Smile Ye Fin(e)land

lauwo-the-poet · Post by **lauwo-the-poet** » Mon Nov 16, 2009 11:36 pm

My appreciation to my host country, let me know your opinions.

Smile Ye Fin(e)land

Smile Fineland,
Smile you land of finesse,
Smile for your shining beauty,
Smile and keep on smiling.

Smile you land of waters
Smile and show your happy tears
Smile, for nothing have you to fear
Smile and your echoes shall reach far.

Smile for the cuteness of your culture,
Smile and let your silent smile Speak volumes,
Smile for the entire world to envy you.

When hailstorms start falling
And trees and waters turn stiff white
Smile, smile until the winter
Pause you smiling.

**Sponsor:**

EP · Post by EP » Tue Nov 17, 2009 12:16 am

I am not an English-speaker, so I really cannot comment. I can only comment this:

Smile, for nothing have you to fear

Wrong, fear is already in the genes.

Pursuivant · Post by **Pursuivant** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 10:28 am

The poet is Yoda on bad acid.

lauwo-the-poet · Post by **lauwo-the-poet** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 3:58 pm

Not so sure of what you mean by saying the poet is yoda on bad acid, but this is my own composition. After i arrived in Finland and having stayed here for few months it was a very difficult moment of culture shock. The distance, space and individualistic approach to almost everything sort of estranged me but then i realised that there has to be a meeting point between two cultures for some sort of an understanding to exists. Then Istarted looking at a Finnish culture from a different stand point and discovered that there is the beauty aspect of it if discovered is a reason enough to keep the host culture(Finnish) and any foreign culture in contact with finnish culture smiling.

lauwo-the-poet · Post by **lauwo-the-poet** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 4:01 pm

Ep, thanks for your comment in English though you are not an english speaker, and you dont have to be in order to comment on this one. It might be true that fear is in the genes but can be conquered by a genuine smile

Pursuivant · Post by **Pursuivant** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 4:05 pm

Yes well that might be something you people write in your country but for a Finn that makes me puke.... sounds like "hymns to the great leader".

This is Finland: (ripped off from a movie)

]Choose clean nature. Choose safe environment. Choose free education.
Choose a f*n big country with a f*n small population,
Choose taxes the size of a yearly income elsewhere,
old cars, half a year of darkness and a meter of snow.
Choose no sleep, high alcohol content and no mental therapy.
Choose fixed union salaries. Choose a rented shoebox for a family of five.
Choose no friends. Choose black jeans and matching combat boots.
Choose an axe for your cottage in a range of f*n forged steel blades.
Choose a Finnish partner and wondering why the f* you're logged on FinlandForum on a Sunday morning.
Choose sitting in a classroom listening at mind-numbing, spirit-crushing Finnish grammar,
craving f* foreign food into your mouth.
Choose leaving at the end of it all, selling your last piece of furniture at a loss to some miserable newcomer,
nothing more than an embarrassment to the rose-tinted-glasses-wearing,
f*d up losers spawned by Ryanair to get over to their Nordic Welfare Paradise.
Choose your future.
Choose Finland.

But its good you realized that it is culture shock. And its good you have a way to deal with it. Usually people just whine a lot.

Pursuivant · Post by **Pursuivant** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 4:06 pm

lauwo-the-poet wrote:. It might be true that fear is in the genes but can be conquered by a genuine smile

Well... what does a smile mean? In Finland - in the winter - it means your teeth freeze

Pursuivant · Post by **Pursuivant** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 4:09 pm

lauwo-the-poet wrote:Not so sure of what you mean by saying the poet is yoda on bad acid.

That your style sounds like you've been taught some pompous colonial remnant English with early 19th century grammar.

lauwo-the-poet · Post by **lauwo-the-poet** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 6:24 pm

Pursuivant wrote:
lauwo-the-poet wrote:Not so sure of what you mean by saying the poet is yoda on bad acid.
That your style sounds like you've been taught some pompous colonial remnant English with early 19th century grammar.

Such a cutting hedge style of commenting back, but i love it. Blunt and outspoken. the excerp is scary for a new visitor to Finland but a perfect description of a Finnish social setup

Just like an iceberg model, values of Finnish culture are so hidden underneath their cold feet, shoulders and hearts, perhaps their mind too. but how do you tell what goes on in their mind if you dont try to star the truth in a poetic manner under the guise of praises and hear the responses.

"Smile until the winter pause you smiling" might as well mean that it is time to come out of the cold snow shell and enjoy the social warmth.

sammy · Post by **sammy** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 7:56 pm

Just like an iceberg model, values of Finnish culture are so hidden underneath their cold feet, shoulders and hearts, perhaps their mind too. but how do you tell what goes on in their mind if you dont try to star the truth in a poetic manner under the guise of praises and hear the responses.

The "truth"

I am reminded of the ending of Alan Booth's excellent road trip novel "Roads to Sata"... it's about Japan but more or less applicable to any country really...

I was sitting outside a little grocer's shop in the sun, talking to an old man. The old man had asked me where I lived, and I told him I lived in Tokyo.
“Tokyo is not Japan,” he said. "You can't understand Japan by living in Tokyo.”
“No,” I agreed. “That’s why I'm taking this time off to have a good look at the rest of it.”
“You can't understand Japan just by looking at it,” the old man said.
“No, not just by looking at it,” I said. “Not by looking at it as a tourist might out of the window of a bus, but by walking through the whole length of it.”
“You can't understand Japan just by walking through it,” the old man said.
“Not just by walking through it,” I argued, “but by talking to all the different people I meet.”
“You can't understand Japan just by talking to people", the old man said.
“How do you suggest I try to understand Japan, then?” I asked him.
He seemed surprised by the question, and a little hurt, and a little angry.
"You can't understand Japan,” he said.

-

Incidentally, your text vaguely reminded me of a piece by Tennyson. Blow bugle blow and all that splendour that falls on castle walls, dying, dying, dying, and what ho. And all this recited by Nat King Cole, wearing a mauve shell suit. A disturbing image

lauwo-the-poet · Post by **lauwo-the-poet** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 10:29 pm

"You can't understand Japan,” he said.

Culture is something embedded in the blood of the people, they were born and nurtured in it, in case another person, an outsider, sort of get crush into this culture, the hosts tend to repel not physical though, but subconsciously by trying to deny the fact that an outsider can understand the ways of the host culture's values, but we all know that the more you get to interact with the host culture and break into values of their social circle, is the more you discover the truth.

Pursuivant · Post by **Pursuivant** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 10:51 pm

On the other hand - Finnish poetry is so dire I never read it.

EP · Post by EP » Wed Nov 18, 2009 12:22 am

we all know that the more you get to interact with the host culture and break into values of their social circle, is the more you discover the truth

True. But I am suspecting that you are still in the honeymoon period, and you will be more negative later.

raamv · Post by **raamv** » Wed Nov 18, 2009 1:12 am

FInnish Response to a Poem...

...............

sammy · Post by **sammy** » Wed Nov 18, 2009 10:08 am

lauwo-the-poet wrote:
"You can't understand Japan,” he said.
Culture is something embedded in the blood of the people, they were born and nurtured in it, in case another person, an outsider, sort of get crush into this culture, the hosts tend to repel not physical though, but subconsciously by trying to deny the fact that an outsider can understand the ways of the host culture's values, but we all know that the more you get to interact with the host culture and break into values of their social circle, is the more you discover the truth.

It seems you might have missed the point... the thing is, there is no "truth" and neither Mr Booth (the narrator in that quote) nor the old Japanese geezer were right. Or even if they were, they were equally right.

Of course one may try and describe Finnishness, or Japanese-ness, etc... but to say that there is some mysterious "truth" out there about these cultures is slightly weird, since Finnishness -whatever it is, I have no f*cking idea- only exists through individual people - and I'm pretty sure nobody embodies any kind of True Finnishness (except perhaps Mr Timo Soini

). Such idealistic nationalistic nonsense has only ever led to harm in the long run.

Since you asked for an opinion - and now don't be offended - your poem seemed more than a bit laboured, syrupy and embarrassing to me. "Cuteness of your culture"?

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