African American Female studying in Finland

[ladiemarmalade]

Thanks Jahasjahas!
I read that while Finnish is very different from English, it is very straightforward, therefore making it easier to "pick-up".
By no means do I expect to be able to write a dissertation or discuss the laws or thermodynamics, but I would like to be able to at least order food in a restaurant, locate the bathroom, and exchange pleasantries.

[Adrian42]

Thanks Jahasjahas!
I read that while Finnish is very different from English, it is very straightforward, therefore making it easier to "pick-up".

Opinions differ on whether learning Finnish is much harder than learning e.g. Russian, but it is definitely an initial barrier that there are not many similarities between English and Finnish (while English and Russian are more similar).

Finnish is likely easier for you to learn than e.g. Mandarin.

By no means do I expect to be able to write a dissertation or discuss the laws or thermodynamics, but I would like to be able to at least order food in a restaurant, locate the bathroom, and exchange pleasantries.

People in Finland are very good at speaking English, and you might often get the answer in English if you ask in broken Finnish...

"Moi" and "Hei" are "Hi", "Kiitos" is "thanks", and when the bathroom door says "N" that's the female bathroom. That's basically everything you will use in practice.

[Flossy1978]

I was an exchange student here and was in the last year of school. There was a Finnish class I was in where they were still doing Finnish grammar stuff. Maybe it was some 'smarty pants' Finnish class for nerds who loooooooved studying the language? LOL. But it existed and I was in it.

Finnish is easy to pronounce. And yes, they claim if you are good at maths you should be good at learning Finnish. Well, I am good at maths, and !"#¤% at learning Finnish LOL. Finnish is strict with it's 'rules', that's what makes it supposedly straight forward. But, there are always 'exceptions'. Just because you've read or heard it's straight forward, doesn't mean it's easy. The rules are numerous, and it can drive you crazy trying to learn it. I think to be successful with Finnish you need to study it intensively, everyday. Like those integration programmes where they are studying for hours five days a week.

If you go to restaurants in Helsinki, everyone will speak English. The other poster is right. If you try in Finnish they often pick up you don't really speak Finnish and will often change to English. And be prepared to pay in restaurants here. It's not cheap. You pay much more than in America and you get a lot less food. Even Macdonalds is rather expensive compared to America. I don't think students on budgets eat out a lot here. Though the nasty kebab places aren't too pricey. To get some gross meat and chips isn't too expensive LOL. Oh you get some vegies too with that.... bland salad with the typical orange coloured sauce on top LOL.

Chances are there'll be many foreigners in your classes. Therefore the chances of using what Finnish you learn may be little, because they'll all be speaking English with each other. Your friends will all speak English with you. And probably you'll make a friend or two who are Finnish and when you go out somewhere with them, they'll just do the talking anyway LOL.

Why don't you go to a book store where you live while you're still at home in America and ask them to help you find a book you can learn Finnish phrases from? Not a full on expensive 'learn Finnish' book, but the usual tourist guide book. Then you'll learn the phrases needed without all the other jargon you won't need because you won't be here for too long.

And as for housing. Who knows where you'll end up. But wherever you do, it'll be in metropolitan Helsinki, Vantaa or Espoo. And Finland has near excellent transportation for the metropolitan areas. The metro, buses, trains and trams. I think most of those student housing places are in areas close to train stations etc. I think you'll be surprised at the public transportation here. There are plenty of Fins living in the middle of Helsinki and outer areas who don't own cars and their lives aren't really any more difficult than someone with a car. I have plenty of co-workers who don't own cars. They seem to do fine without them.

I think you'll really enjoy your time here. You sound like and open and nice person. Autumn is pretty in the beginning, with the leaves changing colours, but once the real darkness comes..... Then it's not so nice. But you are only coming for 8 weeks, so I guess you won't be here during that time. Just the time when the leaves are changing colour and it's very pretty.

[Sami-Is-Boss]

Opinions differ on whether learning Finnish is much harder than learning e.g. Russian, but it is definitely an initial barrier that there are not many similarities between English and Finnish (while English and Russian are more similar).

Finnish is likely easier for you to learn than e.g. Mandarin.

I speak/am learning both to different levels and I don't think there's a huge amount of difference really. The main problem in my book is that spoken Finnish is so different from official Finnish (the grammar and endings change a bloody lot), whereas that's not really the case in Russian

[jahasjahas]

I read that while Finnish is very different from English, it is very straightforward, therefore making it easier to "pick-up".

I'd say that English is more straightforward in many ways. You can look up the words you want to use and sort of throw them into a sentence. In Finnish you'll have to consider how to conjugate the verb, what case to use, etc. It takes most people years, and they are very motivated by the fact that finding a job without knowing the language is close to impossible.

But I guess it's better to stop pondering whether you can learn the language or not, and just give it a try. Here's a nice set of videos to hear some of the basics: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... 8770584399

[Marjo]

Dear Ladie -

Welcome and I hope you enjoy your 8 weeks stay in Finland.
Since I am not from the Helsinki area, I am not going to comment on the living arrangements, however, if you do get your hands on a bicycle, Helsinki and majority of the Finnish towns are cycle friendly (compared to for example London). Specially in the summertime cycling through the town is a lovely experience.
Lot of the posters above have already commented on the language side of things, and I would just say that if you learn couple frases - just to show that you have tried - the locals will appreciate it. The language will pretty quickly change to english, but people will respond much better to your enquiries i.e. for directions if you try to get in couple words in finnish.

Saunas - nearly every Finnish home has one. If you are invited to a "sauna-ilta" (translates as Sauna evening - usually involves a lot of gossiping, eating and depending on the crowd, moderate drinking. None of my friends have never gotten absolutely bladdered when visiting, and I would personally consider it bad form) by a friend, you may wish to clarify with them the "dress code"... Normally specially in the public saunas the rules are that you are to use the sauna naked (saunas are gender specific, locals are used to this and therefore it is considered bad form to stare - trust me, you will forget about the nakedness fairly shortly!). In the saunas at the summercabins (large quantity of Finns have second homes/small lakeside cabins) it really depends from the crowd - swimming costumes/towels/ or naked.
Try it - it really is amazing experience, specially if you had just done a heavy sports session. If you have never been to on one before, start from the lowest bench and work your way up when you feel you can take the heat.

Drinking - yeah. I come from a small town in rural Finland, and fri/sat evenings you would see drunken youngsters stumbling out of a nighclub/pub at closing time. The alcoholics in the "puistokemisti" (=park chemist ) stage are not that common. They usually congregate in their traditional spot of a park bench somewhere and despite their rough appearance are fairly harmless. And as was mentioned above, they do have the occasional tendency to shout out something, but they are against the world in general, so try not to take it personally. Having said that, the cities in Finland are safe to walk around alone in the late evening. With a bit of common sense, you will be fine! If your 8 weeks are during summer, you may find it difficult to sleep as it is light nearly 24hrs. You will get used to it in time, but you may find it easier to sleep if you have (sorry don't know what they are called in english) "eyepatch" thingys - you know those things that airlines often supply to make it easier to sleep during long flights.

Helsinki is on the sea side, so it is worth to walk around or catch a ferry (there used to be ferries going to the nearby islands - I am sure somebody in this forum can confirm if that is still the case?) to the archipelago. There is a thing called "jokamiehenoikeus" every man's rights, and those allow you to walk around pretty much anywhere in the forest/archipelago if you wish to. Obviously one must remember the usual courtesies - no lighting fires (unless in a designated place) or cutting trees etc.

If you are visiting the marketplace ("tori") during summer, they occasionally have somebody selling "neulamuikku". It is a small fish - i think related to salmon, and it is usually eated fried with a dollop of garlic dressing and some seriously unhealthy (but nice..) potatowedges. Worth a try... My British husband often claims that the local finnish food is on the bland side, however, he absolutely loves the various types of fish Finland has to offer - specially when smoked.

Hoping to hear from your experiences!

Marjo

[Upphew]

Saunas - nearly every Finnish home has one.

Indeed, there is about one sauna for every 2 dwellings. And about ½ a million cottages that have probably over one sauna for one cottage. All in all the estimate is about 2 million saunas here.

[jahasjahas]

if you do get your hands on a bicycle, Helsinki and majority of the Finnish towns are cycle friendly (compared to for example London).

Though when compared to actually cycle friendly places, they're not. Drive on the sidewalk, crash into pedestrians; drive on the street, get hit by a car

[misu]

and you might often get the answer in English if you ask in broken Finnish...

QFT. I've been living here for 3+ years and my Finnish level on paper is B1, but I *still* get answers in English when I ask questions in Finnish. Finns aren't used to deciphering broken/foreigner/imperfect/stilted Finnish (the exceptions might be language teachers or others who work a lot with foreigners/immigrants) so if confronted with it they will either want to switch to English or (if they don't know any English) possibly ignore you. Today at LIDL an old man asked me what the number is for the tomatoes, and I tried explaining in very simplistic and stilted Finnish that there is no number and that the cashier weighs it instead. Apparently I might as well have been speaking Klingon because he got a glassy-eyed look on his face and he turned away and asked someone else instead (who answered in native Finnish, which he instantly understood). Boy, did that make me feel like crap, but I've accepted that my Finnish won't 'hook' onto Finnish ears until it's improved to near fluency.

[AldenG]

Gosh, people can be so pessimistic. And optimistic.

It only takes a few minutes of concentrated focus and attention to detail to learn to ask the questions you mention in Finnish.

And only a few years of concentrated study to learn to understand the answers in Finnish.