Fancy a Cucu?

One specific request that I got for this blog before it was created was "just to take a photo at your local supermarket shelf". Well here goes:

Candy is not my thing, so don't ask me what's in those bags. Your guess is as good as mine.

I'll admit this is probably a bit self serving picture to prove the point that we are not in Kansas anymore. Typically there would be more things with proper English label texts.

Opposite of draconian

Only in the Nordic countries you can expect something like this: convict serving a prison sentence decided he didn't quite feel like coming back while on vacation (!) from the prison. This episode was recently reported in a Finnish newspaper.

This convict in question happened to be just a murderer who had hacked his business associate to pieces. Furthermore, he had tried to escape already a couple of years ago while visiting the city to apply for university. 

Police announced that this is not such a big thing as the prisoner had already served 6 years (out of which they had subtracted the time he went AWOL the previous time). Also they mentioned that there is no need for any public concern as this particular criminal is hardly the most dangerous villain out there right now.

All this sounds quite otherworldly after living in a society which has one of the most draconian legislative system in the world and reportedly inhumane conditions for inmates serving time.

Scoop of palm sugar

I mentioned previously that I won one years supply of ice cream from a contest related to the first Hobbit movie. As a sad announcement to the hordes of people lining behind my front door and clawing my windows, let me formally let you all know that the ice cream is long gone. Please go home. Nothing to see here anymore.

It lasted for something like 3 months. So should I consider that I have been cheated? Actually not really. Just came across this little tweet over here, which clearly states that the difference in the consumption of ice cream between Finland and Singapore is 6 fold -- for the favour of all of us Finnish ice cream aficionados. Based on this it seems that the amount of ice cream I won would have easily lasted for the promised period for a standard Singaporean.

This consumption awareness also explains couple of other anomalies. For one, it has been deceptively easy for me to conquer the Foursquare mayorship of more than one ice cream cafes in my neighbourhood. Additionally it does offer an explanation to the surprised expressions of my fellow colleagues when I have entered the office early in the morning enjoying my morning cone. For many of them it seems to be unheard of to have a few scoops for breakfast. While for me it makes absolutely perfect sense: what else could be better treat than a cold ice cream under the scorching sun -- no matter the time of the day.

For the record though, there are some very interesting experimentations of ice cream flavours going on over here. Like the stinky durian flavoured ice cream. Or sweet gula melaka. Or just stingy green tea.

PS. Reaping the benefits of early adulthood, I have once tried to survive on ice cream alone for a whole day. Unfortunately I failed miserably by dinner time.

Anniversary time

As of today I have been in this country for one full year. Once again I have to wonder out loud how fast does the time indeed fly by. It has been and continues to be one exciting adventure!

Furthermore it has been an enjoyable experience to be sharing some of the observations from relocation through this blog. It feels good to see that there has been an ever increasing number of people actually reading these entries. I would like to use this opportunity to apologise publicly to one specific reader who stumbled upon the blog with the following Google query: "barbecue Finland bear". I am not sure if you ever found what you were looking for from here.

I'm anxiously looking forward to the remaining year of my two year assignment. Going into next set of 12 months, I promise to think real hard on how I could expand the blog coverage on grilling various forest creatures to keep all my readers satisfied.