Dominican Republic: Sports Day

August 2

Hello everyone!

What would be the strangest place where you’ve seen a sports competition played? How about the ground floor of a shopping mall…

Squash at the Agora Mall

Wrestling in the Olympic Centre

The Dominican Republic is currently hosting the 25th edition of the Central American and Caribbean Games. As of last Wednesday, the Dominican Republic is also my current home. Happy coincidence.

The games run from July 26 to August 8

It is hot here, so not everyone is keen to participate

The Games, which I also saw in El Salvador in 2023, have a wide variety of events and locations. The golf is in Punta Cana on the east coast. The surfing is at Cabarete on the north coast. Some events, like BMX and football, are being held in another city called Santiago. The vast majority of events, however, fall within the jurisdiction of the capital, Santo Domingo. Where I now live.

Santo Domingo is the the close dots on the southern coast

The view from the top of my apartment block - the sea is in the distance

That’s not to say that they are easy to get to. When I visited Santo Domingo in late 2022, I was based in the Colonial Zone. A tourist area. So at that time I didn’t really grasp the fact that the city is actually quite long, particularly from west to east. I’m living in the western area, about 7 kilometres from the Colonial Zone. That may not sound like a lot, but you may not have seen traffic here…

I'm living in an area called Bella Vista,
which is the circle on the far left

An interesting intersection near my apartmen

Also as a new arrival, I’ve had things to do organised by my new job. Signing contracts, setting up bank accounts, going to IKEA. Yes, there’s an IKEA here. IKEA with island prices, admittedly.

When I worked for IKEA in 2005, they told us that there is a
strategy to their building plan so that people are tired by the time
they get to the restaurant. We stopped there, so it worked on us!

Celebrating our first weekend in the city

Sunday was therefore my opportunity to take in some of the Games, and I limited myself to areas relatively close to home. Deciding to sleep in rather than wake up early to watch the cycling along the Malecon, a sort of corniche or waterfront promenade, I eventually roused myself to go to the Juan Pablo Duarte Olympic complex. JP Duarte was not alive when the Olympics were on, interestingly.

There are a wide variety of sports in the games

Independence hero - there'll be more about him
in these blogs in the future, I'm sure

Arriving here for 10am gave me free access to the men’s diving competition final. It was called the 10m platform event, which made it strange that the local pairing spent most of their time jumping off lower platforms. I can’t criticise, though; it looked terrifying enough from my vantage point, let alone theirs.

The complex was created for these games in 1974

10 metres...quite a splash if you get it wrong...

They weren’t scores that would get any of them near Olympic medals, or even the games themselves, but they were incredible to watch. It made me wonder about how often they get to compete.

Imagine if you slip!

There were teams from Venezuela, Cuba,
DR, Mexico and Colombia in this final

If any of these teams will make it to Los Angeles in 2028, it will be the Mexican pairing. They were phenomenal, and really took their time to make sure they were ready before diving, as attested to by the video below.

Their score was significantly higher than the other teams

Can't remember if this was Mexico - either way,
nothing for the truly elite to worry about

The Centro Olimpico is where many events are taking place, from chess to wrestling. I watched the latter shortly after the end of the diving competition. I don’t really know the rules of this sport, and was confused during the first match when a referee told a man to lie on the floor. It did begin to make sense later.

Ajerdez: new word for me!

There are two 'fighting' arenas, this is one of them

This was an event in which a Dominican athlete had more success, outmanoeuvring his Puerto Rican opponent after a fast start. There was quite a fervent atmosphere, particularly when a point was docked from him by the referee.

A lot the the time was spent like this...

...or like this...

The most spectacular wrestling bout involved a Venezuelan, who was able to roll, collect and slam his opponent out of the circle. My understanding was that this gave him an automatic win. You might be confused by the idea of Venezuela being in the Central American and Caribbean Games. I was too, until I remembered that the country has a coastline on the Caribbean Sea. It is why Colombia, Guyana and Suriname are also competing.

The Venezuelan grappler is in blue

He seemed significantly stronger than his opponent!

The Games themselves seem quite flexible. When I had planned what I was going to see on this particular Sunday, I had noticed that there was boxing taking place at the Centro Olimpico at midday. Sat outside the very much closed entrance to the boxing arena at 11:45am, I checked the website again…to find that it was starting at 2pm. Not wanting to wait that long, I walked a couple of kilometres away from the complex to a shopping centre called Agora Mall.

A beautiful flame tree at the Olympic Complex

An art piece in the Olympic Complex

I love the idea of having events in places like this. Guaranteed eyes and publicity, and no massive waste of building a stadium that wouldn’t be used much after the event has finished. Unlikely they could have done diving here, admittedly, though the mall does have four floors…

There were two courts in the mall

A friend had visited on Thursday and said the courts looked
nothing like this, so it's impressive that they were ready

There was a lot more I could have seen, but I more than satisfied my desire to explore and see something interesting on my first weekend living in Santo Domingo. And if they keep the squash courts in that mall after the Central American and Caribbean Games ends next Saturday, maybe I’ll need to find a racquet…

Very. High. Up.

Taekwondo is one of the other events

Love you all,

Matt

Finland - Fortresses and Forests

July 12, 14

Hello everyone!

Finland is a surprisingly big place. It covers an area almost equivalent to Germany, which I definitely didn’t expect to read. A lot of that is nature, specifically forest, and far from Helsinki. However, there are some nice places just outside of the city which are worth a visit.

Suomenlinna Fortress

Nuuksio National Park

Green is Nuuksio National Park, red is Suomenlinna Fortress

One of these could easily be classed as ‘inside’ the city; it just happens to sit on an island. As I said last time, Helsinki lacks elements like a medieval Old Town because it wasn’t an important city until the 19th century. Its surrounding area was of military importance, however, so defensive structures were built in the surrounding area, particularly off the coast. One of these is the island of Suomenlinna: The Castle of Finland.

One of about 330 islands within Helsinki's city limits

There are over 6 km of defensive walls

If you take the boat between Tallinn and Helsinki, you pass Suomenlinna and a few other islands. Technically, Suomenlinna is eight islands, but some of them are tiny, and they are all connected by foot bridges. 

Lots of wildlife on the island - this is a Eurasian oystercatcher

You can see a bridge behind the boat.
To the left is a submarine.

The scale of the bastion, star-shaped fortress is best appreciated from that big boat traversing international waters. It was built by Sweden in the middle of the 18th century, perhaps wary of potential threats from the south and east.

The star shape is to help protect from cannon fire

The fortress is a UNESCO World Heritage Site

It may have helped for a little bit of time, but it ended up in Russian hands in the first decade of the 19th century. Russia added some artillery protection and boosted the walls of the bastion at the end of the island. 

The King's Gate was the main entrance to the fortress
when built in the 1750s - this was renovated in the 1990s

Multiple cannons are on display - now
they are used as a seat by seagulls!

There are other intriguing elements of Russian/Soviet history here. One is that it briefly became a prison for Bolshevik Red Army soldiers after Finnish independence. Another is that there is a Finnish submarine, the Vesikko, raised above the water’s edge. This submarine was active in the Second World War and actually sank a Soviet ship in 1941.

The submarine is 41 metres long, and was first launched in 1933

It patrolled in the Gulf of Finland,
protecting the country from enemy vessels

Suomenlinna also possesses other old buildings, some of which are seen as relatively old for the greater Helsinki region. The church, originally Russian Orthodox, was inaugurated in 1854. Other areas, such as the Dry Dock, are from the 1750s. People lived here at the time to make sure that the fortress was in working order.

It switched to a Lutheran church in 1918, a
year after Finland declared independence

A popular walking spot, the island has a 'Blue
Trail' to help you see interesting places

What makes Suomenlinna interesting is that people still live here. Between 300 and 900, depending on your source. There are residential areas, a school, a day care centre and a library, amongst other things. I think that the number of restaurants and cafes on the islands are due to the number of visitors they receive: it’s a very popular and easy trip from Helsinki, a 15 minute boat ride with boats going pretty much every 20 minutes from very early until very late.

One of many residential properties on Suomenlinna

Boats run approximately from 6am to 2am in summer

Another popular place to visit is Nuuksio, to the west of the capital. It’s accessible using the greater Helsinki transport network, which actually includes Espoo, Finland’s second most populated city. A short bus ride north of that takes you far away from urban life.

A tram and two buses, but a total trip of only about 90 minutes -
it's about 30km from Helsinki, so would be much faster in a car

The private beach area at Haltia Gate, the main jump-off
point for exploring Nuuksio National Park

Nuuksio National Park was formed in 1994, and is one of 41 in the country. It consists of dense forest, placid lakes…and silence. Aside from the occasional sound of birdsong or a cyclist zipping along the trails.

Trees and mires make up much of the forest

You could rent bikes at the Haltia Gate office, though
most people would be locals bringing their own

As I mentioned earlier, there’s a fair bit of forest here. Over 75% of Finland is classed as forest. They are therefore important to the country's culture and economy. Over 20 million hectares has been deemed suitable for wood production.

Note the change in bark colour

A lot of the trees were thin and spindly

The well-marked trails I took initially took me on a loop through this forested area. An easy and lovely stroll of about 6 kilometres through the undulating forest of aspen and juniper trees.

A sign told me that junipers are hundreds of years old, and
that aspens are the most important tree species in the forest 

In winter, this place has many cross-country skiers

What this trail didn’t have was any view of water, which led me to join a different trail taking me away from the popular starting point of Haltia Gate. It took me past Nuuksio’s Reindeer Farm; unfortunately, it is only open on Wednesdays and weekends.

The other trail passes into another national park

Rudolph: only available 3 days a week

After a while, I found some of the stillest water you’re ever likely to see. I had been planning on going for a swim, but no one else had braved the water. Also in the first place, there was a small family eating their picnic lunch on the jetty, who probably wouldn’t have appreciated a strange foreigner stripping off and jumping in next to them!

After a lot of steps, this section was much flatter

The family on the jetty were around the corner. I also think
this particular part may have been private property...

I finished my hike at another popular spot, called Haukkalampi. A different lake, and one with a lot more people (there’s a car park nearby). I contented myself to laze on the jetty for a while…until realising that the nearest bus stop was over 2 kilometres away, and that the bus was arriving in 25 minutes.

Food reward for the 11 kilometre hike

Visual reward for the 11 kilometre hike

Walking through here on a pleasantly warm day was very relaxing. Like Suomenlinna, Nuuksio National Park is a place where people living in the capital like to come to get away from life for a little while. Both lovely places to visit if you ever go to Finland.

Suomenlinna Fortress

Nuuksio National Park

See ya Suomi!

Love you all,

Matt