I recently travelled with 47 teachers and other co-workers to Helsinki, and we had a great time!
Our main goal was to learn about the Finnish educational system, and, being Norwegians, we went to Tölö gymnasium because they speak Swedish there. We could therefore communicate in Norwegian with both teachers and students. It was fun discussing everything from Nordic languages to the TV series Skam. The high school educational system is organized very different from ours, with many, many shorter classes over the course of 2-4 years, but the classrooms looks pretty much the same. This gave us a lot to think and talk about, but I'm not going there now.
But we also did the «tourist things» like shopping and looking at churches:
Some of us also went to Kiasma to look at contemporary art. Here is one of Grayson Perry's many tapestries:
It was also interesting to see Sveaborg, a part of Helsinki located on a group of small islands 15 minutes by ferry from the city centre. Sveaborg is also a museum and on the Unesco World Heritage list. About 800 people live there, and tourists visit in hundreds of thousands, so the experience is perhaps not so unique, but still quite interesting! Here is the grave and monument over Augustin Ehrensvärd, who built the fortress in the 1700s:
And last, but not least, they also have Aperol Spritz in Helsinki:
Kippis!
