Flammie A Pirinen on github pages
This rant has probably at leats two goals: to make you understand my behaviour, faux pas, and reactions and help you not to confuse me or other finns or even others from non-anglosphere cultures. It’s probably also just funny stuff about Finnish culture.
In the so-called western society there is a wide-spread idea that we are mostly from the same cultural background and have same kind of practices and rules of interaction. This is actually based on the concept that we all grow up with hollywood movies and US American (I sometimes use the term American when meaning USA) tv series and that becomes our culture, but it doesn’t actually work like that. As an academic immigrant for nearly a decade now I can well tell you all that our cultures are in fact very different in very basic every day fundamental stuff even. And one of the reasons why it goes so wrong is that both US Americans and Finns who don’t travel much and don’t interact with different cultures much do not actually realise how differently we view the US American entertainment. Like for example, if in tv series friends there’s a joke about nudity, both a Finn and American watching the show will laugh at same thing, but unknowing to each other the Finn will laugh at what they think is hyperbole of US American people’s shame of nudity in all forms, some will learn that it is not hyperbole over time but many will not; I know this experience is outdated a bit but there will always be similar happenings in contemporary entertainment, I believe Friends as a comedy series is probably better known throughout the generations than more modern example (also there is a growing concensus that friends has not aged all too well with regards to it’s humour).
In Finland at least how I grew up it is very unusual to call person by name in a typical conversation, whereas in English-speaking cultures it is not unusual even when talking one-on-one. So the two situations I can think of someone calling my name in Finland is:
Therefore if it’s friendly discussion among peers (in reasonably uncrowded place that requires no extra shouting) and someone repeatedly names me, my first thought will be I done something wrong. I think even in English this can be used effectively with some extra tones and emphases: So, Irene, tell us, what is your solution to the problem, Irene.
The politeness levels are one of the most surprising and risky things in any culture, because there is a huge potential to offend, but also because such rules of good behaviour are learnt very early in one’s lifetime, most people will hold on to what their parents or guardians taught them very tightly and assign very strong universality to that.
In English speaking cultures there is a strong rule to always say please or thank you after most of the interactions with other people, and not doing so is seen as a purposeful insult. This works with friends and relatives as well as bartenders in cheap dive bars and expensive fine dining, no way around it. In Finland, it is nearly impossible to say kiitos (thank you) or ole hyvä (please) without sounding sarcastic or rude, asking you’re friends or relatives for a thing is anna(tko) X:n (gimme(?) X) and I don’t think there is a thing to say when you pass something, or maybe joo (yeah), if you say like saisinko X:n kiitos (may I have X please) it really sounds like you are early level language learner or being rather sarcastic akin to “would you be so kidn as to entertain the possibility of passing me the X kind sir please”.
Which does remind of another thing in the politeness scale, many languages in Asia have politeness baked in to the system so strongly that e.g. native speakers of many Indian languages struggle not addressing people sir, with at least some of the English speakers in UK, Ireland and the USA it invokes the same kind of weird feeling as thanking about everything does to me as a Finn.
Nudity is not a big deal in Finland, and not sexual per se, just simple as that. If you are trying to make things sexual by just being nude you probably will fail with a Finn. If you go to a Finnish sauna you might see nude people enjoying the sauna and no sex. It’s actually too hot for sex in proper sauna anyways.
There is a huge difference in western cultures into what is considered as a norm when it comes to looking at other people, looking into their eyes specifically and smiling at them. People who come from the English speaking world often think that their way is the gold standard and everything else is rude. This means, in public you are not allowed to look at other people for more than maybe a second, and if they notice you looking at them you are required to whip your head into other direction within a millisecond, anything else would be rude and creepy. Finnish people in Helsinki area follow this guideline quite a bit I feel. In east Finland it didn’t used to be like that, you can look at people in the public and when they notice you looking you smile and/or nod. And that is polite.
Links: