On identity

I am visiting Budapest for the first time in my life. In cities like these Iyou really see the difference between old cultures (Hungary) and new cultures (Finland). I know several people hate this comment but I am still going to use it: Based on meetings with Hungarians I have realised that when a nation has been around for centuries, it is much more uncomplicated to be. This city is bursting with different cultural centres and open workshops. At the moment I sit in an old factory that has been turned into a huge cultural centre. Yesterday evening I was at the Open Workshop where they showed a film that was based on James Joyce's Ulysses. On the other side of the wall young women were making beautiful handicrafts out of leather. All these centres have something in common: they are not trying too much. They let the people make the place.

Something really peculiar happened yesterday. I was heading back to my hotel and stopped at a kiosk. The woman behind the counter did not speak English. She asked me:"Finnish?" I still do not understand how. Today I have been amusing myself by spying on Finnish tourists who do not realise that I am Finnish.

I would not say that living abroad bring out the Finn in me. But when I interact daily with people from different countries, it happens automatically that I start defining my Finnishness more. Well, it is the basic sociological theory that the other is needed for an identity to develop, fourish and exist.