Finland

The Hidden Europe book excerpt from the opening of the Finland chapter

Finland is nearly a perfect society. Everything works. Cities are clean. There is no crime. People are nice. It’s just that the winters suck.

Finland is big and empty. It is 80 percent of the size of California, yet has 14 percent of the population. Most of the five million Finns live in the south, around Helsinki, to enjoy the country’s best weather, which is horrible most of the year. According to a worldwide 2010 Gallup poll, only five percent of Finns thought global warming was a threat to them—that was the lowest rate on Earth.

Few Americans know exactly where Finland is. The answer is simple: it’s where Santa Claus lives. Really. Rovaniemi is a quaint town on the edge of Lapland, the northernmost region in Finland, and is Santa’s global headquarters. However, St. Nick was officially born in Korvatunturi (meaning “Ear Mountain”), which is even farther north. Santa Claus thought that Korvatunturi was a bit too chilly, so he set up shop a bit south of there in Rovaniemi. That’s like moving from Houston to Dallas to escape the heat.

Although most of the world agrees that Finland is where Santa Claus lives, not everyone believes that Finland is part of Scandinavia. Looking at a map, it seems like Finland is in Scandinavia, along with Sweden and Norway. However, Finns told me that Scandinavia has little to do with geography and more to do with the historical, cultural, and linguistic heritage that Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland share. They said that if you must slap a label on Norway, Sweden, and Finland, then call them Nordic countries. Telling a Finn that he’s from Scandinavia won’t insult him, but telling him that he’s from Eastern Europe will.

Still, maps don’t lie—Finland is directly north of the Baltic states. Given that the Baltic states are solidly in Eastern Europe, that means Finland is in Eastern Europe. Of course, like all Eastern European countries, Finland will vehemently deny that they are in Eastern Europe. Finns will cry that they are in Northern Europe, and that Eastern Europe is a “political concept” that only includes countries that used to be in the Warsaw Pact. Despite their denials, I figured that two weeks in Finland would be a nice warm up for the “real” Eastern Europe. It’s ironic that my “warm up” almost froze me to death.

Read more by reading the preview of The Hidden Europe: What Eastern Europeans Can Teach Us.

Photo by: Samo Reponen.