Sara Hammerzmith

So, I think in all honesty we woke up a little later than we should have. We had made some epic plans for today – Lordi exhibition! So, we were supposed to meet Sophie and Marianne at the Kamppi square around, well, some time, but we decided to postpone it a little bit because you know, we are lazy as hell. But, eventually did we make it out there, and it was a nice day you know. Sun was shining, really warm, me and Sophie wearing the exact same Lordi shirt… you know, normal things.

We were supposed to go to McDonalds, but Marianne asked to go to this Finnish burgerplace called Hesburger instead, and you know, sure, why not? So, we went there, enjoyed a nice brunch with a lot of talking and laughing and planning and what not. After that, the “epic” journey to Weird Antiques started.

The place was a little bit off, or well, actually, the thing is, we decided to walk there. It is probably easier and more convenient to go to subway, but we figured “why not?”. So after a long walk, we finally made it to the place, and we were… very reluctant and hesitant at first. For some reason we were a group of super shy people. We forced Nathan to go first seeing he was the only guy, and after some waiting and more awkwardness we found the owner who let us in to the exhibition.

And let me tell you something about Lordi exhibitions. When you walk into it, at first you get taken aback. A little petrified, because of all the mannequins. And then, the next stage is joy. You feel the adrenaline and joy fill up in your heart, feeling it pound a little faster when all the things and people-less costumes you love so much and dearly are there. And then the excitement and mischiviousness comes. When you start giggling at everything and nothing. You are literally entering a world were it is a hundred percent Lordi and no one can take it away from you, and no one can touch you in this state of bliss.

Unlike the exhibition in Savonlinna, you could actually walk straight up to the costumes, touch them if you wanted to. We were very, VERY reluctant at first like.. oh my god, we don’t wanna break them, you know? But I guess that at some point we’d accidently hit one thombstone one too many times so as the hours passed by, we simply didn’t care anymore and that’s when face-swaps and goofyness enters. If Lordi only knew.

The exhibition consisted of three “rooms” – first room was more of a big room with two sections – first section consisting of a stage with a lot of random costumes, Mana seated (!) and some extra goodies. Paintings and thombstones. Second part of the room had all of Mr Lordis costumes – The Arockalypse and – Get Heavy in one line, as well as a few other costumes, the most noteable one being Otus’ costume being on display. A lot of random small things – Amen’s guitar case, Amen’s guitar, the Rock Police gear, some more paintings.

In the last room was, again, a lot of the costumes, Hella’s scarbie box, the entire set up from “Deadache” tour, Dark Floors props and some old goodies. The chainsaws, the old Monsterican Dream set up, Blood Red Sandman bed, Hella’s baby stroller… A lot of things! We had the exhibition all to ourselves, which made it even better!

We had a fantastic time at the exhibition, and after about three hours it was time for us to leave. We heard some shoutings out from the store, but didn’t think so much about it. Then I saw this guy spraying something and it was about the time when we saw the store owner grab a baseball bat and chase after the guy that we realized that this was actually a robbery.

Very, very quickly did we turn around and hurried back into the backroom, all the way back behind the “Dr Sin” autopsy table to hide. And you know… Things are really getting out of control when you hear yourself asking “Ok, so what Lordi props within reach are good weapons in case he comes in here?”.

It’s a surreal… surreal feeling, I tell you. We stayed in there for a while before we thought it was safe to go out. Sophie is starting to cough a little bit, but I didn’t think much about it. Then I started coughing and I didn’t think too much about it either – I’ve been crawling around on the floors, who knows how much dust and latex pieces I have in my throat! I figured I’d take a deep breath to clear the throat a bit, which would turn out to be the biggest mistake.

As I inhaled I felt my throat complete clogging up and getting difficulties to breathe. About this time, I notice Sophies coughing has gotten worse, and both Marianne and Nathan are coughing. Nathan rushed for us to get out of there, as he noted that every person who was in the store was, just like we, coughing really badly.

Once outside, we learn that it had indeed been a robbery, but gladly, the robber hadn’t gotten away with anything. The police arrived shortly thereafter, and we left our testimonies and then, when we checked so the storeowner was okay and everything, we left the scene. Nathan said afterwards; “First time in Helsinki and I’m already known by the police!”

Well, Welcome to Helsinki Nathan!

TO BE CONTINUED

// Sara

This entry was posted on July 26, 2016 at 7:05 pm and is filed under Finland, Travels, Uncategorized with tags helsinki, lordi, weird antiques. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.