All the other Nordic countries are like -La la la la la la while Finland is like -*growling sound*. We’ll get into the heavy metal thing in a bit …, but first Now just remember: Finland is Nordic, but DON’T call it Scandinavian There’s a huge difference.
That title only belongs to Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. First of all, Finland is located in Northern Europe, lying on the Gulf of Finland and the Gulf of Bothnia east of all that Scandinavian stuff To the west.
They border Sweden on the Torne river or the’Tornionjoki’until it reaches the tripoint border, with Norway, at the Three-Country Cairn Stone. And to the east. They border big old Russia with another tripoint border with Norway that looks like this.
. The country is divided into 19 regions or maakunta with the autonomous region that we’ll talk about a little bit later and the capital of Helsinki located in the south. On the Gulf of Finland, which is also the second most northern capital in the world after Reykjavík Iceland.
, The country also owns about 180,000 islands, the highest concentration of which is found in the Baltic off the coast in the Åland Archipelago. Keep in mind. Parts of Finland also lie within the Arctic Circle that’s.
How far up north they are. And the three busiest airports are Helsinki, Oulu, and Rovaniemi. Now my favorite part territorial anomalies. First of all, with Russia, there are too many split islands and pene-enclaves the islands of Äikkääniemi and Suursaari Tarassiinsaari islands and lakes, the island in the Koitajoki river Seriously just play around with Google Earth and see how many you can find.
. Finally, we get to Sweden and things get interesting. Most of the borders with Sweden run along rivers that eventually flow into the Torne River. Then we get a strange golf course that is split between the two countries in the town of Tornio and Sweden.
. Not only that but then you have the strange Märket island right next to Åland in the Gulf of Bothnia, which has an inverted S-shaped border. It had to do with the lighthouse that was built belonging to Finland, but then Sweden was likely.
It’s too close to our side of the island’s they drew a border that was like this to give each side equal shares of the land., See this archipelago cluster of islands right here Yeah. It belongs to Finland, even though most of the people here speak Swedish.
Åland. Is Finland’s strange little administrative anomaly, Long story short: it used to belong to Sweden, but then the Russians took over it. In addition to Finland, but then after the Russian Revolution, Finland became free, and then the UN decided Åland should belong to Finland with autonomy.
But then the Soviets started attacking again and then Finland was like nope and then fought back relentlessly. Defending themselves and Åland and Sweden just kinda sat there and didn’t really do much for Åland as they decided to stay.
Neutral. Finland defending Åland was kinda the turning point. Now it’s. Kinda, like’Åland, Come back to me” Look Sweden. We had some great times, but you kinda really didn’t do much for me when things got crazy.
” I mean Finland defended me, okay, And he treats me well. Okay” His tax incentives are great” It’s time to move on …’& # 39; It’s, not me …. It’s. You.’*sobbing*’Åland ‘
Also, Finland kinda threatened that if Åland was ceded back to Sweden, they would demand the Tornio valley. Now before the whole Soviet thing, Finland operated the regions of Karelia, Salla, Kuusamo Petsamo, and some extra islands in the gulf.
After the wars with the Soviets. These regions were all ceded back to Russia, affected by cutting off their access to the Arctic Ocean. Very quickly. Some notable sights and landmarks would have to be the old castles like Savonlinna, Hämeenlinna, Olavinlinna, and the most renowned Suomenlinna.
. You can probably guess what ‘ Linna’means by now, … Rovaniemi is otherwise known as the home of Santa Claus, where you can go reindeer sledding, Inari, and Ivalo is where you can get a real Saami traditional cultural experience.
Of course, Helsinki is the epicenter of Finnish architecture and culture with landmarks, such as the Temppeliaukio Church excavated into a rock Mannerheim street, the busiest road with all the shops and austere post-Soviet, influenced blocky colonnaded buildings or the iconic Helsinki cathedral.
. Now those are all great, but Finland isn’t really much of a tight metropolitan type of country. They love their space and have quite a bunch of it., See what lies outside these cities. Shall we now, if you want me to make this simple, some would argue that Finland is the best winter wonderland in the world.
. I mean Canada’s cool, but they have too many bears, and Iceland is too explodey and Russia is too … cold. Seriously, though, the land is generally flat, except in the north, by the border with Norway, in which the highest mountain can be found.
Mt. Halti, although the peak is in Norway., However, in 2017, Norway plans to give Finland the peak for its 100th anniversary of independence from the Soviets… Finland is just wonderfully crisp and refreshing, usually ranking in the top 3 countries in the world with the cleanest air quality.
. This is partly because Finland is almost 80 % covered in forests, one of the highest concentrations per square kilometer in the world. Only behind countries like Gabon and Suriname… This makes Finland the largest producer of wood in the EU and one of the tops in the world.
. Not only that, but Finland has about 188,000 lakes, most heavily concentrated in Lakeland and, in addition to lakes, about 10 % of the country is comprised of all water bodies like rivers, ponds, and streams.
, When mixed with the land. This makes about one-third of the country home to swamps and bogs, making it the highest wetland, proportioned country in Europe and disputably. The world.’Ehhh, maybe …, But our floods are crazier’Fittingly.
The name for the swamp in Finnish is’suo’and the word for Finland is’Suomi’I mean technically, they also have like 9 other words for the swamp, like räme neva, letto, luhta, lähteikkö, papa, palsa, jänkä and Korpi And they love these swamps, one Finnish pastime is jumping in the mud, (, sometimes naked, ) and either playing soccer or wrestling.
. The landscape of Finland is shaped that way because imagine what happens when you crush something under a heavy glacier for a really long time, and then after the glacier melts you’re left with pockets of erosion and mineral residue, all over.
. Not only that, but Finland is experiencing a post-glacial rebound in which the land is steadily rising along the coast of the Gulf of Bothnia. Every year Finland gains about 7 square kilometers and is technically rising out of the sea.
. The longest river is the Kemijoki that passes through Lapland and reaches the Gulf of Bothnia. And the largest lake, as well as the fourth largest in Europe. Lake Saimaa is located in the southeast., Because Finland is so far north.
They are known for being the land of the midnight sun. During summer, you can literally see the sun for 24 hours a day in the northern parts by the Arctic Circle. And, of course, in the wintertime, there’s, hardly any sunlight at all.
But if you’re lucky, you can witness an aurora borealis, especially in the northern parts., Oh, and by the way the national animals are the whooper swan and the brown bear. Finnish agriculture is, of course, very standard for northern European countries.
Lots of rye, wheat, turnips, potatoes, and, of course, fishing is huge out here. However, due to the abundance of lakes and rivers, Finns prefer their own domestic freshwater fish like perch, zander, and murukku, as opposed to the sea fish.
Speaking of which coming to Finland chances. Are you will eventually try reindeer meat in some shape or form, whether in a stew or grilled, in Lapland you might even find a bear on the menu? You can try mämmi a pudding made of rye and, of course, every Finn will make every visitor try the strong, salty salmiakki.
They love salmiakki, so much that they made it into ice cream and it’s. So good and I’m so mad they don’t, sell it in my home town And in the wintertime, they build ice hotels and there’s. This cool waterfall in the Paratiisikuru area and the Urhokekkonen National Park.
. Okay, let’s. Talk about Finnish people! Okay! If you go to Finland, you will most likely experience a rather intense, yet intriguing social construct. First of all, the country has about 5.5 million people and is the most sparsely populated country in the EU.
The country is about 90 %, ethnically Finnish about 6 %. Are Swedish and the rest is made up of everything else under the sun like Russians, Estonians, Asians, and Africans.? They use the Euro as currency, they use the type C/E/F outlets and they drive on the right side of the road.
. Of course, the Finnish people speak the Finnish language, which is arguably one of the hardest languages on earth to learn. Conjugation is a mess of nouns and adjectives that have inflectional forms … whatever that means.
Nevertheless, Finland has one of the best schooling systems in the world. In Finland, school hours are shorter, less homework is given and there are virtually no mandated standardized tests. Apart from the exam, you take in your final senior year of high school.
. Also, if you get your Ph.D., you have the option to get a sword and a top hat along with your diploma. This is also why Finland is one of the most English-friendly countries in Europe. Children are taught around ages 9 to 11, and most people of the younger generation can at least hold an impressibly fluid conversation.
. Finland is actually a conscription country in which all men, ages, 18 and up are required to serve either in the military or civilian services anywhere from 165 days to a year, depending on the type of service applied.
For. Åland Islands are exempt from military conscription but are required to serve in some kind of institution like the coast guard or civil services. Finnish culture is … actually pretty funny.
The stereotype is that Finns are incredibly quiet and don ‘ T talk that much in most public transactions just mind your business and do small talk The cartoon’Finnish Nightmares’illustrates this concept.
Pretty well. Check it out., Which is funny because Finland is huge on the boisterous loud, and flashy heavy metal culture having the highest concentration of heavy metal bands out of any other country in the world with nearly 650 per 1 million residents.
Finns also invented the wife-carrying competition in which a man must carry either his wife or girlfriend or any girl that agrees to get tossed around in an obstacle course, and the winner gets the woman’s weight in beer.
It’s. Very strategic, because if you want to win, you might want to carry a lighter wife, but if you want more beer, you better do your squats bro.! Now, if you must know one thing about Finnish culture, you have to know about sauna.
The Finns invented the sauna. Most homes, hotels, and apartments have a sauna built into them. They actually had a sauna competition at one point, but then a Russian guy died and they had to kinda cancel it.
. Overall, though, Finns are kinda brought up in a mindset known as’sisu’it’s, kinda hard to explain the exact definition of it, but it kinda means something like’guts’or’determination’and’never giving up which really helped them along with the fight with the Soviets.
Sisu is to Finland what janteloven is to Denmark. There are so many other things I wish we could talk about, but we’re running out of time., But we do have time for friend time. Historically, Finland was kinda, always a little lonely.
I mean few. If any trading routes ever went through this area., Even the Mongols were like’Ehh …, we’re good. Nah Nah … carry on. ‘ Nevertheless, over time, Finland did develop relations and, to this day, is one of the most diplomatically outreached countries in the world I mean the Finnish passport is the number 1 ranked and most sought-after, as it has the highest number of visa-free countries applied to it.
. First of all, Finland generally gets along with other Nordic countries. However, they have the biggest frenemy relationship with Sweden. They’ll trade and share a beer or two, but when hockey season comes, the bloodbath begins.
When it comes to Russia, Finland kinda has to be their friend, because Russia has the longest border with them, and business is important. Nevertheless, Russia is kinda, seen as like the next-door neighbor that you once got into an argument with, but then you kinda fixed things up, but then you kinda, really didn’t get over it, and then you have to see them every other day.
In the morning, as you go to work., Germans are always welcome in Finland, and Hungarians are like the long-lost distant cousins that they just discovered and are trying to build a relationship with.
Their best friends, though, might be Estonia and Norway. Everybody loves Norway. It’s like the Cameroon of Europe. Norway has never had any controversy with Finland and with the recent mountain gift proposal, relations are only strengthening.
. Estonia is like the nagging little sister that tries to imitate her bigger brother. I mean they both even have the same national anthems, but in the end, they are family and Finland always loves her…
In conclusion, Finland really is a winter wonderland, with quiet people that transform into metal monsters after a pint of long drink, topping their days off baking themselves in human ovens. For fun.
And with that, we finish the Finnish episode AAAAHAHA. You waited for that for over 10 minutes Stay tuned, The F … M-Mace … … ‘ The country that must not be named’… … is coming up next.
. Ah Finland, oh let’s. Talk about this place that I totally have no preconceived biases towards it’s time to learn geography. Now, everybody, I’m. Your host Barbie welcomes the dark sheep of Northern Europe.
All the other Nordic countries are like yeah well, Finland is like we’ll get into the heavy metal thing in a bit. But first now just remember: Finland is Nordic, but don’t call it Scandinavian there’s.
A huge difference that the title only belongs to Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. First of all, Finland is located in Northern Europe, lying on the Gulf of Finland and the Gulf of Bothnia east of all that Scandinavian stuff to the west.
The borders Sweden on the Torne River or the touring nyonyo key until it reaches the tripoint border, with Norway, at the three-country Karen stone and to the east. They border big old Russia with another tripoint border with Norway.
That looks like this. The country is divided into 19 regions or mock Kunta with the autonomous region that we’ll talk about a little bit later and the capital of Helsinki located in the south on the Gulf of Finland, which is also the second most northern capital.
In the world after Reykjavik, Iceland, the country also owns about 180,000 islands, the highest concentration of which is found in the Baltic off the coast in the Oland archipelago, keep in mind. Parts of Finland also lie within the Arctic Circle, that’s.
How far up north they are, and three busiest airports are Helsinki Lulu and Rovaniemi. Now my favorite part territorial anomalies. First of all, with Russia, there are too many split islands and Penni enclaves, the islands of ikon yeah me and sue sorry, Terezin, sorry, islands and lakes.
The island in the koi taiyaki River seriously just play around with Google Earth and see how many you can find. Finally, we got to Sweden and things get interesting. Most of the borders with Sweden run along rivers that eventually flow into the Turin a river, and then we get a strange golf course that is split between the two countries in the town of Turin, yo, and Sweden.
Not only that but then you have the strange Market Island right next to öland in the Gulf of Bothnia, which has an inverted s-shaped border. It had to do with the lighthouse that was built belonging to Finland.
But then Sweden was like hey it’s too close to our side of the island, so they drew a border that was like this to give each side equal shares of the land, see this archipelago cluster of islands right here yeah.
It belongs to Finland, even though most of the people here speak Swedish öland is Finland strange little administrative anomaly, long story short: it used to belong to Sweden, but then the Russians took over it.
In addition to Finland, then after the Russian Revolution, Finland became free and then the UN decided all and should along to Finland with autonomy. But then the Soviets started attacking again and then Finland was like nope and then fought back relentlessly defending themselves and öland and Sweden.
I just kind of sat there and didn’t really do much for Oland as they decided to stay neutral. Finland, defending öland was kind of like a turning point. Now it’s kind of like öland. Come back to me. Look Sweden.
We had some great times, but you kind of really didn’t do much for me when things got crazy. I mean Finland defended me, okay and he treats me well. Okay, his tax incentives are great. It’s. It’s time to move on it’s.
Not me it’s. You, oh, and also Finland, kind of threatened that if öland was seated back to Sweden, they would demand the Tornillo Valley. Have a for most Soviet thing: Finland operated the regions of Corellia, salikus, amo petsamo, and some extra islands in the Gulf after the wars with the Soviets.
These regions were all seated back to Russia, effectively cutting off their access to the Arctic Ocean very quickly. Some notable sites and landmarks would have to be the old castles like Savile, Nena, hominid, enough, olivine, Lena, and the most renowned swarming Lena.
You can probably guess what Lena means by now. Rovaniemi is otherwise known as the home of Santa Claus. We can go reindeer sledding, Inari and Ivalo are where you can get a real, Sami. Traditional cultural experience.
Of course, Helsinki is the epicenter of Finnish architecture and culture with landmarks, such as the attempt le al Kia Church excavated into a rock Mannerheim Street, the busiest road with all the shops and austere post-Soviet influence, blocky colonnaded buildings, or the iconic Helsinki Cathedral.