Hyvää itsenäisyyspäivää!

Excatly 98 years ago Finland got its independence from Russia. December 6 is the most imporant holyday in Finland and all stores and shops are closed.

One thing you should not to miss today is the live broadcast the big celebration at the president's palace. Finland's most important and glamorous people are invited to shake the president's hand and join the big party.

The event will be shown live on Yle 1 starting from 18:15. You can watch it on tv or in the online live stream.

Hyvä itsenäisyyspäivä!

Happy Independence Day! Today is one of the most important Finnish holidays. The day where the country got its independence from Russia in 1917.

Unfortunately this year it falls on a Saturday. So no extra free day this time. But keep in mind that except for a few supermarkets everything is closed today. So enjoy the day with the family at home (the weather is anyway not supposed to be that great today). 

And of course don't miss the president's big reception tonight. This year it is back in Helsinki in the newly rennovated President's Palace. The whole event will be covered live on Yle 1 starting at 18:15.

Have a great day and a wonderful weekend!

Watch the World Cup anywhere

The Football World Cup started. And all the matches are shown live and in HD from Yle.

But even if you are on the go you can still follow all the games from your computer, tablet or mobile phone. Just open Yle Areena. Here you get not only the live stream for the matches but also lots of other videos, highlights and extra information. And of course it is all for free and accessible all over Finland.

Enjoy the World Cup!

Finland for the win

Tonight the Grand Final of the Eurovision Song Contest in Copenhagen takes places. Finland sends their contestants into the ring as well.

The Finnish band Softengine competes with their song Something Better for the victory.

You can follow the semifinal live tonight at 22.00 on TV YLE 2 or online on YLE Areena. To find out more about all the contestants and much more about the show visit the official website of the Eurovision Song Contest.

Enjoy the show!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Tomorrow evening Joulupukki (Santa Claus) will put the presents under the Christmas tree.

But Joulupukki is a busy men. And so he will already be there for the children in the morning on his Joulupukki Kuumalinja (Hotline) on Yle 2. The show starts already at 8.00 and is one of the most loved and watched in Finland.

Kids can call Joulupukki, talk and sing with him. And in between short Christmas films are shown. As every year the show ends with the beautiful BBC production of The Snowmen from 1982.

No kid should miss it.

Hyvää Itsenäisyyspäivää!

Today is Independence Day. And quite a special one. For the first time ever the big Independence Day celebration that the president invites to doesn't take place in Helsinki.

Instead it will be hosted by Tampere this year. The reason is that the presidential palace is under construction. And rather than finding another venue in Helsinki the idea was to have it in a different city for a change.

The whole celebration with the welcoming of Finnish stars and starlets starts at Tampere Hall will be broadcast live starting at 17:15 from Yle 1. Don't miss it! On Monday everyone will be talking about it.

Hyvää Itsenäisyyspäivää!

News in English on Yle TV

Did you know that you can watch news from Finland in English every day? The English news desk at Yle broadcasts daily on Yle TV. 

Yle News air from Monday to Sunday at 15:05 on Yle 1. It's a great way to catch up with what's happening in Finland at the moment.

You can also watch the latest Yle News broardcast at any time on their website.

Red Nose Day in Helsinki

As part of the Red Nose Day (Nenä Päivä /Näs Dagen) the Swedish speaking radio channel YLE X3M still broadcasts live today and tomorrow from Kamppi Kauppakeskus from 9 till 18:00. Drop by and take a look at how radio is done. And help donate for the good cause. 

Tomorrow evening at 19:10 the big Red Nose Day gala will be broadcast live at YLE 2 TV.

For more information on the Red Nose Day check out the official website.

Hockey is back

The hockey season started again in Finland. The first few games have been played already in the SM Liiga.

Finns love hockey and in case you haven’t seen any Finnish league games so far it is really time. Unfortunately you can’t watch them on free-TV and the packages are quite expensive. But lots of bars show the games and watching with a crowd is anyway more fun.

The best option is of course to watch the matches live in the stadium. And here the capital area offers several options. See HIFK at Jäähalli, Jokerit at Hartwall Areena or the Espoo Blues at Barona Areena.

Let's watch the Hockey Championships!

The Ice Hockey World Championships 2013 start today. As last year the games are partly played in Helsinki and partly in Stockholm with the difference that the last games (starting from semifinal) will be in Sweden this time.

And as last year if you want to see all the games you will have to either get a subscription to MTV3 total (24,95€), buy the games as a whole package (24,95€) or singularly (7€) online at Katsomo or find a nice sports bar that shows the championships.

All Finland games will be shown on MTV3 for free though:

03.05.    20:00     Finland – Germany

04.05.    20:00     Finland – Slovakia

06.05.    20:00     Finland – France

08.05.    20:00     USA – Finland

10.05.    20:00     Russia – Finland

11.05.    16:00     Finland – Austria

14.05.    20:00     Latvia – Finland               

16.05.    18:15     Quarterfinal 3

18.05.    15:45     Semifinal 1

              19:45     Semifinal 2

19.05.    16:45     Bronze Medal Game

              21:15     Final      

007 every Monday

In just a few days the new James Bond movie Skyfall will come to the theatres. But at the same time with the 23^rd movie James Bond celebrates his 50 year anniversary as the world’s most popular secret agent.

For those who would love to see all Bond movies again there are good news. For the upcoming 22 weeks Nelonen will show a one 007 movie every Monday at 21.00. Tonight it’s Pierce Brosnan’s turn to save the world in Golden Eye.

Have fun!

Creating History Together

 Under this motto the Euro Cup 2012 starts today with the first game between Poland and Greece in Warsaw.

And there is good news for football fans. Unlike at the Ice Hockey Championships YLE, the national public broadcasting company hold the rights for the Euro 2012. You can watch all games for free on TV 1 or TV 2 and in HD on YLE HD. Furthermore YLE streams the games online on YLE Areena.

You can find all information on times and channels on their website.

Enjoy the games and may the best team win!

Sing, Europe, sing!

Today is the big final of the Eurovision Song Contest in Baku. Of course the weather today it pretty good and there are also lots of other things to do tonight then watching TV. Watching the ESC in Finland has one quite interesting extra to it though. Finland is the only country where the lyrics of all the songs are subtitled. For those of you who understand some Finnish it should be quite interesting to also follow what artists from countries like Serbia or Bosnia and Herzegovina are singing about.

Sweden's Laureen has good chances to win tonight.

Also quite interesting to know is that you can watch the ESC with two different commentaries. There is a Finnish and a Swedish audio line. It is really amazing through which trouble Finns go through to provide Swedish versions of everything for a minority of around 5 % of the society.

The show starts tonight at 10 p.m. on YLE 2. Have fun!

The dilemma with the World Cup

 

Imagine it’s ice hockey world cup and nobody is watching. That’s pretty much the case at the moment with the championships taking place in Helsinki and Stockholm at the moment. Since the broadcasting rights were too expensive the public TV station YLE doesn’t show any of the games. The private broadcasting company around MTV3 got the rights this time but will only show games of the Finnish national team on free TV (MTV3 and AVA). For everything else you have to buy a pricy subscription for Channel+ or via the online platform Katsomo.

And if you don’t plan on paying ridiculous amounts of money watching a game live in the stadium is also out of question. Prices for games in the first round start from 90 Euros. For a Finland game you have to calculate with at least 150 Euros per ticket. No wonder that the stadiums in Stockholm and Helsinki half full in best case.

The only chance to see the games is going to one of the sports bars.

It’s really a pity how the greed of the organizers made the world cup in one of the most ice hockey crazy countries in the world such a disaster.

For those who want to get at least some world cup feeling into their homes here a list of the games shown in free TV:

05/06    16:00     Finland – Slovakia           MTV3

05/08    19:55     Finland – Switzerland      AVA

05/10    19:55     France – Finland             AVA

05/11    19:55     Finland – Canada             AVA

05/13    16:00     Finland – USA                MTV3

05/14    19:55     Kazakhstan – Finland      AVA

05/17    18:10     Quarterfinal 3                 AVA

05/19    14:15     Semifinal 1                     MTV3

            18:10     Semifinal 2                     AVA

05/20    15:40     third-place game             AVA

            20:15     Final                             AVA

The amazing Voice of Finland

Since the end of December The Voice of Finland is searching for the best singer in the country. Those who haven’t seen the show so far will say: “What? Isn’t that just another stupid casting show? Aren’t they all the same?” But The Voice of Finland is actually really something else.

Jesse Kaikuranta

I met one of the candidates, Jesse Kaikuranta, in Helsinki. He explained that the concept comes from the Netherlands and has been running successfully in several European countries already. In four teams, each tutored by a famous Finnish singer (Elastinen, Lauri Tähkä, Michael Monroe and Paula Koivuniemi), the candidates compete against each other. Still the atmosphere within the teams is good, the candidates can choose to sing what they want and what is most important, the heads of the teams are really supportive. Also within the shows the critic is always constructive – in contrast to known formats e.g. Idols or X-Factor.

There seems to be something special about the version from Finland. Jesse told me, that even the creators from the Netherlands where surprised about the high quality the singers in Finland brought to the stage. Well, Jesse himself also amazed with great performance. One of the highlights of the show so far was his duet with Juho Räisänen singing Minä ja hän. Try watching it without getting chills.

You can find more great performances on their website. Check out e.g. Saara Aalto, Mikko Herranen and all the other extraordinary singers.

The show airs every Friday at 8 p.m. on Nelonen (channel 4). Enjoy!