Ben's Second Week

I have really been able to settle down during my second week, as I started to get into the groove of coaching and playing. Matt and I usually coach about three times a week for an hour and a half each time. This has been a fun and challenging experience. The kids range from 9-16 and they represent the full spectrum from being brand new to the game, to having played for a number of years.
One day Matt and I went to an elementary school to teach football to a group of about 25 boys. We were very excited to see that seven of these boys came out to practice with the junior teams two days later. Many of these young boys show a lot of promise, and something our junior teams need more than anything is numbers.
On Friday night before our game Matt and I were invited to our head coaches apartment for dinner. His name is Ilpo Temonen he was a long time player for the Indians, now the head coach, and his photo you see below. The meal was fantastic, and we watched video of games from the Indians last season. The following day we had the trip down to Helsinki for our game, and you can read my game summary to hear more about that.

The celebration following the game was a lot of fun, many of the players and coaches went to a bar together and had a great time. The next day Matt and I went to our teammates, Janne Siltanen, lake house for the day. The weather was great as it has been for the past week now, and it was very nice to be in the sun, although the water was still very cold. At the lake house there is a sauna that we used. We were alternating between 5 or 10 minutes in the sauna, to jumping in the cold lake water. On our last trip into the sauna it was quite hot, and we threw a lot of water on the stones to create a bunch of steam. Maybe its because I sweat so much, but once that steam hit my skin I began to feel a burning sensation and really lost my cool. I started yelling that I needed to get out of the sauna immediately, and everyone was laughing at me. No harm done though, perhaps I’m just a little sensitive to getting burned, (For non-family members: I poured a pot of boiling water on my head when I was 5, hospital for nine days, only memory- being in a big silver tub and having someone scrap my skin off with steel wool…) Regardless, it was a great day and I look forward to many more times at Finnish lakes, known as the land of a thousand lakes.
The mosquitos around dusk here (11 pm) have been pretty terrible. They seem to be bigger and badder than anything I was used to in the states. There also does not seem to be any good solution other than just staying indoors, luckily they are not our for many hours during the day. Matt and I are also helping coach at a sports camp this week. We are helping three hours on Tuesday, 1.5 Wednesday, and 1.5 Thursday. This will help us get a little bit of extra food/beer money. These kids are much younger than those on the junior teams, and that has proved to be even more challenging. That’s because these little ones have not yet begun studying English, so it is necessary for us to have a counselor translate constantly. On top of this the counselors don’t know the game of football either, so the general football language is tough on them too.
We have enjoyed some great dinners this week at Satu Yrjanne’s house, she is the sister of the aforementioned Janne Siltanen. This has been a big help, as Matt and I haven’t really been keeping the fridge stocked too well. I have also booked a trip to Oslo for later this month. Looking forward to meeting up with Tony Torres while I’m there, as well as some friends that I met while abroad in Perth, Australia. We have a big game this weekend with the only other undefeated team in the league, Vantaa Taft, and it is our first game at home. The Indians will be celebrating their 25th season at our home game on Saturday. Sorry I have no more pictures, Matt has some and he will be contributing to the blog shortly.

Ben's First Game

The second game of the season for the Kuovola Indians was a victory, 13-7. This was my first game playing as the season opener was during Trinity College graduation, which I felt obligated to attend. The game in Finland has its similarities and its differences from the level of football I had grown accustomed to in the NESCAC. Athletically I would say it is pretty close. Each team has a decent amount of skill players on both sides of the football that are able to make some good plays. Size and strength wise it is apparent that there is not a whole lot of off season weight training, as is to be expected because the majority of players also have full time employment.

            There is not too much game planning leading up to the games, although we did go a week earlier and watch our opponent, The Helsinki 69ers, play against another team. This meant that it was important to make adjustments during the game to try to stop what the opponents are doing. For me being defensive minded this meant adjusting to formations that I had not seen before. The 69ers had a good amount of success running the football against us, and we were getting out flanked by certain formations. We adjusted the alignment of our linebackers, and this got us some success. It was frustrating for me to see a team successfully run the football, as I was a part of division 3’s #1 rushing defense in the country in 2010.

            That being said we were able to keep the 69ers out of the end zone until the middle of the fourth quarter. Our offense was highlighted by some great passes by our quarterback Nesi Carpelan . We were able to pass the ball effectively all game, but we also had our struggles putting the ball into the end zone. Due to some injuries and a thin roster we put our backup quarterback in at wide receiever. His name is Hank, and he is only 16 years young. He scored his first ever touchdown in the senior league on Saturday on a deep pass from Nesi. Our other score was a reception by fellow American Matt Shepherd on a precise double move in the end zone.

            The 69ers had the ball with a few minutes to go and were moving it down the field fairly effectively. As the clock ticked away they began hail-mary passes, and I knocked down the final one as time expired. To the dismay of the Helsinki players no pass interference was called, but there was a lot of arguing in Finnish going on for about five minutes as the referees tried to figure out what to call. It was difficult throughout the game to argue with the referees, as they cannot understand me. What makes it worse is that I see them make incorrect calls and I can do very little about it, that will take some getting used to as I have been in constant communication with referees during the pass two seasons as captain with the Bantams. That is it for my first game, this Saturday June 11 we play the Vantaa Taft, the only other undefeated team in the league.

My apologies, I am still figuring this whole blogging thing out.

This photo was taken during our bike ride down to practice, the majority of the trees in Finland are tall and skinny like the ones you see in this photo. It is an extremely wooded country, and I was told today that lumber is the countries main export.

This was also during our bike ride on a bridge that passes over our trail.

This is a picture of the sign out front of our apartment, we are still unclear if it is an advertisement for our apartment building, or a car rental service.

This is the entrance to our apartment building, we live on the first floor.

This is where Matt and I get free lunch Monday-Friday. Try saying that five times fast.

This is one of the streets that are reserved for pedestrians and bicyclists only. Shops line both sides of the streets in this part of the city.

Ben's First Week

The first week in Kuovola, Finland has been a very exciting change from life in America. I have already been picking up on some cultural differences, and have also befriended many Finns. I arrived on Wednesday May 25th, after two five-hour flights, one from Boston to Iceland. I then went through the volcanic ash of Iceland to land in Helsinki. Mika Lindholm, the man who runs the Kuovola Indians (my team), picked me up at the airport and drove me the hour and a half up to Kuovola.
We had practice that night, but I watched because my equipment was not ready and I was pretty jetlagged. Afterwards I went to a teammates house and experienced my first sauna. The Finns are the proud founders of the Sauna, even though the damn Swedes try to take credit for it as well. Basically every household, as well as most apartments, has their own personal sauna inside of them. This was unlike any that I had experienced in the states, as the fire heated a group of rocks that would saturate the air when a bit of water was thrown onto them. This Sauna got up to a “very average” 100 degrees Celsius.
The following day I had my first meal at Lounaskahvila, which is the place where I get free lunches Monday through Friday. This has been a great place to experience real Finnish cuisine, and besides the fish it has been very good. After this Matt and I ventured into the downtown area on our bikes. Matt is the other American player that I live with he is a recent graduate of Monmouth College in Illinois. This area is mostly filled with bars and shops, and one interesting part about it is that there are a few blocks where cars are not allowed. These areas are constantly filled with people walking and on bikes.
That night I participated in my first practice in Finland, where we did some simple drills, and light conditioning. I played predominantly outside linebacker at this practice, but it looks like I will be floating from safety and linebacker depending on our opponent, and the down and distance.
On Saturday of that weekend I traveled to Vantaa with our coaching staff to watch our next two opponents play each other. Vantaa is a city on the outskirts of Helsinki, and the Vantaa Taft were playing the Helsinki 69ers. This coming Saturday we play the 69ers in Helsinki, and next weekend we play Taft at home. The amount of talent in the game was not all that high, but it was obvious the Taft was better coached, and they had much higher numbers. The result was Taft 35-0. One important part of scouting the teams in my league is identifying their American players. Each team is allowed two players that are not European citizens, and they can never be on the field at the same time.
Following the game I went to my head coaches apartment where we watched some recorded NFL games he had recorded. I was surprised to find out that he was a Patriots fan, and is currently reading Bill Belichick’s, Education of a Coach, but since this day I have realized that most Finns who are interested in football are also fans of the Patriots. The success of the Patriots is clearly to blame for that. I went out on the town that night with many teammates and a few coaches. I was impressed by certain elements of the bar we went to. For one there are two distinct areas, one has the feel of a pub, and it had a live band that night. The other is much more similar to a nightclub, with extremely loud music and a crazy light show.
The Monday of my first full week in Kuovola was filled with coaching. In addition to our playing responsibilities, Matt and I are expected to coach the junior teams, and also help teach people the game of football in the hopes that they may become interested. Monday we did both of these responsibilities. First we went to a school where we taught 16 and 17 year olds football for the first time in their lives, and it seemed that they had a great time. Ideally we could get a few of these teenagers to come play for one of the junior teams. That evening we helped coach the Junior-B team, which is under the age of 16.
The coaching has proved to be challenging as I try to remember the things that I first learned about football in the 4th grade. It has been fun though as the Finnish kids are very interested in the sport, and cannot complain since I can’t understand them. This language barrier has proved to be difficult only with the youngest of the kids though, as the older ones are more experienced with English. It is required in Finnish education that students begin learning the English language when they are in the third grade. This has made it easy to communicate with my teammates and coaches.
That is a summary of what I have been up to for my first week, now here is a summary of what I have noticed about Finnish people in my first week. The first thing that I have noted is that most men wear black athletic socks, even if they are wearing white sneakers. This was peculiar to me, as my only pair of black socks are dress socks. You may think it is strange that I would notice people sock color, you may be right, but the reason it is so obvious is because everyone is required to take their shoes off whenever they enter someone’s house. There are even shoe brushes outside of buildings so that you can rub the dirt off of your shoe before you enter the breezeway. I have never seen anyone violate this rule, except for Matt and I inside of our own apartment.
The drinking age is somewhat strange in Finland. The general age is 18, where you can purchase and go into bars. The only adjustment to that rule is that if you are under the age of 20 you cannot purchase anything over 20% alcohol content. This means no liquor from 18-20. But it does not mean that you cannot buy liquor from bars in the form of shots or mixed drinks. This rule is somewhat strange, but I have yet to see this rule enforced.
My teammates and coaches have been extremely conscious to make sure that I am well fed, and that I am having a good time. They have cooked us food many times, and also buy us drinks when we are out consistently. I think this is because they realize that Matt and I do not have a ton of money. This really helps out, as I don’t think we could go out on the town at all if we were completely on our own. This has been really nice, and helpful. Something completely different I have noticed is that it is not customary to say 'bless you' after someone sneezes. I am still trying to figure out why this is, more in the upcoming weeks. That is it for week one; I hope you continue to follow the blog as we get deeper into the season, and Finnish culture.