Going on to talk about an ugly, but ok book:
I cannot give a better advice than to enroll in a fulltime course and try your best for 2-3 months. Daily 8 hours of Finnish for that long will bring result. However I was recently contacted by Jeremy Taylor who suggested that a book, he put together could help anyone to learn Finnish easy. While I am doubtful of that, I also think the book looks awful, but don’t judge it by the cover (that is quite poor by the way), because the jokes are pretty good.

For all of you that want to read a real ugly, but otherwise quite entertaining book, it is published as an eBook and can be downloaded from:

Smashwords www.smashwords.com
Apple https://itunes.apple.com/
Barnes and Noble http://www.barnesandnoble.com/
Amazon http://www.amazon.com/

The book was published in print form in Norway, Sweden and Denmark.

The discussion went in a very predictable way. The Finnish speakers spoke about some outstanding problems, like freedom of speech being controlled not through censorship, but through economic means – those that don’t share the government’s values are not getting work or support from the government controlled artistic communities.. etc) – that Nobel-prize-winning Hungarian Jewish novelist has been  removed from the curriculum that is now populated by anti-Semitic writers. The opposing Hungarian speakers told of a European conspiracy led by the left-leaning opposition to badmouth the current Hungarian government. According to the Hungarian speakers, everything is perfectly OK.

The speakers touched on problems like the fast tracked law creation of the current government, emphasising that, for instance in Finland, a law has to be thoroughly discussed and accepted widely where in Hungary the opposition doesn’t have a chance to affect any law. In response, it was pointed out, that 5 laws out of 400 were proposed by the opposition. It was also mentioned that Hungarians living outside of Hungary are used for the political agenda of the current government, but the point has beed dismissed by the Hungarian lecturers.

A particularly nice point of the event was when Gábor Richly told the audience: contrary to common slander, no one with a healthy mind denies the Finno-Ugrian language theory. The audience – many of whom are openly denying such theory – watched with complete indifference. To be fair, it has to be mentioned that the audience were manly right-wing government supporters.

The audience asked questions but most of the questions were simple statements siding with the current Hungarian government. An elderly man quoted from the new Hungarian constitution stating that the current opposition is the successor of the Hungarian Communist party and therefore it is a criminal organization, adding that from such discussions emotions cannot be left out. Additional questions/statements were not friendly either:

“The news is only one-sided. Where were you when people were shot with plastic bullets during the last regime. No one wrote about that. In Hungary there is no anti-Semitism compared to France and the US.”

“Why is the Finnish media critical only now? Why were they not critical before, during the last regime? Europe is scared of Hungary, because things go so well.”

Yrjö Lautela Finnish-State-Journalism-Award-winning journalist had a simple question for the audience at the end of the discussion: What was Kádár’s role in the regime change?. The crowed got furious and shouted “[He was a] Traitor, Traitor, Traitor”. In the midst of the tumult Mr. Lautela left the auditorium.

The discussion was closed with a story by Urpo Kivikari, director of the panel discussion and Hungary’s Honorary Consul: “When Viktor Orbán, the current Prime Minister of Hungary, visited Finland in the beginning of the 2000s, we went on a boat trip and he asked me: How can Hungary become Finland? I was shocked and told him, I cannot answer such a question but I told how Finland got to the place it is now. ” – He sounded sad and tired.

Indeed Hungary got far. Farther from Finland than it was 10 years ago.

While ties to a motorcycle gang is not a criminal offence Putin does on occasion look to care a little too much – to put it mildly – about Night Wolves – or Nochniye Volki – that are known to be a  rebellious,  counter cultural gang that grew out of the anti-Soviet “rock culture” of the 1980s. For instance last year’s July, he kept the Ukrainian leader waiting just to meet the Night Wolves gang’s leader instead. He also appeared to give a speech in the same year’s August at a biker show hosted by the Night Wolves that was held on the waterfront in Novorossiysk. He went on to say in his speech: You are not just having fun and riding motorcycles, but you combine it with excellent patriotic events that are vital to our people and country. He surely did not foresee the patriotic gang shootings that followed that year’s November. While he appears to like macho posturing he doesn’t forget to decorate his chest with his grandmother’s ornate Russian Orthodox crucifix on occasions like meeting George Bush.

Putin is also known to be a new “holy” figure for the orthodox church and thus the “national leader” is credited of resurrecting the personal cult well known from the time of Stalin. While he has many sides and it is vividly argued whether he is a bad or a great leader of the Russian people, someone in Finland really wants him behind bars. During Easter Putin’s name has been placed in the National Bureau of Investigation’s register. The register is supposed to list individuals that may be a treat to Finland. Just when the public uproar is subsiding Putin’s name turns out to be in an other register of the National Bureau of Investigation. A list that collects information of organised crime. The case is being investigated while bringing embarrassment to Finland once again. Or does it really? Does the Finnish police know something that eluded the media so far? Unlikely, however the case can be made, that Putin’s shady regime deserves such misunderstanding, but getting the Russian President arrested, even theoretically is not good for foreign relations.

For instance every second Dental X-Ray Machine is produced in Finland. The health technology sector includes almost two hundred companies that give job for tens of thousands of people in Finland. The pride of the sector according to news agencies lies in the fact that the production is still in Finland, and was not transfered to “cheap countries”.

By: Malene Wiborg Serup malene@kridthus.com

The Finish/Danish band Koskelainen/Andreasen Near Life Experience invites 69 people on tour with them. The tour goes from Aarhus, Denmark to Helsinki, Finland with 10 stops in 10 days in 4 countries. The audience travels on the bus with the band. Aside from the 6 planned concerts the tour will also offer a variety of activities so the travelers can experience the local culture in the different Nordic countries together with their fellow travelers. The tour is a pro bono project for the innovation company, Kridthus, in Aarhus, Denmark. Anne Gadeberg, co owner of Kridthus explains: “Every year we take on a couple of selected pro bono projects within the area of culture and art. It is a way for us to maintain our creative form and have the possibility to affect the cultural environment in an experimental way at the same time. Here we have room to be creative in relation to coordinating an event like this and attract an audience as well as overseeing the economic aspect of it”

Crowdsourcing
Everyone will have a say in how the tour is shaped. Before the tour a Facebook page will be launched where people can give their input as to which activities the audience should experience, which local bands to check out and where to stay each night and so much more. This way the audience will get to experience places and people not listed in a guidebook. This is a unique and outstanding rethinking of a folk high school stay and a concert experience all rolled into one amazing experience.

The music
“Koskelainen/Andreasen is a modern show ensemble which delivers, often improvised, live shows. The shows are powerful, chaotic, playful and a wild experience” explains Jonas Andreasen.

The compositions are originals by Sini Koskelainen and Jonas Andreasen who have also incorporated modern dance and visuals in their performance. The Nordic Culture Fund has granted 150.000 DKK (approximately 20.000 Euros) to create a concert tour containing modern jazz, poetry, improv and dance on the audiences’ terms. “We in Koskelainen/Andreasen Near Life Experience are very grateful for the money which the Nordic Culture fund has granted us. It is a sign of faith which we take very seriously. We promise to create a lot of new and insisting music. I am looking forward to going on this tour along with the band and with them, and the audience, get this music to live up to its full potential.” Says Jonas Andreasen. For a tiny taste of what can be expected check out this video on YouTube:

Who was the eight-year-old girl who suffocated while tied to a sofa last spring? She was a girl who didn’t even have her own name.

That day, she had put a tiara on her head. And wearing that tiara, she died during the night.

The girl was first rate. She liked everything that sparkled. On Mondays, she went to choir practice; on Tuesdays, a sports club; on Sundays, track and field.

She was fitting in; she was liked; she was engaged in the society around her.

The girl was lying like a package on the sofa-bed with a purple and red tiara on her head. Her hands were bound together with packing tape and cable ties, according to the father in front, but in the opinion of the mother, behind her back. The didn’t even remember which that night. The girl had been sleeping with her hands tied for months.

For almost as long, the girl had also been swaddled in a sheet. The fabric was closed sometimes with clothes pins and sometimes with tape and then gradually, both. At first, the girls face was left uncovered. Then later, this too was covered with the sheet.

The father recalls that the girl used to play around with the sheet. The sheet rose and fell with the rhythm of her breathing, in and out.

The girl wasn’t blowing anymore. That night, she was wrapped more tightly than ever before; a sheet was not enough. Huge green tarps had been used around which plenty of brown tape was wound.

The father and stepmother wanted to relax; they were focused on the Wallander movie. But the girl was being disruptive, annoying. She was banging her head against the sofa-bed frame. And there was no place to escape from the sound in that tiny studio apartment, where the adults’ double bed was less than a meter away from her sofa.

“That’s why they had covered her mouth with tape. That’s why they had covered her face with tape.

At about three, there was silence.

The Nameless Girl

The girl did not have a name. She had different names in different places.

For the first six years and two months, she was Eerika. The girl was Eerika as long as she had lived with her mother.

In a way, her life at that time was rosy. She was Eerika. She lived together with her mother in Mellunmäki in East Helsinki. She had a rabbit. Her father had moved away when she was four-months old.

At that time, the girl’s mother had discovered about her husband seeing a 14-year-old girl. The father was later convicted. But the girl was hardly aware of all this.

The girl’s life was as sunny as it would be when her mother was having a problem with alcohol; when her brother was taken into care; when her mother and father were arguing so much that her father was given a restraining order; when her home was in an unacceptable condition.

The girl was six years and two months old when she was taken into care. The girl moved in with her father. She was allowed to meet her mother in a controlled meeting place, every two weeks.

Gradually the girl became Vilja.

At kindergarten, the girl had introduced herself as Eerika. Also, to her new neighbors, the girl had introduced herself as Eerika. At track and field competitions in the autumn, she was announced as the old name though at school she was beginning to be called Vilja. Her paternal grandparents called her Eerika instead of Vilja. They sometimes called her Vilja Eerika.

Eerika or Vilja, she now lived in Puotila with her dad, Touko, a truck driver-karaoke host-free lance musician. Her father did not drink. He had been sober for seven years. He went to AA on Fridays.

The girl no longer had a rabbit but she had a stepmother, a French-Moroccan Nadia Berough. Nadia took care of the girl while her father earned a living. Nadia was always there.

However, the home was small, only 30 square meters. They wanted to move to a bigger place; the step-mother was pregnant.

The girl’s life was once again kind of sunny.

The Naughty Girl

In early autumn 2011, the girl began running circles in the yard.

The ran 200-meter loop along the walking path through the sixties houses where old oaks grew and squirrels scurried. There was a courtyard at the girl’s home where everyone would leave bikes and beach toys at night. The girl ran past the laundry room, over the speed-bump, past the flower boxes and around the brick barbecue.

The neighbors started to notice the girl running around and around.

The girl did not seem to enjoy running. Sometimes she had bruises on her face.

Once the girl, after a running a couple of hours, she stopped and shouted at the balcony, “Can I come in yet?” Her father responded, “How many have you done?” “96,” she said.

96 laps? Bruises on her face? Child protect was notified.

The girl was running because she was being punished, the father later explained to the police. The girl was forced to run, because otherwise she would not be outdoors, the stepmother explained.

Both agreed about one thing, the girl was naughty. She destroyed her clothes, her boots. She destroyed her dad’s debit cards and guitar strings. The girl was hiding things. The girl was slow; she resisted. The girl intentionally did things to annoy her parents.

The girl ran because she was overweight. Her dad believed that she had gained weight since her life was chaotic while she was with her mother. According to the stepmother, the girl was large because she had been allowed to eat what she wanted there.

Her father and stepmother were of the opinion that her wrists were thick. When they were tied together, it took five cable ties: two for each wrist and then one more to tie them together.

The Ignorant Girl

At around the same time the running began, the girl started school. The girl enjoyed it there.

On the first day, the girl was shy. She lagged behind the other children. She was placed in a special needs group. She didn’t dare say a word.

The girl did luckily remember her name. When the teacher asked the children to write their names on the board, she scribbled VILJA in capital letters. The girl knew that she was no longer Eerika; she was the first-grade Vilja.

In the autumn, the girl cheered up. She was still suspicious with strangers. She was like a depressed Little Myy. But among those she knew, she became another girl; a girl who worked diligently and looked forward to school; a girl who wanted to learn new things.

However, the girl was not well-received in the schoolyard at her new school. The other children knew each other from kindergarten. The girl, on the other hand, had come from a different kindergarten. She had started first grade where her family was planning to move.

Even if the girl was not bullied, she was somehow separate. Her clothes were different. They were strangely worn. Her hair was odd. There were strange hairless patches; bruises and scrapes here and there.

And she was late. The first time she arrived late to school was the last day of August.

The teacher spoke to her father. In her teacher’s opinion, her journey to school was a bit long for a first grader alone. Her father believed that missing the morning’s activities at school was a good punishment.

They tried to talk to the girl about her injuries at school. I don’t know, she told the school nurse. I don’t know, she told the principal.

She never knew anything about her scuffs or scrapes.

The Happy Girl

Her symptoms disappeared. The girl’s naughtiness ended suddenly.

Her symptoms were resolved when the girl was temporarily removed from her father’s care. She was assigned to a group home in Herttoniemi.

The girl no longer had any bruises, scrapes or injuries. The bald patches no longer appeared. The girl was no longer late for morning activities. The girl was no longer late for school and she no longer had worn-out clothes; no longer was she hiding things nor wetting the bed. She didn’t even play with her food.

While she was at the group home, the girl was cheerful and talkative; a girl who had a great sense of humor; a girl who arrived at school in high spirits by taxi every morning; a girl who visited other children at home comfortably. The girl was popular at school with both girls and boys.

On weekends, she visited her father and stepmother’s house. The girl seemed very happy with the visits. The father applied to have the girl returned to him and she was.

For a while, the relationship between father and daughter seemed to be very good. It seemed to be warming.

However, when it was time to move back to her father, the girl was again crying. But other children were in the same situation. What could they do with her?

She would not be sent to her mother, who had applied to have custody herself. The district court issued an interim order. The child would return to live with her father.

So she moved back in with her father and stepmother despite the fact that the girl’s mother gotten her life back on track.

So despite claims of abuse by the girl’s mother, she was sent back to live with her father in Puotila. The girl refused to speak about her injuries. She would only say, “I don’t know.” But the mother noticed bruises.

However, the court believed that the father would get better.

The Gagging Girl

The facts are these:

On Friday, April 13th, in the spring of 2012, she went to her paternal grandfather’s for a sleepover without outer clothing. They were torn.

On the morning of the same day, she was 30 minutes late for school. She had a bruise under her eye and a scratch on her cheek. She only responded, “I don’t know,” to the teacher’s questions.

On that same day, her father had taken a picture of his daughter. In the picture, his daughter was crying and had some jewelry in her hand.

Later, the father explained to the police, that the girl was holding her stepmother’s jewelry. The girl had hidden the jewelry and nail polish as well. The stepmother caught the girl red-handed.

The stepmother then called Touko to take the picture of his daughter. The picture was taken in order to show her grandmother had naughty she was.

There are other pictures and videos. In one the girl’s crying face is smeared with berry soup. In another, the girl is being force fed, she vomits and cries. In a third, the girl is dressed in jaggedly cut clothing. Facts, the pictures are facts.

Text messages too are facts. Texts sent to Touko from Nadia.

“What do you think about the trick Vilja pulled on Monday,” she texted Touko on the same day as the picture of the torn clothing was taken.

It is also true that Touko’s apartment had exceptionally poor sound insulation. There was no insulation around the pipes. The shouting was heard by the neighbors word for word. Even the gagging was audible.

The fighting was particularly bad at eight in the morning before the girl went to school. There was a lot of gagging in the morning and in the evening as well.

The worst were the cries from the woman. The woman screamed “Cow” at the girl. “Whore! Fat! You are so fat you have no friends!”

On the other hand, she was punished for not eating.

Mostly the girl didn’t respond. Sometimes she retched but mostly she just cried.

The Bruised Girl

As spring approached the destruction of the girl continued. Her school books were cut. Her back pack in which she carried her things was cut. After Labor Day, her books disappeared entirely.

“I do not know,” she said. The books probably fell out on the ground somewhere, she thought.

The injuries also continued. A black eye at the end of March. A huge bruise on her stomach on May 9th to which the girl responded, “I don’t know.”

And when on May 11th, her mother asked her about her black eye, she refused to answer.

The school notified child protection services, got in touch with her social worker, called the father and asked the social worker for help. All this was in vain; no progress was made.

The girl was sleeping at night with her hands tied, swaddled in clothing, tied to the sofa.

On the last day of her life, Saturday May 12th, the girl asked to go to the bathroom at 11:30 in the morning. The girl was released from the swaddle of clothing and the cable ties were removed.

However, according to the father, he went to grandmother’s to say that she would not be allowed to go there. The girl had hidden the house keys. The girl had to be punished.

Much later, when the grandfather was going through his son’s apartment, the keys were found high on a shelf in the closet. They were so high that the first grader could not have placed them there.

But on the last day of the girl’s life, the keys were missing. That’s why she spent the day at her stepmother’s side.

Upon his return from his mother’s, her hands were already again tied.

The Quiet Girl

And so the evening came. The cable ties came, the tarp came, and the night progressed, the whole package. The Wallander movie came on. The heavy knee of her stepmother pushed on her stomach. Her father sat on her legs. The terrible punches came.

From Saturday to Sunday, Mother’s Day

At four a.m., the adults woke up. The stepmother went to pee. The dad shook the girl and then went to the balcony to smoke.

Then the adults cut her out of her restraints. They put the tarp into its bag and closed it. The father called emergency services and the stepmother tried to revive her.

When the ambulance and police arrived the girl’s lips were blue. The spikes of the tiara had been forced into her skin.

Four plastic beads had come off her tiara.

Source & Image: Seura.fi

Communications Manager for Sinebrychoff (makers of Karhu beer), Timo Mikkola, does not remember having heard previously of any similar cases.

“There was likely to have been some sort of human error during the bottle filling process,” Mikkola says.

According to Mikkola, a whole batch with the wrong cap is unlikely because then this would have been spotted during production.

“Both caps are the same, clean bottle caps, so there was no qualitative defect in the product. The visual identity, of course, was incorrect,” Mikkola says.

Both products are manufactured at Sinebrychoff in Kerava. The company bottles about half of the soft drinks and beer sold in Finland.

Details of the incident are being forwarded to our customer service department, so that we can find out where the error occurred,” Mikkola continued.

Source & Image: Aamulehti

Curious footsteps have appeared in the accumulated snow around the boat. Someone has come across the ice by snowmobile to marvel at the ice-bound boat. There are even fox tracks around the boat.

Generally motorboats leave the little jetty during the winter. At the first sign of ice, they are swiftly moved to safety.

One boat equipped with an outboard engine that has been left in the pier has attracted attention in Hämeenlinna this cold winter. People walk to the beach to marvel at the sight. Especially since the sight can be seen from the windows of some of the most luxurious apartments in the city.

The neat looking boat with an outboard engine is sitting in the city-owned Vanaja pier which is located on the south side of Hämeenlinna city center. The engine is down in the frozen lake. Ice and snow have accumulated inside the boat. The reinforced plastic hull is being squeezed on every side by thick ice of Vanaja lake.

Who is responsible?

“It is the owner’s responsibility. If the mooring fee has been paid and it is in working order, all the responsibility for the motorboats lies with the owner,” says Jukka Kuvaja, of the Hämeenlinna City outdoor leisure center.

“The situation changes if the mooring fee has not been paid. If the city must pay the rent for the slip then the boat becomes property of the city.”

Such cases are quite rare. According to Kuvaja, they don’t happen every year in Hämeenlinna. There was agreement at the Hämeenlinna Boat Club. According to them, there have only been a few boats left in the ice in the last two decades.

Townspeople are left wondering what happened to the owner of the boat left stuck in the ice.

Source & Image: YLE

The backpack, left in the cloakroom by a customer aroused staff suspicions due to a strong smell. The incident occurred early Sunday morning in Helsinki’s Casino restaurant.

The staff informed police, who sent a patrol. By that time, the owner of the backpack had already claimed it and left the restaurant. The police caught up with him in the street.

Upon closer examination, it was revealed that the backpack contained a jar of cannabis. The case in being investigated as a drug offense.

Source: Iltalehti

Image: M. Martin Vicente

It was December 2010 when I left everything behind. I packed only a book about mushrooms and a Finnish thesaurus. After thirty years in Finland, I left everything else in Helsinki. My entire family, my three-year-old daughter Reema and I, left for Amsterdam.

In five years, Finland will celebrate the centennial of its independence. By then, my daughter will have lived most of her life away from Finland. Why would my child, who won the lottery, leave it unclaimed?

I arrived in Finland, a 20-year-old Palestinian girl, in 1981. At that time, there was no internet or globalization. When the plane landed in Helsinki-Vantaa Airport, the Arabic language, music, the food, the jokes, colors, my friends, all was left behind for good. Finnish became my identity, nature, language and life. I grew up a Finn in Finland.

People in Finland always shouted things at me. For thirty years, I heard the entire spectrum of insults: raghead, terrorist, Ali Baba, Mussulman…but even I hadn’t thought that black skin would be a magnet for such hatred.

My adoptive daughter is Zulu, born in Johannesburg, South Africa. When she was a year old, sitting in her pram with a pacifier in her mouth, we were waiting for the metro in Helsinki. An eighty-year-old woman walked directly up to the baby and cried out, “Fucking nigger!”

She looked around waving her arms to show others what she had found, “Look, a fucking nigger!”

The old woman was not insane and not drunk, but just an ordinary human being who could have been pushed under the subway train with a little nudge.

About three times a month, an ordinary Finn thus shamed my daughter in front of her mother. Teenage boys at a tram stop might say “Nigger, nigger”, laughing.

After a Finnair flight to Paris, a forty-something couple approached my two-year-old daughter who was standing at the baggage claim conveyor. I smiled as I thought they were going to say something cute. The man pushed his head close to my daughter and growled, “Damn nigger, hands off the bags!”

With the repetition of such scenes, I wasn’t sure how I would convince my daughter to believe that she was a precious person, that she is really valuable.

My three-year old and I waved goodbye to Finland and we arrived two years ago in the Netherlands. We are unlikely to return.

It was only in Amsterdam, however, that I realized how Finnish I am.

My new country is one in which the most hair gel is used and least work is done in Western Europe. My child’s schoolmates’ parents work 2-4 days a week. Almost everyone seems to be satisfied to, if not enjoy, offering help to others.

Neighbors appear at my door to repair the heating, unblock the taps, help with my daughter or teach her to ride a bicycle. As a Finn, I would prefer to receive the repair instructions through the door but keep the helpers behind it.

Along with Dutch, my daughter’s school has, amongst others, Moroccans, Surinamese, Italians and Britons. Every morning I dread taking my daughter to kindergarten because it requires a real mow ‘em -down attitude.

I am, in fact, the only parent who leaves the class at 8:30. Others will stay there to read to the children in groups, look for lice in the children’s hair or teach the guitar. Parents have their own dedicated room at the school and their own school band and they frequently visit each other’s houses.

Every single morning these mothers and fathers interrogate each other about their children are doing. There I am, the uncomprehending, silent mother who drops off her child and sneaks away.

And on the bus, I’m the one who is searching for the place to sit where no one is sitting next to me. At children’s birthday parties, I’m the one hoping that the minute the parents arrive to collect their children, they do so and vanish.

So I march into the principal’s office to ask him what all these hobbies have to do with the actual curriculum of the school. Why don’t these parents have lives? Why do they get so entangled in the affairs of the school?

The principal looks at me as if I’m speaking Finnish. He points out that the school’s mission is to bring children, parents, school and society together. If you do not learn how to navigate in the culture, information is of no importance, he says.

I realize that these parents are similar in their sociability to Palestinians. Closer than I am! I am used to Finland where the system replaces participation. Thank you, but I have a job!

My daughter is attending school with the children of the Dutch Deputy Prime Minister and a child who father would not bring his daughter to play with us because a single zipper on her jacket was broken. Both live on the same block.

The new, architecturally stunning economic and ethnic mix of Amsterdam would certainly be repellant in Finland. Million-euro apartments are found just above and below state housing apartments which are divided into different ethnic groups. All these brown faces with hats and scarves leave the recesses of their Alvar Aalto style houses and all the inhabitants come to the same school.

People of Amsterdam have two common sayings. The first is, “Why not?” and the second is “Says who?” Children of Amsterdam have been shown to have a better self-confidence than say those of Madrid.

This equality arises from the fact that different classes of people, the poor, the rich, peasants, the unemployed and millionaires, appear to be the same socially. There is no resentment of physical labor. Here it is taken for granted that it deserves respect.

Finnish society starts from the premise that with diversity there is automatically a hierarchy. This gives rise of Mr. Angry, Helsinki-envy and resentment of foreigners. In Finland, it is believed that differences must be fought because diversity creates a different footing. Equality comes for sameness.

Social status and income inequality based on the spiritual hierarchy in the Netherlands is much milder than in Finland. This facilitates the growth of a multicultural society. Let’s take an example:

Rotterdam, the world’s second largest port after Shanghai, has a higher education and income level than the Dutch average, but Rotterdam is receives also more immigrants from outside the industrialized group of nations than any other Dutch city.

The mayor of this “Gateway to Europe” is a muslim of Moroccan decent, Ahmed Aboutaleb. It was a long time before I heard about this muslim mayor because it is not noteworthy.

Rightwing politician Geert Wilders and Mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb live side by side here in this shiny hair-geled country.

To get cheap laughs at a party I wait until guests have a mouth-full of wine and then ask, “Do you know how we call people like Geert Wilders in Finland?” I pause and then say, “Immigrant-critics!”

The power of the laughter erupts the wine from their mouths. I experience a feeling of liberation because it means that I am not crazy, I’m not alone.

Finnish society has changed. It allows a kind of psychological violence to be perpetrated on migrants which it would by no means tolerate against women, Swedish-speakers, Jews, the disabled or sexual minorities. In Finland, racism has become an intellectual participation in a democratic society.

Migrants do not appear in leadership positions at heart of Finnish society: in politics, finance, education, science or the arts. If you come across a black man in these areas, he’s holding a broom and a rag.

In Finland, who has the power to decide who is in and who is out? Who are those who are excluded from the Finnish and Swedish-Finnish power?

It is only the academically educated, liberal and international folks who speak about the importance of multiculturalism. Once, I had a long discussion about how power could be shared in a new multicultural society with a Swedish-Finnish friend. My friend pointed out that the Swedish language cannot compromise on its position: “Take (power) from the Finnish speakers.”

A Helsinki Green politician in turn said that foreigners who come to Finland are different from those of the rest of Europe. Finland gets the worst, the uneducated.

When new minority delegates were sought in Finland in 2010, there were two qualified and experienced candidates from Muslim backgrounds, from the group whose expertise in dealing with minority problems was desperately needed.

Officials decided, however, to appoint the unqualified Swedish-speaking applicant, Eva Biaudet. The Greens bit their tongues and supported the decision.

What about those two qualified, experienced candidates? What were they told? They weren’t even given an interview. Not necessary in Finland. In Finland, there are supposedly no social distinctions. We immigrants in Finland appreciate the humor.

In 2010, I received an invitation to the Independence Day celebrations from the President. My three-year-old daughter heard that her mother was going to the castle. Putting on her jacket, the child said, “Mom, I too want to go to the Queen’s castle.”

That a small South African-Finnish girl wanted to go to the party and identify with the female president, Tarja Halonen, and what she stood for made me grateful. I described the episode in a note and slipped it to the president when we were shaking hands.

The headlines in the press was “Abu-Hanna gives the president an angry letter from her daughter. In the media, the story was of a respectful and well-meaning Finland and its symbol, the president, and the dark, strange woman whose small child had already been taught to hate the Finnish.

This is just one example of my experience with this pathological feeling towards diversity. We have a complete picture and the story of ‘the others’ and their ‘real’ feelings towards the Finnish. This reminds them of their enemies who are used to war-torn societies. To Finland are we ‘others’ coming here to fight?

I was elected to the Helsinki City Council in 1987. In the Greens’ meeting room in Senate Square, new politicians were laughing. Frilly curtains hung from floor to ceiling reminiscent of a joyful brothel. Then members were elected to the committees. Pekka Haavisto said, “Ummaya should be put on an important committee, for all the good it will do. I suggest the property commission.”

That’s how it was in the 1980s when Finland had a clear determination to create a multicultural country.

In 1990, Heidi Hautala asked to me run for a candidate for parliament. I refused because I was not ready to be an MP at that stage of my life. Hautala reassured me, “We need the traits that you have. I can assure you that you have no chance of being elected. Your becoming an MP would be very difficult.”

When I was in Prague on election night, news arrived that I had been elected. Upon recount, fortunately, the decision was reversed.

In the 2004 European elections I got 12,730 votes. Not to downplay my own skills or work, I can say that there is a very strong will of the people to move towards a more international and multicultural society. This strong desire for change in Finland should not be overlooked.

Selling the idea of Europeanism required a great campaign to which politicians and the media were committed. Europe is seen as a step forward. Multiculturalism, in media, however, is seen otherwise.

In the 1980s, plastic bags were seen as the symbols of progress and modern life. Now, we understand the value of paper bags, because we have realized the world has changed.

In terms of ethnicity, Finland is still at the glossy plastic-bag stage.

Finnish was the sixth language I learned, so I don’t feel like starting to learn Dutch. But I did not imagine that the only member of my family would speak in a language that I do not understand. Rather, I can understand the words, “pork, rabbit, fart, do not knock, go, her eminence Princess Maxima, is beautiful.

Without apartheid, I would not have my daughter, my dearest family member. Without British colonialism and European anti-Semitism, Palestine would be and I would not have necessarily be in Europe. Destinies and families like mine will increase in the future.

Without Finnish pain and fear of globalization, my daughter and I would not be here sitting on the couch texting with other five-year-olds about skating and cookie recipes.

In Amsterdam, I’ve been amazed at the attitudes of white laborers. In two years, every single bus driver, plumber, garbageman, official and police officer have kindly treated this non-Dutch-speaking Arab woman and her young black daughter.

Racism cannot survive unless it is approved by fundamental cultural traits. In Finland, the migrant is forced to accept his/her place in the hierarchy of society.

Someone from Amsterdam can be understood even without knowing the language. Here a social integration project is unnecessary. “Amsterdam is the sum of its inhabitants” sounds very different from the “Learn from a resident and you can be almost as good”.

In five years, Finland will celebrate the centennial anniversary of its independence. I wish we had a story of a new Finland which is alive and accepting.

At the European Cultural Foundation dinner, Princess Laurentien is giving an entertaining speech. My cell phone rings. Might my brother be calling about my daughter? Because of the thick walls, reception is poor. I run through the restaurant to the street. Standing in the yellow glare of the street lamps in the snow in a thin dress, I answer.

My brother whispers, “Reema just fell asleep. Go back and enjoy yourself.”

Wiping the wet snow from my cheeks, I look around trying to figure out where I am. After years in Finland, the reality of Amsterdam flows over me.

A group walks past and a man winks and smiles. In this country, a wink means, “cheer up and enjoy yourself, good soul!” I smile. I know that my snoring daughter is safe and all is well. It’s time to return to the princess’s entourage.

Source: Helsingin Sanomat