Helsinki in the snow

This morning on my way to the language course: It was a cold and sunny day. Behind the frozen bay you can already see the tower of the white cathedral. I can also see it from the seminar room.

The Senate Square was designed by C. L. Engel. Typical are yellow and red houses. The orthodox Uspenski cathedral is not far.

Now a huge amount of snow has been collected in the middle of the piazza. Compare the height to a man. The picture shows the senate building, directly opposite of the university main building.

Also on my way back to the physics campus I had to stop in order to take a picture of these icicles!

FAZIT: Helsinki is much more beautiful on a sunny winter day than in the grey November. The days are noticeably getting longer now, too. For example we had 8:48h sunlight today, in Hannover for comparison 9:41h.

Birthday

It was the coldest birthday of my life!! When I was a child, I always wished for a snow on my birthday. This year it came more than true. After a nice dinner with my flatmates - which was at the same time a goodbye dinner for my Italian flatmate Giulia - we went sledding! (see "Winter activities)

At the following weekend we had a big party in our appartment because Anne-Sophie's and Mathilde's birthdays are nearly at the same time and we celebrated together.





We also prepared some snacks for the party of which none was left. Our flat was so full of people!

Not much later it was the birthday of my French neighbour Manu. We invited him to a dinner on the evening before his birthday and made a surprise at midnight.

So, in the last time I did not study all the time. Instead there were so many nice get-togethers, parties, dinners, outdoor winter activities,... But now there are a lot of homework and lab reports...

Cold Winter

"If you want to see snow and a real winter, Helsinki is the wrong city."
This is what I was told by plenty of people "here in the south" when I arrived here in autumn. But this winter seems to be an exception. We have sooo much snow, many really cold days and the baltic sea is frozen.
However, I usually still go by bicycle, but sometimes I have to wheel my bike. Sometimes it is ok to bike on the even snow. But also excavators shovel the snow from streets, pedestrian ways and bike paths onto trucks which carry the snow away. At the roadside the snow piles up to 1.5 or 2m!

This warm winter equipment is necessary because...








... it was -22°C, as this thermometer which I pass on my way into town proves.













Who does not remember where he left his car will have difficulties finding it under the snow...















... or the bikes!

















Marco is standing in the snow up to his knees!

Winter activities

On the evening of my birthday we went sledding on a bob,
that was a lot of fun :-) Of course we had to dress well. Here are my French flatmates Anne-Sophie and Mathilde and I in our winter equipment. My gloves (self-made by Juho) in the Finnish colours and with my initials kept my hands warm!












We went to a nice slope, but already the way was great :-)
Like children we pulled each other on the bob. Of course, we also had a snowball fight!








Fortunately I had taken my ice skates from Germany after the Christmas holidays. In the stadion in our part of town you can now skate where usually people run. A car even removed the snow from the track. This was already a nice place to go ice skating, especially when the sun was shining, but...






... skating 7 km the frozen Baltic sea was even more spectacular! A 7 km long loop on the ice in the western part of Helsinki was cleared from the snow. That was a special experience!











When we were cold after skating, I prepared Bratäpfel (filled apples from the oven) with vanilla sauce, a sweet German winter speciality. In my opinion, Bratäpfel are a good example of typical German food, better than Schnitzel and Würstchen...