Finlândia (Finlandês: Suomi. Sueco: Finlândia) está no norte da Europa e tem fronteiras com a Rússia ao leste, Noruega ao norte e Suécia ao oeste. A Finlândia é um estado de bem-estar completamente moderno com pequenas cidades e cidades bem planejadas e confortáveis, mas ainda oferece vastas áreas de natureza intocada. A Finlândia tem aproximadamente 188 mil lagos (cerca de 10 do país) e um número similar de ilhas. Na parte mais ao norte do país, as luzes do norte podem ser vistas no inverno e no sol da meia-noite no verão. Os finlandeses também reivindicam a montanha mítica de Korvatunturi como a casa do Papai Noel, e uma indústria turística crescente na Lapônia atende aos fãs de Santa. Apesar de viver em um dos países mais tecnicamente desenvolvidos do mundo, os finlandeses adoram ir às suas casas de verão nos meses mais quentes para desfrutar de todo tipo de passatempos relaxantes, incluindo sauna, natação, pesca e churrasco. Hoje, a Finlândia tem uma linguagem e uma cultura distintivas que o separam do resto da Europa nórdica. Entenda Editar História Editar O Castelo de São Olafs, o castelo medieval mais ao norte do mundo, construído em Savonlinna pela Suécia em 1475 Não se sabe muito sobre a história inicial da Finlands, com os arqueólogos ainda debatendo quando e onde uma tribo de palestrantes Finno-Ugric surgiram. O historiador romano Tácito menciona uma tribo primitiva e selvagem Fenni em 100AD e até mesmo os vikings escolheram não se instalar, negociar e saquear ao longo das costas. Em meados da década de 1150, a Suécia começou a conquistar e cristianizar os pagãos finlandeses com seriedade, com Birger Jarl incorporando a maior parte do país à Suécia em 1249. A Finlândia permaneceu parte integrante da Suécia até o século 19, embora houvesse uma guerra quase constante Com a Rússia na fronteira oriental e duas ocupações breves. Após a derrota desastrosa final da Swedens na guerra finlandesa de 1808-1809, a Finlândia tornou-se em 1809 um grande ducado autônomo sob o domínio russo. A regra russa alternava entre a tolerância e a repressão e já havia um importante movimento de independência quando a Rússia mergulhou no caos revolucionário em 1917. O Parlamento aproveitou a chance e declarou a independência em dezembro, obtendo rapidamente o consentimento soviético, mas o país rapidamente se precipitou em uma civilização breve mas amarga Guerra entre os brancos conservadores e os vermelhos socialistas, eventualmente conquistados pelos brancos. Durante a Segunda Guerra Mundial, a Finlândia foi atacada pela União Soviética na Guerra do Inverno. Mas lutou contra eles para uma paralisação que viu a URSS conquistar 12 do território finlandês. A Finlândia, em seguida, se aliou com a Alemanha em uma tentativa mal sucedida de repelir os soviéticos e recuperar o território perdido, foi derrotada e, como condição para a paz, teve que se voltar contra a Alemanha. Assim, a Finlândia lutou três guerras separadas durante a Segunda Guerra Mundial. No final, a Finlândia perdeu grande parte de Karelia e Finlands segunda cidade de Vyborg. Mas os soviéticos pagaram um preço pesado por eles com mais de 300 mil mortos. Após a guerra, a Finlândia estava na zona cinza entre os países ocidentais e a União Soviética. O Pacto finno-soviético de amizade, cooperação e assistência mútua comprometeu a Finlândia a resistir aos ataques armados da Alemanha ou dos seus aliados (leia: Oeste), mas também permitiu que a Finlândia permanecesse neutra na Guerra Fria e evitasse um governo comunista ou membro do Pacto de Varsóvia . Na política, havia uma tendência de evitar políticas e declarações que poderiam ser interpretadas como anti-soviéticas. Este equilíbrio de finlândia foi definido com humor como a arte de se curvar ao Oriente sem lua no Oeste. Apesar das estreitas relações com a União Soviética, a Finlândia conseguiu manter eleições democráticas multipartidárias e se manteve uma economia de mercado da Europa Ocidental, construindo laços estreitos com seus vizinhos nórdicos. Apesar de alguns momentos tensos, a Finlândia conseguiu: no meio século subsequente, o país fez uma transformação notável de uma economia agrícola para uma economia industrial moderna diversificada com gigantes de alta tecnologia como a Nokia e a renda per capita agora está no Top 15 do mundo. Após a implosão da URSS, a Finlândia se juntou à União Européia em 1995 e foi o único estado nórdico a se juntar ao sistema do euro em sua iniciação em janeiro de 1999. Geografia Edit Ao contrário da Noruega esbelta e da Suécia, a Finlândia consiste principalmente em baixa, plana para rolar Planícies intercaladas com lagos e colinas baixas, com montanhas (de um tipo) apenas no extremo norte, enquanto o ponto mais alto de Finlands, Fell Halti, sobe apenas para um modesto 1,328m. A Finlândia possui 187.888 lagos de acordo com a Pesquisa Geológica da Finlândia, tornando o moniker Land of the Thousand Lakes realmente uma subestimação. Ao longo da costa e nos lagos são 8212 de acordo com outra estimativa de 8212179,584 ilhas, tornando o país também um excelente destino de barco. A Finlândia não está localizada na península escandinava, portanto, apesar de muitos links culturais e históricos, não é tecnicamente uma parte da Escandinávia. Mesmo os finlandeses raramente se preocupam em fazer a distinção, mas um termo mais correto que inclui a Finlândia são os países nórdicos (Pohjoismaat). Ainda assim, a capital, Helsínquia, tem muitas características escandinavas, especialmente quando se trata da arquitetura do centro da cidade, e outra língua escandinava, sueca, é uma das duas línguas oficiais do país. Clima Editar Finlândia tem um clima frio mas temperado, que na verdade é relativamente suave para a latitude devido à influência moderadora do Gulf Stream. O inverno, no entanto, é tão escuro quanto em todas as latitudes, e as temperaturas podem (muito raramente) chegar a -30C no sul e até mergulhar abaixo de -40C no norte. O breve verão finlandês é consideravelmente mais agradável, com temperaturas em torno de 20-23C em dias de sol (raramente perto de 30C) e geralmente é a melhor época do ano para visitar. Julho é o mês mais caloroso. No início da primavera (março-abril) é quando a neve começa a derreter e os finlandeses gostam de se dirigir para o norte para esquiar e esportes de inverno, enquanto a transição do outono para o inverno em outubro-dezembro de 8212 é o momento menos agradável para visitar. A costa do sul onde Helsinki e Turku estão localizados não é realmente um destino de inverno, porque não há garantia de neve, mesmo em janeiro ou fevereiro. Devido à extrema latitude, partes do norte da Finlândia experimentam o famoso Sol da Medianha perto do solstício de verão, quando (se acima do Círculo Ártico) o sol nunca se põe durante a noite e, mesmo no sul da Finlândia, nunca escurece. O outro lado da moeda é o Arctic Night (kaamos) no inverno, quando o sol nunca aparece no Norte. No sul, a luz do dia está limitada a algumas horas lamentáveis, com o sol apenas subindo pelas árvores antes de voltar para baixo. Cultura Editar Vinminen defendendo o Sampo. Por Akseli Gallen-Kallela (1896) Golpeado por seus vizinhos durante séculos e absorvendo influências do oeste, leste e sul, a cultura finlandesa como uma identidade distinta nasceu apenas no século 19: não somos suecos e não desejamos nos tornar Russo, então vamos ser finlandeses. O mito fundador finlandês e o épico nacional são os Kalevala. Uma coleção de antigas histórias e poemas carelianos reunidos em 1835 que conta a criação do mundo e as aventuras de Vinminen. Um herói xamanista com poderes mágicos. Kalevalan temas como o Sampo. Uma cornucópia mítica, tem sido uma grande inspiração para artistas finlandeses, e figuras, cenas e conceitos do épico continuam a colorir seus trabalhos. Embora uma das condições prévias essenciais para ter direitos civis completos na terra da Finlândia fosse uma adesão à Igreja Evangélica Luterana (em que a maioria das tradições católicas foram preservadas, as doutrinas são pronunciadamente cristocêntricas e ainda formalmente baseadas apenas no Livro da Concórdia ), A constituição da Finlands garantiu a plena liberdade de religião desde 1923. Hoje, a observância cotidiana da grande maioria é negligente, na melhor das hipóteses, ou praticamente inexistente (mesmo entre alguns dos ministérios) e a pertença à igreja luterana esteve em um Declínio acentuado desde a década de 1960. Consequentemente, os turistas e os visitantes fazem sabiamente exercitando um certo tato e sendo conscientes do fato de que os tópicos sobre prática religiosa e fé pessoal são considerados uma questão estritamente privada pela maioria dos finlandeses. Existe toda a probabilidade de que as questões relacionadas à fé sejam encontradas intrusivas ou desconcertantes na maioria dos casos. A política e a religião são diferenciadas no debate finlandês, na medida em que qualquer participante é esperado para não destacar suas crenças pessoais. Os finlandeses compartilham a maioria das virtudes e desvantagens de seus vizinhos escandinavos. Estes incluem a ética de trabalho intransigente e uma noção inclusiva de igualdade. Tornou-se o segundo país depois da Nova Zelândia que concedeu o sufragio universal. (Nota: este é um equívoco comum. A Finlândia foi em 1907 o primeiro país a conceder elegibilidade total das mulheres ao Parlamento, à Noruega em 1917 e à Nova Zelândia até 1919.) Da mesma forma, a Finlândia é regularmente classificada na lista dos Países menos corrompidos da Transparency International. Por cortesia de seu sistema educacional sem escolaridade internacional, bem como de um sistema abrangente de saúde pública e bem-estar social, a Finlândia adquiriu uma reputação mundial para um dos países mais avançados do mundo. Enquanto isso, o país está atormentado por problemas semelhantes peculiares aos estados de bem-estar nórdicos que incluem a homogeneidade do envelhecimento da população e taxas comparativamente elevadas de alcoolismo, depressão, exclusão social e suicídio. No entanto, o caráter distintivo dos finlandeses é muitas vezes resumido com a palavra sisu. Uma mistura de perseverança admirável e teimosia de cabeça de porco diante da adversidade. A fundação da cultura da música finlandesa e da educação musical foi construída principalmente no trabalho de vida de um compositor clássico Jean Sibelius, cujas sinfonias são regularmente tocadas pelas orquestras sinfônicas mais conhecidas do mundo e cujo nome é suportado pela Academia Sibelius, a melhor música da Finlândia instituição. Os compositores da música clássica moderna (Kaija Saariaho, Magnus Lindberg, Esa-Pekka Salonen, etc.) e a música eletrônica finlandesa (Pan Sonic. Darude. Rinneradio, Jimi Tenor, Jori Hulkkonen etc.) são realizadas com grande reverência entre especialistas e entusiastas. . Além disso, alguns finlandeses mainstream heavy metal e pop (Children of Bodom. Nightwish. HIM. O Rasmus. Bomfunk MC) obteve aclamação global. A banda de metal conhecida Lordi, conhecida por sua roupa de monstros de látex, tornou-se uma sensação internacional durante a noite ganhando o Eurovision Song Contest em 2006. Nas outras artes, a Finlândia produziu o arquiteto e designer Alvar Aalto. Autores Mika Waltari (egípcio), Vin Linna (The Unknown Soldier) e Tove Jansson (The Moomins) e pintor Akseli Gallen-Kallela. Conhecido por suas ilustrações de Kalevala. Bilingualismo Editar Gráfico de referência de rua A Finlândia tem uma minoria de 5.5 falantes suecos e é oficialmente um país bilíngüe, de modo que os mapas quase sempre possuem nomes finlandeses e suecos para, por exemplo, Cidades e vilas. Por exemplo, Turku e bo são a mesma cidade, mesmo que os nomes diferem totalmente. As estradas podem ser especialmente confusas: o que primeiro aparece em um mapa para ser uma estrada que muda seu nome é, na maioria dos casos, uma estrada com dois nomes. Isto é comum nas áreas de língua sueca nas costas do sul e do oeste, enquanto os nomes do interior da Suécia são muito menos comuns. Em qualquer lugar fora das áreas bilíngües e do extremo norte da Lapónia da Finlândia, você nunca verá o sueco, e um sinal bilíngüe é extremamente raro, você ocasionalmente verá a sinalização em Smi. O Google Maps, em particular, parece selecionar o idioma aleatoriamente, mesmo que os nomes suecos sejam extremamente raramente usados na prática na maioria dos lugares. Feriados Editar finlandes geralmente são muito gostosos em grandes carnavais públicos, a maioria dos feriados são gastos em casa com a família. A exceção mais notável é Vappu em 1 de maio, já que milhares de pessoas (principalmente as jovens) ocupam as ruas. Feriados importantes e acontecimentos semelhantes incluem: Dia do Ano Novo (Uudenvuodenpiv), 1 de janeiro. Epiphany (Loppiainen), 6 de janeiro. Páscoa (Psiinen), datas variáveis, sexta-feira santa e segunda-feira de Páscoa são feriados públicos. Atadas a este são 40 dias antes da Páscoa, nominalmente um dia santo que inicia a Quaresma, praticamente um tempo para crianças e estudantes universitários para deslizar para baixo de pistas nevadas, e Ascension Day (helatorstai) 40 dias depois, apenas mais um dia para a Lojas a serem fechadas. Walpurgis Night ou mais vezes Vappu. 1 de maio, embora as festividades começam o dia anterior (Vappuaatto). Um festival da primavera que coincide com o dia de maio. Originalmente uma tradição pagã que coincide com a celebração dos trabalhadores mais recentes, tornou-se um festival gigante para estudantes, que usam macacões de assinatura coloridos e percorre as ruas. Muitas pessoas também usam suas bonitas de estudantes brancas entre as 18:00 e 30 de abril e o final de 1 de maio. No dia seguinte, as pessoas se reúnem para cuidar de suas ressacas em piqueniques ao ar livre, mesmo que a sua chuva caia. Midsummer Festival (Juhannus), no sábado, 20 a 26 de junho. Realizada para celebrar o solstício de verão, com abundância de fogueiras, beber e merrymaking geral. As cidades ficam quase vazias à medida que as pessoas correm para suas casas de verão. Pode ser uma boa idéia visitar uma das cidades maiores apenas para o sentimento estranho de uma cidade vazia. Dia da Independência (Itsenisyyspiv), 6 de dezembro. Uma celebração bastante sombria da independência da Finlândia da Rússia. O presidente detém uma bola para as pessoas importantes (por exemplo, deputados, diplomatas e merceadores de esportes e artistas finlandeses). Little Christmas (Pikkujoulu), as pessoas vão ao pub rastejando com seus companheiros de trabalho em dezembro. Não é um feriado oficial, apenas uma versão Viking-strength de uma festa de Natal do escritório. Natal (Joulu), 24-26 de dezembro. A maior festa do ano, quando praticamente tudo se fecha por três dias. Santa (Joulupukki) vem na véspera de Natal em 24 de dezembro, o presunto é comido e todos vão à sauna. Véspera de Ano Novo (Uudenvuodenaatto), 31 de dezembro. Tempo de fogos de artifício O tempo de férias típico é em julho, ao contrário de outros países da Europa, onde é em agosto. As pessoas geralmente começam suas férias de verão em torno de Midsummer. Durante esses dias, as cidades provavelmente serão menos povoadas, já que os finlandeses vão para suas casas de verão. Os alunos começam suas férias de verão no início de junho. Regiões Editar Regiões da Finlândia ter um grupo autônomo e monolentamente sueco de ilhas ao largo da costa sudoeste da Finlândia Enquanto uma divisão burocrática conveniente e inequívoca, as províncias 8212 agora formalmente conhecidas como Agências Administrativas Estaduais Regionais 8212 não correspondem realmente a fronteiras geográficas ou culturais muito bem. Outros termos que você pode ouvir incluem Tavastia (Hme), cobrindo uma grande área da Finlândia central em torno de Tampere e Karelia (Karjala) para o Extremo Oriente, a maior parte da qual foi perdida para a União Soviética na Segunda Guerra Mundial (ainda um assunto dolorido Em alguns círculos). Em 2010, a Finlândia Ocidental foi formalmente dividida em Finlândia Ocidental e Interior (para Tampere e a costa perto de Vaasa) e no sudoeste da Finlândia (a área perto de Turku). Cidades e cidades Editar Helsínquia 8212 a filha do Báltico, a capital da Finlândia e sua única cidade real Hmeenlinna 8212 uma pequena cidade à beira do lago com um castelo medieval e um parque Aulanko Jyvskyl 8212 uma cidade universitária localizada na Finlândia Central Kuopio 8212, uma cidade universitária no centro da Finlândia, Área de lakeland. Lappeenranta 8212, uma cidade universitária perto da fronteira russa no sudeste da Finlândia, pelo lago Saimaa. Oulu 8212 uma cidade tecnológica no final do Golfo de Bothnia Rovaniemi 8212 porta de entrada para Laponia Savonlinna 8212, uma pequena cidade à beira do lago com um castelo grande e um popular festival de ópera. Seinjoki 8212 Finlands é uma cidade pequena de crescimento mais rápido, anfitriã de muitos festivais importantes todos os anos. Tampere 8212, a maior cidade industrial da Finlândia, lar de cultura, música, arte e museus, no meio de outras grandes cidades do sul da Finlândia. Talvez a melhor cena musical na Finlândia. Turku 8212, a antiga capital da costa ocidental. Castelo medieval e catedral. Vaasa 8212 uma cidade com fortes influências suecas na costa oeste localizada perto do sítio natural mundial da UNESCO Kvarken Archipelago Outros destinos Editar Editar Editar Não há controles de fronteira entre os países que assinaram e implementaram este tratado - a União Européia (exceto a Bulgária, a Croácia , Chipre, Irlanda, Romênia e Reino Unido), Islândia, Liechtenstein, Noruega e Suíça. Do mesmo modo, um visto concedido para qualquer membro Schengen é válido em todos os outros países que assinaram e implementaram o tratado. Mas tenha cuidado: nem todos os membros da UE assinaram o tratado de Schengen, e nem todos os membros do Schengen fazem parte da União Européia. Isso significa que pode haver cheques alfandegários locais, mas não cheques de imigração (viajar dentro de Schengen, mas de um país que não seja da UE) ou você pode ter que limpar a imigração, mas não os costumes (viajar na UE, mas de um país que não é Schengen). Por favor, veja o artigo Travel in the Schengen Zone para obter mais informações sobre o funcionamento do esquema e quais são os requisitos de entrada. De avião Editar O centro internacional principal de Finlands é o aeroporto Helsinki-Vantaa perto de Helsínquia. Finnair. E Flybe Nordic são baseados lá. Cerca de 30 companhias aéreas estrangeiras voam para Helsinki-Vantaa. Os hubs da Ryanair são Finlandia são Tampere, no centro da Finlândia e Lappeenranta, no leste, perto da fronteira russa, enquanto o Wizz Air está diminuindo seu hub em Turku, no sudoeste. Outras companhias aéreas têm serviços regionais limitados para outras cidades, principalmente apenas para a Suécia e, na temporada alta de inverno, cartas diretas ocasionais (especialmente em dezembro) e vôos regulares sazonais (dezembro-março) para a Lapônia. O Air Baltic liga muitas cidades finlandesas provinciais convenientemente para a Europa através de Riga. Pode também valer a pena o seu tempo para obter um voo barato para Tallinn e siga as instruções do barco abaixo para chegar à Finlândia. A partir do início de 2011, a Norwegian Air Shuttle estabeleceu a Helsínquia como uma das bases, e agora oferece vôos domésticos e internacionais. De trem Edit VR 2 e Russian Railways operam em conjunto serviços entre São Petersburgo e Helsínquia, parando em Vyborg. Kouvola e Lahti ao longo do caminho. A linha foi atualizada em 2010 e os novos e lisos trilhos Allegro se deslocam entre as duas cidades em três horas e meia até 220kmh. Atualmente, a rota é servida quatro vezes por dia, retornando a dois dias a partir de novembro de 2011. Este é certamente o método mais caro de chegar a Helsínquia a partir de São Petersburgo, com preços de 92 durante o verão e 84 de resto do ano para um único caminho bilhete. No entanto, os bilhetes para o primeiro comboio pela manhã, que partiram às 6:12 da manhã, podem ser comprados por um preço tão baixo quanto 39 nos meses de verão. Há também um dorminhoco nocturno lento tradicional de Moscou. Que leva cerca de 15 horas. Não há trens diretos entre a Suécia ou a Noruega e a Finlândia (o percurso do trilho é diferente), mas o ônibus sobre a lacuna de Boden Lule (Suécia) para Kemi (Finlândia) é gratuito com um passe Eurail Inter Rail e você também pode obter Um desconto de 50 da maioria das balsas com estas passagens. De ônibus, os ônibus são os mais baratos, mas também o modo mais lento e menos confortável de viajar entre a Rússia ea Finlândia. Ônibus programados regulares correm entre São Petersburgo. Vyborg e as principais cidades finlandesas do sul, como Helsínquia. Lappeenranta. Jyvskyl e todo o caminho a oeste para Turku. Confira Matkahuolto para horários. Helsinki-St. Petersburgo é servido três vezes por dia, custa 38 e leva 9 horas durante o dia, 8 horas à noite. Vários minibuses diretos correm entre o hotel Oktyabrskaya de São Petersburgo (estação de trem de Moskovsky) e Helsinkis Tennispalatsi (Etelinen Rautatiekatu 8, a uma quadra de Kamppi). Com 15 pontos de ida, esta é a opção mais barata, mas os minibuses deixam-se somente quando cheios. As partidas de Helsínquia são mais frequentes na parte da manhã (cerca de 10:00), enquanto as saídas de São Petersburgo normalmente durante a noite (cerca de 22:00). Você também pode usar um ônibus da Suécia ou da Noruega para a Finlândia. Haparanda na área de Norrbotnia da Suécia tem conexões de ônibus para Tornio. Kemi e Oulu. Veja mais de Matkahuolto. Eskelisen Lapinlinjat oferece conexões de ônibus das partes do norte da Noruega, por exemplo Troms. Veja mais de Eskelisen Lapinlinjat. Por barco Editar Dentro de uma balsa de passageiros Silja Uma das melhores maneiras de viajar para e da Finlândia é pelo mar. Os barcos para a Estônia e a Suécia. Em particular, são gigantes, palácios flutuantes de vários andares e lojas de departamento, com preços baratos subsidiados pelas vendas de bebidas alcoólicas isentas de impostos: uma viagem de regresso a Tallinn, incluindo uma cabine para até quatro pessoas, pode chegar até 50. Se viajar por Inter Rail. Você pode obter 50 tarifas fora do convés. A melhor maneira de chegar a Helsínquia está de pé no convés exterior com uma visão a seguir. Estônia e os estados do Báltico Edit Helsinki e Tallinn ficam a apenas 80 quilômetros de distância. Linha Viking. A linha Ecker e Tallink Silja operam ferries de serviço completo durante todo o ano. Dependendo do tipo de ferry, os tempos de viagem são de pouco mais de duas horas (Viking Line e Tallink Siljas Star, Superstar e Superfasts) a três horas e meia (Ecker e Tallink Siljas maiores navios de cruzeiro). Alguns serviços viajam durante a noite e se encontram fora do porto até a manhã. Linda Line oferece serviços rápidos que completam a viagem em 1,5 horas, mas cobram um pouco mais, comparativamente pouco para entretê-lo a bordo e suspender serviços em mau tempo e durante o inverno. Se o clima parecer desonesto e você está propenso a doenças do mar, é melhor optar por os grandes barcos lentos. Existe uma conexão de ferry adicional entre Hanko e Paldiski. Operado por NaviRail. Não há serviços programados para a Letónia ou a Lituânia. Mas alguns dos operadores acima oferecem cruzeiros semi-regulares no verão, sendo Riga o destino mais popular. Alemanha Edit Finnlines 3 opera de Helsínquia para Travemnde (perto de Lbeck e Hamburgo) e de Helsínquia para Rostock. A viagem de Helsinki-Travemnde demora cerca de 27 horas, enquanto Helsinki-Rostock leva cerca de 34 horas. A linha Travemnde é administrada por navios rápidos e grandes da classe Star, enquanto um único navio de classe Hansa, significativamente menor, opera na linha Rostock. Este último é considerado mais luxuoso e confortável mesmo que a viagem demore muito mais. Rússia Editar Para os serviços de ferry programados para a Rússia, a Rússia tem sido parada e viagem. A partir de abril de 2010, a St Peter Line oferece um serviço regular de ferry de São Petersburgo a Helsínquia para um mínimo de 30 minutos. A Kristina Cruises também oferece cruzeiros ocasionais de Helsínquia. Suécia Editar Silja Serenade saindo de Helsínquia Tanto Silja quanto Viking oferecem cruzeiros durante a noite de Helsínquia e durante a noite, bem como cruzeiros diurnos de Turku a Estocolmo. Geralmente parando nas ilhas terrestres ao longo do caminho. Estas são algumas das maiores e mais luxuosas ferries de passageiros do mundo, com até 14 andares e toda uma série de restaurantes, bares, discotecas, piscinas e instalações de spa, etc. As classes de cabine mais baratas abaixo das plataformas do carro são bastante espartanas , Mas as cabines com vistas mais altas do mar podem ser muito bonitas. Note-se que, devido a uma multidão de jovens barulhentos com o objetivo de ser bem sucedido em bebidas alcoólicas baratas, Silja e Viking não permitem que jovens menores de 23 anos não acompanhados se cruzem nas sextas e sábados. (O limite de idade é de 20 em outras noites, e apenas 18 para os viajantes que não fazem pacotes de cruzeiros no mesmo dia). Além disso, Silja não oferece a classe de convés em seus serviços durante a noite, enquanto o Viking faz. Note-se também que, com a Viking Line, muitas vezes é mais barato reservar um cruzeiro em vez do tráfego rodoviário. O cruzeiro inclui ambos os caminhos com um dia no meio. Se você quiser ficar mais, simplesmente não volte - ainda pode ser mais barato do que reservar um bilhete de trânsito de sentido único. Isto conta especialmente para bilhetes de última hora (você poderia, por exemplo, chegar de Estocolmo a Turku por cerca de 10 durante a noite - o tráfego rodoviário teria mais de 30 para uma cabana com menor qualidade). Além dos dois grandes, FinnLink oferece a conexão de ferry de carro mais barata de todos, de Naantali a Kapellskr (de 60 para um carro com motorista). As balsas de carros costumam parar por alguns minutos em Mariehamn, nas ilhas terrestres. Que estão fora da área fiscal da UE e, portanto, permitem que as balsas operem vendas isentas de impostos. Entre Vaasa e Ume há uma balsa operada por Wasaline. De carro Editar Finlândia possui uma rede rodoviária abrangente que liga e atravessa todas as principais cidades. Conduzir através da Finlândia durante qualquer época do ano é um tratamento com estradas sinuosas e colinas suaves enquadradas por florestas de pinheiros e bétulas com terras agrícolas agrícolas aqui e ali. A noite de verão conduz com o sol da meia-noite, fornecendo luz suave são particularmente cênicas e divertidas. Durante os meses de verão, as reparações rodoviárias estão em pleno andamento, portanto alguns atrasos menores podem ser experimentados. As câmeras de patrulha rodoviária são utilizadas amplamente para monitorar o tráfego e impor limites de velocidade. Suécia Editar Como mencionado acima, uma das maneiras mais fáceis de chegar de carro da Suécia para a Finlândia é uma balsa de carro. A rota europeia E12 (rodovia nacional finlandesa 3) inclui uma linha de ferry entre Ume e Vaasa. Outra rota que inclui um ferry é E18, de Estocolmo a Turku. Noruega Editar Rússia Editar a rota européia E18, como a rota russa M10, vai de São Petersburgo via Vyborg até a estação fronteiriça de VaalimaaTorfyanovka, perto de Hamina. De lá, a E18 continua como a rodovia nacional finlandesa 7 para Helsínquia e, a partir daí, ao longo da costa como a rodovia 1 para Turku. Em Vaalimaa, os caminhões terão de esperar em uma fila de caminhão persistente. Esta fila não afeta diretamente outros veículos. Existem controlos nas fronteiras e cheques aduaneiros em Vaalimaa e passaportes e vistos Schengen, se aplicável, serão necessários. Do sul ao norte, outros cruzamentos da fronteira podem ser encontrados em NuijamaaBrusnichnoye (Lappeenranta), VaalimaaTorfyanovka, ImatraSvetogorsk, Niirala (Tohmajrvi), Vartius (Kuhmo) Kelloselk (Salla) e Raja-Jooseppi (Sodankyl). Todos exceto o primeiro são muito remotos. Estônia Edit Como mencionado acima, há um ferry de carro entre Tallinn e Helsínquia. Forma parte da rota europeia E67 Via Baltica que vai da capital estónia Tallinn, atravessa Riga na Letônia e Kaunas na Lituânia para a capital polonesa, Varsóvia. A distância de Tallinn para Varsóvia é de cerca de 970 km, não incluindo quaisquer desvios. Get Around Edit The Finnish rail network (linhas de passageiros em verde) Finlands um país grande e viajar é relativamente caro. O transporte público é bem organizado e o equipamento é sempre confortável e muitas vezes novo, e as reservas antecipadas são raramente necessárias fora dos maiores períodos de férias. O planejador Journey doméstico oferece um site útil com horários integrados para todos os comboios, ônibus e aviões, incluindo transporte interurbano e local. Se você precisar de informações sobre um endereço na Finlândia, você pode encontrá-lo através do Jokapaikka. fi (um mecanismo gratuito de busca de informações de área local). Tem o Google traduzido incluído para não locais. De avião Editar Voos são as formas mais rápidas, mas geralmente também as mais caras de se locomover. A Finnair e algumas companhias aéreas menores operam vôos regionais de Helsínquia para todo o país, incluindo o Kuopio. Pori. Rovaniemi e Ivalo. Vale a pena reservar com antecedência, se possível: no setor de Helsinki - Oulu, o país mais ocupado, um bilhete de economia de retorno totalmente flexível custa um enorme 251, mas um ingresso de passagem única não mutável pode ser tão baixo quanto 39, menor que Um bilhete de trem. Você também pode obter bilhetes domésticos com desconto se você voa para a Finlândia em Finnair. Outra possibilidade é o Air Baltic, que também voa o setor Turku-Oulu por preços muito competitivos, muito menos do que o trem. Além disso, em 2011 Norwegian Air Shuttle começou a voar de Helsínquia para Oulu e Rovaniemi. Um ônibus de traslado (ônibus da cidade de Finnair) opera entre o aeroporto de Helsínquia-Vantaa e a estação ferroviária central de Helsínquia em aprox. Intervalos de 20 minutos (30 min de duração da viagem, 6,30) A linha de ônibus 615 (no dia) 620 (à noite) é uma alternativa ligeiramente mais barata (36 minutos de duração da viagem, 5 dias, 7 noites, preços 102015). Há também conexão de trem no aeroporto e leva você em 45 minutos (o acesso ao novo terminal de trem será aberto no final de 2015 e o tempo de viagem será de aproximadamente 35 minutos. Existe um ônibus gratuito para a estação de trem mais próxima no momento) Para a estação ferroviária central de Helsínquia. Os preços são de 5 dias, 7 noites. Confira o planejador de viagens de transporte da Região de Helsínquia para horários e outras informações. Existem três companhias aéreas principais que vendem vôos domésticos: Finnair. A companhia aérea nacional da bandeira. Atende quase todo o país, com alguns vôos operados pela subsidiária Nordic Regional Airlines. Norueguês voa para as cidades do norte, como Rovaniemi, Oulu, Ivalo e Kittil. Além disso, BASe Airlines e Air100 preenchem algumas lacunas. De trem Editar Um trem Pendolino, o mais rápido na frota de VRs (220 kmh) VR 4 (Finnish Railways) opera a rede ferroviária bastante extensa. O trem é o método de escolha para viajar de Helsínquia para Tampere. Turku e Lahti. Com partidas pelo menos uma vez por hora e velocidades mais rápidas do que o ônibus. As seguintes classes de serviço estão disponíveis, com exemplos de preços e durações para o popular serviço Helsinki-Tampere entre parênteses. Trens inclináveis Pendolino (código S), a opção mais rápida (836432, 1:26) com trens express InterCity (IC) e InterCity2 (IC2), com sobretaxa IC (836426.9, 1:46) Express ordinário (pikajuna. P), com express Sobretaxa, apenas trens noturnos lentos para esta conexão (836424.6, 2: 12-2: 16) Trens locais e regionais (lhiliikennejuna. Lhijuna ou taajamajuna), sem sobretaxa, bastante lento (836421, 2:03) Os trens geralmente são muito confortáveis , Especialmente os serviços expressos. Os trens Pendolino e IC têm carros de restaurantes, carros familiares (apenas IC, com playpen para crianças) e tomadas elétricas. Os trens Pendolinos e IntercityIC2 oferecem uma conectividade Wi-Fi gratuita (embora muitas vezes muito lenta). Sobretaxas adicionais aplicam-se para viagens de primeira classe, negócios de marca em alguns trens, o que lhe permite assentos mais espaçosos, jornais e, eventualmente, um lanche. As travessas durante a noite estão disponíveis para rotas de longo curso e muito bom valor em 8364112143 para uma cama em um compartimento de cama de algodão, mas os compartimentos de uma cama só estão disponíveis em primeira classe. Uma criança com menos de 7 anos pode viajar gratuitamente com todos os adultos que pagam taxas, e idosos com mais de 65 anos e estudantes com identidade de estudante finlandesa (cartões ISIC, etc., não aceitos) recebem 50 pessoas. Grupos de 3 ou mais começam 15 fora. A Finlândia participa nos sistemas Inter Rail e Eurail. Os residentes da Europa podem comprar passes da InterRail Finland que oferecem 3-8 dias de viagem ilimitada em um mês para 8364109-229 (2ª classe de adulto), enquanto o passaporte Eurail Finland para não residentes é 8364178-320 por 3-10 dias. VRs próprio Holiday Pass (LomaPassi), em 8364145 por 3 dias, incluindo até 4 reservas de lugares livres, está disponível para todos, mas apenas válido no verão. You would have to travel a lot to make any of these pay off though by comparison, a full-fare InterCity return ticket across the entire country from Helsinki to Rovaniemi and back is 8364162. Generally, the trains are most crowded at the beginning and end of the weekend, and that means Friday and Sunday evening. Shortly before and at the end of major holidays like ChristmasNew Year and Easter, trains are usually very busy. If you try booking for these days at a late time, you may find the seat you reserve may be among the least desirable, that is, facing backwards, without recline, and facing towards and sharing the legroom with other passengers. While VRs trains may be slick, harsh winter conditions and underinvestment in maintenance mean that delayed trains are not uncommon, with the fancy Pendolinos particularly prone to breaking down. As in the rest of the EU, youll get a 25 refund if the train is 1-2 hours late and 50 if more. By bus Edit Matkahuolto 5 offers long-distance coach connections to practically all parts of Finland. Bus is also the only way to travel in Lapland, since the rail network doesnt extend to the extreme north. Buses are generally slightly higher priced than trains, although on routes with direct train competition they can be cheaper. Speeds are usually slower than trains, sometimes very slow (from Helsinki to Oulu), sometimes even faster (from Helsinki to Kotka and Pori). On many routes, though, buses are more frequent, so you may still get to your destination faster than if you wait for the next train. Unlike the trains, student discounts are available also for foreign students by showing a valid ISIC card at Matkahuolto offices (in every bus station) and getting a Matkahuolto student discount card (5). There is also BusPass travel pass from Matkahuolto 6. which offers unlimited travel in specified time, priced at 149 for 7 days and 249 for 14 days. Onnibus 7 offers a cheaper alternative (ticket prices beginning from 3 on all routes when bought online) for long-distance coaches on routes HelsinkiTurku, HelsinkiTampere, TamperePori and beginning from the autumn 2012 also TurkuTampereJyvskyl and JyvskylOulu. Note that the routes in Tampere dont serve the city centre (with exception the Pori route) but instead stop in Hervanta (10km south of city centre), which will be Onnibus bus terminal serving as an interchange station between different routes. Local transport networks are well-developed in Greater Helsinki, Tampere and Turku. In smaller cities public transport networks are usable on weekdays, but sparse on weekends and during the summer. There are easy-to-use high-tech English route planners with maps to find out how to use local bus services provided by national bus provider Matkahuolto 8. Demand responsive transport Edit Demand responsive transport (DRT) is a form of public transport, in which the routes are determined based on the customers needs. You can find the zones where DRT services are available by using the map or address search services9. By ferry Edit In summertime, lake cruises are a great way to see the scenery of Finland, although most of them only do circular sightseeing loops and arent thus particularly useful for getting from point A to point B. Most cruise ships carry 100-200 passengers (book ahead on weekends), and many are historical steam boats. Popular routes include Turku - Naantali and various routes in and around Saimaa. By car Edit Moose on the loose The use of sand instead of potassium formate and salt leads to a dirty environment. In Spring, the breathing air is often polluted by dust and thus can result in respiratory malfunctions. Srninen, Helsinki. Car rental is possible in Finland but generally expensive, with rates generally upwards of 80day, although rates go down for longer rentals. Foreign-registered cars can only be used in Finland for a limited time and registering it locally involves paying a substantial tax to equalize the price to Finnish levels. If you opt to buy a car in Finland instead, make sure it has all annual taxes paid and when its next annual inspection is due: the deadline is the same day as the cars first date of use unless the registration form says 00.00.xx in first date of use. In that case the inspection date is determined by the last number of the license plate. All cars must pass emissions testing and precise tests of brakes etc. Police may remove the plates of vehicles that have not passed their annual inspections in time and give you a fine. Traffic drives on the right, and there are no road tolls in Finnish cities or highways so far. Roads are well maintained and extensive, although expressways are limited to the south of the country. Note that headlights or daytime running lights must be kept on at all times when driving, in and outside cities, whether its dark or not. Drivers must stay very alert, particularly at dawn and dusk, for wild animals. Collisions with moose (frequently lethal) are common countrywide, deer (mostly survivable) cause numerous collisions in South and South West parts of the country, and semi-domesticated reindeer are a common cause of accidents in Lapland. Bear collisions happen sometimes in eastern parts of the country. VRs overnight car carrier trains 10 are popular for skipping the long slog from Helsinki up to Lapland and getting a good nights sleep instead: a Helsinki - Rovaniemi trip (one way) with car and cabin for 1-3 people starts from 8364215. A few unusual or unobvious rules to beware of: Headlights are mandatory even during daylight. Always give way to the right, unless signed otherwise. There is no concept of minor and major road, so this applies even to smaller road on your right. Almost all intersections are explicitly signposted with yield signs (either the stop sign or an inverted triangle). There is no explicit sign on the road that has priority, instead watch out for the back of the yield sign on the other road. Signs use the following shorthand: white numbers are for weekdays (eg. 8-16 means 08:00-16:00), white numbers in parentheses apply on Saturdays and red numbers on Sundays and holidays. In Helsinki, trams always have the right of way. Collisions do a surprising amount of damage. Dont get into arguments with a vehicle that cant change direction and weighs as much as a small battle tank. A vehicle is required by law to stop at a zebra crossing, if at least one other car has stopped, regardless of whether or not there is a pedestrian (in a similar manner as if there were a stop sign). A car is obliged to stop at a zebra crossing, if the pedestrian intends to cross the road. Many pedestrians intend to cross the road only when there is a sufficiently large gap in the traffic. When crossing the road as a pedestrian at a zebra crossing, do not leave a shadow of a doubt that you will cross the road, and cars will stop. With some practice, this works out smoothly, efficiently and without taking undue risks. By default, drivers will assume that the pedestrian does not intend to cross the road right now, in other words, cars will not stop. A car horn may only be used to prevent a collision or a similar hazardous situation. Using the horn for other purposes such as expressing frustration in surrounding traffic is unlawful and quite strongly frowned upon. Circular traffic can be rather complex. For example, in one spot, two new lanes are created while the outer lane is suddenly forced to exit. This creates a difficult situation, when the lines are covered by snow. Pedestrians walking on unlighted roads without sidewalk or cycle tracks in the dark are required by law to use safety reflectors. Their use is generally recommended, since the visibility of pedestrians with reflector improves greatly. Winter driving can be somewhat hazardous, especially for drivers unused to cold weather conditions. Winter tires (MS) are mandatory from 1 December through the end of February. The most dangerous weather is in fact around the zero degree mark (C), when slippery but near-invisible black ice forms on the roads. Finnish cars often come equipped with an engine block heater ( lohkolmmitin ) used to preheat the engine and possibly the interior of the car beforehand, and many parking places have electric outlets to feed them. Liikenneturva, the Finnish road safety agency, maintains a Tips for winter driving page 11 in English. Note that especially in the Helsinki area, the majority of cars are equipped with steel-studded tires that allow more dynamic driving and shorter braking distances on frozen surfaces than conventional traction tires (MS), as used in other European countries. Finnish speeding tickets are based on your income, so be careful: a Nokia VP whod cashed in some stock options the previous year was once hit for US204,000 Fortunately, the police have no access to tax records outside Finland and will just fine non-residents a flat 8364100-200 instead. Speed limits are 50 kmh in towns, 80-100 kmh outside towns and usually 120 kmh on freeways. From around mid-october to april, speedlimits on freeways are lowered to 100 kmh and most 100 kmh limits are lowered to 80 kmh. Software for GPS navigators that warns of fixed safety cameras is legal and installed by default in many mobile phones. Warning signs before fixed cameras are required by law. A blood alcohol level of over 0.05 is considered drunk driving and 0.12 as aggrevated drunk driving, so think twice before drinking that second beer. Finnish police strictly enforce this by random roadblocks and sobriety tests. If you are driving at night when the gas stations are closed (they usually close at 9 PM), always remember to bring some money for gas . Automated gas pumps in Finland in rare occasions do not accept foreign visacredit cards, but you can pay with Euro notes. In the sparsely-populated areas of the country, distances of 50 km and more between gas stations are not unheard of, so dont gamble unnecessarily with those last litres of fuel. If you come in your own car, note that all petrol in Finland contains ethanol . If your car should not be run on ethanol-containing petrol or you are unsure use the 98 octane petrol. This contains residual ethanol from the pump station up to a maximum of 5 and can be used in all cars that run on petrol. By taxi Edit Finnish taxis are heavily regulated by the government, so theyre comfortable, safe and expensive. No matter where you go in the country, the starting fee is fixed at 5.90, rising up to 9.00 at night and on Sundays. The per-kilometer charge starts at 1.52km for 1 or 2 passengers, rising up to 2,13km for 7 or 8 passenger minivans. A 20-25 km journey (say, airport to central Helsinki) can thus easily cost 40-50. Taxis can come in any color or shape, but they will always have a yellow TAXI sign (sometimes spelled TAKSI) on the roof. Hailing cabs off the street is difficult to impossible, so either find a taxi rank or order by phone (any pub or restaurant will help you on this, expect to pay 2 euros for the call). Taxi companies around the country can be found at the Taksiliitto 12 site. In the Helsinki city center, long lines at the taxi stops can be expected on Friday and Saturday nights. It is not uncommon to share a taxi with strangers if going towards the same general direction. Using of unofficial taxis is illegal and to be avoided. You might lose your walletpursephone, despite Helsinki being maybe one of the safest capitals in Europe. The Uber service is illegal in Finland and the driver may face a notable penalty. If you decide to use Uber and your driver gets caught by the police, youre on your own. By thumb Edit Hitchhiking is possible, albeit unusual, in Finland, as the harsh climate and sparse traffic dont exactly encourage standing around and waiting for cars. The most difficult task is getting out of Helsinki. Summer offers long light hours, but in the fallspring you should plan your time. The highway between Helsinki and Saint Petersburg has a very high percentage of Russian drivers. See Hitchhiking Club Finland liftari. org 13 or the Finland article 14 on Hitchwiki for further details if interested. By bicycle Edit Most Finnish cities have good bike paths especially outside the centres, and taking a bike can be a quick, healthy and environmentally friendly method of getting around locally. The roads are generally paved well, although gravel roads are sometimes unavoidable. As long as you dont go off-road, you will not need suspension or grooved tyres. Because of the long distances, bicycle tourists are advised to plan well and be prepared to use public transport for the less interesting stretches. Long-distance coaches are well-equipped to take bicycles on board, trains take bicycles if there is enough space. Ferries take bikes for free or for a small fee. Due to the relatively gentle topographic relief, too hilly terrain is rarely a problem, but in the cold months, windchill requires more protection against cold than in walking. Finnish language map. Finnish is a Official Language (dark blue) and Finnish spoken by a minority (aruba blue) Finland is officially bilingual in Finnish (spoken by 90 of the population) and Swedish (spoken by 5,6 of the population), and both languages are compulsory in all schools, but in practice most of the population is monolingual in Finnish. Finnish is spoken everywhere in the country except land islands and Finnish is the main language of Finland. Finnish is not related to the Scandinavian languages (Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Icelandic and Faroese), Russian, or English. In fact, it is not even an Indo-European language, instead belonging in the Uralic group of languages which includes Hungarian and Estonian, making it hard for speakers of most other European languages to learn. Reading signboards can also be difficult as Finnish has relatively few loan words from common European languages, and as a result it is very hard to guess what words in Finnish mean. Swedish is the mother tongue for 5.6 of Finns. There are no large towns with a Swedish majority, and the Swedish-speaking communities are mainly smaller rural communities along the Southwest coast. Many towns and road signs on the coast use alternate Finnish and Swedish names, so road signs can be confusing, but bilingual signs outside bilingual areas never appear. The small autonomous province of land and the municipalities of Nrpes, Korsns and Larsmo are exclusively Swedish-speaking, and people there typically speak little or no Finnish at all, so English is a better bet. Swedish is a mandatory subject in Finnish-speaking schools (and Finnish in Swedish-speaking schools), so everyone is supposed to speak and understand it in reality, though, only 41 of the Finnish-speaking population is conversant in it, and most of these people live in coastal areas and in predominantly Swedish-speaking areas. Even this varies: for example, in Helsinki and Turku most people can speak Swedish enough to deal with important conversations you engage in as a tourist and often somewhat beyond, but living would be impossible without knowledge of Finnish, whereas towns like Vaasa and Porvoo have significant Swedish-speaking minorities and are more genuinely bilingual (i. e. it would be possible to live there with Swedish only). Most hotels and restaurants, especially in areas where Swedish is widely spoken, do have some Swedish-proficient staff. Russian is best understood near the Russian border, such as in Lappeenranta, Imatra and Joensuu, which are areas frequented by Russian tourists. Tourist destinations which are popular among Russians in Eastern and Northern Finland have some Russian-speaking staff. Elsewhere, knowledge of Russian is often far rarer. In bigger towns, with the exception of the elderly, many people you would meet as a tourist speak good English, and even in the countryside younger people will nearly always know enough to communicate. In fact, outside of the Swedish-speaking communities, English is usually far better understood than Swedish . Conversely, within the Swedish-speaking communities, English is often better understood than Finnish. 73160 of the population in Finland can speak English. Dont hesitate to ask for help: Finns can be shy but will help you out in need. Besides English and Swedish, some Finns can speak German (18160) or French (3160), other secondary languages (Spanish, Russian) being rare. Foreign TV series and movies are nearly always subtitled. Only childrens fare gets dubbed into Finnish. The grammar of Finnish language has relatively few exceptions but quite many rules (where some rules might be considered cleverly disguised exceptions). There are about 17 different cases for getting some coffee and getting the coffee, going into a pub, being in a pub (or in a state of drunkenness), getting out of the pub, being on the roof, getting onto the roof, getting off the roof, using something as a roof and so on that are encoded into the word endings. In written text, the plethora of cases makes it a challenging exercise to even look up a single word from the dictionary. The conjugation of verbs is unfortunately somewhat more complex. Sunset with reflections on a lake in Finland. A selection of top sights in Finland: Central Helsinki. the Daughter of the Baltic . on a warm and sunny summer day The Suomenlinna Sea Fortress, 15-minute ferry trip from Downtown Helsinki. A Unesco World Heritage Site. The historical sites of Turku and the vast archipelago around it, best viewed from the deck of a giant car ferry. Pottering around the picturesque wooden houses of Porvoo. Finlands second-oldest town Renting a car and exploring the Lake Land of Eastern Finland, an area dotted with around 60 000 lakes with a similar number of islands, which in turn have their own lakes. Olavinlinna Castle in Savonlinna. Finlands most atmospheric castle, especially during the yearly Opera Festival Hmeenlinna Castle in Hmeenlinna is Finlands oldest castle. Built in 13th century. Relaxing at a sauna-equipped cottage in the lake country of Eastern Finland Icebreaker cruising and the worlds biggest snow castle in Kemi Seeing the Northern Lights and trying your hand sledding down a mile-long track at Saariselk A ride on the historical Linnanmki wooden roller coaster (Helsinki). Unlike modern designs, only gravity keeps it on the track, and it requires a driver on each train to operate the brakes. Sports Edit Notably lacking in craggy mountains or crenellated fjords, Finland is not the adrenalin-laden winter sports paradise you might expect: the traditional Finnish pastime is cross-country skiing through more or less flat terrain. If youre looking for downhill skiing, snowboarding etc, youll need to head up to Lapland and resorts like Levi and Saariselk. During the short summer you can swim, fish or canoe in the lakes. They are usually warmest around 20th July. Local newspapers usually have the current surface temperatures, and a map of the surface temperatures can also be found from the Environment Ministry website 15. During the warmest weeks, late at night or early in the morning the water can feel quite pleasant when the air temperature is lower than the waters. Most towns also have swimming halls with slightly warmer water, but these are often closed during the summer. Fishing permits, if needed, can be easily bought from any R-Kioski although they take a small surcharge for it. For hikers, fishermen and hunters, the Ministry of Forestry maintains an online Excursion Map map 16 with trails and huts marked. The best season for hiking is early fall, after most mosquitoes have died off and the autumn colors have come out. And if youd like to try your hand at something uniquely Finnish, dont miss the plethora of bizarre sports contests in the summer, including: Air Guitar World Championships 17. August, Oulu . Mobile Phone Throwing Championship 18. August, Savonlinna. Recycle your Nokia Swamp Soccer World Championship 19. July, Hyrynsalmi. Probably the messiest sporting event in the world. Wife Carrying World Championship 20. July, Sonkajrvi. The grand prize is the wifes weight in beer. Sulkavan Suursoudut 21. July, Sulkava Finlands biggest rowing event Festivals Edit Finland hosts many music festivals ( festari ) during the summer. Some of the most notable include: Most of the festivals last 2-4 days and are very well organized, with many different bands playing, with eg. Foo Fighters and Linkin Park headlining at Provinssi 2008. The normal full ticket (all days) price is about 60-100, which includes a camp site where you can sleep, eat and meet other festival guests. The atmosphere at festivals is great and probably youll find new friends there. Of course drinking a lot of beer is a part of the experience. There are also many more less-advertised underground festivals around the countryside every summer. Northern Lights Edit Spotting the eerie Northern Lights ( aurora borealis . or revontulet in Finnish) glowing in the sky is on the agenda of many visitors, but even in Finland its not so easy. During the summer, its light all day along and the aurora become invisible, and theyre rarely seen in the south. The best place to spot them is during the winter in the far north, when the probability of occurrence is over 50 around the magnetic peak hour of 22:30 8212 if the sky is clear, that is. The ski resort of Saariselk. easily accessible by plane and with plenty of facilities, is particularly popular among aurora hunters. Finland has the euro () as its sole currency along with 24 other countries that use this common European money. These 24 countries are: Austria. Belgium. Chipre. Estonia. Finland . France. Alemanha. Greece. Ireland. Italy. Latvia. Lithuania. Luxemburgo. Malta. the Netherlands. Portugal. Slovakia. Slovenia and Spain (official euro members which are all European Union member states) as well as Andorra. Kosovo. Mônaco. Montenegro. San Marino and the Vatican which use it without having a say in eurozone affairs and without being European Union members. Together, these countries have a population of more than 330 million. One euro is divided into 100 cents. While each official euro member (as well as Monaco, San Marino and Vatican) issues its own coins with a unique obverse, the reverse, as well as all bank notes, look the same throughout the eurozone. Every coin is legal tender in any of the eurozone countries. Finland does not use the 1 and 2 cent coins instead all sums are rounded to the nearest 5 cents. The coins are, however, still legal tender and there are even small quantities of Finnish 1c and 2c coins, highly valued by collectors. It is common to omit cents and the euro sign from prices, and use the comma as a decimal separator: 5,50 thus means five euros and fifty cents. Getting or exchanging money is rarely a problem, as ATMs (Otto) are common and they can be operated with international credit and debit cards (Visa, Visa Electron, Mastercard, Maestro). Currencies other than the euro are generally not accepted, although the Swedish krona may be accepted in land and northern border towns like Tornio. Russian roubles are accepted in some select touristy shops, such as Stockmann in Helsinki. Money changers are common in the bigger cities (the Forex chain 33 is ubiquitous) and typically have longer opening hours and faster service than banks. Credit cards are widely accepted, and the payment is almost always accepted by your PIN code. Visa Electron and Visa Debit cardreaders are found in all major and most minor shops, so carrying large amounts of cash is not usually necessary. As a rule, tipping is never necessary in Finland and restaurant bills already include service charges. That said, taxi fares and other bills paid by cash are are occasionally rounded up to the next convenient number. Cloakrooms ( narikka ) in nightclubs and better restaurants often have non-negotiable fees (usually clearly signposted, 83643 is standard), and 8212 in the few hotels that employ them 8212 hotel porters will expect around the same per bag. Costs Edit Declared the worlds most expensive country in 1990, prices have since abated somewhat but are still steep by most standards. Rock-bottom traveling if staying in hostel dorms and self-catering costs at least 25day and its well worth doubling that amount. The cheapest hotels cost about 50 per night and more regular hotels closer to 100. Instead of hotels or hostels, look for holiday cottages, especially when travelling in a group and off-season, you can find a full-equipped cottage for 10-15 per person a night. Camp-sites typically cost between 10 and 20 per tent. Museums and tourist attractions have an entrance fee in the range of 5-25. Using public transport costs a few euros per day and depends on the city. One-way travel between major cities by train or by bus costs between 20 and 100, depending on the distance. Note that a VAT of 24 is charged for nearly everything, but by law this must be included in the displayed price. Non-EU residents can get a tax refund for purchases above 40 at participating outlets, just look for the Tax-Free Shopping logo. Shopping Edit As you might expect given the general price level, souvenir shopping in Finland isnt exactly cheap. Traditional buys include Finnish puukko knives, handwoven ryijy rugs and every conceivable part of a reindeer. For any Lappish handicrafts, look for the Smi Duodji label that certifies it as authentic. Popular brands for modern (or timeless) Finnish design include Marimekko 34 clothing, Iittala 35 glass, Arabia 36 ceramics, Kalevala Koru 37 jewelry, Pentik 38 interior design and, if you dont mind the shipping costs, Artek 39 furniture by renowned architect and designer Alvar Aalto. Kids and not a few adults love Moomin 40 characters, which fill up souvenir store shelves throughout the country. In case one prefers souvenirs that are made in Finland and do not just appear Finn Made, caution is advised. Many wooden products are actually imported and Marimekko, for instance, manufactures most of its products outside Finland. Safe bets for truly Finnish souvenirs are products made by Lapuan Kankurit 41 and Aarikka 42. for example. Grocery stores are rather common, and there is usually at least one supermarket in almost all localities. The range of products in Finnish grocery stores tends to be a little bit more limited than in neighboring countries (except perhaps in Norway). Many products need to be imported, and this unfortunately shows in the selection of goods and the pricing. It is not uncommon to see exactly the same product in different shops, at exactly the same price. Finnish food markets are mainly dominated by two large groups: S Group (supermarket chains Sale . Alepa . S-Market and hypermarket chain Prisma ), and K Group (supermarket chains K-Extra . K-Market . K-Supermarket and hypermarket chain K-Citymarket , while local market chains like Siwa . Valintatalo . Tarmo and M-Market covers lots of gaps where larger chains do not operate. In addition to these chains, international discount store chain Lidl operates around 150 stores in Finland, mainly in cities and towns with population over 5,000. It usually offers the cheapest prices, and product range is similar to the rest of Europe. Previous restrictions on shopping hours were recently lifted, and now vary significantly by shop and location. For many smaller shops in large towns, normal weekday opening hours are around 08:00-22:00, but may be closed or have reduced hours during weekends. Larger shops and grocery stores in central locations are sometimes open later. Shopping hours for specialty stores, as well as shops in small towns and in the countryside, are often much shorter. Note that opening hours are often reduced considerably around national holidays, such as Christmas, Easter or Midsummer. Convenience stores like the ubiquitous R-Kioski 43 tend to have longer hours, but are often closed when you most need them. Some shops in Central Helsinki are open 247 or until 22:00 every day of the year. If in desperate need of basic supplies, gas station convenience stores are usually open on weekends and until late at night. Most notable 247 Gas station-chains are ABC 44 and Shell 45. While shopkeepers may vehemently deny this to a foreigner, prices in smaller stores are by no means fixed. When buying hobby equipment, it is not uncommon to get 30160 discount (hint: Find the international price level from a web shop and print it out). The more specialized the goods, the higher the gap between Finnish and international prices, and mail order may save a lot of money. When a package is intercepted by customs (which is quite rate for physically small items), the buyer is notified and can pick it up from customs. VAT and possibly import duty are charged, bring a copy of the order that is then signed by the buyer and archived. When buying consumer electronics, one should be aware that the shelf life of products can be rather long, especially if the shop isnt specialized in consumer electronics. There is a risk to buy an overpriced product that has already been discontinued by the manufacturer or replaced with a newer model. A typical Finnish meal. Clockwise from bottom: warm smoked salmon, boiled potatoes, cream sauce with chantarelles, lightly pickled cucumbers with dill Finnish cuisine is heavily influenced by its neighbors, the main staples being potatoes and bread with various fish and meat dishes on the side. Milk or cream is traditionally considered an important part of the diet and is often an ingredient in foods and a drink, even for adults. Various milk products such as cheeses are also produced. While traditional Finnish food is famously bland, the culinary revolution that followed joining the EU has seen a boom in classy restaurants experimenting with local ingredients, often with excellent results. Seafood Edit With tens of thousands of lakes and a long coastline, fish is a Finnish staple, and theres a lot more on that menu than just salmon ( lohi ). Specialities include: Baltic herring ( silakka ), a small, fatty and quite tasty fish available pickled, marinated, smoked, grilled and in countless other varieties Gravlax (graavilohi), a pan-Scandinavian appetizer of raw salted salmon Smoked salmon ( savulohi ), not just the cold, thinly sliced, semi-raw kind but also fully cooked warm smoked salmon Vendace ( muikku ), a speciality in eastern Finland, a small fish served fried, heavily salted and typically with mashed potatoes Other local fish to look out for include zander ( kuha ), an expensive delicacy, pike ( hauki ) and perch ( ahven ). Meat dishes Edit Reindeer stew ( poronkristys ), a Lappish favorite Meatballs ( lihapullat ), served with mashed potatoes and lingonberry jam Karelian stew ( karjalanpaisti ), a heavy stew usually made from beef and pork (and optionally, lamb), carrots and onions, usually served with potatoes Liver casserole ( maksalaatikko ), consisting of chopped liver, rice and raisins cooked in an oven it tastes rather different from what youd expect (and not liver-y at all) Loop sausage ( lenkkimakkara ), a large, mildly flavored sausage best when grilled and topped with a dab of sweet Finnish mustard ( sinappi ), and beer Meat balls ( lihapullat . lihapyrykt ) are as popular and tasty as in neighboring Sweden Reindeer ( poro ) dishes, especially sauteed reindeer shavings ( poronkristys . served with potato mash and lingonberries), not actually a part of the everyday Finnish diet but a tourist staple and common in the frigid North Swedish hash (pyttipannu), (originally from Sweden. Swedish: pytt i panna) a hearty dish of potatoes, onions and any meaty leftovers on hand fried up in a pan and topped with an egg Makkara traditional Finnish sausage. Affectionately called the Finnish mans vegetable since the actual meat content may be rather low. Milk products Edit Cheese and other milk products are very popular in Finland. The most common varieties are mild hard cheeses like Edam and Emmental, but local specialities include: Aura cheese ( aurajuusto ), a local variety of blue cheese, also used in soups, sauces and as a pizza topping. Breadcheese ( leipjuusto or juustoleip ), a type of very mild-flavored grilled curd that squeaks when you eat it, best enjoyed warm with a dab of cloudberry jam Piim . a type of buttermilk beverage, thick and sour Viili . a gelatinous, stretchy and sour variant of yoghurt Other dishes Edit Karelian pie ( karjalanpiirakka ), a signature Finnish pastry Pea soup ( hernekeitto ), usually but not always with ham, traditionally eaten with a dab of mustard and served on Thursdays just watch out for the flatulence Karelian pies ( karjalanpiirakka ), an oval 7 by 10 cm baked pastry, traditionally baked with rye flour, containing rice porridge or mashed potato, ideally eaten topped with butter and chopped egg ( munavoi ) Porridge ( puuro ), usually made from oats ( kaura ), barley ( ohra ), rice ( riisi ) or rye ( ruis ) and most often served for breakfast Bread Edit Bread ( leip ) is served with every meal in Finland, and comes in a vast array of varieties. Rye bread is the most popular bread in Finland. Typically Finnish ones include: hapankorppu . dry, crispy and slightly sour flatbread, occasionally sold overseas as Finncrisp limppu . catch-all term for big loaves of fresh bread nkkileip . another type of dark, dried, crispy rye flatbread ruisleip (rye bread), can be up to 100 rye and much darker, heavier and chewier than American-style rye bread unlike in Swedish tradition, Finnish rye bread is typically unsweetened and thus sour and even bitter. rieska . unleavened bread made from wheat or potatoes, eaten fresh Seasonal and regional specialities Edit Attack of the killer mushrooms The false morel ( korvasieni ) has occasionally been dubbed the Finnish fugu, as like the infamous Japanese pufferfish, an improperly prepared false morel can kill you . Fortunately, its easily rendered safe by boiling (just dont breathe in the fumes), and prepared mushrooms can be found in gourmet restaurants and even canned. From the end of July until early September its worthwhile to ask for crayfish ( rapu ) menus and prices at better restaurants. Its not cheap, you dont get full from the crayfish alone and there are many rituals involved, most of which involve large quantities of ice-cold vodka, but it should be tried at least once. Or try to sneak onto a corporate crayfish party guestlist, places are extremely coveted at some. Around Christmas, baked ham is the traditional star of the dinner table, with a constellation of casseroles around it. There are also regional specialties, including Eastern Finland s kalakukko (a type of giant fish pie ) and Tampere s infamous blood sausage ( mustamakkara ). Around Easter keep an eye out for mmmi . a type of brown sweet rye pudding which is eaten with cream and sugar. It looks famously unpleasant but actually tastes quite good. Desserts Edit An assortment of pulla straight from the oven For dessert or just as a snack, Finnish pastries abound and are often taken with coffee (see Drink ) after a meal. Look for cardamom coffee bread ( pulla ), a wide variety of tarts ( torttu ), and donuts ( munkki ). In summer, a wide range of fresh berries are available, including the delectable but expensive cloudberry ( lakka ), and berry products are available throughout the year as jam ( hillo ), soup ( keitto ) and a type of gooey clear pudding known as kiisseli . Finnish chocolate is also rather good, with Fazer 46 products including their iconic Sininen (Blue) bar exported around the world. A more Finnish speciality is licorice ( lakritsi ), particularly the strong, salty kind known as salmiakki . which gets its unique (and acquired) taste from ammonium chloride. Places to eat Edit Cold fish buffet at Liekkilohi, Savonlinna Finns tend to eat out only on special occasions, and restaurant prices are correspondingly expensive. The one exception is lunchtime . when thanks to a government-sponsored lunch coupon system company cafeterias and nearly every restaurant in town offers set lunches for around 8-9, usually consisting of a main course, salad bar, bread table and a drink. University cafeterias, many of which are open to all, are particularly cheap with meals in the 2-4 range for students, although without local student ID you will usually need to pay about 5-7. There are also public cafeterias in office administration areas that are open only during lunch hours on working days. While not particularly stylish and sometimes hard to find, those usually offer high-quality buffet lunch at a reasonable price (typically 8.40 in 2011). The cafe scene has quickly developed, especially since the 1990s and above all in Helsinki. The array of cakes and pastries is not perhaps as vast as in Central Europe. but the local special coffees (lattes, mochas etc.) are worth trying when it comes to the two big local coffee house chains: Waynes Coffee (originated in Sweden) and Roberts Coffee (Finland). You can now also find Starbucks in Finland. For dinner, youll be limited to generic fast food (pizza, hamburgers, kebabs and such) in the 5-10 range, or youll have to splurge over 20 for a meal in a nice restaurant. For eating on the move, look for grill kiosks ( grilli ), which serve sausages, hamburgers and other portable if not terribly health-conscious fare late into the night at reasonable prices. In addition to the usual hamburgers and hot dogs, look for meat pies ( lihapiirakka ), akin to a giant savoury doughnut stuffed with minced meat and your choice of sausage, fried eggs and condiments. Hesburger 47 is the local fast-food equivalent of McDonalds, with a similar menu. They have a Finnish interpretation of a few dishes, such as a sour-rye chicken sandwich. Of course most international fast food chains are present, especially McDonalds, which offers many of their sandwich buns substituted with a sour-rye bun on request. The Finnish word for buffet is seisova pyt (standing table), and while increasingly used to refer to all-you-can-eat Chinese or Italian restaurants, the traditional meaning is akin to Swedens smrgsbord . a good-sized selection of sandwiches, fish, meats and pastries. Its traditionally eaten in three rounds 8212 first the fish, then the cold meats, and finally warm dishes 8212 and its usually the first that is the star of the show. Though expensive and not very common in a restaurant setting, if you are fortunate enough to be formally invited to a Finns home, they will likely have prepared a spread for their guest, along with plenty of coffee. Breakfast at better hotels is also along these lines and its easy to eat enough to cover lunch as well If youre really on a budget, you can save a considerable amount of money by self-catering . Ready-to-eat casseroles and other basic fare that can be quickly prepared in a microwave can be bought for a few euros in any supermarket. Note that youre usually expected to weigh and label any fruits or vegetables yourself (bag it, place it on the scale and press the numbered button. The correct number can be found from the price sign), and green signs mean possibly tastier but certainly more expensive organic ( luomu ) produce. One should be aware that more often than not, cheap food contains disproportionate amounts of fat. At restaurants, despite the high prices, portions tend to be quite small, at least when compared to USA and Canada. and even many European countries. Dietary restrictions Edit Traditional Finnish cuisine relies heavily on meat and fish, but vegetarianism ( kasvissynti ) is increasingly popular and well-understood, and will rarely pose a problem for travellers. Practically all restaurants offer vegetarian options, often marked with a V on menus. Two ailments commonly found among Finns themselves are lactose intolerance ( laktoosi-intoleranssi . inability to digest the milk sugar lactose) and coeliac disease ( keliakia . inability to digest gluten). In restaurants, lactose-free selections are often tagged L (low-lactose products are sometimes called Hyla or marked with VL), while gluten-free options are marked with G. However, hydrolyzed lactose (HYLA brand) milk or lactose-free milk drink for the lactose intolerant is widely available, which also means that a lactose-free dish is not necessarily milk-free. Allergies are quite common among Finnish people, too, so restaurant workers are usually quite knowledgeable on what goes into each dish and often it is possible to get the dish without certain ingredients if specified. Kosher and halal food are rare in Finland and generally not available outside very limited speciality shops and restaurants catering to the tiny Jewish and Islamic communities. Watch out for minced meat dishes like meatballs, which very commonly use a mix of beef and pork. The Jewish Community of Helsinki 48 runs a small kosher deli in Helsinki. and there are Halal grocery stores and restaurants in some larger towns. Drink Edit Thanks to its thousands of lakes, Finland has plenty of water supplies and tap water is always potable (In fact, never buy bottled water if you can get tap water). The usual soft drinks and juices are widely available, but look out for a wide array of berry juices ( marjamehu ), especially in summer, as well as Pommac . an unusual soda made from (according to the label) mixed fruits, which youll either love or hate. Coffee and tea Edit Finns are the worlds heaviest coffee ( kahvi ) drinkers, averaging 3-4 cups per day. Most Finns drink it strong and black, but sugar and milk for coffee are always available and the more European variants such as espresso and cappuccino are becoming all the more common especially in the bigger cities. The biggest towns have had French-style fancy cafs for quite some time and modern competitors, like Waynes or Roberts Coffee, are springing up in the mix. For a quick caffeine fix, you can just pop into any convenience store, which will pour you a cuppa for 83642 or so. Tea hasnt quite caught on in quite the same way, although finding hot water and a bag of Lipton Yellow Label wont be a problem. For brewed tea, check out some of the finer downtown cafs or tea rooms. Dairy Edit In Finland some people like to drink milk ( maito ) as an accompaniment to food at home or at the cafeteria at work or school. The most popular beverage is water, though. Another popular option is piim . or buttermilk. Viili . a type of curd, acts like super-stretchy liquid bubble gum but is similar to plain yogurt in taste. It is traditionally eaten with cinnamon and sugar on top. Fermented dairy products help stabilize the digestion system, so if your system is upset, give them a try. Alcohol Edit Chilling out at the Arctic Icebar, Helsinki Alcohol is very expensive in Finland compared to most countries (though not to its Nordic neighbours Sweden and Norway ), although low-cost Estonia s entry to the EU has forced the government to cut alcohol taxes a little. Still, a single beer will cost you closer to 83644-5 in any bar or pub, or 83641 and up in a supermarket. While beer and cider are available in any supermarket or convenience store (until 9 PM), the state monopoly Alko 49 is your sole choice for wine or anything stronger. The legal drinking age is 18 for milder drinks, while to buy hard liquor from Alko you need to be 20. ID is usually requested from all young-looking clients. Some restaurants have higher age requirements, up to 30 years, but these are their own policies and are not always followed, especially at more quiet times. Surprisingly enough, the national drink is not Finlandia Vodka, but its local brand Koskenkorva 50 or Kossu in common speech. However, the two drinks are closely related: Kossu is 38 while Finlandia is 40, and Kossu also has a small amount of added sugar, which makes the two drinks taste somewhat different. There are also many other vodkas ( viina ) on the market, most of which taste pretty much the same, but look out for Strm . The Spirit of Santa, a Finnish attempt at a super-premium vodka. A local speciality is Salmiakki-Kossu or Salmari . prepared by mixing in salty black salmiakki licorice, whose taste masks the alcohol behind it fearfully well. Add in some Fishermans Friend menthol cough drops to get Fisu (Fish) shots, which are even more lethal. In-the-know hipsters opt for Pantteri (Panther), which is half and half Salmari and Fisu. Other classic shots are Jaloviina ( Jallu ) cut brandy and Tervasnapsi tar schnapps with a distinctive smoke aroma. Beer ( olut or kalja ) is also very popular, but Finnish beers are mostly nearly identical, mild lagers: common brands are Lapin Kulta . Karjala . Olvi . Koff and Karhu . Pay attention to the label when buying: beers branded I are inexpensive but has low alcohol content, while III and IV are stronger and more expensive. In normal shops you will not find any drinks with more than 4.7 alcohol. You may also encounter kotikalja (lit. home beer), a dark brown beer-like but very low-alcohol beverage. Imported beers are available in bigger grocery stores, most pubs and bars, and Czech beers in particular are popular and only slightly more expensive. In recent years, some microbreweries ( Laitila . Stadin panimo . Nokian panimo etc.) have been gaining foothold with their domestic dark lagers, wheat beers and ales. The latest trend is ciders ( siideri ). Most of these are artificially flavored sweet concoctions which are quite different from the English or French kinds, although the more authentic varieties are gaining market share. The ever-popular gin long drink or lonkero (lit. tentacle), a prebottled mix of gin and grapefruit soda, tastes better than it sounds and has the additional useful property of glowing under ultraviolet light. At up to 610 kcalliter it also allows to skip dinner, leaving more time for drinking. Different variations of lonkero have become quite popular as well, for example karpalolonkero . which is made from gin and cranberry soda. Remember that most long drinks you buy from a supermarket are made by fermenting, and if you want to get real mixed drink youll have to look for them in Alko . During the winter dont miss glgi . a type of spiced mulled wine served with almonds and raisins which can easily be made at home. The bottled stuff in stores is usually alcohol free, although it was originally made of old wine and Finns will very often mix in some wine or spirits. In restaurants, glgi is served either alcohol-free, or with 2cl vodka added. Fresh, hot glgi can, for example, be found at the Helsinki Christmas market. Quite a few unusual liquors ( likri ) made from berries are available, although theyre uniformly very sweet and usually served with dessert. Cloudberry liquor ( lakkalikri ) is worth a short even if you dont like the berries fresh. Homemade spirits: you have been warned More common in rural areas, illegal and frequently distilled on modified water purification plants - which are subject to import control laws nowadays - anecdotical evidence suggests that those are occasionally played as a prank on unsuspecting foreigners. Note that normal alcohol slows the metabolism of poisonous methanol and thus acts as an antidote. Politely decline the offer, especially if still sober. Finally, two traditional beverages worth looking for are mead ( sima ), an age-old wine-like brew made from brown sugar, lemon and yeast and consumed particularly around Mays Vappu festival, and sahti . a type of unfiltered, usually very strong beer often flavored with juniper berries (an acquired taste). Sleep Edit Inside a Finnish sauna Sauna The sauna is perhaps Finlands most significant contribution to the world (and the worlds vocabulary). The sauna is essentially a room heated to 708211120176C according to an oft-quoted statistic this nation of 5 million has no less than 2 million saunas, in apartments, offices, summer cottages and even Parliament. In ancient times, saunas (being the cleanest places around) were the place to give birth and heal the sick, and the first building constructed when setting up a new household. If invited to visit a Finnish home, you may be invited to bathe in the sauna as well 8212 this is an honour and should be treated as such, although Finns do understand that foreigners may not be keen about the idea. Enter the sauna nude after taking a shower, as wearing a bathing suit or any other clothing is considered a bit of a faux pas . although if you are feeling shy, you can wrap yourself in a bath towel. (When there are guests, men and women usually bathe separately.) The temperature is regulated by throwing water onto the stove ( kiuas ): the resulting rush of heat, known as lyly . is considered the key to the sauna experience. Some sauna-goers also like to flagellate themselves with leafy branches of birch ( vihta in western Finland, vasta in eastern Finland), which creates an enjoyable aroma and improves blood circulation. Depending on the occasion, the temperature in a Finnish sauna may start quite hot and gradually cool down over the hours, especially in a wood-heated sauna. The lower benches are cooler, the corner that is the furthest away from the stove is usually the hottest place. In work-related events, the actual decision-making frequently takes place in the sauna afterwards. In public saunas (hotels, gyms and the like), it is customary to sit on a paper towel (dont forget to take it out when leaving). The environment is rather hostile towards germs, so there is no need to worry about catching a disease from the sweaty wooden bench. If the heat is too much, cup your hands in front of your mouth or move down to a lower level to catch your breath. In winter, it is common to go for a swim in an ice hole in a nearby lake. The ground can be much colder than the water - use beach sandals or the like, if possible. After youve had your fill of sauna, you can cool off by heading outside for a dip in the lake or, in winter, a roll in the snow 8212 and then head back in for another round. Repeat this a few times, then cork open a cold beer, roast a sausage over a fire, and enjoy total relaxation Finnish style. These days the most common type of sauna features an electrically heated stove, which is easy to control and maintain. In the countryside you can still find wood-fired saunas, but purists prefer the (now very rare) traditional chimneyless smoke saunas ( savusauna ), where the sauna is heated by filling it with hot smoke and then ventilated well before entering. Anyone elderly or with a medical condition (especially high blood pressure) should consult their physician before using a sauna. Accommodation in Finland is expensive, but many large hotels are cheaper during the weekends and summer. In addition to the usual international suspects, check out local chains Cumulus 51. Scandic 52. Finlandia 53 and Sokos 54. The small but fast-growing Omena 55 chain offers cheap self-service hotels, where you book online and get a keycode for your room, with no check-in of any kind needed. One of the few ways to limit the damage is to stay in youth hostels ( retkeilymaja ), as the Finnish Youth Hostel Association 56 has a fairly comprehensive network throughout the country and and a dorm bed usually costs less than 836420 per night. Many hostels also have private rooms for as little as 836430, which are a great deal if you want a little extra privacy. An even cheaper option is to take advantage of Finlands right to access. or Every Mans Right ( jokamiehenoikeus ), which allows camping, hiking, and berry and mushroom picking as well as simple (rod and hook) fishing on uncultivated land. Since this is occasionally mis-interpreted by visiting foreigners, it may be a good idea to discuss travel plans with a local - or simply ask - to avoid embarrassing situations. Note that making a fire requires landowners permission. For a taste of the Finnish countryside, an excellent option is to stay at a cottage ( mkki ), thousands of which dot the lake shores. These are generally best in summer, but there are also many cottages around Laplands ski resorts. Prices vary widely based on facilities and location: simple cottages can go for as little as 836420night, while luxurious multistory mansions can go for 10 times that. Beware that, while all but the most basic ones will have electricity, its very common for cottages to lack running water: instead, the cottage will have an outhouse (pit toilet) and youre expected to bathe in the sauna and lake. Renting a car is practically obligatory since there are unlikely to be any facilities (shops, restaurants, etc) within walking distance. The largest cottage rental services are Lomarengas 57 and Nettimkki 58. both of which have English interfaces. Virtually every lodging in Finland includes a sauna ( see box ) for guests 8212 dont miss it Check operating hours though, as theyre often only heated in the evenings and there may be separate shifts of men and women. Learn Edit Finlands universities are generally well-regarded and offer many exchange programs, but the high cost of living and the prospect of facing the long, cold Finnish winter mean that the country is not a particularly popular choice. However, there are no tuition fees for regular degree students, including international exchange students. While lectures are usually conducted in Finnish, most universities offer the option to complete all courses through assignments and exams in English. Many universities also offer the option to study Finnish at various levels. A reasonable monthly budget (excluding rent) would be 600 to 900. Rents vary depending on location such that in Greater Helsinki and particularly Helsinki proper prices may be two times that of cheaper locations or student housing. Many exchange programs fully or partly subsidize accommodation in student dorms. However, the state does not provide student accommodation and dorms are usually owned by student unions and foundations. Student union membership at around 70-100year is obligatory, but this includes free access to student health services. EU citizens can simply enter the country and register as a student after arrival, while students from elsewhere will need to arrange their residence permit beforehand. CIMO 59 (Centre for International Mobility) administers exchange programs and can arrange scholarships and traineeships in Finland, while the Finnish National Board of Education 60 offers basic information about study opportunities. There is little informal work to be found and most jobs require at least a remedial level of Finnish. Citizens of European Union countries can work freely in Finland, but acquiring a work permit from outside the EU means doing battle with the infamous Directorate of Immigration ( Maahanmuuttovirasto ) 61. However, students permitted to study full-time in Finland are allowed work part-time (up to 25 hweek) or even full-time during holiday periods. For jobs, you might want to check out the Ministry of Labour 62. Most of the posted jobs are described in Finnish so you may need some help in translation, but some jobs are in English. A rapidly growing trend in Finland, especially for the younger generation, is to work for placement agencies. Although there has been a massive surge of public companies going private in the last ten years, this trend seems to be fueled by the increased demand for more flexible work schedules as well as the freedom to work seasonally or sporadically. Due to the nature of these types of agencies as well as the types of work they provide, it is common for them to hire non-Finns. Some agencies include Adecco, Staff Point, Manpower, Aaltovoima and Biisoni. If you are invited to a job interview, remember that modesty is a virtue in Finland. Finns appreciate facts and directness, so stay on topic and be truthful. Exaggeration and bragging is usually associated with lying. You can check expected salaries with the union for your field, as they usually have defined minimum wages. Salaries range from 1,200 - 6,500 per month (2010). Stay safe Edit Crimeviolence: Low Most violence is alcohol-related andor domestic walking in the street is usually safe even in the night Authoritiescorruption: Low The police are generally courteous and speak some English, offering bribes will get you into serious trouble. Transportation: Low to Moderate Icy roads and sidewalks in the winter, mooses and other animals occasionally crossing the roads Health: Low Tick and mosquito bites Nature: Low to Moderate Blizzards in the winter, getting lost when hiking in the forests Crime Edit Finland enjoys a comparatively low crime rate and is, generally, a very safe place to travel. Use common sense at night, particularly on Friday and Saturday when the youth of Finland hit the streets to get drunk and in some unfortunate cases look for trouble. The easiest way to get beaten is to pay a visit at a grill kiosk after bars and pubs have closed and start arguing with drunken people. It is, anyway statistically more likely that your home country is less safe than Finland, so heed whatever warnings you would do in your own country and you will have no worries. If you yourself run in with the law, remember that Finland is one of the worlds least corrupt countries and you will not be able to buy yourself out of trouble. Finnish police never requires a cash payment of fines which it gives. Do not ever give money to person who presents himherself as a police officer. An obvious way to stay out of most kinds of trouble is to stay sober and act businesslike, when dealing with police, security or the like. Racism is a generally of minor concern, especially in the cosmopolitan major cities, but there have been a few rare but highly publicized incidents of black, romani amp Arab people getting beaten up, attacks against immigrants and group fights with native Finns amp immigrants. Sometimes there might be group fights where immigrants do their part as well, but thats very uncommon. The average visitor, though, is highly unlikely to encounter any problems. Pickpockets are rare, but not unheard of, especially in the busy tourist months in the summer and almost always done by foreigners. Most Finns carry their wallets in their pockets or purses and feel quite safe while doing it. Parents often leave their sleeping babies in a baby carriage on the street while visiting a shop, and in the countryside cars and house doors are often left unlocked. On the other hand, you have to be careful if you buy or rent a bicycle. Bicycle thieves are everywhere, never leave your bike unlocked even for a minute. In case of emergency Edit 112 is the national phone number for all emergency services, including police, and it does not require an area code, regardless of what kind of phone youre using. The number works on any mobile phone, whether it is keylocked or not, and with or without a SIM card. If a cellphone challenges you with a PIN code, you can simply type in 112 as a PIN code - most phones will give a choice to call the number. This is not possible with all phones For inquiries about poisons or toxins (from mushrooms, plants, medicine or other chemicals) call the national Toxin Information Office at (09) 471 977. At sea, the maritime search and rescue number is 0294 1000. Stay healthy Edit Signs to watch out for vaara, vaarallinen160 danger, dangerous sortumisvaara160 risk of avalanchelandslidemudslide hirvivaara160 risk of mooseelks on the road hengenvaara160 life threatening danger tulipalo160 fire kielletty160 prohibited psy kielletty or privat no entry htuloskynti or htpoistumistie160 emergency exit lkri160 doctor poliisi160 police sairaala160 hospital apua160 help Youre unlikely to have stomach troubles in Finland, since tap water is always drinkable (and generally quite tasty as well), and hygiene standards in restaurants are strict. If you have any sort of allergies, many restaurants often display in the menu the most common ingredients that people typically are allergic to. Examples: (L) Lactose free, (VL) Low Lactose, (G) Gluten free, if you are unsure just ask the waitress or restaurant staff. There are few serious health risks in Finland. Your primary enemy especially in wintertime will be the cold . particularly if trekking in Lapland. Finland is a sparsely populated country and, if heading out into the wilderness, it is imperative that you register your travel plans with somebody who can inform rescue services if you fail to return. Always keep your mobile phone with you if you run into trouble. Dress warmly in layers and bring along a good pair of sunglasses to prevent snow blindness . especially in the spring and if you plan to spend whole days outdoors. Always keep a map, a compass and preferably a GPS with you while trekking in the wilderness. Take extra precautions in Lapland, where it can be several days hike to the nearest house or road. Weather can change rapidly, and even though the sun is shining now, you can have a medium sized blizzard on your hands (no joke) an hour or two later. If out on the lakes and sea, remember that wind and water will cool you faster than cold air, and keeping dry means keeping warm. A person that falls into cold water (close to zero C) can die in a few minutes. Safety in small boats . Dont drink alcohol, wear a life vest at all times, if your boat capsizes - keep clothes on to stay warm, cling to the boat if possible (swim only if shore is a few hundred meters away, never try to swim in cold water below 20176C). Finland hosts a number of irritating insects, but if you are planning to stay in the centres of major cities, you are unlikely to encounter them. A serious nuisance in summer are mosquitoes ( hyttynen ), hordes of which inhabit Finland (particularly Lapland) in summer, especially after rains. While they carry no malaria or other nasty diseases, many species of Finnish mosquitoes make a distinctive (and highly irritating) whining sound while tracking their prey, and their bites are very itchy. As usual, mosquitoes are most active around dawn and sunset 8212 which, in the land of the Midnight Sun, may mean most of the night in summer. There are many different types of mosquito repellants available which can be bought from almost any shop. Another summer nuisance are gadflies ( paarma ), whose bites can leave a mark lasting for days, even for month. A more recent introduction to Finnish summers are deer keds ( hirvikrpnen ), that can be particularly nasty if they manage to shed their wings and burrow into hair (although they rarely bite as humans are not their intended targets, and mainly exist in deep forests). Use repellent, ensure your tent has good mosquito netting and consider prophylaxis with cetirizine (brand names include Zyrtec . Heinix . Cetirizin Ratiopharm ), an anti-allergen that (if taken in advance) will neutralize your reaction to any bites. Topical anti-allergens in the form of gels and creams are also available as over-the-counter medication. A flea comb can be useful for removing deer keds. As in other European countries, mites can become a major annoyance, if walking bare-footed. As a remedy, Permethrin creme is available from pharmacies without prescription. In southern Finland, especially land. the Lappeenranta - Parikkala - Imatra - axis and areas near Turku s coast, there are ticks ( punkki ) which appear on summertime and can transmit Lymes disease (borreliosis) and viral encephalitis through a bite. Although these incidents are relatively rare and not all ticks carry the disease, its advisable to wear dark trousers rather than shorts if you plan to walk through dense andor tall grass areas (the usual habitat for ticks). You can buy special tick tweezers from the pharmacy ( punkkipihdit ) which can be used to remove a tick safely if you happen to get bitten. You should remove the tick from your skin as quickly as possible and preferably with the tick tweezers to reduce the risks of getting an infection. If the tick bite starts to form red rings on the skin around it or if you experience other symptoms relating to the bite, you should visit a doctor as soon as possible. The only venomous insects in Finland are wasps ( ampiainen ), bees ( mehilinen ) and bumblebees ( kimalainen ). Their stings can be painful, but are not dangerous, unless you receive several stings or if you are allergic to it. Theres only one type of venomous snake in Finland, the European adder ( kyy or kyykrme ), which has a distinct zig-zag type of figure on its back, although some of them are almost completely black. They are mostly found near lake sides and sometimes in the streets like Kristianinkatu and Kamppi. The snake occurs across Finland all the way from the south to up north in Lapland. Although their bites are extremely rarely fatal (except for small children and allergic persons), one should be careful in the summertime especially when walking in the forests or on open fields at the countryside. Walk so that you make the ground vibrate and snakes will go away, they attack people only when somebody frightens them. If you are bitten by a snake, always get medical assistance. If you are planning to travel in the nature on summertime, its advisable to buy a kyypakkaus (Adder pack, a medicine set which contains a couple of hydrocortisone pills). It can be bought from any Finnish pharmacy. It is used to reduce the reactions after an adder bite, however its still advisable to see a doctor even after youve taken the hydrocortisone pills. The kyypakkaus can also be used to relieve the pain, swelling and other allergic reactions caused by bee stings. If you see an ant nest, ants have quite likely taken care of all snakes nearby. As for other dangerous wildlife, theres not much more than a few extremely rare encounters with brown bears ( karhu ) and wolves ( susi ) in the wilderness. Both of these animals are listed as endangered species. Contrary to popular belief abroad, there are no polar bears in Finland, let alone polar bears walking on the city streets. The brown bear, which occurs across Finland, has been spotted on a few very exceptional occasions even in the edges of the largest Finnish cities, but normally bears try to avoid humans whenever possible. The brown bear hibernates during the winter. In the least densely populated areas near the Russian border, there has been some rare incidents of wolf attacks - mainly lone, hungry wolves attacking domestic animals and pets. During the past 100 years there has been one recorded case of a human killed by a large predator. In general, theres no need to worry about dangerous encounters with wild beasts in Finland, other than traffic accidents. In winter, lakes and the sea are frozen. Walking, skating or even driving a car on the ice is commonly seen, but fatal accidents arent unheard of either, so ask and heed local advice. If the ice fails, it is difficult to get back out of the water, as the ice will be slippery. Small ice picks are sold as safety equipment (a pair of steel needles with bright plastic grips, connected with a safety line). Given the size of the Finnish population, a surprisingly high number of people drown in the lakes every year in summer. As pointed out by an annual public awareness campaign (partly Finnish black humor, partly the truth), the stereotypical accident involves an intoxicated fisherman who capsizes his boat while standing up to pee. Respect Edit Fishing Finnish style It was a beautiful summer day, and Virtanen and Lahtinen were in a little rowboat in the middle of a lake, fishing. Two hours passed, both men sitting quietly, and then Lahtinen said Nice weather today. Virtanen grunted and stared intently at his fishing rod. Two more hours passed. Lahtinen said, Gee, the fish arent biting today. Virtanen shot back: Thats because you talk too much. Drinking Finnish style Virtanen and Lahtinen decided to go drinking at their lakeside cottage. For a couple hours, both men sat silently and emptied their bottles. After a few more hours, Lahtinen decided to break the ice: Isnt it nice to have some quality time Virtanen glared at Lahtinen and answered: Are we here to drink or talk Finns generally have a relaxed attitude towards manners and dressing up, and a visitor is unlikely to offend them by accident. Common sense is quite enough in most situations, but there are a couple of things that one should keep in mind: Finns are a famously taciturn people who have little time for small talk or social niceties, so dont expect to hear phrases like thank you or youre welcome too often. The Finnish language lacks a specific word for please so Finns sometimes forget to use it when speaking English, even when they dont mean to be rude. Also lacking in Finnish is the distinction between he and she, which may lead to confusing errors. Occasional silence is considered a part of the conversation, not a sign of hostility or irritation. Being loud in crowded places like public transport or a restaurant is considered rude. If you ever ended up to argue with someone, the social norm is to stay calm during an argument . Arguing loudly with a stranger is considered very rude. Personal space is important, and standing very near someone can make Finns feel uncomfortable. All that said, Finns are generally helpful and polite, and glad to help confused tourists if asked. The lack of niceties has more to do with the fact that in Finnish culture, honesty is highly regarded and that one should open ones mouth only to mean what one is about to say. Do not say maybe later when there is no later time to be expected. A visitor is unlikely to receive many compliments from Finns, but can be fairly sure that the compliments received are genuine. Especially younger Finns speak usually excellent English due to the policy of subtitling foreign language movies and TV series instead of dubbing them. Another highly regarded virtue in Finland is punctuality . A visitor should apologize even for being a few minutes late. Being late for longer usually requires a short explanation. 10 min is usually considered the threshold between being acceptably late and very late. Some will leave arranged meeting points after 15 min. With the advent of mobile phones, sending a text message even if you are only a few minutes late is nowadays a norm. Being late for a business meeting, even by 1 or 2 min, is considered rude. The standard greeting is a handshake . Hugs are only exchanged between family members and close friends in some situations, kisses, even on the cheek, practically never. If you are invited to a Finnish home, the only bad mistake visitors can make is not to remove their shoes . For much of the year, shoes will carry a lot of snow or mud. Therefore, it is customary to remove them, even during the summer. During the wet season you can ask to put your shoes somewhere to dry during your stay. Very formal occasions at private homes, such as baptisms (often conducted at home in Finland) or somebodys 50th birthday party, are exceptions to these rules. In the wintertime, this sometimes means that the guests bring separate clean shoes and put them on while leaving outdoor shoes to the hall. Bringing gifts such as pastry, wine, or flowers to the host is appreciated, but not required. In Finland, there is little in the way of a dress code . The general attire is casual and even in business meetings the attire is somewhat more relaxed than in some other countries. Topless sunbathing is accepted but not very common on beaches in the summer, while going au naturel is common in lakeside saunas and dedicated nudist beaches. Even though it is unlikely that youll seriously offend anybody, certain topics of discussion can sometimes be slightly sensitive. Despite its proximity to Russia, Finns generally dont prefer being called Eastern Europeans, but rather Nordics or North Europeans. Although once a part of the Russian Empire, Finland fought against the Soviet Union in WWII and has remained unaligned since the Cold War, and referring to Finland as belonging to the Russian sphere of influence most likely wont be appreciated. A majority of Finnish men still serve for some time in the Finnish armed forces, and expressing strong views on the military or on wartime history can sometimes stir up emotions. Also war veterans are highly respected in Finnish society. Although jokes concerning Finlands rather high levels of depression, suicide and alcoholism may be common amongst both Finns and foreigners alike, its nevertheless good to remember that these are serious social problems that affect many people and excessive humorous remarks may not always be received well. Contact Edit By mail Edit Finlands mail service, run by Posti. is fast, reliable and pricy. A postcard to Finland and anywhere in the world costs 1. By phone EditFinland (Finnish: Suomi . Swedish: Finland ) is in Northern Europe and has borders with Russia to the east, Norway to the north, and Sweden to the west. Finland is a thoroughly modern welfare state with well-planned and comfortable small towns and cities, but still offers vast areas of unspoiled nature. Finland has approximately 188,000 lakes (about 10 of the country) and a similar number of islands. In the northernmost part of the country the Northern Lights can be seen in the winter and midnight sun in the summer. Finns also claim the mythical mountain of Korvatunturi as the home of Santa Claus, and a burgeoning tourist industry in Lapland caters to Santa fans. Despite living in one of the most technologically developed countries in the world, Finns love to head to their summer cottages in the warmer months to enjoy all manner of relaxing pastimes including sauna, swimming, fishing and barbecuing. Today, Finland has a distinctive language and culture that sets it apart from the rest of Nordic Europe. Understand Edit History Edit Saint Olafs Castle, the worlds northernmost medieval castle, built in Savonlinna by Sweden in 1475 Not much is known about Finlands early history, with archaeologists still debating when and where a tribe of Finno-Ugric speakers cropped up. Roman historian Tacitus mentions a tribe primitive and savage Fenni in 100AD and even the Vikings chose not to settle, trading and plundering along the coasts. In the mid-1150s Sweden started out to conquer and Christianize the Finnish pagans in earnest, with Birger Jarl incorporating most of the country into Sweden in 1249. Finland stayed an integral part of Sweden until the 19th century, although there was near-constant warfare with Russia on the eastern border and two brief occupations. After Swedens final disastrous defeat in the Finnish War of 1808-1809, Finland became in 1809 an autonomous grand duchy under Russian rule. Russian rule alternated between tolerance and repression and there was already a significant independence movement when Russia plunged into revolutionary chaos in 1917. Parliament seized the chance and declared independence in December, quickly gaining Soviet assent, but the country promptly plunged into a brief but bitter civil war between the conservative Whites and the socialist Reds, eventually won by the Whites. During World War II, Finland was attacked by the Soviet Union in the Winter War . but fought them to a standstill that saw the USSR conquer 12 of Finnish territory. Finland then allied with Germany in an unsuccessful attempt to repel the Soviets and regain the lost territory, was defeated and, as a condition for peace, had to turn against Germany instead. Thus Finland fought three separate wars during World War II. In the end, Finland lost much of Karelia and Finlands second city Vyborg. but Soviets paid a heavy price for them with over 300,000 dead. After the war, Finland lay in the grey zone between the Western countries and the Soviet Union. The Finno-Soviet Pact of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance committed Finland to resist armed attacks by Germany or its allies (read: the West), but also allowed Finland to stay neutral in the Cold War and avoid a Communist government or Warsaw Pact membership. In politics, there was a tendency of avoiding any policies and statements that could be interpreted as anti-Soviet. This balancing act of Finlandization was humorously defined as the art of bowing to the East without mooning the West. Despite close relations with the Soviet Union, Finland managed to retain democratic multi-party elections and remained a Western European market economy, building close ties with its Nordic neighbours. While there were some tense moments, Finland pulled it off: in the subsequent half century, the country made a remarkable transformation from a farmforest economy to a diversified modern industrial economy featuring high-tech giants like Nokia, and per capita income is now in the top 15 of the world. After the implosion of the USSR, Finland joined the European Union in 1995, and was the only Nordic state to join the euro system at its initiation in January 1999. Geography Edit Unlike craggy Norway and Sweden, Finland consists mostly of low, flat to rolling plains interspersed with lakes and low hills, with mountains (of a sort) only in the extreme north, while Finlands highest point, Fell Halti, rises only to a modest 1,328m. Finland has 187,888 lakes according to the Geological Survey of Finland, making the moniker Land of a Thousand Lakes actually an underestimation. Along the coast and in the lakes are8212according to another estimate8212179,584 islands, making the country an excellent boating destination as well. Finland is not located on the Scandinavian peninsula, so despite many cultural and historical links, it is technically not a part of Scandinavia. Even Finns rarely bother to make the distinction, but a more correct term that includes Finland is the Nordic countries ( Pohjoismaat ). Still, the capital, Helsinki, has a lot of Scandinavian features, especially when it comes to the architecture of the downtown, and another Scandinavian language, Swedish, is one of the two official languages of the country. Climate Edit Finland has a cold but temperate climate, which is actually comparatively mild for the latitude because of the moderating influence of the Gulf Stream. Winter, however, is just as dark as everywhere in these latitudes, and temperatures can (very rarely) reach -30C in the south and even dip below -40C in the north. The brief Finnish summer is considerably more pleasant, with temperatures around 20-23C on sunny days (rarely closer to 30C), and is generally the best time of year to visit. July is the warmest month. Early spring (March-April) is when the snow starts to melt and Finns like to head north for skiing and winter sports, while the transition from fall to winter in October-December 8212 wet and dark8212 is the least pleasant time to visit. The southern coast where Helsinki and Turku are located is not really a winter destination, because there is no guarantee of snow even in January or February. Due to the extreme latitude, northern parts of Finland experiences the famous Midnight Sun near the summer solstice, when (if above the Arctic Circle) the sun never sets during the night and even in southern Finland it never really gets dark. The flip side of the coin is the Arctic Night ( kaamos ) in the winter, when the sun never comes up at all in the North. In the South, daylight is limited to a few pitiful hours with the sun just barely climbing over the trees before it heads down again. Culture Edit Vinminen defending the Sampo . by Akseli Gallen-Kallela (1896) Buffeted by its neighbours for centuries and absorbing influences from west, east and south, Finnish culture as a distinct identity was only born in the 19th century: we are not Swedes, and we do not wish to become Russian, so let us be Finns. The Finnish founding myth and national epic is the Kalevala . a collection of old Karelian stories and poems collated in 1835 that recounts the creation of the world and the adventures of Vinminen . a shamanistic hero with magical powers. Kalevalan themes such as the Sampo . a mythical cornucopia, have been a major inspiration for Finnish artists, and figures, scenes, and concepts from the epic continue to colour their works. While one of the essential preconditions for having full civil rights in the land of Finland used to be a membership in the Evangelical Lutheran Church (in which most Catholic traditions have been preserved, doctrines are pronouncedly Christocentric and still formally based on the Book of Concord only), Finlands constitution has guaranteed full freedom of religion since 1923. Today, the everyday observance of the great majority is lax at best or virtually non-existent (even among some of the ministry) and the membership of the Lutheran church has been in a sharp decline since the 1960s. Consequently, tourists and visitors do wisely by exercising a certain tact and being conscious of the fact that topics concerning religious practice and personal faith are considered a strictly private matter by most Finns. There is every likelihood that faith-related questions are found either intrusive or baffling in most cases. Politics and religion are differentiated in the Finnish debate to the extent that any participant is expected not to highlight their personal beliefs. Finns share most virtues and downsides of their Scandinavian neighbours. These include uncompromising work ethic and an inclusive notion of equality . It became the second country after New Zealand that granted the universal suffrage. (Note: this is a common misconception. Finland was in 1907 the first country to grant women full eligibility to the Parliament, Norway in 1917 and New Zealand as late as 1919.) Likewise, Finland is regularly top-ranked in the list of the least corrupted countries of Transparency International. By courtesy of its internationally vaunted tuitionless education system as well as comprehensive public health care and welfare system, Finland has acquired a worldwide reputation for one of the most advanced countries in the world. Meanwhile, the country is plagued by similar problems peculiar to Nordic welfare states that include the homogeneity of the ageing population and comparatively high rates of alcoholism, depression, social exclusion and suicide. However, the distinctive character of the Finns is often summed up with the word sisu . a mixture of admirable perseverance and pig-headed stubbornness in the face of adversity. The foundation of the Finnish music culture and music education has been built mainly on the life work of a classical composer Jean Sibelius whose symphonies are regularly played by the most esteemed symphony orchestras of the world and whose name is borne by Sibelius Academy, Finlands top music institution. Composers of the modern classical music ( Kaija Saariaho . Magnus Lindberg . Esa-Pekka Salonen etc.) and the Finnish electronic music ( Pan Sonic . Darude . Rinneradio . Jimi Tenor . Jori Hulkkonen etc.) are held in great reverence among experts and enthusiasts. Additionally, some Finnish mainstream heavy metal and pop ( Children of Bodom . Nightwish . HIM . The Rasmus . Bomfunk MC ) have garnered global acclaim. Conspicuous metal band Lordi known for its latex monster outfit became an international sensation overnight by winning Eurovision Song Contest in 2006. In the other arts, Finland has produced noted architect and designer Alvar Aalto . authors Mika Waltari ( The Egyptian ), Vin Linna ( The Unknown Soldier ) and Tove Jansson ( The Moomins ) and painter Akseli Gallen-Kallela . known for his Kalevala illustrations. Bilingualism Edit Street reference chart Finland has a 5.5 Swedish-speaking minority and is officially a bilingual country, so maps nearly always bear both Finnish and Swedish names for, e. g. cities and towns. For example, Turku and bo are the same city, even though the names differ totally. Roads can be especially confusing: what first appears on a map to be a road that changes its name is, in most cases, one road with two names. This is common in the Swedish-speaking areas on the southern and western coasts, whereas inland Swedish names are far less common. In anywhere outside bilingual areas and the far north Lapland of Finland youll never see Swedish, and a bilingual sign is extremely rare you will, occasionally, see signage in Smi instead. Google Maps, in particular, seems to select the language randomly, even though the Swedish names are extremely rarely used in practice in most places. Holidays Edit Finns arent typically very hot on big public carnivals most holidays are spent at home with family. The most notable exception is Vappu on 1 May, as thousands of people (mostly the young ones) fill the streets. Important holidays and similar happenings include: New Years Day ( Uudenvuodenpiv ), 1 January. Epiphany ( Loppiainen ), 6 January. Easter ( Psiinen ), variable dates, Good Friday and Easter Monday are public holidays. Tied to this are laskiainen 40 days before Easter, nominally a holy day that kicks off the Lent, practically a time for children and university students to go sliding down snowy slopes, and Ascension Day ( helatorstai ) 40 days after, just another day for the shops to be closed. Walpurgis Night or more often Vappu . 1 May, although festivities start the day before ( Vappuaatto ). A spring festival that coincides with May Day . Originally a pagan tradition that coincides with the more recent workers celebration, it has become a giant festival for students, who wear colourful signature overalls and roam the streets. Many people also use their white student caps between 18:00 on 30 April and the end of 1 May. The following day, people gather to nurse their hangovers at open-air picnics, even if its raining sleet. Midsummer Festival ( Juhannus ), the Saturday in the period 20-26 June. Held to celebrate the summer solstice, with plenty of bonfires, drinking and general merrymaking. Cities become almost empty as people rush to their summer cottages. It might be a good idea to visit one of the bigger cities just for the eerie feeling of an empty city. Independence Day ( Itsenisyyspiv ), 6 December. A fairly sombre celebration of Finlands independence from Russia. The President holds a ball for the important people (e. g. MPs, diplomats, and merited Finnish sportspeople and artists). Little Christmas ( Pikkujoulu ), people go pub crawling with their workmates throughout December. Not an official holiday, just a Viking-strength version of an office Christmas party. Christmas ( Joulu ), 24-26 December. The biggest holiday of the year, when pretty much everything closes for three days. Santa ( Joulupukki ) comes on Christmas Eve on 24 December, ham is eaten and everyone goes to sauna. New Years Eve ( Uudenvuodenaatto ), 31 December. Fireworks time Typical vacation time is in July, unlike elsewhere in Europe, where it is in August. People generally start their summer holidays around Midsummer. During these days, cities are likely to be less populated, as Finns head for their summer cottages. Schoolchildren start their summer holidays in the beginning of June. Regions Edit Regions of Finland land an autonomous and monolingually Swedish group of islands off the southwestern coast of Finland While a convenient and unambiguous bureaucratic division, the provinces 8212 now formally known as Regional State Administrative Agencies 8212 do not really correspond to geographical or cultural boundaries very well. Other terms you may hear include Tavastia ( Hme ), covering a large area of central Finland around Tampere, and Karelia ( Karjala ) to the far east, the bulk of which was lost to the Soviet Union in World War II (still a sore topic in some circles). In 2010, Western Finland was formally split into Western and Inner Finland (for Tampere and the coast near Vaasa ) and Southwest Finland (the area near Turku ). Cities and towns Edit Helsinki 8212 the Daughter of the Baltic, Finlands capital and its only real city Hmeenlinna 8212 a small lakeside town with a medieval castle and Aulanko park Jyvskyl 8212 a university town located in Central Finland Kuopio 8212 a university town in central Finland, lakeland area. Lappeenranta 8212 a university town near the Russian border in South East Finland, by lake Saimaa . Oulu 8212 a technology town at the end of the Gulf of Bothnia Rovaniemi 8212 gateway to Lapland Savonlinna 8212 a small lakeside town with a big castle and a popular opera festival. Seinjoki 8212 Finlands fastest growing small town, host of many important festivals every year. Tampere 8212 the largest industrial town in Finland, home of culture, music, art and museums, in the middle of other big cities in Southern Finland. Perhaps the best music scene in Finland. Turku 8212 the former capital on the western coast. Medieval castle and cathedral. Vaasa 8212 a town with strong Swedish influences on the west coast located near the UNESCO world natural site Kvarken Archipelago Other destinations Edit Get in Edit There are no border controls between countries that have signed and implemented this treaty - the European Union (except Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Ireland, Romania and the United Kingdom), Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. Likewise, a visa granted for any Schengen member is valid in all other countries that have signed and implemented the treaty. But be careful: not all EU members have signed the Schengen treaty, and not all Schengen members are part of the European Union. This means that there may be spot customs checks but no immigration checks (travelling within Schengen but tofrom a non-EU country) or you may have to clear immigration but not customs (travelling within the EU but tofrom a non-Schengen country). Please see the article Travel in the Schengen Zone for more information about how the scheme works and what entry requirements are. By plane Edit Finlands main international hub is Helsinki-Vantaa Airport near Helsinki. Finnair. and Flybe Nordic are based there. Around 30 foreign airlines fly to Helsinki-Vantaa. Ryanair s Finland hubs are Tampere in central Finland and Lappeenranta in the east near the Russian border, while Wizz Air is decreasing its hub at Turku in the southwest. Other airlines have limited regional services to other cities, mostly just to Sweden, and, in the winter high season, occasional direct charters (especially in December) and seasonal scheduled flights (Dec-Mar) to Lapland. Air Baltic connects many provincial Finnish towns conveniently to Europe via Riga. It may also be worth your while to get a cheap flight to Tallinn and follow the boat instructions below to get to Finland. Starting in early 2011, Norwegian Air Shuttle established Helsinki as one of its bases, and now offers both domestic and international flights. By train Edit VR 2 and Russian Railways jointly operate services between Saint Petersburg and Helsinki, stopping at Vyborg. Kouvola and Lahti along the way. The line was upgraded in 2010 and the slick new Allegro - branded trains glide between the two cities in three and a half hours at up to 220kmh. Currently the route is served four times per day, returning to two daily from November 2011. This is certainly the most expensive method of getting to Helsinki from Saint Petersburg, with prices of 92 during summer and 84 rest of the year for a one-way ticket. However, tickets for the first train in the morning, which departures at 6:12 am, can be bought for a price as low as 39 in the summer months. There is also a traditional slow overnight sleeper from Moscow. which takes around 15 hours. There are no direct trains between Sweden or Norway and Finland (the rail gauge is different), but the bus over the gap from Boden Lule (Sweden) to Kemi (Finland) is free with an Eurail Inter Rail pass, and you can also get a 50 discount from most ferries with these passes. By bus Edit Buses are the cheapest but also the slowest and least comfortable way of travelling between Russia and Finland. Regular scheduled buses run between St. Petersburg. Vyborg and major southern Finnish towns like Helsinki. Lappeenranta. Jyvskyl and all the way west to Turku. check Matkahuolto for schedules. Helsinki-St. Petersburg is served three times daily, costs 38 and takes 9 hours during the day, 8 hours at night. Various direct minibuses run between St. Petersburgs Oktyabrskaya Hotel (opp Moskovsky train station) and Helsinkis Tennispalatsi (Etelinen Rautatiekatu 8, one block away from Kamppi). At 15 one-way, this is the cheapest option, but the minibuses leave only when full. Departures from Helsinki are most frequent in the morning (around 10:00), while departures from St. Petersburg usually overnight (around 22:00). You can also use a bus from Sweden or Norway to Finland. Haparanda in Norrbotnia area of Sweden has bus connections to Tornio. Kemi and Oulu. See more from Matkahuolto . Eskelisen Lapinlinjat offers bus connections from northern parts of Norway, for example Troms. See more from Eskelisen Lapinlinjat . By boat Edit Inside a Silja passenger ferry One of the best ways to travel to and from Finland is by sea. The boats to Estonia and Sweden. in particular, are giant, multi-story floating palaces and department stores, with cheap prices subsidized by sales of tax-free booze: a return trip to Tallinn including a cabin for up to four people can go as low as 50. If travelling by Inter Rail. you can get 50 off deck fares. The best way to arrive in Helsinki is standing on the outside deck with a view ahead. Estonia and the Baltic states Edit Helsinki and Tallinn are only 80km apart. Viking line. Ecker line and Tallink Silja operate full-service car ferries all year round. Depending on the ferry type travel times are from slightly over two hours (Viking Line and Tallink Siljas Star, Superstar and Superfasts) to three and a half hours (Ecker and Tallink Siljas biggest cruise ships). Some services travel overnight and park outside the harbor until morning. Linda Line offers fast services that complete the trip in 1.5 hours, but charge quite a bit more, have comparatively little to entertain you on board and suspend services in bad weather and during the winter. If the weather is looking dodgy and youre prone to sea sickness, its best to opt for the big slow boats. There is an additional ferry connection between Hanko and Paldiski. operated by NaviRail. There are no scheduled services to Latvia or Lithuania. but some of the operators above offer semi-regular cruises in the summer, with Riga being the most popular destination. Germany Edit Finnlines 3 operates from Helsinki to Travemnde (near Lbeck and Hamburg ) and from Helsinki to Rostock. Helsinki-Travemnde trip takes about 27 hours while Helsinki-Rostock takes about 34 hours. The Travemnde line is run by fast and large Star-class ships while a single, significantly smaller Hansa-class ship operates in the Rostock line. The latter is considered to be more luxurious and comfortable even though the trip takes much longer. Russia Edit For years scheduled ferry services to Russia have been stop-and-go. Starting in April 2010 St Peter Line offers regular ferry service from Saint Petersburg to Helsinki for as low as 30 one way. Kristina Cruises also offers occasional cruises from Helsinki. Sweden Edit Silja Serenade leaving Helsinki Both Silja and Viking offer overnight cruises from Helsinki and overnight as well as daytime cruises from Turku to Stockholm. usually stopping in the land islands along the way. These are some of the largest and most luxurious passenger ferries in the world, with as many as 14 floors and a whole slew of restaurants, bars, discos, pool and spa facilities, etc. The cheaper cabin classes below the car decks are rather spartan, but the higher sea view cabins can be very nice indeed. Note that, due to crowds of rowdy youngsters aiming to get thoroughly hammered on cheap tax-free booze, both Silja and Viking do not allow unaccompanied youth under 23 to cruise on Fridays or Saturdays. (The age limit is 20 on other nights, and only 18 for travellers not on same-day-return cruise packages.) In addition, Silja does not offer deck class on its overnight services, while Viking does. Note also that with Viking Line it often is cheaper to book a cruise instead of route traffic. The cruise includes both ways with one day in between. If you want to stay longer you simply do not go back - it might still be cheaper than booking a one-way route traffic ticket. This accounts especially to last minute tickets (you could, e. g. get from Stockholm to Turku for around 10 overnight - route traffic would be over 30 for a cabin with lower quality). In addition to the big two, FinnLink offers the cheapest car ferry connection of all from Naantali to Kapellskr (from 60 for a car with driver). Car ferries usually stop for a few minutes at Mariehamn in the land Islands. which are outside the EU tax area and thus allow the ferries to operate duty-free sales. Between Vaasa and Ume there is a ferry operated by Wasaline. By car Edit Finland has a comprehensive road network that connects and runs through all of the major cities. Driving through Finland during anytime of the year is a treat with winding roads and gentle hills framed by pine and birch forests with agricultural farm lands here and there. Summertime evening drives with the midnight sun providing gentle light are particularly scenic and enjoyable. During summer months road repairs are in full swing so some minor delays may be experienced. Road patrol cameras are utilized extensively to monitor traffic and enforce speed limits. Sweden Edit As mentioned above, one of the easiest ways to get by car from Sweden to Finland is a car ferry. The European Route E12 (Finnish national highway 3) includes a ferry line between Ume and Vaasa. Another route that includes a car ferry is E18, from Stockholm to Turku. Norway Edit Russia Edit European route E18, as Russian route M10, goes from St. Petersburg via Vyborg to VaalimaaTorfyanovka border station near Hamina. From there, E18 continues as Finnish national highway 7 to Helsinki, and from there, along the coast as highway 1 to Turku. In Vaalimaa, trucks will have to wait in a persistent truck queue. This queue does not directly affect other vehicles. There are border control and customs checks in Vaalimaa and passports and Schengen visas if applicable will be needed. From south to north, other border crossings can be found at NuijamaaBrusnichnoye (Lappeenranta ), VaalimaaTorfyanovka, ImatraSvetogorsk, Niirala (Tohmajrvi ), Vartius (Kuhmo ) Kelloselk (Salla ) and Raja-Jooseppi (Sodankyl ). All except the first are very remote. Estonia Edit As mentioned above, there is a car ferry between Tallinn and Helsinki. It forms a part of European route E67 Via Baltica that runs from the Estonian capital Tallinn, crosses Riga in Latvia and Kaunas in Lithuania to the Polish capital Warsaw. The distance from Tallinn to Warsaw is about 970km, not including any detours. Get around Edit The Finnish rail network (passenger lines in green) Finlands a large country and travelling is relatively expensive. Public transportation is well organized and the equipment is always comfortable and often new, and advance bookings are rarely necessary outside the biggest holiday periods. The domestic Journey Planner offers an useful website with integrated timetables for all trains, buses and planes including inter-city and local transport. If you need information about an address in Finland, you can find it through Jokapaikka. fi (an free local area information search engine). It has Google translate included for non locals. By plane Edit Flights are the fastest but generally also the most expensive way of getting around. Finnair and some smaller airlines operate regional flights from Helsinki to all over the country, including Kuopio. Pori. Rovaniemi and Ivalo. Its worth booking in advance if possible: on the Helsinki - Oulu sector, the countrys busiest, a fully flexible return economy ticket costs a whopping 251 but an advance-purchase non-changeable one-way ticket can go as low as 39, less than a train ticket. You may also be able to get discounted domestic tickets if you fly into Finland on Finnair. Another possibility is Air Baltic which also flies the sector Turku-Oulu for very competitive prices, far less than the train. Additionally, in 2011 Norwegian Air Shuttle started flying from Helsinki to Oulu and Rovaniemi. A shuttle bus (Finnair city bus) operates between Helsinki-Vantaa airport and Helsinki central railway station in approx. 20 minute intervals (30 min trip duration, 6.30) bus line 615 (at day)620 (at night) is a slightly cheaper alternative (36 minute trip duration, 5 day, 7 night, 102015 prices). There is also train connection at the airport and it takes you in 45 minutes (access to the new train terminal will be opened late 2015 and travel time will be approx. 35 minutes. Theres a free shuttle bus to nearest train station at the moment) to Helsinki central railway station. Prices are 5 day, 7 night. Check out Helsinki Region transport journey planner for timetables and other information. There are three major airlines selling domestic flights: Finnair . the national flagship airline. Serves nearly all of the country, with some flights operated by their subsidiary Nordic Regional Airlines . Norwegian flies to the cities in the north, such as Rovaniemi, Oulu, Ivalo, and Kittil. In addition, BASe Airlines and Air100 fill in a few gaps. By train Edit A Pendolino train, the fastest in VRs fleet (220 kmh) VR 4 (Finnish Railways) operates the fairly extensive railroad network. The train is the method of choice for travel from Helsinki to Tampere. Turku and Lahti. with departures at least once per hour and faster speeds than the bus. The following classes of service are available, with example prices and durations for the popular Helsinki - Tampere service in parenthesis. Pendolino tilting trains (code S ), the fastest option (836432, 1:26) InterCity ( IC ) and InterCity2 ( IC2 ) express trains, with IC surcharge (836426.9, 1:46) Ordinary express ( pikajuna . P ), with express surcharge, only slow night trains for this connection (836424.6, 2:12-2:16) Local and regional trains ( lhiliikennejuna . lhijuna or taajamajuna ), no surcharge, quite slow (836421, 2:03) The trains are generally very comfortable, especially the express services. Pendolino and IC trains have restaurant cars, family cars (IC only, with a playpen for children) and power sockets Pendolinos and IntercityIC2 trains even offer free (though often very slow) Wi-Fi connectivity. Additional surcharges apply for travel in first class, branded Business on some trains, which gets you more spacious seating, newspapers and possibly a snack. Overnight sleepers are available for long-haul routes and very good value at 8364112143 for a bed in a threetwoone-bed compartment, but one-bed compartments are only available in first class. One child under 7 can travel for free with each fare-paying adult, and seniors over 65 years old and students with Finnish student ID ( ISIC cards etc not accepted ) get 50 off. Groups of 3 or more get 15 off. Finland participates in the Inter Rail and Eurail systems. Residents of Europe can buy InterRail Finland passes offering 3-8 days of unlimited travel in one month for 8364109-229 (adult 2nd class), while the Eurail Finland pass for non-residents is 8364178-320 for 3-10 days. VRs own Holiday Pass ( LomaPassi ), at 8364145 for 3 days including up to 4 free seat reservations, is available to all but only valid in summer. You would have to travel a lot to make any of these pay off though by comparison, a full-fare InterCity return ticket across the entire country from Helsinki to Rovaniemi and back is 8364162. Generally, the trains are most crowded at the beginning and end of the weekend, and that means Friday and Sunday evening. Shortly before and at the end of major holidays like ChristmasNew Year and Easter, trains are usually very busy. If you try booking for these days at a late time, you may find the seat you reserve may be among the least desirable, that is, facing backwards, without recline, and facing towards and sharing the legroom with other passengers. While VRs trains may be slick, harsh winter conditions and underinvestment in maintenance mean that delayed trains are not uncommon, with the fancy Pendolinos particularly prone to breaking down. As in the rest of the EU, youll get a 25 refund if the train is 1-2 hours late and 50 if more. By bus Edit Matkahuolto 5 offers long-distance coach connections to practically all parts of Finland. Bus is also the only way to travel in Lapland, since the rail network doesnt extend to the extreme north. Buses are generally slightly higher priced than trains, although on routes with direct train competition they can be cheaper. Speeds are usually slower than trains, sometimes very slow (from Helsinki to Oulu), sometimes even faster (from Helsinki to Kotka and Pori). On many routes, though, buses are more frequent, so you may still get to your destination faster than if you wait for the next train. Unlike the trains, student discounts are available also for foreign students by showing a valid ISIC card at Matkahuolto offices (in every bus station) and getting a Matkahuolto student discount card (5). There is also BusPass travel pass from Matkahuolto 6. which offers unlimited travel in specified time, priced at 149 for 7 days and 249 for 14 days. Onnibus 7 offers a cheaper alternative (ticket prices beginning from 3 on all routes when bought online) for long-distance coaches on routes HelsinkiTurku, HelsinkiTampere, TamperePori and beginning from the autumn 2012 also TurkuTampereJyvskyl and JyvskylOulu. Note that the routes in Tampere dont serve the city centre (with exception the Pori route) but instead stop in Hervanta (10km south of city centre), which will be Onnibus bus terminal serving as an interchange station between different routes. Local transport networks are well-developed in Greater Helsinki, Tampere and Turku. In smaller cities public transport networks are usable on weekdays, but sparse on weekends and during the summer. There are easy-to-use high-tech English route planners with maps to find out how to use local bus services provided by national bus provider Matkahuolto 8. Demand responsive transport Edit Demand responsive transport (DRT) is a form of public transport, in which the routes are determined based on the customers needs. You can find the zones where DRT services are available by using the map or address search services9. By ferry Edit In summertime, lake cruises are a great way to see the scenery of Finland, although most of them only do circular sightseeing loops and arent thus particularly useful for getting from point A to point B. Most cruise ships carry 100-200 passengers (book ahead on weekends), and many are historical steam boats. Popular routes include Turku - Naantali and various routes in and around Saimaa. By car Edit Moose on the loose The use of sand instead of potassium formate and salt leads to a dirty environment. In Spring, the breathing air is often polluted by dust and thus can result in respiratory malfunctions. Srninen, Helsinki. Car rental is possible in Finland but generally expensive, with rates generally upwards of 80day, although rates go down for longer rentals. Foreign-registered cars can only be used in Finland for a limited time and registering it locally involves paying a substantial tax to equalize the price to Finnish levels. If you opt to buy a car in Finland instead, make sure it has all annual taxes paid and when its next annual inspection is due: the deadline is the same day as the cars first date of use unless the registration form says 00.00.xx in first date of use. In that case the inspection date is determined by the last number of the license plate. All cars must pass emissions testing and precise tests of brakes etc. Police may remove the plates of vehicles that have not passed their annual inspections in time and give you a fine. Traffic drives on the right, and there are no road tolls in Finnish cities or highways so far. Roads are well maintained and extensive, although expressways are limited to the south of the country. Note that headlights or daytime running lights must be kept on at all times when driving, in and outside cities, whether its dark or not. Drivers must stay very alert, particularly at dawn and dusk, for wild animals. Collisions with moose (frequently lethal) are common countrywide, deer (mostly survivable) cause numerous collisions in South and South West parts of the country, and semi-domesticated reindeer are a common cause of accidents in Lapland. Bear collisions happen sometimes in eastern parts of the country. VRs overnight car carrier trains 10 are popular for skipping the long slog from Helsinki up to Lapland and getting a good nights sleep instead: a Helsinki - Rovaniemi trip (one way) with car and cabin for 1-3 people starts from 8364215. A few unusual or unobvious rules to beware of: Headlights are mandatory even during daylight. Always give way to the right, unless signed otherwise. There is no concept of minor and major road, so this applies even to smaller road on your right. Almost all intersections are explicitly signposted with yield signs (either the stop sign or an inverted triangle). There is no explicit sign on the road that has priority, instead watch out for the back of the yield sign on the other road. Signs use the following shorthand: white numbers are for weekdays (eg. 8-16 means 08:00-16:00), white numbers in parentheses apply on Saturdays and red numbers on Sundays and holidays. In Helsinki, trams always have the right of way. Collisions do a surprising amount of damage. Dont get into arguments with a vehicle that cant change direction and weighs as much as a small battle tank. A vehicle is required by law to stop at a zebra crossing, if at least one other car has stopped, regardless of whether or not there is a pedestrian (in a similar manner as if there were a stop sign). A car is obliged to stop at a zebra crossing, if the pedestrian intends to cross the road. Many pedestrians intend to cross the road only when there is a sufficiently large gap in the traffic. When crossing the road as a pedestrian at a zebra crossing, do not leave a shadow of a doubt that you will cross the road, and cars will stop. With some practice, this works out smoothly, efficiently and without taking undue risks. By default, drivers will assume that the pedestrian does not intend to cross the road right now, in other words, cars will not stop. A car horn may only be used to prevent a collision or a similar hazardous situation. Using the horn for other purposes such as expressing frustration in surrounding traffic is unlawful and quite strongly frowned upon. Circular traffic can be rather complex. For example, in one spot, two new lanes are created while the outer lane is suddenly forced to exit. This creates a difficult situation, when the lines are covered by snow. Pedestrians walking on unlighted roads without sidewalk or cycle tracks in the dark are required by law to use safety reflectors. Their use is generally recommended, since the visibility of pedestrians with reflector improves greatly. Winter driving can be somewhat hazardous, especially for drivers unused to cold weather conditions. Winter tires (MS) are mandatory from 1 December through the end of February. The most dangerous weather is in fact around the zero degree mark (C), when slippery but near-invisible black ice forms on the roads. Finnish cars often come equipped with an engine block heater ( lohkolmmitin ) used to preheat the engine and possibly the interior of the car beforehand, and many parking places have electric outlets to feed them. Liikenneturva, the Finnish road safety agency, maintains a Tips for winter driving page 11 in English. Note that especially in the Helsinki area, the majority of cars are equipped with steel-studded tires that allow more dynamic driving and shorter braking distances on frozen surfaces than conventional traction tires (MS), as used in other European countries. Finnish speeding tickets are based on your income, so be careful: a Nokia VP whod cashed in some stock options the previous year was once hit for US204,000 Fortunately, the police have no access to tax records outside Finland and will just fine non-residents a flat 8364100-200 instead. Speed limits are 50 kmh in towns, 80-100 kmh outside towns and usually 120 kmh on freeways. From around mid-october to april, speedlimits on freeways are lowered to 100 kmh and most 100 kmh limits are lowered to 80 kmh. Software for GPS navigators that warns of fixed safety cameras is legal and installed by default in many mobile phones. Warning signs before fixed cameras are required by law. A blood alcohol level of over 0.05 is considered drunk driving and 0.12 as aggrevated drunk driving, so think twice before drinking that second beer. Finnish police strictly enforce this by random roadblocks and sobriety tests. If you are driving at night when the gas stations are closed (they usually close at 9 PM), always remember to bring some money for gas . Automated gas pumps in Finland in rare occasions do not accept foreign visacredit cards, but you can pay with Euro notes. In the sparsely-populated areas of the country, distances of 50 km and more between gas stations are not unheard of, so dont gamble unnecessarily with those last litres of fuel. If you come in your own car, note that all petrol in Finland contains ethanol . If your car should not be run on ethanol-containing petrol or you are unsure use the 98 octane petrol. This contains residual ethanol from the pump station up to a maximum of 5 and can be used in all cars that run on petrol. By taxi Edit Finnish taxis are heavily regulated by the government, so theyre comfortable, safe and expensive. No matter where you go in the country, the starting fee is fixed at 5.90, rising up to 9.00 at night and on Sundays. The per-kilometer charge starts at 1.52km for 1 or 2 passengers, rising up to 2,13km for 7 or 8 passenger minivans. A 20-25 km journey (say, airport to central Helsinki) can thus easily cost 40-50. Taxis can come in any color or shape, but they will always have a yellow TAXI sign (sometimes spelled TAKSI) on the roof. Hailing cabs off the street is difficult to impossible, so either find a taxi rank or order by phone (any pub or restaurant will help you on this, expect to pay 2 euros for the call). Taxi companies around the country can be found at the Taksiliitto 12 site. In the Helsinki city center, long lines at the taxi stops can be expected on Friday and Saturday nights. It is not uncommon to share a taxi with strangers if going towards the same general direction. Using of unofficial taxis is illegal and to be avoided. You might lose your walletpursephone, despite Helsinki being maybe one of the safest capitals in Europe. The Uber service is illegal in Finland and the driver may face a notable penalty. If you decide to use Uber and your driver gets caught by the police, youre on your own. By thumb Edit Hitchhiking is possible, albeit unusual, in Finland, as the harsh climate and sparse traffic dont exactly encourage standing around and waiting for cars. The most difficult task is getting out of Helsinki. Summer offers long light hours, but in the fallspring you should plan your time. The highway between Helsinki and Saint Petersburg has a very high percentage of Russian drivers. See Hitchhiking Club Finland liftari. org 13 or the Finland article 14 on Hitchwiki for further details if interested. By bicycle Edit Most Finnish cities have good bike paths especially outside the centres, and taking a bike can be a quick, healthy and environmentally friendly method of getting around locally. The roads are generally paved well, although gravel roads are sometimes unavoidable. As long as you dont go off-road, you will not need suspension or grooved tyres. Because of the long distances, bicycle tourists are advised to plan well and be prepared to use public transport for the less interesting stretches. Long-distance coaches are well-equipped to take bicycles on board, trains take bicycles if there is enough space. Ferries take bikes for free or for a small fee. Due to the relatively gentle topographic relief, too hilly terrain is rarely a problem, but in the cold months, windchill requires more protection against cold than in walking. Finnish language map. Finnish is a Official Language (dark blue) and Finnish spoken by a minority (aruba blue) Finland is officially bilingual in Finnish (spoken by 90 of the population) and Swedish (spoken by 5,6 of the population), and both languages are compulsory in all schools, but in practice most of the population is monolingual in Finnish. Finnish is spoken everywhere in the country except land islands and Finnish is the main language of Finland. Finnish is not related to the Scandinavian languages (Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Icelandic and Faroese), Russian, or English. In fact, it is not even an Indo-European language, instead belonging in the Uralic group of languages which includes Hungarian and Estonian, making it hard for speakers of most other European languages to learn. Reading signboards can also be difficult as Finnish has relatively few loan words from common European languages, and as a result it is very hard to guess what words in Finnish mean. Swedish is the mother tongue for 5.6 of Finns. There are no large towns with a Swedish majority, and the Swedish-speaking communities are mainly smaller rural communities along the Southwest coast. Many towns and road signs on the coast use alternate Finnish and Swedish names, so road signs can be confusing, but bilingual signs outside bilingual areas never appear. The small autonomous province of land and the municipalities of Nrpes, Korsns and Larsmo are exclusively Swedish-speaking, and people there typically speak little or no Finnish at all, so English is a better bet. Swedish is a mandatory subject in Finnish-speaking schools (and Finnish in Swedish-speaking schools), so everyone is supposed to speak and understand it in reality, though, only 41 of the Finnish-speaking population is conversant in it, and most of these people live in coastal areas and in predominantly Swedish-speaking areas. Even this varies: for example, in Helsinki and Turku most people can speak Swedish enough to deal with important conversations you engage in as a tourist and often somewhat beyond, but living would be impossible without knowledge of Finnish, whereas towns like Vaasa and Porvoo have significant Swedish-speaking minorities and are more genuinely bilingual (i. e. it would be possible to live there with Swedish only). Most hotels and restaurants, especially in areas where Swedish is widely spoken, do have some Swedish-proficient staff. Russian is best understood near the Russian border, such as in Lappeenranta, Imatra and Joensuu, which are areas frequented by Russian tourists. Tourist destinations which are popular among Russians in Eastern and Northern Finland have some Russian-speaking staff. Elsewhere, knowledge of Russian is often far rarer. In bigger towns, with the exception of the elderly, many people you would meet as a tourist speak good English, and even in the countryside younger people will nearly always know enough to communicate. In fact, outside of the Swedish-speaking communities, English is usually far better understood than Swedish . Conversely, within the Swedish-speaking communities, English is often better understood than Finnish. 73160 of the population in Finland can speak English. Dont hesitate to ask for help: Finns can be shy but will help you out in need. Besides English and Swedish, some Finns can speak German (18160) or French (3160), other secondary languages (Spanish, Russian) being rare. Foreign TV series and movies are nearly always subtitled. Only childrens fare gets dubbed into Finnish. The grammar of Finnish language has relatively few exceptions but quite many rules (where some rules might be considered cleverly disguised exceptions). There are about 17 different cases for getting some coffee and getting the coffee, going into a pub, being in a pub (or in a state of drunkenness), getting out of the pub, being on the roof, getting onto the roof, getting off the roof, using something as a roof and so on that are encoded into the word endings. In written text, the plethora of cases makes it a challenging exercise to even look up a single word from the dictionary. The conjugation of verbs is unfortunately somewhat more complex. Sunset with reflections on a lake in Finland. A selection of top sights in Finland: Central Helsinki. the Daughter of the Baltic . on a warm and sunny summer day The Suomenlinna Sea Fortress, 15-minute ferry trip from Downtown Helsinki. A Unesco World Heritage Site. The historical sites of Turku and the vast archipelago around it, best viewed from the deck of a giant car ferry. Pottering around the picturesque wooden houses of Porvoo. Finlands second-oldest town Renting a car and exploring the Lake Land of Eastern Finland, an area dotted with around 60 000 lakes with a similar number of islands, which in turn have their own lakes. Olavinlinna Castle in Savonlinna. Finlands most atmospheric castle, especially during the yearly Opera Festival Hmeenlinna Castle in Hmeenlinna is Finlands oldest castle. Built in 13th century. Relaxing at a sauna-equipped cottage in the lake country of Eastern Finland Icebreaker cruising and the worlds biggest snow castle in Kemi Seeing the Northern Lights and trying your hand sledding down a mile-long track at Saariselk A ride on the historical Linnanmki wooden roller coaster (Helsinki). Unlike modern designs, only gravity keeps it on the track, and it requires a driver on each train to operate the brakes. Sports Edit Notably lacking in craggy mountains or crenellated fjords, Finland is not the adrenalin-laden winter sports paradise you might expect: the traditional Finnish pastime is cross-country skiing through more or less flat terrain. If youre looking for downhill skiing, snowboarding etc, youll need to head up to Lapland and resorts like Levi and Saariselk. During the short summer you can swim, fish or canoe in the lakes. They are usually warmest around 20th July. Local newspapers usually have the current surface temperatures, and a map of the surface temperatures can also be found from the Environment Ministry website 15. During the warmest weeks, late at night or early in the morning the water can feel quite pleasant when the air temperature is lower than the waters. Most towns also have swimming halls with slightly warmer water, but these are often closed during the summer. Fishing permits, if needed, can be easily bought from any R-Kioski although they take a small surcharge for it. For hikers, fishermen and hunters, the Ministry of Forestry maintains an online Excursion Map map 16 with trails and huts marked. The best season for hiking is early fall, after most mosquitoes have died off and the autumn colors have come out. And if youd like to try your hand at something uniquely Finnish, dont miss the plethora of bizarre sports contests in the summer, including: Air Guitar World Championships 17. August, Oulu . Mobile Phone Throwing Championship 18. August, Savonlinna. Recycle your Nokia Swamp Soccer World Championship 19. July, Hyrynsalmi. Probably the messiest sporting event in the world. Wife Carrying World Championship 20. July, Sonkajrvi. The grand prize is the wifes weight in beer. Sulkavan Suursoudut 21. July, Sulkava Finlands biggest rowing event Festivals Edit Finland hosts many music festivals ( festari ) during the summer. Some of the most notable include: Most of the festivals last 2-4 days and are very well organized, with many different bands playing, with eg. Foo Fighters and Linkin Park headlining at Provinssi 2008. The normal full ticket (all days) price is about 60-100, which includes a camp site where you can sleep, eat and meet other festival guests. The atmosphere at festivals is great and probably youll find new friends there. Of course drinking a lot of beer is a part of the experience. There are also many more less-advertised underground festivals around the countryside every summer. Northern Lights Edit Spotting the eerie Northern Lights ( aurora borealis . or revontulet in Finnish) glowing in the sky is on the agenda of many visitors, but even in Finland its not so easy. During the summer, its light all day along and the aurora become invisible, and theyre rarely seen in the south. The best place to spot them is during the winter in the far north, when the probability of occurrence is over 50 around the magnetic peak hour of 22:30 8212 if the sky is clear, that is. The ski resort of Saariselk. easily accessible by plane and with plenty of facilities, is particularly popular among aurora hunters. Finland has the euro () as its sole currency along with 24 other countries that use this common European money. These 24 countries are: Austria. Belgium. Chipre. Estonia. Finland . France. Alemanha. Greece. Ireland. Italy. Latvia. Lithuania. Luxemburgo. Malta. the Netherlands. Portugal. Slovakia. Slovenia and Spain (official euro members which are all European Union member states) as well as Andorra. Kosovo. Mônaco. Montenegro. San Marino and the Vatican which use it without having a say in eurozone affairs and without being European Union members. Together, these countries have a population of more than 330 million. One euro is divided into 100 cents. While each official euro member (as well as Monaco, San Marino and Vatican) issues its own coins with a unique obverse, the reverse, as well as all bank notes, look the same throughout the eurozone. Every coin is legal tender in any of the eurozone countries. Finland does not use the 1 and 2 cent coins instead all sums are rounded to the nearest 5 cents. The coins are, however, still legal tender and there are even small quantities of Finnish 1c and 2c coins, highly valued by collectors. It is common to omit cents and the euro sign from prices, and use the comma as a decimal separator: 5,50 thus means five euros and fifty cents. Getting or exchanging money is rarely a problem, as ATMs (Otto) are common and they can be operated with international credit and debit cards (Visa, Visa Electron, Mastercard, Maestro). Currencies other than the euro are generally not accepted, although the Swedish krona may be accepted in land and northern border towns like Tornio. Russian roubles are accepted in some select touristy shops, such as Stockmann in Helsinki. Money changers are common in the bigger cities (the Forex chain 33 is ubiquitous) and typically have longer opening hours and faster service than banks. Credit cards are widely accepted, and the payment is almost always accepted by your PIN code. Visa Electron and Visa Debit cardreaders are found in all major and most minor shops, so carrying large amounts of cash is not usually necessary. As a rule, tipping is never necessary in Finland and restaurant bills already include service charges. That said, taxi fares and other bills paid by cash are are occasionally rounded up to the next convenient number. Cloakrooms ( narikka ) in nightclubs and better restaurants often have non-negotiable fees (usually clearly signposted, 83643 is standard), and 8212 in the few hotels that employ them 8212 hotel porters will expect around the same per bag. Costs Edit Declared the worlds most expensive country in 1990, prices have since abated somewhat but are still steep by most standards. Rock-bottom traveling if staying in hostel dorms and self-catering costs at least 25day and its well worth doubling that amount. The cheapest hotels cost about 50 per night and more regular hotels closer to 100. Instead of hotels or hostels, look for holiday cottages, especially when travelling in a group and off-season, you can find a full-equipped cottage for 10-15 per person a night. Camp-sites typically cost between 10 and 20 per tent. Museums and tourist attractions have an entrance fee in the range of 5-25. Using public transport costs a few euros per day and depends on the city. One-way travel between major cities by train or by bus costs between 20 and 100, depending on the distance. Note that a VAT of 24 is charged for nearly everything, but by law this must be included in the displayed price. Non-EU residents can get a tax refund for purchases above 40 at participating outlets, just look for the Tax-Free Shopping logo. Shopping Edit As you might expect given the general price level, souvenir shopping in Finland isnt exactly cheap. Traditional buys include Finnish puukko knives, handwoven ryijy rugs and every conceivable part of a reindeer. For any Lappish handicrafts, look for the Smi Duodji label that certifies it as authentic. Popular brands for modern (or timeless) Finnish design include Marimekko 34 clothing, Iittala 35 glass, Arabia 36 ceramics, Kalevala Koru 37 jewelry, Pentik 38 interior design and, if you dont mind the shipping costs, Artek 39 furniture by renowned architect and designer Alvar Aalto. Kids and not a few adults love Moomin 40 characters, which fill up souvenir store shelves throughout the country. In case one prefers souvenirs that are made in Finland and do not just appear Finn Made, caution is advised. Many wooden products are actually imported and Marimekko, for instance, manufactures most of its products outside Finland. Safe bets for truly Finnish souvenirs are products made by Lapuan Kankurit 41 and Aarikka 42. for example. Grocery stores are rather common, and there is usually at least one supermarket in almost all localities. The range of products in Finnish grocery stores tends to be a little bit more limited than in neighboring countries (except perhaps in Norway). Many products need to be imported, and this unfortunately shows in the selection of goods and the pricing. It is not uncommon to see exactly the same product in different shops, at exactly the same price. Finnish food markets are mainly dominated by two large groups: S Group (supermarket chains Sale . Alepa . S-Market and hypermarket chain Prisma ), and K Group (supermarket chains K-Extra . K-Market . K-Supermarket and hypermarket chain K-Citymarket , while local market chains like Siwa . Valintatalo . Tarmo and M-Market covers lots of gaps where larger chains do not operate. In addition to these chains, international discount store chain Lidl operates around 150 stores in Finland, mainly in cities and towns with population over 5,000. It usually offers the cheapest prices, and product range is similar to the rest of Europe. Previous restrictions on shopping hours were recently lifted, and now vary significantly by shop and location. For many smaller shops in large towns, normal weekday opening hours are around 08:00-22:00, but may be closed or have reduced hours during weekends. Larger shops and grocery stores in central locations are sometimes open later. Shopping hours for specialty stores, as well as shops in small towns and in the countryside, are often much shorter. Note that opening hours are often reduced considerably around national holidays, such as Christmas, Easter or Midsummer. Convenience stores like the ubiquitous R-Kioski 43 tend to have longer hours, but are often closed when you most need them. Some shops in Central Helsinki are open 247 or until 22:00 every day of the year. If in desperate need of basic supplies, gas station convenience stores are usually open on weekends and until late at night. Most notable 247 Gas station-chains are ABC 44 and Shell 45. While shopkeepers may vehemently deny this to a foreigner, prices in smaller stores are by no means fixed. When buying hobby equipment, it is not uncommon to get 30160 discount (hint: Find the international price level from a web shop and print it out). The more specialized the goods, the higher the gap between Finnish and international prices, and mail order may save a lot of money. When a package is intercepted by customs (which is quite rate for physically small items), the buyer is notified and can pick it up from customs. VAT and possibly import duty are charged, bring a copy of the order that is then signed by the buyer and archived. When buying consumer electronics, one should be aware that the shelf life of products can be rather long, especially if the shop isnt specialized in consumer electronics. There is a risk to buy an overpriced product that has already been discontinued by the manufacturer or replaced with a newer model. A typical Finnish meal. Clockwise from bottom: warm smoked salmon, boiled potatoes, cream sauce with chantarelles, lightly pickled cucumbers with dill Finnish cuisine is heavily influenced by its neighbors, the main staples being potatoes and bread with various fish and meat dishes on the side. Milk or cream is traditionally considered an important part of the diet and is often an ingredient in foods and a drink, even for adults. Various milk products such as cheeses are also produced. While traditional Finnish food is famously bland, the culinary revolution that followed joining the EU has seen a boom in classy restaurants experimenting with local ingredients, often with excellent results. Seafood Edit With tens of thousands of lakes and a long coastline, fish is a Finnish staple, and theres a lot more on that menu than just salmon ( lohi ). Specialities include: Baltic herring ( silakka ), a small, fatty and quite tasty fish available pickled, marinated, smoked, grilled and in countless other varieties Gravlax (graavilohi), a pan-Scandinavian appetizer of raw salted salmon Smoked salmon ( savulohi ), not just the cold, thinly sliced, semi-raw kind but also fully cooked warm smoked salmon Vendace ( muikku ), a speciality in eastern Finland, a small fish served fried, heavily salted and typically with mashed potatoes Other local fish to look out for include zander ( kuha ), an expensive delicacy, pike ( hauki ) and perch ( ahven ). Meat dishes Edit Reindeer stew ( poronkristys ), a Lappish favorite Meatballs ( lihapullat ), served with mashed potatoes and lingonberry jam Karelian stew ( karjalanpaisti ), a heavy stew usually made from beef and pork (and optionally, lamb), carrots and onions, usually served with potatoes Liver casserole ( maksalaatikko ), consisting of chopped liver, rice and raisins cooked in an oven it tastes rather different from what youd expect (and not liver-y at all) Loop sausage ( lenkkimakkara ), a large, mildly flavored sausage best when grilled and topped with a dab of sweet Finnish mustard ( sinappi ), and beer Meat balls ( lihapullat . lihapyrykt ) are as popular and tasty as in neighboring Sweden Reindeer ( poro ) dishes, especially sauteed reindeer shavings ( poronkristys . served with potato mash and lingonberries), not actually a part of the everyday Finnish diet but a tourist staple and common in the frigid North Swedish hash (pyttipannu), (originally from Sweden. Swedish: pytt i panna) a hearty dish of potatoes, onions and any meaty leftovers on hand fried up in a pan and topped with an egg Makkara traditional Finnish sausage. Affectionately called the Finnish mans vegetable since the actual meat content may be rather low. Milk products Edit Cheese and other milk products are very popular in Finland. The most common varieties are mild hard cheeses like Edam and Emmental, but local specialities include: Aura cheese ( aurajuusto ), a local variety of blue cheese, also used in soups, sauces and as a pizza topping. Breadcheese ( leipjuusto or juustoleip ), a type of very mild-flavored grilled curd that squeaks when you eat it, best enjoyed warm with a dab of cloudberry jam Piim . a type of buttermilk beverage, thick and sour Viili . a gelatinous, stretchy and sour variant of yoghurt Other dishes Edit Karelian pie ( karjalanpiirakka ), a signature Finnish pastry Pea soup ( hernekeitto ), usually but not always with ham, traditionally eaten with a dab of mustard and served on Thursdays just watch out for the flatulence Karelian pies ( karjalanpiirakka ), an oval 7 by 10 cm baked pastry, traditionally baked with rye flour, containing rice porridge or mashed potato, ideally eaten topped with butter and chopped egg ( munavoi ) Porridge ( puuro ), usually made from oats ( kaura ), barley ( ohra ), rice ( riisi ) or rye ( ruis ) and most often served for breakfast Bread Edit Bread ( leip ) is served with every meal in Finland, and comes in a vast array of varieties. Rye bread is the most popular bread in Finland. Typically Finnish ones include: hapankorppu . dry, crispy and slightly sour flatbread, occasionally sold overseas as Finncrisp limppu . catch-all term for big loaves of fresh bread nkkileip . another type of dark, dried, crispy rye flatbread ruisleip (rye bread), can be up to 100 rye and much darker, heavier and chewier than American-style rye bread unlike in Swedish tradition, Finnish rye bread is typically unsweetened and thus sour and even bitter. rieska . unleavened bread made from wheat or potatoes, eaten fresh Seasonal and regional specialities Edit Attack of the killer mushrooms The false morel ( korvasieni ) has occasionally been dubbed the Finnish fugu, as like the infamous Japanese pufferfish, an improperly prepared false morel can kill you . Fortunately, its easily rendered safe by boiling (just dont breathe in the fumes), and prepared mushrooms can be found in gourmet restaurants and even canned. From the end of July until early September its worthwhile to ask for crayfish ( rapu ) menus and prices at better restaurants. Its not cheap, you dont get full from the crayfish alone and there are many rituals involved, most of which involve large quantities of ice-cold vodka, but it should be tried at least once. Or try to sneak onto a corporate crayfish party guestlist, places are extremely coveted at some. Around Christmas, baked ham is the traditional star of the dinner table, with a constellation of casseroles around it. There are also regional specialties, including Eastern Finland s kalakukko (a type of giant fish pie ) and Tampere s infamous blood sausage ( mustamakkara ). Around Easter keep an eye out for mmmi . a type of brown sweet rye pudding which is eaten with cream and sugar. It looks famously unpleasant but actually tastes quite good. Desserts Edit An assortment of pulla straight from the oven For dessert or just as a snack, Finnish pastries abound and are often taken with coffee (see Drink ) after a meal. Look for cardamom coffee bread ( pulla ), a wide variety of tarts ( torttu ), and donuts ( munkki ). In summer, a wide range of fresh berries are available, including the delectable but expensive cloudberry ( lakka ), and berry products are available throughout the year as jam ( hillo ), soup ( keitto ) and a type of gooey clear pudding known as kiisseli . Finnish chocolate is also rather good, with Fazer 46 products including their iconic Sininen (Blue) bar exported around the world. A more Finnish speciality is licorice ( lakritsi ), particularly the strong, salty kind known as salmiakki . which gets its unique (and acquired) taste from ammonium chloride. Places to eat Edit Cold fish buffet at Liekkilohi, Savonlinna Finns tend to eat out only on special occasions, and restaurant prices are correspondingly expensive. The one exception is lunchtime . when thanks to a government-sponsored lunch coupon system company cafeterias and nearly every restaurant in town offers set lunches for around 8-9, usually consisting of a main course, salad bar, bread table and a drink. University cafeterias, many of which are open to all, are particularly cheap with meals in the 2-4 range for students, although without local student ID you will usually need to pay about 5-7. There are also public cafeterias in office administration areas that are open only during lunch hours on working days. While not particularly stylish and sometimes hard to find, those usually offer high-quality buffet lunch at a reasonable price (typically 8.40 in 2011). The cafe scene has quickly developed, especially since the 1990s and above all in Helsinki. The array of cakes and pastries is not perhaps as vast as in Central Europe. but the local special coffees (lattes, mochas etc.) are worth trying when it comes to the two big local coffee house chains: Waynes Coffee (originated in Sweden) and Roberts Coffee (Finland). You can now also find Starbucks in Finland. For dinner, youll be limited to generic fast food (pizza, hamburgers, kebabs and such) in the 5-10 range, or youll have to splurge over 20 for a meal in a nice restaurant. For eating on the move, look for grill kiosks ( grilli ), which serve sausages, hamburgers and other portable if not terribly health-conscious fare late into the night at reasonable prices. In addition to the usual hamburgers and hot dogs, look for meat pies ( lihapiirakka ), akin to a giant savoury doughnut stuffed with minced meat and your choice of sausage, fried eggs and condiments. Hesburger 47 is the local fast-food equivalent of McDonalds, with a similar menu. They have a Finnish interpretation of a few dishes, such as a sour-rye chicken sandwich. Of course most international fast food chains are present, especially McDonalds, which offers many of their sandwich buns substituted with a sour-rye bun on request. The Finnish word for buffet is seisova pyt (standing table), and while increasingly used to refer to all-you-can-eat Chinese or Italian restaurants, the traditional meaning is akin to Swedens smrgsbord . a good-sized selection of sandwiches, fish, meats and pastries. Its traditionally eaten in three rounds 8212 first the fish, then the cold meats, and finally warm dishes 8212 and its usually the first that is the star of the show. Though expensive and not very common in a restaurant setting, if you are fortunate enough to be formally invited to a Finns home, they will likely have prepared a spread for their guest, along with plenty of coffee. Breakfast at better hotels is also along these lines and its easy to eat enough to cover lunch as well If youre really on a budget, you can save a considerable amount of money by self-catering . Ready-to-eat casseroles and other basic fare that can be quickly prepared in a microwave can be bought for a few euros in any supermarket. Note that youre usually expected to weigh and label any fruits or vegetables yourself (bag it, place it on the scale and press the numbered button. The correct number can be found from the price sign), and green signs mean possibly tastier but certainly more expensive organic ( luomu ) produce. One should be aware that more often than not, cheap food contains disproportionate amounts of fat. At restaurants, despite the high prices, portions tend to be quite small, at least when compared to USA and Canada. and even many European countries. Dietary restrictions Edit Traditional Finnish cuisine relies heavily on meat and fish, but vegetarianism ( kasvissynti ) is increasingly popular and well-understood, and will rarely pose a problem for travellers. Practically all restaurants offer vegetarian options, often marked with a V on menus. Two ailments commonly found among Finns themselves are lactose intolerance ( laktoosi-intoleranssi . inability to digest the milk sugar lactose) and coeliac disease ( keliakia . inability to digest gluten). In restaurants, lactose-free selections are often tagged L (low-lactose products are sometimes called Hyla or marked with VL), while gluten-free options are marked with G. However, hydrolyzed lactose (HYLA brand) milk or lactose-free milk drink for the lactose intolerant is widely available, which also means that a lactose-free dish is not necessarily milk-free. Allergies are quite common among Finnish people, too, so restaurant workers are usually quite knowledgeable on what goes into each dish and often it is possible to get the dish without certain ingredients if specified. Kosher and halal food are rare in Finland and generally not available outside very limited speciality shops and restaurants catering to the tiny Jewish and Islamic communities. Watch out for minced meat dishes like meatballs, which very commonly use a mix of beef and pork. The Jewish Community of Helsinki 48 runs a small kosher deli in Helsinki. and there are Halal grocery stores and restaurants in some larger towns. Drink Edit Thanks to its thousands of lakes, Finland has plenty of water supplies and tap water is always potable (In fact, never buy bottled water if you can get tap water). The usual soft drinks and juices are widely available, but look out for a wide array of berry juices ( marjamehu ), especially in summer, as well as Pommac . an unusual soda made from (according to the label) mixed fruits, which youll either love or hate. Coffee and tea Edit Finns are the worlds heaviest coffee ( kahvi ) drinkers, averaging 3-4 cups per day. Most Finns drink it strong and black, but sugar and milk for coffee are always available and the more European variants such as espresso and cappuccino are becoming all the more common especially in the bigger cities. The biggest towns have had French-style fancy cafs for quite some time and modern competitors, like Waynes or Roberts Coffee, are springing up in the mix. For a quick caffeine fix, you can just pop into any convenience store, which will pour you a cuppa for 83642 or so. Tea hasnt quite caught on in quite the same way, although finding hot water and a bag of Lipton Yellow Label wont be a problem. For brewed tea, check out some of the finer downtown cafs or tea rooms. Dairy Edit In Finland some people like to drink milk ( maito ) as an accompaniment to food at home or at the cafeteria at work or school. The most popular beverage is water, though. Another popular option is piim . or buttermilk. Viili . a type of curd, acts like super-stretchy liquid bubble gum but is similar to plain yogurt in taste. It is traditionally eaten with cinnamon and sugar on top. Fermented dairy products help stabilize the digestion system, so if your system is upset, give them a try. Alcohol Edit Chilling out at the Arctic Icebar, Helsinki Alcohol is very expensive in Finland compared to most countries (though not to its Nordic neighbours Sweden and Norway ), although low-cost Estonia s entry to the EU has forced the government to cut alcohol taxes a little. Still, a single beer will cost you closer to 83644-5 in any bar or pub, or 83641 and up in a supermarket. While beer and cider are available in any supermarket or convenience store (until 9 PM), the state monopoly Alko 49 is your sole choice for wine or anything stronger. The legal drinking age is 18 for milder drinks, while to buy hard liquor from Alko you need to be 20. ID is usually requested from all young-looking clients. Some restaurants have higher age requirements, up to 30 years, but these are their own policies and are not always followed, especially at more quiet times. Surprisingly enough, the national drink is not Finlandia Vodka, but its local brand Koskenkorva 50 or Kossu in common speech. However, the two drinks are closely related: Kossu is 38 while Finlandia is 40, and Kossu also has a small amount of added sugar, which makes the two drinks taste somewhat different. There are also many other vodkas ( viina ) on the market, most of which taste pretty much the same, but look out for Strm . The Spirit of Santa, a Finnish attempt at a super-premium vodka. A local speciality is Salmiakki-Kossu or Salmari . prepared by mixing in salty black salmiakki licorice, whose taste masks the alcohol behind it fearfully well. Add in some Fishermans Friend menthol cough drops to get Fisu (Fish) shots, which are even more lethal. In-the-know hipsters opt for Pantteri (Panther), which is half and half Salmari and Fisu. Other classic shots are Jaloviina ( Jallu ) cut brandy and Tervasnapsi tar schnapps with a distinctive smoke aroma. Beer ( olut or kalja ) is also very popular, but Finnish beers are mostly nearly identical, mild lagers: common brands are Lapin Kulta . Karjala . Olvi . Koff and Karhu . Pay attention to the label when buying: beers branded I are inexpensive but has low alcohol content, while III and IV are stronger and more expensive. In normal shops you will not find any drinks with more than 4.7 alcohol. You may also encounter kotikalja (lit. home beer), a dark brown beer-like but very low-alcohol beverage. Imported beers are available in bigger grocery stores, most pubs and bars, and Czech beers in particular are popular and only slightly more expensive. In recent years, some microbreweries ( Laitila . Stadin panimo . Nokian panimo etc.) have been gaining foothold with their domestic dark lagers, wheat beers and ales. The latest trend is ciders ( siideri ). Most of these are artificially flavored sweet concoctions which are quite different from the English or French kinds, although the more authentic varieties are gaining market share. The ever-popular gin long drink or lonkero (lit. tentacle), a prebottled mix of gin and grapefruit soda, tastes better than it sounds and has the additional useful property of glowing under ultraviolet light. At up to 610 kcalliter it also allows to skip dinner, leaving more time for drinking. Different variations of lonkero have become quite popular as well, for example karpalolonkero . which is made from gin and cranberry soda. Remember that most long drinks you buy from a supermarket are made by fermenting, and if you want to get real mixed drink youll have to look for them in Alko . During the winter dont miss glgi . a type of spiced mulled wine served with almonds and raisins which can easily be made at home. The bottled stuff in stores is usually alcohol free, although it was originally made of old wine and Finns will very often mix in some wine or spirits. In restaurants, glgi is served either alcohol-free, or with 2cl vodka added. Fresh, hot glgi can, for example, be found at the Helsinki Christmas market. Quite a few unusual liquors ( likri ) made from berries are available, although theyre uniformly very sweet and usually served with dessert. Cloudberry liquor ( lakkalikri ) is worth a short even if you dont like the berries fresh. Homemade spirits: you have been warned More common in rural areas, illegal and frequently distilled on modified water purification plants - which are subject to import control laws nowadays - anecdotical evidence suggests that those are occasionally played as a prank on unsuspecting foreigners. Note that normal alcohol slows the metabolism of poisonous methanol and thus acts as an antidote. Politely decline the offer, especially if still sober. Finally, two traditional beverages worth looking for are mead ( sima ), an age-old wine-like brew made from brown sugar, lemon and yeast and consumed particularly around Mays Vappu festival, and sahti . a type of unfiltered, usually very strong beer often flavored with juniper berries (an acquired taste). Sleep Edit Inside a Finnish sauna Sauna The sauna is perhaps Finlands most significant contribution to the world (and the worlds vocabulary). The sauna is essentially a room heated to 708211120176C according to an oft-quoted statistic this nation of 5 million has no less than 2 million saunas, in apartments, offices, summer cottages and even Parliament. In ancient times, saunas (being the cleanest places around) were the place to give birth and heal the sick, and the first building constructed when setting up a new household. If invited to visit a Finnish home, you may be invited to bathe in the sauna as well 8212 this is an honour and should be treated as such, although Finns do understand that foreigners may not be keen about the idea. Enter the sauna nude after taking a shower, as wearing a bathing suit or any other clothing is considered a bit of a faux pas . although if you are feeling shy, you can wrap yourself in a bath towel. (When there are guests, men and women usually bathe separately.) The temperature is regulated by throwing water onto the stove ( kiuas ): the resulting rush of heat, known as lyly . is considered the key to the sauna experience. Some sauna-goers also like to flagellate themselves with leafy branches of birch ( vihta in western Finland, vasta in eastern Finland), which creates an enjoyable aroma and improves blood circulation. Depending on the occasion, the temperature in a Finnish sauna may start quite hot and gradually cool down over the hours, especially in a wood-heated sauna. The lower benches are cooler, the corner that is the furthest away from the stove is usually the hottest place. In work-related events, the actual decision-making frequently takes place in the sauna afterwards. In public saunas (hotels, gyms and the like), it is customary to sit on a paper towel (dont forget to take it out when leaving). The environment is rather hostile towards germs, so there is no need to worry about catching a disease from the sweaty wooden bench. If the heat is too much, cup your hands in front of your mouth or move down to a lower level to catch your breath. In winter, it is common to go for a swim in an ice hole in a nearby lake. The ground can be much colder than the water - use beach sandals or the like, if possible. After youve had your fill of sauna, you can cool off by heading outside for a dip in the lake or, in winter, a roll in the snow 8212 and then head back in for another round. Repeat this a few times, then cork open a cold beer, roast a sausage over a fire, and enjoy total relaxation Finnish style. These days the most common type of sauna features an electrically heated stove, which is easy to control and maintain. In the countryside you can still find wood-fired saunas, but purists prefer the (now very rare) traditional chimneyless smoke saunas ( savusauna ), where the sauna is heated by filling it with hot smoke and then ventilated well before entering. Anyone elderly or with a medical condition (especially high blood pressure) should consult their physician before using a sauna. Accommodation in Finland is expensive, but many large hotels are cheaper during the weekends and summer. In addition to the usual international suspects, check out local chains Cumulus 51. Scandic 52. Finlandia 53 and Sokos 54. The small but fast-growing Omena 55 chain offers cheap self-service hotels, where you book online and get a keycode for your room, with no check-in of any kind needed. One of the few ways to limit the damage is to stay in youth hostels ( retkeilymaja ), as the Finnish Youth Hostel Association 56 has a fairly comprehensive network throughout the country and and a dorm bed usually costs less than 836420 per night. Many hostels also have private rooms for as little as 836430, which are a great deal if you want a little extra privacy. An even cheaper option is to take advantage of Finlands right to access. or Every Mans Right ( jokamiehenoikeus ), which allows camping, hiking, and berry and mushroom picking as well as simple (rod and hook) fishing on uncultivated land. Since this is occasionally mis-interpreted by visiting foreigners, it may be a good idea to discuss travel plans with a local - or simply ask - to avoid embarrassing situations. Note that making a fire requires landowners permission. For a taste of the Finnish countryside, an excellent option is to stay at a cottage ( mkki ), thousands of which dot the lake shores. These are generally best in summer, but there are also many cottages around Laplands ski resorts. Prices vary widely based on facilities and location: simple cottages can go for as little as 836420night, while luxurious multistory mansions can go for 10 times that. Beware that, while all but the most basic ones will have electricity, its very common for cottages to lack running water: instead, the cottage will have an outhouse (pit toilet) and youre expected to bathe in the sauna and lake. Renting a car is practically obligatory since there are unlikely to be any facilities (shops, restaurants, etc) within walking distance. The largest cottage rental services are Lomarengas 57 and Nettimkki 58. both of which have English interfaces. Virtually every lodging in Finland includes a sauna ( see box ) for guests 8212 dont miss it Check operating hours though, as theyre often only heated in the evenings and there may be separate shifts of men and women. Learn Edit Finlands universities are generally well-regarded and offer many exchange programs, but the high cost of living and the prospect of facing the long, cold Finnish winter mean that the country is not a particularly popular choice. However, there are no tuition fees for regular degree students, including international exchange students. While lectures are usually conducted in Finnish, most universities offer the option to complete all courses through assignments and exams in English. Many universities also offer the option to study Finnish at various levels. A reasonable monthly budget (excluding rent) would be 600 to 900. Rents vary depending on location such that in Greater Helsinki and particularly Helsinki proper prices may be two times that of cheaper locations or student housing. Many exchange programs fully or partly subsidize accommodation in student dorms. However, the state does not provide student accommodation and dorms are usually owned by student unions and foundations. Student union membership at around 70-100year is obligatory, but this includes free access to student health services. EU citizens can simply enter the country and register as a student after arrival, while students from elsewhere will need to arrange their residence permit beforehand. CIMO 59 (Centre for International Mobility) administers exchange programs and can arrange scholarships and traineeships in Finland, while the Finnish National Board of Education 60 offers basic information about study opportunities. There is little informal work to be found and most jobs require at least a remedial level of Finnish. Citizens of European Union countries can work freely in Finland, but acquiring a work permit from outside the EU means doing battle with the infamous Directorate of Immigration ( Maahanmuuttovirasto ) 61. However, students permitted to study full-time in Finland are allowed work part-time (up to 25 hweek) or even full-time during holiday periods. For jobs, you might want to check out the Ministry of Labour 62. Most of the posted jobs are described in Finnish so you may need some help in translation, but some jobs are in English. A rapidly growing trend in Finland, especially for the younger generation, is to work for placement agencies. Although there has been a massive surge of public companies going private in the last ten years, this trend seems to be fueled by the increased demand for more flexible work schedules as well as the freedom to work seasonally or sporadically. Due to the nature of these types of agencies as well as the types of work they provide, it is common for them to hire non-Finns. Some agencies include Adecco, Staff Point, Manpower, Aaltovoima and Biisoni. If you are invited to a job interview, remember that modesty is a virtue in Finland. Finns appreciate facts and directness, so stay on topic and be truthful. Exaggeration and bragging is usually associated with lying. You can check expected salaries with the union for your field, as they usually have defined minimum wages. Salaries range from 1,200 - 6,500 per month (2010). Stay safe Edit Crimeviolence: Low Most violence is alcohol-related andor domestic walking in the street is usually safe even in the night Authoritiescorruption: Low The police are generally courteous and speak some English, offering bribes will get you into serious trouble. Transportation: Low to Moderate Icy roads and sidewalks in the winter, mooses and other animals occasionally crossing the roads Health: Low Tick and mosquito bites Nature: Low to Moderate Blizzards in the winter, getting lost when hiking in the forests Crime Edit Finland enjoys a comparatively low crime rate and is, generally, a very safe place to travel. Use common sense at night, particularly on Friday and Saturday when the youth of Finland hit the streets to get drunk and in some unfortunate cases look for trouble. The easiest way to get beaten is to pay a visit at a grill kiosk after bars and pubs have closed and start arguing with drunken people. It is, anyway statistically more likely that your home country is less safe than Finland, so heed whatever warnings you would do in your own country and you will have no worries. If you yourself run in with the law, remember that Finland is one of the worlds least corrupt countries and you will not be able to buy yourself out of trouble. Finnish police never requires a cash payment of fines which it gives. Do not ever give money to person who presents himherself as a police officer. An obvious way to stay out of most kinds of trouble is to stay sober and act businesslike, when dealing with police, security or the like. Racism is a generally of minor concern, especially in the cosmopolitan major cities, but there have been a few rare but highly publicized incidents of black, romani amp Arab people getting beaten up, attacks against immigrants and group fights with native Finns amp immigrants. Sometimes there might be group fights where immigrants do their part as well, but thats very uncommon. The average visitor, though, is highly unlikely to encounter any problems. Pickpockets are rare, but not unheard of, especially in the busy tourist months in the summer and almost always done by foreigners. Most Finns carry their wallets in their pockets or purses and feel quite safe while doing it. Parents often leave their sleeping babies in a baby carriage on the street while visiting a shop, and in the countryside cars and house doors are often left unlocked. On the other hand, you have to be careful if you buy or rent a bicycle. Bicycle thieves are everywhere, never leave your bike unlocked even for a minute. In case of emergency Edit 112 is the national phone number for all emergency services, including police, and it does not require an area code, regardless of what kind of phone youre using. The number works on any mobile phone, whether it is keylocked or not, and with or without a SIM card. If a cellphone challenges you with a PIN code, you can simply type in 112 as a PIN code - most phones will give a choice to call the number. This is not possible with all phones For inquiries about poisons or toxins (from mushrooms, plants, medicine or other chemicals) call the national Toxin Information Office at (09) 471 977. At sea, the maritime search and rescue number is 0294 1000. Stay healthy Edit Signs to watch out for vaara, vaarallinen160 danger, dangerous sortumisvaara160 risk of avalanchelandslidemudslide hirvivaara160 risk of mooseelks on the road hengenvaara160 life threatening danger tulipalo160 fire kielletty160 prohibited psy kielletty or privat no entry htuloskynti or htpoistumistie160 emergency exit lkri160 doctor poliisi160 police sairaala160 hospital apua160 help Youre unlikely to have stomach troubles in Finland, since tap water is always drinkable (and generally quite tasty as well), and hygiene standards in restaurants are strict. If you have any sort of allergies, many restaurants often display in the menu the most common ingredients that people typically are allergic to. Examples: (L) Lactose free, (VL) Low Lactose, (G) Gluten free, if you are unsure just ask the waitress or restaurant staff. There are few serious health risks in Finland. Your primary enemy especially in wintertime will be the cold . particularly if trekking in Lapland. Finland is a sparsely populated country and, if heading out into the wilderness, it is imperative that you register your travel plans with somebody who can inform rescue services if you fail to return. Always keep your mobile phone with you if you run into trouble. Dress warmly in layers and bring along a good pair of sunglasses to prevent snow blindness . especially in the spring and if you plan to spend whole days outdoors. Always keep a map, a compass and preferably a GPS with you while trekking in the wilderness. Take extra precautions in Lapland, where it can be several days hike to the nearest house or road. Weather can change rapidly, and even though the sun is shining now, you can have a medium sized blizzard on your hands (no joke) an hour or two later. If out on the lakes and sea, remember that wind and water will cool you faster than cold air, and keeping dry means keeping warm. A person that falls into cold water (close to zero C) can die in a few minutes. Safety in small boats . Dont drink alcohol, wear a life vest at all times, if your boat capsizes - keep clothes on to stay warm, cling to the boat if possible (swim only if shore is a few hundred meters away, never try to swim in cold water below 20176C). Finland hosts a number of irritating insects, but if you are planning to stay in the centres of major cities, you are unlikely to encounter them. A serious nuisance in summer are mosquitoes ( hyttynen ), hordes of which inhabit Finland (particularly Lapland) in summer, especially after rains. While they carry no malaria or other nasty diseases, many species of Finnish mosquitoes make a distinctive (and highly irritating) whining sound while tracking their prey, and their bites are very itchy. As usual, mosquitoes are most active around dawn and sunset 8212 which, in the land of the Midnight Sun, may mean most of the night in summer. There are many different types of mosquito repellants available which can be bought from almost any shop. Another summer nuisance are gadflies ( paarma ), whose bites can leave a mark lasting for days, even for month. A more recent introduction to Finnish summers are deer keds ( hirvikrpnen ), that can be particularly nasty if they manage to shed their wings and burrow into hair (although they rarely bite as humans are not their intended targets, and mainly exist in deep forests). Use repellent, ensure your tent has good mosquito netting and consider prophylaxis with cetirizine (brand names include Zyrtec . Heinix . Cetirizin Ratiopharm ), an anti-allergen that (if taken in advance) will neutralize your reaction to any bites. Topical anti-allergens in the form of gels and creams are also available as over-the-counter medication. A flea comb can be useful for removing deer keds. As in other European countries, mites can become a major annoyance, if walking bare-footed. As a remedy, Permethrin creme is available from pharmacies without prescription. In southern Finland, especially land. the Lappeenranta - Parikkala - Imatra - axis and areas near Turku s coast, there are ticks ( punkki ) which appear on summertime and can transmit Lymes disease (borreliosis) and viral encephalitis through a bite. Although these incidents are relatively rare and not all ticks carry the disease, its advisable to wear dark trousers rather than shorts if you plan to walk through dense andor tall grass areas (the usual habitat for ticks). You can buy special tick tweezers from the pharmacy ( punkkipihdit ) which can be used to remove a tick safely if you happen to get bitten. You should remove the tick from your skin as quickly as possible and preferably with the tick tweezers to reduce the risks of getting an infection. If the tick bite starts to form red rings on the skin around it or if you experience other symptoms relating to the bite, you should visit a doctor as soon as possible. The only venomous insects in Finland are wasps ( ampiainen ), bees ( mehilinen ) and bumblebees ( kimalainen ). Their stings can be painful, but are not dangerous, unless you receive several stings or if you are allergic to it. Theres only one type of venomous snake in Finland, the European adder ( kyy or kyykrme ), which has a distinct zig-zag type of figure on its back, although some of them are almost completely black. They are mostly found near lake sides and sometimes in the streets like Kristianinkatu and Kamppi. The snake occurs across Finland all the way from the south to up north in Lapland. Although their bites are extremely rarely fatal (except for small children and allergic persons), one should be careful in the summertime especially when walking in the forests or on open fields at the countryside. Walk so that you make the ground vibrate and snakes will go away, they attack people only when somebody frightens them. If you are bitten by a snake, always get medical assistance. If you are planning to travel in the nature on summertime, its advisable to buy a kyypakkaus (Adder pack, a medicine set which contains a couple of hydrocortisone pills). It can be bought from any Finnish pharmacy. It is used to reduce the reactions after an adder bite, however its still advisable to see a doctor even after youve taken the hydrocortisone pills. The kyypakkaus can also be used to relieve the pain, swelling and other allergic reactions caused by bee stings. If you see an ant nest, ants have quite likely taken care of all snakes nearby. As for other dangerous wildlife, theres not much more than a few extremely rare encounters with brown bears ( karhu ) and wolves ( susi ) in the wilderness. Both of these animals are listed as endangered species. Contrary to popular belief abroad, there are no polar bears in Finland, let alone polar bears walking on the city streets. The brown bear, which occurs across Finland, has been spotted on a few very exceptional occasions even in the edges of the largest Finnish cities, but normally bears try to avoid humans whenever possible. The brown bear hibernates during the winter. In the least densely populated areas near the Russian border, there has been some rare incidents of wolf attacks - mainly lone, hungry wolves attacking domestic animals and pets. During the past 100 years there has been one recorded case of a human killed by a large predator. In general, theres no need to worry about dangerous encounters with wild beasts in Finland, other than traffic accidents. In winter, lakes and the sea are frozen. Walking, skating or even driving a car on the ice is commonly seen, but fatal accidents arent unheard of either, so ask and heed local advice. If the ice fails, it is difficult to get back out of the water, as the ice will be slippery. Small ice picks are sold as safety equipment (a pair of steel needles with bright plastic grips, connected with a safety line). Given the size of the Finnish population, a surprisingly high number of people drown in the lakes every year in summer. As pointed out by an annual public awareness campaign (partly Finnish black humor, partly the truth), the stereotypical accident involves an intoxicated fisherman who capsizes his boat while standing up to pee. Respect Edit Fishing Finnish style It was a beautiful summer day, and Virtanen and Lahtinen were in a little rowboat in the middle of a lake, fishing. Two hours passed, both men sitting quietly, and then Lahtinen said Nice weather today. Virtanen grunted and stared intently at his fishing rod. Two more hours passed. Lahtinen said, Gee, the fish arent biting today. Virtanen shot back: Thats because you talk too much. Drinking Finnish style Virtanen and Lahtinen decided to go drinking at their lakeside cottage. For a couple hours, both men sat silently and emptied their bottles. After a few more hours, Lahtinen decided to break the ice: Isnt it nice to have some quality time Virtanen glared at Lahtinen and answered: Are we here to drink or talk Finns generally have a relaxed attitude towards manners and dressing up, and a visitor is unlikely to offend them by accident. Common sense is quite enough in most situations, but there are a couple of things that one should keep in mind: Finns are a famously taciturn people who have little time for small talk or social niceties, so dont expect to hear phrases like thank you or youre welcome too often. The Finnish language lacks a specific word for please so Finns sometimes forget to use it when speaking English, even when they dont mean to be rude. Also lacking in Finnish is the distinction between he and she, which may lead to confusing errors. Occasional silence is considered a part of the conversation, not a sign of hostility or irritation. Being loud in crowded places like public transport or a restaurant is considered rude. If you ever ended up to argue with someone, the social norm is to stay calm during an argument . Arguing loudly with a stranger is considered very rude. Personal space is important, and standing very near someone can make Finns feel uncomfortable. All that said, Finns are generally helpful and polite, and glad to help confused tourists if asked. The lack of niceties has more to do with the fact that in Finnish culture, honesty is highly regarded and that one should open ones mouth only to mean what one is about to say. Do not say maybe later when there is no later time to be expected. A visitor is unlikely to receive many compliments from Finns, but can be fairly sure that the compliments received are genuine. Especially younger Finns speak usually excellent English due to the policy of subtitling foreign language movies and TV series instead of dubbing them. Another highly regarded virtue in Finland is punctuality . A visitor should apologize even for being a few minutes late. Being late for longer usually requires a short explanation. 10 min is usually considered the threshold between being acceptably late and very late. Some will leave arranged meeting points after 15 min. With the advent of mobile phones, sending a text message even if you are only a few minutes late is nowadays a norm. Being late for a business meeting, even by 1 or 2 min, is considered rude. The standard greeting is a handshake . Hugs are only exchanged between family members and close friends in some situations, kisses, even on the cheek, practically never. If you are invited to a Finnish home, the only bad mistake visitors can make is not to remove their shoes . For much of the year, shoes will carry a lot of snow or mud. Therefore, it is customary to remove them, even during the summer. During the wet season you can ask to put your shoes somewhere to dry during your stay. Very formal occasions at private homes, such as baptisms (often conducted at home in Finland) or somebodys 50th birthday party, are exceptions to these rules. In the wintertime, this sometimes means that the guests bring separate clean shoes and put them on while leaving outdoor shoes to the hall. Bringing gifts such as pastry, wine, or flowers to the host is appreciated, but not required. In Finland, there is little in the way of a dress code . The general attire is casual and even in business meetings the attire is somewhat more relaxed than in some other countries. Topless sunbathing is accepted but not very common on beaches in the summer, while going au naturel is common in lakeside saunas and dedicated nudist beaches. Even though it is unlikely that youll seriously offend anybody, certain topics of discussion can sometimes be slightly sensitive. Despite its proximity to Russia, Finns generally dont prefer being called Eastern Europeans, but rather Nordics or North Europeans. Although once a part of the Russian Empire, Finland fought against the Soviet Union in WWII and has remained unaligned since the Cold War, and referring to Finland as belonging to the Russian sphere of influence most likely wont be appreciated. A majority of Finnish men still serve for some time in the Finnish armed forces, and expressing strong views on the military or on wartime history can sometimes stir up emotions. Also war veterans are highly respected in Finnish society. Although jokes concerning Finlands rather high levels of depression, suicide and alcoholism may be common amongst both Finns and foreigners alike, its nevertheless good to remember that these are serious social problems that affect many people and excessive humorous remarks may not always be received well. Contact Edit By mail Edit Finlands mail service, run by Posti. is fast, reliable and pricy. A postcard to Finland and anywhere in the world costs 1. By phone Edit
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