What counts as uncomfortable?

A couple of months ago we had some friends over for dinner, non of them mormons. After dinner we decided to amuse ourselves with Eurovision song contest "worst bits" from the last couple of years. Worst or best... after that we looked up a youtube video on Boney M, who all the Europeans knew but none of the Americans. And then a friend of ours showed a video from last year, Lady Gaga's "Telephone" (with Beyoncé). We're all so ancient that hardly anyone knew about it beforehand... but we were watching the video and everyone was probably a bit in a shock except for the guy who introduced it.

After watching it J, a woman, just bluntly said: That's just porn! And the two other women in the group, D and myself, started laughing because we'd been thinking about the same thing but hadn't wanted to express it. D said: I though I was just so old that I shouldn't say anything...

The funny thing is, Lady Gaga is sometimes marketed as empowering - in fact, this video ends with her and Beyoncé killing a bunch of people in a restaurant because Beyoncé's boyfriend is so annoying. Sure, getting rid of annoying boyfriends can be empowering, but really is it empowering to be dancing in your bra and knickers? Is it empowering for women to take charge of your own sexuality and use it for your advance? Maybe... But I can't help wondering if it doesn't kick back, since although you might feel like a subject doing your burlesque dance or similar, the people watching still objectify you.

Oh, V who showed the video mentioned that this is just normal MTV-style now... really goes to show I'm old. But what kind of image of how a woman should be do the younger generation get? Scary...

Two cool links that go with this story, one of them a song from the '70's feminists in Finland (in Finnish) and another one an Onion-story that I hope everyone will enjoy.

Maternity package

When I want to torture myself about living in the US I go and look at the pictures of the maternity package sent to every Finnish woman giving birth. This is not the only benefit you get for having a baby in Finland, but it's the most tangible one. There are researches about the birth rate in Europe, and surprise surprise, the Nordic countries where babies and mothers are supported in every way lead the way. Where Italians have one child or less, Finns are getting to three. I think (but am not sure) that Norwegians might be ahead of that too. Explanations abound, but I think personally, that when getting a child is not really a financial problem (before they get a bit older) it means that those who want to have children can.

America is a different story altogether - people have loads of children compared to Europe, with hardly any benefits. True, there is a tax benefit - but even with that, all the stuff you need to get, the fact that childcare is frighteningly expensive, the fact that you don't get paid for your maternity leave (in some work places you might) and all this makes you really count whether you can afford the baby or not... fortunately, with the American volunteer spirit, friends and family will help out.

But then there are all the American mothers who get babies without planning, without any economical possibilities of taking care of them and so on... I think might have to do with lack of sex ed and also a more negative attitude towards contraception than, say, in Finland. These mothers go to Medicaid for health insurance to cover their labour and oh-oh if they're too "rich" for that. They'd get used clothes for their babies (very sensible I think) and as to childcare, they hope there's a grandmother or aunt who can help out... because they can't afford to take more time off work than a couple of weeks.

After this rant, let me add a list of what the maternity package of 2009 includes (they haven't translated the 2010 package to English yet on Kela's pages, and I'm too lazy to do it myself):

-Snowsuit
-hat
-insulated mittens and booties
-Sleeping bag / quilt
-Knitted hat
-Balaclava hat
-Socks and mittens *2
-Bodysuit *5
-Romper suit *4
-Footed leggings (pants with socks)
-Leggings (pants)
-Knitted overall
-Stretch suit
-Play suit
-Mattress
-Mattress cover
-Under sheet
-Duvet cover
-Blanket
-Bath towel with hood
-Nail scissors
-Hairbrush
-Toothbrush
-Bath thermometer
-Cream
-Bib
-Cloth nappy set + 2 inserts
-Muslin squares
-Bra pads
-Sanitary towels
-Condoms
-Lubrication gel for parents
-Picture book, 16 pages.
-Toy
-Leaflets
-Box (can be used as crib)

The energy problem according to Tuittu

When I was working (volunteering) with the Sierra Club in Minneapolis, I belonged to the Clean Air and Renewable Energy committee. But what kind of sources of energy were we whole-heartedly supporting? I wish these were things that would be easy to solve, but the truth seems to be that with any energy source there are problems. Here are some:

Oil: oil spills, difficulty in getting it out (like in Canada, the oil industry is definitely not clean), will run out eventually, need energy and roads and similar to move it from place to place and accidents happen all the time, causing more spills.

Wood: carbon dioxide into atmosphere, climate change hazard. Also in many places of the world there isn't enough trees as it is. Forests lose their recreation value when trees are cut down (also in Finland!)

Coal: I'm not even starting. There is no clean coal at the moment - all of those carbon capture methods are still being researched and too expensive to use - nobody uses them yet. Not to mention that coal mining has problems at all angles.

Wind: Do we really want to destroy the view in every windy place? Also, in many places of the world there just isn't enough of wind energy (see Finland, for example). Also, the energy needs to be transmitted to the cities somehow and the transmission lines cause problems.

Water: Can't we leave any rivers in their pristine state?

Wave: Don't know much about this, but as far as I know it's not yet economically feasible.

Nuclear: Finns think this is clean for some reason. The problem is, the part that isn't clean (waste) can be buried in rock - but will it stay there? Also, if there's human errors in taking care of a plant we might face another Tsernobyl - but those who are for this power seem to think that this could never happen in Finland.

My favourite source of energy is the one Finns have started to develop from methane in dumps, but apparently it still needs research... The transmission is one problem, the economical factors (like is it worth it) are others. In the end though, I think one of the chairmen of that Sierra Club committee said it best: we need to make energy efficiency sexy again. If we don't learn to save energy no solution we can make will be enough.

Theory of the day

Today we went to the Mormon temple and I tried to think spiritual thoughts on the way. Here's the theory that I figured out on the way.

Listening to Sibelius and others I realized how just maybe, if the world didn't have sorrow and pain, there might be no music in minor key. Just maybe all music would be in major... and if there was no minor, major wouldn't have much meaning either.

Went on from there to think about our existence before being born here - Mormons believe that all humans lived as spirits with God before coming on earth. I thought, since there really was hardly any opposition there - hardly any sorrow or pain (yes yes, I say hardly because we also believe that some rebelled against God and that should have caused some sorrow and pain) - maybe all the music was in major. And how beauty is actually only understood if opposition to it exists. So, I thought, we must have been excited to experience these things. Even if we didn't really know what it means. Discussion must have gone something like this:

God: I could send you to earth, where you can have aesthetic experiences of different sorts!

We: Yay! (Wait, what's aesthetic experiences? But wants it!)



Hieronymus Bosch: Garden of Earthly Delights.

Xenophobia... the worst disease...

I remember the song from the end of the 90's: Homophobia, the worst disease, you can't love anyone you like in times like these... I was at a writing course and all my friends there were singing it. Not that many of them actually were gay, just wanted to show their support. Or maybe the song just stayed easily in your head.

These days I'm more worried about xenophobia. I belong to the "white" part of humanity, and in practice that means that there are few places in the world where I'd meet with blatant racism. My features are also fairly hard to place, so even if there was a country where Finns were hated or despised (I doubt it), I could just pretend to be something else. Not so for everyone...

Xenophobia means fear of the stranger and it has existed forever. Seems to be a very human trait. One of the ugly ones, I think. We humans can mostly deal with the stranger who comes and blends in, thereby becoming "one of us". What is really difficult to deal with is the stranger who comes to our area but keeps his own language and culture. At times this has been the problem with Jews (always keeping their own culture and religion even in the middle of severe persecution) and the Roma (gypsies, also staying separate with their own culture and sometimes language). These days there are new groups. Americans are worried about the Latino that might not speak English - the worry seems to be that then the grand children of the English speakers will speak Spanish. Europeans are worried about different ethnic groups, mostly from Africa, and Australians want to make sure their boundaries stay closed enough so that not everyone from Indonesia and other areas in Southeast Asia can come in.

Maybe xenophobia stems from real worries? The history of mankind shows how peoples and languages move and push away what used to be somewhere. The Finns came from somewhere and pushed the Same living in the area to the inhospitable north - and even there the Same could not keep their language and culture in peace.

So do Finns think that the Somali will eventually do the same to them? Is this the under conscious fear? Do the Americans worry that the English language culture and white skin colour will become a despised scarcity?

I'm not sure, but what I am sure about - as an idealist - is, that we need to face our phobia and deal with it. We need to face the Stranger in his own culture and on his terms and understand before we can deal with the fear. Maybe then we will see what part is the Stranger and what part we have in common, as humans... Once we see clearly, maybe we can talk about immigration with actual sense.

"Contemporary Art"

When Kiasma, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Helsinki, was built, reactions varied from outrage to enthusiasm, but most prevalent was the outrage. I've understood that this is the case almost every time a new museum is built for contemporary art. Reasons vary: people don't like to architecture, people are upset that money is used to house contemporary art, people like more old style... All of this proves in my mind that contemporary art is still doing its job - making people think.

My sister refuses to visit Kiasma, because according to her, she doesn't like "contemporary art". I'm using quotation marks because I think the concept is in itself interesting and definitely not very clear. Does she hate it all? Does she have an idea of what all "contemporary art" is like?

There is some "contemporary art" that I don't like. We visited an international art exhibition in Kassel - Documenta - in 2007 with my husband (art historian with specialisation in contemporary art)and there was one painter who I really hated, Juan Davila. I won't torture you by posting photos here. Interesting is that the format was very traditional - oil on canvas. The paintings seemed to radiate hatred and violence, sexual violence and just blood and gore. Don't take your children to an exhibition of his works.

On the beautiful side, we were in New York in 2008 and visited MoMA and PS1 with an exhibition of my current absolute favourite artist, Olafur Eliasson. Where sometimes "contemporary art" makes people frown and look serious, entering the room with the mirror on the roof, or the round room with lighted wall seemed to make people smile and be happy. Most of the work had to do with light, but he had also intricate little things (husband decided to call them polygonic sculptures) that delighted me, and a wall full of photos from the rugged shores of Iceland (one might be cliche, a whole wall full made it really interesting).


Of course, Eliasson manages also to cause distress in a true artistic tradition. He built (well, not alone) several waterfalls in the East River in NYC, which made people worry about the salt water's impact on plants... I didn't see the big waterfalls, but I saw a small upside-down waterfall in his exhibition. The sound of water and the strange direction it was flowing in made me happy.

Recommended for adults, children and teenagers: Olafur Eliasson.

Homesickness

... where does it come from?

A friend of mine has lived nearly 15 years in America and just recently posted a status on facebook saying that she's homesick. Homesick for what? Finland.

I just got a horrible bout of homesickness - I'm extremely happy and excited for my husband who got a tenure track in upstate New York, but I'm wondering if that means we won't ever move back to Finland. Or at least not before getting retired. That would mean that I should somehow get used to the idea that I'm not living in the US only for a couple of years, but that this is my home. As I noticed in my friend's status, it's not easy to do for all of us.

Some enjoy it in a different country. I think it might be a question about embracing versus resistance. Unfortunately, it's not as easy as to say "OK, I won't resist, I'll embrace in stead" - if you're in the resistance mode your mind will resist that though!

My strategy so far has been (hate to admit this) to think that it's temporary - that maybe in some years we could move back to Europe at least. That would be closer and more familiar. And I don't only mean closer to family and old friends, although of course I miss them. I miss the familiar culture even more, strange to say. And the familiar geography and all that.

Most Finns wouldn't even consider moving to another country. We love ours. Some love to move and adopt a new culture, but I'd say they are in a minority. Once I got a fantastic glimpse into another culture's love for the country. I was in Minneapolis, talking with a really nice Somalian man (co-worker) about homesickness. I thought he'd understand and so I asked: Do you miss Somalia? He said: Yes. I think about it every day. But I can't go back.

We all know why Somalians can't go back: death and destruction, no functioning government. Imagine if scores and scores of Finland-loving people had to move out because we had a civil war or some other disaster. Imagine if you couldn't go back.