Welcome & Why Finland Matters

Speaker 3 0:00

This transcript was automatically created and has not be read or edited by our team. Hi, I'm Alexa. And I'm Rory. And together we are The ROAMies. We are married to each other. Right. We are a touring musical duo.

Speaker 2 0:11

And our music has taken us to all kinds of places all around the world and keeps us always on the go.

Speaker 3 0:16

So we hope you enjoy our stories and adventures while running around working to keep all your plates spinning.

Speaker 2 0:22

And we hope to facilitate your busy lifestyle and feed your inner travel bug.

Speaker 0:27

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2 0:32

Hi everyone, welcome to the Romies Podcast. We are continuing our Language for Travelers series. And today we are going to focus on a really fun language, and it's a very interesting language and very unrelated to other languages language.

Speaker 3 0:50

Well, very unrelated to other languages, languages.

Speaker 2 0:55

Yes.

Finnish Basics: Sounds, Doubled Letters, Rhythm

Speaker 3 0:55

Yes, yes.

Speaker 2 0:56

We're going to teach you Finnish today. Now, Finnish you're pretty pretty much going to use only in Finland. Like we've talked about German. Yeah, talking about German, where you can use that in multiple places. French, you can use it in multiple countries.

Speaker 3 1:12

Arabic, same.

Speaker 2 1:13

Yeah. But Finnish, you're going to use it in Finland.

Speaker 3 1:17

And so it's like a secret language.

Speaker 2 1:19

Yeah. And you're thinking, why are we giving you such practical advice? Well, here's our practical advice. You need to come to Finland. Finland is amazing. We s we end up find ourselves coming here every single year. And we love the people. We think they have the best chocolate in the world, which is crazy. Agreed. Yeah. And so it's just you need to come to Finland, and that's why we are spending time and effort to have this little lesson for you. Yes. So it's worth it. All right. So today, our teacher with us is the awesome Evelia.

Speaker 1:57

Yes.

Speaker 2 2:03

Thank you so much for joining us. We're really glad to have you. One of the things, so Rory and I, because we've come to Finland every year. Quite a few times. They're already pros.

Speaker 3 2:14

Oh, yeah, the job win.

Speaker 2 2:17

Now, another here's a little trick, too. You can so many people in Finland do know English. They're learning English in school. And so that's really helpful. But still, even if people are speaking English and it's very common in a country, we still want to be polite. We still want to be respectful. One and before Evelyn dives in, one other little fun thing that Rory pointed out to me when we were first coming.

Speaker 3 2:41

I pointed something fun out to you. Yeah. Nice.

Speaker 2 2:43

With the Finnish language, do you want to tell them how you read it?

Speaker 3 2:48

Oh, yeah. It's like, what is this thing? I'm going to tell them. Tell me too. Yes. So one thing that you have to your advantage in learning Finnish is that they pronounce every letter. Really, no two letters make a singular sound.

Speaker 2 3:06

So if you see a word, which it can be four letters, it could be how many letters.

Greetings and Polite Words

Speaker 3 3:12

Yeah, it could be a word this so long. This, but yeah, an internal. But you can slowly pronounce it because you say every letter. If there are two T's together, you say both T's. Two L's, both L's.

Speaker 2 3:24

I mean it's And two I's together, both I's.

Speaker 3 3:26

Yeah, your vowels, you say both T.

Speaker 1 3:28

So we have a friend, Mika, and it's two I's and it's crazy. What would you say? So reading out loud is gonna be way easier than, for example, French. Yes. Yes.

Speaker 3 3:37

Oh, way easier. Yeah. For sure. Yes, yeah. Sorry.

Speaker 1 3:44

I'm not gonna answer that. I don't know French.

Speaker 3 3:48

Just trust me.

Speaker 1 3:49

Let's keep going with the finishing.

Speaker 3 3:51

Okay, finish. Yes, yes.

Speaker 2 3:53

Yeah, there's so many. And another little interesting thing about Finnish that we've just as Americans that we've discovered is that they put their prepositions at the end of the word. And so their words are like, like I said, 16 syllables per word. And that's because they're doing like a whole sentence. One word is a sentence. So it's like in the car. Or she has something in the car is like one word.

Speaker 3 4:18

Yeah, school of plumbers for Finnish people who live in Lapland. It's all one word. I mean, it's hard to read at a glance if you're driving down the street with street signs.

Speaker 1 4:29

And everything has a thousand meetings. So you're gonna go farm with just three words. Nice. Nice.

Speaker 3 4:35

That's right.

Speaker 2 4:36

See, and we're gonna feel so smart after this episode. I really, I really love that. So yeah.

Speaker 3 4:43

Way more than you need for Finland. Yes.

Speaker 2 4:46

So, Evelyn, what would you say? Usually we might start out with a greeting. Would you say that's a good place to start? For sure, for sure.

Speaker 1 4:54

There's many, many ways to greet someone in Finnish, but I'd say a nice, polite, still cool and chill way is to say moika. Moika. Moika. Moika. I think that that's fine. Or if you but want to be a bit more formal, hey is fine. The same as in English. Nothing. I think so. I think that moika is something you say like moika, hey to a friend, maybe. Hey is more hey.

Speaker 3 5:20

That's why everyone says, first of all, yeah. Okay.

Speaker 1 5:23

But both are fine. I think hey obviously is a lot easier if you don't want to learn anything new. Moika, if you want to learn something new.

Speaker 2 5:32

Okay. And hey, they even though they say hey, like we say hey, they spell it H-E-I. So there is a different spelling. Just in that way.

Speaker 3 5:41

So with moika, say like the two syllables slowly and clearly for everyone.

Speaker 1 5:45

Moika. So it's two-case, but moika. Ah. It's hard to hear from the from when you say it out loud, but it is two-case.

Key Travel Phrases: Where, Thank You, Yes/No

Speaker 2 5:55

Moika. Can we can we just do our Thuli-Tuli Thuli example here before we dive in more? Sure. Because this goes with the whole two-letter things. Ah, tule. Right. So we've got fire, wind, and we're going to be able to do it.

Speaker 3 6:09

So tell us the word for fire, wind, and customs.

Speaker 1 6:12

Fire, word, and customs. Fire, wind.

Speaker 3 6:14

Wind.

Speaker 2 6:15

Fire, wind. Thuli, tuli, tuli, basically. Yeah. Thuli, tuli.

Speaker 3 6:19

For us, they sound the same thing.

Speaker 1 6:20

Tully, tully. Uh-huh. Yes. I'm already gonna know this. Okay, this is what the Finnish language is all about. You're getting to the root of it now. Uh okay. So basically, tuli, tuli, and tuli have three completely different meanings. And they're totally different words.

Speaker 3 6:40

Yeah, they don't sound the same to these people.

Speaker 1 6:41

So re repeat the three different words. So the first one is tuli, or the second one is tuli, and the third one is tuli. Okay.

Speaker 2 6:50

So what's the difference in the spelling? And then pronounce them again.

Speaker 1 6:54

Yeah. Okay, so fire is tuli. And it only has one u. So tuli. T-U-L-I. Yes. Okay. Wind is tuli with two U's, otherwise completely the same. So T-U-U-L-Is.

Speaker 3 7:10

And she said both the Us.

Speaker 1 7:12

Mm-hmm. And actually also Thuli as in wind also means it used to be windy. Okay. Sorry for another time. And the last one is Tully, as in customs. Customs. Like when you go through an airport or into a country. And the difference with that one is it has one U but two L's. So tully. So tully, tully, tully. And this is why Finnish is hard. Yes.

Speaker 2 7:45

Because when we, as Americans, when we hear it, it all sounds the same. And you know, when yeah. So moika has two kings. Moika. Moikka. Yeah. But how could you know? All right. Wow, all that just for greeting. Okay, so that's hello.

Speaker 3 8:03

What about like thank you? Uh excuse me. Yeah, what do you think is something that you would want someone to know that would, you know.

Navigating Places: Bathroom, Train, Airport, Cafe

Speaker 1 8:11

With sorry, you can go a long way. Okay. It's basically, oh, oops, forgive me. For example, if you bump it to someone on the street, you can say, oh, sorry. Okay. It's it's not super polite, but it's not unpolite. It's familiar and it's like a very just um very useful. Very useful and fast way of saying uh sorry. So sorry. I think the only kind of pronunciation difference to English is in Finnish. Yeah, it's a flip R. So sorry. So just sorry. Yeah, yeah. That's true. Yeah, that's the difference. Okay. But even if you would be even if you would say sorry with a bit of a rounder S, it would work. Sorry. And then if we want a bit more formal way of saying sorry, it would be on the X. Okay. On the Xi. Alright, so break that down syllable by s on thic C.

unknown 9:06

Okay.

Speaker 1 9:06

And that only has one K. You would never know though.

Speaker 3 9:09

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But how many E's does it have? Uh two. Two E's. Yeah.

Speaker 2 9:14

Okay. So again, if you say it really slowly, on thic C. Okay.

Speaker 1 9:20

On the Xi.

unknown 9:22

Yeah.

Speaker 3 9:22

Did you hear say both the E's? So say it again fast.

Speaker 1 9:25

I didn't. On the Xi. Okay. On the Xi.

Speaker 3 9:29

She's so good with the language, right? It's like she sounds so negative.

Speaker 2 9:32

It's like I'm bored Finnish or something. Yeah, it's so negative. Wow. Okay. So that's excuse me. And then so like sorry. And then are you gonna use excuse me in excuse me, can I get your attention?

Speaker 1 9:44

Sorry, would actually work. I think sorry. Okay.

Speaker 9:51

Yeah.

Speaker 1 9:51

But even if I were if even if I was, for example, in class and I would need to ask something from the teacher, I could just say, ah, sorry. Okay. And then I could say my my thing, whatever I need to say. Okay. Alright. Or antexi, but again, that may might be a bit formal. Sorry. Mulin Asian would be sorry. I have something to say.

Speaker 2 10:11

Okay. But moolin Asian, whatever you just said. We don't need to know that for travel right now. Okay. So what's our next thing for travel that is good and helpful? Uh I'd say Well, thank you.

Speaker 3 10:25

Yes.

Speaker 1 10:26

Yeah, of course, of course. Thank you would be kitos. Okay. Kitos. I don't think that there's really another way of saying that. Yeah. So that has two eyes. I think that I I think that you can even maybe hear. Kitos. Kitos. Okay.

Speaker 3 10:47

There it is.

Speaker 1 10:48

And then what about um thank you very much? Kitos palion. Okay. That's even maybe sim more simple. More simple than the English way of saying kitos better. Kitos palion. Okay, can you slow that down? Balion. Balion. So it's a hard P. Balion. Okay.

Speaker 2 11:10

Kitos Balion. So let's say I want to go somewhere. Where would I how would I say where is? Missa on.

Speaker 1 11:19

For example, the bathroom. Vissa. Missa on this. Okay.

Speaker 3 11:25

So where is the the bathroom. And so but I mean the word where.

Speaker 2 11:30

And so if we were to translate each word that you're saying, how can you break that down for?

Speaker 1 11:33

Misa on, because there's no the in Finnish. So if you if you would be um starting the sentence of like principle, where is the something? Right. It's just misa on. So misa is where? Yeah, misa is where. Okay. On is where is something. Okay.

Speaker 2 11:53

Yeah. So if we need where is the restrooms or the toilets, then how do we say that?

Speaker 1 11:58

Misa on this. Misa on this. So on is is. That's gonna be useful in a lot of things.

Speaker 3 12:09

And two s is in vessa.

Speaker 1 12:11

Mm-hmm. Also in misa. Misa and vessa. Also. Pretty similar words. Yeah. So then we're on.

Ordering Like a Local: Coffee, Tea, Water, Please-Without-Please

Speaker 2 12:18

Okay. Now vessa is kind of like also veti, right? Like isn't there veta and veti and all of that stuff? So what's the difference between toilet and water? Um, okay. Um you don't want to confuse them.

Speaker 1 12:33

You don't you don't want to confuse those. If you need to use the bathroom, you don't want you don't want more water. Yeah, right. So this y is water. This y. It's also with the same as this y. So V-E-S-I. V-E-S-I. V-C. Okay. And bathroom is this. So an A in the ending.

unknown 12:55

Okay.

Speaker 1 12:55

And two S. And two S. Two S. Yeah. Okay. Alright. And also with Misa, there's an A that is there that you're gonna be very familiar with if you try to learn any Finnish. And you're also gonna be very confused because it looks just like an A, like an A. A. A. Yeah, A letter A in Finnish A. Right. But it looks just like an A with two dots. Okay. Uh above it. Yeah. Okay. And it's said as A.

Speaker 3 13:23

More like R. Okay.

Speaker 1 13:24

Like at Apple.

Speaker 3 13:26

For English speakers. Yeah. So you see the two dots. It's ah, not ah.

Speaker 2 13:31

Speaking of cats, I miss my cats. How do you say cat? Kisa. Kisa. Like this. There you go. Two S again. I just have to point out, we're not with our cats right now because we're actually recording this in Finland. Yeah. Because we recorded Japanese in Switzerland. We recorded Arabic in Finland. And we recorded. We were in like different countries for everything, but now we're actually in Finland recording. For the Finnish language.

Speaker 3 14:00

How strange that we would do that.

Speaker 2 14:02

It's crazy. Okay. Anyway, so back to we've learned, excuse me, where is the whatever, but you don't say the. Yeah. Right. You just say the whatever. So what what else are we gonna need?

Speaker 3 14:12

Thank you. Yes, no. What about this?

Speaker 1 14:14

Yes, no. Yeah. Yes, it's y. Yo. So j-o-o. Two of the.

Speaker 2 14:21

So you're if you see a j, it's a y. And if you see a y, it's not a y sound, it's a u sound.

Speaker 3 14:27

Well, sort of. It's like the German um law.

Speaker 1 14:32

Okay. And no. A. A. So e I. A. Okay. That's very simple.

Speaker 2 14:39

Which rhymes with hey. H-E-I. It's basically just the ending of hey.

Speaker 3 14:44

Yeah. Take the H off.

Speaker 2 14:46

See, you're learning so much. Okay, going back to the where is the? If I'm if I want to find where is the, I'm gonna need toilets, where is the water fountain? Where is the restaurant? Can you teach us some of those words? Words and phrases, yeah.

Speaker 1 14:59

Uh so for example, restaurant and well, we already learned bathroom, which is best. Let's try this one. Okay. Might be a bit hard. Train station. Great. Where is the train station? Very useful. Yeah. Might be a bit hard. Yuna asema. And if someone actually asks for you in finish, they're gonna say misa yuna asema. But if we were gonna take it slow, it's gonna be misa un yuna asema. So train is yuna. J O no J U N A and Asema is A S something. I'm not gonna go there. Asema.

Speaker 3 15:38

A-S-E-M A.

Speaker 1 15:39

Asema. Yuna Asema.

Speaker 2 15:43

That might be useful.

Speaker 3 15:44

Use that.

Speaker 2 15:45

So that's the train station. And then uh, what if we want to know where's the airport?

Speaker 1 15:49

Lendo asema. So asema is the same. Asema. Lendo is like flight station, not plane station. Okay. Lendo asema. Lendo asema. And then in the whole sentence, where is the airport? We saon lendo asema. Yes. Okay.

Speaker 3 16:16

As travelers, we often like to be polite, you know. So in Finland, I remember the first time I wanted to say please. Um and now having gotten into the culture better, it's so appropriate. I find it really intriguing that you don't really have a word for please.

Speaker 1 16:33

No, and you don't also really need to use it to be polite. Right. Yeah. You just need to eat.

Snacks & Sweets: Karjalanpiirakka and Pulla

Speaker 3 16:39

How do you How are you polite if you're asking for something in Finnish and says, hey, give me this?

Speaker 1 16:44

Yeah. Now there's a few ways. There's either you can change the way that you say, can I have this, or you can add kidos to whatever you're having. So for example, if I would go to a cafe and I would want to order a coffee, I could either say voicing co sara instead of otan. For example, otan is like I'll take. I can either change it to could I please could I have not please? Could I have? Or I can just add kidos, which is thank you, to whatever I'm having. So I could, for example, say, I'll have a coffee, kitos. And kitos is just thank you. And that's if you learn that, you're also gonna be able to use it in other things.

Speaker 17:23

Okay.

Speaker 1 17:24

So how do we say can I have a coffee? I could just say uksy, cohabi, kitos. So that'll be one coffee thanks. One coffee please, basically. Um so uksy is one. Uksi. That has the Y. Uksi. Kohvi is coffee. That word you're also gonna need a lot. They're coffee drinkers. I don't think coffee better.

Speaker 3 17:48

And there's an H in that one. So it's not just coffee, it's Cohvi. Yeah, how about that? Try that one.

Speaker 1 17:55

Uksi, cohvi, quietos.

Speaker 3 17:58

So brush your teeth before you have to say that in someone's face.

Speaker 1 18:02

Yeah, okay. At the stand. Um if that's too hard, you can even just say cohvi quietos.

Speaker 3 18:08

Yeah.

Speaker 1 18:08

That'll get the message there.

Speaker 3 18:10

I use the quietos all the time. Just like do you speak English? Uh so then after everything, you can put that and it makes you feel like you're being more polite. It does. It's in your veins.

Speaker 2 18:22

Now, even though I the Finns drink a lot of coffee, I hear that it's not so great. So how do we ask for may I have some tea?

Speaker 3 18:30

Oh, this from you.

Speaker 1 18:31

Well, yeah, of course I want tea. Of course. Tea in itself is actually a very easy word because it's just the same as we would say just the uh letter T in finish. Okay. So you could then say ooksy te kitas. Okay. Very simple.

Speaker 2 18:53

You're gonna need if I want water, I'm gonna say ooksy thisy kitas. All right. And I'm gonna get this coffee and tea and water at either a cafe or a restaurant. So what are our words for cafe and restaurant and those kinds of places?

Speaker 1 19:12

Cafe. Cafe is cohabila. Now that's a bit hard again. Uh it basically has the word coffee in it. Cohobi. Coffee la. So just the same word as coffee coffee, go. Again with the weird H.

Speaker 3 19:28

And add la.

Goodbye Made Easy and The Magic of “Noniin”

Speaker 1 19:30

Yeah. Okay. And if you want to order multiple things, so for example, you want a water and a coffee and a tea, you can add add yuck. Yuck is and one basic water, yuck, go hobby, coffee, yuck, tea.

Speaker 19:55

There you go, the king of the happily you're providing it with all of these things.

Speaker 1 20:01

All of these things. Yes. And what are we going to eat with our coffee and taste? Mmm. I wonder, maybe some rye bread or a goriolan biraka. So goriolan birakka is one of maybe the most traditional foods in Finland. It's kind of like a sandwich type of bready pastry that's made of rye flour and like a dough part, and then some rice porridge inside. And that's something that you might maybe order in cafe. So gariolan birakka. Biraca is a pie, and gariolan is just the beginning of the word. Gariolan birk.

Speaker 2 20:46

Okay, so if we're looking at it, if we're just Americans trying to read it, we would say Carillian pie. Yeah. Is that exactly? Okay. But then it used to get it. Gariolan beer. Okay. Beautiful.

Speaker 1 20:59

And what is this poola stuff? Pula. Mmm. I'd say what it would be straightly translated into English, maybe like a bun. Like a sweet bun. Yeah, like a s yeah.

Speaker 3 21:17

Well, it depends.

Speaker 1 21:18

For us, yeah. Yeah. It's like a pastry sweet bun, basically. Made out of wheat and butter and sugar and sometimes eggs. Yeah, yeah. And so that is what do you call that? Yeah. Bulla. It actually has a pretty cute name. Pullah. I feel I feel like it pictures pictures what it actually is. It's also with uh a hard P, so bulla. Okay. Pulla. Alright. So ooksy pulla.

Speaker 3 21:48

Kidos.

Speaker 1 21:48

Kidos.

Speaker 3 21:52

Oh, so we've said hello. What about if you're leaving?

Speaker 2 21:57

What do you how do you say goodbye?

Speaker 3 21:59

And and well, first the question, is there a different do you have to change the way you say hello if it's morning, afternoon, evening, or those appropriate for all times?

What Finnish Sounds Like: Speed, Tone, Monotone Myths

Speaker 1 22:09

Uh you can if you want. But it's not needed. So you'll manage with just hate for the entire day and the entire year. Nice.

Speaker 3 22:24

There are plenty other challenges. Like easy.

Speaker 1 22:26

We like easy. Yeah, we like eye easy. And you'll even manage with hey when you say bye-bye. Okay. So this is where the easy part comes in of the language. So when you greet someone, if you want to be casual, you can say hey. And when you say bye-bye to someone, you're gonna say hey, hey. So just say it twice. Once for hello, twice for goodbye. Like the chicken in the Moana movie, if you watched it. Maybe you haven't, but maybe someone has. Hey, hey.

Speaker 3 22:58

I know someone has. I know someone has. I watched it.

Speaker 1 23:02

So yeah. Hey. And then when you say bye-bye, hey, hey. Nice.

Speaker 3 23:07

Very simple. Easy and finish. Wow.

Speaker 1 23:10

But it again, it has to H. That's maybe not the easiest. Hey, hey.

Speaker 23:14

Hey, hey.

Speaker 1 23:15

Mm-hmm. Well, that was perfect. You're setting a bad example for the people. Oh, pressure. It's hard. Really? Okay, okay. Maybe I'm just maybe I'm just Hey Hey. I'm not I'm not expecting more. I'm expecting too little of you. Is my hey bad? No, it's very good. It's perfect.

Speaker 3 23:34

So good.

Speaker 1 23:37

Oh true. Of course. Of course. You say hey too. Okay. Okay. Alright. Yeah. Well, this was the easy part.

Speaker 3 23:43

Yeah, that's right. This was the easy part. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 23:45

So now that we had a little mental break with that easy part, what else do we need to uh Uh-oh I have one word that you can use for everything.

Speaker 1 23:54

And that is nonin.

Speaker 3 23:56

Oh, yes. Oh my goodness.

Speaker 1 23:59

That's perfect for basically every situation. You can say no need if you're about to start something. So for example, you're about to leave somewhere with your friends, and you can say, no ni, let's go. No need, men na. Or you can say that if you're waiting for someone, you can say, no need, like it's taking too long, no need. And someone is telling you an interesting story, and you're really surprised, or like, I don't know, this is Or you're agreeing kind of in surprise.

Speaker 3 24:32

Really?

Speaker 2 24:33

Or you don't care. They just told a weird story and you're not sure what to say. Yeah, you can say no neen.

Speaker 1 24:38

Or you can say no neen. Like as an agreeing term.

Speaker 3 24:42

That's awesome.

Speaker 1 24:43

Uh works for everything. I don't think that anyone is gonna question you if you have no need to do anything. Yeah. Someone bumps on the street. No need. Works every time. That's also that's kind of like the French, what the French say. Um, like they add this like hesitant tone to all the sentences. Nonin is like the thing that makes you sound Finnish. You want to blend in. In English, we say, uh is that like our um? Yeah, kind of.

unknown 25:18

Yeah.

Speaker 2 25:18

No neen. Oh, yeah, that's a new one.

Speaker 3 25:24

In context and everything. It's just so good.

Wild Wordplay: Tuli/Tuuli/Tulli and Kuusi palaa

Speaker 1 25:29

Okay, that's good. Yeah. And also from no niin, you're gonna gain two more words, which are no and need. Okay. And what do each of those mean? No is it's like so. So for example, if you're starting a sentence, you can say no. I was here and did this no. Or and then mean is it's kind of like an agreeing term. Like yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 25:57

You're listening to a story and you would normally say, yeah.

Speaker 1 26:01

Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3 26:03

Could you also use none for that?

Speaker 1 26:05

Yeah, you could.

Speaker 2 26:06

You couldn't. Because you can use none for you. Yeah, that's not even that's not a good question. That was a dumb question.

Speaker 1 26:12

I mean, of course you can. Um so yeah, two more words from noni.

Speaker 2 26:17

Great, great.

Speaker 1 26:19

Awesome.

Speaker 2 26:19

Now, just for fun, like we can't go to our libraries, our college libraries, and find learn Finnish in your car. Right. Right? There's there's really very difficult uh processes and stuff like that. Just speak Finnish for us. Tell us a story how like you just got married, and where you know you can tell us what about our we don't have to know what you're saying, but some people know what you're saying.

Speaker 1 26:41

What Finnish sounds like uh I need to preface this by saying that my husband says that my English is impossible to understand because of how fast I speak. And especially if I speak with my friends, it's like blah blah blah blah blah blah.

Speaker 3 26:56

Okay, so your Finnish is that just impossible to understand. Yeah, yeah. She speaks great English, so yeah.

Speaker 1 27:05

Maybe that's what I'm actually yapping. Me mentiin just naimisiin mun miehen kanssa tuossa itse asiime joulukuussa. Ja me oli siinä isossa vaukisessa kirkossa, mikä on Helsinki keskustassa.

Speaker 3 27:24

See, that's not really fair because when she says it, you're looking at her and you're thinking, this is a beautiful language. Close your eyes. When we would hear our band, we would hire Finnish musicians who tour Europe. And they would be speaking with each other, and it sounded like this just monotone. Yeah, monotone thing. And so when I was trying to learn some, I would always do the things, and they're like laugh and laugh and laugh.

Speaker 1 27:56

Like you need to go more Swedish when you're gonna do have some movement in your family tongue. Yeah. And I mean, even if you don't, for example, know a lot of English, American English, you're still gonna get a grasp of of like some things because it's so like it goes high and low and you know, it switches up the tone. But with Finnish, you're gonna miss everything.

Speaker 3 28:17

Oh my goodness, yeah. Are they happy? Are they angry? Are they like, is it a story or are they telling me off? I I Is it dramatic? Is it totally? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 28:27

It's really it's just kind of kinking me.

Speaker 3 28:29

Yeah, but it's really cool. It's like a secret language.

Speaker 1 28:32

If you can speak Finnish, and yeah, yeah, they're gonna got it going on. Yeah, have a nice party trick.

unknown 28:38

Yes.

Finland Culture Hits: Santa, Reindeer, Seasons, Chocolate

Speaker 1 28:39

You can tell about all the all the six six meanings of koosipala or something.

Speaker 2 28:44

Yes, we had a guy tell us this the other day.

Speaker 1 28:46

Well, maybe we could this can be maybe an interesting thing.

Speaker 2 28:50

We were we were at a restaurant, so how do we say restaurant?

Speaker 1 28:53

Uh Ravindola. Ravindola. Ravintola.

Speaker 2 29:00

Great. Okay, great. So that's where we were. And the guy told we were trying to learn some Finnish because we were teaching him some English. Yeah. And so he said, if you know this phrase, it means six different things. Yeah. And it was that. So tell us that one now.

Speaker 1 29:14

So it is koozy pala.

unknown 29:17

Okay.

Speaker 1 29:18

Koozypala. And to be honest, I'm not even sure if I'm gonna remember all the six meanings, but means six. It also means your moon. It also means spruce, like as a tree. Yeah, well, then when we go to the pala, pala is coming back, it's also burning, and maybe something else, but when you combine them together, can be the six are coming back, it can also be the spruce is on fire, it can also be your moon is on fire, it can also mean your moon is coming back. So also six is coming back. Yeah, true. Also, six is coming back. So it's vogue to be six. Again, with this, you're gonna know a lot, but are you gonna know how to use it? That's another question. Yeah.

Speaker 3 30:12

No, no. The answer is A.

Speaker 1 30:14

A. Probably no. I can't even I can't even remember all the meanings.

Speaker 3 30:19

And how many Us are in the word cool zero two. Two. So as an American, what if I accidentally only say one of the Us?

Speaker 2 30:30

That's gonna get you in trouble.

Speaker 3 30:32

See what I'm saying?

Speaker 2 30:33

This is a rated G program.

Speaker 3 30:35

It changes it completely. I mean, I've made so many wonderful, hilarious mistakes in Finnish because I only say no now or whatever. Yeah. In public from the stage.

Speaker 2 30:45

And it just sounds the same to us. Yeah.

Speaker 3 30:47

Yeah. Because my student's name is Vessa. And I don't hear the difference between Vesa and Vessa.

Speaker 2 30:54

Where is Vesa? And y'all, if you listen to the beginning, you know what Vessa means if you listen to the beginning of Vesa. That's right.

Speaker 3 31:00

Vessa.

Speaker 2 31:00

So you don't want to call someone a toilet. Yeah.

Speaker 3 31:05

Unless you mean to.

Speaker 2 31:06

But we don't do that in Finland. We're nice. Right. That's so nice. Because this is a happy country. Finland claims to be the happiest country in the world. Yeah. Other countries also make that claim, but Finland is one of those.

Speaker 3 31:17

Well, I think like lately they've been voted or something the happiest country in the world. I say they. You guys.

Speaker 1 31:23

Yeah, we have voted ourselves as the happiest country in the world.

Speaker 2 31:28

Why you need to visit and why you need to learn Finnish.

Speaker 3 31:31

Yeah, visit the happiest country in the world in the summer time.

Speaker 2 31:34

Yeah, come in the summer.

Speaker 1 31:35

There have to be. At the winter time, we just hibernate. The whole country doesn't exist in the winter time.

Speaker 2 31:42

Now, speaking of the country, just some little fun facts. Santa Claus is from here.

Speaker 3 31:47

Yeah, from Lapland.

Speaker 2 31:48

We have discovered, Rory and I just recently took a trip to Lapland. We'll tell you about in some future episode. The Sami people are there, which is the indigenous people of like not only northern Finland, but also Norway and Sweden. And so we now have learned where the elves are inspired from. Santa's Elves and this reindeer. We kept driving around seeing the reindeer. So we got all that. So Finland's got that going on. And so if you didn't know, Santa Claus is actually from Finland. So that's super fun.

Speaker 3 32:21

Yeah. And then and there are reindeer everywhere, up in the Laplands, so you gotta be careful driving because they will be in the road.

Speaker 2 32:27

Yeah, probably just driving around stage.

Speaker 3 32:29

So now we know why Santa has reindeer pulling his sleigh.

Speaker 1 32:31

Yeah, the whole thing.

Speaker 3 32:32

Of course, duh reindeer everywhere. Yeah. There's no horses running around like that. It's gonna be reindeer.

Speaker 1 32:37

Nope. Yeah. And you can also see the northern lights. Thank you. That's what I was gonna point out. In the city and Lapland, both. Actually, I even though it's pretty warm right now, I think that we saw some northern lights like a month ago. Even though it's summer, basically. Wow. Sweet. So it's possible all year round.

Salmiakki Debate and Final Travel Word: Lumi

Speaker 2 32:56

Maybe not as often as in the winter, but and then because Samps is up there, you've got the Arctic Circle up north. Also, Finland has seasons, is one of those places where you can come in the summer and you're gonna have like daylight for gazillion time, you know, and like hardly the sun hardly goes down at all. And then there's certain parts you can go and you have all of the nighttime. Like all the time. Yeah. And it's nonstop dark. And like it'd be cool, but depressing. Yeah.

Speaker 3 33:27

It'd be cool to experience if you knew you could leave.

Speaker 2 33:30

Right. Right. And not have experience all the time. Four seasons. Yeah. And then what we like about the finished chocolate, and that's not all finished chocolate. We found this the one brand Fotzer. Fotzer. What we like about their chocolate, well, I mean we should say love, is that Belgian chocolate is very rich and almost bitter. It's like that dark vibe, like it goes more the dark direction. Switzerland goes more like the sweet direction. And the finished chocolate is like right in between of the two. And so there's always a war of like what's better, Belgian chocolate or Swiss chocolate, and like it's finished chocolate.

Speaker 3 34:07

Right. You're asking the wrong question.

Speaker 1 34:09

You're looking at the wrong thing, yeah. That's right. And it's so much in the perfect or the perfect middle that you could basically eat a whole bar at one in one sitting. It's not too sweet, it's not too bitter, it's uh just it's perfectly milky, smooth.

Speaker 3 34:27

It's a blessing and a curse. Yeah, it is, yeah. Yeah, I I would never eat a whole chocolate bar generally in one setting. But if you give me the yellow with the hazelnuts, yeah. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2 34:38

Now, you also have something very disgusting that people like here. Now, we think that probably we I would not vote for fish soup, and you have some very strange things. Fish soup is probably like a good food or whatever, but you have some weird fish things going on. But we're gonna just stick to the candy world. You have this stuff called salamiaki. And how do you say that in Finnish? Salomiaki.

Speaker 1 35:02

So that's two cakes. Two case. Salomiaki.

Speaker 35:05

Okay.

Speaker 1 35:06

Okay, yeah. And so how would you describe that? It's basically salty, really, really salty licorice. So if you've ever had black licorice, kind of the same taste, but then again, not at all, because you're not gonna taste anything else over the saltina.

Speaker 3 35:22

Yeah, imagine like licorice, and for me, it's like soak it in ammonia.

Speaker 1 35:26

Yeah.

Speaker 3 35:26

And then salt it down.

Speaker 1 35:27

Some people say it tastes kind of like they would think car tire tastes like.

Speaker 2 35:33

But I love it. You can pick car tire candy, or you can have chocolate.

Speaker 1 35:40

Yeah. Uh totally up to the same. So I wonder which one is the favorite.

Speaker 3 35:45

Yeah. Yeah. Or if you're in Finland, yeah.

Speaker 1 35:47

I love salomiyaki, and we have salomiyaki, everything we have salamiak. Yeah. Ice cream, salmiyaki chocolate. Yeah, which is actually both of them. Because the chocolate save the salomiyaki taste. Yeah. Yeah. And some people even eat straight up salomiyaki because it's kind of, it's almost like a seasoning in itself, so you can have like dried up, just straight up salomiyaki.

Speaker 3 36:08

Dip your finger in it, or oh. Okay. I have my own way of saying it because of my thoughts on it. Salomiyucki.

Speaker 1 36:16

Salamiyaki. Yeah. Yucky.

Speaker 3 36:17

So it emphasis on the yucky thing instead of although I did have it in the chocolate and it was really good. Yeah. The fatset of the colour. Yes, the combo. Yeah, I know.

Speaker 1 36:28

I think that's one of my favorites. And I I think that it's kind of like an I could compare it to Australian. Is it marmite? The big mite. Oh, right. That's strange. Yeah, maybe. Yeah, maybe not the flavor, but it's something. It's like an acquired taste. Right. Good work.

Speaker 36:45

There you go. Good analogy.

Speaker 2 36:48

Alright. Any other final thoughts of things we might a word we might need to know for traveling to Finland? I'd say snow.

Speaker 1 36:57

Okay. Because you're gonna see a lot of fat here in the winter season. Okay. And that is lumi. I think that lumi is actually a very pretty Finnish word and it's also a name that many Finnish people have. Lumi. Cute. Yeah.

Speaker 2 37:11

Now, is that two U's, two M's? How do you spell it?

Speaker 1 37:14

Lumi, so it's just one of everything. L-U-M-I. Lumi.

Wrap-Up & Where to Follow Us

Speaker 2 37:20

Alright. Yeah. Well, keep those polio for the two wonderful tips on travel phrases and all of the things that we need to know when we're visiting Finland. Thank you, Evelina. We really thank you so very much. So for having me. And we will see y'all on the next episode. Yay! We hope we've inspired you this episode. So join us next time. Please subscribe to, rate, and share our podcast with your friends.

Speaker 3 37:54

Or, you know, whomever.

Speaker 2 37:56

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Speaker 3 37:59

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Speaker 2 38:10

At www.theromies.com.

Speaker 3 38:12

That's right, that's T-H-E.

Speaker 2 38:15

R O A M. I E S dot com. We'll be there until next time. Yeah, thanks for listening. Bye.