Gotta love those Fins

[Skybird]

Saw a docu yesterday, from Helsinki. Due to the special conditions regarding Sunshine in summer, and weeks of darkness in winter, Helsinki simply shuts down during summer holidays. I couldn'T believe what I saw. empty streets in the centre. no cars, no pedestrians. No shops open. Public services limited to 20%, or shut down. Hospitals running with 50% or less capacity, all non-emergency operation being delayed until after holiday season. Over 80% of the inhabitants they said are leaving Helsinki during summer vacation, leaving behind a ghost town. Ministers rotate through offices and replace their colleagues, sometime holding three offices at once, until their colleagues are back and the former placeholders are leaving. Police is gone for the most, the government as well. People head into the forest and live a simple life there, without comfort and luxury and the iterms and services of civilization, focussing on mastering life in the essential way, focussing on sauna (of course), family and friends, and community. they have very small wooden huts, what does not mind them, since all their life takes place outside anyway.

First I thought this is queer. Then I got warm over it. And next I realised that I like the idea and the eccentricity behind it as well. Becasue it is not eccentricity, but healthy reason of the kind you do not see in modern civilisation anymore. If I ever should travel again and move north, Finland will be the place I must see - if for no othr reason than to applaude these strange aborigines!

[Tchocky]

I've only ever visited Helsinki in the middle of winter, it must be lovely in summer

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Tchocky

I've only ever visited Helsinki in the middle of winter, it must be lovely in summer

Yes - it would be all yours.

[UnderseaLcpl]

Sounds wonderful. Too bad the rest of the world has criminals to mess it all up. Maybe I will move to Finland if America becomes much more socialist.

[FIREWALL]

Yup. We'll all move there and turn it into what we left behind.

I already feel sorry for the Fins.

[bookworm_020]

Expect a crime wave next summer when the crims of the world desend to steal anything not nailed down. By the time the local relize that they have being fleeced of everythng they own, the crims will be on a holiday brought fro the proceeds of the crim spree.:hmm:

[Diopos]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

Sounds wonderful. Too bad the rest of the world has criminals to mess it all up. Maybe I will move to Finland if America becomes much more socialist.

Finland is already "too socialist" by American standards.
Maybe that's why they enjoy the "simpler" life in their summer vacations!:hmm:

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Saw a docu yesterday, from Helsinki. Due to the special conditions regarding Sunshine in summer, and weeks of darkness in winter, Helsinki simply shuts down during summer holidays. I couldn'T believe what I saw. empty streets in the centre. no cars, no pedestrians. No shops open. Public services limited to 20%, or shut down. Hospitals running with 50% or less capacity, all non-emergency operation being delayed until after holiday season. Over 80% of the inhabitants they said are leaving Helsinki during summer vacation, leaving behind a ghost town. Ministers rotate through offices and replace their colleagues, sometime holding three offices at once, until their colleagues are back and the former placeholders are leaving. Police is gone for the most, the government as well. People head into the forest and live a simple life there, without comfort and luxury and the iterms and services of civilization, focussing on mastering life in the essential way, focussing on sauna (of course), family and friends, and community. they have very small wooden huts, what does not mind them, since all their life takes place outside anyway.

First I thought this is queer. Then I got warm over it. And next I realised that I like the idea and the eccentricity behind it as well. Becasue it is not eccentricity, but healthy reason of the kind you do not see in modern civilisation anymore. If I ever should travel again and move north, Finland will be the place I must see - if for no othr reason than to applaude these strange aborigines!

Dont know about Helsinki, but the city I live in, a small ~25,000ppl city in the eastern Finland doesnt have that happening. The vacations are arranged so, that there is ppl to fill the spots always.

But as for the "life in nature", I've been going to our summerhouse as long as I can remember. It's on an small-ish island, with 25km to the nearest town. Oh the peace and silence there is, fracking love it! And yes, sauna is a big part of it, me & my brother usually heat it up in the middle of the night (we are for most of time the only ones still awake, tho drunk as monkeys) and spend hours there, occasionally going for a swim or get a new beer. Wouldnt change it for anything.

[stabiz]

:rotfl:

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Dowly

Dont know about Helsinki, but the city I live in, a small ~25,000ppl city in the eastern Finland doesnt have that happening. The vacations are arranged so, that there is ppl to fill the spots always.

But as for the "life in nature", I've been going to our summerhouse as long as I can remember. It's on an small-ish island, with 25km to the nearest town. Oh the peace and silence there is, fracking love it! And yes, sauna is a big part of it, me & my brother usually heat it up in the middle of the night (we are for most of time the only ones still awake, tho drunk as monkeys) and spend hours there, occasionally going for a swim or get a new beer. Wouldnt change it for anything.

I would have had a hard time believing it or would have assumed they exaggerate, if I only would have read it and if they would not have filmed the city, and showed pictures from the streets: and there were all the houses shut off, shops closed, and simply not a single man moving around in the streets. There were the interviews with doctors at the hpsital telling the numbers I repeatded, and with a ministre who currently was doing the ministies of two of his colleagues as well. there were no interviews with the shop owner, because they were not there 80% of the inhabitants, they said on TV, are moving out in summer holidays, and even take no cellphones - not even Nokias! - with them, being totally unreachable for any kind of communication, mail or telephone.

when I travelled myself a lot ten years ago, I also only had minimal expedition luggage, and we were sometimes alone in some desert - like wilderness. sometimes I felt as free as I never felt before and never felt again since then, during my private journeys. when I worked with those correpondent crews, it was different, of course. the mere nature of the job reminded me constantly that we were strangers in a strange land, with a hardware-coded uplink into the complicated life of civilisation. Tjhatz summer in the woods idea definitely is for me. I am a forest-lover anyway.