If you can, avoid being away from Finland in the summer. If you've never even been there, go finally NOW. Why? Well, first of all, you should just go there for the sake of my friends. They're just mad, silly, goofy, cute and absolutely insane. I miss them so much.
The blondes are the best reason to go to Finland.
Top 5 of Finnish Summer
1. The Silence. It's breathtaking. Finland is a big country with few inhabitants, and they're famous for not speaking much. Just sit on the coast of a lake on a summer night and listen and see the purity around you.
2. The Noise. In the summer Finland is full of festivals and music. People really come out of their shells and get out on the streets to bond and be merry. They say Finland is a land of opposites, and I agree. After all the melancholy and silence of the winter, summer brings out a new side in us, and it is extreme.
Ankkarock, 2007.
PMMP playing in Ankkarock, 2007.
Juhani, the Sleeper, overnighting in a wooden school, keeping his gin close. Provinssirock, 2008.
Henri, the Sleeper, and his mattress-tattoo. Provinssirock, 2008.
1st of May celebrations, Helsinki, 2008.
3. The water. Finland is largely covered in lakes. They are beautiful and calming to look at by sunset with a beer in your hand, and refreshing to swim in after a hot sauna.
They are clean too, and the Finnish tap water is the best tasting water in the world.
(Except in the town of Nokia some time ago, where a pipe was accidentally reversed and the crap got back into the purified water. Just wanted to mention that so you can't blame me for idealizing Finland too much.)
Olivia and isoisä (grandpa) on the lake Päijänne.
The lake likes it when you jump into it.
4. Spending time at the summer house. This includes happy people, sauna, chopping wood, fireplaces, barbecuing sausages and delicious fresh food from the local farm, silence, fighting off mosquitos and sitting outside with a wine bottle 'til late at night, staring at the blue sky.
At the summer house you wear your cousins' old overalls and mom's paint-covered sweaters from 1993, which are also totally OK to wear for grocery shopping at the local town.
Going to the summer house is a freeing experience. It kind of takes you back to the nature, where there is often no running water or inside toilets.
Everything is old and primitive but beautiful.
Johku shows how a beer after the sauna makes you naturally gorgeous.
Tired home-karaoke is one of my favorite pastimes.
Just check out the sky. It's midnight.
5. The food. It's not just in the summer, though, I can't live without Finnish food, whatever the season. But in the summer, most of the celebrating surrounds food. Maybe because the country is so cold most of the year, and only 3 months in the summer you can have fresh summer potatoes, the sweetest strawberries in the world (!), and fresh fish, we enjoy eating them so much.
Salad in a tin pot with a spoon and plastic fork. In the backgroung you can see a national dish: champignons filled with garlic cheese and wrapped in bacon. Just fry them on the grill and cry of happiness!
Well, these marinated fish condiments are far from fresh, but the atlantic herring is a summer thing, and Finns love it with new potatoes and butter.
I just had to make some 'mansikkamaito' (strawberries with milk), to soothe my home-ache... It's the simplest and healthiest thing, but so delicious, and reminds me of childhood. Although the German berries need to be sugared, and still can't quite beat the sweeties back home.
These are the real things, the Karelian pasties, that I keep talkin about. Somebody had grated the flour themselves, I thought that was pretty awesome.
Cinnamon rolls, Mocca-pies, coffeecakes, cookies, apple pie... guess where I was located all evening.
Blondes!
Ladies at their best: in national costumes and with a beer.
I could somewhat identify myself to these chicks, who were selling self-made goodies. They even invited me to their Student-community (wohoo!), although I gratuated a year ago. :) But I'm still equally poor and I totally lead the lifestyle (which is actually quite alarming).
Olivia & kukkaseppele ('flower garland')
Mölkky (throwing a wooden block on some wooden blocks). Good fun!
Little guy playing mölkky.
Germans trying to make a bonfire. Even little girls were like "that's nothing but a camp fire" (the difference in enormous, as you will see)...
...Until the Finns had to interfear, and we had a small but decent bonfire.
Some home made Salmari (Salmiakkikossu). It's a mixture of booze (vodka style) and salty liquorice. The proportion is like 99% booze, 1% candy. It still tastes like pure candy. Most foreigners hate it, and I do too, exactly because foreigners pass theirs on to me, "cos' you're Finnish" and that never ends up well. The flavour brings horrible flash backs and most of my friends can back me up on this. You know who you are. ;)
