Cultural Shocks you can experience as a foreigner moving to Lapland
If you have read a blogpost that I wrote before you already know I moved to Lapland a few months ago. I arrived here in February as an Erasmus exchange student doing an internship here in Lapland.
I have been here for 2 months now, and I learned quite some things about the culture already!
Some of them you will probably know, others might surprise you!
Take off your shoes
One of the first thing you quickly learn is to take off your shoes when entering someone’s house. This makes a lot of sense. With the weather conditions outside you either bring in a lot of snow, gravel, or dirt.
Coat hangers
Another thing that surprised me is the public coat hangers that you can find everywhere. You find coat hanger areas in the university, museums, bars etc. Whenever you enter one of those public building it is customary to hang you coat on one of the hangers before you proceed to explore the building. How cool is that? And here in Scandinavia you do not have to fear that someone will steel you coat or jacket! You just pick it back up where you left it before you leave.
Cabins, cabins and… more cabins!
Not only young people, but Finnish people of all ages occasionally go to cabins to spend their weekends or holidays. It is mostly the young people who do this the most and seek the seclusion to throw parties and drink alcohol. (Lots of alcohol…) For most of the celebrations they go to cabins and bring a lot of alcoholic beverages.
Eating out in Lapland
I came from Milan before I moved to Lapland, where it is custom to go eat out and grab a drink almost every day. In Italy you either go for an aperitivo or you go eat delicious pasta or pizza every week. Here in Lapland however people rarely go eat in a restaurant. Both in Belgium and Italy I was used to eat dinner in a restaurant on a weekly basis. Both countries had a wide range of restaurants spread all over the city, everywhere you look there’s a bar or restaurant on the corner of the city centre. In Lapland small villages mostly only have 1 restaurant. Most of the restaurant’s offer fast food or offer buffets. This, for me, is in sharp contrast with the several restaurants in Belgium and Italy that all offer a different kitchen and speciality.
Buffets… who would have thought… I’m not sure if they’re built here for the high number of tourists that arrive during the winter… but it nonetheless surprises me how little high quality food restaurants there are to find in Lapland. You can find Pizza, Kebab, and hamburgers everywhere though.
Different kinds of food in the supermarket
More food related cultural differences are the high number of diverse kinds of packed bread in stores… I never thought I would see that many kinds of bread together in one store! Another thing that is quite different compared to what I am used to is the variety of 1 type of vegetable. When you walk in a store in Finnish Lapland it looks like you have a wide range of vegetables on the shelf. When you look more closely however, you realise that there is not a lot of variety but that you have 10 kinds of different tomatoes… and 5 kinds of different carrots or apples of bananas or salad… But you cannot find a lot of variety in the types of vegetables and fruits in most stores. The big supermarkets however offer a bit of a wider range.
Finnish beers and alcoholic beverages
The next thing that surprised me is the number of Finnish beers that exist. I always thought that Scandinavian countries drank a high amount of strong alcoholic beverages. But here it seems to be that beers are as popular! I tried a few myself and I have to say that some are good! They also have this drink called ‘Long Drink’ it’s and alcoholic beverage that consist of multiple mixed alcoholic beverages. I never knew this was such a Finnish thing. They even have their own brand ‘Original Long Drink’ created and invented by the Finnish! You must come and try it yourself! They have it at every bar and store in Finnish Lapland.
Outdoor clothing
Outdoor clothes here are not only worn in the outdoors here… but literally everywhere. Lappish people do not tend to dress up nice to go to the city but will just stroll trough it in their rainboots or timberlands, North Face jackets, Helly Hansen trousers and Fjällräven backpack. I cannot blame them. Cities in the north are still located in the missile of the wilderness and in an hour drive you are back in the missile of the forest.
The long and straight roads
The straight roads… are remarkably interesting to me. Driving to the next city contains of 3 hour driving straight on the same road without a turn for over 100 km’s. That is crazy to me! I thought Belgium was well known for its bad roads with holes and bumps, but here In Finland the roads are the same… or even worse! Especially those forest roads with rocks on them, holes and wild animals crossing are a true adventure here in Lapland. It makes you almost wish winter would come again, because it’s almost easier to drive on the snow.
How the Finnish like to break some rules
If you think the Finnish are rule followers… Think again! They all drive +70 km/u trough snow and on the ice; they go across the boarders to get nicotine patches called ‘snooze’ (which are illegal here) and alcohol. Going across the border to shop is something quite common here. They organise their monthly trip to the border of Sweden to shop some goods like coffee at a lower price.
Dating culture
Socially there are also some other differences. One of the more confusing things for me was that as a woman you are supposed to start the conversation when you’re interested in the other party. Meaning that in clubs men rarely will come to you as a woman to start a conversation. Coming from Italy, where that most definitely is the other way around, was a strange experience. I would walk in a club in Rovaniemi, men would walk up to me and say a ‘hey’ and that would be the end of the conversation if I would not continue it. They would rarely ask a question or even look me in the eye. Coming from the country of Casanova’s that was quite the cultural shock for me!
Making friends with Finnish people also comes slowly and is quite the challenge. They rarely go out to make new friends or are interested in foreigners or different countries and cultures. They are very content with their small circle of friends and their own local environment I found. This is quite generalising of course! But it was my experience with most native people here in Rovaniemi so far!
Trustworthy Scandinavia
The good news is that in general people tend to be more respectful here in Scandinavia. Crime rates are super low, everybody knows everybody, and people leave their doors and cars open all the time! Pretty impressive social security system if you ask me! It still blows my mind as I am pretty used to being taught by my parents to always lock everything and keep everything close to you. In Italy most of my friends their phones were stolen by the time I lived there for 2 months, here the count on stolen phones is still at zero.
Taste in food – Lapland
One of the last things I want to discuss is again food related. More specifically taste related… I think this has to do with the fact that you can barely grow any vegetables in Lapland due to its climate and most of the food is imported but… most of the food has so little taste here compared to mid and south Europe! The contrast is quite high and to find high quality and good tasting food you pay the price. Even silly things like cake or crepes are less tasty than what I am used to! And before you think it is my taste that is defective, I spoke with multiple exchange students that say the same!
There for sure is tasty food to find here in Lapland, but it’s a bit of a harder quest to find it.
In my experience most of the local products and bakeries are good and tasty! I find that everything that’s not locally produced or baked lacks more taste compared to the typical Lappish or Finnish specialities that do taste good.
An ongoing list
I could continue with more and more cultural changes that I personally experienced like ones concerning fashion or work ethics, but I think my list is long enough al ready.
It is very thrilling and exciting to explore these cultural differences and learn from other people, countries, and their culture! I am overly excited to explore even more and more and learn from all my new redefining experiences.
⇐By: Kaat Vandeweyer/Visit Lapland⇒
kaat@ourlapland.fi
