Review of Accor hotels in Poland

Room of ibis in Poznan

I spent 2 weeks in Poland and during that time I stayed in Ibis Budget in the center of Warsaw, Ibis old town in Poznan and Novotel in Lodz which all are different category hotels of Accor. In this post I'm going to compare the experience in their different price category hotels. In each hotel I stayed in a room which was for three people. Ibis budget is 1-star hotel, Ibis is 2-star hotel and Novotel is a 4-start hotel.

Surprisingly the room of Ibis budget was the biggest and it was the only place where you could find place to sit for three people. Three stools were available but in other higher class hotels a sofa was converted to a bed so then only one chair was available for having a seat. The loud ventilation in Ibis Budget stood out negatively and many might find sleeping difficult with the loud humming. Also the overall look of the room was cheap compared to Novotel and Ibis. All the hotel rooms were clean and in good shape. In Ibis budget you didn't get a hand towel beside the towel for having a shower.

In every hotel you could also buy a breakfast for about 10 euros. There was a remarkable difference between the breakfast served in Novotel and Ibis Budget. The breakfast served in Novotel had at least 3 times more options available than in Ibis Budget. The biggest difference between Ibis and Novotel was the breakfast and more spacious shower and toilet of Novotel. Novotel had a small gym so I managed to get a workout done.

Ekstraklasa First League of Poland

Stadion Miejski

Today I went to see Polish First League match in Poznan. The home team Lech Poznan lost 0 - 2 against visitor Stal Mielec. The stadium has capacity of 43 000 people, the first round league match brought 12 000 spectators to the stadium. Almost everyone was wearing the Lech Poznan scarf and shirt. The whole crowd welcomed the teams by standing and supporting. Home team had a loud group of supporters chanting through the match eventhough home team didn't perform well. I believe they had about 1 000 fans singing the full match. The atmosphere was good eventhough most of the seats were empty.

Here listed my previous matches seen abroad

Tampere

Tallipiha

Lapinniemi

On June I visited Tampere which reminds me of my old my city Łódź in Poland. Both cities are old industrial cities where big part of the architectural charm is created by old industrial buildings built with red bricks. Both cities have been also compared to Manchester as textile industry have been present and mills were powered by rivers. 

Roihuvuori park in Helsinki

Japanese style park in Roihuvuori

In may the cherry trees are blossoming in Helsinki. Nearby Herttoniemi metro station is Roihuvuori park where you can find many cherry trees and many people come to the park for a picnic to enjoy the pink blossoming flowers of the cherry trees. In the same area you can find also Japanese style park divided to four different sections. I have never been to Japan but I could sense the atmosphere of Japan and enjoyed it a lot. 

I recommend also checking out Herttoniemi mansion and its surroundings by walking towards south next to the flowing water. You can also see houses of Tammisalo with their own private piers. Nowadays it is difficult to get your own plot reaching all the way to the water as coastlines are now dedicated for public use to enable everyone have a stroll by the water. The Herttoniemi mansion holds a museum inside which you can visit on Sundays.

Park of the Herttoniemi Mansion

Here link 1 and link 2 to the posts where I'm introducing parks of Barcelona. 

Second season of my podcast

Season 2022 of Finnish football league Veikkausliiga started in April. I am continuing my podcast where I focus interviewing Spanish speaking football players and coaches. In the most recent episode l interviewed Álvaro Molinos the fitness coach of HJK. we spoke about physical training in football teams, myths about training and about giving physical exercise as a punishment for the players. The interview is in Spanish and includes Finnish subtitles. I have now published 17 interviews in Spanish and 1 in Finnish.

Sant Andreu de Palomar in Barcelona

Art work by Juanma García Escobar

In Barcelona I lived in a neighborhood called Sant Andreu de Palomar. One day I received a flyer with letter S without any other text. I didn't understand what the flyer was about but I liked the art work it had. I edited out the letter S and posted it here. In the picture you can see the main attractions which you can visit. There is a over 100 years old restaurant called Versalles which is surrounded with small streets with old town atmosphere. Placa Masadas is another place where you can find nice places to enjoy food and drinks. You can find also a nice park called Parc de la Pegaso which was old truck factory and old factory area Fabra i Coats. Sant Andreu de Palomar is not popular among tourists so you can find authentic Catalan atmosphere, non touristic prices and historical attractions. The neighborhood can be easily reached by Rodalies train to Sant Andreu Arenal or Sant Andreu Comtal. Other option is Red metro line 1 stop called Fabra i Puig or Sant Andreu.

Do you prefer cycling in Finland during the winter or in Spain during the summer?

This week I had an interview with physical trainer of HJK Álvaro Morenos. He is also a cycling enthusiast and I asked him whether he prefers cycling in Finland during the winter or in Spain during the summer. He answered that infrastructure in Finland is much better than in Spain so therefore he prefers Finland for daily commuting, but mountains makes Spain more suitable for training. Another advantage of Finland is that you can park your bike around the city you don't have to be extremely worried that your bike will be stolen. In Spain your bike will be stolen much more likely than in Finland when parked on the street. Once I have made the subtitles, I will publish the full interview on my YouTube channel.

In the below video Álvaro Molinos made a comparison of electric scooter, electric bicycle and walking as a method of transportation for distance of 1,5 km in Helsinki. The video is in Spanish

Popular Finnish rap duo inspired by reggaeton

Few months ago I was wondering if reggaeton could make a breakthrough in Finland. All of a sudden one of the most popular rap artists of Finland released a song where you can hear the influence of reggaeton and Latin music. Rap duo JVG published "Vamos" one week ago and the song has been on the 1st and 2nd position in the most listened tracks in Finland's Spotify list.

I got inspired by the song and decided to write the chorus in Spanish to make it more approachable for Spanish speaking audience. 

Vamos, vamos, vamos, vamos, vamos

Nos salimos como los ricos

y bailamos como unos locos

déjame que lleno nuestros vasos

Vamos, vamos, vamos, vamos, vamos

quiero que aquí no lo dejamos

me gustan las fiestas en los veranos

que bien esta noche lo pasamos

Vamos, vamos, vamos, vamos, vamos

What happened to the savings in Turkish liras?

The Turkish lira has been in finance headlines because it has been suffering significant inflation recently.  I was in Turkey ten years ago and then one Euro was worth two Turkish liras. Now one Euro is worth 15 Turkish liras. Basically if I had left 5 000 euros exchanged to 10 000 Turkish on a Turkish bank account 10 years ago it would be today worth only 670 Euros. This is a great example how leaving savings in cash on a bank account or as bank notes in your safe has also risks. I talked to a Turkish friend who was pretty upset after losing the savings. The fall of Turkish lira has stirred up also protests on the streets of Turkey and people are also stocking up goods. Now that we have been seeing inflation reported also in Euro zone it is good idea to think about options for cash saving in Euros. 

Salary of Professional Floorball Players

Credit: Salibandyliitto

Floorball is the 3rd most practiced hobby in Finland with 61 000 registered players in 2020. If you add also recreational players the number is 350 000. Despite the high number of the players there are not many professional floorball players in Finland. On December 2021 world cup of Floorball is played in Helsinki and about half of the Finnish national team are professionals according to Helsingin Sanomat. Semi professionals are combining their floorball career with studies or part-time work. For example National team player Eemeli Salin confirmed in an interview of Yle in 2015 that he was earning about 2 000 EUR per month during the season.

One of the biggest Finnish Youtubers Roni Bäck (559 000 subscribers November 2021) plays floorball in the third division. The turnover of his one person company was 337 000 EUR and profit 202 000 EUR. So he is making much better income than the professional floorball players. Another famous floorball player in 3rd divison is radio host Tuukka Ritokoski whose income in 2019 was 44 000 EUR written in IS.fi. He went for a try-out (video) session to 1st division team. After the training session he commented that he did fine technique wise but was exhausted and could see a great difference especially in the physical condition (audio). I believe that there are also many other players in the third division who have well paying jobs and are making more income than the first division floorball players in Finland.

The budget of players in the Finnish first division floorball teams was between 270 000 EUR and 10 000 EUR in 2018 - 2019 according to pelimies.com. In the season 2019 - 2020 average attendance was 605 spectators. So the floorball league is not considered big in financial standards nor by exposure to the large crowds. Peter Vesterbacka who is known from Angry Birds is explaining in the article of Iltalehti how he is planning to help making Finnish floorball league the most valuable floorball league by the year 2028. Part of the plan is to make the league attractive for bigger audience and expand internationally.