Understanding the minds of Finnish people

Have you seen a Finn who is speaking and laughing loudly in a crowd; making a show of oneself? Or is your image of a typical Finn a person who sits quietly in the corner observing the crowd? I am sure that these both types of people do exist but the latter one is what we usually think Finns are like. But why? This is a cultural matter. Whether the Finns want it or not they more or less think that it was just a while ago they still lived alone in a cabin surrounded by a thick pine forest. This image is scary but at the same time tells something essential about Finns. I give you some hints how to understand the minds of Finnish people:

1      Success

It is okay to succeed. It is okay to make profit . It is okay to be rich. It is not okay to show it. It is not okay to brag about it. Old Finnish saying goes like this (freely translated): If one has a fortune, one should keep it hidden.

2      Asking for help

Finns are hard-working people. From the beginning of time many Finnish people have been working in agriculture, from early morning to late evening. Finns are used to earning their own living and they are proud of it. They want to do things themselves because they can. Only if they are forced, they ask for help.

3   Failing

Finland is full of innovations and people with new ideas. Finns could be brilliant in many areas of  business if they just had the courage to put things forward. Entrepreneurship is highly valued by Finns but only too seldom people start their own business. As people say in Eastern Finland: we don’t dare.  That means that they are afraid. There is a 50 percent possibility to fail. Yes, Finns are likely to think of failing. The big question might be: what if I don’t make it or what do people say? That is the reason why people often keep good ideas in their diaries or in their drawers.

4     Swedish people

Finns have many stereotypes for Swedish people. For example, Finns can think that Swedish people get things easier in life or the Swedes were born a golden spoon in their mouth (a Finnish saying). When Finns are competing against Swedes in athletics, it is very serious. Winning the Swedes is the only option. There is nothing more rewarding than winning Swedes in ice-hockey in World Championship games.

Were you able to identify some of the above mentioned features? If you did, you have started to understand Finns.  You have a real possibility to succeed in social gatherings with Finns.

I think that Finns should be proud of what they are. All those limitations make Finns brilliant. These features make Finns a little strange but unique.

Text: Riina Kosonen, a student in Independent Study in English course

Don’t be shy. Speak it up!

What differentiates a passionate language learner from an ordinary one? There can be many personal aspects also included, but undoubtedly the fearless attitude to practice the language via speaking and to learn through making mistakes is among the main distinctions.

A passionate language learner knows that starting to speak as early as possible is extremely beneficial for the language process and can boost it a lot. Firstly, speaking improves the fluency since the knowledge of grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary becomes the “quickly-accessed” assets of the brain. Secondly, communicating with a native speaker can be indeed an exciting as well as motivating activity for a learner to keep up developing the language skills. Meanwhile, this communication also supports the process of enlarging vocabulary and improving grammar skills of a learner.

I personally see learning languages as my hobby, and already from the age of six I have been learning and developing my English, originally being a Russian-speaker. Five years ago I moved to Finland, and from that moment I got an idea of learning Finnish somewhere in the future. Time goes by, and I ended up being a student of Lappeenranta University of Technology, where I finally was able to set my mind right in terms of learning Finnish. I went to all the Finnish courses, offered by the university’s Language Center, and enjoyed those so much that decided to practice more in “real world” cases: in shops, cafeterias, over the phone when ordering pizza or so on, and eventually never regretted this idea of mine 

I assume you can image how tough and embarrassing it was at the beginning, because I didn’t know a lot of words and could barely understand when an interlocutor was responding to me and I was humbly trying to express some thoughts of mine in Finnish. Sometimes people could understand me, sometimes they asked several times so I would repeat my phrase or express it in other words, but eventually this whole practice helped me a lot. And maybe it helped not only in the way of practice speaking, but in terms of reducing the internal mental barrier to open my mouth and speak it up.

Of course, you can’t just start talking a language straight after opening a grammar book on it. In order to proceed well with communication, it is essential to study and to acquire new skills and knowledge on vocabulary and grammar. Talking to a foreigner gives an opportunity to develop the communicating skills and to obtain more confidence, and most probably it supports the learning of slang or set expressions. However, to highlight – don’t give up on books or e-sources when learning, they are necessary to get a starting point and gain general understanding on the culture of the language.

To conclude, living far from home for a long time and travelling a lot, I was able to meet great number of interesting people – some of them were good at English, some could barely say a word in the foreign language, but what is pleasantly surprising is that the majority of them was not afraid of communicating not in their native language. So I hope after reading this, you will also challenge yourself a bit, and start practicing a new language by simply opening your mouth and saying “hi” in Finnish, Italian, German or whatever language you are learning now! Good luck and stay cool!

Text: Anastasiia Kisurina, a student of Independent Study in English course