I see that Brian Burke is in the news again. I wish him good luck at the new job, even if, to me, he'll always be best known for this:

»This is a must-read for the hockey fan, whether hard-core or casual. The tales are well-told, whimsical and thoughtful all at the same time.« – Brian Burke, GM, Anaheim Ducks

More here.

"What?" said the taxi driver after he picked up his phone and made the sound of a Formula One car engine finally go away.

"Is it Ben? Yeah, I missed your call earlier, tried to call you back just now," he then went on, even though he hadn't.

"What?" he said again. "A rat? In the Volvo? In the garage? Are you kidding me?" he said, getting more upset with each question. And then he paused, for a second or so.

"The rat ate the journal?"

I guess nobody believes a cat or a dog eating the homework anymore.

Anybody who's spoken with me in the last two years, knows that I often begin my sentences, "I heard in a podcast that..."

Because I listen to a lot of them. On the bus, the subway, driving, at the gym, you name it.

But I realized today, walking towards the Old Town in Vienna that, whenever I'm in a new city, I don't want to listen to my iPod. I want to hear the sound of the city, even if it is the same old sound of cars driving by.

There's the odd clonk of the trams, the honking, and the lacking of it. The muffled sounds of everything when there's snow. And I don't want to miss it.

There was an interesting story about swear words in the Atlantic Monthly. I happened to read it today on a plane to Switzerland. And the on the train, a few hours later, I saw something that looked like a huge cross up on a hillside, and I started to think about symbols.

I remember when I first saw somebody flipping the bird, or extending their middle finger at somebody else. I was in the seventh grade, and back then, my classmates told me that the proper way to reply to that one was to show the "extended index finger and pinky" combination towards the bird man.

To me, these gestures seemed weird. I remember not understanding the power of an extended middle finger, or how two other fingers would be the appropriate reply. I have a faint memory of starting a campaign of my own, by replying with just my pinky. Why would that finger be any less powerful?

As you've probably noticed by now, after all, it's been a good 25 years, that one didn't catch on. But I haven't seen the two-finger reply salute in a long time, either. Why wasn't that sticky? Too difficult maybe?

"Life magazine announced Tuesday that is is making more than 10 million of its archival photographs publicly available through a partnership with Google."

So, their entire archive gets scanned and made available, searchable, through Google Image Search. Among the classics and other super shots, there's quite a bit of hockey photos as well, from, for example, the 1940s and 1950s.

Like this George Silk 1958 photo of Jacques Plante:



More, and more, and more.

Warning: you will lose your sense of time and will thereby end up spending hours watching the LIFE magazine photos. (Like this one).

So yes, Cookie, I did spend more time trying to get the visa than I did in Russia. And in hindsight, I realize that in my eagerness to get a visa I may have rushed things, more than necessary.

Or else, I wouldn't have had this conversation with Igor:

» Continued

Hey, I’m back from Magnitogorsk. I was just here, a mere 50 hours earlier, waiting for a stylish little Atlas suitcase that never came. I was just an innocent little Finn, curious about Russia, a wide-eyed kid, venturing out on a journalistic adventure in George Orwell’s footsteps. On a charter plane, of course.

And here I am now, tired and weary, with images of a memorial to a war that’s mostly a part of my grandparents’ past, and a city, going forward and backward at the same time flashing before my eyes, and memories of my journey from Europe to Asia, and back, still vivid on my mind. There I was, for what seemed like days, weeks, a lifetime, with one of Magnitogorsk’s most famous TV personalities as my travel companion. In a taxi cab, naturally.

The Magnitogorsk hockey crowd was one of the rowdiest I have ever seen. They were loud, they were loud, and they were loud.

The press box happened to have another row of seats behind it, so I got to see (read: hear) the fans enthusiasm first hand. The guy behind me had a horn, a whistle, four cups of beer, and a voice that would have given him a front row place in the Red Army choir back in the 1970s.

They also had the most aggressive "wave" I have ever seen. Not violent aggressive, just aggressive: fast and rowdy. And they spilled a lot of beer on the floor. Their wave went around the rink in two seconds. A world record, I'm sure.

This morning, I decided to leave my smokey room, and go for a walk. Curious about Russia, I boldly ventured out all the way to the end of the parking lot of my Hotel Europe.

Just as I was about to pass the huge Volga, I saw a tiny little cat run across the parking lot. OK, yes, I thought it was a rat at first, even as I tried to get closer to the cat, to take a photo of it.

I saw the guard watching me, so I decided to act natural. I stopped, and took a photo of the big old Volga, then admired the photo for a second. Then I heard the cat move again, towards the fence, so I took a couple of steps to the left. Glanced at the guard, he was looking the other way, I proceeded to find the kitten.

And then I saw it at the fence.



I snapped the photo, and confirmed that it was a cat and started to walk back towards the front end of the parking lot, towards the guard, guarding the gate, that was the only entrance to Hotel Europe, surrounded by a black, metal fence.

"It was a cat," I said.
"Przua hjuede," said the guard.
"Sorry .. um, yeah, it was ... meow," I said and smiled.
"Da, da," said the guard and smiled back.

I just hired a cab driver for an hour - 300 ruble, or nine dollars - and went on a sight seeing tour in Magnitogorsk.

I can't say that I saw everything - I don't even know what "everything" would be here - but I did cross the border to Asia, said hi to Lenin (a statue), admired the statue of the Soviet Worker handing the sword that he has forged to the Soviet Soldier, and found out that there's no McDonald's in Magnitogorsk, for reasons that I still don't quite understand.

Something to do with territorial rights, and McDonald's getting Russia only west of the river Volga.

And somebody else getting the rest. Who? No idea. Tomorrow.

I've never understood why anybody would smoke in bed. Any romantic notions that people have about it are wrong, OK? It's just wrong.

After having slept last night in a room where somebody secretly took a puff or two, I understand it even less. OK, it's not a puff or two. It's like there's an old Russian guy sitting in the chair in the corner, smoking away.

Which is why it's nice to have a balcony. With a view:

What a fascinating country. And I don't understand a word. That said, I've only been here for a few hours, and have only met Evgeny, Elena, Vladimir, and Igor, and those four just briefly at the airport.

The passport control took a while, because apparently, there are only two daily flights from Magnitogorsk, and both to Moscow. Our charter was one of the first international flights, at least this year.

Not knowing the language is a little scary. And here's a room you don't want to enter.

And what are the odds of you watching a junior hockey game in 1994, and have a lady screaming, "PASI!" behind you throughout the entire game, only to find yourself face to face with Pasi, the TV commentator in Magnitogorsk in 2008.

Not sure, but the odds for me are 1:1.

What are the odds of your hitching a ride to Russia on a plane chartered by your old coach, now the GM of the team that you'll be covering?

I don't know, but right now, mine are about 1:1.

Off to 'Gorsk.

(The guy in the photo is that old coach of mine, Juha Junno, now the GM of Kärpät).

Look who I bumped into at the airport!

Yes! That's right! It's totally the lady with the green hat and the orange suitcase, and her husband!

My mother believes in the power of thought, among many other things, but this one is so strong that she's instilled some of that into my brain. Which is why, when I wanted a job at the Canadian Embassy, I actually walked around the block every day for a few days, to send good vibes up to the third floor.

(I did get the job).

Unfortunately, it also works the other way. This morning, as I was packing my tiny suitcase, I went back and forth about packing/not packing my glasses and contact lenses. I decided to pack them and ... (drum roll) ... my bag didn't make it to Oulu. Not yet, anyway. I wonder how long I can wear the same pair of contacts. (Please, no comments about how long I can wear the same pair of underwear).

They promised me that the bag would be on the next flight, landing about now. Or if not on that one, surely on the 1 am flight. And at the hotel at 5 am.

But who knows, "they" are tricky people. "They" also say we put a man on the moon. Really?

Still in Terminal 2, only this time in Helsinki, my city of birth. My city.

The city with the green trams, the hockey arena that smells like a real hockey arena, and the city of the park where I played with my son like my parents had played with me some 30 years earlier.

But now, Gate 29 is calling for me.

Yes, I'm still in Sweden. This far, my adventure consists of a subway ride with drunk Finns, and that's not much of an adventure to me anymore. Been there, seen that, you know.

It's been a while since I flew with Finnair, the pride of Finland, and hence, it's been a while since I've been at Terminal 2 of the Arlanda international airport. This terminal is the backyard where SAS, the pride of Scandinavia doesn't fly from.

Arlanda is the name of the Stockholm international airport, even if, with regular intervals, somebody comes up with a new name suggestion, such as re-naming it Alfred Nobel International Airport.

I want it to stay as Arlanda. I don't mind naming it after the person who invented dynamite as much as I'd hate to see them go amiss the great slogan I have crafted for them (and tried to get the word of mouth going mostly by repeating it to my wife every time I or we have been to the airport):

Updated version: On Monday, I'll I picked up my visa, and then I am off to Magnitogorsk for a quick trip to watch some hockey. And this is one of those trips that may be fun to live blog about, so I will do just that.

Join me on my Stockholm - Oulu - Magnitogorsk - Oulu - Stockholm adventure. Come back, and refresh often.

It started so innocently. My son and daughter had started this moving business - "Max Moving Men", freely translated - and all I needed to do was lie on the bed while they would move our pillows and blankets from the bed to their storage.

My son took one end of the pillow, and my daughter the other as they carried everything to .. I don't know where.

While I was lying there, they got tired of me and threw everything on top of me again. And then I moved my arm, and I heard how they ran away, screaming "monster!"

That sounded great so I got into it. They came back, I made a move, they ran away.

Then the pauses started to get longer. I heard them running towards the bedroom, and away from the bedroom, but not really into the bedroom. I thought they were just getting ready to meet the monster.

So I did the grown-up cheating thing: I looked. I peaked through a hole in my mountain of blankets and pillows, and I saw my son running past the bedroom, with a plastic helmet and a sword in his hand.

Just as I thought. They were preparing themselves for meeting the Monster.

I pulled the cover over me again and waited. I made a little breathing hole to myself, and waited. I heard the tapping of the tiny feet outside the bedroom, and laughed a little. Were they in for a surprise! This was a monster like none they'd ever seen!

And then the tapping stopped. I heard voices from far away, muffled voices, so I figured they were hiding. So I decided to wait them out and hide longer.

Ten minutes later, my wife came to tell me that she was going to the gym.

"What about the kids? What are they doing?" I said through my breathing hole.

"They're reading in their little home in the bathroom," she said.

"Oh."

Back in 1990, I spent a fine summer day in Toronto, Canada, waiting in line to get into the American Embassy, to apply for a visa to enter the country. I had no idea that it would take me the entire day, but I remember the sense of freedom I felt when I emerged on the other side of the building seven hours later – and saw a hot dog vendor.

I wasn't as lucky today, standing two hours in line to the Russian Embassy in Stockholm, trying to get in to apply for a visa to enter that country. I got close to the magic door, with only two people in front of me, when they closed the door for the day. Better luck tomorrow maybe.

It'll be interesting to see whether they sell hotdogs on the other side of the building.

Here's Ricky and Jessie's girl.



And me, I'm Jessi's guy ... and I wish that I had Ricky's style! Fabulous!

In the last two months or so, I’ve traveled across Europe, covering hockey games, talking to players, coaches and GMs in different cities, in different countries, in different languages. In every country, there are a million different stories, and fewer, but many, heroes.

» Continued

Here's a mystery I have been thinking about for years, unable to solve it. Ready? Here it comes:



I've never (before) said this out loud for the fear of sounding inadequate, but ... can somebody listen to the guy and read the tickers at the same time? I really can't. I can read the tickers, but then I can't really listen to the person speaking, and vice versa. (And yes, I might not be able to hear or see anything but the typo on that shot but that's another blog entry).

But now, reading the magnificent Traffic: why we drive the way we do (and what it says about us) by Tom Vanderbilt, I feel liberated.

Disclaimer: the only time I can read one thing, and listen to somebody else, is when I'm reading a book/morning paper, and my wife says something to me - like last night when I read this paragraph:

We are led to believe that this is how people now process information, as if we are suddenly genetically programmed to multitask. Studies have shown, however, that the more information there is on the screen, the less we actually remember.

It's interesting, though, when I was a kid, I took great pride in my ability to concentrate on a book and block the rest of the world, not hearing anything, or anybody.

I don't seem to be able to do it anymore. My son is, though.

Today, as I was driving towards downtown Stockholm, and admiring the Old Town skyline, two thoughts entered my brain at the same time. Maybe three.

One, I was thinking that I have to tell my wife that Gamla Stan, the Old Town, is really beautiful and that we should probably move there.



Two, I was wondering why I always have to tell people where I was when I was thinking about something. It's not that important, or even unusual that I think.

And three - and I just realize I'm listing the thoughts in reverse order, because this was the one I was thinking about as I was admiring the Old town - I was wondering if my children, one part Finnish, one part Swedish, will grow up to be Swedish, or Stockholmian first (and whether most people identify with the city first, and country second).

And naturally, I was thinking about that because I, born Finnish in Helsinki, am starting to feel at home in Stockholm. This city is Sweden to me. I don't feel particularly Swedish, but a Stockholmian? Yes. In the last six months, I've found myself hesitating when people ask me where I come from. "Well, I came here from Stockholm, but I'm a Finn" is my standard line.

I get to pick and choose.

And here's a column that runs in the November '08 issue of Scanorama. After the jump, that is.

» Continued