Toni Ahvenainen
The Marketplace
Season of Summer Light
Week 29, Saturday
As I promised couple of days ago (see here), today I'll take you to the Finnish marketplace. The reason for this expedition is simple, you really haven't seen Finnish summer if you haven't visited the marketplace. To understand the importance of this subject, you first need to know something about the Finnish society. Today Finland is a typical information society, with all the technological schemes like broadband connections, databases, social media, mobile phones, tablets etc. But it has not always been like that. Just a few decades ago at 1970s Finns moved from countryside to cities and left their typical path of life as farmer behind to become today's telecommunication engineers. Our way of life has changed very rapidly in couple of generations and this change has molded in its own way the Finnish culture and the meaning of the marketplace. You see, in today's Finnish information society the marketplace has a special meaning. Not only Finns buy their vegetables, sausages, berries and potatoes from the marketplace at summer, the marketplace also allows us to experience our countryside roots again. While modern Finn might feel a certain loneliness living in his flat and surrounded by electronic gadgets, he can always go to the marketplace and meet a big handed and sweaty farmer with his beautiful daughter offering, not only their earthy potatoes and carrots, but also the connection to original Finnish communality. You would be surprised to see how quiet and distant Finns turn into talkative and social extroverts when they sit at the marketplace eating sausages and drinking black coffee with each other. And the summer is of course a special time of the year for this kind of social activity, very much like in agrarian society in the past. One could even say, that in a contradictory way the development of information society maintains the important meaning of the marketplace. It's part of our history in a small and convenient way - and if you ever visit Finland in summer you should definitely head to the marketplace to encounter the real Finns.
Year of the Alpha – 52 Weeks of Sony Alpha Photography: www.yearofthealpha.com
The Marketplace
Season of Summer Light
Week 29, Saturday
As I promised couple of days ago (see here), today I'll take you to the Finnish marketplace. The reason for this expedition is simple, you really haven't seen Finnish summer if you haven't visited the marketplace. To understand the importance of this subject, you first need to know something about the Finnish society. Today Finland is a typical information society, with all the technological schemes like broadband connections, databases, social media, mobile phones, tablets etc. But it has not always been like that. Just a few decades ago at 1970s Finns moved from countryside to cities and left their typical path of life as farmer behind to become today's telecommunication engineers. Our way of life has changed very rapidly in couple of generations and this change has molded in its own way the Finnish culture and the meaning of the marketplace. You see, in today's Finnish information society the marketplace has a special meaning. Not only Finns buy their vegetables, sausages, berries and potatoes from the marketplace at summer, the marketplace also allows us to experience our countryside roots again. While modern Finn might feel a certain loneliness living in his flat and surrounded by electronic gadgets, he can always go to the marketplace and meet a big handed and sweaty farmer with his beautiful daughter offering, not only their earthy potatoes and carrots, but also the connection to original Finnish communality. You would be surprised to see how quiet and distant Finns turn into talkative and social extroverts when they sit at the marketplace eating sausages and drinking black coffee with each other. And the summer is of course a special time of the year for this kind of social activity, very much like in agrarian society in the past. One could even say, that in a contradictory way the development of information society maintains the important meaning of the marketplace. It's part of our history in a small and convenient way - and if you ever visit Finland in summer you should definitely head to the marketplace to encounter the real Finns.
Year of the Alpha – 52 Weeks of Sony Alpha Photography: www.yearofthealpha.com