December 2009 Archives

Every time I have ever gone to a foreign country and mentioned I lived in Dallas, I always get lots of questions about J.R. and the rest of the Ewings.  When this came up with my Finnish friends here, Tanja told me about an amazing Finnish song that was written about and dedicated to Pamela Ewing.  (A country song, of course!)  Behold:



I will now attempt to translate this song for you.  Please note:

• I do not speak Finnish, so this should be interesting.
  
• This is based off a combination of Google's shady translation engine and my faulty memory of what Tanja explained to me.
• That sound effect in the beginning is a moped engine, and not a chainsaw like I originally thought.  This is Jaakko Teppo, not Jackyl, for god's sake.

"Pamela" - by Jaakko Teppo

"<Gunning a moped engine>
It's Friday night again and I'm on my moped.
I'm going home to watch Dallas on the color TV.
They are so famous and they take bribes.

You will be on the screen,
And I never want to turn it off.

(chorus)
Pam-Pam-Pam-Pam-Pamela!
Oh you, you wonderful you.
Pam-Pam-Pam-Pam-Pamela!
Pam-Pam-Pamela!

Yes, you live a different kind of life.
With all that oil.
And big boobs and bulls.
In Dallas.

(chorus)
Pam-Pam-Pam-Pam-Pamela!
Oh you, you wonderful you.
Pam-Pam-Pam-Pam-Pamela!
Pam-Pam-Pamela!

Lucy is too short.
Sue Ellen drinks too much whiskey.
You are the one I want.

I can offer you a lot.
There is an extra seat on my moped.
Come with me and we will ride through the swamp.
Leaving Dallas behind in a puff of steam smoke."

(chorus)
Pam-Pam-Pam-Pam-Pamela!
Oh you, you wonderful you.
Pam-Pam-Pam-Pam-Pamela!
Pam-Pam-Pamela!

1. Visiting the spot where the cholera outbreak of the mid 1800s started...and not only finding the exact spot where the cholera-spouting pump was, but finding a whole pub there dedicated to cholera!
   
   
2. Making a Q-Tipped-Headed Guard at the Tower of London giggle.
   
   
3. Making shrinky dinks and sitting on the floor of Leslie's kitchen, gathered around the oven ooo-ing and ahh-ing.  There were moments where we were spazzing out all excited like Arsenio Hall audience members.  It kept looking like they were going to roll up and be ruined...but wait!  It flattened back out, yay!  So triumphant!
   
   
4. Playing drinking games at Leslie's local pub:
   
   
• Quick-thinking name game, where I say "Regis Philbin" and so you say something like "Pliny the Elder" and then the next person says "Eddie Guerrero".  Then, much like UNO, if someone does a name with the same letter for first and last name...reversal!  If you can't think of something, drink up.
  
  
• "The Minister's Cat". This is basically an alphabet game where you all clap out a rhythm, and go around the table inserting an adjective with that round's letter to describe the Minister's cat.  "The Minister's cat is an awful cat."  "The Minister's cat is an aerobics cat."  Etc... If you can't think of an adjective, drink up, and proceed to the next letter of the alphabet.  Andy was awesomely hilarious at this one, he was getting all in a twist: "THERE ARE NO MORE K ADJECTIVES!!!!" 
  
5. Getting a million British Invasion songs stuck in my head, particularly:
   
   
• "Going Underground" by The Jam, stuck each time I passed a London Underground sign which was every 12 seconds.
  
  
• "Waterloo Sunset" by The Kinks, stuck when I passed Waterloo Station and wondered if Terry and Julie would be meeting there on Friday.
  
  
• "Pictures of Jimmy" by The Who, which was me absent-mindedly getting confused between "Pictures of Lily" and "Dr. Jimmy and Mr. Jim."
  
  
6. Learning that Leslie (if given the proper sunglasses) can do a ridiculously amazing Yoko Ono impersonation.  "The sun is down.  It's getting...so dark."
   
   
7. At customs, the customs agent yawned in my face, and I smarted off to him saying that he wasn't allowed to yawn when I was so tired.  He said, "Oh, it's just that I read your occupation is a web analyst, and I couldn't help but yawn."
   
   
8. Unexpectedly happening upon a big Christmas caroling session at Trafalgar Square.  And unexpectedly not being able to sing along.  Did you know that there is a whole other violently different melody to "Away in a Manger"?  And if you try to sing the American version along with the English version, it does NOT magically harmonize?  And then you just end up looking tone deaf?
   
   
9. Discovering that the Elgin Marbles at the British Museum are not those kinds of marbles, but the crumbled remains of the Parthenon.
   
   
10. Pumpkin pie.  Not, not THAT kind of pumpkin pie.  When I say "pie," think Shepard's pie kind of pie.  We went to a traditional English comfort food place, and I was so confused when pumpkin pie was listed with the entrees and not the desserts.  It was explained that it was more of a casserole, filled with big chunks of cooked pumpkin all gooey with cheese and topped with a pastry cover.  Amazing.
    

I had a lovely time in London, and I am looking forward to going back a few more times in the next year.  Stonehenge, get ready!  Wimbledon, look out!

Wow.  I just witnessed something surreal and amazing and crazy.  I almost feel like I don't deserve to have seen and experienced what I just saw...it's like it was a secret Finnish ritual that I snuck in and watched without the proper credentials.  I am talking about Raskasta Joulua, aka Heavy Christmas.  This is an annual Christmas concert where local heavy metal dudes play traditional Finnish Christmas songs in the key of METAL.

Throughout 98.7% of this concert, I just stood there with my mouth open in amazement.  All the songs and onstage banter were in Finnish, so I was obviously a little lost.  But music is music, and heavy metal wailing is heavy metal wailing...so it was still very easy to appreciate the magic that was going on.  Remember when Corn Mo and John Freeman used to do their cover of Temple of the Dog's "Hunger Strike"?  And how awesome that was?  Well take that, multiply it by seven metric tons and add a splash of Ronnie James Dio in a nativity scene as the Baby Jesus, that's how awesome Raskasta Joulua was.  The bass player guy looked like a cross between Nuno Bettancourt and Toki Wartooth.  One of the 5 leader singers looked like Nikki Six.  Another looked like the 1988 Mark Slaughter.  Another looked like Kevin Nash.  Another looked like Glenn Danzig's younger, taller brother.  Another looked like Baby Varg (he was actually the Finnish American Idol).  Another looked like a drunk billy goat.

Thankfully, most of the Finnish songs have the exact same melody as the American ones, so I wasn't completely lost.  So even if I couldn't sing along, I could hum along.  Oh!  But there was one song where I could sort of sing along!  Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.  Here is my version of the Finnish version:

"Taka-taka-taka-taka PORO,
taka taka taka taka tak!"

"Poro" is reindeer, which I learned from all the menus here because reindeers aren't cute Santa pets, they are FOOD.  Anyway, here is the real version:



At the end they threw Christmas tree ornaments at us, and then threw a Christmas tree at us.  Merry Christmas, in your FACE!


 

Today is Finnish Independence Day.  I'm still trying to figure this out, but from the best I can tell it is like a combination of 4th of July, Veterans Day, Memorial Day, Thanksgiving, and Oscar night.  The entire day is spent in celebration of Finland declaring their independence from Russia in 1917.  (I think.)  They have parades, dignitaries go hang out in cemeteries to honor the dead soldiers, they wheel out the remaining veterans (apparently there are about 2 left) to clap at them, and then 2,000 special people are selected to attend the President's Ball.  At the ball, they all wear super fancy dresses (usually by Finnish designers) and tuxedos, queue up for their chance to shake the President's hand, and then the Finnish equivalent of Joan Rivers and Steven Cojocaru run commentary on what everyone is wearing.

It is basically 2 hours of this:



I'm about an hour and a half in, and I have seen:

• Several women whose dresses look like they drifted right in from a figure skating performance.
• One girl who had her hair in one of those pompadour-style ponytails, and had pink rhinestones lining the sides of her head like racing stripes.
• James Lipton!?!  No, sorry.  Fakeout.
• The infinite patience of President Tarja "Conan O'Brien" Halonen, who has to shake the hands of 2,000 people.

Last night was Christmas party 1 of 3.  This one was at the agency with all the Wundergirls and Wunderboys.  Party 2 will be just a small affair with me and the three guys on my immediate team.  Party 3 will be the big huge corporate Christmas party thrown by the client, so big that I actually have to pay money to attend.  These early Christmas parties are called "Little Christmas" or "Pikkujoulu."

We started last night's fun at the office, where we had drinks (including glögi, the traditional hot wine drink), catered dinner, and a presentation on why selling bottled water is as stupid as selling bags of air.  Then we just hung out, dancing and playing Beatles Rock Band and decorating gingerbread cookies.  Like these:




Then they handed out a lyrics sheet (all in Finnish of course) to a song called "Tonttujen Jouluyö."  We all sang the song and acted out what was happening in the lyrics, which was cute but there was one problem...I had no idea what I was singing.  So I just confusedly did what everyone else did, but a few seconds behind.  We started on the ground and had to dramatically stand up, then dance around squaredancing-style, then pretend to eat, and then walk around all hunched over.  I was offered two explanations of what the song was about:

1. It was a children's song about little Christmas elves who sneak out of their holes and tip-toe around, go into people's houses, eat their food, dance, play, and then pick up their messes and sneak off on tip-toes back to their elf holes.
   
   
2. It was a song for the annual ritual where we reaffirm our allegiance to Satan.  As a first-time participant, I was Satan's newest bride.  The part at the end where we hunched over was our descent back into the fiery pit of hell.
   

In either case, I very much liked the line "Tip-tap, tip-tap, tipe-tipe, tip-tap, tip, tip, tap!" Someone shot a video of our song and dance and will be posting it on youtube so we can send it out as a company Christmas card, and of course I will share that as soon as I get the link.

Shortly after we headed to a fancy cocktail bar, where we had yummy berry-based cocktails and broke approximately 40 champagne glasses because everyone was pretty wasted.  It was really nice because the music wasn't too too loud so you could actually talk and joke around with everyone.  Apparently I talked and laughed a lot, because my voice is totally hoarse today.  While we were at the cocktail lounge, one of the Wundergirls told me about a bar next door, which is one of Helsinki's best rock bars so we went to check that out.  There's an upstairs bar part and a downstairs venue, and lots of rocker types hanging around.  It is the Finnish Gatti's!!  Yay, a potential candidate for my bar...in that sense becoming the Finnish Tin Hat!

After that, a few of us went and got some pizza.  While eating my pizza, I looked at my watch and saw that it was 5am.  The party started at 4pm.  This was a THIRTEEN HOUR PARTY.  Realizing it was so late/early made me suddenly very tired, so I called it a night.  Another one of the Wundergirls shared a cab with me, and I managed to get all the way home without vomiting in my mouth OR on my knee!  I consider that a success, although I think all my Finnish friends would probably be a little disappointed.

My poor hair.  With all the craziness of life and moving, I haven't bothered to get my hair cut in over 5 months.  So my super layered haircut has been looking very scraggly.  And I seem to have been experiencing some sort of "Marge Simpson Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder" where my hair is falling out and getting very thin.  Then add to that the day I was walking around with my very heavy laptop bag, and I hurriedly tried to switch it from one shoulder to the other and managed to yank out a fistful of my hair in the process.

All that means that I have been walking around looking like this:



Look at my pony tail on the picture in the right!  Look at how skinny and scrawny and gross that is!

I got several recommendations on hair salons, and selected the stylist who was a gay boy.  That seemed the smartest.  His rad name also helped him win the selection process: Veltsu. 

I went to visit Veltsu today.  After a few very confused moments when I walked up to the door of the salon and thought the sign said it was a tattoo parlor, he came out into the street and rescued me.  (Note: it is a tattoo parlor.  AND a hair salon.  Thank you, Finland, for always being so metal.)  Thank goodness he spoke awesome English, I was very nervous about trying to explain what I wanted via mime. 

And what did I want?  I wanted him to make me look like a cross between Nicholas Bradford from Eight is Enough and my 7-year-old self, but you know, like in a super-stylish super-Finnish way.



Good ol' Veltsu.  He was totally thorough and meticulous and spent a long time making sure everything was even and right.  We had the best time and I was able to educate him about the existence of Dollywood, and teach him new English words like "hillbilly."  And he totally delivered, hair-wise:



See!?  I am Nicholas Bradford, just like I wanted!!  It's shorter than I was ready for, but it was nasty and needed to be chopped off.  And dang if I don't look super authentically Finnish now!  And it still can be corralled in a ponytail, which was my only length requirement.  This will definitely take some getting used to, but I think I love it.  I know this because on the walk home from the salon I found myself singing the theme song from "Alice" to myself.  You know:

"There's a new girl in town
And she's looking good.
There's a fresh freckled face
In the neighborhood.

There's a new girl in town
With a brand new style.
She was just passing through,
But if things work out she's gonna stay...a while...bom bum bum bym-bummm."

We'll see how it looks tomorrow when I'm in charge of styling it.  I may be singing a different theme song.  Like maybe the theme from Garry Shandling's show, I always liked that one.

This post is pretty outdated, since the events contained here actually happened weeks ago.  Oops.  You'll understand momentarily, because I was obviously in no shape to write in the day(s) after it all happened, and then I've been out of town for the past week.

So the only friends I've really made so far are the girls from the office.  Unfortunately, it's not the office I actually go to every day since I sit at the client's office and not with the other agency people, so it's a real treat when I get to hang out with them.  The day after the sauna, the office girls (heretofore to be referred to as The Wundergirls) invited me out for drinks.  It was a Thursday.  In Helsinki, that can mean only one thing:  you are going to Kaarle to drink cheap sparkling wine and dance on tables.

My new American-friend-in-Finland Joe explains:

"It is a typically Finnish metastasized after-work party in which 30-50 year olds act like they just discovered this amazing new substance, alcohol, that makes you act crazy.  It is really funny how in Finland at every age people act like frat boys when you pump them with beer, and the Finnish definition of going out for a beer implies that you will not remember how you got home.  I have Finnish friends who are married with kids and go out once a month or something, and if they can remember how they got home or if they do not have a mind-numbing hangover the next day they get mad at themselves for not drinking enough!"

We ate at a Tex-Mex place (irony duly noted), and then headed to Kaarle early so we wouldn't have to wait in line to get in.  I'm sure I've complained about how expensive everything here is, but there is one thing that is dirt cheap: those dang bottles of sparkling wine!  If you know me, you know that I am not supposed to have alcoholic beverages with bubbles.  I'm certainly not supposed to have a bottle and a half's worth of alcoholic beverages with bubbles.

Needless to say, I don't remember the second half of the evening.  Here are the scattered memories I do have:

• Hearing the Finnish version of "Is This the Way to Amarillo?"  (Irony duly noted AGAIN.)
  
  
• Going to the bathroom and realizing halfway through that I hadn't bothered to shut the stall door.
  
  
• Standing on the booth seat and dancing like I was in a Scandal video being chased by The Warrior.
  
  
• Practicing my pronunciation of "Pohjoinen Hesperiankatu."
  
  
• Being walked down to the entry way by one of the Wundergirls, and having her help me put my coat on and putting me in a cab.  I don't remember deciding to leave or wanting to leave, I think it was decided on my behalf.
  
  
• Riding in the cab, and suddenly throwing up in my own mouth.  I was terrified of getting anything anywhere in the cab, so I just held it.  Then the cab driver asked me something, I forgot about what was in my mouth, and so I answered him and got puke all over my knee.
  

Now that that's explained, today in an email one of the Wundergirls addressed me as "Vomit Stain Lady" to which Leslie suggested I start going by "VSL".  And that looks like "YSL" aka "Yves Saint Laurent", which makes me laugh so hard that it went from something so nasty to so classy!  I will get to work monogramming everything immediately.