Atlantica - 01.07.2004, Page 27

has put enormous funds and effort into
strengthening the Finnish school of
photography, an effort that is most cer-
tainly beginning to pay off. I spot the
ultimate Finnish rockabilly pacing the
halls and I start up a conversation. Turns
out he’s Niko Luoma one of the photog-
raphers with works in the exhibition,
and I ask him about this weird rockabil-
ly thing going on in Helsinki. He’s very
polite. “Oh I don’t know about that. I just
came back from Vegas, maybe that’s
why I look this way.” He recommends a
couple of places to eat and drink that
night in his friendly Finnish fashion.
We follow his counsel, and, of course,
bump into him and fellow photogra-
phers at Tori, a nice, laid-back restaurant
that’s apparently the hang out of
Helsinki’s media and art elite. Snapper
orders a mountain of meatballs, mash
and gravy, a concoctions he later swears
kept him stone-cold sober all night. I
tuck into whitefish, another classic
Finnish staple and chat with Jyrkki, an
archetypal friendly Finn photographer.
His cute little son talks to me in Finnish
and Jyrkki tells me in a gentle voice that
the kid has grown up in this bar. “We
come here almost every night, the two
of us.” When I try to pay my bill at the
counter, my card won’t work. “Don’t
worry about it,” says the Irish waiter.
“I’ve got a hangover.” He asks me
where I’m from. “Oh, Iceland. It’s a real-
ly cool place but it’s too expensive.” His
A T L A N T I C A 25
THE SENATE SQUARE HAS
DOUBLED AS A RUSSIAN BACKDROP
IN COLD WAR SPY FILMSSUCH AS
GORKY PARK AND WHITE NIGHTS.
022-28 HELSINKI ATL 304 22.6.2004 17:22 Page 25