Hello there stranger!

My name is Jari Mäkeläinen or if you get confused over the a with dots (a-umlaut) you may think of it as Makelainen. But please call me just Jari. I used to be Jari-Pekka but after getting fed up with the dash and the name lenght I changed it to very compact and cool Jari. My middle name is even cooler: Steve. As my old nickname J-P is no more valid, you may call me one of the following "Jari","Yi", "Ö", "Öri" or "J". And you can get creative and make up your own.

I was born and raised in Tampere. Tampere is the 3rd largest city of Finland with a population of just over 200 000 people. After living relatively short periods, for example study reasons, in Lammi, Espoo and Pori I ended up to Helsinki, the capital city. One of my brothers lives in Helsinki also. My other brother, sister and father live back in Tampere.
I like living in Helsinki because of the big city pulse and the services that are both near and plentiful. Also I like Helsinki a lot because the city is by the sea. Even though I have grown accustomed to living in Helsinki, I wouldn't mind moving back to Tampere at all as it is in my opinion a very relaxed city to live and be in. And besides Tampere is the home of the yummy delicacy "mustamakkara" (black sausage). I've also toyed with the idea of moving to abroad (US, GB, Germany or The Netherlandas) to work for few years. So far it has been on on the idea level only.

Tampere - City between two lakes, divided by rapids

About work

My job title reads as Quality Assurance Consultant - cool or what?! Basically it means I test web services, computer programs and mobile device software for living. When I ended up to a testing job, I immediately felt it as my own. I am quite enthusiastic about testing, it is a multifaceted, constantly developing and challenging field. Even though testing may easily sound like a largely routine based job, it is definitely not. Testing requires a lot of creative thinking as well as learning and analyzing abilities. If it's up to me, I believe I'll work as a tester for a many years to come.

Personal description

Deep down I see myself as a basic honest Finnish guy (although a tad nerdy one). I have no religious opinions, I have even resigned myself from the state church. Also I don't have any politic views either. However my dirty little secret is that I was a member of Finnish Youth Social Democrats for around 8 years. In my defence I joined totally by accident but being so lazy it took me that long to resign myself. Whenever I moved apartment I never voluntarily gave them my address but they were always able to find it out and the membership magazine regularily came through my letterbox.
My laugh nerve gets tickled especially by sarcasm and irony. In addition British humour amuses me quite a lot. For example short sketches in the style of The Fast Show make me roll on the floor laughing my head off.
It seems I am forever doomed to be single. In case you happen to be single of the opposite sex and you live in Helsinki area, let's just say that my email box has enough free space for your message...

Hobbies

I do irregular sports, I like badminton and bowling the most. A couple of years ago I did fitness boxing and Savate Forme which is fitness version of the French kickboxing sport. Last year I wasn't able to since I busted my shoulder when moving home. Maybe I'll try to pick it up again during the upcoming summer.
One of my favorite hobbies is writing, I mostly write poems and short stories, you can read a couple of stories in the Texts section. Recently I wrote and offered a poem book to a few bigger publishers in Finland but none of them dared to publish it.
I am also interested in the Italian culture and so I have been studying the Italian language on a hobby basis in an adult high school for two semesters few years back. I also challenged myself to learn Dutch in Helsinki Adult Education Centre for a year. It didn't really work out that well, but at least I gave it a shot.
Earlier I was also on the board of Capital Area's Bachelors of Business Administration. I was mostly involved in organizing the member events. I can proudly claim I have at least one time in my life been able to organise a piss-up in a brewery.
Naturally ICT field also takes up some of my free time (too much perhaps?) in the form of fiddling with my computer, building web pages (like these) or keeping up to date with the latest news in the field.
My motto is: Well, I saw this then too.

Music I listen

My musical taste leans mostly towards 80's and 90's rock/pop. Artists such as U2, Queen and The Scorpions blast out of my earphones often. In addition to those I listen widely to different artists such as Jay Jay Johanson, System Of A Down, The Streets, John Mellencamp and several Finnish artists. As a curiosity in my listening habits is Adelmo Fornaciari, better known as Zucchero, an Italian softrock artist that isn't well known here in Finland. Zucchero is best known for the song "Senza Una Donna" which I think isn't a very good example of his material. I would encourage you to listen to his latest album titled "Fly" or the older "Shake" album or the duet album "Zu & Co" to get a better idea of his music. I belong to Un po' di Zucchero, an unofficial Zucchero fan club. Every now and then I also belong to the official Zucchero fanclub.
Last spring, out of a long time obsession, I went ahead and bought an electric bass. With my miniscule music talents the bass guitar has remained more as an ornament in the corner of my room rather than an actual hobby equipment.

When I grow up...

My future dream is to have my own house, nice car and maybe a summer cottage with a sauna by a lake. A quite common Finnish dream that is. Winning the national lottery coudn't hurt my dream to come true.
Or then alternatively I happen to win in the US diversity visa lottery and can shake off the dust from Finnish maid's apron for good and move across the pond to show the yanks how to test software - European style.

That's pretty much it, quite a long story then. So you have a good reason to give yourself a slap on the back and drink a congratulatory coffee for reading it all, well done! If you still want to know about something not covered here, feel free to fill in the guestbook or email me and I'll try to scribble something here about the subject. Well it's goodbye for now!