can't remember the last time I did that.
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| Waiting, with anticipation |
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| Duck breast salad for starters |
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| Salmon! |
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| Fruits for dessert (and fruit derivatives) |
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| A bit luxe, but you're only a tourist once |
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| I ate here! |
Hop on a tram, back to base in Kallio.
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| The Weekend pub tram |
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| Whereupon I caught the right one back to base |
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| In search of the perfect chocolate... |
Sleep well, for tomorrow is the day, the big day...
[Camera : iPhone6s, 2.28pm-6.32pm; 9 September 2017]
