land of elves « uerd crep

land of elves

04Mar07

This post should’ve come days ago, on the 28th of February, but I had my big Finnish test and a “see you soon” party for the russians and my portuguese who left for the holiday and some CS parties and some normal parties and…bo! i write now.

On the 28th of Feb. it was Kalevalan päivä. Kristina (our Finnish language professor) took us “in” a bit into the story of this national celebration. “Kalevala” is the national epic of the fins and karelians (the part of Finland that remained under Russian occupation). Elias Lönnrot travelled what is now the border between Finland and Russia, the Karelia and Ingria region and gathered these old poems transmitted orally throughout generations. They started recording the names of the villagers who sang them and the original names of the poets (where they could find them because most of them got lost in time). All this became the book of Kalevala. The day of 28th is actually the day when the first edition (Old Kalevala) came out. The Fins celebrate it in the memory of their heritage. The poems follow the story of Finnish heroes (the main character is Väinämöinen) and have been interpreted as the ancient war between the Fins and Saami people.

Kalevala has spread its influences throughout music, art and finnish literature. Imagine hearing the name of Lord of the rings coming up and the obvious similarities between the elfs (Glorfindel had actually to be blonde because his name means “the golden-haired”) and wizards (both Saruman and Gandalf were built after Väinämöinen) and the kalevalan heroes. J.R. Tolkien’s “Silmarillion” has the book of Kalevala as a main reference.

We also learnt a bit about the other finnish national days and the significance behind them and about the struggle of the Fins to become independent of Russia and Sweden.

As another “elf”-ish fascinating thing (love this country for this ): the name of the months in finnish are given by a certain moon. so here they are: (kuu=moon)

Tammikuu (jan): the oak moon
Helmikuu (feb): the pearl moon
Maaliskuu(mar): the earth moon (maa=country, land, earth)
Huhtikuu(april): the moon of fire (huhti=ancient form of the word fire)
Toukokuu(may): the moon of the farmers’ work
Kesäkuu(jun): the summer moon
Heinäkuu(jul): the moon of the grass cutting (heinä=hay) mmm…this one is my fav friends know why…
Elokuu(aug): the moon of the crops
Syyskuu(sep): the autumn moon (sysky=autumn)
Lokakuu(oct): the mud moon
Marraskuu(nov): the death moon (marras=death) spooky one…
Joulukuu(dec): the Christmas moon (joulu=Christmas) Santa is coming from Rovaniemi