Tip 3: Staying in hotels with a reception is generally advisable when travelling alone.
I arrived in Helsinki by ferry from Tallin, Estonia. It was a lovely ride, sitting up the front with large windows overlooking the ocean. When I got there, I headed for my hotel. Now this was a different hotel, it didn't have a reception, and at 4pm on the day of check-in they texted/emailed me a code for the front door and for my room door. This seemed fine, I got in ok, settled into my room and then went exploring.
When I got back, I settled down to eat my dinner and watch some netflix before bed. It was a nice first day in a country. That is, until about 1am when I decided to use the bathroom. It was then that I noticed for the first time that one of the panels on the roof was out of place. Convinced that that meant someone was hiding in the roof, ready to attack me, I quickly left my room. The problem then was there was no reception and no one to go to to check it out.
Downstairs I found a number for security, but in a foreign country I had no ability to make phone calls. What followed was a long time spent sitting outside my room trying to work out my next move. Once again, I explained the problem to my mother over facebook and she came to the rescue. From Australia, she rang security for me and then told her they would ring me back, so I waited.
It took a while but eventually the security man rang and explained that, in fact, the roof panels could not support the weight of a person and there was no way to get from one room to another above the panels. In hindsight, that seemed pretty logical. I mean who builds a hotel when someone can climb into the roof and get from room to room?
Back in my room, still a little freaked out, I worked up the courage to investigate and discovered that the roof panel didn't even fill the space, meaning that it must have always been out of place. Typical. But even with this added reassurance, I still didn't feel quite comfortable for my entire stay there.
Moral of the story: if you're travelling alone, and are prone to paranoia, make sure you stay somewhere with a reception and on site security.
On the positive side, Helsinki is a beautiful city:
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