Name: Geography Now! Finland
Uploaded: 2020-04-04T09:36:22.000Z
Duration: 11 min 42 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Adverbs of degree

Oh, uh... Let's talk about this place that I totally have no preconceived biases towards...

Welcome to the dark sheep of Northern Europe

All the other Nordic countries are like: -La la la la la la!

We'll get into the heavy metal thing in a bit

Now just remember: Finland is Nordic, but DON'T call it Scandinavian! There's a huge difference!

That title only belongs to Sweden, Denmark, and Norway.

Finland is located in Northern Europe, lying on the Gulf of Finland and the Gulf of Bothnia, east of all that Scandinavian stuff

To the west, they border Sweden on the Torne river or the 'Tornionjoki'

until it reaches the tripoint border with Norway at the Three-Country Cairn Stone.

And to the east, they border big old Russia with another tripoint border with Norway that looks like this.

The country is divided into 19 regions, or maakunta

with the autonomous region that we'll talk about a little bit later

and the capital of Helsinki, located in the south on the Gulf of Finland

which is also the second most northern capital in the world after Reykjavík, Iceland.

The country also owns about 180,000 islands, the highest concentration of which found in the Baltic off the coast in the Åland Archipelago.

Keep in mind, parts of Finland also lie within the Arctic Circle, that's how far up north they are.

And the three busiest airports are Helsinki, Oulu, and Rovaniemi

Now my favorite part: territorial anomalies!

First of all, with Russia, there are too many split islands and pene-enclaves

the islands of Äikkääniemi and Suursaari, Tarassiinsaari islands and lakes, the island in the Koitajoki river

Seriously, just play around with Google Earth, and see how many you can find.

Finally, we get to Sweden, and things get interesting.

Most of the borders with Sweden run along rivers that eventually flow into the Torne river

then we get a strange golf course that is split between the two countries in the town of Tornio and Sweden.

Not only that, but then you have the strange Märket island right next to Åland in the Gulf of Bothnia

It had to do with the lighthouse that was built belonging to Finland

but then Sweden was like, 'Hey! It's too close to our side of the island!'

So they drew a border that was like this to give each side equal shares of the land.

See this archipelago cluster of islands right here?

Yeah, it belongs to Finland, even though most of the people here speak Swedish.

Åland is Finland's strange little administrative anomaly

Long story short, it used to belong to Sweden, but then the Russians took over it, in addition to Finland

but then after the Russian Revolution, Finland became free

and then the UN decided Åland should belong to Finland with autonomy

but then the Soviets started attacking again, and then Finland was like, 'NOPE'

and then fought back relentlessly, defending themselves and Åland

and Sweden just kinda sat there, and didn't really do much for Åland, as they decided to stay neutral.

Finland defending Åland was kinda like the turning point

'Look, Sweden, we had some great times, but you kinda really didn't do much for me when things got crazy.'

'I mean, Finland defended me, okay? And he treats me well, okay?'

Also, Finland kinda threatened that if Åland was ceded back to Sweden, they would demand the Tornio valley.

Now before the whole Soviet thing, Finland operated the regions of Karelia, Salla, Kuusamo, Petsamo, and some extra islands in the gulf.

After the wars with the Soviets, these regions were all ceded back to Russia, affectedly cutting off their access to the Arctic Ocean.

Very quickly, some notable sights and landmarks would have to be the old castles

like Savonlinna, Hämeenlinna, Olavinlinna, and the most renowned Suomenlinna.

You can probably guess what 'linna' means by now...

Rovaniemi is otherwise known as the home of Santa Claus, where you can go reindeer sledding

Inari and Ivalo is where you can get a real Saami traditional cultural experience

Of course, Helsinki is the epicentre of Finnish architecture and culture

with landmarks such as the Temppeliaukio Church, excavated into a rock

Mannerheim street, the busiest road with all the shops and austere post-Soviet influenced blocky colonnaded buildings

Now, those are all great, but Finland isn't really much of a tight metropolitan type of country.

They love their space, and have quite a bunch of it.

See what lies outside these cities, shall we?

Now if you want me to make this simple, some would argue that Finland is the best winter wonderland in the world.

I mean, Canada's cool, but they have too many bears, and Iceland is too explodey, and Russia is too... cold.

Seriously though, the land is generally flat, except in the north by the border with Norway

in which the highest mountain can be found, Mt. Halti, although the peak is in Norway.

However, in 2017, Norway plans to give Finland the peak for their 100th anniversary of independence from the Soviets.

Finland is just wonderfully crisp and refreshing

usually ranking in the top 3 countries in the world with the cleanest air quality.

This is partially because Finland is almost 80% covered in forests, one of the highest concentrations per square kilometre in the world

only behind countries like Gabon and Suriname.

This makes Finland the largest producer of wood in the EU, and one of the top in the world.

Not only that, but Finland has about 188,000 lakes, most heavily concentrated in Lakeland

and in addition to lakes, about 10% of the country is comprised of all water bodies like rivers, ponds, and streams.

When mixed with the land, this makes about one third of the country home to swamps and bogs

making it the highest wetland proportioned country in Europe, and disputably the world.

'Ehhh, maybe... But our floods are crazier!'

Fittingly, the name for swamp in Finnish is 'suo', and the word for Finland is 'Suomi'

I mean, technically they also have like 9 other words for swamp like räme, neva, letto, luhta, lähteikkö, aapa, palsa, jänkä and korpi

And they love these swamps, one Finnish pastime is jumping in the mud (sometimes naked)

The landscape of Finland is shaped that way, because imagine what happens when you crush something under a heavy glacier for a really long time

and then after the glacier melts, you're left with pockety erosion and mineral residue all over.

Not only that, but Finland is experiencing a post-glacial rebound

in which the land is steadily rising along the coast of the Gulf of Bothnia.

Every year, Finland gains about 7 square kilometres, and is technically rising out of the sea.

The longest river is the Kemijoki, that passes through Lapland and reaches the Gulf of Bothnia.

And the largest lake, as well as the fourth largest in Europe, Lake Saimaa is located in the southeast.

Because Finland is so far north, they are known for being the land of the midnight sun

as during summer, you can literally see the sun for 24 hours a day in the northern parts by the Arctic Circle.

And of course in the wintertime, there's hardly any sunlight at all

but if you're lucky, you can witness an aurora borealis, especially in the northern parts.

Oh, and by the way, the national animals are the whooper swan and the brown bear.

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Geography Now! Finland

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