Nokia Phone to the rescue!

 I have been using the iPhone for over 15 years. 

Old trusted Nokia, where the keyboard has faded!

Before that, like every Finn,had  I was a Nokia phone user. 

There were intervals where I used Jolla and then went back to a Nokia, but came back to the iPhone. 

Part of my collection of mobile phones from 1987: 2 Mobiras, Jolla, iPhone 4, Nokia clam shell, other 2 Nokia antiques, an Häger internet phone.  (My only Samsung was lost in Helsinki and my Nokia 920 was lost at Delhi Airport.)

When my iPhone 4 gave up the ghost, my friends, The Gang of 18 from around the world (Canada, India, Israel, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, UK, USA)  made sure I got an iPhone as a present so I would keep in touch with all my classmates. 

It has been very reliable, till yesterday, when it refused to charge.

I was in a desperate situation, as I have several phones, right  from the original Nokia, when it was called Mobira, but the problem was all of them are in a safe place but I did not know where the charging cables were.

It was a desperate search as without a phone I am dead to the world. With our two daughters,  it is OK as they used FaceTime and we can call each other from my MacBook Air.

The problem was that to even call a taxi to go to the repair shop  is a problem without a phone, as we are both house-bound. 

I found some charging cables and played around till I found the one which matched one of my ancient Nokia phones. I got the phone charged. Then the problem was of getting my micro SIM from the iPhone to fit the Nokia. 

I knew I had a lot of adapters, but when you want one, it is impossible to find it. Annikki’s  grandfather had a saying that when one stops looking for something, it will just come to hand!

I found an old wireless adapter with an old SIM and in its old large holder frame. I fixed my mini SIM to that, and voilà, worked.

I called my taxi service. Annikki and I went right  across town to the K-Citymarket in Rusko, where I knew FONUM has a service centre working on Sinday.

The two youngsters were most helpful. 

While Annikki and I did our shopping they fixed  my iPhone. They found some dirt had got into  the charging port and they cleaned it out.

When we got back, it was working fine.

The charge was to be €25.

I asked them to change my Elisa home network connection to 5G from the present 4G, which was just €2 per month more than my present charge. I also bought a wireless INSMAT wireless charging station. No more dirt likely in the charging port! The boys did not charge me for cleaning the iPhone. I got the charging station for just €4. 

I bought a SIM card for my old trusted Nokia and now that is hanging next to my TV for hopefully another unlikely emergency..

The lesson learnt with this experience is that although I have everything to handle any situation, I have left everything disorganised after my health issues got to the foreground. 

Now is the time to reorganise as I have all these beautiful gadgets, all sitting there and I waste so much time when an emergency arises.

I am on 5G from tomorrow. I hope that will help get my blogs out faster. 

I have some great news for our blog readers as we shall concentrate on a new schedule to help you get to the blog you want to read in a more organised fashion.

I have two new blogs lined up for December and a couple of older focused ones will come back on line, completely refurbished. 

I will give you the calendar schedule shortly.

Here are the list of our blogs:

1. Collectibles By Annikki (Daily)

2. Jacob’s Blog (Weekly)

3. News (Weekly) Findians  Breaking News

4. Maliyakal Family Blog (New) (Weekly)

5. Kandathil Family Blog (New) (Weekly)

6. Seventh Heaven for Cathedralites (Fortnightly)

7. Oulu Best (Worst) Buy (Fortnightly)

8. JM Politics (Fortnightly)

9. Findians (Fortnighly)

10. Findians Editorial (Fortnighly)

11. Findians Briefings (Fortnightly)

12. Kooler Talk (Web Version) (Monthly)

13. Art of Kamutaza's Tembo (Monthly)

14. CHAFF (Chamber for Assistance of Finns and Foreigners) (Monthly)

15. Photographs from Finland and India(Monthly)

16. Last Will and Testament (Monthly)

17. Move The UN (Monthly)

18. Mobile Snowman (Winter)

19. Talk Show Ratings (When news is available!)

Do stay turned for this BREAKING NEWS which we have scheduled for the next Finnish Independence Day on 6th December 2023.

Strange Finnish Banking Law?

Before we got married, Annikki had no bank account. She used to get paid in cash on a Friday morning. By Friday night she would have spent all of it at various local shops in the area!

I had a bank account in Barclays Bank on Finchley Road in London. Since I only got money transfer twice a year from India, I had to budget my life and live strictly within that budget. 

At that time we were only allowed £600 as the student transfer plus the fees for our college, which was a princely sum of £240.

It was very difficult to manage on  £600. That is another story I will blog another time. 

When we moved from London to Shrewsbury after I graduated and we got married I  started our joint bank account. 

Ever since then we have always had joint bank accounts as there was no saying my or your money.

We lived of a strict budget and the sum spent on our wedding, a grand sun of  £100 overdraft from the Barclay’s Bank in Shrewsbury was cleared by us in one year

When we moved to Indi,a again we had only a joint bank account. There Annikki was in charge of the money and budgeting. She had a few extravagances as I would be travelling round India almost 20 days s month.

On one such trip I returned to find my office room had been turned into a zoo with birds, and even a mongoose as a pet. 

That is also another blog for the future!  

When we moved back to Finland we started our Nordea account. As child benefit was paid only to the mother of the children, a Postipankki account was started in Annikki’s name. But she converted it to a joint account.

That Postipankki account has over time become a Danske bank account but we hardly use it

Because Annikki got a loyalty card from the S-Group, they started a bank account to pay the monthly bonus. 

Annikki again converted it into a joint acount over two decades ago.

Last week we found that the S-Psankki account was not working. 

All our salaries, now pensions are all paid into our Nordea account and we transfer s small sum for our monthly living expenses to the S-Psnkki account as we do almost 100% of our shoppang in Prisma.

Today we went to the customer service of S-Pankki to find out why our bank account was not working.

The lady went through all the requirements as our names, address, email address and finally the telephone number. 

Then came a shock, as she said that our account was stopped because we have the same telephone number. She said the Finnish law demands that we must have our own phone numbers as they have to send text messages (OTPs) to us individually for the verification code.

Annikki, who is quite meek and mild, was flabbergasted at this. She said on our family we had only one telphone and we did not intend to get a new phone justfor the convenience of the bank.

I told the lady that the Nordea bank had no such requirement. Even on Paypal the same phone number is used for both of us.

Annikki was ready to stop the S-Panikki account altogether as we only use it to get the deposit of the monthly bonus.

Better sense prevailed and I told the lady that Annikki would not be using her access to the account and only I woulkd use it so only one phone number would suffice!

We think it is stupid to ask customers to have separate phone numbers for the convenience of the bank. 

The Nordea system is more relevant as they provide one with s code calculator and with that both of us can access the bank without access to text messages ffom the bank. 

The only reason we keep the two banks are because the Nordea one is used by me as my Personal

Identifier  and the S-Pankki one is for Annikki.

I hope this new set up will not make it more complicated for us. 

Annikki has no intention to buy a phone and the iPhone does not have a dual SIM option!