Now I’ve been to the Arctic and back, it is difficult to comprehend my experience. I’ve been to a place where just about everything is different: the language, the food, the plants and animals, even the bathrooms.
Finnish is a language with few connections, apparently Estonian is the closest relative. What does this mean? First of all, there are very few cognates. A cognate is a word that is the same or similar in different languages. Cognates in Finnish include “kahvi” for coffee, and “tee” for tea. You cannot begin to communicate with no common ground.
Nearly everyone I met spoke English with amazing fluency. When I asked about the bird outside the window, the answer was, “Oh, that’s a magpie.” Really?! I know my way around with a few languages, but believe me, I don’t know the word for magpie in any of them. Everyone speaks English — so what’s the problem? You become an illiterate, dopey person with the capacity of a two year old.
I couldn’t read the newspapers, the signs or anything in order to get around on my own. Who won the reindeer races? Were any records broken? I never found out. One sunny day, I decided to take a bus to the nearest town (25 miles away) to get my glasses fixed. At some point I must have sat on them, while zooming around on the snowmobile. Questions like “how much is it?” to ride the bus, or “let me off across the bridge,” were beyond me.
Before leaving at the hotel, I had them write down the word for “bridge,” as well as the phone number in case I became desperate enough to need a taxi. I felt like a child boarding the school bus for the first time. The smallest task can become an adventure when you can’t speak the language.
One tip always given when traveling abroad is to learn a few words, especially “thank you.” Finnish isn’t one of the languages offered by Berlitz, Duolingo or any of the common language services, but I was able to find the equivalent of an English-Finnish dictionary online.
But when I sank into the snow up to my waist, unable to move, my dictionary wasn’t handy. How do you cry “Help, me, I need help,” in Finnish? At the time, I sure wish I knew; words like “Mayday, mayday,” or “SOS” came to mind, but were useless.
People were gathered about 20 yards from my location, but I wasn’t visible, and no one was looking. Finally, I caught someone’s attention — he was a big, big hockey player big, Finnish man and he waded in to help me. I almost pulled him down several times (I’m no light weight), but I was extracted, wet, cold and exhausted, but I was OK.
I couldn’t even ask his name, or thank him properly, but I just kept saying, “Kiisa, kiisa” for thank you. It turns out, the Finnish word for thank you is “kiitos;” “kiisa” means cat. He looked perplexed, and silently walked away. What was there to say? I was deeply humbled.
The Finns are wonderful, hospitable people, but it seems they aren’t cat lovers, not this one anyway.
