So Tampere is, so far, the best city I’ve visited. It’s not beautiful, like Helsinki, or super-urban, like Kuopio. It just kind of exists. There are some beautiful parts, there are some ugly parts, there are some parts that just exist. It feels like a place, instead of Fairyland. I don’t know how to explain it, I just love Tampere, so much.
I got started late, because I spent my morning speaking with a French person who was also staying at my hostel. His English was pretty terrible (though he thought he was amazing…), so we mainly spoke French. It was good to know that I can still speak French (though Finnish words have been sneaking in, I taking that as a good sign)
Tampere doesn’t have an open air market (first place not to, one thing I don’t like about the place) (it does have a super-extended covered market, so it’s kind of equivalent, and there are still berry-stalls all over) but it does have a Central Square. When I walked past, they were setting up for their floral festival (which I will spend three hours at on Friday) and using metalish music for a sound check (I think it was super-recent Sirenia? Not sure, the song was recognizable but not one I listen to all the time), it was awesome, one of those moments of “oh! Now I remember why I’m here in the first place”
The main attraction of the day was the Moominvalley museum, which was in an exciting building, which also housed a library and a rock museum.
The museum was much more book-related than Moominworld, so everything made a little more sense. However, I did find out that there is one book that was translated into English that I haven’t read! Its called “Moomin and the Great Flood” and was the first ever moomin book (then came “The Invisible Child”, which we know as “Tales from Moominvalley”), I think its so old and outdated that they don’t print the English translation anymore, bah! I’ll get my hands on it somehow.
The two themes for the museum were models and original artwork. There were millions of models based off of the artwork, including Moominmamma painting the lighthouse wall, Tooticky’s snow horse and snow latern, Sniff and Moomin meeting Snufkin, the Snork Maiden and Misabel trying on dresses and wigs, the Hobgoblin sending a table of food off to Snufkin, the Groke coming to see Moomintroll’s lantern…so many!
There was also lots of Tove Jannson’s original artwork. A lot of it was actually watercolor, which is so beautiful (I got some postcards for keepsake). The one where the sun finally comes back in winter was gorgeous. Most of the time, the artwork and the models were the same scenes for consistency, which was really interesting to compare.
Also (because it amused me), they had a child-size replication of the theater from “Moominsummer Madness”, complete with tilt and boats in front, with an audience of stuffed moomins (for some reason, the children kept putting them facing away from the stage…)
Anyways, enough obsessing without pictures…after the museum, I stopped and had pulla (this roll thingy, very Finnish) at a tiny tiny café (kahvila, it’s a little different) in a park.
And then, I explored the covered market. By that time, it was raining, and, in a moment of silliness, I decided to walk along the river in the rain (the river in Tampere is clear and blue and pretty)
I also visited a tiny orthodox church, which was very very very ornate, culture shock for me, because there are mainly Finnish Lutheran churches here, which are all about simplicity. The gold and intricacy of this church was just so fancy.
And then, a long(ish) train ride, with a layover in Pieksämäki to arrive in Kuopio.
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