Vappu

I just had one of the greatest experiences in Finland yet.

Vappu.

This is sort of the Finnish equivalent of "May Day", a national 'workers' holiday held on the 1st of May every year. However, Vappu is something truly and wonderfully Finnish. And thanks to my friend, Otto Köylijärvi, I got the chance to go to Helsinki (capital city of Finland) and experience the REAL Vappu.

Vappu is... hard to describe. It's a massive party, with no real reason to celebrate. There is a connection with students however, as all of the University students in Helsinki, as well as graduates, wear special white hats. The students also wear different coloured overalls, depending on their faculty. Some hats have special tassels signifying that the wearer attended the Technical University of Helsinki.

Now, Vappu is something that EVERYONE celebrates. There are lots of students of course, but you find families, grandparents and foreigners everywhere. Although Friday, May 1st is the real Vappu day, Thursday is important as well. A famous statue in Helsinki, known as "Havis Amanda" is crowned with her very own white cap by a group of university students. It's a huge deal, since over 50, 000 people were present to see this event.

The White Hats near "Havis Amanda":

The statue has been adorned with a hat by the students, who hang above the statue from a crane.



After the hat has been placed, everyone makes their way to "Tuomio Kirkko", the large white church in the Helsinki center. And I mean EVERYONE. In the bottom right, you can see a group of students wearing red overalls! The overalls are always customized with badges by the owner.



And that's about it for Thursday. I had travelled to Helsinki with Otto and his family, and we stayed overnight with some of their family friends near Helsinki. The partying continued at their house however, with a fantastic meal and more celebrating. Midnight is the 'official' time to put on your white cap, so they sang a song at midnight and gave a toast.

Early on Friday morning, we went back to Helsinki. The big celebration on Friday is in a park called "Ullanlinnanmäki", a beautiful hillside park beside the Baltic Sea. And of course, EVERYONE is here too. Barbeques, drinks and more hats and overalls.



There is an observatory at the top of the park's hill. You must have noticed the great weather too, we were lucky.



A great picture of my friend, Otto, and me!

Vappu is great because of the atmosphere - everyone is happy. Grown-up graduates meet up with old classmates, students party hard, and families have picnics in the somewhat calmer areas. There is A LOT of drinking. Everyone has a minimum of 2 champagne bottles and carries around a glass all day. Most people just attach a glass to their clothes/overalls or have one hung around their necks. There is a police presence, but people behave themselves. They are just there to have fun, and there's absolutely no feeling of fear or apprehension. It's a truly huge, somewhat pointless but nonetheless fantastic, celebration, and there are so many traditional things associated with it, I can't even begin to list them.

That's what Vappu is, and it's my new favourite holiday. And it's the favourite holiday of the Finns too.

I will post more pictures when I receive them from Otto's camera. Here are a couple more pictures from the Rotary conference in Jyväskylä last weekend:

Kathleen Easlick (America), Me and Marja Liisa Bolten (Germany) play some piano in the hotel where the conference was held.

The exchange students wait outside the hotel. I'm in the red blazer in front of the guy wearing white (Jordan Hunt, Australia).

That's all for now! Right now it's 10PM here on Friday night. At 7:45AM tomorrow morning I am leaving for Helsinki, where I will get the bus to St. Petersburg, Russia! The bus will be full of my exchange friends, so it's going to be a fun ride! We will spend Saturday-Tuesday in St. Petersburg sightseeing. We will visit the "Hermitage" museum and watch "The Nutcracker" ballet at the Mikhailovsky Opera and Ballet Theatre. Cool! I will post again in Russia if I have time, if not then it will be next Wednesday.

Oh man, I heart Vappu.