Paavo Matti Väyrynen, was born on 2 September 1946 in Kemi. He was elected into the Finnish parliament at age 23 and has been playing hard ball on the highest level of Finnish politics ever since.
Over those years it has become clear to all who is the man that carries the biggest set of marbles around the halls of eduskuntatalo*.

Paavo Väyrynen is the best known political brand in Finland by a mile. Indeed, as Mr.Väyrynen’s shrewd tactics and bold political moves have landed him on the front page of the Finnish tabloids frequently, so has the cunning man with the fish eyes steadily cemented his status as the country’s most famous politician and a respected man the whole nation passionately loves to hate.

At the age of 60 Mr.Väyrynen is the minister of foreign trade, an established writer with several books published, he has introduced the word “mediapeli”** to the modern Finnish dictionary and has never done any hard time.

Paavo Being Paavo

 

More used to dodging allegations and scandals, this past Monday the hardest working civil servant in Finland pulled off a narrow escape of a different sort alltogether.

While preparing for a trip to Brussels the good minister sensed something was wrong and sought medical attention. Later that day at the Meilahti hospital Mr.Väyrynen was diagnosed to have suffered a coronary thrombosis.

In the hospital Mr.Väyrynen it was soon clear that death would be no match for the crafty politician this time around. Driven by a strong sense of duty towards his country and a solid commitment to his minister’s salary for the next 4 years, the hard boiled veteran simply refused to give in and is now already half way through a speedy recovery.

Known for both his unyielding and determined nature (as well as a dumbfounding physical resemblance to a baltic herring), the charismatic minister can be expected to keep swindling death out of sheer principle for years to come. The altruistic man of the people who will celebrate his 61^st birthday this September has said he is prepared to keep paying taxes until he reaches 200.

“V” stands for Väyrynen

 

(*) eduskuntatalo = the building in which the Parliament of Finland meets

(**) mediapeli = term conceived by Paavo to describe the both unfortunate and down right unfair treatment he suffered at the hands of the Finnish media during his campaign for the 1994 presidential elections.

During their career, the Finnish rock group Lordi has been forced to shove their heavy metal boots up countless adversaries asses. Yet without exception, it has been their opponents, not Lordi, who have found themselves knee-deep in shit.

Following their initial selection to represent Finland at the 2006 Eurovision Song Contest in Athens, Greece, religious leaders in Finland were demanding president Tarja Halonen to veto their entry. In Greece the reception was equally hostile. Number of organizations and other likely narrow minded individuals tried to stop Lordi from taking part, some going as far as initiating legal actions.

Everyone knows how that sad piece of business ended. Lordi went on to take the Eurovision 2006 title with the highest points ever scored (292) in any international competition in history (excluding cricket).

 

Lordi at MTV Crib’s

 

In 2007 Lordi has been busy touring in Japan, the United States and Europe. Currently Lordi is back in the US, touring with the 2007 Ozzfest until the end of August. Success has caused more “Lordi-haters” to surface. This time the front man of an American based heavy metal group Gwar has attacked Lordi in an interview. The groups vocalist Oderus Urungus, who cleverly refers to himself as “The Ruler of Earth” has been referring to Lordi as “Gwar-Lite” and quoted as saying that: “They (Lordi) are like a kiddie version of GWAR”. Gwar have continued to attack Lordi at their concerts, where the singer has been waiving a replica head of Lordi at the end of a stick while performing on stage.

Gwar Guitarist Flattus Maximus

 

It seems that Lordi, “The Bastard Son of a Thousand Megalomaniacs” and “The Hulk from Hell”, has somehow managed to keep his high octane temper from the burning netherworld cool. Although so far Lordi has publicly spared Gwar from his wrath, anyone with a half of a brain should tell the Gwar boys that its just not smart to try to go after “The Unholy Overlord of Tremors” and the company he keeps.

Oderus Urungus’s mum offered some insight into the altercation and was quoted saying: “Dave or Oderus as he likes to be called, is just upset since I didn’t let him go to the Lordi concert with his friends”. Apparently Dave had stayed in his room all that night dressed in his costume and even refused to come down for dinner in the evening.

Dave’s friend Todd

It remains to be seen whether “The Most Fearsome Khan of All” will end up giving Dave and his friends a break this time.

Gold goes to the ruskies; 10^th annual tournament otherwise a huge success, but future looks uncertain.

 

An international capacity crowd of football fanatics witnessed Sputnik Samara from Russia take the title 2-0 at the Swamp Arena against Kuusamon Futaajat from Finland, in a proper old-school swamp-thriller. Länsi-Porin Gepardi, also from Finland, was awarded some bronze metal.

Despite all the excitement created by the successful tournament , it seemed that everyone was talking about the split within the organizers and NOT the actual hard core endurance football played in the (knee-)deep swamps. In the past the annual tournament has been organized by Kainuun Paronit ry, a non profit organization together with the kunta* of Hyrynsalmi, which owns the Swamp Football World Cup brand. The whole Swamp Footballing world has been caught in the speculation of exactly how the split will affect the quality of the 2008 tournament.

 

The unfortunate beef dates back to the 2005 event preliminaries where the home team Kainuun Paronit was dominating their Brazilian opponents. With 5 minutes left to play, neither team had managed to score despite the hosts coming close several times. With everyone having their eyes fixed so closely on the Brazilian end, no one noticed how the Finnish center back and goalie both sunk in to the swamp and disappeared from sight completely. As the game went to extended time the Brazilian defense managed to steal the ball and pass it to swamp football icon Fabio, who suddenly found himself alone in front of the hosts now empty net. Fabio scored an absolute stunner of a goal in from 3 meters away and so it was Brazil who took the win.

Needless to say the home team had nothing left to do but to protest furiously, demanding for the goal to be disallowed for offside. The referee however made a controversial decision and let the goal stand as he stated that according to the position where the Finnish defender was last seen standing, the Brazilian was onside when the pass had occurred. The bitter home team filed a protest claiming that the referee who also had ties to with the local board of tourism had intentionally misinterpreted the rules.

 

(*) kunta = municipality