That's Not My Name!

A headline in the Helsingin Sanomat last weekend was:

Halonen: “Pidän Obamasta”
[Finnish President] Halonen: “I like Obama”

There's something bizarre about this in my opinion...

MoreGiantWordFormations

As if Finnish words were not long enough as it is, Finns have developed endless strategies to pad them out. Chief amongst these are those related to cases which apply to the end of noun and adjectives, and can give you up to a 4-letter bonus! Woohoo!

Love is in the Air

It's Valentine's Day, the day of romance and love. Have you written a poem or sent a card to your loved one or to your secret fancy? Have you bought flowers or chocolates or some garishly heart-branded present? Have you planned a romantic dinner?

Turning Japanese

In the previous post about polar questions, I mentioned a bizarre connection between Finnish and Japanese. This reminded me of an amusing story that happened to one of my Finnish friends while on holiday in Bali a few years ago.

Language Oddity #2: Polar Questions

It can be difficult to work out whether a Finn is asking a question, because they do not inflect their tone upwards at the end of interrogative sentences. Instead, the Finns have developed an ingenious trick to give a subtle clue to those-in-the-know that they are asking a question.

Giantwordformations

No home should be without a “kolmivaihevaihtovirtakilowattituntimittari”. Obviously.

More to the point though, what an impressive word! At 42 letters, that word makes “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” look positively puny!

Steamy Movie

Last week, I saw a Finnish movie (with English subtitles, of course) called “Miesten Vuoro” (“Men’s Turn”). This is a pretty steamy movie featuring lots of nudity. It has no plot at all, but that really doesn't matter.

Turning Success into Failure

In life, the gap between success and failure, winning and losing is often a small one. But for Finns, that gap is tiny.

Cat Calls

This week, a Finnish co-worker of mine pointed out a bizarre coincidence between Finnish and English, involving cats.