Finnishness is a whole, not just individual elements for me. It shows in my everyday life and in certain ways of thinking. It’s connected to my backround and the ways I have learned to act and think. My roots are big part of who I am and where I come from. I have always been interested in my family history, and for example, my mother’s father has been in the war. This topic is been talked about a little, but not much. Even so, I have grown up celebrating Independence day in some way and every christmas we always watch the declaration of christmas peace, which is a long-standing finnish tradition. As I have gotten older, I have also learned to understand that finnishness involves a certain kind of silence, even when some things may later affect other people as well.
I also have some kind of finnish “shyness”. It shows in the way that, especially among people I don’t know yet, I’m not the one who talks the most or feels a strong need to fill the silence. I often need time to think before expressing my opinions, and silence doesn’t feel awkward to me.
Finnishness represents familiarity and continuity to me. Of course, times change, and I change with them, but I still always want to remember where I come from and who I am. It likely influences my life more than I fully realize.
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