I started my day in search of the Kuopio City Museum, but there was kind of a parking garage where the guide book said the museum would be…hrm. Anyways, I ended up at the art museum instead.
It was pretty tiny and packed a lot in for being so tiny. One exhibit was called “Love” and…it was kind of weird and modern. There was this set of three paintings that literally looked like a three year old was the artist, except 3 year old’s artwork is sometimes a little more visually appealing. However, there was this tiny crocheted swan and then a poodle, both being absolutely adorable.
Upstairs, the artwork was more “traditional”, some forest landscapes, village scenes, a couple scenes of France, because that’s where all the Finnish artists studied, some bright colored city-scenes. There was this really cool painting of a vase, except there were tree shadows on the sides, the coloring was really beautiful, anyways…
After the art museum, I went in search of the old town, because I’m thoroughly attracted to quaintness. The (very silly) guide book told me it was “just east of the market”, I found nothing old-town-like, but I did find a lake.
If you’re not aware, Finland is famous for its lakes, and Kuopio (and Tampere) and pretty much central Finland is considered “lake region” because, well, the entire region is covered in lakes (and forests). This was a pretty tiny lake, actually kind of Walden Pond sized, maybe smaller, but it was still gorgeous. It was also a pretty central hang out place for the locals – lots of joggers and bikers and children on the playground, old people taking a break from the nursing home, fishers…you know.
I had lunch in the market, and met a really lovely Finn. Normally, if you want to talk to a Finn, you have to approach them, they aren’t normally the most outgoing people (as a group, individuals, its impossible to say, obviously) Anyways, she was sitting at the table next to me, looked over and smiled and started talking. We spoke in a mix of English and Finnish about lots of things – she originally went into Marketing and social sciences, but was also a language teacher and a translator for a while, really cool!
Then I went to visit Marja-Leena, my other Finnish teacher, who was teaching Finnish for foreigners in Kuopio (reason why I came to Kuopio in the first place). I got to meet some of her students, including one who seemed about early high school age? (not sure) who had moved to Kuopio two years ago from Los Angeles, ouf.
Marja-Leena and some of the students took me into the middle of the woods, to this tiny, traditional farm (so traditional, they made the hay with horses instead of machines)
Then we had a “Word Tasting”, which was…interesting (very Finnish). I learned some fun things, like the derivative of the word “ymmärtä, to understand” comes from the Finnish word “around” because if you go all the way around something, you understand it. However, the person in charge also played this song for us, it was in pretty old complicated Finnish, so most of the people there didn’t really understand it because we were students and not Finns, but apparently it was super super meaningful, because the four Finns in the room were tearing up and getting super emotional, which was just kind of uncomfortable. But, you know, new experiences, maybe that song will make sense when I’ve learned more Finnish and understand the significance.
And that’s pretty much the day in a nutshell, woohoo!
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