Sisu!

I'm celebrating my first-ever Independence Day of Finland tonight by displaying two candles in my kitchen window.

Though I'm one hundred percent Finnish, it seems a bit odd to celebrate this day as my ancestors emigrated from Finland in the late nineteenth century, when Suomi (how you say "Finland" in Finnish) was still part of the Russian empire. And if it weren't for the oppression of the Russkies, I wouldn't be an American now! Actually, I don't know why my ancestors moved here. Opression may not be the cause. I emailed with a guy in Finland a few years ago and he said the mass emigration back then was due to the economy being on the craps and that most Finns have long-lost relatives in the USA and Canada as the result of that emigration.

On a related note, years back a British friend of mine semi-scolded me for referring to myself as a Finn. (I had commented that my then-neighbor was Finnish and said something like: "We Finns stick together.") He said something to the effect that Americans tend to claim they are something else and don't ever just settle on being American. His American wife said that that is the result of so many of our families originally being from elsewhere.

In my own defense, if I were overseas (or elsewhere in North or South America even), I would obviously identify myself as an American. And while here in the USA it's obvious to anyone who meets me that I'm an American. But when you have a name like "Tuomala" ("Ylituomala" back in Suomi) and are in constant position of: 1) explaining how to pronounce your name, and 2) explaining of what national origin the name is ... well, you tend to identify yourself as "Finn" (secondary to being a citizen of the good ol' USA, natch) early and often. Throw in the Finnish words thrown around by my parents in our household growing up (both Mom and Dad were raised in households in which Finnish was the primary language) and my tendency to pronounce English words with the emphasis on the first syllable just like how the first syllable is always emphasized in the Finnish language but I can't speak Finnish outside of a handful of words ... well, fuck yeah I'm a Finn. Shit, the Irish in America have branded their ethnicity and are raking in the dough over it - all I'm doing is being proud of where my people came from in the first place. A place which is now, thankfully, free from Russia. (And Sweden to boot.)

Anyway, congratulations to my Suomalainen cousins on their celebration of independence. Sisu!