indymedia does a pretty fantastic analysis of last saturdays riots in the centre of dublin city. here is an extract:

a political analysis of the dublin riots and why nobody saw them coming o’connell street was a building site and bricks, paving stones, barricades and oil cans were neatly arranged all along it, almost like an ammunition dump for rioters. combine that with the proximity of many of the poorest residential areas in the city where the gardai are feared and hated and the reasonable number of destitute drug users who you will find around o’connell street on an average saturday and you had a ready supply of people and ammunition for a proper riot and that was what we saw. there were probably no more than 200 people who were involved in the initial onslaught, but hundreds more joined in as the fighting made its way down o’connell street. local youths could be seen coming out of side streets phoning their mates and as the fighting progressed more and more people joined in. i’d estimate that over a thousand people took part in the events in one way or another. every time that the riot squad managed to advance a few metres, they would have to leave a line of police to guard any of the side streets that they had passed as more and more locals came out to see what was happening. there were crowds massed all along the side streets and most of their sympathies appeared to liewith the rioters. at one stage some of the more political republicans who had organised the counter-protest engaged in a sit down protest in front of the riot police advance. presumably they had decided that they wanted to distance themselves from the rioters and mount a protest that was less liable to be associated with mindless violence. predictably they were brutally beaten and promptly cleared from the road. shortly afterwards, i witnessed a half dozen gardai trying to arrest an individual who had become trapped behind police lines, a crowd of onlookers let out an enraged shout and started rushing over to intervene – causing the gardai to relinquish their hold. the street was still thronged with shoppers and passers by many of whom seemed entirely nonplussed by the riot, simply standing towards the sides of the roads or wandering around behind police lines without taking part in the fighting, but clearly more sympathetic to the rioters than the gardai as i reached nassau street i witnessed an incredibly bizzare and disconcerting sight. on my left a mob was torching cars, on my right grafton street shopping continued very much like any ordinary saturday afternoon indymedia ireland 2006.02.26

a ghost like figure walks down the street in the snow.

just after i moved to helsinki a hole in the centre of the city appeared. i dont really have any memories of what was there before.

back in the summer of 2003 i showed a photo of the big hole in the ground. well the whole project is pretty much finished now – ahead of schedule and under budget i would imagine (the world is better if you just imagine that). the bus station / refurbished metro station have been open a few months and are pretty fantastic.

on thursday the upper levels (shopping and more food/ bar spaces) finally opens – i’ll be in work on thursday but im sure the rest of helsinki will be in there having a look around and spending their hard earned euros.

for the last few weeks ive been passing through it everynow and then and seeing the fitouts of some of the visible shops. ive wanted to take pictures when there was as few people there as possible. so the other night i was watching television until it was late – and i remembered and decided that there was no point in going to bed. so at 0500 i headed off to take some pictures. when i got to kamppi i saw that the second floor was all shut off (boo) so i had to take pics of the already opened areas. you can see some of the images here. some came out well i think. (when i passed through the building again on sunday i saw that i could see into the second floor – thats the image above).

kamppi aukea 2006.03.02 klo0900 : kampinkeskus.fi
there is a really cool webcam operating from the tower behind lasipalatsi. have a look there just before 0900 finnish time on thursday to see all of helsinki waiting.

i went back to taivallahti today – walked around and stared at the amazing sunset. i walked across the frozen bay and saw all these people off in the distance skating. there is 10cm or so of snow on the ice – but there is a huge skating circuit on the ice – the city must have cleared away the ice from it to form the circuit. people skiing by. i took almost a hundred pictures of the sunset and the people going by – a beautiful sight. then just as i was walking home (and before i took the above pic) i realised i had the camera iso set to 1600 – so all the pictures were grainy. boo amateurs! i did get a few dozen at the end at proper iso settings thankfully.

below are some people skating. the first one had a mother skating along pushing a pram. coolest thing i saw today.

last time i skated was in the mid 90s in dublin on the north circular road. now the ice rink is a furniture shop. a “des kelly” one i think.

a wonderful quote from eliel saarinen in 1931.

“we are confronted with a thick wall through which we have to force a way. this wall is composed of inertia on the part of bystanders; their inability to comprehend necessities of town planning derives from the evolution of the city. the same inertia is often a mere prop for officialdom in its state of suspended slumber” “far sightedness is not synonymous with foolhardiness, rather. . .the ability to raise oneself above routine to a higher plane, to understand evolution and act accordingly. farsightedness is akin to having artistic imagination, while remaining firmly rooted in reality”.