I was taught that was where Santa Claus lived and came from and only knew that it is a very, very cold country. My knowledge of that remained that way because I am not a very curious person and I am very lazy, until Tex and I visited Helsinki last autumn.
It was clean.. and simple. I tried so hard to think of an adjective to describe but "simple" hits me hard. I'm not going deep into their social structure because I'm no expert to comment but I'll just describe what I saw, as a traveller.
All their tram platforms were level to their tram carriages. It was practically effortless to wheel a pram into the tram. Adults who had season tickets need not whip out their cards to tap that often - only during their first leg of the journey. The fare that they pay initially would sustain for, say, about one and a half hours? So even if you are changing trams, just alight and board again, no more tapping. Don't find fault with my accuracies, I'm just saying it's rather hassle-free to take public transport. Besides, being cheapo Singaporeans, we winged our way through and forgot to pay for many trips. I don't think at Helsinki, anyone worried about not having enough space in a tram to bring a pram, much less to collapse a pram before you can hurl it onto the tram.
Ask a parent to wake his/her sleeping child up. The last time I did that to my niece, I got a cold hard stare from my sister that could turn me into stone and was made to babysit my niece for the next four hours. Let's just say I will never do it again.
Collapsing a pram before you board a bus? Not as easy as you think, CEOs of bus operators. Wake a child up, carry him, carry the bags, collapse a pram, board and squeeze into the bus with many other commuters and THEN fish out your EZ-link? I'd like to see the CEOs do that. Of course, it's not like there isn't a choice. We can also adapt and make do with the cards that we are dealt with. Hence many resorted to buying cars and.. the rest is history.
I've digressed. Truly a Singaporean at heart while I complain happily away. I just wanted to demonstrate how EASY Helsinki made commuting for parents. Even with my super big bagpack then, we had little trouble entering and exiting the trams and subways.
Then I came across this little article - Why Finnish Babies Sleep In Boxes. Apparently, "for 75 years, Finland's expectant mothers have been given a box by the state. It's like a starter kit of clothes, sheets and toys that can even be used as a bed. And some say it helped Finland achieve one of the world's lowest infant mortality rates." Every year, mothers look forward to receiving The Box as the rest were left curious about the contents of the box. It was easy to know what year the babies were born in as the design of clothes changes a little every year. Well, to me, that sounded a lot more like checking out what your NDP goodies bag contained this year. Same same but different, you get the idea.
Now, isn't this AWESOME?! Talk about meaningful gifts, it's like someone from the government cares. So I gave this link to Tex, thinking he would enjoy it tremendously. And so he did. He countered me with this even awesome-r article - The Babies Who Nap In Sub-zero Temperatures. We finished the article with one common memory - there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing.
As you can see, I am deeply fascinated with the Nordic way of parenting. Resilience to them is in-built right from a very very young age and in many aspects. Leaving the kids to nap outdoors? I think I like that idea already.
Erm, not in this haze lah.
