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Saturday, September 04, 2004
 Fuksi stands for "1st year student" and Sauna stands for... Hell on Earth. Of course everybody knows what sauna is, but how many of you have tried finnish sauna? It's a whole different story. Sauna is actually the most famous finnish word in the planet. In Finland no one is "allowed" to use any kind of clothes during sauna, otherwise the "sauna spirit" would become angry. It also reaches 100 ºC easily, if not more. And that's what expected me on my 4th day in Oulu...
My coordinator, Juho, welcomed me to my new department's Guild (OPTIEM) by inviting me to this event they organized for "fuksis" called Fuksisauna (yes.. something about fuksis having sauna, you guessed it). After I met him, we walked for a bit around town towards Pikisaari, which is an island in the middle of Oulu where the Fuksisauna took place. When I got there, the fun had already begun. The students had divided themselves into teams, and they had to go through some strange competitions, like Relay Drinking and Running (I invented the name...), which consisted on each member of a team drinking a glass of beer (vodka?) and then running, going around a chair and returning to pass it on to another teammate, who would do the same thing. The fastest team wins..
Needless to say that I didn't get a word they were saying, but Juho helped me with that, and it took no big effort to realize they were surely having lots of fun. I had the idea that finnish drank a lot, but one thing is to hear about it and another is to witness it live! I learnt to respect that as time went by, and now I am very confortable with that aspect of their culture. Still, the initial impact was kind of surprising.
After the sun set down, we went indoors, where Sauna was happening. "Allright, my first finnish sauna! Can't wait to get in there!". Down the stairs I went, and.. Whoa! Girls changing! "Ok, now I screwed up... Hey!!, Juho, is it the girls' turn? Oh.. it's boys'... but the girls are changing here.. Can I change here? Someone said - Suuuure, noooo problem, just go! They don't care!" (what about ME caring...?). Well, nevermind, turned myself to a wall, changed (got naked to be accurate) and 5 seconds later a girl with a towel around her was already asking me stuff, having noticed I wasn't from those parts. She was very nice, although slightly altered ("better get used to this..."). So there I went, and as soon as I opened the sauna's door, I felt the most intense heat ever and realized this wasn't going to be good... Inside, all the guys were singing, happy, some really drunk.. and I was struggling for survival. It was really crowded too. Well, I managed to stay inside for 10 seconds or so... great premiere, ah?
One thing about saunas that foreigners should know... There are mixed saunas quite often, especially if it's a student party or something called "sauna-party". They have no problems with nudity at all! So, be prepared to leave your clothes outside and your prejudice at home. For me, who attended 2 or 3 of them, it was only a matter of survival (trying to breathe in and out) as my first saunas were. But don't be surprised to be invited to a thing like this, and after a while you will forget there are naked women in there, you will accept it as a natural fact...
After putting my clothes back on, I decided to socialize. It was so much easier now that they're all drinking. I saw how amazing the change of behaviour can be between sober finn and "happy" finn. It's radical! They really know how to have fun, believe me, and are the best people to hang out with after a couple of beers. I made two or three friends in a matter of minutes. I spoke about myself over and over and what was I doing there, etc. They all seemed very interested, and actually they were. That's another thing about the finnish people in general (yes I know it's dangerous to generalise). They are very genuine in their actions. If they ask you "Mitä kuullu?" (How are you?), they really want to know how you're doing, for example.
To end the night, Juho, Olli, Jarno and me decided to visit some pubs. (surprise!!!) We went to one called Never Grow Old. It's usually a reggae/latin music bar, but that evening there was a live band playing - The Lunatics. I was very eager to hear some music, as I am an amateur composer and guitar player (my website - by the way). The band played instrumentals and they just simply rocked. I loved it! Do I need to say that the lead guitarrist had some beers before performing? I thought not...
That night I discovered the most hilarious thing a finnish person can do: speaking bad words in Portuguese. You have to believe me, this was just awesome. I was literally rolling on the pub's floor laughing like hell as I kept hearing Juho, Olli and Jarno saying words like "caralh*, filho da put*, foda-s*". Ok, it may not sound like a big deal, but you just have to try it to see how funny it is.
Fuksis, sauna, girls changing, live concert, laughter attacks - what a crazy day... let's do it again sometime!!
Posted at 12:10 am by edcarpediem
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EDU IN OULU is a weblog about the stay of Eduardo Gouveia in Oulu for 4 months in the Fall 2004 as an exchange student under the Erasmus programme. It includes the relevant stories of this experience and it may be useful for those considering to go to Oulu as exchange students in the future. Please enjoy! :) To see some nice pictures about it, click below ;)
Any questions, anytime to:
edcarpediem@hotmail.com
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EDU IN OULU - 4 Months in Northern Heaven by Eduardo Gouveia - Porto, Portugal
