Christmas time is here, and what other better place to spend Christmas then in the land of the real Santa, excuse me, joulupukki. Sure enough, in Finland time around Christmas is funky for many reasons: it’s the time of longest nights, indulging in food and liquor is at its height and the number of close encounters with the old white-bearded men - yes, there’s more than one, in case you’re still wondering how could one man accomplish all of these deeds (spoil alert: all kids and tourists who believe in Santa, stop reading now!) - is at it’s highest.

It always begins half a year earlier right after the summer solstice on June 22nd when the day is slowly eroded by longer and longer nights. For all the patient people out there this slow and silent takeover culminates on December 21st, the day (or more appropriately, night) when the sun is out only for a few hours. In northern Finland this is taken to such an extreme that sun doesn’t come out for the whole 8 weeks. Please, stop doing whatever you’re doing right now and think about this for a moment: imagine what it would be like to sit in a darkroom for 8 weeks! That’s 48 days of darkness people. Admirable, I must say. At the same time, we in Jyväskylä can thus consider ourselves to be pretty lucky since the day today will be a bit more than four and a half hours long. But darkness is no reason for sadness or depression in the land of night and frozen lakes. Quite the contrary I must say.

Late December is one of the most joyful times for Finns. Surprised? Wonder no more. First, and probably most important is that Christmas is (besides being the day when the baby was born) the most awaited day in the second half of the year. By Christmas six months have already passed since the last official drinking day in Finland, the long forgotten midsummer’s night, and Finns are eager to be able to officially grab their bottles and drink. What better reason to rejoice? And it’s the time when both, consumers and retailers are happy too: consumers of booze, well no real need to explain why, and retailers because now’s the time when they sell one third of year’s worth of booze. But booze makers and retailers aren’t the only ones with smiles on their faces. Around Christmas Finns like to enjoy their pork too. The traditional meal eaten for Christmas is the joulukinkku (the Christmas ham) 7 million kilograms of which was sold this year alone in a nation of 5,5 million people (including babies and the growing number of vegetarians, that is). The profile of the average joulukinkku sold is 9 kg in weight, raw and salted. Bon appétit, or more appropriately, hyvää ruokahalua!

I shall not mention Christmas without its precursor pikkujoulu, or Little Christmas. True, there is only one Christmas, but there are always several pikkujoulut (no exact number is set, but rest assured that there are many). Little Christmases are indispensable joyful social festivities which can begin as early as November and take place until the actual Christmas. These parties are organized by either friends, in schools, clubs, associations, organizations or at workplaces where people gather to eat, socialize and drink. Especially workplace pikkujoulu parties can turn into rather lively and even rowdy events as the consumption of alcohol catalyzes the release of stress and frustration accumulated during the whole year. And alcohol having such a balmy effect on social barriers, pikkujoulu parties are a real nest for promiscuity: it’s the most likely time of the year when both the secretary and the boss get laid. According to statistics 17% of pikkujoulu goers (thus 17% of Finnish population) cheats on their partners on at least one of pikkujoulu parties. It for sure ain’t a negligible amount.

Whenever I meniton drinking, I really mean drinking as Finns do know how to consume excessive amounts of alcohol. The amounts of consumed booze during all of these pikkujoulu parties and the Christmas indulging in alcohol for many people results in such an excess that they proclaim January to be ‘a month without a single drop’ (tipaton tammikuu, as Finns like to refer to it). January thus becomes a month when noses of many slowly begin turning from red to white and to add irony to insult, they even have a term for this slow healing process: nenänvalkaisu.

But even Finnish Christmas would not be complete without the Santas (or joulupukit as they are called around here) themselves. Of course there’s more than one. Come on people, only British tourists who annually come to Rovaniemi (or Korvatunturi, to be precise) in flocks and little children still believe there’s only one and only Santa. And it takes just a glance at the daily papers classified adds section where scores of adds offering Santa service can be found. Yes, there are numerous Santa’s offering to show up on Christmas eve on people’s doorsteps for minuscule monetary compensation. Sad news for all those who pay piles of cash to see ‘The Real Santa’ if you can get one for peanuts. Or even for free (Money for Nothing and Santa for Free anyone), as most Finnish kids get a visit from a relative or a neighbor Santa: kids’ parents dress-up either one of their relatives or the nicest neighbor from their neighborhood as Santa and make them show up on Christmas eve. Although kids do love the presents they get, joulupukki does present a horror experience as well as lots of kids shit their pants when an oddly dressed old man intrudes on their privacy, makes them sing and drinks koskenkorva with their dad. Not funny at all.

Joulupukki being Finnish is thus in many aspects much more polite then his North American colleague. The North American Santa literally invades the family’s house through a chimney, in the middle of the night when everyone is sleeping, and on top of all that he comes completely unannounced. Judging by his actions, he could just as well be labeled as the real cowboy Santa. In comparison, joulupukki comes by personal appointment only and at an exact beforehand mutually agreed time. Now couple this with Finnish punctuality and politeness of ringing the door bell and entering the home of scared and excited children through the door and you get a real gentleman (Sober? As advertised!). Something to cheer about after all. The only thing that makes Finnish joulupukki so incredibly un-Finnish is that all joulupukki are men. Joulupukki job is completely overtaken and monopolized by men. The case here is not that representation of sexes is tilted just a little bit in favor of men, as is the case with many other jobs. It’s worse as women do not even exist in the joulupukki domain. Finnish women, I therefore ask you to stand up for your constitutional rights and fight against this sex-based prejudice in workplace. I thus urge you to immediately contact your minister of labor Tarja Filatov and ask her to instantly act on this matter.

Dear earthlings, I wish you a very Merry Christmas.

Mladen

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 22nd, 2005 at 8:19 pm and is filed under Culture, Finland. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.