Chemnitz celebrates 60 years of partnership with Tampere

On Friday and Saturday, 30 September and 1 October, a delegation from the Finnish twin city of Tampere will visit Chemnitz. The occasion is the 60th anniversary of this town twinning, which was actually to be celebrated last year.

The delegation will include Aleksi Jäntti, Deputy Mayor of Tampere. He will be accompanied by Lauri Savi, Director of Culture and Education, and staff from Visit Tampere.

The delegation will be welcomed by Mayor Sven Schulze on Friday 30 September at 5 pm . For this festive occasion, a tram will be christened in the name of the twin city Tampere at the Adelsberg tram depot, Carl-von-Ossietzky-Straße 186.

Afterwards, at 6.30 pm, the guests from Tampere will sign the Golden Book of the City of Chemnitz in the presence of Lord Mayor Sven Schulze at City Hall.

Media representatives are invited to attend.

On the following day, the delegation will visit the Garage Campus and the Chemnitz Art Collections, take part in the Finnish afternoon in the Stadthallenpark and visit the Piha Sauna on the Sonnenberg.

Further public events are planned so that everyone in Chemnitz can join in the celebrations:

• Tuesday, 27 September, 3 pm - exhibition opening, TIETZ, VHS, 5th floor:
  The exhibition "Terveisiä Tampereelta - Pictures from Chemnitz's twin city" gives a very personal impression of Tampere. Andreas Liese, who was in charge of the city twinning from 1990 to 2015 as an employee of the City of Chemnitz, has brought pictures from the city, which he visited this year for the first time without a work assignment. Media representatives are cordially invited to the exhibition opening.
  
• Friday, 30 September - Finnish film evening at the Metropolkino:
  6pm: "What men don't usually show" - an insightful documentary with men philosophising about life in the sauna.
  20:15: "Hatching" - contemporary young Finnish cinema with black humour coming-of-age horror and the biggest cinematic surprise of the year.
  
• Saturday, 1 October, from 3 pm - Mölkky, music, Makarra - Finnish afternoon and evening in the Stadthallenpark:
  The Finns are known for their unusual sports. In addition to rubber boot throwing and finger hooking, all visitors can try their hand at the Finnish wooden throwing game Mölkky. You can even make the wood required for the game yourself in the wood-carving workshop at the Holzkombinat. The Stadtsportbund will be organising the competition, with small prizes to be won.
  The principle of the Mölkky game is quite simple. The game is played in groups. The numbered sticks are thrown in turns with the Mölkky. The hand must be under the Mölkky when throwing. After each throw, the points are counted and the sticks are put back where they landed. The first player to reach 50 points wins the game.
  
  Finnish music will also be played on the evening. The Köhler-Schimmel dance school will be dancing to Finnish tango from 6 pm . Joining in and dancing is allowed.
  The Jazzcompany Chemnitz will be playing from 7 pm and has invited reinforcements from Tampere. The musician Marko Aho from the Swing Doctors will support the band.
  
  Thanks to the Hoffnung Stern e. V. association, Finnish delicacies can also be savoured.
  
• Saturday, 1 October, 5 p.m., Piha sauna in Zietenaugust
  What would a Finnish day be without a sauna? In May of this year, a Piha sauna, a so-called self-built courtyard sauna, was created on the Sonnenberg in Chemnitz. It was built as a joint German-Finnish project by hard-working sauna fans from Chemnitz and Tampere. The delegation from Tampere is now officially taking over the sponsorship of this sauna project. The Zietenaugust community garden cordially invites you to join them. Music and a relaxed evening will be provided.
  
• Monday, 17 October, 6 pm, reading with Dieter Hermann Schmitz, TIETZ, Central Library
  To mark 60 years of town twinning between Chemnitz and Tampere, Dieter Hermann Schmitz will be reading from his humorous novel "Finnisch verheiratet - Oder: auf der Suche nach dem finnischsten aller Worte". Admission: free of charge
  
  What do you do when you're on an aeroplane and you're afraid you're about to crash into the Baltic Sea? Of course, you reach for your mobile phone and try to tell your loved ones at home that ... just like you know it from American films. But the Finnish reality is different! While a flippant "I love you!" may help on the other side of the Atlantic, action is needed in the far north. After the traumatic experience of an emergency landing, Hermann, a Finn by choice with Rhenish roots, is determined to make the whole family happy. At the same time, he takes part as a judge in a cultural project to find the most Finnish of all words. The search for the right word is as tricky as the best intentions at home.
  
  In the early 1990s, university lecturer Dieter Hermann Schmitz came to Tampere to teach at the Goethe-Institut as part of a year abroad. He stayed for good. Today, the father of two, who is married to a Finnish woman, works at the University of Tampere and writes books on the side, such as "Die spinnen, die Finnen", which was a source of amusement for many Finland fans in 2011.