Lapland Trip in pictures

I just made a short videos with some pictures from our trip to lapland, you can watch it here:

Pirate Cruise

As you already know we spent some time travelling around Finland and we also spent a week in Tallinn. But that not all, you know now that Francois went to Russia, however I did not join him there. Another opportunity has been presented to me; I had then chosen to not follow them in this trip (in Russia) though I have the opportunity earlier to make a cruise to Stockholm in Sweden.

This trip has been organized by ESN Finland.

What is ESN Finland? Well ESN Finland is a national student’s organization working towards international students and mobility.

First let’s speak about the time we spent on the boat. When we arrive on board the first thing we have done there was visiting the boat, it was pretty impressive. The commodore rooms were very luxurious. In the Boat there are many stores, bars, two clubs, a casino, there is also a swimming pool with Jacuzzi and Sauna.

Then during the day we decided to go on the deck in order to enjoy the sea air and the sun.

But most of the time spend on the boat was dedicated to party’s. I think you can imagine what can give a boat full of students (Some Amazing Party’s).

So what about Stockholm you will say!!! We spend one day visiting the city, a very nice one, I especially liked the old town.

Let‘s make a bit of history about Stockholm. The earliest written mention of Stockholm dates from 1252, the city has been founded by Berger Jarl to protect Sweden from sea invasions by foreign navies. At the beginning the city was only located in one little ice land, the one of the old town. But the city increased quite fast. Stockholm became the capital of Sweden in 1634, nowadays Stockholm is the political center of Sweden and also the city residence of the king.

The city of Stockholm is now the European capital of culture.

This trip was definitively the best that I did.

Now we will speak about another subject.  If you remember we were talking about floor ball and the team of Seinajoki, they are today once again champions of Finland. Also a word about Ice Hockey, yesterday the third game of the playoff opponent Oulu and Tampere has finished by the defeat of Tampere thus Oulu finished champion of Finland and Tampere is placed at the second.

That’s all I wanted to tell you today.

Sources :

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Accueil_principal

http://www.ligue.com/hockey/finlande/sm-liiga-play-off/

Ice Hockey

A few days ago I was in Tampere in order to visit the city at the same time we have visited some museum there one of this museum was dedicated to the Ice Hockey which remind me that I didn’t make any article about Ice Hockey at all. Even though Ice hockey is one of the most important sport in Finland.

Moreover I was already in Tampere before to attend a hockey game in Hakametsä Stadium, this is the first ice hockey stadium of Finland (It was built for the ice hockey world championships in 1965. Five other world championships have been organized there) I was there to see the match between Tappara (Tampere, here in blue) and karpat (Oulu, here in white).

This game had been won by Tappara, actually Karpat is the first of the league and Tappara the second.

What about the game? Awesome atmosphere, a fan team for Tappara singing for the victory of their team.

A mascot walking around the stadium, cheerleaders dancing during the match and between each period there are possible to go to drink or get something to eat in different bar, or simply tour the shop that the stadium offers.

Thanks to Ice Hockey museum I could learn more about origin of Ice Hockey.

The history of ice hockey is quite complicated. Various ball games played with sticks have been played for thousands of years, and natural conditions have beckoned players to the ice. Ball and ice games from both Europe and America had an impact on the emergence of ice hockey. The game evolved into its modern form in the eastern provinces of Canada in the 19^th century. Ice Hockey became one of the major sports in Finland in 1990 thanks to the success achieved in world class events.

At the beginning of 2009 Ice Hockey became the top sport in Finland, during this year according to the Finnish Ice Hockey Association, the number of licensed players was over 63.000 and there were 200.000 active players.

sportingly, see you soon.

---

sources

http://www.eurohockey.com/

Travel in Estonia ! |Part 2|

Few weeks ago Francois wrote our first article about Tallinn, now it’s my turn to speak to you about this city, this capital. As he said you our trip to Estonia and Tallinn have been organised by our self during our free week. We go there with other Erasmus students from all Europe.

Francois made you a geographic situation of Estonia, he spoke you to the Russian influence and a bit about food. I will speak you about the old town, the medieval old town, the historical center. In other words i will replace this city in the history.

The origins of Tallinn date to the 13th century, when a castle was built by the crusading knights of the Teutonic Order (a German medieval military order). It developed as a major center of the Hanseatic League.

What is Hanseatic League? The Hanseatic League was a commercial and defensive confederation of merchant guild and their market towns that dominated trade along the coast of Northern Europe. This League born in 13th century and she disappeared during the 17th century.

Today the old uptown stay the administrative center, the old town has preserved his role of central life of the city. Surprisingly the city being well conversed in spite of fires and wars which it has faced, thanks to that the old town as began a touristic area with his castle, its fortification but also its old medieval house.

This makes this city a very pleasant place to visit.

Moreover you can see people dressing like a medieval era

and you can also go to eat in some restaurant which reproduces the medieval atmosphere, eating has candle light with plate hand made in clay, you are served buy costumed people and in some of those restaurant you can heard some musicians playing with traditional instrument.

Tallinn is a very good place to visit, this trip was definitively amazing .

---

Sources :

– http://whc.unesco.org/fr/list/822/

The Sauna Culture

How could people go to Finland without saying a few words about Sauna? As a matter of fact, Sauna is a Finnish word, and probably the only word of this language which become part of the world’s vocabulary.

Throughout history many civilizations (Roman, Greek, Scandinavian, etc…) have been using sweat baths for hygienic and medicinal purposes. The first Sauna as we know appears in Finland in the 5^th century when northern European tribes abandoned their nomadic lifestyle and settled down.

Today in Finland there is more Saunas than cars. To give you a quantity, Finland has more or less two millions Saunas. Every Finnish person has access to a sauna; they often have one in their own house or at least in a shared facility in an apartment block. You can even see Saunas in the parliament.

The Finns think that Sauna are for business as much as for leisure, they believe that due to its social nature and relaxing effect, the sauna is an great place for doing business. It’s not uncommon for them to make some political meetings into a sauna.

For us it could be a little bit difficult to understand and maybe a little bit strange to think we can make business in those Saunas and especially when you know that they are all naked in the sauna. It is true I have forgotten to mention before that in Finland you have to go naked in the sauna.

To speak about my own experience in the Finnish sauna: I went in two different types of saunas.

The first sauna was only for men so you have to go naked into the sauna. In general men and women are separated for the sauna; this could be a problem especially when you know that they make some meetings in sauna.

The second one is part of a special activity called Ice swimming; this one is mixed so you wear a swimsuit. You first spend some time into the sauna and then you have to go to a hole into an iced lake to swim.

The shock of dousing the body in cold water is supposed to have health benefits. But for my first time I had to go into this hole was very hard, the shock (temperature changes near to 70 degree) was too important for me however I finally succeed to go in this hole and swim a little bit (such an hard day).

Here you can see a germ friend who try the experience with me going into the hole and swimming (the photographer does not like to be picked photo, I am the photographer ^^)

This experience is very relaxing finally, not necessarily easy at first. However with the will, if we get used rather quickly. Therefore we renew experience has several times with increasing ease to go swimming in the chilling water.

For those who have the opportunity I would advise you to try.

Floorball

On Friday night I went to watch a floorball match, and during the time I am spending in Finland I try to play this sport, it is very interesting for me. Moreover, this sport is an important sport mainly in Finland.

That is why I decided to write my new article on that sport.

Floorball it is a sport which could be considered like a brother of Ice Hockey, but you don’t need ice to play, this game is an indoor team sport.

At the beginning in Nordic countries it was played during the summer in order to make another form of training for hockey’s players.

–

–

–

Like for the hockey you need a stick, however the puck is replaced by a ball.

–

–

–

–

–

–

The goalkeeper is wearing limited protection, he does not use any stick. He has to protect the goal with his hands.

–

–

–

As I previously said I could practice this sport yet in Finland, we played at five players on the ground and one goalkeeper per team during three periods of twenty minutes. The contact between players is not rude as hockey but, this sport is still quite physical especially due to his speed.

As regards to the match I saw on last Friday it opposed the team « SPV » of Seinajoki to the « OLS » of Oulu. In this Picture you can see the « SPV » in red and the « OLS » in yellow.

That was a very attractive match. During this match, I could see a real comfort front the players to control the ball with their stick, I saw some incredible tricks.

The SPV won the match 13 to 8, which permit the Seinajoki team to consolidate his second place of the raking of this year just behind the « Happe » of Jyvaskyla.

But the cup is not over yet, so “go go SPV”.

And I will be back soon ^^

---

sources:

– http://www.exelsports.fi/app/product/list/-/id/12

– http://www.modsport.co.uk/collections/hockey

Visit of Vaasa

I made a trip with my roommate and other guys from the university to Vaasa on last Saturday. In this article i will tell you what we do in this city but until that we will made some history about this town.

So the story of Vaasa begins in the 14th century, when seafarers from the coast region in central Sweden disembarked at the present Old Vaasa and the wasteland owners from Finland proper came to guard their land.

The town grow up thanks to the sea connections which allow the business of Vaasa to flourished in the 17th century.

However, in August 1852 a fire burn all the old town of Vassa, The town haves been rebuild on 1862.

Today Vaasa is the regional capital of Ostrobothnia, the city has a population of 67,000. The City is bilingual the population speak Finnish and Swedish, that make the city an important center for Finland-Swedish culture.

Now let’s speak about our trip in this town :

To begin for going to Vaasa we just have to take a train from Seinajoki to Vaasa we take it at 9h30 and in something like one hour we were in Vaasa then our visit of Vaasa could begin.
First we go to the Market place, which is the center of the city life in Vaasa there you can see the Finlands Statue of Freedom :

Then we just walk to the Trinity church :

After that, we were quiet hungry so we decided to take a break, take some cake with an hot drink cause yes in Finland the weather is a little bit cold (well this year and for the moment is not so cold but walking when it is snowing and with some wind you feel cold as well).

But before that we were strolling on the waterfront or for some of us walking on the sea

To finish our trip we just took a leisurely stroll through the city but you know with the weather it could be difficult to walk into the town some of us fall down because of ice.

It is over for today see you soon.

Objective : Seinajoki SeAMK !

Hi everyone, with this first article we will introduce you our blog on our Finnish trip. Who are we ? just two ingenering students in IT from Esaip ingenering school in France (Alexandre Hacquard-Sierra and François Delessard).

Well what can we say about Seinajoki ? Seinajoki is a Western town of finland, it is the capital of South Ostrobotnie, it is 59,138 people for 5 millions in the all country.

This Town is known for its modern architecture and especially for the downtown with Alvar Aalto construction.

The town got 4 universities, Seinajoki, Finland, in SeAMK – SeinäJoen Ammattikorkeakoulu (Seinajoki Unversity of Applied Sciences), The Business School University, The Graduate School of Agriculture and Forestry, The Graduate School of Culture and Design and The Graduate School of Health and Social Sciences; but the most known is the university of Applied Sciences for its opening at the international. And we will go at this university to improve our knowledge area.

The town is the theater of two great event the tango festival and the most important rock festival of finland.

I could read on some blogs that we should walk along the river of the town, around the hospital where we could see a beautiful lake and they speak about great forest as well.

About shared appartment : it is quite easy to find an appart thanks to the university which gives us information about students campus. However you have to take it early, in order to be in the most requested campus of the city cause this one is near to the university less than 10minute walk and something like 15minute for the center of the town. We finally all managed to be in this campus, Martilan Korterri.

The transport are’nt very useful in the town for us cause we are near everything but students got a 50% discount for all transport.

We were speaking about transport so it is maybe the best moment to explain you how we will go to Seinajoki Finland from France, well we take an airplane with finnair a finnish companie which takes us to Helsinki and then we take a train from Helsinki to Seinajoki. This is a 6 hours of trip and 1 hour of shift schedule, it is 2 hours of plane and 4 hours of train.

To conclude  this first article we will speak a little about the students life in Seinajoki. So like all of us know it a big part of the students life are composed of party and for this Seinajoki got 2 important places Ilona and Karma clubs and just the usual hangout you got the Galaxy bar, The celtic bar which are all in the downtown.

With this, we finish our first article but don’t worry we will be back soon.

---

sources :

– santatelevision.com

– http://www.seamk.fi/en/About-us/Faculties/School-of-Technology