New stamps for April 2011

Today, Posti released several new stamp designs.

Click for a larger view

At the top right is a set of six second class stamps featuring comic characters Maisa and Kaarina to commemorate 100 years of the National Council of Women of Finland.  They come with a number of speech bubbles to customise the stamps, similar to the fantastic vegetable stamps that were released around this time last year.

Below is another set of six second class stamps showcasing Finnish government buildings spanning 200 years.  The booklet contains information and a basic plan of each building.

At the bottom right is a set of five second class stamps commemorating the 100th anniversary of designer Kaj Franck's birth.  The sheet displays illustrations of many of Franck's designs with various sized stamps framing certain elements.

On the left are two new flower sets.  The upper stamps are first class, completely circular, and feature red and yellow dahlia flowers.  The lower stamps are second class with a single design of yellow and white tulips to celebrate Easter.

I really like this new selection of stamps, especially the government buildings and Kaj Franck sets.  They also came out with perfect timing; Nordia 2011 (Nordic Stamp Exhibition) opened today at the Jyväskylä Paviljonki.  In addition to this fair, the Paviljonki is also hosting a book, wine, leisure and wellbeing, and garden and balcony fair.  One ticket covers all of these fairs which are open this weekend.  I am hoping to visit tomorrow.

Angry Birds championship

Yesterday saw the final of the first Angry Birds championship in Helsinki.  Two Finnish giants - Nokia and Angry Birds - teamed up to tour the country in order to find the country's best Angry Birds player.  A couple of weeks ago the travelling contest visited Jyväskylä, and I went along.

Many people stopped to play and watch

The event was hosted in the Forum shopping centre and featured several big screens hooked up to various Nokia devices as well as a huge catapult for playing a simplified "real life" version of the game.

This seemed to be much harder than it looked

Although I had only tried Angry Birds briefly a few months ago, I decided to give it a go.  I knew didn't have a chance of getting anywhere in the contest, but I thought I could at least win a small prize for taking part.  I also asked my boyfriend to play so we'd have twice the chance of winning something.  Okay, I just really wanted one of those Angry Birds soft toys!


I had fun playing and didn't do too badly considering my lack of experience.  I even managed to win an Angry Birds lanyard.  Not exactly what I wanted, but my boyfriend did better:

He won the red one for me!

In all, it was good fun to take part.  Congratulations to Jonas Koivula who was crowned the first Finnish Angry Birds champion yesterday in Helsinki, and even made the news.

University of Jyväskylä open as normal after gun scare

According to Keskisuomalainen, the Mattilanniemi campus of the University of Jyväskylä is open today as normal.  It seems that the gun scare was just that; a scare.  The police acted upon a report from an individual that apparently heard the sound of a gun being loaded.

Gun scare at the University of Jyväskylä

I just received this email from the University of Jyväskylä:

University buildings on Mattilanniemi campus cleared for security reasons

University’s Mattilanniemi campus buildings MaA, MaB, MaC and MaD are cleared and staff and students are requested to leave the premises immediately, because the police investigating a gun scare in the buildings. The police asks people to leave all doors to offices and classrooms open and unlocked, so that the buildings can be checked quickly. Staff and students can leave campus for today. The buildings will be open normally on Friday unless otherwise notified.

Information is currently a bit sketchy; Keskisuomalainen and Helsingin Sanomat are both currently following this story online.  The whole picture should be clear later today or tomorrow.

New stamps on sale

Yesterday, Posti released new stamps for sale.  As I send quite a lot of postcards as part of Postcrossing I'm always interested in new stamps.

A selection of the new stamps I bought.

Interestingly, all of the new stamps are second class (0,60€).  This is fine for sending mail within Finland but a first class stamp (0,75€) is needed to send a basic letter or postcard outside of the country.  This meant I had to buy a load of 5 and 10 cent stamps.  Not a problem in itself, but it makes me wonder how many people are going to buy second class stamps without realising it.

Until recently, second class mail wasn't really open to the public.  Second class mail had to be posted in person at a post office and in a minimum quantity of twenty pieces.  Soon Posti will allow single, second class mail items to be posted in post boxes (there are even new blue post boxes in some places along with the orange post boxes to help separate the first and second class mail).

However, I feel that by offering only second class stamps, Posti is attempting to make their work easier; after all, they can take longer sorting and delivering second class mail.  Of course, first class stamps are still available but if you want the nice new designs, you're out of luck.

Still, I am very happy with the new designs and it's good to see Posti embracing new and innovative ideas when it comes to stamps.  After all, we've had stamps with Braille, holograms, scented stamps, and customisable vegetable stamps that come with eyes, mouths and accessories to decorate how you like!  Maybe I should suggest a stamp which would just consist of a frame, with the rest of the space free to draw your own picture in.  What do you think?

Blood donation in Finland

The Finnish Red Cross Blood Service (Punainen Risti Veripalvelu) is responsible for blood donations in Finland.  They have centres across the country as well as mobile units where it is possible to donate blood.  The big screen in the centre of Jyväskylä (by the compass (kompassi)) has started to show the levels of donated blood, and I thought it would be good idea to bring attention to this.

Unfortunately I cannot donate blood - actually, permanently banned from giving blood - in Finland for two reasons.  The first reason is that anyone that has lived in the UK between 1980 and 1996 is banned from giving blood forever due to mad cow disease.  In the UK we can obviously donate blood, but I suppose that's because we're all so disease ridden that it can't hurt us any further.

The second reason I cannot donate blood is because I'm gay.  Yes, really, if you are male and have ever had sex with a man, even once in your life, you are forever banned from giving blood because of the supposed higher risk of HIV infections.  So while a person that has heterosexual sex with multiple partners all their life can donate blood, a man that either has sex with a man just once, or is in a committed relationship (one sex partner), they cannot donate.  Finland is not alone in adopting this policy, but people are still sometimes surprised to hear this.

Because I cannot donate blood in Finland, I encourage others to do so.  The website of the Finnish Red Cross Blood Service has all of the important information in English, including who can and cannot donate and details of the Jyväskylä donation centre.

Partial solar eclipse tomorrow

I know it's quite soon, but I only just heard about this.  Apparently tomorrow (January 4) there will be a partial solar eclipse visible in Finland.  Although Sweden will get the best view of the eclipse, here in Finland we will see it at its fullest at 10:50am.