"Ant and Dec survive Taliban attack"

There are some headlines, such as the one above, that there is simply no way you can avoid clicking on. From Yahoo news:

"TV stars Ant and Dec came under fire while visiting Afghanistan to present a bravery award to troops, it has emerged. Ant McPartlin and Dec Donnelly were waiting to catch a military flight when the Taliban shelled Kandahar airport, it has been reported."

One wonders if it was personal? Those cheeky chappies can get a tad annoying but it seems unlikely that any Taliban commanders have ever had to sit through that many episodes of Byker Grove. On a more serious note, big-up to Ant'n'Dec for going out in the first place and for reminding perhaps not the most engaged sections of the community back home that: "It was pretty hairy - not something I'd like to experience again... It shows what our troops go through every day."

A Walk at Salmijärvi, Nuuksio

No climbing this weekend, but some hiking pictures instead. Either my colour blindness is miraculously getting better or due to something to do with the cool, wet summer the colours of the trees seem really impressive this year. The pictures were, except the first couple, taken today in the Salmi recreational area, which is at the northern end of Nuuksio National Park.

Crazy colours in the garden

Not sure what these berries are called in English, but they make good jam

Birches and blue skies

On the 5 km walking trail at Salmijärvi

Poikkipuolinen - time to light a fire and cook some sausages

Yellow sycamores and a little cottage

Autumn colours

Salmijärvi

Late afternoon in the southern Finnish countryside

Hope you enjoyed. A normal service of musings on global mayhem and political idiocy will resume shortly.

"Reach Out" 6- (E1 5b) - Reventeenvuori

The following video is 'from the archive' and shows the first ascent of the climb in the post title. This is mainly here for Tony, and for our mutual commiseration, as we have now both fallen off the route just around where Jody is in the clip.


"Reach Out" 6- (E1 5b) from Toby A. on Vimeo.

"We only question. No answers...."

(Autumn colours and APCs in Kauhajoki NYT/AP)

...and "the world has changed, I can say it." said Mayor Anti Rantokokko of Kauhajoki.

I was a bit late leaving work and rode home as the sun was setting. I rode mainly through the central park, and listening to my iPod could ignore the traffic noise in the distance and just enjoy what was around. The perfect autumnal evening. The sycamores are going bright yellow, the birch and aspen trees golden and red. There is a particular plant I don't know the name of, used by many as a garden hedge, which turns a comically lurid pink; it's as if it has to go punk to out do the glorious displays of the trees above. As I head further north through the suburbs the smell of apples and wood smoke arrive. Many gardens have apple trees and this year has been a bumper crop, the tree are laden and many rot on the ground releasing their rich, pungent smell. And wood smoke: the smell of winter now, and of my childhood - homely and warm. The sky is blue above and orange to the west, the air cool but not cold. Ignore or be at peace with the city's traffic noise in background, and it is perfect.

The European Security Strategy, that was under discussion at the conference I attended last week, opens with the words "Europe has never been so prosperous, so secure nor so free. The violence of the first half of the 20th Century has given way to a period of peace and stability unprecedented in European history". But nobody seems to think that, instead some say:

"Whole life is war and whole life is pain
And you will fight alone in your personal war"

Then they go and shoot people who had done them no harm.

A colleague said to me today as we watched the breaking news "something is going wrong with society". Not really - we just think something is going wrong with society and then it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. But for the majority of the first world, and even for increasing numbers in the developing world, we have never before been so prosperous, so secure nor so free. My wife said that earlier she had been discussing with the neighbours, before it was announced that Saari had died - that they hoped he lived so that people could find out why? But the mayor was right straight away: there would have been no answers beyond what occasionally happens when mentally unstable people have easy access to firearms.

Finnish people in cool weather

Not that bloggers would ever be obsessive weirdos with excessive numbers of bees in their bonnets about completely unimportant things and a constant need to share those with innocent bystanders, but I feel I have to revisit the issue of Finns and the weather. This morning when I noticed the temperature was 10 oC when I was about to leave home on my bike I decided to wear shorts. With these, a cycle shirt and a long sleeve cycle jersey over it, I was fine - indeed a bit sweaty. I should have worn fingerless cycling gloves rather than full gloves for instance. Anyways - down in the city, near Pasila station, a ninja on a bike rode past me. I mean I presume the chap must have been a ninja because along with the black shell suit he was also wearing a black balaclava pulled up over his nose, so only the eyes were showing (if anyone hears that a bank got robbed this morning in the Pasila area by a dude on the bike, I will of course retract this and pass on the information to the authorities...).

Now I well accept that there are real difference in how much people feel the cold, but can there be that big a differences?! I was out this evening in the yard in a t-shirt standing around doing nothing beyond trying to break up the occasional toddler war, whilst the neighbour who was very busily pushing the lawn mower was wearing full goretex, a woolly cap, and gloves!?

Finns have all sorts of strange genetic conditions and diseases, indeed my friend was telling us just yesterday about her just completed PhD research into one such genetic condition, but a predisposition to feeling the cold seems an odd evolution for a Nordic nation! I blame nurture not nature, and think the modern world is sucking the sisu away from my Finnish friends. I worry for the future of the nation, I really do.

And yep, the title was an oblique reference to a certain song, but you probably have to be at least in your 30s and British to get it. I was expecting to find the song on YouTube and embed it here but surprisingly, couldn't find it. So instead, for no other reason than that it is still a kick-arse tune, is Mark E. Smith with the Inspiral Carpets doing "I want you".

Weekend climbing post

Sometimes I think I'm getting a bit bored with climbing. This normally lasts about 3 days, 4 at the most if I'm really down. I guess I'm pretty unimaginative and by the time the end of the week rocks around I just can't think of anything else I could feasibly be doing at the weekend that would be as much fun. And then after days like today I'm back in love.

Dave starts up "Noora", a soft-touch 6- (E1, but more like HVS) and future classic

Early morning drives along empty roads. Sun coming up on dewy fields. BBC news on the radio. Country petrol stations, coffee and donuts, laughing with mates. Chatting about respective families and the McCain-Palin ticket, biochemistry and Joy Division, furry ropes and belay jackets. Nothing and everything.

High up on "Noora" but still plenty to go

Autumn. Yellow leaves swirl down, the woods are golden. They sky a perfect blue after a week of monotonous gray. The rock is cool to the touch. Woodpeckers peck, and crows craw in the background.

Timo on "Pilli", F6b

Nuts slot deep into crack first time. Big moves, making you get your feet above the gear time after time. Be a man, go for it, make some shapes. And then another good foothold, another breath in balance, another nut slots perfectly in and all is safe again. Repeat until you reach nirvana, or at least the top.

Me belaying, Nora seconding on "Maria" 5 (HVS 5a), Noora's little sister

You win some, you loose others. Reach out as far as I can and feel for the crack. Can't see it but it takes my finger tips. Figure on that being about nut #3, place it blindly, and amazingly it stays in as I tug. Was thinking about going back to the slab for a rest but feel committed now. Clip the mystery nut - a hopefully non-lethal Russian roulette spin. Feet on little footholds - and I've cleared the roof. Eyeball the nut it looks, hmmm, OK-ish... Stretch and stretch, stab fingers into the crack but it's shit and flaring. Help! Take! Slump. Fail.

But the nut doesn't and that's the main thing. And the sun is still shining and the trees are still gold.

Simon climbs, Dave belays on "Reach Out" 6- (E1 5b). I had fallen off at exactly that spot

At least I tried and tried hard. That's enough. The next route is hard for me, but my head is in the game now and I send it - managing to keep my shit together above a zero cam on slightly grubby 5b moves. Good stuff. I lower off and sit smelling the leaf mulch and moss whilst enjoying a cup of tea from the flask.

Dave on "Summer Days" 6- (E1 5b)

The sun's getting lower, time for the last route. Dave starts in the gathering gloom of the forest but is soon high where the granite is turning red in evening rays. Finish the route, pack up and hike back past the woodpecker still pecking to the cars.

High on "Summer Days"

Back on the road, the sun has set. The autumn mists float thin over just the fields as entrancing as ever. Dusk turns to dark, and we head home.

Live foreign minister gossip!

The interesting men of Nordic Foreign Policy (snapped on my phone)

I'm listening to Carl Bildt of Sweden (left) and Alexander Stubb (right) of Finland give a talk on the future of European security. It's fun as they are both bright fellas with outspoken views. Stubb just said the new European Security Strategy is almost certainly going to be "wishy washy crap" - and that's a direct quote! - if some serious political will isn't put into it.

I like ("just call me") Alex - I might not agree with him on everything, but the man has style. Finnish foreign policy are still waters, and whilst those still waters do without doubt run deep, they are very still. Stubb arriving on the scene wasn't a brick being thrown into those still waters, it was a hand grenade.

Iftar with the Ambassador

I got invited to my first Iftar dinner last night. Iftar is the meal that breaks the daily fast during Ramadan. Amusingly this very nice occasion took place at the hotbed of Muslim cultural activity that is the U.S. Embassy in Helsinki! The embassy's chef out did himself with a selection of dishes from across the Muslim world.

The U.S. State Department has a rather clever public diplomacy programme of bringing four U.S. Muslims to other countries to meet civil society groups, local Muslims, students and who ever else they can rustle up (such as people like me) - so the meal was partly in their honour and partly a way of bringing Finnish Muslims and others who have tangential relations with the Finnish Muslim communities together with the U.S. diplomats.

I was told the delegations from the U.S. always include an Imam, a businessman or woman, a student and someone working for an NGO, and of the delegation visiting Finland, two were native born Americans from South Asian families, whilst the other two were newish citizens having arrived as refugees or asylum seekers. As the visitors said, the profiles of the people selected for these trips reflect the diversity of American Muslims, so one chap seemed quite secular and was busy tucking into food with the non-Muslims whilst most of the other Muslims present gathered for brief Iftar prayers, and one of the young women wore a hijab whilst the other didn't. I also learnt a new term from one of the speakers who talked about people "going fundo" (as in fundamentalist), a term that I rather like. So all in all a fun and interesting evening, and the guests from the U.S. were a credit to their nation, showing yet again that 'normal people' (whatever that means!) are often the best ambassadors for their country.