Refunded in full

Only a year ago many Icelandic companies were flying high buying property abroad and investing in many businesses.

I always wondered where the money came from, as Iceland to my knowledge has not many natural sources except their inexpensive way making electricity and heating up houses due to the heat produced by the seismic activity beneath the island. Everything else has to be imported from abroad.

Today the picture is completely the opposite. Iceland is in big trouble with their national finances, and they are now trying to borrow money in order to save their economy from total collapse amidst the global economical decline.

Also here in Finland the aftermaths of the touch and go collapse of the Icelandic economy can be seen, and one financial bank owned by Icelanders was taken over by their Finnish employees and sought for financial subsidies from the Finnish government in order to be able to refund all the money deposited by their clients.

Currently only up to 50.000 Euros of deposited money in bank accounts are guaranteed to be paid back to the customers in case of the bank is not able to do.

Fortunately for the 10.000 clients of the bank in question now three Finnish banks in are now lending the money needed to refund their clients in full.

More interest in politics

Voter turnout in the municipal elections has from the year 2004 improved to 61 percent voting in yesterday’s municipal elections.

24 % had voted in advance and could stay home instead of having to make the trip to the polling stations in the prevailing bad weather with hard winds and heavy rain.

The True Finns Party gained most votes, as their share of voters rose most in percentage still being a small party, but The National Coalition Party were the winners as the got the biggest part of the votes.

These numbers from the elections are just absolutely useless, as they give no hint of what happens in your own city council or municipality. It just gives a clue of the party’s popularity in general all over Finland, with the numbers are added up party-wise.

The interesting part is what happens where you live.

For me remains only one question to ponder about after the municipal elections.

How are people, who already are members of the parliament, and now were elected into city councils and municipalities, going to be able to be at two places at the same time? If they are not able to be in two places at the same time, then they must get double pay for half the job?!?

Gold medal in cooking

The Culinary Olympics founded in 1896, is one of the oldest and most prestigious international cooking competitions in the world. And this year the gold medal was won by the Finnish team in Erfurt, Germany, with participating teams from 40 other countries.

So, what does this mean for Finnish cuisine after years of bad mouthed comments from leaders of other European countries, have they been wrong or has the Finns improved their cooking skills?

I am quite sure there were teams present from the countries with leaders who think they have the best culinary skills in their country and I doubt any drastic change has been taken place in the Finnish cuisine, so i guess these famous politicians must have been wrong. And maybe not for the first time as I has been all across the European tabloids.

Anyway, to my own disappointment, the menu served, did not consist of any Finnish specialities, but I guess the ingredients were chosen before hand, as in most renowned cooking competitions.The Finnish winning menu consisted a three-course meal consisting of salmon and lobster with spinach for starters, veal with sweetbread sausages for main, followed by an orange-yoghurt cake and strawberry-chocolate mousse.

Sounds yummy!

Good economy TV

Having been down with a bad flu and not having any strength do to much but doze off to the TV, I have really had time to discover is going on in TV land here in Finland.

And my conclusion is that at least there is one place that uses recycling well, that is, so many programs are re-run so many times within i very short period of time, that they turn washed out as some series are broadcasted three or four times within the next year or two.

Guess this is good economy and makes the TV shows less expensive to purchase if yo0u show them as many times as you possibly can in the given contract time, but it kills the interest of the viewers even though the program itself was good the first time around.

The second thing that is recycled but the program or show itself, is the idea for reality TV shows, and this goes for the whole world and not just for Finland. One reality TV show format is sold around the world and all the programs are made in the same mold, with a little difference for some cultural variations. And is this reality TV, are there really no written scripts?

Guess there has to be some water tight legal work behind, so no one can reveal the truth of reality shows and reveal any scripts. But they seem cheap enough to produce and there also apparently must be a market for them as they are produced en masse.

Pre-voting begins today

Today the pre-voting begins for the Finnish municipal elections at special polling stations.

A campaign has also been launched to try to make most people to vote in advance, as the number of polling stations on the election day itself, has been cut.

Even foreign residents are allowed to vote in the municipal elections, provided they are registered for voting and have a valid piece of identification, which is required of all voters. This gives you a good opportunity to influence the politics in your home town, and the interest in municipal politics is said to have increased, especially among the younger voters.

Revising gunpermits

The most controversial thing that has happened lately here in Finland, has been the sacking of the editor in chief for a newspaper.

The owners of the newspaper deny the editor in question for having been sacked for living in a lesbian relationship and claims instead that the reason instead is her dishonesty, as the editors' partner is involved in local politics and this never came up in their talks previous to hiring her.
And with a journalist being involved in a relationship with a politician, no matter being lesbian, gay or heterosexual, there is always the possibility of being biased towards your spouse. Which is all natural,

Anyway, the Finnish gun laws are now being revised and it seems that Finland is to get the most restrictive laws concerning the possession and licensing of firearms in the whole of EU. All permits granted during the past two years are to be revised and in the future two police officers will have to be present when applicants are interviewed for their permits and also a medical check will be required.

Strangely enough both of the recent school shooting incidents here in Finland, were committed with licensed firearms, and as there always are ways to obtain illegal guns, I really wonder how much impact, if at all, this new gun permit law will have on sad incidents like these as they seem to become more and more common.

Mutated perch

Four beautifully orange perches have in a short period of time been caught in one lake here in Finland.

The outlook of the fish differs from the usual perch by being yellow and orange instead of their normal darker colours and black stripes. Fisherman first suspected the outlook of the perch being a result of industrial chemicals getting into the lake, but the scientists lean mote towards it being a form of genetic mutation of the perches, even more so as one of the caught fish weighed over one kilogramme.

And as these extras ordinary fish have survived and lived to be this big, there is a possibility of more of these mutated fish swimming around in the depths of this lake. This makes me think of the so called golden perch for sale occasionally in some supermarkets, as I have always felt they must be some form of a mutation.

So here comes the trick question, are these mutated, intentionally or non-intentionally genetically mutated fish, safe to digest?