Own experiences
I used to travel quite much when I was young. My grandmother lived in Stockholm so we spent a few weeks in Sweden every summer with my younger sister. I lived in Kenya for one year when I was 16 years old.
I remember how it felt to be a foreigner. In Stockholm we didn’t look like strangers but I still felt like an outsider. All the young people in Sweden seemed to be more loud, social, confident and joyful compared to us. The Finns had a reputation of being big fighters, heavy drinkers and hard workers back then.
In Kenya I stood out from the crowd because of the skin color. To my surprise the culture shock was much stronger when I returned to Finland than when I arrived in Nairobi. I remember the feeling of experiencing everything from outside and being extremely critical to most Finnish habits and traditions.
Finnish qualities
Honestly I don’t feel like a 100 % Finnish person. I always felt that I am more like a world citizen. I don’t identify myself with the Finnish majority. For example, I don’t watch ice hockey, I don’t like skiing, I don’t have a summer cottage, most of my friends are foreigners, I don’t miss any certain things when I’m abroad.
To me the most typical Finnish qualities are being uncomfortable in social situations, love of nature, long quiet moments in the middle of the conversation, honesty, true friendship, individual life style, good social welfare system, respecting times and agreements, good education system and democracy.
Feedback from foreign friends
Most of the time I’ve got only positive feedback from my friends from other countries. But sometimes they say it’s very hard to get new friends in Finland. Most people want to hang around with their old friends and they are not socially open. It seems that when you once break the ice and find a Finnish friends you can probably expect them to stay forever.
Some people might find Finland quite depressive, dark, racist and cold place. If you have bad luck you only meet the most patriotic people who tell openly all strangers to go to h***. Especially during the last couple years the two extreme groups have grown even more apart: the tolerant, liberal and open-minded people who have an international lifestyle and on the other hand the group of people who hate everybody who comes to Finland to take our jobs and women 😉
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