last night...

...was imatra night, a night celebrating this weird little town that has been my home for the past ten days. after sitting in front of a computer screen for hours and hours as we edited our final images from the workshop, melissa and i headed into the small city center and sat at an outdoor table in the chilly evening next to a bandstand listening to covers of 'penny lane' and such in finnish and other american rock songs in english and some jazzy, soft-rocky finnish songs we had of course never heard before. this is where the older crowd and the very young were hanging out; dancing in pairs by the bandstand, strolling arm in arm in light jackets, saying hello to neighbors and friends as they passed - a night on the town in a small town in a northern land. around ten we headed to the dam, which during the early summer is released every night but it now happens only on saturdays. since the whole population of imatra was out anyway celebrating their city, the bridge from which we watched this event was so so packed that i had to snap this imperfect photo standing on my tippy toes with my hands above my head. at about five of ten, classical music began playing and a chorus standing on the edge of the dam began singing something that sounded like a mix of traditional choral songs and gregorian chants over an incredibly powerful sound system that projected their collective voice all the way down through the long, steep, dry gorge that was about to become a river again. when the waters were let loose, it was much less impressive than we had expected, but the height and velocity of the river grew and its mist formed clouds above the bridge, and people started zip-lining across it, and ot was certainly worth sticking in town for two extra hours to see. as we left, we encountered our third musical event of the evening, this one was for the highschoolers, about whom i might say a word or two. our building (which i learned today is called 'south karelia university of applied sciences imatra unit of fine arts') is right next to the combined elementary, middle, and high school, so i have had some time to observe them and the strange phenomenon of their freakish homogeneity... not only in their northern complexions but in their style as well. they all dress in some mixture of metal and emo, melissa describes them as 'straight out of a SoCal emo-pop music video.' they must all shop at the one h&m in the town...you couldn't even create that cliched teen movie shot that pans all the different cliques in the cafeteria with these kids- it seems that there are no geeks, no jocks, and certainly no ethnicaly oriented groups...maybe a few goths. they all arrive at school doing wheelies on bmx bikes or riding mopeds and mini-motorcycles, but even under their helmets and even if they have facial piercings, seem to maintain perfectly preened 'dos and perfectly made-up (and acne free) visages. forgive me if i seem critical, i do not mean to be, i am just fascinated. there are probably few places in the world more diverse than new york, so melissa and i are particularly sensitive to so much of the same. anyway, back to the events of the evening. it was the second night of a music festival called 'rock to the river,' which one has been vaguely been able to hear from school even in the afternoon...muted bass and a lot of screaming. jan calls it 'forest metal.' the festival was taking place in an athletic field not far from school so that we had to walk by on our way home. the little paved path through the woods was crammed with the aforementioned teens, standing in groups flirting and drinking and being crazy as teens do. the path exits the woods and runs along the river, and there they were also in groups by the river, in whose black, smooth surface you could see reflections of the strobes and spotlights from inside the field. i can't describe how interesting it was, the energy coming from that place, and how strange for it to feel like such a big event and yet such a small one. i am sure every person between the ages of fourteen and twenty-one who lives in imatra was there, it was a big event, but tiny comapared to any similar music festival i have ever been to. so that was saturday night in imatra (and not just any saturday night, but imatra night), from tame good old rock to river worship to forest metal...and all this even before we got home and talked about st petersburg with the russians over vodka and potatos (seriously) until three in the morning. they warned us against pickpockets, suggested many things we should see, helped us with our pronunciation and laughed for over and hour at the three pages of russian phrases melissa had photocopied from the back of a lonely planet. it must have been written by an idiot, they said, as many of the words were ukranian, many were misspelled or incorrectly translated, and included phrases such as 'may i breastfeed here?' while omitting some of the more, uh, typical phrases. what fun! we have received much warning about st petersburg, but more encouragement. it is going to be magnificent, i can feel it. for now, everyone has gone but melissa and i, and we are spending our last night in finland alone in this big old re-imagined barn of a sculpture facility and eating all the leftover food in the fridge.


there is no way to describe this place.