Crushed Expectations

It's amazing how a city, people and even the whole country can change totally during the time. Or actually they remain almost the same, but your interpretation changes.

For example Petrozavodsk, a city in Russian Carelia, felt really unwelcoming, cold and rude three years ago while now, when I visited city last weekend, the image I got was totally opposite. Even though I ended up to awful nightclubs and met random stalkers on a Sunday walk, Petrozavodsk felt warm, welcoming and an interesting city.

For an explanation three years ago I knew hardly any Russian and working in a small Finnish newspaper in Russia wasn't only an easy experience. Nobody understood me nor I understood them. When I went to cafe and ordered coffee I got milkshake; and when I went to restaurant I managed to order potatoes with smashed potatoes. In a marshrutka it was always a horrifying moment to get out because I didn't know how to stop minibuses. Maybe that's one reason why I always got lost when I travelled to the Soviet style suburban to aerobics which was held in a local school number 42 (in Russia school don't have names, only numbers). And of course I met hardly any people because I didn't know the language, and it didn't feel too good to sit alone in the bars and waiting for somebody to talk to me (I tried once but left quickly because I realized how it looked like to be a lonely girl in bar). 

To be honest, I was a bit scared to go back to Petrozavodsk last weekend for a seminar on environmental politics. But as always my prejudices collapsed almost the minute I arrived. City looked so friendly, clean and quiet after the busy and growded St. Petersburg. The student dormitary were we stayed was newly renovated and super-neat, only minus was that the light didn't work. But it didn't mind because sun was shining during the day and in the evenings we were exploring the activities of Petrozavodsk. Also the University of Petrozavodsk where the seminar was held was more modern than I expected and computer rooms filled with brand new computers!

City itself looked almost the same but the atmosphere seemed to be totally different. Maybe also thanks to my imporved Russian skills, I got coffee everytime I ordered it and this time I could order something else with potatoes than other kind of potatoes. People in the public transportation helped us to get out at the right bus stop and even the statue of Lenin and Ulitsa Karl Marx were more funny than scary this time.

Same theory applies for people too. I always thought that Russian girls were a bit silly with their high heels, mini-skirts and non-stop mirroring. I also felt that Russian women were somehow exhausting because of their arrogant and rude attitude. Maybe that's because I don't know too many Russian girls personally. After three days of seminar in Petrozavodsk with Russian students I had to crash my prejudice. During the seminar I became fan of Russian girls.

After a three days with Russian students, who were all under 20 years old, I was more than impressed by the level of their education. Especially the girls in the university of Petrozavodsk were not only beautiful (or ridiculously beautiful like my American friend call Russian girls) but also smart, confident and what surprised me most, fluent in English. They all studied international politics which include one year of studying only English. According to their professor the students of IR should be fluent in English. What a change of paradigm, before Russian language was the only important language now but obviously the new generation knows the importance of globalization.

During the weekend in Petrozavodsk, or actually during the whole spring, I have started to appreciate Russian girls more and more. I thought before that they are rude and selfish but I have started to realize that they are only confident about themselves. At the seminar they were always willing to speak in front of the class and they weren't afraid of telling their opinion out loud while Finnish girls were usually unwilling to stand in front of the class and speak English in front of a big audience.

Maybe that's because Russian girls don't take themselves that seriously: they can go to strip aerobic without any problem because they are confident enough and also their sense of humor can handle also some silly things. I could never wear as high heels or as short skirt as they do because I would feel that all those super-feminine things make me less convincing. Like the looks of person determines what's inside the head. Well, in Petrozavodsk I learned that you can have both: model-appearance and brain of a scientist.

Maybe one day I will have the same confidence and self-respect to give a shit about what other people thing about me. It still far away: only on Tuesday I missed my last chance to participate the strip aerobics at my gym. I already was at the door but I didn't have the guts to enter the room. Instead of learning some new, interesting moves I escaped to the spinning room. What a boring finka I am!

Forced Communality

After the horrifying school shootings in Kauhajoki and Jokela, Finns started to seek for the lost "communality" (=yhteisöllisyys). It was amazing for the Finns how these young boys could isolate themselves from society which alarmed people to ask where the Finnish sence of communality had gone.

After living in Russia, I know where it went: the searched and desired communality escaped to our Eastern neighbour. Although Russian state with journalist-killings and with cruel wars in Chechnya can seem awfully cold-blooded and ruthless, the every day life here is filled with face-to-face interaction between people. And I think these everyday meetings are the glue which keeps society together. 

Even if you feel like not speaking to anyone, it doesn't work in Russian. In a normal weekday you'll face at least the following meetings with fellow citizens:

When you take the marshrutka to university, first you hail to stop it and maybe ask the driver if the minibus takes you where you're heading to. Then you climb into the back seat and start to search for the right amount of money to pay the ride (fee is something between 15-30 rubles). Because there are no electronic tickets or automats, you have to always pay in cash. So after finding the right amount of money, you ask the passenger in front to you to peredat, pass forward, your money to the driver. It's purely impossible to stay mute in Russian public transportation. Even if you manage to pay the ride without using a single word, you have to stop the marshrutka by shouting "Ostanavite, pazhaluista" to the driver when you want to get off. 

So before you even reach your university you have talked - or at least muttered something- to some people you don't know. Next step in daily routines is entering the university. First you have to greet the babushka who's guarding that only students and people working in university get in. If you forget to do this and thus look suspicious they may check your student card. After guard-babushka, you head to the cloakroom where you leave jacket for another babushka. If your jacket is somehow hard to hang, you will hear about this. (Once babushka criticized that my jacket was hanging too much on the other side because of the original design)

At the university you can become part of faceless mass only in Finland. In Russia the small study groups (3-8 students) force you to open your mouth on every class you want it or not. At the cafeteria between the classes you have to order everything behind the counter (unlike in Finnish self-service university kitchen) and probably explain why you cannot pay with smaller money. Sometimes even note worth 100 rubles (2,5 euros) is too big for them.

After university you go to the corner shop next door to buy some food. Usually they are Soviet style shops, where you have to ask for each item behind the counter. Again you probably have some discussion about with what kind of money you can pay the food. Some times you even get advice (unwanted) if you buy something "stupid". I have fought with babushkas about lip balsam which was "too expensive", whether cold beer is unhealthier than warm one and should bananas be in a plastic bag or not (I think not, and babushka though it was the most stupid thing ever NOT to pack bananas into plastic). Try to mumble something about nature protection in that situation.

When you finally leave the shop with the food babushka allowed you to buy, there will be many more encounters before you get home. It happens more than once a day that somebody ask you direction on a street. Once at Nevski Prospekt (main street of St. Petersburg) I was asked "Where's Nevsky Prospekt?". Believe me, this street is hard to miss even if you're not standing on it!

Only tourists use maps, Russians trust more each other (and also the tourist with maps) in order to find the right direction. Maybe this is because during the Soviet time the maps were either forbidden of fake ones so that Soviet people couldn't find their way out from the communist wonder land.

In addition to the lost Russians, you may meet some babushkas who need assistance. Especially during the cold winter months, the babushkas wear some much thick clothes they can hardly move. More than once or twice babushka has shouted me "Devushka, come here to help me" which means that I have had to pull them up on stair(s) because they are too packed to lift their legs high enough.

On a street you also meet people selling all sort of stuff (herbs, tights, fish, books etc.), bumming cigarets (the unwritten rule in Russia is always a give one if you have) and unfortunately also people begging. 

You may also go to gym, where it's almost impossible to train without the instructor coming to you to order you to have heavier weights or to do some motion in a different way. In trains (if you're girl) you never have to lift your luggage to the self because there are always some Russian men doing that for you. In a train between Finland and Russia, it sometimes shameful to see how Russian men help women while Finnish men are sitting quietly and doing nothing. Or at most telling their stupid businessman wanna-be-funny jokes in Finnish when they think nobody understands them.

So all in all, you meet at least dozen stranger during your normal routines in a normal day, not to mention your friends and other people you choose to meet. Sometimes, or actually quite often, it is really annoying to face all these encounters everyday, but that is what communality is about: meeting people, even when you prefer to be left alone.

In Finland like in some other Western welfare countries the services and state support are functioning almost too perfectly because the society is working without people having to really meet each other: machines sell the bus tickets, you get into university with an electronic key, on a lecture you study with dozens of other people without hardly any discussion with the professor, at the gym even the skinniest anorectics can exercise without somebody telling them to stop, on a street people almost never ask direction from strangers, and in some shops you may even pay for a machine instead of a shop assistant.

Of course in Russia, there is no welfare society taking care of people, which is not only a good thing either. Despite (or because of) all its dysfunctions, in Russia people still have to lean on each other. Maybe this is one reason why they never had a large-scale school shootings.

Russian Icons: from Lenin to Gazprom-children

A week in St. Petersburg and I have started to like Russia again. The spring sun, good gigs, interesting lessons, and the fact that someone blew up Lenin's ass have compensated the anger I gathered during the visa fight. And naturally I need to have the right state of mind to celebrate the 200 year old relationship between Russia and Finland. Year 1809 Russia wan Finland from Sweden and gave the area an autonomy. Some consider this to be the beginning of the state of Finland because before that we were part of Sweden without any (special) rights.

So how could I feel gloomy when Russia and Finland have survived next to each other already that long. There were some good times and some bad times but all in all we have managed to put up with each other already two centuries!

One example of the shared history between these two countries is visible at Finlandskyi vokzal where's a statue of Lenin. This is the first statue of Lenin ever made and it was placed at Finlandskyi vokzal where Lenin arrived from his exile from Finland and where he gave the famous speech which started communist revolution. This was 3rd of April 1917. First of April 2009 somebody decided to make the statue of Lenin even more attractive tourist sight by putting a bomb between poor-Lenin's legs. This "terrorist-act" (like Russian press called it) was quite accurate work because the bomb has destroyed statue only around Lenin's butt. I had to go and see the buttless Lenin myself and I wasn't the only one. People were laughing and photographing Lenin while construction workers tried to hide the statue by building wooden box around it. One could say that this was the best April joke ever if the ones who claimed to be responsible for the bomb wouldn't have been fascists.

Less explosive event happened at Sotsi-club, where Risto and Pintandwefall had arrived to celebrate the 200-year old Finnish-Russian relations. Pintandwefall attracted mainly Russian part of the audience while Risto and his crazy Finnish lyrics charmed the Finnish fans. Even Risto forgot sometimes to speak English between songs because the small club was full of Finnish expats living in St. Petersburg. And it was scary to notice how everybody knew each other. It was like a big family gathering were you rather avoid some people and enjoy only meeting few of the party guests.

I believe that Finnish consulate and exchange programs connect people better than Nokia and the rest of the Finns living here must have met in bars, house parties or at least in a restaurant cart on a Sibelius- or Repin-train on their way to Russia. Finnish president Tarja Halonen said on her visit to St. Petersburg last Sunday, that there are 4000 Finns living in the city. I'm pretty sure they (or we) all know each other some how.

To balance the time in a smoky clubs, I have started to guljat (means more or less walking without destination) more now than during the darkest winter months. Spring sun has dried the streets from snow which has brought cyclists and rollerblader back to the streets. Usually they are young boys and girls who dare to ride a bike in the city center but this spring there's been a new group of cyclist in the city, the gastarbeiters. Men from Central Asia and Caucasus have find the new vehicle, maybe because they have to travel from one construction site to another to look for a job. Unfortunately many of the works of gastarbeiters disappeared after the financial crisis which made their situation even worse. What would Lenin think if he'd saw how the new proletariat of Russia, the gastarbeiters, are being treated?

Living in a big city like St. Petersburg might be exhausting, but luckily Russian Federation knows how to amuse people on the streets. Maybe the lack of advertisers have increased the amount of state adds on the streets. They're quite hilarious for a Finnish eye because they advice people to "live in a right way". Slogans can be something like "Take care of your children", "Choose love over alcohol" or "Don't make noise during the night, neighbours are sleeping". But my favourite adds are not the life-guides but the adds of Gazprom. The most common is add where's simply written "Gazprom, for children" (picture with the head quarter of FSB, the successor of KGB) with picture of a blond-haired and blue-eyed child. It's a bit unclear what they want to say by that add. But they also have an add with a very clear message; it says "Gazprom. We take from nature and give it to people."  What could be a more accurate slogan for a gas and oil company?