East Side Gallery, Berlin

Back from Berlin. Above a photo,  a tiny little part of  the East Side Gallery, probably the longest Art Gallery in the whole world. And that's what's left from the Berlin Wall.   Sini and I stayed for three days in the wonderful capital of Germany. Very, very enjoyable stay. There was so much to see. (Juha H.)

Miehitysmuseo

Museum of Occupations, Tallinn. Estonia was occupied by both Nazi-Germany and Communist-Russia. Estonians have a lot of very sad and tragic memories. (Juha H.)

Musaa ja muuta

Music, mostly was my whole day. I played quite many hours flute, recorded Sini's singing and then did some mixing... PasuunaPelimannit had a longish rehearsal, Finnish folk music for the most. ( We did play one Swedish piece...)

Some songs of Dead Cult Diaries on their website. Marvels to be heard!

And I did have every now and then some time off and away from my music - then I checked this tweeter. Such unrest in Iran.

Juha H.

Barack Obama

America has a new president - Barack Obama. Congratulations! Sini and I have spent much of the evening watching the inauguration on television and over the Internet. Let's hope for the best - for America and for the world.

Juha H.

Kristalliyö

Kristallnacht memorial day. Exactly 70 years ago happened - or actually was more or less organized - the first dreadful sign of the coming Holocaust. During one night and the day after some 90 jews were killed, 100 synagogues burned and 20000 - 30000 thousand jewish men were sent to concentration camps in Germany. Europe and the world was on a collision course heading to the World War II ... I truly hope that such events won't come again anymore - not ever.

Rainy day. Very much so.

Juha H.

Rumpuja ja vaaleja

All evening recording percussion instruments. It's so hard. I'm really not any drummer. So I have to be extra careful. Well, and do some more takes than just one or two.

Americans chose Barack Obama as their next president. Congratulations! I sincerely hope this is a change for better - both for America and the rest of the world.

Juha H.

Oksa

Twig. - Some mixing, some recording. That's the way it goes. - Tomorrow morning when I wake up America has voted for their new president... Anyways there are changes coming. (Juha H.)

Machine Men ja Katri Vala

Yesterday J-V called from Nurnberg, Germany. Pouring rain and no wlan. Today we got a postcard from Prague, Czech Rebuplic. It was signed by all the guys of Machine Men. How nice!

I just keep on composing poems of Katri Vala. Now there are 12 songs.

Well, 9/11 and all that shit what happened six years ago. So sad. Was it right what those selfish religious zealots did then? Did they really get into their heaven by destroying so many people then? And as a side effect what they did has caused so much turmoil and disaster afterwards through all these years...

Juha H.

07.07.07, DDR ja Kaustinen

It's a bit peculiar and memorable date. Years ago - 7.7.77 - Sini and I were in DDR (=German Democratic Republic). That was a memorable date and day, too. We wrote lots and lots of postcards and sent them back to Finland for our friends and relatives. Actually that was the only time I ever visited DDR. Nowadays there's only one Germany and communism has lost its rule all over the Europe. And there are only a few countries in the whole wide world that resemble Sovjet-style socialism...

Early tomorrow I'll be leaving for Kaustinen Folkmusic Festival - for a couple of days of music making. I'll take only flute, recorder and domra with me... and of course my camera.

Juha H.

Musaa ja Sandmonkey

I continued working with my music. One more song is taking its shape. Edith Sodergran wrote the poem Salojarvi (= Lake in Forest) almost a hundred years ago. And for my part - keyboards, recorders and domra are done...

Great Egyptian blogger Sandmonkey announced today that he'll quit. It's too dangerous for him to blog in a country where there's no real freedom of speech, no real democracy... I've read his texts quite regularly for a couple of years. He's been a delight with his humour and brave seriousness. Actually since last autumn I've wondered how long he can continue to write freely. During the winter bloggers have had quite dire times in Egypt and now it seems to be getting worse... Sad, sad. But as the great late author Kurt Vonnegut said: "That's the way it goes."

Juha H.