Nordic travel fair weekend

So yesterday I went to Matka 2016 - Nordic travel fair in Helsinki. Two of my friends, Annina and Linda accompanied me as well as my mom.

We were there about 12pm and started our tour. Firstly we were greeted by Spain booth with flowers, so nice! But I ruined my flower like in 12 minutes :( well, at least I have pretty photo about it xD

We started just looking around and found Estonia's booth after Spain. I went to talk about Tallinn because I plan to do 2-day trip sometime this year. So I got couple brochures (they had alot about Tallinn so it was extra nice!) and then after small talk session we went forward.

We ended up to Iceland's booth and I got some more brochures. I'm interested about Iceland and I defiently want to visit there in near future. It was pleasant surprise that Iceland had big booth with Icelandair.

Then we just walked and looked around while my mom visited couple booths to ask about living abroads (mom was interested in spain and portugal which were easy to find and the assistants have lots of advices).

After walking around near Argentina's booth we spotted Korea~ Had to go there and just grab every brochure available xD They had this yellow Subway partner brochure which I browsed through and I found it really useful! I don't have better singe photo about it now in here but it was yellow and kinda small. Everyone, I advise you to grab it with you because inside was like with which line you will get to most famous places in Seoul and which exit out you have to take. It's size is very practical, you can basically have it with you while you're travelling in Seoul without having to carry large travel guide just to know which line and exit you have to take to go for example gwanghwamun square.

After visiting Korea's booth we looked around long-haul destinations part. We visited Panama/Costa Rica's, Thailand's, Malaysia's, Japan's and Indonesia's booth. Thailand showcased their handicraft again and I can't help but silently admire that kind of amazing work. Japan had a small robot show going on and it was so cute! Japan had big booth and lots of info, Linda was excited because she's propably going to Tokyo this year and she got many brochures about Japan and Tokyo.
Then got some brochures from Indonesia and also got memory stick, which was interesting wooden model. My mom visited Bali's booth in the meantime.

After hanging out in long-haul destinations area and getting tea from Sri Lanka's booth, we walked towards Finnair's booth. They had this fun competition, you can win flights to Asia if you post photo of yourself in plane seats (they had couple seats from their newest Airbus in there). So we took couple photos and took part to competition. I really wanna get one more trip to Asia this year! :P

Then we just walked aimlessly through some european countries booth's and decided to stop by and eat beside Greece's booth. We ate one greek dish I already forgot xD Sorry~
 After being full from eating good meal, we walked a little in Finland's section and talked how we could promote us much more to foreigners than what we promote now. Also, we talked how finnish people often say to foreigners in abroad "Finland is boring, don't go there." It's really bad advertisement for us so next time you go abroads, try think something positive about Finland when somebody asks "what's Finland alike?"

We were getting pretty tired already, Annina finally found Czech which she had been looking for all the time and I found Croatia which also interests me from europe. Then we pretty much stopped to listen Forex bank's program for a few moments and then decided that our concentration is starting to falter so it would be best to go home. 

I'd say this year Matka was more bigger than last year. But long-haul destination part was more smaller while europe section was more bigger. For me, I would have wished the other way ^^;;;
Because I'm mainly interested in Asian countries I found it a little disappointing for not finding for example Singapore. My mom wanted info from Phillipines but they weren't in Matka 2016 either.

But all in all, we enjoyed more than last year, for me Korea's booth was a definite plus and I liked how almost every worker in every booth were ready to give you information. From europe's section I think Iceland and Estonia had the most interesting booths!

I got excited with brochures xD

That's all today~ I'm going again tomorrow with different friend :P So let's see what is left because some booths run out material yesterday already. I guess Matka 2016 is more popular this year? ;)