The true value of our words is revealed by how faithfully we stand behind them. If I were asked to name one thing that lies at the heart of Finnish people, I think I would say this: Finns place great value on words. That is something I have carried with me all my life, perhaps…
Tag: identity
Outside Finns
Longing for where we came from is not a failure to belong where we are, but a reflection of how deeply we have loved both. There is a word in Finland for people like me, for people like us — those of us who were born there, but live somewhere else in the world. We…
One Day in September
A new life is built by meeting one unfamiliar moment at a time. The morning after arriving in Australia from Finland, my family went for a walk from our new home at the migrant Midway hostel in Maribyrnong. I suppose we wanted to see this strange new country we had landed in, to step out…
The Magic Word
Delivery matters, but warmth does not sound the same in every language or culture. To an English-speaking ear, Finnish can sound a little blunt. The words do not always arrive wrapped in softness. They are not dressed up or sweetened unnecessarily. Finns tend to say what they mean and mean what they say. There is…
I Found It!
Our roots help explain who we are. When my brother and I were children, we loved playing hot and cold. One of us would hide some small object, and the other would become the hunter, searching, guessing, listening for clues. The closer the hunter came, the louder and more excited the cries would be: “hotter……
Timeless Treasures
Some people belong not only to our memories, but to the story of who we are. When I was a little girl living in Finland, I had a friend who was woven deeply into the fabric of my childhood. Her name was Tiina. We lived only a few hundred metres from each other, and we…
Treasured Simplicity
The deepest sense of home comes from feeling known without needing to explain who we are. Some places do not simply hold memories. They hold parts of us. That is how Finland feels to me. Not only as the country of my birth, but as a place where something deep within me still recognises itself….
Blue and White
What we experience as children, we often only truly understand as as adults. I was eleven when my family left Finland and migrated to Australia. At that age, I could not possibly grasp the full weight of what was happening. To me, the biggest wonder was that I was about to fly on an aeroplane…
Dancing Lights in the Sky
Contentment begins when we stop measuring a good life by the world’s expectations. I come from the country of the midnight sun, from a land of crystal-blue lakes and endless forests, where the air feels so clean it seems to wash over not only the skin, but the soul. I come from a place where…
Apples of Gold 