NL39 - Feels like Christmas

Hello from my home in Matinkylä! This is NordLetter #39, a weekly newsletter on living and walking in Finland. Each week I share some of the interesting things I found on the web.

Previous editions can be found here. You can reach out to me by replying on this mail or adding a comment on this. I am also posting on Threads and Mastodon.

It feels like Christmas!

We went to Tripla Mall today. The stated aim for the visit was shopping at SinSay. Sinsay is a brand, like HnM. You get stuff for cheap. Prerna wanted to buy some stuff for cheap.

We don't shop in Tripla often so I was a bit confused by where to go and how. Plus travelling with a pram can be a challenge in itself. You have to use lifts. There was a lot of go here, no go back, go there.

The mall was decked up in seasonal decorations. After shopping we ended at Delhi Rasoi. We were there at eight, there was no one else in the restaurant at that time. It felt like we had booked the entire hotel for ourselves. The restaurant is neat, the interiors are well done.

Per usual, I ordered a samosa. Additionally tikki-chat and their special paneer. The samosa tasted like a bastardised version of my beloved samosa. It lacked flavour. And they had put gobhi in it. The tikki-chat had plenty of flavour. The paneer was pretty great too.

One thing that surprised me back in 2021 when I had first arrived here was all gravies are served with naan and rice. You don't pay extra for that.

There is a seasonal attraction in the form of a winter themed space for children to play in. After dinner we sat for a bit there and let Savya play in the area. He was very happy. He does not usually get to play in that much free space or with other children.

All in all, a good day.

/five things to share

1. Why are laws written in an incomprehensible fashion - an MIT study

Just as “magic spells” use special rhymes and archaic terms to signal their power, the convoluted language of legalese acts to convey a sense of authority, they conclude.

2. The decaying internet - The Verge

There’s a phenomenon that happens where I live along the rugged coastline of Northern California, when conditions are right, or, more accurately, wrong: a layer of green, foamy scum clings to the surface of the ocean so that when the waves wash your footprints away, they are replaced by a layer of vile, reeking slime dotted by writhing marine organisms. This is, at times, how the internet feels right now. We are being slowly erased, but instead of passing peacefully into the vale with the ebb and flow of soothing waves, we are being actively replaced by garbage.

3. The ghost artists of Spotify - Liz Pelly

Around this same time, I started hearing jazz piano playlists on Spotify that disturbed me. Every track sounded like it was played on the same instrument with the exact same touch and tone. Yet the names of the artists were all different.

About how Spotify is filling up mood playlists with music from Swedish studios, whom they pay less. Also read the ugly truth about spotify is finally out, which basically talks about the same thing.

4. How automakers created the rules around jaywalking

It’s strange to imagine now, but prior to the 1920s, city streets looked dramatically different than they do today. They were considered to be a public space: a place for pedestrians, pushcart vendors, horse-drawn vehicles, streetcars, and children at play.

Can you imagine such a time?

“The crucial thing it said was that pedestrians would cross only at crosswalks, and only at right angles,” Norton says. “Essentially, this is the traffic law that we’re still living with today.”

5. Parker solar probe will fly into the sun

The probe will fly into the sun then out multiple times as it tries to understand the source of solar winds. It is technically impressive as something if heated and cooled rapidly becomes brittle or might sag.

/new posts

1. Digital consumption does not let me do actual work
2. We can have a fun conversation with max four people
3. We don't own anything in this age of subscriptions
4. The net good or bad of AI
5. No pity for the bosses
6. How do I know if someone subscribed to me via RSS

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Until next week.