John In A Kilt

One of the largest festivals on the island in Ponce…wonderful flavor of Puerto Rican culture nice way to spend a Saturday afternoon…hearing locally sourced island music and eating some local favorites, like fried codfish.

A little down home Texas culture from Mark Chesnutt in Sunnyvale, TX

There were several museums, alll free, but the most unique and interesting was The Storekeepers Museum. It did a great job of revealing a realistic view of life in early 1800 Finland. No romantic/nostalgic illisions…life was hard and average life span was about mid 40”s. You have to admire their perseverance and enginuity. Great museum!

Pesapallo, “Finnish baseball”, what a hoot! Unfortunately, didn’t get to see a game but found this field (obviously some type of baseball diamond, but not what I am use to) and a baseball statue in Hamina, so I had to dig deeper.

Similar to American baseball but much faster. It was invented by Lauri "Tahko" Pihkala in the 1920s after a visit to the US. He felt the game needed some improvements so he made some changes that makes it less of a pitching game (the pitcher stands next to the batter and throws the ball up vertically) and more of an offensive strategical game. It moves much faster than America baseball and is referred to as the national sport of Finland.

The Rock Church in Helsinki is unique. Initially was supposed to be as shown in the black etching but the neighborhood objected to the height. Instead the architects decided to blow a big hole in the granite on the lot and build the church inside the granite crater. It has a copper ceiling created by winding over 100 miles of copper wiring to create a dome as the church’s roof. The acoustics are wonderful! Now, besides being a place of worship, it is also used as a venue for musical productions.