25 y.o. | She/her | русский, English, lite svenska, todella vahan suomi | The social account :) my art account is here: https://www.tumblr.com/artbyrevontuli
The fun thing about finnish is that formal written finnish is technically speaking a distinct dialect that's different from all spoken dialects, and while fiction is almost always written with written finnish, many authors will have the dialogue spelled out in spoken dialects to give the text more "real", naturally flowing flavour.
Someone speaking written finnish in casual day-to-day life usually means one of two things - either the speaker is somewhere on the autism spectrum (not a diagnostic criteria, but one of those "I've never seen a neurotypical person do that" things) or they speak finnish as a second language. And I don't know how to say this without sounding condescending, but I love hearing it, it's so charming. Like you stepped straight out of a 19th century play.
Standing in the line to a public bathroom, there's a man talking on the phone, speaking in finnish with a distinct accent, going "I understand, darling. Love. My love. Beloved, I understand. I understand. I will make my way there. Yes, I understand. I will make my way to you. Two hours."
And now that I wrote that out, I can see that there is no way to express in english just how delightfully formal and "writing a love letter with ink on paper to your beloved promising to come back from the war" it sounds when someone in finnish says "rakkaani, minä ymmärrän, minä tulen luoksesi."
@ozyga fun thing actually! The finnish written language was deliberately intentionally constructed during the 1500s during protestant reformation, in order to translate the bible into the peoples' own language. The concept of finns as a distinct people - not to mention a nation - was not even regarded as a valid thing. Finland wasn't occupied as much as just the isolated eastern half of the Swedish kingdom, whose peasants just happened to speak their own rural peasant language.
The reason why finnish is written so strictly exactly the same way it's pronounced is because the people who wrote it down were men of the church, who spoke the language as their "home language" but were educated in latin. Finnish was written down the way it phonetically sounded to people who could read and write latin.
And while I will now pause to aknowledge that the "fathers of the finnish language" were Problematic™ by 21st century Tumblr standards, the written form of finnish was constructed by intentionally mixing together different dialects of the spoken language, to tie them all together to an uniform standardised common finnish.
To add to this: spoken Finnish existed for a really long time before people (or one man) decided that it needs to have a written form too and combined two "different" type of Finnish into one (which is why the dialects are separated into Eastern and Western dialects, as they are basically the same language but also not because the proto-language for both is a different one. Eastern dialects share the same protolanguage as Karelian, whereas Western dialects developed from just proto-Finnic or such iirc). Then this guy also added and made up lots of new words.
Jokinly I always say that when the written Finnish was literally made up, Finnish speakers were not really having it and continued to use the spoken language regardless which led us to having two types of Finnish that everyone here understands. In reality it probably was that people just could not read or did not have access to education that would have taught them to read, I'm not sure as I haven't really researched this. Anyhow, all Finns understand both the written and spoken language as well the dialects, but for Finnish learners that can be a challenge. Many have said that they learned Finnish from books and then traveled to here and realized no one speaks whatever they were taught in those books.
I also find it very fascinating that so many words in Finnish have 1-3 synonyms because we have the spoken language version(s) and then the written language version, but also loan words from either Swedish and/or Russian. And then of course regional differences between different dialects, e.g. naturally the Russian/Slavic loan words are more common in the East.
I totally forgot I collected all of these a couple of months ago... Enjoy
~~~~~~
Josua: What time is it?
Mäskis-Gunnar: I don’t know, pass me that saxaphone and we’ll find out
Mäskis-Gunnar: *BLASTS the saxaphone*
Kurt: WHO THE FUCK IS PLAYING THE SAXAPHONE AT TWO IN THE FUCKING MORNING
Mäskis-Gunnar: It’s 2 am
~~~~~~
Kurt: So are you gonna explain how the hell you crashed my car?
Kenneth: Well we were driving and there was a deer in the road, so I said "Klas, deer!"
Kurt: ...And what did Klas do?
Kenneth: ...They said "Yes, Honey?"
~~~~~~
Mäskis-Gunnar: Mint is just cold spicy.
Kurt: ...
Kurt: What the actual fuck is wrong with you.
~~~~~~
Gita, setting down a card: Ace of spades.
Berit, pulling out an Uno card: +4.
Margita, pulling out a Pokémon card: Jolteon, I choose you!
Josua, trembling: What are we playing?!
~~~~~~
Kenneth: Name a more iconic duo than my crippling fear of abandonment and my anxiety. I’ll wait.
Klas: You and me!
Kenneth: *tearing up* Ok.
~~~~~~
Berit: I fell—
Kurt: From heaven?
Berit: No, I literally fell—
Kurt: In love with me the moment you saw me?
Berit: MY ARM IS BROKEN!
Kurt: Okay, but do you think I'm pretty? Be honest.
~~~~~
*talking on the phone*
Gita: Remember how I said that Margita and I were gonna have a calm night out for once?
Berit: Yeah…
Gita: Well, we’re in jail.
Berit: *hangs up*
~~~~~~
Mäskis-Gunnar: The Ocean is a soup.
Josua:
Josua: Do elaborate.
Mäskis-Gunnar: What are needed for something to be a soup?
Josua: Erm... Water, salt, some form of vegetation, and personally I prefer some meat in mine.
Mäskis-Gunnar: *Tilts head*
Josua: The Ocean is a Soup.
Mäskis-Gunnar: The Ocean is a Soup.
~~~~~~
Josua: I’m totally useless.
Kurt: You’re not totally useless.
Kurt: You can be used as a bad example.
~~~~~~
Kenneth: We just ate. Why are you making pancakes?
Klas: For the dogs.
Kenneth: Why are you making pancakes for the dogs?
Klas: They don't know how.
~~~~~~
Mäskis-Gunnar: Wanna hear some dark humor.
Kurt: Yeah, I love dark humor.
Mäskis-Gunnar: Alright.
Mäskis-Gunnar: *Turns off the lights*
Mäskis-Gunnar: Knock knock.
Kurt: Turn the damn lights back on.
~~~~~~
Gita: Being gay is a constant battle between "I wish to sit on a window bench with my lover, our legs tangling as we listen to the birds" and "Hey, let's go throw rocks at fascists" and I think that's very sexy of us.
Margita: If the window's open and you time it right, you can do both.
~~~~~~
Berit: I hate you sometimes.
Kurt: Well according to this picture Josua drew of us holding hands that's not true.
Berit: Kurt, you drew that.
Kurt: That doesn't matter.
~~~~~~
Gita: *pulls back the curtain while Margita is showering*
Gita: Hey did we - stop screaming it’s me - did we run out of Cheerios?
~~~~~~
Josua: Hi, who's this? Mäskis-Gunnar changed all of my contacts to mythical creatures.
Kurt: What's mine?
Josua: Dwarf.
Kurt: I'M NOT THAT SHORT!
Josua: Oh, hey dad.
Kurt: FUCK!
~~~~~~
Josua: I don’t think the therapist is supposed to say ‘wow’ that many times during their first session with a client, but here we are.
~~~~~~
Kurt: You’re an idiot.
Mäskis-Gunnar: That’s the charm.
~~~~~~
Berit: Klas learned how to fold origami penguins from Kenneth the other day. I told them, “I feel a little bad for the penguins, it’s hot here”, and the next day they put them in the fridge.
~~~~~~
Kurt: Punch me in the face.
Berit: ...Punch you?
Kurt: Yes, punch me, didn’t you hear me?
Berit: I always hear ‘punch me in the face’ while you’re speaking but it’s usually just subtext.
~~~~~~
Kurt: I’m not mad, I just need to know why you had a fake ID.
Josua: *Incoherent mumbling*
Kurt: Huh?
Josua: …You need to be 18 to hold the puppies at PetCo.
~~~~~~
There are so many more from where that came from... Let me know if you want more! And please feel free to do some yourself! The more the merrier :D
The cultural impact of KAJ on Swedish-Finnish relations
I wanted to highlight some positive things that I've observed around the KAJ-phenomenon (Swedish Eurovision entry 2025), while also clarifying a few things about the cultural context to those who aren't from the region - but my small overview got out of hand, so here is an essay-length cultural analysis (sorry about that and hats off to anyone who reads to the end!)
You can read the rest under the cut or on Reddit where there is also lots of interesting stuff in the comment section.
I'm interested in this topic because I'm part of the Swedish speaking minority in Finland, but also because I've lived in the Finnish speaking parts of Finland (Jyväskylä) and in Sweden (Malmö), so I've had a front-line seat to people from all of these communities making assumptions about each other and misunderstanding each other.
Here are the three geopolitical aspects of the KAJ-phenomenon that I find particularly noteworthy and heartwarming:
1) Sweden is celebrating Finnish culture and it's changing the narrative in both countries
The fact that a Finnish band is topping charts in Sweden with a song about an aspect of Finnish culture is a bigger deal than you might think, because Finnish culture has not traditionally been held in high esteem in Sweden.
There are some ancient reasons for this, related to the fact that Finland was under Swedish rule from the 13th century all the way up to 1809 with the power dynamics that this implies, but I think the most important reason is probably the wealth gap during much of the 20th century.
In the 1950-70s many Finns emigrated to Sweden for work. They were mostly known to be reliable hard workers, but new immigrants are never highly regarded and on top of that this was the same generation that was on the front lines during the war, with lots of trauma that nobody knew how to treat or diagnose at the time, leading to self-medication with alcohol, emotional detachment, violence and social problems. Being Finnish became associated with a number of negative stereotypes in Sweden (alcoholism, violence, social exclusion, poverty), to the point where children in many Sweden-Finnish families were bullied for being Finnish and people were encouraged to distance themselves from their Finnish heritage.
This is why the hype in Sweden around Bara Bada Bastu - a silly feelgood song about unconditionally loving a part of Finnish culture - is getting so much attention in Finland. Finnish people aren't used to Sweden being this enthusiastic about anything related to their country. Some people in Finland still expect Swedes to look down on them for being Finnish. "The happiest country in the world" should of course have sorted out their self-esteem issues by now (most people have), but sometimes these things can be slow to evolve.
Finnish culture has actually been getting a lot of positive attention in Sweden for some time now. The love for KAJ is part of a cultural shift that has been going on for years. Some notable music examples are Käärijä doing well on Swedish charts, Swedish artist Markus Krunegård releasing an album in Finnish in 2023 (Nokia & Ericsson) and Swedish artist Miriam Bryant releasing several singles in Finnish in 2024 (Mustelmilla, Otan kii), as well as wildly popular Hooja throwing in some Finnish words in their Swedish lyrics.
The fact that Melodifestivalen producer Karin Gunnarsson invited KAJ to the competition in the first place probably wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for this phenomenon already being a thing.
2) Finland is showing Sweden some love in return
There is a saying in Finland that goes "it doesn't matter who wins as long as Sweden loses" and yet here we are: Finnish people are singing along to a song in Swedish and many are actively rooting for Sweden to win Eurovision.
The fact that a song in Swedish is topping charts in Finland is very unusual.
Finland is a bilingual country, with Finnish and Swedish both being official languages, so you might expect the music scene and the general population to be bilingual as well, but they are not. The percentages are 95% Finnish speakers and 5% Swedish speakers, meaning public life is basically 100% Finnish speaking. Swedish speakers have their own schools and radio channels and so on, but if they want to talk with the rest of the country they need to do so in Finnish.
The same thing is true for the music scene. If you choose to sing in Swedish you have a potential audience of less than 300 000, if you switch to Finnish you have a potential audience of 5,5 million. There are several Fennoswedish artists who are very successful in Finland at the moment, the big names being Mirella and Averagekidluke, but they all sing in Finnish. You would have to be a specific kind of lovable goofball to choose your local Swedish dialect instead.
The Swedish language is also viewed negatively by many in Finland. This is an unfortunate consequence of mandatory Swedish lessons in schools, often nicknamed "pakkoruotsi" ("involuntary Swedish" or "forced Swedish"). The idea to teach everyone the basics of both national languages doesn't sound particularly far-fetched, but many people, especially in the East and North where there are no native Swedish speakers, dislike this requirement to the point where it might do more harm than good.
As for Sweden, the country is seen as a close and reliable friend, but the friendship is somewhat more complicated than it might seem on the surface. The Finnish banter with Sweden is friendly 99,9% of the time but the remaining 0,1% can be surprisingly dark, because it's rooted in feelings of humiliation and injustice that go quite deep.
This is why it made sense for KAJ to do Melfest instead of UMK, beyond the fact that Melfest reached out to them. Gaining a Swedish audience when singing in Swedish is a realistic goal. Gaining a Finnish-speaking audience when singing in Swedish is... not realistic - or so everyone assumed.
In other words: seeing Swedish people sing "yksi, kaksi, kolme, sauna!" in Finnish is surprising, but seeing Finnish-speakers go "bara bada bastu, bastu!" in Swedish is just as unexpected and somehow even more heartwarming, for me as a Fennoswede at least.
As far as I know it's the first time in history a Fennoswedish artist gets nationwide recognition with a song in Swedish. There is more warmth towards Sweden in Finland right now and more curiosity about the Swedish speaking minority than I think I've ever seen.
3) People are suddenly learning about the Swedish speaking minority in Finland
KAJ getting all this attention is making a real difference in fighting ignorance (mostly in Sweden) and prejudice (mostly in Finland) about the Swedish speaking minority.
Some Swedish people still don't know we exist, which can be a little disheartening to Swedish speaking Finns who follow media in both countries and know everything about Sweden. Fennoswedes trade anecdotes about how Swedish people compliment them on their "really good Swedish" when they speak their native language or how well-meaning Swedes switch to English because they can't tell the difference between a dialect and a foreign accent. The most extreme anecdotes are about Swedish people saying "I had no idea Finnish was so easy to understand" when you talk to them in Swedish.
In Finland people know we exist, but sometimes mistake us for a small and homogenous group of upper-class snobs - which is fine really, compared to what almost any other minority anywhere has to put up with, but it's also quite far from the truth, so getting some nuance added to the mix wouldn't hurt. Most Fennoswedes are just ordinary people and do not have mansions and old money (unfortunately for us!). Those old money families do exist, but they are not that many.
The Fennoswedes you see in Finnish media tend to live in the Helsinki area and be perfectly bilingual, which isn't the case for all of us. KAJ is such a refreshing addition to the media landscape because they aren't part of this group: they are from the countryside, their Finnish is a little wonky, and you couldn't possibly accuse them of being upper class snobs.
And finally, if you read this to the end: Thank you, I spent way too much time on this, so I really appreciate it! Here is your well-earned diploma on Finnish-Swedish relations: 📜👩🏼🎓
In the current news landscape it is so heartwarming to find stories about how things like music and good genuine fun helps people find connection and understanding and break down walls❤️
Bad Apple Cookie is a unique creature. Not least because he was accidentally created by an ordinary 17-year-old girl from the big human city. Well, almost ordinary—hey, how ordinary can a Witch's descendant be?
Anyway, they are best friends now, even though their friendship began with fear and a bitten off hand…
