I cannot really claim that I have ever in my life experienced a situation when I was exposed to any particularly perilous situation. Nevertheless, I could affirm that Finland is probably one of the safest places in the world. There are no natural disasters, no threats of war, famine, political upheaval or any kind of revolutions. If this place is ever dangerous it is around this day, add or take a day or two.

Why just now, I hear you saying? It’s summer, the weather is nice and relatively warm, so what could make this time of year particularly dangerous. Well, it might be exactly the weather that’s causing all the danger. Let me explain.

This coming Saturday Finns are celebrating what is probably the biggest party of the year for the whole nation. It is the midsummer or Juhannus as it is known around here. Even though midsummer should astronomically be the exact day of the summer solstice, no matter which day of the week it is, Finns celebrate it every year on a different date as long as it is a Saturday between June 20th and 26th. Which really is no surprise at all as they again prove just how flexible they are. But then again, seriously, who really cares whether it is the 20th or the 26th if the biggest party of the year is about to take place.

In Finland and in all of the other Nordic and Baltic countries Juhannus is one of the craziest parties of the year. Since it coincides with the longest day of the year this really means that the sky in most of Scandinavia will stay bright all night, if the sun sets at all. And after a dark, cold and all-night winter days who wouldn’t go crazy when it’s time for the sun to shine all the time.

Long, unusually warm days and short but very bright nights make people go nuts. I am pretty sure that every single village in Finland hosts at least four different festivals at the same time all of which are packed with people who have already been to sixteen other festivals in previous four villages they have visited on the same day. There is this urge within the nation at this time of the year to be outdoors as much as possible. As I stay sometimes all day inside reading or working on something, I have already developed a sense of guilt for not doing the same. And seriously, whoever survives the long, dark and cold winters around here has a difficult time understanding why someone would not want to come out when the ice melts. Maybe it’s that I haven’t seen enough of such winters yet. Who knows.

In the beginning I mentioned that if ever, it is around this time of year that being in Finland can actually be dangerous. Well, I already wrote on these pages about a sort of a Finnish national specialty of drowning with their zippers wide open. Although I have to say that this act is still a mystery to me. How can it be possible, especially since everyone, I mean, everyone is aware of the consequences they possibly face if they combine booze, boats and the urge to urinate. And, on top of everything, there is plenty of all sorts of direct and indirect warnings issued in the media asking people to try and avoid combining water with intoxication. But to no avail. Last year seven people drowned during Juhannus alone.

Alright, but that’s self-inflicted peril. With a tiny bit of smarts it can be easily avoided. What is a bit more unpredictable are assaults with a knife. You see, that is another Finnish speciality. Not particularly related to Juhannus, but to every season and time of the year. I don’t remember when was the last time that I did not see the news in the daily papers about someone being stabbed, usually several times. In fact, stabbing is so common that it amounts to about a third of all physical assaults. Which maybe even isn’t that surprising considering that one of the national icons is a handy dagger puukko. A useful tool, but add a little alcohol to the mixture and you might make the news either as assaulter or assaulted.

And speaking of booze, a friend of mine already pointed out in one of his comments that Finns really do not consume that much alcohol per person per year. True, but when they do, they consume a lot. Right after Christmas Juhannus is the second busiest time of the year for alcohol consumption. The state wine and liquor monopoly Alko expects to sell around 4 million liters of alcohol during this week alone. That is almost a liter per inhabitant. Which makes it a lot less surprising that Ukon juhla (as Juhannus used to be called during the pagan times) is at the same time a celebration of love, short-lived but passionate.

Mladen

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 21st, 2007 at 5:03 pm and is filed under Culture, Finland, Leisure. 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.