New Years Eve 2009 in Helsinki!

I flew back to Finland on December on the 30th and arrived on December 31st. Me and the other foreigner on my team, Thais from Brazil, decided to get out of our small town and head to the big city for New Years Eve. We had decided to meet in Helsinki in the afternoon so we could walk around and sitesee before we headed out for the night. Things didnt go quite as planned. I arrived at the airport at about 2. Took a taxi to the hotel and tried to call Thais to tell her where I was. But my Finnish phone was not working! Thais didnt know the hotel name or address. So I ended up eamailing her a few different times trying to tell her what was going on. I was extremely jet lagged so I took a nap and hoped Thais would find her way here! The phone woke me up at about 8 and it was Thais saying she was at the hotel! yay!! It turned out her Finnish phone wasnt working either and she had to have her boyfriend check her messages for her. But finally we were both at the hotel ready for the night!
We first went to the store to get some drinks and then stopped at the Mcdonalds to get a quick dinner. Once we were all ready we took a taxi and went to downtown. The night was a typical Finnish night, cold and snowing! There were fireworks going off everywhere. We ended up walking around outside when it was midnight but there was plenty of people outside to celebrate with. The first two places didnt really work out for us so then we walked around for a bit and found one place that looked promising. We walked in and from that point on we had a blast!! There was a live band there and so many people! We had a great time!!
The next morning we had an amazing buffet breakfeast at the hotel!! It was perfect! This was both our first time in Helsinki and we both loved it and cant wait to go back!