"EDUCATION" - Learning the Finnish Language

The Finns believe that Finnish is the most difficult language to learn as it has a highly complex grammar structure. This is certainly true. 

If you go to a normal Finnish language class you will find yourself quite frustrated as the teacher focuses on teaching the students this complex grammar.

This is not the way children learn any language. Little children communicate with others. As they build a vocabulary they learn how to structure the language. 

In my own case, I was busy learning Finnish at evening classes twice a week in Pohjankartano. In the meantime, our 13 year old daughter was playing and speaking with her Finnish friends in the neighbourhood and none of them spoke any English.

So I asked my teacher why this was so? 

She had no logical answer. 

I decided to learn Finnish the way my daughter had learned it.

I studied the way Finnish was spoken. The first difference I noted was that the alphabet was different to the English language and the language was highly phonetic. Especially difficultb was the letter "y" as the Finnish "y" sound has no equivalent in any Indian language but because of my knowledge of French, I knew it was equivalent to the "eu" sound in French.

I first mastered the Finnish alphabet. 

I then decided that I would not use the English language to study it as English the least phonetic of languages! 

As my "Delhi" Hindi was reasonable, I decided to use the phonetic basis of my poor Hindi to learn Finnish.

The second aspect I noted was I understood how Finnish was spoken. The first syllable of every word is stressed, so it was easy to follow the spoken language, word by word.

Then I did a study the normal words used by a Finn. In my fields of Plastics, Rubber  and Microelectronics, I found that there was a paucity of words in the Finnish language. 

The Finns had added words from German, English and Swedish liberally to their dictionary, making them fit to the structure of the language. For instance, my title at Oulu University was "yli insinööri Mikroelektronikka Laboratorio". Leaving aside the first word "yli" the other three were derived from English "Engineer, Microelectronics Laboratory".

I picked up a workbook  produced by BBC “List of first degree derived words from the “Technology Tomorrow Workbook””. 

I found that over 90%  of the words in Microelectronics were derived from English.

We had an interesting public debate at that time when we were working on Gas Sensors.  There was strong views in some circles that we should not use the word sensor, as in Finnish it was supposed to relate to censoring a movie or document. The debate became quite heated as the Finns wanted us to use the word "antuuri".

I let the debate reach a climax and then I threw the grenade.

I pointed out the word "antuuri" was derived from the English word “antenna", which was a sensing device.

A hush fell over those in the debate! :-)

Some language experts say that between 3000 to 5000 words is sufficient to consider oneself well on the way to understanding a language. When I did an analysis, because of my knowledge of Gerrman, French and English, my Finnish "derived" vocabulary was well over 10000 words. Of course, the bulk of the words were in the technical field.

However, I quickly started to apply these rules to my grocery shopping. Sugar was "sokeri", coffee was  "kahvi" and tea was "tee". I worked out my shopping list and started to use these first as single words and then started to create short sentences.

When I joined Oulu University, which was six months after coming to Finland, I had mastered enough of the language but I did not divulge my methodology. When I went  to take part in a business meeting between our laboratory and the Finnish Oil giant, Neste Oy, a month after my joining, my professor was quite surprised as I was busy making notes at the meeting.

I knew that if they knew I was following their spoken Finnish , the more prudent ones would have dropped into good Finnish, leaving me in the dark. 

I kept quiet about my method all through my life in University. I only revealerd it when Annikki and I wrote our book "Handbook For Survival in Finland" in 1994.

However, in my daily life I was able to carry on a normal life in Finland.

I did not, and still have not mastered written Finnish. I did not bother as Annikki was always there to help me out in difficult situations.

My sincere advice to all foreigners in Finland is that they should not fall into the trap that says the Finnish is a difficult language. This is especially true for those who have children. 

Send your children to Finnish schools rather than International Schools as the children will make great friends in their locality and these friendships can be valuable in life, even if they move out from Finland. 

Our children are now scattered around the world and yet they value their Indian and Finnish roots and traditions and are comfortable wherever they go.

In the fifties, Finland was recovering from the war . Poverty was widespread. There was no free food for children in schools, for instance. 

Annikki left Finland when she was just 17 and went to work in a Hospiz caring for old people in the more prosperous Sweden which had not been ravaged by war.

She learnt Swedish quickly. Then a colleague said there were more prospects in England to learn nursing. So off she went to England, but before she got into the system, she met me and she decided that she would concentrate on her inborn skills, language and art. She mastered English quickly as she had a devoted teacher! :-)

She then thought to broaden her horizons and moved to Germany and quickly mastered the German language as she was working with children.

She returned to Finland but love was in the air so she moved back to England. Soon after I graduated and got a job, the Findian culture was born. We were just 23 and 24 years old at that time!

We moved to Madras in India in 1969. She had to manage a huge house with four children. English speaking home help was expensive. She started to learn Sanskrit. I soon convinced her it would be bettter to learn Tamil as the children were already speaking it fluently. With a cook, maid, cleaner, gardener, two watchmen, a driver, and the shopkeepers in Panagal Park Market to communicate with, she quickly learnt Tamil and also learnt to understand Malayalam, as my mother mainly spoke that at home. She could not master spoken Malayalam as we Mallus have a horrible habit of rolling our tongues!

Life was great and when we left India she was heartbroken and kept her bags packed for 5 years to go back to the land she loved so dearly, India.

In our mind this is "education".

Regards, Findians