Halls of Kalevala - Pepe Deluxe

Our journey through the Halls of Kalevala

Starts from the northern entrance

Please follow me

Ladies and gentlemen, this building

Is an epitome of architecture

The art that gives shelter to and leads

All the other arts to the future and beyond

We have arrived at a wing housing thirty-six chambers of innovation

It’s a stronghold of research for the brightest minds

Please heed the warning signs

As we move on, notice the large empty spaces on the walls

During the next few hundred years they will all be filled

With tomorrow’s master painters' frescoes

And now, the very heart of the building, the Pantheon

It’s time to get down

Down to «Tuonela,» the Underworld

A crypt of the champions

The final resting place for the great and the good

It is believed they will rise from their tombs

When the worst danger threatens the motherland

Be careful, the stairs are slippery

This way, please

Here, on this exact spot where I stand now

Eliel Saarinen’s visiting colleague Le Corbusier

Promptly threw himself on the floor and tantrummed

«This monstrous building, like a charnel-house

Is strewn with the detritus of dead epochs»

Fortunately, the possibly awkward situation was averted

When Saarinen quickly produced a little packet from his coat pocket

«Charlie, I bet I’m more modern and functional than you are

I drew the first plans of this house on a pack of 'worker man' cigarettes»

And here we have the original pack

You can take photos, but no flash, thank you

Replicas are available at the gift shop (The gift shop)

Now we have finally come to the last section of our tour

A purgatory of stairs

Four-hundred-and-four steps to be precise

That we need to ascend

In order to reach the paradise at the top of the tower

A breathtaking panorama embracing in one glance

The entire glorious city and its magnificent surroundings