Traveling dancer's vocabulary: English - Finnish

Alla suomeksi!

Happy New Year everybody! I thought I'd start the year off with something fun.....! Hehe. Some weeks ago I published the English - Portuguese dance vocabulary, to help my fellow traveling dancers. Now why not continue this, with another set of "dance & survival" words and phrases: English - Finnish! Now you can impress your Finnish dance friends ;)

English words & phrases are written on red, and on their right the Finnish words & phrases on blue.

Muutama viikko sitten julkaisin ensimmäisen tanssisanaston, englanti - portugali, matkalevien tanssijoiden avuksi. Nyt sanastosarja jatkuu; vuorossa englanti - suomi! On hyödyllistä osata muutama sana tai lause maailmalla tanssiessaan - toivon mukaan tästä on sinulle apua! Ja: Hyvää uutta vuotta kaikille!

Englanninkieliset sanat ja lauseet on kirjoitettu punaisella, ja näiden oikealla puolella suomenkieliset vastineet.

Helsinki seasons: Winter!

Perhaps you read my earlier post Helsinki all year round and Helsinki: Autumn? Now it's time to look into one of my favourite seasons in Helsinki, and Finland: WINTER!!

Winter in Helsinki!

Finland, the land of four seasons. If you're an inhabitant of Helsinki, you'll probably have a love-hate relationship with winter. You look forward to the snow that lights up the city during the dark months. And you dread the days when it's pouring rain, sleet or snow horizontally onto your face, temperature suddenly drops -25C and for the fifteenth time dig your way out of your house/to your car/to the tram. I have to admit though: I love winter!

Some of the best of Helsinki during winter: Scenes (left:) Töölönlahti, Kruununhaka, Esplanade, (right:) Meilahti, Töölönlahti, Hakaniemi from Eläintarhanlahti and harbour towards Suomenlinna.

Winter basically starts when the daily average temperature goes below zero Celsius. You can expect the winter weathers to arrive sometime between end of October and start of January, and end sometime between the start of March and end of April. You'll most likely see the picture postcard type of snow frosted sceneries in Helsinki in January - February. But as the the climate change is affecting Finland as well the weather can be quite fickle. From December to mid March you can expect anything from +10 and rain, to -25 and 1+ meter of snow. So check for forecasts before arriving to Helsinki!

Despite the extreme weather  conditions public traffic is quite reliable in Helsinki (though the locals complain even about 1-2 minutes' delays) and the roads remain open. Just be careful driving & walking out on the roads when it's dark and slippery!

While the end of autumn and early winter (Oct - early Dec) can be quite gloomy with short daylight hours, the mid and end of winter (End of Dec - Feb) are typically much more pleasant, even truly terrific times to visit Helsinki! When the snow covers the city and the daylight hours quite rapidly start to increase after the winter solstice (22nd Dec), you can experience the magical winter wonderland, right in the capital city with all its activities and services! The weeks before Christmas certainly are a great time to experience the city with its holiday lights and Christmas markets. If you want to try out winter sports, you can do all of that in Helsinki as well! Check below for more details.

If you're interested to make a Lapland visit on your winter trip to Finland, then read more on my post Fun winter week in Lapland!

Make most of your travels: 10 best tips

There are a few things I've learned while traveling.... like never ask for "spicy" food in Mexico or Thailand and don't fall asleep on the beach without 50+ sunscreen. Well, you probably know these already, don't you? Below some a bit substantial life lessons I've picked up along the way: my tried and true notes to make the most of your travels!

If you are planning a long tip, feel free to read the summary of my round-the-world trip with the FAQs and my favorite spots, or take a look at the Travel index page!

Traveling dancer's vocabulary: English - Portuguese (Brazil)

Abaixo da imagem em português!

Knowing the local language can help a lot while traveling. Unfortunately (IMO) it's not possible to learn every language of the world - but learning even just a couple key words and phrases can save you from a lot of trouble. And it always makes a positive impression with the locals!

With kind assistance from my friends in Brazil I compiled this short Brazilian Portuguese vocabulary for the traveling dancers. Thanks to Stela Regina Novaes from Studio Metrópole and Jaakko Pispala from ZK Adventures for the help!

English words & phrases are written on blue, and on their right the Brazilian Portuguese words & phrases on green!

Now t-shirts available with this print!

Conhecer a língua local pode ajudar muito durante a viagem. Infelizmente acho que não é possível aprender todas as línguas do mundo - mas pode realmente ajudar se você aprender ainda algumas palavras e frases importantes. E isso faz sempre uma impressão positiva!

Com a ajuda dos meus amigos no Brasil eu compilei este pequeno vocabulário de inglês - português brasileiro para os dançarinos que viajarão. Obrigado Stela Regina Novaes de Studio Metrópole and Jaakko Pispala de ZK Adventures pela ajuda!

Palavras e frases em inglês são escritos em azul, e do seu lado direito as palavras e frases do português brasileiro são em verde!

Break the rules, break the routines - 5 keys to being innovative

I took a break from my daily routine and headed to Slush. Not the wet snow you might find on the streets of Helsinki this time of the year, but the hottest IT start-up event in the Nordics. Though slightly off-topic on this blog (will get on-topic soon), I truly can recommend attending Slush if you are an IT innovator or investor anywhere in the world - these guys really know how to make a cool event!

Together with over 10.000 people I roamed, what I would describe, a super-sized nightclub meets science lab for two days. Four mesmerizing stages packed with key notes & seminars, a hundred+ cool stands and quite a few free macchiatos later, a person does get a little worn down with the same innovation BS. A lot of smoke and mirrors... literally. (Which they need for the 1000000 lazer beams that criss-cross the ceilings.) Nonetheless, weary or not, you always end up picking up something new and interesting, meet lots of people you'd normally never get around to see and get some valuable practice on your elevator pitches (and notice how much you're in need of that practice).

On the second morning of Slush, the United States Ambassador to Finland Bruce Oreck - known in Finland not only for his position in the US Embassy and local politics, but also from his charismatic appearances around the country ranging from TV cooking shows to displaying his well-shaped biceps (a life-long body builder) - stepped up to start off the day two of the event. I was definitely expecting something to wake me up. Though the crowd was clearly tired & hungover (myself luckily only the former) from the party the night before, and though the points he covered while on stage were no rocket science, his talk served as a good reminder on an important topic; how to be more innovative.


If Slush has one thing slightly in tangent to this blog, it's innovation and that particular speech. So I'm not totally off in writing about this. Below are Bruce Oreck's 5 practices to being innovative:

Beyond words: Helsinki Zouk Festival 2014

It takes quite a lot of effort to create something good. But what does it take to make... magic?

I know, I know. Last year I made the statement that Helsinki Zouk Festival is a zouk event quite unlike any other. And true, the 2013 HZF was great. But indeed, the last weekend's 2014 HZF was simply beyond words.

I try not bore you with everything I've already told before. Yes, Helsinki is a cold, dark place in November. The zouk scene is small but us zoukers in Helsinki are extremely proud of it. And I think many may agree we've developed a fairly nice group of dancers here. But now, we also have one of the best zouk events in the world!

Helsinki Zouk Festival is organised by Freddy Marinho and Andressa Castelhano with their Rio Zouk Style dance school now for the third time with the same format:

• Six professional zouk artist couples representing the best of the best in a few different zouk styles.
• Two and a half days of workshops with only one intermediate/advanced track and one beginners' track.
• Three nights of parties (plus separate pre & after party).
• Family atmosphere.

In summary: Less is more. Quality over quantity.

Artists who took part in this year's event: Renata Peçanha & Jorge Peres, Leonardo & Becky Neves, Jefferson Dadinho and Kelly Palhares, Daniel & Leticia Estevez Lopez, Clinton Lacerda & Cristi Boone and the hosts, Freddy & Andressa.

Zouk dancer's challenge: Learning salsa!

A while back I decided to take on a new dance challenge: I signed up for salsa classes for this autumn season.

In other words: Salseros, beware! :D

So starting early August I've been learning cross-body salsa with a simple intention of becoming a fluent social salsera. I committed myself to this project for four months -  it will be exciting to see how much I improve during that time and how I'll feel about salsa then!

So where did I start off in August? I'm not a complete beginner in salsa or social dancing in general, as you might know. Which is a double-edged sword: I have both the luxury and the complications of not starting from scratch. While most of my knowledge in social dancing I derive from Brazilian zouk, during the past couple years I have also ventured on the salsa floors around the world a couple times. Remember when I was salsa dancing in Mexico, Bolivia, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, Estonia..? Basically I've just used the little I know of the on 1 basic step and count myself to death with 123 567 while I dance. Every time I've danced salsa I've discovered something new... and realised yet again I have no idea what I should do. But now I'm learning to dance salsa, for real.

Below I talk about the challenges and rewards of learning salsa during my first two months of training!

Is this how I will look like dancing salsa... way way in the future? 

2015 zouk congress calendar

Zouk The World: zouktheworld.com | ZTW on Facebook | ZTW on Twitter | ZTW on Instagram

Find the updated version of the calendar: http://zouktheworld.com/2015-zouk-calendar

Zouk non-stop at Zouktime 2014!

A couple weeks ago, after a 3 year break, I made a return visit to Brno for Zouktime 2014. This was the fifth edition of what is among (if not the) best zouk congresses in Europe at the moment. Yes, I said it.... Zouktime definitely topped my zouk congress chart for the past couple years!

Taking place in a quiet city of Brno, Czech Republic, Zouktime attracts a couple hundred zouk dancers from all around Europe and the world. And there were quite a few names that certainly did attract the people... Zouk teachers at the event this year:

Rodrigo Delano & Ruana Vasques (Brazil), Alex de Carvalho (Brazil) & Mathilde dos Santos (France), Renato Veronezi & Babi Pacheco (Brazil), Bruno Galhardo & Eglantine Oliveira (Brazil), Freddy Marinho & Andressa Castelhano (Brazil/Finland), Luděk Lužný (Czech Republic) & Olaya Dende (Spain), Jakub Jakoubek & Pavla Lužná (Czech Republic), Adilio Porto (Brazil) & Krisztina Balazs (Switzerland) and Ronaldo Magalhães & Gabi Peres (Brazil/Hungary). Teaching samba de gafieira among them were also Adalberto Shock and Mariana Torres.

Helsinki Zouk Flash Mob and IZFM 2014

September 21st to me nowadays equals International Zouk Flash Mob! Last Sunday we yet again danced zouk all around the world. Over one hundred cities and thousands of zouk dancers hosted flash mobs with one zouk song and one choreography. And all this hard work only to share our passion for zouk!

Baltic Sensual Weekend 2014

Whenever there's a zouk event closeby - I'm there. And so I was at the Baltic Sensual Weekend in Estonia last weekend! This was the second edition of the event that last year took place in Villa Andropoff, now in Hotel Lepanina in the area of Kabli, about half an hour drive south from the "summer capital of Estonia", Pärnu, and about 180 km from Tallinn. The idea seemed to be to gather Baltic & Northern European zouk & kizomba dancers under the same roof, learn some new moves & refresh on the fundamentals, leave the city for some nature & fresh air - and of course to party until early morning!

And what can I say? Mission accomplished!

Helsinki seasons: Autumn!

Perhaps you read my earlier post of Helsinki all year round? Now it's time for the first part of my "Helsinki seasons" series:

Autumn in Helsinki!

In Helsinki you'll find all the four seasons. Autumn starts roughly at the beginning of September and turns to winter sometime during November or December. In terms of climate, autumns in Helsinki can be warm and sunny, cool and sunny, cool and rainy, very cold rainy or very cold and snowy. Hmm... Prepare for everything! It's not unusual that every day (or every ten minutes) the weather is different. Average temperatures are slightly above or below 10 C. Still in September you may experience summer-like temperatures (+20 C or above), if you're lucky. Winter officially starts when the daytime temperatures go below 0 C and by then, usually, city is covered with snow.

The end of the autumn can be quite dark. November and December are considered the darkest months; day light hours hit their lowest point at Dec 20-21st but the few weeks before that can indeed be gloomy if there is no snow - with snow, things (and moods) are a bit brighter! To fight the dark & cold, people do whatever they can to keep their minds off of it; work, hobbies, going out on dinners and drinks... The Pre-Christmas party season (pikkujoulu, literally: little Christmas) starts already at the end of October and by the end of November you'll see the city sparkling with Christmas lights.

But it's not all dark, wet and cold. For many, the autumn is a season of new beginnings: school, new hobbies, healthy lifestyles, autumn fashion... Crisp morning air brings on a certain inspiration and feeling of a fresh start. And it's the season of new colors, as shades or red, orange and yellow brush over the city!