Finns are known as being people who are silent, a bit difficult to approach and.. well, kind of shy and unsocial.
However there are methods to make friends with Finnish people. I will tell you this in a form of a story. A true story, which has happened to me.
The story!
It was a dark and cold night. My car didn't pass the annual inspection and I had to take it to the repair shop due to the issues in the handbrake. They couldn't get the required spare parts in time, so I had to travel to work with a bus.
As my wife had been in a surgery, I also had to be taking my son to daycare and picking him up. So I had to specific times I always traveled with the bus.
In the same bus there was this one guy from India. At first I didn't recognize him, but when we walked to the office from the bus stop, he tried to talk to me something but I just said "Yes" and didn't respond any further.
The next day, same happened. He talked to me something, I replied something quite short. First "Hi" and then "Thank you". You can see there was a big leap, double amount of words from the last !
The third and final day I was taking the bus to work, I already smiled and nodded to him in the bus as a greeting. When we walked the way from the bus stop to the office, we talked all the way there. In addition to this, I started to talk with him in the office when we met.
Now I'm counting him as a friend.
So what did actually happen?
Becoming a friend with a Finn has three stages. In the first stage, you can try to make a contact but the Finn rarely responds properly. Don't mind this, this is very normal.
The second stage is that you finally get a response. The Finn is already prepared you might talk to him and has prepared some kind of answers, like "Yes" or "Hello". This is a huge leap.
The third stage is when the Finn has finally accepted you as a friend and can share anything with you. If you ask them "How are you doing?", they might tell you their life story. About happy or sad things. Hopes and dreams, fears and doubts.
Congratulations!
You have now a new Finnish friend.
Please remember, most Finns know very good English, but they think they suck at it.
image from Pixabay