25 November 2008

A secret message

My needles in Helsinki

I start to think of the "needles"...

I've got here just less than two months. One of the most amazing thing I learnt about was you could pay your tram ticket through your mobile phone! Wow! That was amazing! Mobile phone is taken seriously here in Finland. I have read a joke "How do you get a Finn to talk? Put a phone in his/her hand!" May be that's how people are "connected" here like Nokia says in their ad. I'm not sure if it's the Finnish who invented the mobile phone or the technology, but from a survey in 2006 showed that 124 per cent of the population had a subscription. They are the highest per capita users of mobile phones in the world.

Yet when I walk on the streets, I couldn't feel this kind of "connection" at all. It's a big contradiction. I feel people are more connected through the phone than "real" people. It doesn't mean Finns are rude. It's a cultural characteristic which I was too. When I walk in the Forest every weekend it is rare to get a smile from a person walking the opposite direction to me. So may be that is where I can "put a needle onto" . My little wish to Helsinki. A secret messages to the people in Helsinki...

Secret messages I saw today at a bathroom door

No comments: