Visit Porvoo

Hello from my home in Matinkylä! This is NordLetter #15, a weekly newsletter on living and walking in Finland. Previous editions can be found here.

Porvoo is a quaint little town to the east of Helsinki. It is one of the oldest cities in Finland. We planned a day trip to Porvoo this Saturday. It was supposed to rain till 11. Then cloudy till 2. Then sunny afterward.

We took the metro to Kamppi and then the M7. The M7 was the fastest bus to get to Porvoo. We started from Kamppi at 2:05 and were in Porvoo at 2:55.

While crossing the Porvoonjoki to get to the bus stop, we had seen both the many restaurants to our right and old town to the left. Even before we had gotten down, our minds were made up.

Old town is a charming little place with cobbled streets and quaint buildings, most painted in beautiful colours. There are quirky sign posts and beautiful flowers in front of almost every eatery and shop. We roamed around the streets at a casual pace, taking in the sights.

Further up was the old bridge (vanha silta). It is a wooden bridge which goes from the old town to the new town 😄.

We were slowly making our way to the picture point opposite the red wooden houses. This is one of the most photographed places in Finland.

This concluded our trip for the day 😄.

Not really.

Next up was walking at one of the cafe's on the river's shore. There was a pedestrian bridge further up ahead. So we walked.

We thought Thai food would be awesome and the restaurant was well-rated as well. And so we walked along the harbour, past quite a few restaurants on our way to this Thai restaurant. Which was a let down. I wanted to sit on the side of the river, eating something, drinking a long drink. This restaurant did not have any place to sit. So we walked back to Cafe Kiva.

We sat there for an hour or so. Eating, drinking, talking, laughing. The food was great. We had ordered Kiva fries and Kiva wings. Both were spicy and the mayo was flavourful.

It was around 6:30 when we left Kiva. We were scheduled to return on the 8:05 bus so we proceeded for another jaunt across old town. This time through a different street.

Prerna stopped at Nelly's art and cafe. We needed a fridge magnet after all. The owner told us that all the art is hand-crafted by around 50 local women.

This time we walked past the old bridge and found another small bridge. We asked a passing Finn to take a few pictures. Which was perhaps super uncomfortable for her. But the result was quite good.

By then it had gotten late and the Iso Linnamäki Castle Hill seemed on too steep a hill! So we went back to bus stop. Took the M7 back to Kamppi and then the metro back home. The Matinkyla metro station on the Iso Omena side was under renovation so we had to walk a bit extra.

/reading

Khan Academy - Why We’re Deeply Invested in Making AI Better at Math Tutoring (and What We’ve Been Up to Lately)
This is an interesting application of AI in learning and teaching. Something that seems ethical and better for the students. And teachers. I mean that's the pitch right? Everyone is overworked and these AI agents will be able to help. Take care of the mundane stuff. But if mundane stuff is all you do, then, good luck!

This about the world’s first public housing.

I finished reading Little Brother this week. It is an excellent piece of fiction. It shows how fragile society is, and how it can change so quickly. It teaches about some technical stuff too, but in an easy to understand fun way. These things are fun. So so fun.

In sci-fi media, there are things that sometimes need to happen to move the plot. How those things happen are not really explained. They might be presented as fact. That this thing that is magic, well it just happens here.

One of those things that I used to keep imagining is local grids. Like a black box which has some sort of fusion energy. Which is clean. And free.

Well, that might not just be sci-fi. Batteries are getting cheaper. The dream of local grids might just be around the corner.

Batteries: how cheap can they get?

The other aspect of this that I thought of when thinking of these local micro grids: nuclear fusion. It always seems like it is 20 years away.

Will We Ever Get Fusion Power? sums up everything about fusion succinctly.

When it’s possible to get better, embracing mediocrity isn’t a useful strategy.

Until next week.