On Tuesday was the great day. I had my guiding exam and I needed to guide ten minutes in every language: swedish, english and finnish. I wondered so much about my swedish part, because it is much weaker language than others. I practised a lot swedish to make it work in exam.
So my guiding tour went like this. I introduced three different finnish company: Sokos, Stockmann and Marimekko. My tema was how can you buy brandclothes with cheap prise.
How do I feel after my guiding?
so awesome, happy and energic
everything went so good, I didn't forget anything, it went like a dance
even my swedish part.. I was so calm and I spoke with calm and relax voice. I tought I might forget something and actually scared it too, but I did not forget anything.
After it I really felt I could be a real guide. I had always think how this all really work on. How can I keep my group together and what to say..
I even suprised myself. I can do it! I am so happy!
I was few weeks ago in Hämeenlinna, where my sister lives with her husband. This was the time when Goodman shopping center opened it door to customers. So now I will present to you many attractions from Hämeenlinna: Goodman shopping center, Castle of Häme and Aulanko's national park.
Goodman
Diandra sang songs from her new album. My favorite is "Vielä vapaa".
It was weekend when I went to Hämeenlinna. I actually reached to there Thursday evening and of course we needed to go visit to Goodman with my sister. We visited there also Friday and Saturday. There visited also Diandra and Dudeson's. I have some pictures about their shows.
Goodman's logo.
Here is perhaps the best cookies I had ever eat!
It's a bit weird people actually entered from Clas Ohlson doors, but not from front door.
Dudeson's made different kind of crazy stunts in Goodman on Saturday. Seriously they stapled their tongue to the paper. Also they jumped with trampoline. There was also some neats which stayed their back when they jumped back in front of the trampoline. Crazy men!
Tongue in paper!
Castle of Häme
Here we were in guided tour with my sister. Our tour was in english because there were also Russian group and of course they didn't understand finnish. I choose Castle of Häme, because I had never be there before and I wanted to see it inside.
Attentions I made our guide and all tour:
There were actually two guides, because Russian Group's guide translate everything to russian.
Our finnish guide had a lot information, but I think that the Russian guide actually a little bit stole her show
I needed to answer for my school exercise how our guide worked on everything. So I start from beginning. She actually needed to find a toilet for some of customers, but toilets were closed. She apologize that and promised that customers can go to toilet inside of Castle. Then she introdused herself and wished all welcome to Hämeenlinna.
Her tema was very historical of course. She knew a lot about what happened in 1500-century and etc. Unfortunately it was not very intresthing to listen first her english version and then russian after it.
She always waited everybody to be there and didnt start to speak before all were in front of her. I think here moves were toughtful and she knew exactly where to stand. I saw she had done this many times before. She actually is only one guide in Castle of Häme.
She introdused almost six different rooms in hour. And end of the guiding she thanks as all to be there and also said it in finnish. Then she got some tips where to go in the castle
Castle of Häme
Castle of Häme
Here we are with my sister in living room.
This room is the most warm place in castle I think.
Art where they build the Castle.
Old money from 1500-century.
Aulanko's National Park
We visited there also. The park is very historical, because Aulanko's rock was first points of ground which arose after ice age. In Park there is also old Yoldia's sea's water's edge.
Here now some amazing pictures from Aulankos lookout tower.
I was scare if I fall down.
Steep stairs.
Lakes are beautiful.
From tower.
Because Jean Sibelius is from Hämeenlinna I will share Finlandia now. He actually got inspiration to Finlandia from Aulanko's national park.
Our last visiting places were Ateneum and 'The Hotel and Restaurant Museum. I will introduce them for you now. Let's start from Ateneum.
Ateneum
Our guide showed us the PowerPoint from Sibelius, because topic of their changing exhibition is now Sibelius. When we were in auditorio they also made a tv-document from this event or this is how I understood it.
Anyway our guide had a lot information about Sibelius and after her presentation we were free to go watch exhibition from the Sibelius. Unfortunately it was not allowed to take pictures by Sibelius exhibition. But I took some pictures from downstairs where is paintings by Hugo Simberg. Many paints which topic is Kalevala.
The Wounded Angel is a painthing by symbolist painter Hugo Simberg. Year 1903
Ferdinand von Wright: Taistelevat metsot. Year 1886
Akseli Gallen-Kallela: Aino taru. Year 1891 It is first painting from Gallen-Kallela which topic was Kalevala.
Albert Edelfelt: Pariisin Luxembourgin puistossa, 1887.
Albert Edelfelt: leikkiviä poikiarannalla. Year 1884
The Hotel and Restaurant Museum
(ps.all my pictures under of this headline is from the museum)
It is in Ruoholahti. You will find it from the Cable Factory. This museum is investigating the history of restaurants and hotels. It opened it doors in year 2012. Now I will tell about our guided tour.
If I lost at least I will know where is Alko and A bar, right? ;)
A hotel dollhouse.
Why can't hotels be nowadays also this glamorous?
Here it is, A whole hotel dollhouse.
First our guide showed this dollhouse and she told a lot about it how things were almost 100 years ago. For example before buffets were public for a while. There was cold and hot foods together and you could take them as the same ways as nowadays. Then it didnt take much time people started to realize more about hygiene. This buffet table went out of fashion, because when food is a long time in table there is starting grow some bacteries.
After buffet they started to serve food in big dishes and everyone took food as much they needed. Actually this way also was not enough. Then 'A la carte' -food became to hotels and restaurants. But as you know, now in 2000-century buffets came back. They are very public on the ships.
Looks so good! ^^
This is an old vodka/alcohol hammer. In this time water was so dirty that people prefer to drink alcohol with food. They tought that in this way the won't get sick by drinking.
After the dollhouse we walked foward in front of the 'hotel room'.
About the hotel room our guide told that this was an example about Sokos Hotel Vaakuna, which was complited olympia year 1952. On her example in this room visited a woman. This woman was rich, because in this time normal people had no money to book a room from hotel.
There was also some rules for women. You could never go to eat to the restaurant without a man company. If you was hungry and you wanted to order something you needed to call with phone to chambermaid.
Believe me, it is so heavy!
An old kitchen
Here is an old kitchen. Usually many women works in there. But in a good hotel women always stayed in kitchen. They never could not be a waiter or it meaned that hotel is cheap. In their best hotel was three (***) stars hotel, where women were waiters.
In this time salary in kitchen and restaurant business was low. You could not feed your family with this salary and you needed to do extra work after work. Also workers could not eat same food as customers. Today this might be self-evident.
I never can do like this!
Cool
Then our guide leaded us to an old bar. There were some different kind of rules at this time. First if you wanted to drink alcohol you needed also order some food. But ofc people found out way to broke this rule. For the bar their customer were important and they watched under their fingers if people broke rules. Also in this way by time you can now order only alcohol if you like.
Then we visited in first Alko's in Finland. There was also some rules. You could not see bottles in Alko. Always you needed to be sure what to buy. You also had 'Alko pass' where cashier wrote date and what you bought this day. It was possible to visit in Alko one time per day. If you forgot something or you counted wrong you couldn't go back to Alko anymore.
Sometimes cashiers also watched what you bought and how much. If they doubted you might use too much alcohol then they tooked you to background and kept earful for you. "Don't use this much alcohol, it is not healty!"
Look at the bottles! You can't see what they really are. Only cashiers knows.
Alcohol pass. By time this became like driving license. They just asked if you have age to buy alcohol.
Alko's logo
After our guided tour it was time to play with things there! :)
I travelled to the Tallinn with my school and our ship company was
Eckerö Line. The ship left Helsinki from West Terminal and it arrived to
the A-terminal in Tallinn. In terminals there was a little kioskies and
other shops.
First we had a breakfast buffet on the ship.
I had never before use Eckerö Line as a ship company. This was my first
time. I saw the ship were much more smaller than for example Tallink or
Viking Line. For the breakfast we had different kind of eggs, bacon,
thin pancakes, frankfurts, different kind of fruits and something to
dessert.
After breakfast we went to the ship’s
conference room. There ship’s restaurant manager told us about the
company and the M/S Finlandia ship itself. The company will repair the
ship. They will build a bigger conference room and another rooms to the
ship. They are also planning to have more seats to there. Next year they
will also fix M/S Finlandia’s timetable.
Jippey we are in Tallinn now.
Our sightseeing bus.
When we
arrived to Tallinn we had first a two-hours bus sightseeing. We had
couple stops where our guide told more about the places and we had a
chance to watch places peacefully.
Orthodox Church of St.Nicholas
My lovely Liila! <3 Here we are in Tallinn!
What I learned from our
guide is that, when you are a guide you should always wait your group.
Our guide didn’t always wait for that all the group is in front of her
before she started to speak. But that’s a little thing anyway. After all
everything went good.
Old town.
We had two stops in this
sightseeing. First was in Tallinn's lookout spot. There you can see text
'The Times we had' text on the wall.
Next stop was in Kadriorg Park. I
had been there before and it is a beautiful park mostly at summer. "The
Estonian president’s residence and many foreign embassies are
located here. The park is one of the favourite spots for walking of
Tallinners young and old. But Kadriorg is famed mostly for its baroque
palace and park ensemble, begun in 1718 as the summer palace for the
family of Russian tsar Peter I." - Tourism Tallinn
Kadriorg Palace. First time I saw this building I didn't realize this the palace. I was looking for it, but expect it will be much more elegant. I tought there is some gold in it, but this really was a little disappointment.
But there is a nice park anyway.
:))
KUMU museum
After
our sightseeing our group had an hour time to eat and after it we were
supposed to go visit to Swissotel Hotel. We went to the Amarillo and
there was ten of us. We made our orders and we ate in one hour. It was
fast, because there was so many of us. But I see it is possible in
Tallinn to have fast service.
Then we visited in
Swissotel. There our guide was a young girl who was a little bit
nervous. She presents hotel to us. In hotel there is thirty floors, so
it is a high building. She told us that hotel’s president suite is
almost as big as a little house could be. In this suite had visit Lady
Gaga, Barack Obama and other famous people.
Hotel’s
restaurant is on the thirtieth floor and it is also famous place to have
a romantic dinner. From this floor you can see a whole Tallinn and
more. It’s worth it.
30th floor
I love this sofa! :)
A conference room
After Swissotel we had some free time
and first we went to the Viru Centre. After it we visited in Old Town
and then we went to the Rotterman. I was just so tired and I had pain in
my feets. Hu.
Our last visiting place was Tallink Spa & Conference Hotel. I had been there before. I love the spa in there. It's big and you can also go swim outside. Water is warm and it is intresthing to swim when it's so cold like almost zero degrees outside. In the spa there is also spa where you can buy different kind of drinks if you like.
We also visited in suites. There was four different kind of suites: French, Arabian, Cosmos and Metropolian suites. My favorites were Arabian and French suites! :)
