Circus Freaks
May. 25th, 2008 03:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyrasantae
Both of us slept into the afternoon today, so I don't suspect we'll be doing very much today (it's a Sunday anyway).
There were events for the entire day of the festival, starting in the afternoon. They're mostly arts or sports: shows, demos, and workshops, and I really think the sports stuff was the most popular with the youth, as well as some of the music shows. there were also some arts for the kids, of course, but children here are very active and really enjoy sports, both boys and girls. There was also a go tournament for the strategically minded.
I hadn't really noticed a whole lot of dark culture this week, until now - while we were eating pizza for lunch (tuna fish and mussels on pizza?!), all of a sudden it was like a sudden stampede of emos as group after group of teens wearing My Chemical Romance shirts walked past the window of the pizzaria. otherwise, the streets didn't seem really busy for what is a major festival in the city, though the venues are not clumped together.
The pizza is superthin, by the way. One can fold it up into a sandwich and eat it, and it comes uncut. I wonder if delivery pizza is cut, though.
I managed to get one of those rock festival posters from a booth. There's also booths of people selling arts and crafts, and of course the professional artists charge a lot for their work.
At a small art studio, there was an opportunity to try something like paper engraving/etching (the paper has a black coating you scrape off with a scalpel). An old lady was demonstrating this to me and explaining it to me all in Finnish, but actions are louder than words and all that. Once I figured out what I was doing, I kind of ran out of ideas, so I dug in my wallet for a coin and I couldn't find one. so I just had to engrave the Finnish lion from memory instead. And I signed their guestbook, and then it seemed I had suddenly become a freak show with the old people there all trying to show off their English skills and telling me the most random things about themselves in English. One wondered if J and I went to art school. Another tried to speak Swedish to me. I freaking let them keep my paper since the whole freak show started with one man seeing my lion image and telling his colleagues to "katso[kaa]!" He pinned it to the corkboard above the telephone.
After this incident it was the evening proper - and the metal/emo/punk and people-chillin'-at-the-park-with-drinks invasions were in full force, the atmosphere more like a festival. I wished I was wearing my NW shirt with cloak outfit, then I would have fit right in. So either they're sitting at the park or just about anywhere drinking, or they're walkin' around the street, with a sixpack in one hand and a beer in the other, or a bottle of wine, or whatever. I'm uncomfortable enough around dark peoples as it is, but when they're all drunk too... J wishes that the youths will grow out of their dark phases quickly - as she feels a bit out of place too.
We went home to get changed before heading out for some nightlife (to pick up hot Finnish guys with long hair?), so I got into my aforementioned outfit. Upon return to the downtown, it was around 10PM, and there were still a lot of people, but the place looked like the aftermath of a Stanley Cup playoffs riot - spilled liquor all over the street, people milling about drunk, cursing and swearing, bottles broken and unbroken everywhere, bottlepickers making a killing.
We watched a weird duo play at a crowded bar, where a crazy drunk dancer had to be escorted out by a couple of bouncers, and when the their show was over, watched the final Eurovision vote tally at another bar. There's a good spirit of losing - they're so used to it they'll cheer whenever they get points even though they almost always place near the bottom if they make it to finals at all.
At one point on the street some drunk guy with shaved head and trenchcoat wondered if I could do any magic tricks (J translated this for me after), and I just put on my mysterious smile and moved on =) There was another (?) guy at the second bar who winked at me too; that was creepy.
There were events for the entire day of the festival, starting in the afternoon. They're mostly arts or sports: shows, demos, and workshops, and I really think the sports stuff was the most popular with the youth, as well as some of the music shows. there were also some arts for the kids, of course, but children here are very active and really enjoy sports, both boys and girls. There was also a go tournament for the strategically minded.
I hadn't really noticed a whole lot of dark culture this week, until now - while we were eating pizza for lunch (tuna fish and mussels on pizza?!), all of a sudden it was like a sudden stampede of emos as group after group of teens wearing My Chemical Romance shirts walked past the window of the pizzaria. otherwise, the streets didn't seem really busy for what is a major festival in the city, though the venues are not clumped together.
The pizza is superthin, by the way. One can fold it up into a sandwich and eat it, and it comes uncut. I wonder if delivery pizza is cut, though.
I managed to get one of those rock festival posters from a booth. There's also booths of people selling arts and crafts, and of course the professional artists charge a lot for their work.
At a small art studio, there was an opportunity to try something like paper engraving/etching (the paper has a black coating you scrape off with a scalpel). An old lady was demonstrating this to me and explaining it to me all in Finnish, but actions are louder than words and all that. Once I figured out what I was doing, I kind of ran out of ideas, so I dug in my wallet for a coin and I couldn't find one. so I just had to engrave the Finnish lion from memory instead. And I signed their guestbook, and then it seemed I had suddenly become a freak show with the old people there all trying to show off their English skills and telling me the most random things about themselves in English. One wondered if J and I went to art school. Another tried to speak Swedish to me. I freaking let them keep my paper since the whole freak show started with one man seeing my lion image and telling his colleagues to "katso[kaa]!" He pinned it to the corkboard above the telephone.
After this incident it was the evening proper - and the metal/emo/punk and people-chillin'-at-the-park-with-drinks invasions were in full force, the atmosphere more like a festival. I wished I was wearing my NW shirt with cloak outfit, then I would have fit right in. So either they're sitting at the park or just about anywhere drinking, or they're walkin' around the street, with a sixpack in one hand and a beer in the other, or a bottle of wine, or whatever. I'm uncomfortable enough around dark peoples as it is, but when they're all drunk too... J wishes that the youths will grow out of their dark phases quickly - as she feels a bit out of place too.
We went home to get changed before heading out for some nightlife (to pick up hot Finnish guys with long hair?), so I got into my aforementioned outfit. Upon return to the downtown, it was around 10PM, and there were still a lot of people, but the place looked like the aftermath of a Stanley Cup playoffs riot - spilled liquor all over the street, people milling about drunk, cursing and swearing, bottles broken and unbroken everywhere, bottlepickers making a killing.
We watched a weird duo play at a crowded bar, where a crazy drunk dancer had to be escorted out by a couple of bouncers, and when the their show was over, watched the final Eurovision vote tally at another bar. There's a good spirit of losing - they're so used to it they'll cheer whenever they get points even though they almost always place near the bottom if they make it to finals at all.
At one point on the street some drunk guy with shaved head and trenchcoat wondered if I could do any magic tricks (J translated this for me after), and I just put on my mysterious smile and moved on =) There was another (?) guy at the second bar who winked at me too; that was creepy.
