Atop the top

While the markets might be a long way from the top, my family hit the top of the city today, as my parent-in-laws wanted to take us out for a fancy lunch.

Näsinneula is the tallest building by far in what is otherwise a pretty low (but slowly increasing in height) city. It is a spire tower built on the lake edge (Näsijärvi) with a revolving restaurant at the top and it is one of those places that people go maybe once a year or four, as it isn't the cheapest, but the view is great. My wife and I had our wedding dinner in the restaurant, but since we eloped, it wasn't too costly.

There is an amusement park at the base, which is also where we were the other other day (in a part of it) and were disappointed. The rest of the park is better, but there isn't really that much for a five year old to do, especially a short one. In a couple years Smallsteps will get more out of it, so we can wait until then.

On one side is the lake, the other the city. There are only about 300K people in the greater area, so it is a small city, but it is growing quite rapidly, with many new and highly overpriced apartments going in around the place. The regional and country areas are emptying fast, so the cities are getting filled rapidly and more services are popping up outside of the capital of Helsinki.

In the picture directly above, is the construction site for the new entertainment center which they have officially named "Uros" which means male in Finnish. Essentially, if they were to build a sister site, they would have to call it the Finnish equivalent of "Bitch".

Speaking of males... Here are some antique balls.

Finland has a fair bit of industry going on and a lot of it is moved by goods trains. The picture below has rolls of steel from up in Lapland and they get loaded still glowing red from the foundry, retaining their heat all the way for the slow couple of day journey south.

And above, you can see wood being carried also. Forestry is an old an important industry in Finland and it is the reason that Finland has the oldest environmental laws in the world, dating back almost 300 years. Before that, they had almost cleared everything, but if you fly over now, it is all lakes and trees.

The forests that are cut down for paper and construction are pretty much all owned by private land owners, who tend to the forests and then earn from them being cut down every 30 years or so, meaning that each generation gets a significant cash injection from the sale. The cost is having to look after the forests, so it is a pretty decent circular industry that benefits many directly and indirectly. It is far better than the clearing they do in many other countries and here, they grow back more cubic meters than they cut down each year.

Family interlude.

"Torni" hotel (below) was the first real tall proper building in the city of Tampere and by international standards, isn't very large. It is built on a low ridge in the center of the city and the plan is to build more along there, where there are now three or four already or near completed. I take credit for this plan a bit, since years before any of it was thought of, I was training the owner of a large construction firm and was telling him about "my vision" and even picked out some of the lots. I have no idea if it had an effect, but his firm has been heavily involved in building at least two of them.

And just to finish up, a few more random shots from the restaurant looking over the surroundings. I should probably mention that the food was really good, but as normal in these kinds of places, it was only about 75% enough, leaving everyone feeling a little hungry after. The other thing that I have always found weird here (I have been several times over the years) is the service is nowhere near what it should be, as even though they try to make it "fancy", they don't seem to have the right personalities for it and it comes off something like a caricature of a good restaurant.

But, my daughter loved it and that is all that really matters. The main reason for them wanting to take us to eat there was that my daughter had mentioned that she had never eaten there before, so they wanted to take her up the top. Unfortunately, she didn't ask for a new car or complain that she doesn't own a whole Bitcoin or something - I have failed as a parent.

I actually think that the "health scare" that I had last month has reminded them of their own mortality and while they aren't wealthy, they can't take anything that they have saved with them. I think they are realizing in their mid-70s that they would rather be there for the smiles on their grandchildren's faces as they experience new things, than buy or save more for themselves. Fair call I think, but my daughter would have been just as stoked to have ice cream on the deck below also.

But it was nice to spend a couple hours looking over life passing, before rejoining as one of the ants below.

Taraz
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