Random notes about trip to Zurich, part 2 – Fashion, it’s good to look so cool

Even though you might be just fat, heterosexual engineer – you can still have a fashion sense comparable to gay male in Queer eye for the straight guy. And if you want to renew your garderobe, there is a possibility that Zurich is a good place for that. Around the old town you will find all the well known luxury brands and brand stores, including also international low cost alternatives and local chains that offer clothes and fashion accessories to different audiences. Our visit to Zurich was scheduled well as most of the department stores, brand stores and boutiques were having huge sales – selling merchandise with up to 70% off from normal retail prices. With a little legwork you could therefore make real good finds and purchase quality fashion clothing for the price of department store collections.

One interesting thing in retail landscape was to notice that almost all the pricepoints were catered. On the main shoppingstreet – Bahnhofstrasse – you could find all the luxury brands as well as Hennes & Mauritz and other low cost alternatives. One interesting retail chain we saw was Tally Weijl, which seemed to be targeted to young women and girls.

All and all clothes seemed to be produced quite well, were funny and quite cheap ( produced in child labour countries or something similar ). Store design also worked well, dance songs playing all the time and lot’s of customers making constantly small purchases.

As an old fart it was fun to see different product lines and their slogans that boldly made mashups of many ideas, including reviving grunge and punk attitude for teenagers.

If nothing else Tally Wejl gives a good competition to H&M, which in comparison seemed quite dull and boring. Wonder why they haven’t yet landed into scandinavia and Finland.

American Apparel also had a large store in Zurich. Very spacious and trendy store was fun place to visit, though we didn’t make any purchases.

As always, Americal Apparel clothes were simple, well made and very much of retro style – same time being modern and classic. Even though AA-clothes are made in Los Angeles, prices were not that much more expensive than in other stores that produce their clothes in who knows where. Definitely for metropolitan hipsters.

For those who were or wanted to be hip in 1980’s, Zurich had atleast two Benetton stores – just few hundred meters away from each other. We wondered what on earth was the idea in that, untill we realized that the other store was dedicated for baby- and children clothes… Two storey store in very prime location in the old town, only for children clothes.

Benetton’s store was among the ones giving best discounts, all the way to 70% off. I made great purchases – two pairs of really cool Benetton jeans, for less than 70 euros together. Normally I have had terribly hard time in finding good pair of jeans – rather two – so I had a good reason to celebrate.

Another interesting new retail chain for us was We-fashion, which catered just for men – similarly like Jack & Jones, but with a little bit more upscale style. Found nice shirts, ties and white blazer – all 50% to 70% off normal prices.

We also witnessed opening of new Jack & Jones-store in the old town. They didn’t have any other interesting sales, except the ones to celebrate the opening of the store – printed t-shirts for 6 euros and similar.

As it was rather hot weather in Zurich I was more than happy to buy few of those as I hadn’t packed enough t-shirts for such hot weather.

Box New Generation was interesting fashion and accessories shop that – as the name says – had boxes also as their retail stands.

Wink-fashion was an interesting store that promoted sustainability and ecological consumerism. If you were buying fashion you had atleast the opportunity to think that you were doing also something good, promoting fair trade and organic materials.

Even though large stores and chains were offering best price reductions, most interesting things were offered in small boutiques and shops around the city center.

Only if we would have had more time and money to shop around…

Random notes about trip to Zurich, part 1 – money talks

I am not as seasoned traveler as I would like to be, but even with my limited experience on the subject of traveling I can sum up some of our experiences from Zurich and compare them to other similar city-escapes – namely London, Barcelona, Paris, New York and Berlin – each of which is also served regularly from Helsinki and to each of which you can get really cheap flights if you are lucky.

First question anyone should ask is whether city like Zurich has anything at all to offer to them. If you are looking for great out door environment for romantic walks and hikes, vast opportunities for shopping, lively bar and clublife – and good food, then Zurich might be a match for you. As we are speaking about capital of Switzerland’s economy, it is important to note that Zurich can be more expensive than many other city escapes. If it is worth the extra money is up to you, for us – and even on tight travel budget – Zurich presented itself as a very warm and cool summer city that definitely earns a second and third look with more time, energy and budget.

We had hardly any time and energy to spend in bars and clubs as we were quite exhausted after each warm day we spent walking around the city. Few bars and restaurants that we used to hang out in the city center can’t be used to give review to the whole city – especially since we didn’t hit them with the full force and dedication normally required. But even with this small sampling it was clear that Zurich is filled with interesting bars and clubs. Next time when we have the budget to drink more 10 – 20 euro drinks, we have to head back there. We have to also go further outside the old town and get into parts of Zurich where young people go out and where things are bubbling under.

Last time I was in Zurich European or world championships in football guaranteed that every single bar and restaurant was filled with people. What I did not know and understand was, that night life in Zurich seemed to be very active also on normal days! It was great to walk around the old town and see so many people enjoying great weather on restaurants and bar terraces. You could really feel that the city was living.

( You can see a small set of pictures of Step B performing at Casa Bar )

And when sun sets and night comes, you get amazing views – for free – to the river.

One that was really cool in Zurich – similarly as in London’s Soho – was the open and relaxed atmosphere towards sex. I haven’t seen anywhere else that from one single place you can see four or five different strip clubs ( called night clubs ) at the same time – and no-one thinks there is anything wrong with such establishment being right next to a family restaurant.

Similarly you could see and hear gay-bars in the center, identifiable by the rainbow colours and thumping techno music throughout the night. Everyone just gets along, which is so cool! And right next to a Starbucks cafe, on a beautiful square, was a huge porn theater.

Haven’t seen porn fit so well into normal landscape alongside cafes, ice cream shops and high priced fashion stores anywhere. And remember this is not the red light district around Langstrasse, but around Niederdorf area of old town. We did not have time to see the actual red light district and the club area on the other side of the railway station, but will have to check it out the next time. However while walking to the hotel, we noticed not a redlight district – but rather a red light house – on Niederdorf area.

Photoset about the trip in Flickr.

How do white shoes stay white? With gall soap, naturally!

I like sneakers. I really like my white leather sneakers – though most of the time I have had to worry about herds of people stomping on them and turning them into all shades of gray leather sneakers.

These days I really don’t worry that much anymore, as I have found the perfect answer so far. Gall soap has turned my shoes time and time again back into sparkling and shining white. Me likes.

http://www.sonett-online.de/1eng/spotre.htm

Sunny Zurich and cheap champagne

It always feels nice to go on a trip. There is something magical on the feeling you have before a journey, and even though you try to plan and prepare yourself – be rational – every step you take towards the airport fills you up with the joy of traveling.

However at the airport you fall back to the normal routine of seasoned traveler. One thing that got my eye immediately at the airport was that people were in queques to normal checkin counters, even though modern self check-in machines were there ready to serve five passangers at a time. Doing your own check-in and dropping luggage to the drop off point we were ready in just a few minutes, without almost any queque.

Flight was normal Finnair-flight with not so good breakfast ( crepes with spinach ) served with a side order of turbulence over Germany. As we forgot to bring enough water with us to the plane, we had to drink sparkling wine for the rest of the flight. Finnair luckily serves piccolo bottles of Bernard Massaud at affordable 5 euros per bottle, which is the same cost that they would take for a small can of Coca Cola.

( And yes I’m reading Choke – and loving it )

Before the trip I wrote to Facebook that we’re on our way to sunny Zurich. However as the weather announcements and the pilot told us, weather in Zurich would be rainy throughout whole wednesday. As we arrived before 10 o’clock that seemed to be he case. However as we took train to the main railway station, found our way to the hotel and had lunch started sun to shine, and rest of the day was hot and sunny.

We walked around the city, went through the Bahnhofstrasse’s expensive luxury stores and admired the great screnery at lake Zurich. On thursday we plan to take a cruise around the lake and the river to see the city from another perspective.

One thing that felt really different compared to Helsinki was the amount of swans. It seemed that there were hundreds of them swimming by the lake, waiting for people to feed them.

For traveler in Zurich Zurich card seems to be valuable deal. For thirty or so Swiss frangs you get free pass to public transportation, cruise on the lake and admissions to numerous museums.

Our hotel is nicely located at the center of the old town, which means good for our walks around the city. The downside is that the place is rubbish, and more like a hostell than a real hotel. Unless you are willing to live in such environment, then cough up twenty to thirty euros more for a real hotel.

I stayed at Zic Zac Rock Hotel few years ago and remembered it to be cleaner and better place, but then again I traveled then alone, was younger and did not need so much pleasentries in life. Luckily for the rest of the trip we have different hotels – and should have a very good designer hotel also when we get back to Zurich on sunday.

As the Zic Zac is located nicely right in the center, we have great opportunities to also go to nice restaurants here. We had lunch in nice italian restaurant called Cantina. Menu with salad and pasta was 19 CHF.

For dinner we went to a ristorante little further away, and ate two very nice pizzas with thin bottom, nice ham and pineapple on top of it.

Nothing to complain, except the price. 57 CHF for two pizzas and diet cokes.

We also looked at all the great looking in- and outdoor bars in the city center, but decided wait for tomorrow or monday before sampling then.

And finally. Cheap champagne, served at room temperature in cheap hotel room!

Blogathon for Eclipse Galileo – participate and win a t-shirt

http://www.eclipse.org/galileo/blogathon/guidelines.php

Though I’ve now used quite hevily Netbeans 6.5 in one private project, I just downloaded new Eclipse distribution and did set it up with all the necessary plugins so that it is once again suitable for work. As Eclipse foundation has blogathon running on for Galileo-release, I thought also to post a proper review about it when I have time to do it. Most promising / interesting new features to review is naturally php-support that has been bubbling under for quite some time, but did not work that well previously and was cumbersome to install.

Traveling with the speed of light

Summer vacation is almost over, but there are still few trips to be made.

First trip is to Switzerland, where we are scheduled to have sampling of urban lifestyle in Zurich and luxurious countryside festival with friends in Almens, small village of approx. 200 inhabitants. Last time I visited Zurich I totally digged the city, though for a finn prices feel quite high. This time I’m also packing my sneakers and going to run some good kilometers by the lake Zurich. Great ideas on what to see and visit in Zurich are taken into consideration with great appreciation.

Second trip will be a train-car roadtrip to Lapland and back. We are celebrating my father’s 80 years birthday by taking a trip with my brother and sister’s husband – spending time in great outdoors and enjoying time and nature togerther. First step is to take car-train to Rovaniemi, then drive to lake Inari and spend few days there. From Inari we will start our descent back to Helsinki, having stops in Sodankylä’s Sattas-pirtti, in Kuusamo and propably also in Pielavesi. Alltogether the trip should take about 9 days.

Naturally I will have my camera with me on both journeys, so great photos are to be seen later on.

Eagles of Death Metal in Helsinki – Shitgoddamn!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/huimanet/sets/72157621020400201/

Saw two shows in Helsinki. First one was one of the best shows ever, going clearly to top five – right next to Hellacopters gig at Tavastia.

From my Flickr-photostream you can get some idea of the atmosphere from the second gig.

Shitgoddamn those were some great shows.

Bacon revisited – annoying food posting

I’ve already stated how magnificent condiment bacon is, but just to emphasise my point – I’ll have to revisit my the subject.

Bacon seems to work extremely well with salads. Light chicken salad gets nice salty touch with a hint of crispy bacon.

Also wraps get a nice touch from bacon.

These wraps were made with unleavened barley bread, tomatoes, eggs, minced meat, salad, cottage cheese and bacon.

Yummy!

After eating two of those, you need a jolt of energy to wake up.

Thank god for Jolt.

Back in design district – Ramblings from a normal monday in Helsinki

It seems that we were destined to return to the design district soon. First of all I had to get my ‘Dead Kekkonen’-tshirt and it seemed that my better half had left ( on purpose I assume ) her purchases to Sopiva Shop. So this monday we wandered back to the Eerikinkatu and were greeted again by the friendly designer who worked over the counter. As we chit-catted this and that, I noticed that besides pins – there were also designer keyrings which also served as bottle openers!

Fell in love with this magic castle theme! It works well together with my magic mushrooms pin.

And to make sure that everyone knows what kind of totally cool hipsters we are, next visit we made was to Helsinki 10 concept store – which is easily the mecca of hipsters in Helsinki. Expensive but cool looking junk from all corners of the world, including the essential Bulgaria magazine’s guidebook to Helsinki.

Noteworthy was Kaksitva’s own small concept store inside Helsinki 10’s concept store. Happening that lasts only ’till half way of july.

After Helsinki10 we finally got to Liike, and I managed to find right size Dead Kekkonen-shirt for me.

At the same time I managed to buy another cool shirt from Dusty, though I also lusted after a men’s sweatshirt – though the price of 155 euros kept me far away from making such purchase.

After making these sweet purchases we were ready to retire and enjoy some refreshments, which we found from Amarillo’s terrace.

Eventhough Amarillo has it’s own reputation, there was a happy hour promotion that we could not resist – especially when it was combined with terrace and great sunshine on otherwise cold day.

And as the day turned into evening we continued to spend time in Amarillo and witness some of the most peculiar events we have ever seen. I am not sure, but I believe that we witnessed an old japanese couple urinate in public, to the lawn of Ateneum art museum. I know, it sounds insane – and we could not belive it either, but we did not could not think of any other viable reason for this couples movements and behaviour on the lawn of the museum.

And speaking of things I thought of not seeing in any time soon, a deli that is open 24 hours a day in the center of Helsinki.

Helsinki. World’s smallest metropolitan!

Shopping in Helsinki – design stuff, handmade goods, local beer and great sparkling wine

On saturday we had an idea to go on shopping in Helsinki design district and quickly visit some small boutiques. It was nothing planned, but as we happened to find ourselves at Eerikinkatu, we thought why not.

First target was Liike at Yrjönkatu, as I desired to get my hands on Dead Kekkonen t-shirt. Unfortunately Liike is closed on summer saturdays, which was a sad news to us – as well as sounded like a stupid business decision. Must go there again during the week: http://www.liike-shop.com/

Second target was new shop called Sopiva Shop, which is a new co-operative formed by 7 designers. The shop is quite small and easy to miss if you don’t keep your eyes open, which actually happened to us – before I took my phone and checked again what was the street number for the shop again. Good thing in our walk by the store was that we walked over to the National Audiovisual Archive’s movie theater and saw that they are running famous old sci fi movies this month. For just the fee of membership card and 4 euros per movie, you can see old classics in very cozy and comfy theater!

But back to the Sopiva:

We talked with one of the designers and purchased some handmade pins with retro designs. I was really looking forward finding some 80’s retro videogame design pin, but best I could find almost Supermario-like pin with rainbow and mushrooms. Pictured below is my street credible skull pin.

Though I did not find anything to lust for from Sopiva shop, it was a nice example of young designers doing something together. I haven’t been following finnish design scene that closely, but somehow I have a feel that even though young designers might be really talented – they lack some essential marketing and industrial economics skills that would and could turn their designs and brands into real businesses. Somehow it seems much more fun to do unique pieces in small numbers and sell them to their selected hipster clients. But that is a subject of another posting.

While walking along Eerikinkatu, we made a quick stop at Sammakko bookstore. I found great finds in promotions basket for just 2 euros per book and would have spent even more time browsing through their selection in the store… only if we weren’t in a hurry to go elsewhere.

As we walked back to the railway station, we noticed a new store in Lasipalatsi: Farmer’s market at the heart of Helsinki. Large store offered a good selection of organic foods, meat, cheese, chocolate, cookies, soft drinks – including Teerenpeli’s great beers and ciders in retail packages! Finally you can get Laiskajaakko and Lempi Mustikka to home!

Though prices were ridiculously high, we made essential purchases of beer and cider – as well as some handmade chocolate and toffee. After which we were ready to move to the cafeteria next door and enjoy some cake and tee, and wait for our friend to join us.

Last target on our journey was Alko, finnish alcohol retail monopoly, where our goal was to purchase new sparkling wines to be tasted. We had just read a review about Pongrácz, south african sprakling wine that got a raving review in Helsingin sanomat.

As you might guess, if there is a great review in largest daily newspaper in Finland about a wine – it is very likely that that specific wine experiences a surge in sales and stockpiles run out. This seemed to be the case also for us, but luckily very helpful salesperson was ready to call to other near by shops and ask whether they had any left. At the same time I discussed about our preferences with another sales clerk, who suggested that we might also like Klein Constaintia Methode Cap Classique – which is few euros more expensive, but should be good for our taste. Eventually I decided to give it a try and walk some five hundred meters to another Alko shop, which had reserved two last bottles of Pongracz for us. In the first Alko we got also great review and approval for our choice of wine from the cashier and in the second on disapproval, as we took the last bottles of wine.

Klein Constantia Methode Cap Classique

In the end our shopping day was quite succesfull.

Pins and large selection books not included in the picture.