Helsinki offers a rich palette of fine restaurants, delis and cafés. Of course, there are also uncountable quasi-food on-the-go vendors. That’s not the type of chow I have in mind today–not the kind you’d eat only when drunk on a Friday night and the kind that leaves that unmistakable aftertaste at least until Monday afternoon for even greater embarrassement not only in front of your spouse, but nosy colleagues too. Not of that ilk.

If you swear by Michelin stars, you’ll find such eating places too. But that again is not what I’m aiming at. Some time last week I spoted a tad odd ad in the newspapers that pierced my brain. It was an advertisement for a café in Helsinki offering a house hamburger for an unfathomable price of 21€. I had to rub my eyes twice before I could be sure those numbers were written in that order.

I cut out the ad and was on a mission to find out what does it feel like, both in the mouth and in the mind, to eat a 21€ hamburger.

I walked past the Kämp café umpteen times, but was never drawn to it enough to cross their doorstep. Although the café seems to be a rather insignificant part within the Kämp imperium spanning from luxurious hotels, and restaurants to bars, spa and what not, it is not at all timorous in this company. Quite the contrary, the café shines in its neoclassical interior decoration and bourgeoisie clientele. Not exactly my kind of thing, but all I have on my mind right now is the burger.

It was Saturday afternoon and the place was packed. I was stunned. But there I was, at the mercy of a waitress trying to find an available table. I couldn’t have ever imagined that I’d need to make a table reservation for a hamburger meal. After I was seated, she handed me the menu, which I did not really need, since I’ve known for days what exactly I came for: Garçon, bring me the Kämp hamburger. What would I like to drink? Bring me whatever goes well with your burger. I got Coke. Surprised? A bit, but when I come to think of it, what else could I have expected. A glass of 2000 Château Cheval Blanc?

The burger arrives. Chef de cuisine even branded the thing; it sports a large K burnt right on top of the bun. It didn’t come from McDonald’s, that’s for sure. I take a couple of snapshots and dig in.

Ground beef replaced with thin slices of marbled fillet of beef, lettuce upgraded to fresh rucola, undisclosed sauce promoted to horseradish mayonnaise. And besides laying these ingredients between two pieces of bread, they actually cared to tell me what I’m eating. Not to mention the fries made out of real potatoes.

The verdict? It tasted alright, it landed in the stomach with a loud thump, but I managed alright. However, I wonder if my friends from the land of the burger would still consider it to be a burger with all these peculiar ingredients.

Bon appétit.

Mladen

Just spotted this traffic sign mashup in Otaniemi, a self-proclaimed Nordic technology hub, but locally better known for its high density of geeky student population. Is that a sign of onslaught on consumerism? Or is it of consumerism? Hard to tell, but I sincerely hope dedicated shopping cart roads are not someone’s true vision or everything this technology hub can contribute to the world.

Mladen

Remember Guns’n'Roses? I’m not surprised. They were in and screamed out within a few brief years. Only if you were a rebellious teenager during those fleeting moments and thought it was cool to dig hard rock and grow long hair, you’re probably humming one of their tunes right now. Even though it might be embarrassing to admit, I was one of those teenagers. But as soon as Spaghetti incident came out I considered the band forgotten. However, I have wondered from time to time what everyone besides Slash is doing. Boy was I surprised when I found out that Mr. Rose runs an established food business these days. It tastes better than it sounded.

Mladen

Already on several occasions I wrote about the peculiar relationship between Finns and alcohol. Even though some of the readers find such topics worn out, interestingly enough there are some intriguing observations about this that continue to make my head spin.

I don’t have many vivid memories from my early childhood, but when I think about it I still rememer the first time I encountered Finns when I was five and they were intoxicated. It was on a hot summer night on the coast of Istrian peninsula in what was then still Yugoslavia (now Croatia). My parents, my brother and I were on our summer vacation in a bungalow village and during the course of our stay we got new neighbors who already during their first night assured a Finnish-Yugoslav get-together. I remember being awaken by short bursts of loud exclamations in a strange language. After this had lasted for a while I heard my dad speaking in another language that was unfamiliar to me and the noise subsided, or I had fallen back asleep.

Without a single trace of doubt this was the event of the week in the sleepy village. In the morning dad explained how in all their drunkenness our Finnish neighbors’ volume meters became unbearably thick-skinned. Since the shouting lasted too long, he had to get up to calm them down. I can imagine that they probably woke up the whole village before they reached their hut in the wee hours.

Fast-forward twenty some years. Not long ago this and other accounts of similar type suddenly all make sense. It was like staring at scattered pieces of a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle for two years, and then solving the puzzle in two minutes. Only recently I have begun understanding what had happened that summer night and why.

Despite the fact that many prices were being readjusted for the pocket of a foreign visitor, Yugoslavia was still a budget traveler’s dream. Whoever could afford to get there, didn’t have to worry about prices once they got there. Nowhere else, but there, have I seen anyone light up their cigar with money, a Yugoslav Dinar bill. So you can imagine that in a place like that stocking up on booze couldn’t present a financial burden. Especially not if you came from any of the Nordic countries where one suspects some sort of a fine has been added to the price of that watered-down pint of beer. While in Yugoslavia for that same sum you’d get a liter of delicious šljivovica and still have some left. The decision is all too obvious: you quit drinking beer. And that’s probably what our neighbors from Finland had decided already during their first night there. Who could blame them?

However, I can imagine that such vacation alone might instigate a month without a drop of booze, even though it is the month of January that is traditionally reserved for serious detoxification. Even though it might not be the quantity, but rather the method of consumption that makes this peculiar relationship problematic, excessive alcohol ingestion is a serious issue in Finland and many are very somber about it. A third of the population, to be more precise. That’s roughly how many have decided in the beginning of January that they will abstain from alcohol during that month. I’m quite sure it takes a steady diet of something a tad bit stronger than Coke Zero before you decide to resort to sober life for 31 days.

But where does this type of secular nationwide month-long ethanol renunciation come from? There is a dispute about who exactly had instigated the custom in Finland, however, it is most plausible that it originated in the 1970s when a gentleman named Niilo Hakkarainen, a CEO of a paper factory, suggested to his workers to stay clean for the month of February. Obviously some took it seriously and more than thirty years later that humble proposition acquired a status of a serious national challenge. It even got upgraded; the challenge shifted from the shortest possible to the longest possible month.

According to a recently conducted poll 35% of responders promised themselves to stay away from alcohol, but only about a 17% of the population has managed to keep that promise until the end of January in 2007. If they don’t manage to spend the whole month without a drop, it can be at least something to look forward to for January 2009. The good news for those is that the rate of success is on the increase.

If you think you can’t make it, worry not, there is plenty of support out there, if you need it. Finnish Center for the promotion of health and Paihdelinkki (English version AddictionLink) are just two inspirational and supportive examples. The former organization even set up a separate Web site Tipaton tammikuu devoted solely to the challenge. There you can track your daily progress or even challenge your friends or family to do the same. Information is abundant and support is offered in different formats ranging from vibrant forums and various self-tests to plain fact calorie counter for those who need to crunch numbers before they act. Center for the promotion of health even created a desktop calendar, if for some reason that’s exactly what you’ve missed in your previous attempts to stop drinking (both PC users and Mac users served).

If none of that helps, then as a last resort it might help to know that the tax on alcoholic beverages has again been substantialy increased at the beginning of the month.

I admit, the forbidden fruit of January can be a tough nut to crack. At least it was me who got cracked before I cracked it; I had blithely enjoyed my sauna beer just a couple of days ago. I lasted eight days. But then again that kspt sound the beer can made when I opened it definitely did not cause any moral introspection.

Cheers to all those who will last for three more weeks.

Mladen

iPod, a music player turned pop icon. It’s a continuous challenge for the nerds, its strong image was used to counter the war in Iraq, it inspired a book documenting its popularity and even sneaked into our daily vocabulary. Surprising? Not really. It looks nice, it’s easy to use and people love it. Apple sold millions, earn googols and marched onto new market.

Nevertheless, I was surprised to find that the talltale iPod player-earphone silhuette landed even on a Finnish rye-bread wrapping. It’s hard to tell if it was an easter egg cleverly smuggled by graphic designers or just a mere me-too statement by the Finnish food manufacturer Fazer gasping for street-cred with their Reissumies rye-bread. Whichever it is, iPod is now gone.

Since Apple jumped the fence onto the home turf of the most valuable Finnish brand, it was really just a matter of time before someone from Olli-Pekka’s office would again pick up the phone and order Fazer to replace that iPod with an Internet Tablet or a Nokia phone. And I wouldn’t be surprised if this is exactly what has happened, given the notoriety Nokia has gained when their head of security ordered a cleaning company to remove “Kallasvuo sucks” stencil graffitti from the walls of the E15 squat in Helsinki.

If that’s the case with Reissumies, I’m sure Nokia got a much more cooperative response and less resistance from Fazer than it did from E15. For the sake of posterity here are both old and new, con- and sans-iPod rye-bread wrappers.

Mladen