GPS anyone?

September 15, 2009

I have this thing about me where I just can’t seem to ever get where I’m trying to go. Some call it a bad sense of direction; some say I’m just to prideful to get directions. I’d say it’s a terrible combination of the two. Today I was riding my bike to class by myself for the first time. I was following the signs to Keskusta or whatever it’s called to try and make my way to the city. Everything went fine for about 20 minutes, and then I found myself in a park with no directions. There were little dirt roads going in every direction. I just took one and found my way to a street. It was a street that I had never been on before but I was hoping I would soon see something familiar. I spent the next hour doing circles and figure 8’s around Oulu… I was less than amused with my inability to find my way around. I have a hard enough time in America and the fact that I don’t speak the language and can’t read the signs was only making things worse. I did find the bank… which was good cause I actually need to go there and set up an account sometime. Sad thing is, I don’t remember how to get to the bank because I was lost when I found it. Luckily for me, the sun was shining bright all afternoon and it was rather warm to where I took my jacket off. I wasn’t trying to sweat. So I rode around Oulu staring at street names, trying desperately to take mental pictures of the places I had been and the names of the streets. Unfortunately, when everything looks a lot like Ylidiosäkkupanömiirten, it becomes difficult to remember what I’ve seen and what the name was. In an exhausted and frustrated state, I remember almost crossing a road and looking down another direction. I saw a fence that looked a lot like the gate entrance to the Architecture block and turned my bike to go in that direction. To my relief, I had amazingly found it. Now class had started at 3.15 and it was already about 4.15. I began texting Carmen and she told me to go ahead and come in but that the class was for the Urban Design course, which I’m not even taking. I wasn’t sure if I was relieved or more annoyed.

I then ran into my next small adventure: getting inside the building. I tried what any normal person would do and pulled the handle. It felt like it was cemented shut. It didn’t move at all. I looked around and saw a little keypad with numbers. Ah, yes! My student code to enter the building! I pressed my code and happily tugged on the door again. It didn’t move. In my experience here, I find it difficult to know whether a door opens in or out. I guess I take for granted the little “PUSH” and “PULL” signs on just about every door in the U.S. I then tried pushing the door. No success. I sat for a moment and remembered some weird key sensor that had been given to us. I didn’t see anything that looked like it would scan, so I just held my whole set of keys up to the keypad. I heard a little beep and a green light came on! Yay! How dumb could I be? I pulled on the door again… it didn’t budge. I look back at the keypad and the green light turns red again. Feeling a little incompetent I just tried it all at once. I scanned my key, punched in my code while the light was green and heard the door make a noise. Thank goodness I’m not a complete moron. I went inside and sat in a display room until they got out of class. Then I was happy to chat and go with Brittany to put more prepaid minutes on her phone. At least today was gorgeous!

While we were riding our bikes around downtown, there were these people taking off their clothes and laying them down in a long line. Boys and girls in undies, pulling off belts and shirts and leggings and tank tops. It was attracting quite a crowd and there was a woman yelling in Finnish and holding a little sign.

I had no idea what was going on, but it was worth viewing for a few minutes. Hopefully they were getting some kind of money for stripping down and then actually laying in the middle of the road. On the rest of our trip home we kept seeing groups of people walking and on bikes all dressed in certain outfits. We saw some pirates, a group of Supermen, a group dressed as pigs, and another group with red t-shirts and their phone numbers on the front. There were about 8 people in each group and I’m not sure what was going on, but they all had an open alcoholic beverage with them. Some had whiskey bottles, wine bottles, vodka, some had beers and ciders. All of it actually sparked my interest. It’s not every Tuesday you see a bunch of kids dressed like Superman and sipping on vodka while they ride their bikes downtown. Seemed a little dangerous… haha.