I know that Finnish is THE hardest language on Earth to learn, which puts me in a difficult place. How is it possible to learn Finnish far away from Finland, in my case upstate NY? If I were learning French I wouldn't have a problem because Quebec is 2 hours away, likewise, Spanish in NYC. I have a theory that the only way to effectively learn any language besides your own is to be immersed in the culture of the language in focus. When I lived in Vantaa I would always go to my roomate when I had questions on the language. I plan to go to school, any school in Finland, but I would prefer to study in Finnish, to begin in Finnish. I went to school for a while in Eiran Aikuislukio in Helsinki and got up to level 2, but gradually the suomea mene pois
Do you have any suggestions for learning Finnish, any GOOD websites? I gotta go now but I will be checking in later.zedko
). for what it's worth, i looooooove my prof.
Korso and Koivukyla are heavenly compared to parts of Bronx and Brooklyn that are *scary* 
and where you really do fear for your life. I never felt that way in Finland, in the student ghettoes of Jokiniemi either. There were just a bunch of foreign students living in the HOAS apts who were pissed off because they had to walk several blocks to get to the Tikkurila train station and that they couldn't live in Helsinki. I had a buddy that lived in Lansimaki (Vantaa) just north of Mellunmaki. That place was scary. The Russians took everything. I left my suitcase in his building on the first floor, and in 5 minutes it was gone. I had valuables in that suitcase and I offered money, I knocked on doors, but I never got it back. It was sad. At night Mellunmaki is more dangerous then Kontula, there are more wackos and wierdos and drunk Finns that chase and push after you, because they are mad for some reason, I don't know.... But it happened to me. 