How to become a friend with a Finn?
Finns are known as being people who are silent, a bit difficult to approach and.. well, kind of shy and unsocial.
However there are methods to make friends with Finnish people. I will tell you this in a form of a story. A true story, which has happened to me.
The story!
It was a dark and cold night. My car didn't pass the annual inspection and I had to take it to the repair shop due to the issues in the handbrake. They couldn't get the required spare parts in time, so I had to travel to work with a bus.
As my wife had been in a surgery, I also had to be taking my son to daycare and picking him up. So I had to specific times I always traveled with the bus.
In the same bus there was this one guy from India. At first I didn't recognize him, but when we walked to the office from the bus stop, he tried to talk to me something but I just said "Yes" and didn't respond any further.
The next day, same happened. He talked to me something, I replied something quite short. First "Hi" and then "Thank you". You can see there was a big leap, double amount of words from the last !
The third and final day I was taking the bus to work, I already smiled and nodded to him in the bus as a greeting. When we walked the way from the bus stop to the office, we talked all the way there. In addition to this, I started to talk with him in the office when we met.
Now I'm counting him as a friend.
So what did actually happen?
Becoming a friend with a Finn has three stages. In the first stage, you can try to make a contact but the Finn rarely responds properly. Don't mind this, this is very normal.
The second stage is that you finally get a response. The Finn is already prepared you might talk to him and has prepared some kind of answers, like "Yes" or "Hello". This is a huge leap.
The third stage is when the Finn has finally accepted you as a friend and can share anything with you. If you ask them "How are you doing?", they might tell you their life story. About happy or sad things. Hopes and dreams, fears and doubts.
Congratulations!
You have now a new Finnish friend.
Please remember, most Finns know very good English, but they think they suck at it.
image from Pixabay
You managed to find a good picture to describe your story. 🤣
I'm hoping the pretty ladies will attract some views.. :D
If I saw a photo like that, I'd want to make some new friends with them real fast!
Sure, sexy ladies will do for men and women, studied fact.
See, all of you arrived to check out the post!
I'm glad the photo is working well.
Sex sells and you have become a merchant of it.
Apsu - The Sex Merchant.
I should change my description in here.
Apsu - The Sex Merchant of Venus written by Bill Makes-Shakes-out-of-Pears
2 red heads, not very finnish at all. :)
Hahaha
This is all true and we Finns tend to be shy and quiet. But there is a hack around all that called alcohol.
haha true for all I'd say :)
I really like simplicity, honesty and sincereness of relationship with Finns. You get what you see, no false drama queens on every corner. :)
And hospitality is great!
Please remember, most Finns know very good English, but they think they suck at it.
My wife and sister are English teachers and they both have encountered many students in upper secondary school who very arrogantly believe their English to be flawless while being utterly in the wrong. That type of student will raise a ruckus if they get an 7 or an 8 if they have been getting 9s or 10s in comprehensive school. Their parents are often as difficult as their children.
There was one student who will never be forgotten who was half Finnish and who had lived an Anglophone country until she turned seven. Neither of her parents was a native speaker of English. Her first language was in actual fact broken English. She would maintain hard in class that "I hope you happiness" was correct English when her corrected paper was returned.
Authoritarian upbringing used to result in the type of people with low confidence you describe. Authoritarian upbringing, however, has long been a thing of the past. Today's situation is that there are many children and youth who have been coddled and raised without boundaries. It does not help at all that the new national curriculum puts the student "at the centre" ("keskiöön"), as if these little emperors hadn't already been there for their whole lives ...
I'm amazed if there has been such a change in the Finnish youth. Not with the skills in English, but if they assume they are great English speakers!
When I was younger I noticed how almost everyone was really insecure about their English skills. When they were supposed to talk with exchange students, they were really shy because they were worried they will say something wrong.
The big thing which helped them was the fact none of the exchange students were native English speakers either!
I can't remember if we had the mentioned authoritarian upbringing, but it can be true. I'm just too used with the low confidence of Finns and might not notice the change with the younger generations.
Thank you for having a big package of information :)
I'm amazed if there has been such a change in the Finnish youth. Not with the skills in English, but if they assume they are great English speakers!
Not all of them, of course. Many do, however, without having the skills to back it up.
I always get 10s in upper secondary school but I still acknowledge that I am not that great. I am decent when compared to my class mates but when comparing to a native speaker, I am bad. I can read and write well enough but my talking skills are almost non-existent. There was this one occasion though when my talking abilities truly amazed me. I was chatting with 2 girls in Poland and my speech sounded better than it usually does in Finnish. The problem I have is that I can't talk well in any language.
"I hope you happiness"
What did she mean and how she would have had to say it correctly?
She wanted to wish someone a happy life.
The above is incorrect use of the verb "hope". You never hope anyone a noun phrase in English. It would be correct to say:
"I wish you happiness" or "I hope (that) you will be happy".
I accidentally the coca cola bottle.
Of course! :)
If Finns are as friendly as you, happy to meet them all.
haha MY english and grammar is terrible so we should get along great :)
Well I'm a special Finn, even though the younger generation is starting to be more and more open for other people too :)
Not other people than Finns, just other people in general!
No worries your a great ambassador for Finn's mate.
-I'll keep your 'trick to Finns for friends' list in the back of my mind.. to help make future Finn friends.
Cheers
I have read that Finnish people do not engage in "small talk." So they simply don't know how to do it. Is this true?
For instance, if I pass a co-worker in the corridor, I may nod and say, "how's it going?" So, a Finnish person would not understand why I am trying to interrupt its important walk somewhere, just to ask it how its life has been lately. What is misunderstood, is that I just wanted to acknowledge the Finn's existence, and get acknowledged in return... which is very important to me for some reason! Now I am offended, and the Finn is annoyed, and we've had a grand misunderstanding.
Well we are really bad at it. Especially the "how's it going?" is a big danger, as we don't recognize the true meaning of the question. We might give the honest answer, with everything which have happened in the past few days.
For us the safest method to existence of a Finn is only to say "Hello" and not smile. You can smile the second (or third) time you say hello, but the first time it's also dangerous, as they might think you are making fun of them.
We are poor reacting with strangers AND in small talk. There are stories in which an American man comes to Finland and gets a ride from a Finn. The American talks a few words and the Finn replies shortly. Then they sit quiet for the next 300 km.
In the end, the American is thinking "That was the most horrible drive ever, he must hate me because he was so cold towards me"
And the Finn is thinking "He seemed really nice, we had a great ride".
It is very strange, the difference between the cultures. I wonder what happened to the small-talker cultures that caused this weird social protocol to emerge. Or, the other way round: what happened to Finns and the like which suppressed the development of small talk?
It's a societal preference, too, not necessarily individual. There are plenty of folks in small-talking countries who hate small talk. I'm not one of them, but I can see why they hate it. If you look at it through a cynical lens, it really is entirely mechanical. It's like a TCP/IP handshake for human beings.
I bet there are Finns who want to small talk too. We should set up an exchange program for the talkative Finns and the reclusive Americans! They can take each other's places, and everyone will be happy :)
I think what happened to the Finns was living in a very cold climate causing them to have to spend a large portion of their time indoors. In past centuries or millenia "indoors" meant the inside of a small cabin. That cramped space was often shared by a fairly large family by modern standards, which would have been intolerable without honing the skill of studied indifference. Such long-standing cultural practices do not change overnight.
But there are signs of that culture slowly dying out. These days, television is filled with constant inane babble, hugging and incessant small talk. Individual sports are no longer where the Finns are the most successful at. Ice hockey has been the de facto national sport for a couple of decades now. In basketball and volleyball, Finland has been able to do surprisingly well in international tournaments in recent years. In sports, Finland is becoming the new Sweden.
If somebody asks you "How are you doing?" in Finland, it is customary to tell them the truth and say "nothing in particular" or just "nothing" if you don't want to open up. Note that people don't usually answer "Fine!" if that really isn't the case.
If you do this in a small-talking country, people will think there is something wrong with you and avoid you like the plague.
The proper answer when asked "How are you?" is some variant of "Good." Occasionally, between acquaintances, an "Oh, okay I guess" is acceptable on Monday.
If you see the person every day, the rare "Been better" is begrudgingly accepted, but only if you obviously have a cold or some other illness. If there is any doubt in the recipient's mind what your inconvenience may be, or worse, if it's obvious but may cause them to feel anything other than a fleeting trace of empathy, expressing it is forbidden.
Would you happen to be English by any chance? Your English is flawless and you describe a mentality I've heard is typically English. You're expected to keep those little polite words coming and never burden others with your problems, weaknesses or annoyances unless they are your close friends - or unless you're talking about something generic like the weather.
That would be telling. :)
Thank you for your kind words. I take great pride in my literacy and writing ability. You may have just inspired me to write again sometime soon. :)
I'll take the one in the back.
Oh wait.. didn't read your text yet 🤣
Oh if I could, I'd send you both of them!
Seeing the picture I somehow hoped this was a sirt of pickup recipee for Finn girls 😬
Still good, nonetheless.👍
If you hear any good pickup tricks for Finnish girls, share them with me too! Maybe I'd finally start getting along with my wife :)
Hey there. Thank you for the narration on how to score some Finnish friends. I only have one of them
and no we didn't follow the above protocol to become friends but here we areso this guide will be essential to make more Finn friends :DION... Thank you for being my only Finnish friend bread. My African soul appreciates yours :)
Well according to the method how we got to know each other, we're now married according to the Finnish law.
Sorry if you didn't know this yet :)
Till death do us part :)
Lol.
okay.. I always stop at stage 1, without knowing if the other person was a finn or not. It makes me feel rejected.. but now I have another point of view, maybe next time I will try out to reach stage 2 and 3. :D
That's the thing, most people stop at stage 1 and this is why we Finns have very few friends. :/
:/ sad thing to hear