Jose worked for Global Me in the autumn together with Anastasia and Jovana. Here's his experience, modified from his blog. In the project the interns taught multiculturalism at local schools.
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| Sunset on a pier |
Finland is Silence. It is getting off the plane on a Sunday in September and covering myself with a jacket because of the 14ºC instead of the usual 30ºC for me. It's a sunny summer day in Helsinki, which becomes cold and dark during the five-hour bus ride to Jyväskylä. An evening walk at 4ºC before arriving at my new home portrays a different autumn. It's moving from summer to winter. My room is empty, there is only something like a mattress on the floor. Security... Housing on the ground floor doesn't require bars. You can hang clothes in the garden which is on the street, they won't disappear. No need to be alert all day thinking about it, since you end up accepting that it is usual here. A normality that we [in my country] can't aspire in our wildest dreams. For the second time, internship abroad with AIESEC, this time with co-workers from Serbia and Moldova. The main objective: get out of the comfort zone.
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| Fall foliage |
Finland is snow in September. Jyväskylä, a university city of about one hundred thirty thousand inhabitants in the Central Finland region. Autumn is here, and the trees are turning red. On the road, looking at the range of colors that merge between lake and lake , the landscape is simply spectacular. The saying of "The country of thousand lakes" is widely justified.
Finland is peace and respect for others. Order and punctuality. Where things are done in another way. Peace is to be quietly eating in a restaurant, and chatting with your friends in a proper tone, without television or radio pounding your ears. Suddenly, you pause and you realize that you can't hear conversations from other tables because people are not screaming. The food, delicious by the way, tastes infinitely better, without stress. And in the highschools of the project, equally so. The lunch as a very late at 11 a. m. because they close the dining room at 12 a.m. Interesting change of habits, starting with meals. And they must be adjusted dinners at 5 or 6 p.m., because already is dark from 4 p.m... Daily sunshine hours are dwindling more and more, and the night is becoming eternal. My Finnish friends told me at the beginning: "Winter can be depressing because of the few hours of light." I don't consider it depressing. It is different. Depressing if you insist on bringing the lifestyle you have in Spain. You just have to adapt to it. It’s up to you.
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| JAMK university of applied sciences |
Finland doesn't have many foreigners, for the time being. As restless mind that I am, I make the effort to learn Finnish, even a little, to get a better understanding of the culture. The multicultural Center is not far and they give free language lessons to immigrants. I collaborate helping on the Spanish lessons for Finns who were living for a time in Spain and they don't want to forget the Spanish they learned. Tiinu, Mónica, Jukka, Louis, Rocío, Luis, Evelyn. What a great place to meet people from other countries: Colombia, Nepal, Thailand, Mexico, Somalia, USA, Italy, France, Russia, Germany, Venezuela, Poland, etc, or learn some basic words of Swahili.
Finland is the country where you go to a store, supermarket, pharmacy ... and you try to ask or talk in Finnish, and Finnish people smile and begin to speak in English to help you (not always could be extrapolated to bus drivers...). Finnish is a language spoken only by 5,4 million people in the country, and if you try to communicate in their language, you will get their sympathy. It may be because the ratio of immigrants is very low (approximately 2% of the population) in this region. Few foreign students dare to come in this latitudes.
Finland is the place in which at each meeting your friends are going to offer you coffee or tea, and a plate of fruit will be there. If in Germany one could say that the largest aisle is for chocolates or beer, here it is the fruits and vegetables aisle. Here is where I will try the first Shusi with Tsuri as host. Finland is that variety of food in the shops, with wide presence of functional foods, adapted to every need of the consumer. Here, each event / meeting, there is a suitable menu for vegetarians, lactose intolerant, and sometimes even for vegans.  |
| Project school |
Finland is where students going to speak as little as possible when they are in the group. No one wants to comment, as if what they could say is not interesting enough. It is humility, perhaps too much. The Finns will not show off if they don't know how to do it very very well. They speak Finnish, Swedish (also official in Finland, although they do not really like talk and study) and most of them English. And they speak it well, because the demand in the education system is very high. Sometimes they're too silent and no one knows what is going through their minds. Again, trying to communicate in Finnish is a useful icebreaker.
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| Nightlife |
Finland is a place where you will not make many friends. They are reserved, quiet, distant. A handshake is the norm in any greeting. No kisses or hugs, maybe a hug when you have more confidence. But the friends that you do make, will be good friends. Once you have confidence with them, they show you their customs, their dishes, their way of thinking. Everything at their own pace. Slow. The neighbors don't greet you when they see you, because they don't know you. Maybe in other countries people establish trusts too fast. The Finns will not bother you by offering you things or help, but when you need something and ask them about it, you'll have it.
Finland is undoubtedly Sauna. A birthday with sauna, a Local Commitee Meeting of AIESEC with sauna. New Members weekend in the forest, with sauna. This contrast of 90°C to 0ºC (or less) is an indescribable feeling, which I recommend to everyone. And sauna is also nudity, with Finnish normality. Normality, and their indifference about what others do or do not do. Gossip here loses its reason for being.
Finland is a sunset on the Lake with shades that make you speechless. And it is suitable because of the silence that reigns demands that. Sun doesn't rise too high, so it is a succession of sunrise-sunset from November.
Finland is also a little bit of Helsinki in the AIESEC national meeting. Many people so motivated to do things, with great ideas, developing future projects. Those weekends are too short. And at night, learning Finnish / German / English / Polish / Spanish with Antti on a whiteboard in a classroom, while others are sleeping. In silence. Normal, of course.
Finland is Talvikki, Piia, Kati, Antti, Tsuri, Kim, Anna, Amy, Dicle, Joanna, Kenan, Le, Marianne, Mira, Petteri, Riku, Thao, Jovana. And all those who have been part of this incredible and unforgettable adventure. Kiitos.
Finland is the place where you would like your family live. For me, normal.
