Things I still do not understand

After five months, I have still yet to figure some things out about Finland. I often despair that I ever will.

• Getting through a Finnish door. Finnish doors that do not have Push or Pull in any language are my nemesis. Without a Push or Pull (I can read Finnish, Swedish, and others), I often fail to guess from any visual clues. It is embarrassing to fail at a door. Especially a door one uses often.
• Karelian pastries. They look so tasty! My American eyes tell me that these cute little things will be so sweet (uh, the word "pasty" conjures that image). But they are not sweet, and when you disappoint a sweet taste that your mind is anticipating, you suffer.
• Getting off the tram. I know I have seen people exit from the front door of the tram. But I also have seen scores of people who sit right by the front door of the tram -- and when they want to get off, they walk all the way back to the middle door to exit. Even if they are nearly lame, There must have been some rule not long ago about front-door tram exiting. Are front-door tram exiters rebels?
• My incomprehensible Finnish. I have worked hard at learning how to pronounce Finnish. But when I speak Finnish, very often native speakers will look at me for an uncomfortable moment as they seem to be translating in their heads the Finnish they have just heard into a language that makes sense to them. Then suddenly their eyes open wider, and they often repeat what I thought I said. Just improved. The margin for error in oral Finnish must be very small.
  
• Salmiakki. Salty liquorice is not a treat for me; it is an ordeal. But Finns seems to enjoy it, and all types of salmiakki-flavored treats are available wherever you think you should be able to buy something to eat or drink.  My recommendation for future visitors to Finland: start young, and acquire this taste. Your eating and drinking options will grow.

The list of things I do not yet understand is longer, but I will not include everything. I have a few more days in Finland, and I hope to mark a couple more of these items off that list -- and put them on the list of things I have figured out.

Reading Finnish

After a few months of looking at Finnish grammar books and doing all I could in my spare time to learn Finnish, I know I have made progress. Now when the 7A or 7B tram driver announces at Pasila station how long we will wait before resuming, I understand. When the cashier at the K-Market grocery store asks me if I want my receipt, I can reply. And when the clerk at Stockmann's Café Argos asks if I will also have a coffee with my sandwich, I don't have to confess my ignorance.

You gotta admire a guy who shoots
cars plunging off NY wharves.

But then I got cocky. I wanted to go beyond small talk and tackle Finnish literature. I assumed I could read Finnish. Not just signs and posters -- but whole groups of sentences. Of course I knew better than to start with the Kalevala, or any novel, of anything long, or -- well, just about anything that people more than seven years old read. So I bought a 96-page graphic novel: Nick Raider, New York City Homicide Detective. The title was "Mafian Tähtäimessä" and I correctly understood "Mafian" but had to rely on Google translate to tell me that "Mafian Tähtäimessä" meant "Mafia Sights." Taking off the "Mafian" got me "in sight." So the meaning I assume was somewhere between the two! Now I was reading! But my optimism was short lived. Every other panel was a struggle unless someone shot at someone else or a car sped off (I can understand a gun that goes "Bang!" and a ricochet that goes "Twiiing." Even a car that goes "Vroooom." I guess the translator didn't bother to put these into Finnish.). But not every panel can contain a gunfight or a speeding car chase; someone has to talk occasionally between shots and screeches. And it was making no sense to me. I was averaging one page per day, and that includes pictures. So I learned I could not even read a Finnish graphic novel. Yet I am not disillusioned and not giving up -- I just have to pick my Finnish texts more carefully (less words, more pictures?). Now I have invested in the most recent Garfield (aka Karvinen). The plot is easier (Garfield eating lasagna or swatting spiders). And I can finally say that I am reading Finnish.

The five-second rule

Getting on and off the tram is easy. Little children and dogs do it all the time, along with kids carrying skateboards and (older) kids carrying beer cans. Even elderly couples hop on and hop off (yet somewhat more slowly than the kids). However, there is one important rule that we all must obey: the five-second rule. This is how it works. When you get on the tram, you have approximately five seconds to either sit down, or to brace yourself somehow, or to find something that you will be able to grab onto -- preferably a pole or back of a seat and not another passenger. You see, in five seconds, unless delayed by a tourist who has climbed aboard and started to ask questions, the tram driver puts the tram in gear (or something like that) and starts moving again. You would think that a tram, being a large and heavy vehicle on tram tracks, would nudge forward gently as it slowly picks up speed. Even though it is not the same as a drag car burning rubber at the green light, a tram jerks forward as if it were in a race. A race to the next tram stop.

When the tram starts forward, if you are not in your seat, or not holding onto something, or not able to find something very quickly to hold onto, you are abruptly jostled. I have never seen anyone thrown to the ground, fortunately. But riders who forget the five-second rule suddenly pantomime drunken sailors on a storm-tossed ship.

But don't worry if you forget the five-second rule. If you are thrown about and grab at things and narrowly avoid plopping into someone's lap, there is no need to be embarrassed. Remember, this is Finland, after all, and Finns respect your privacy; no one even looks at you as you try to regain your dignity (well, they may look but they will pretend not to). Yes, you nonchalantly clutch the nearest pole and act as if was no big deal to nearly fall down in front of strangers. You'll have your sea legs soon.