Living abroad in today's world

Finns living in the US or Americans living in Finland, which ever way....one can gripe all one wants about missing something back home but the truth is...life is good!

With the globalization immigration to a different country is comfortable compared to e.g. the Finns, who took the journey to come to US during the Great Migration (1860 - 1930) in the search after a better life. I could think that anyone from US, who would have decided to immigrate to Finland during that time...would have been ultimately noted as a lunatic back in US.

Nowadays Finland's strengths have reached global media and the number of Americans living in Finland has been steadily rising. In 1987 there were 333 daring Americans living in Finland. In 2009 that number rose to 3907 Americans, who called Finland their home. Today that number is even higher. In 2013 there were in total 15 570 people living in Finland, whose mother tongue is English. This includes also Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia and other countries in addition to the US.
Regardless, quite an improvement.

On this side of the globe, keeping up with the latest and the greatest from Finland is easier now than ever before. I browse the Helsingin Sanomat newspaper every day. Even this morning I was enjoying a quiet morning with my cup of green tea and reading the latest news from the web version of Helsingin Sanomat.

Side note: when there is no paper involved...for an ex-paper industry professional, it feels funny to still call a newspaper. I have yet to find a better way to describe it.

In Facebook there are great communities, where Finns and fellow Nordics post information or share knowledge about how to convert the Finnish recipes to the US environment. We exchange knowledge about which ingredient to use to replace some traditional Finnish ingredient, which is not available directly in the US.

The Finnish and Nordic community in Houston (as well as wider Texas) sticks together nicely. One gets to keep up the Finnish and Swedish language on a regular basis and spend nice times together, sharing the latest events about Life in Texas.

Also there are Facebook,  Facetime,  Skype, WhatsApp, Viber, Twitter, etc. which help to stay in touch with friends all over the world. Back in 1996 when I moved to Germany, I was communicating by good old letters, FAX (!!!!) and sometimes even by phone with friends and family back in Finland.

At least a few times a month there is a Facetime session with my brother and his family. My nephews know how to dial me via Facetime, which was the key reason they inherited my old iPad. It is so different to catch up with them, when they can see how life is here and they can show their drawings and latest lego creations. Especially with them it does make a difference, as they would not have the patience to just talk. Those discussions would stay rather one-sided and VERY short :))))

Then there are all these great internet shops, where one can get the necessary things. The few Finnish things that I cannot live without are proper rye bread, Fazer chocolate, proper loose green tea, Moomin mugs and Xylitol chewing gum. All of those are in one way or another accessible via internet shopping.
With good bribing and begging, friends and family in Finland have eventually also started sending occasional care packages. Yeiiii!

I do consider myself lucky that I have the luxury of learning about the US culture and life, and at the same time being able to keep my roots strong. That is a dream; a dream which the Finns, who left Finland during the Great Migration would not even dare to think of as a possibility.

The descendants of those brave Finns now number around 700 000 Finnish Americans living in the US. It is inspiring to see in the Finnish American Facebook page how proud they are of their Finnish roots, even if they would go a few generations back.  With some, the knowledge of Finnish language is limited to a few sayings, which their grandparents used to say. Yet, you can see that in their hearts....they are still Finns.

Who knows, maybe a few generations from now the descendants of the Americans immigrated to Finland will face the same situation. Hilarious thought, but everything is possible.

Hello Jet Lag!

....Finally managed to take again time to write my thoughts & experiences, which I have been listing the past months. Happily married now and with some of the free time will try to make sure to empty my thinking tank to my blog :)

Sharing some of the my most vital lessons learned for the flights between continents. If you have additional tips and tricks, please feel to share them. Would be fun to hear what other aids have been figured out.

Moving outside your birth-country is exciting but the name of the game is of course to try to keep all the relationship up and alive also back home. In best case one has also some work commitments there. Which means that there are times that Jet lag is all you know for a while, everything else is covered in a fairy tale like fog :) 

I remember when living in Singapore, I was on a local salary and flying home for Christmas was something I did not dare even dream about. Now I know how good I had it. One year I flew only once to Finland. Well....moving preparations to US brought the cross continent flying to a whole new level:
Before moving to US I had 1 week visit to the client site in Alabama. As I was lucky enough to be able to transfer within the company ....and on top of that take my projects with me.

After that trip I had 2 weeks time to pack the house in Finland and take care of the remaining most crucial wedding preparation tasks, which needed on-site presence.

Then 2 weeks in Texas for Christmas....and after New Year back to Finland for a week to hand over my manager responsibilities and then chirpy-chirp directly to Washington to get the 4 day on-boarding to the US workplace.

Flying across the Atlantic weekly or every 2nd week for 6 weeks in a row meant
"Hello jet lag!".
It gets easier though each time as one learns the tricks which fit the flight duration and circumstances.

I learned that if flying to US with a flight, which leaves Finland in the morning and arrives in US during day time ....stay awake as much as you can. Make sure to have all the magazines and books you wanted to read for months...but never had time. Stay away from heavy food and red wine, as it will make you sleepy.

When flying to Finland with over night flight my tricks are following: I wake up extra early on the day of the flight. This to be extra tired for the flight.

Turku Airport with Moomins to greet you

I stay away from pasta or beef meals, prefer chicken or vegetarian to get something to eat but not eat too heavy. I drink whole lot of water but I also allow myself glass of red wine, when it is time to dose off. Luckily the melatonin tablets have become now easy to get in any store. I have those with me or allergy medication.
My husband, being the chemical engineer of the family, educated me that several allergy medication has ingredients, which make one sleepy . But they do not leave you as badly drowsy as sleeping tablets do.

Thus our favorite has become Benadryl, take two of those and you will be nicely asleep most of the flight (http://www.benadryl.com).
At both ends for the first nights we keep taking melatonin or Benadryl to speed up adjusting to the local time zone. So far it has worked rather well.
Waiting for the time when one can just push a button on the wrist watch and say "Beam me up Scotty!" :)