Gone now
July 4, 2008 
I wish I had kept this blog up more. Now I am back in the US for a few days. At the end people told me “it is hard to get settled in Oulu, and even harder to leave.”
I agree with that statement.
This time of year the light is addicting. I am not sure if it was because I was there for long enough for people to accept me or if Finns are like bears, coming out of their caves in summer, but my last days there were full of sun and light and joy.
Two nights before I left there was a sauna party with Joni and Sana (Sana is a cute as a bug 19 year old woman). I got a tee-shirt from Caio, he local bar where I would go to get letters from the Finnish government translated and meet locals. I love and miss the people in Oulu and am glad I will go back and be part of that great community.
Interesting banking practices
March 3, 2008 
Here in Finland, debit cards seem to be more widely used than cash. As a visiting worker, I had to prove I had a job and get paid before I could get a the card. After getting the card, I was giving access to on-line banking. The way it works is that I was given a number to use as my login and the a card with a list of passwords. I was to use each password once, and then cross it off. After half my passwords have been used, the bank sends me a new card with more passwords.
You have to have lots of passwords in Finland, and they change all the time. I much prefer the US system. In the US only a few places have draconian password restrictions, at least for consumers (I have always wondered why PG&E is so terrified that someone will break into my account and pay my power bill).
banks and Finnish danger
March 1, 2008
Filed under Uncategorized
Tags: alcohol, crime, Finland, Finnish crime, marijuana, rape, theft, US crime
Well, I found a place nearby that serves something besides pizza, so I thought I would try it. It is a pub. While I was there I met two women (I will post their pictures when I figure out how). The told me that Finnland is actually very dangerous. Petty larceny is super common and a bicycle has near certainty of being stolen. The thing that worried them was sexual harrasment and rape. They said that last year three women were raped by gangs of strangers in parks in Oulu.
They said “we hear that 1 out of 100 people in the US is in jail,” I had not heard that, but I saw it this morning in the latest Pew survey. At first I was embarrased by it but, oddly, that was not their point. They told me that in Finland people are rarely put in prison. They were especially concerned aabout rapists and told me currently there was a petition being signed asking the government for stronger penalties for rapists. They told me (and I checked with a couple of other people about this and got the same answer) that self defense is not OK in Finland. The story I was told was of a woman who poked the eye of someone that was raping her and got in serioius trouble while the rapist was treated well. The both said they loved the US system where if someone comes into your house and credibly threatens to harm you, you can blow their head off. They said there was no self-defense in Finland. Thus, and one said she doubly locks the door to her third story balcolny.
In addition, they said that locking doors at the university, landery rooms and so on is a very good because Finland is swarming with theves. I see college students, professors and business people, but I am learning that there is a wealfare class, sometimes heavily addicted to alcohol and they do anything to get by.
We talked some about marijuana and its quasi legality in so many places these days. They said that it was very rare (as far as they knew) and very frowned on.
More about food
Ok, I tried the Chinese restaurant by the train station. I wan’t say I haden’t been warned by someone, but what the heck.
When I was little we used to have “Chinese Restaurants” that had stuff like “chopped suey” which were overcooked vegetables in oil with some chicken or whatever in it. Super bland mush. I assume you know where I am going with this. After I ate (a very little, it was really bad, and their “hot sauce” was just tomato sauce). The woman who had taken my money asked how I liked the food. I was honest and she said: “there is no call for Chinese food in Oulu, if we served Chinese food, no one would eat it.” It is regionalized Chinese food. That is not unusual, I have had very weird Chinese food in Mexico, Japan, whereever. But, if you are from Silicon Valley and are used to Chinese food there, don’t even dream of getting Chinese food in Oulu.
I haven’t found any sushi restaurants either.
But there is lots and lots of pizza, the Finnish national food.
Yeah, I am getting paid!
In Finland, they do not write paychecks as in the US. Of course, many now get direct depostis in the US, but in Finland checks are rarely used. To get paid I needed to get a letter from the university saying that I was working for them. Then I went to the bank and got an account. Then I waited for the university to put money in my account. They did not for sure when that would be. I could not pick up my card for the account until the university paid me and I did not know when they would pay me. Happily the folks are SO nice at that part of University of Oulu, they called to day and found that indeed, I will get paid at the end of the money, the card is there in the bank and it is only about a 45 minute walk there and back to get it!
Immigration
Due to a mistunderstanding about the complicated rules for working here, I did not realize that I needed to get a visa to work here before I came. Because of that, I had to get one. This required a trip to the immigration office. I have limited vision and am not alwasy the best at finding things, but one of my project team, Marja, used post it notes on a map and I made my way to the police station and got photographs for my ID. The fee had increased significantly, so I had to go to the station, find out I did not have enough money, go to an ATM and go back, but everyone was efficient and nice. I can’t imagine what a Finn would have to go through going to the DMV in California, much less the immigration services.
Every time I go to the town, I walk around and learn more of it. I got a new camera and will post some more pictures soon. I am not sure I like slide.com the best, so I will try different sites and let you all know which I prefer.
Rats, my camera died – and “small world”
Last night I was at the university and I met a guy and we talked and talked about roles and how our roles limit our world view. He told me that he did not believe it was education, the product, or even the money that made a successful invention or product, that there was something else going on.
Of course, that is EXACTLY what I said that got me into social networks in the first place. It was so weird standing in the halls of the University of Oulu, Finland listening to someone who had to pause to find the right English words basically echoing something I have been saying for years. He did not know me, he did not learn this from me. It speaks to something I have said in my workshops for years (something I borrowed from Andy Hargadon, who borrowed it from William Gibson): the future is already here, it’s just not evenly distributed.
To me this is profound evidence that the REAL meat of social networks, what they are really about, is known everywhere; but prehaps less in the technological communities where people are confounded by the bits and software and not looking at the revolution that is surrounding us. This guy was involved in journalism and communications.
A visit downtown
I have recovered from jet lag and a cold and am back to my normal curious self. Today is Saturday and I went into the town of Oulu. I found a much better grocery store and figured out how to get to the bridges and around the town. I took some pictures.
Loving the snow, social networks
I am looking out my kitchen window at the snow and it is beautiful. Now I will be able to tell people that I have walked miles in a snowstorm to buy food and get to work and the gym. When there is no new snow, the bicycles ride on the paths and compact the snow into ice. If there is an occasional balmy day where the temperature gets over 0 (it sounds more dramatic in Celcius – 32, freezing) then the snow melts and then refreezes as ice. It can get very slippery and a 15 minute walk can take 20 or more because I have to be so careful walking. When it snows, the snow makes traction and it is much better.
I bought a light that simulates sunlight. It goes from dark to really dark around here and at noon the sun is maybe 5 or 6 widths of the sun above the horizon. It is 4:56 right and the sun is pretty much down now.
Random stuff
Tonight I am pretty happy because I found out that I managed to bring about 10 or so CDs of some my absolute favorite music, Rebeca Kilgore, Paul Desmond, Duck Baker, Cannonball Aderly, Herbie Nichols, Maxine Sullivan, Van Morrison, Jim Kewskin, Geoff Mauldar, Maxine Sullivan, and more. I discovered that I can’t get Yahoo! music here, which I had grown dependent on, but I had backed up this stuff and it is pretty darn good. Right now I am listening to Paul Desmond play Line for Lyons, which is cool because I just was talking (through my brother) to Matt Lyons, one of Jimmy Lyon’s sons (the Lyons the song and the founder of the Monterey Jazz Festival). Matt told me about watching Paul Desmond’s ashes be scattered over Big Sur. It is a small circle, I have takend guitar lessons from Duck and Rebecca. Jim spent the night as a guest when he gave a concert in Santa Cruz (which I produced).
I had a nice talk with my uncle who is in Tahoe right now, my friend Harald, who is in Vienna. We are arranging for me to come down there and give a talk in June.
Tomorrow we are going to try and make things happen on the research project we are working on. Last week the folks in Helsinki were on vacation.
