YLE’s weekly magazine show for “adults living the best years of their lives”,
Priima, interviewed a memory techniques expert, Lic. Med., professional magician, stand-up comedian (etc. etc.)
Martti Vannas in their last Thursday’s episode. In the interview, Vannas gave away some of the tricks and techniques one can use for recalling various daily things more reliably.
Recent episodes of
Priima can be viewed on YLE’s
Areena website, but only from Finnish IP addresses (or via a suitable proxy!), and only until the next week’s episode comes out. So if someone would like to watch it,
better do that now. The Vannas interview starts at 8 minutes 43 seconds into the show. You can skip directly there by using the player controls.
One of the words Vannas uses in this interview (and which you can’t necessarily find in a dictionary!) is
puupäähattu, or
Puupää-hattu. This is a reference to a certain type of distinctive hat worn by the fictional comic and film character
Pekka Puupää, originally created by the comics artist
Ola Fogelberg for his comic strip by the same name, and later portrayed by
Esa Pakarinen in numerous very popular black & white comedy films which are now regarded as Finnish comedy classics (much in the same way as e.g. the films by
Laurel and Hardy or
Fy og Bi are seen in their respective home countries.)
Just like with Laurel and Hardy, and Fy og Bi, Pekka Puupää was also paired with a shorter sidekick, called
Pätkä (“Stump”), pictured above. Note the decorative flower in Pekka’s hat (
päivänkakkara, or
Leucanthemum vulgare.) Vannas mentions it in the interview.