Sunday, July 27, 2008

Downtown Oulu and Qstock

Here are a few photos of the scenery that we see on our bike ride to downtown Oulu. It is a beautiful ride through neighborhoods, over a bridge, and through a park. I love it.

This is the local cloud factory. They also manufactures baby toes and kitten whiskers.



Patrick says these are steps for the fish to swim upstream




These are the statues outside of city hall.




Friday we biked to downtown Oulu for a music festival called Qstock.

We stopped off at a local pub to enjoy a beer and the scenery. The downtown area was jumping. Lots of people were showing up to see the bands.



I have no clue what bands we saw, but we tried to stop by every stage.
We went to the Techno tent (my personal favorite).


We also watched some heavy metal bands.



There were a lot of photo ops that I missed. While the sun was up I wasn't thinking about photos for some reason. Let's see. What did I see of interest? I saw 3 people passed out. One guy was on the beach. One guy was in a chair, and the third man was on some steps. Each time, security came up and woke them. I met an adorable girl with a Finnish-Irish accent who lost her friends.

A couple of things I noticed were 1) people politely stand and listen to the music. There weren't any mosh pits or rough housing even though the music was pretty hard core on some stages. 2) Everyone wore ear plugs, which I found smart. And 3) People near us would get real quiet and listen to us speaking in English. If they were brave enough (read: drunk enough) they'd say something and be friendly. It was a little unsettling though when you can tell the people around you are eavesdropping.

Another thing I failed to photo was the pee-dome (I wouldn't dare!). A plastic dome with 5 or six holes cut out about waist high. Guys would walk up to it and pee while trying not to stare at the person across from them. The port-o-potties for the ladies were light pink and light green. They were soooo clean....no pee on the seat covers. At the end of the night, most of the stalls still had toilet paper. I couldn't believe it. By that time, in the US, at least 1/3 of the stalls would've been pushed over or thrown into the water.

Overall, it was a fun day/night of beer, nice people, and rowdy music. I had a blast and met some really cool people. The bike home was interesting since I was tipsy and my bike is too big for me. But, we made it safe and sound!

7 comments:

a. brooke said...

what is this pee-dome that you speak of? and a port-o-john with toilet paper? surely you jest, rebecca.
very finnish, indeed!

Blind Dog Megan said...

The Finns love the heavy metal! Alright! Yet another reason to love the Finns.

I love the pictures. Can't wait to see the comparisons to what the pics will look like in the winter.

Let me know if you ever go south to Turku, my old stomping grounds!!!

Anonymous said...

ROTFLMAO
Well written, and some awesome photos.

Dr E

seraphim said...

PEE-DOME! i remember the pee-dome from my time in amsterdam. i was scared of it at first. i kept thinking "i'm s'posed to stick mr. lopez where?". i had flashbacks to that rock formation in flash gordon where you had to stick your hand in and pray the venomous scorpion creature didn't bite you. it was traumatizing. but i met a hot brazilian dude standing across the way from me so it was all good! oh paulo!

seraphim said...

btw, forgot to ask, but i saw the cloud factory and was wondering if you'd seen the baby temple yet? DON'T go with p-money! just to be on the safe side, you should visit by yourself!

YogaNerd said...

I haven't seen the baby temple yet, but I have seen the super cute babies that come from it. Maybe there is a single big one in Helsinki. I will have to google it. :D

Anonymous said...

er ... why would people go to a loud concert AND bring ear plugs? why not just have a softer playing band/group? naively yours, me.

p.s. loved the photos. and the image of you biking home a bit tipsy on a too-large bike makes me giggle.