ISU_152 Thanks CB , your photos really great . Suomenlinna - its same place , called Sveaborg in russian history book`s ? He amaze my imagination
Sorry I hadn't noticed your question ISU.
Yes, Suomenlinna and Sveaborg are the same, Sveaborg is its Swedish name and Finland and Sweden were one country in the 18th century when Suomenlinna was built.
I am posting a few pictures now that represent the residence of President Kekkonen and an adjacent island called Seurasaari where he liked to take walks and jog. Kekkonen was our president from 1956 until 1981 when he had to retire due to senility. He was very popular and people jokingly said that Kekkonen is the president of Finland and he is elected every six years.
Well, he was! Kekkonen wasn't a tyrant but such a long reign obviously meant that he slowly acquired a little too much power mainly because the weak politicians paid lip service to him in order to strengthen their positions in politics. Of course there were people and politicians who didn't like him at all but they were a minority.
After his death in 1986 the then president Mauno Koivisto, who was just as popular as Kekkonen, suggested that Parliament pass a law to the effect that a person can be elected president only for two six-year terms and he wanted that law to apply to himself as well. The law was passed and the president lost some of his power in the process too.
Today our president is a woman who would never be elected president in the USA. She belongs to no church, she had a common-law husband when she was elected and in her younger days she used to have strong ties with an organization that promotes the rights of sexual minorities. Her second term in office expires in 2012.
Except for a couple of exceptions, presidents used to reside at the official Presidential Residence in the heart of Helsinki until 1956 but Kekkonen was an outdoor man, keen on jogging and skiing, and he didn't want to live there. Like three presidents before him, he preferred Tamminiemi, which was originally a private villa built in 1904. In 1940 its owner had donated it to the State of Finland. It was ideally located for Kekkonen as the open-air museum island of Seurasaari was only 100 metres from it. There was a footbridge to the island, where Kekkonen spent a lot of time jogging and enjoying the scenery.
Above is the entrance to Tamminiemi, which today is the Kekkonen Museum, open to the public. As you can see, the fence isn't very high and no barbed wire was needed to keep people outside. Actually, anyone could have climbed the low fence and entered the grounds. There used to be one guard at the gate. Kekkonen was normally unattended on his walks on the island in the early days. I think it was in the 70s that he finally gave in under pressure and allowed two body guards to jog with him. The young body guards had a hard time keeping abreast with the 70-odd-year-old president.
The main Tamminiemi building.
Kekkonen had a sauna built by the seashore. It's the low building on the left. Kekkonen and his friends took a swim in the sea when they were going in and out of the sauna. Nothing prevented people from approaching the sauna and the grounds from the sea by boat but people never came too close. A president's privacy is respected in Finland.
This bridge is 15 metres from the Tamminiemi grounds entrance (first picture). It leads to the island Kekkonen liked so much. The island was and is open to all people 24 hours a day. There is no admission charge.
A Seurasaari view. Tamminiemi is in the distance.
A pond on Seurasaari island.
There are hundreds of squirrels on the island and they are only too happy if tourists feed them peanuts, which are sold in the island's kiosks. If a squirrel likes you, he may stand on your shoulder eating a peanut as you walk and then climb down into your pocket for more peanuts and back up on the shoulder again where it's easier to eat.
A view from the bridge.
The island is a museum exhibiting dwellings dating back to the 18th and 19th centuries.
Cheers, CB