Suomi (Finland)
Belkis Kambach

 


Photo: Tshahka Hermans

 

I have a diverse background being born in the Caribbean, educated in the USA & Europe and surely adopt rapidly to new environments because for the past decade and a half my live has been that of a modern nomad, I have traveled extensively on all continents leading groups in (over 60 countries), living longer periods of time in 10 countries. For most of my adult life I have been working as a Multilingual Tour Director. I possess fluency in a half dozen languages, including English, French, Italian, Spanish and elementary level Finnish and German. So one may say that for my job I did prepared myself starting by getting a good education.

However, nothing really did prepare me in life, not even my language skills nor travel experience to life in Suomi (Finland). It wasn't enough just to emigrate, I had to choose Finland of all places where over twenty-five winter months in Hell changed completely the course of my life and the following years to come. Finland, Finnish and Finns have given new meaning to my existence in fact I consider myself a Dominican-American-Finn at heart. I’m still a frequent traveler to Finland and an American connected to Finland by friendship ties, curiosity, and an overwhelming love of the place. Helsinki is my favorite place to live.

I found an easy way to learn Finnish "or Finnish in 32 years without a teacher". A fascinating subject for me. Not an easy language to learn , of course easy for Finns to say imagine a new-born Finn speaks only in the Nominative till he is 2, starts with the genitive at 3, and so on. By 15 he knows all cases. But we foreigners, start to learn Finnish , say at 30 or so and if we chose the same system we have a good chance of being fairly proficient in case usage by 45, although we still have to do the plural. So give or take by the time we are 60, that's if we don't take over 6 years with the pronouns, in good health we might live to master 12 adjectives. The Latin and the German experiment with paltry 5-6 cases, the Finns show how cute they are by nonchalantly reeling off 16 of them. Surely there are advantages to what your Finnish skills can do, learning a rich language as in Finnish you may say one thing and mean another sometimes even the opposite, so it becomes sort of an advantage and specially an useful language for: mother in laws, cabdrivers, tour guides, lawyers, witnesses, doctors, politicians, accountants, philosophers and fortune-tellers There is a whole class of Finnish words use to draw attention to the absence of what they describe. One can always do like me at the beginning read Finnish as if it was Spanish and above all look confident. I learned Finnish because this language inspires confidence in your own abilities if you learn Finnish, you may as well learn anything!

Living in this country seems to me an extremely familiar environment I have seen more than enough to keep me captivated, delighted, charmed and sometimes puzzled. I hope you will find in this list sufficient reasons to visit the place that holds a special place in my heart and some of the reasons why I fell in love with that "IHANA" (beautiful) country

 

Some of the 1,000 Reasons You Should Travel to Helsinki

  1. The romance potential of an extended vacation
  2. Avanto: supposed to be a refreshing dip in a hole drilled in the ice to get the cardiovascular benefits of swimming in icy cold water after a real Finnish sauna and at the same time do the essential initiation for Finnishhood.
  3. Eat something you never ate before "reindeer & roast bear"
  4. Like me, have a burning desire to learn all Finno-Ugric languages including Finnish, Estonian, Hungarian and every single obscure dialect spoken in the middle of Siberia
    5.
  5. Finns' nocturnal drinking expeditions Friday and Saturday nights
  6. To have a Finnair pilot with olive skin , blue eyes and the body of a Greek god
  7. Read a lot of strange Finnish books like: Kalevala the national epic complied by Elias Lönnrot: ( 1849) collection of stories, legends, songs and poems translated in over 40 languages, very important to the Finns but none of them can tell you exactly why. I suppose because all those peasants all had postgraduate degrees, as the language is very rich, sophisticated and complicated.
  8. Harsh rolling of R's of drunks swearing (Perkkele!). False teeth an advantage here
  9. Because even the Vikings arrived here before you (5-800A.D.)
  10. Glögi with cloves, cinnamon, Christmas spices, raisins and almonds
  11. To buy Akseli Galen Kalela's paintings: Boy with crow (1884), Lemminkainen's mother (1897), & by the river of Tuonela (at the Ateneum)
  12. Try like me to get a blind date with Juha Ylönen , ( Finnish Ice hockey player)Photo: Tshahka Hermans
  13. Went there thinking "Purgatory Ski Resort " was here ( but it is in Durango, Colorado)
  14. VAPPU (when it is possible to drink in the streets ( with out consequently having to spend a night in a cell) Finns mark the coming of spring on May 1st. with a wild International workers movement and student revelry festival.
  15. Buy a Nokia cellular phone so you are not the only one in the country without one
  16. To learn that being Finnish is important to Finns as they are not Swedes , nor they care to become Russians
  17. See a country which cannot be described with words
  18. Spend a night in "Zetor" with hopes of meeting a Finnish farmer
  19. Try to find a distant relative of Lalli & Kerttu fist Finnish peasants known by their names (1156)
  20. Finns having the best sperm count in Europe
  21. Like Finns to drink 12 cups of coffee without having a nervous breakdown (they drink more coffee per capita than any other European)
  22. Seeing Aurora borealis (Northern lights) as few phenomenon's are as thoroughly researched as this
  23. Drink your first "hot shot" (Galiano, hot coffee and cream)
  24. Home of the most unpronounceable names in the world and realise you'll never get a name's day present because your name is not on the list
  25. See the city that has proven fortune-tellers and travellers wrong
  26. Winter green Jenkki, (Xilitol gum)
  27. Wonder what "Minä rakastan sinua" means? (I love you)
  28. MIDSUMMER: the anticipated culmination of the year celebrated as Midsummer, peak of summer, those 24hours in June when the sun is longest above the horizon.
  29. Perempi yksi hyvä kuin kaksi huonoo (better one good than two bad) Finnish proverb
  30. Helsinki is only 6,600Km. from NYC
  31. Unmarried couples are accepted as: unofficially married
  32. Buy Kalevala jewellery, magnificent bronze jewellery reproductions of the ones received in exchange for furs from the Vikings
  33. Go on an icebreaker tour (Sampo the world's only tourist icebreaker)
  34. Like Nils Adolf Nordenskiöld, to try to reach the North Pole on a reindeer
  35. Confirm that polar bears don't roam around the streets of Helsinki
  36. Jean Sibelius composer who expressed Finnish sentiments poignantly , he composed Finlandia, Kullervo Symphony
  37. Helsinki not a city to fall in love at first sight (takes time to get to know & fall in love forever)
  38. For the many times you thought you took the wrong plane!

 


Photo: Tshahka Hermans

 

Copyright (c) 1999 Belkis Kambach
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