On Monday we celebrated our 93-year-old Finland. For me Independence Day hasn’t been so special day,I have always liked it though, as it is nice to live in Finland and be Finnish, but more it was nice holiday in the end of the year, before Christmas, meaning also in the middle of all final exams in the school (and specially in the university). Not so much celebrating expect spending some time at home, and probably going to see fireworks in the city center.

This year was different. First, this was first time I was celebrating Finnish Independence Day outside of Finland and that made a huge difference inside in my mind. This time it felt something, it was really Finnish day. And as I was in Seoul, I got invitation to reception which was kept by Finnish Ambassador. So at six pm I found myself from metro station, taking taxi to Ambassador’s home with my friend. For next two hours I was enjoying good Finnish style of celebrating. It was little bit weird though, after three months and after pretty much not spoken Finnish or heard it at all for the whole time, suddenly I was in the room that was full of Finnish people, and suddenly I understood what people next to me were talking.

At reception food and other offerings were great, and it was really nice to meet other Finnish people as well. Somehow it did end up that mostly I was talking with other exchange students, but in the end the director of Cargotec’s Korean factories came to talk to us. I guess that there were also few other “big” names, but maybe next time…

After two hours official reception ended and guests left and tried to find taxis. As usual, I and my friends needed to wait for taxi for a while, one taxi even stopped and when he saw us, just left. No idea why we did look so scary or what… In the end we found taxi (surprisingly many taxis were driving in the area though as it was quite far away from anywhere and I guess that people in the area mostly have their own cars and/or drivers…). The night ended to celebrating Finnish independence day little bit more, which included some Soju and in the night also some Karaoke…..