WDC Helsinki 2012: New Year's Eve of Design from
WDC Helsinki 2012 on
Vimeo.
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| The Finnish Ricky Martin on stage! |
Ringin' in 2012 was better than expected! We are staying in Helsinki for a week before heading home, so we decided to check out the annual new years celebration in SenateSquare (about a 10 minute walk from where we are staying). Little did we know that we were part of a GRAND celebration this year because of two special events: 1.) Helsinki celebrates it's
200th year of being the Capital of Finland (1812-2012), and 2.) Helsinki is the designated
Design Capital of the World in 2012.
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| Yep, that is a giant rubix cube. |
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| The Helsinki Cathedral all lit up! |
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| Happy New Year! |
We arrived in Senatesquare just in time for the kick off of the live TV version of the celebration. Now this is the kind of new years celebration I can get down with (long are the days that I want to fight drunk crowds of people), this crowd was (in typical Finn style) chilled out, well-mannered, and for the most part sober. I guess it helped that the demographics included families and many middle-aged people and a HUGE group of crazy Canadians waving their flags (gotta love the Canadians when you travel--they are not shy about showing off their flag.) Plus, the roped off area was strictly "no alcohol" until the fireworks went off, of course, and everyone pulled out their champagne bottles and plastic cups. Why didn't we get that memo to pack champagne?...oh well, next time. . Not only was the crowd impressive, but the live music selection was, well, classic!
Jari Sillanpää is his name and singing like Ricky Martin is his game. Seriously, this dude was a crack-up and the Finns absolutely loved him! Imagine a Ricky Martin look-a-like with frumpy back-up singers and dancers in the background singing (with a Finnish accent) "She bangs, she bangs...", how can you not giggle at that? Suffice it to say, it was entertaining, but I kept asking Charlie...do you think another band will take the stage? Answer: NO...they were the headliner! While all of this was great, the best part was the light show and the fireworks. There were beams of light radiating on all of the surrounding buildings and the fireworks at midnight did not disappoint.
Happy 2012! Now we must remember to write "2" instead of "1"...good luck with that.
1 comments:
Display was fantastic. You definitely hit it on the right year. Sorry about the "no champagne". I'm sure you will remember this new years. I hope the music group sang other good songs. I always see that music contestant that sang the song --Shaw bang. He was a riot.
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