FinnMiss: April 2007

We're all in this Together

We returned to Finland on February 14, 2007 which is known here as Friendship Day. After taking a few days to adjust to the seven hour time difference we began our service in the Helsinki Finland Temple. We were joining six American couples and one Finnish couple who had been in place since the temple was dedicated last October. The Luthy's met us at the airport along with the Koivulas, some Finnish friends we had met during our previous service. Sister Koivula happens to be Sister Luthy's sister. Serving in the Helsinki Finland temple is a very different experience from serving in the Washington, DC temple. In Washington we were an English speaking temple with a large number of Spanish speaking patrons also. Here there are six official languages: Estonian, Finnish, Latvian, Lithuanian, Russian, and Swedish. Twenty seven weeks on the temple calendar are designated as Russian weeks. The Washington DC temple is the third largest in the church. And Helsinki is a two room small temple design. Washington was open 14 hours a day with ordinances being performed almost continuously. Here the temple is open 10 1/2 hours a day and ordinances are performed much less frequently. The primary responsibility for staffing the temple belongs to the stakes and missions. The role of the missionaries is to give leadership when needed, to provide training, and to fill in the gaps. Administrative processes and procedures are still being developed. It is anticipated that in three years' time all ordinance workers will come from the stakes and branches in the temple district. Following are pictures of the missionary couples we are serving with.

Mel and Anne-Maj Luthy

Brother and Sister Luthy were called to be temple president and matron while they were a service couple at the BYU Jerusalem center. They went to Israel almost immediately after he retired as a professor of linguistics at BYU. They live in Provo and she has worked for WordPerfect and as a translator for the Church. He served a mission to Finland in the 1950's and then returned to Finland in the 1960's on a Fullbright scholarship to study Finnish and find his wife. This is their third mission together. He was mission president in Helsinki in the 1980's. I cannot imagine a better couple to oversee the opening of a new temple here in Finland. They are both gifted, gracious, patient, and kind.

Jukka and Anne-Liisa Laine

The Laines are from Rauma on the west coast of Finland. He was serving as bishop there when they were called to six months' service in the Helsinki Temple. They previously served in the Stockholm Sweden temple. He was an educator and is a man of varied interests. They are peaceful and gentle people; we are all improved by our association with them. And, of course, they both speak excellent Finnish.

Richard and Eliisa Smith

This is the Smith's first couples mission. He was a missionary to Finland in the 1960's and she is a native Finn. They were ordinance workers in the Salt Lake Temple prior to coming here. He is in the insurance business. Richard is a direct descendant of Hyrum Smith. She volunteered in the mission department for many years. They are serving a 23 month mission. They have reared eight children.

Mark and Marilyn Anderson

Brother Anderson was the first missionary to Finland in the early 1950's. He was serving a mission in Sweden when he was sent to Finland. In early 1960's he served as mission president. This is their sixth full-time mission as a couple. Previously, they have served as proselyting and leadership missionaries in Seville, Spain, Colombia, and Kiev, Ukraine. They also served a CES mission in Texas. Brother Anderson had a variety of careers and describes himself as a jack-of-all-trades. Sister Anderson was a violinist in the Utah Symphony for more than 20 years. They were ordinance workers in the Salt Lake Temple. He is now second counselor in the temple presidency and she is assistant matron.

Chuck and Nancy Harrington

This is the Harrington's second mission to Finland. They served a proselyting/office mission about five years ago. Chuck is retired from the U.S. Air Force. Nancy was a certified medical technologist. They served in the Portland, Oregon temple previously. They also served three weeks in the Atlanta Georgia Temple while they waited for their residence visas to Finland. Chuck served a mission to Finland in the 1960's. They have four children.

Stig and Ceidi Stromberg

Stig and Ceidi's mission to the Helsinki temple is their fourth full-time mission as a couple. They are both native Swedish speaking Finns. He worked for the Finnish police and after they immigrated to the United States he was in the construction industry. Their previous missions were to Sweden as an office couple and twice to the Stockholm, Sweden Temple. They bring a wealth of temple experience and language ability to their service here. They were ordinance workers in the Jordan River Temple. They reared six children.

Jim and Leena Dawson

The Dawsons live in Ogden, Utah. Sister Dawson was born in Finland where she trained as a nurse and later worked as a nurse in Canada and the U.S. Brother Dawson served a mission in Finland in the 1950's. After Jim retired as president of a credit union the Dawsons served a proselyting mission in Finland. So this is his third mission and her second. They were ordinance workers in the Ogden Utah temple. They have three children.

Kaksio With a View

When we first came to Finland in March 2005 we moved into a wonderful new apartment in Joensuu known as the penthouse of the mission. It was 67 square meters and had a sauna. It also had wonderful closets and storage space. Our second apartment which was in Espoo was quite dated, but still 67 square meters with a gross bathroom and a very spacious kitchen. All the closet space was located in the entry hallway. Hard to imagine, but a not uncommon design here. Now we are living in a bright but small apartment in Espoo near the temple. It is 48 square meters and has a sauna. The kitchen and living area are one room. There is excellent storage in hallway and the bedroom. When we had our first Finnish guests, I warned them that the apartment was quite small--only 48 sq. meters. The wife responded, "How much room do two people need? And you have a sauna." This highlights a major cultural difference. When we were teaching a course about America last year we learned that the average person classified as living in poverty in America lives in a larger space than the living space of the average European. Our whole apartment is about 12-13% as big as our home in Maryland and our house is the smallest model in our neighborhood. But we don't have a sauna.

The View

The Kitchen

The Media Center

The Living Room

The Office

The Dining Room

A Country by Any Other Name

The country we know as Finland is actually named Suomi. The Finnish language is also called Suomi. I asked some Finns (Suomalaisia) where the country got its name. One theory is that suo is the word for swamp and Finland has a lot of swamps and lake areas--hence, Suomi. Another theory is that the name is derived from some Baltic language or the Sami language. Apparently, the name Finland is derived from a Latin phrase meaning end of the earth. My granddaughter, Rachel, tells people she visited her grandparents in Fiddleland last year. And my granddaughter, Eve, says she received a letter from her grandma in Friendland. Take your pick. It's all the same to me. We are living in the country south of Norway, East of Sweden, and on the western border of Russia, just north of Estonia.

The Kids Come to Finland

We were happy to have William's family visit us in Finland from Mid June until July 3. They returned to U.S. on that morning and Alisa and her family arrived that afternoon. The two visits were similar in some ways and different in others. The first family spent the entire vacation in Finland. We traveled to Rovaniemi (on the Artic Circle) on the sleeper train twice. With William and family we visited the museum, the Marttiini knife company, played on the playgrounds, strolled along the river, went to Santa Claus Village, and took the Elders out to dinner. With Alisa and family we hiked a lot, shopped, discovered a wonderful, long, summer tobaggan slide ride, visited Santa Claus Village, and took the Elders out to dinner. At one point in our long walk, I said to Rachel, let's run ahead and pretend we're alone. Then you'll have time to play on the playground while we wait for them. When the others caught up with us, Rachel said to me: "Grandma, do we know these people?"

We went to the Helsinki Zoo which is on an island and called Korkeasaari (high island). The fun part of going to the zoo is that you have to take 20 minute boat trip to get there. The zoo is much smaller than we are used to in Washington, DC. But the trip there and back and the island setting is lovely.

We took the train to Turku twice. I think it's the best castle in Finland, unless you take into account the amazing setting of the castle in Savonlinna and the opera festival that takes place there. I kept telling the kids that when they came to Finland they could see a real castle, not like the one at Disneyland. The castle was founded in 1280 and has been growing ever since. It includes dungeons, magnificent banqueting halls, a chapel, and an excellent museum. Of course the feature that the kids remember most is the king's throne (potty).

With William's family we also went to the Espoo beach, Porvoo, the Juhannus celebration at Seurasaari which means fellowship island or something like that, and toured Helsinki using public transport. One funny experience was while walking along the esplanade in downtown Helsinki, we heard familiar sounding music. A U.S. Air Force band was playing in the concert shell on the esplanade. It was ironic that we heard them in Helsinki when we can hear the military bands play any night of the week during the summer in Washington, DC.

Another ironic experience was going to the so-called Family Italian Restaurant after having it recommended to us by the concierge at Stockmann's. When we got there the hostess would not seat us because we were too large of a group they said (7). I think they didn't like our looks.

Of course everyone enjoyed the open air markets in Helsinki, Porvoo, and Turku. The fresh fruits and vegetable displays were wonderful. And there was a lot of interest in spektroliiti jewelry and wood carvings.

After debating via email an excursion to St. Petersburg with Alisa's family and after getting approval from the director of the temple department we decided to go for four days. To go to Russia, you have to have an "invitation." That can be from a hotel where you have reservations or a tour company or I guess from a native family. Anyway we scheduled with MultiGala tours through our Finnish travel agent in Virginia, obtained our visas, and visited St. Petersburg on the hottest days in recent history. We are all very glad we went. I doubt that we would ever have seen it otherwise. The hotel had no A/C. It was brutal. There were signs in the rooms saying that since we were located close to the sea we needed to keep the windows closed so that the seagulls wouldn't fly into the room. Needless to say we opened the windows--fearing heat stroke more than a few birds in the room. The whole trip was very, very interesting. Very few people spoke English. Since then I have learned that although English was taught in the schools, they read and wrote only. And no one was allowed to talk to English speaking foreigners because the KGB would report you. The people were extraordinarily friendly. We saw very few children and when we rode the subway people would yield their seats to us because we had children with us. The public transportation was convenient and efficient, but the cars and buses appeared to have been built in the 1960's. Apparently, retail outlets are growing by leaps and bounds and now there are many bright lights and a few malls. We couldn't drink the water because of the threat of Giardia. We often compared circumstances in Finland with those of Russia and noted what a difference an imaginary line (the border between Finland and Russia) makes. When we rode the train the contrast between Finland and Russia was instant as we crossed the border. Suddenly, the countryside and cities were dreary.

The kids were marvelous the whole time. We dragged them all over Helsinki, Rovaniemi and St. Petersburg. Maybe we just wore them out. We really enjoyed having them with us.