Finland

I'm spending much of the summer in Finland. Been here for several days now. Sure, the blog is called Taiwan adventures, but this can count as a European holiday in between my regular Taiwanese life. Therefore, while I don't expect to be very prolific in writing the blog during the summer, I might still put up some horrible stereotypes of this country every once in a while.

So far, I've been here in the North for 4 days. Of that, one day was spent in Stockholm (took an overnight ferry there from Turku). I can say that Finnish/Swedish summer (warm, sunny, pleasant) > Czech summer (cold, rainy) > Taiwanese summer (Scorching hot, humid & stormy).

Now for some stereotypes. Finnish and Swedish people are.. very blond. Who would have thought that? But less expected fact, an incredible amount of people has tattoos. Seriously, it's like there are visible tattoos on 50% of the population here. And not just some tiny ones, I'm talking about whole arms (and who knows what else) covered with tattoos. I guess they aren't aware of the fact that they will never be able to appear on Korean TV (apparently, people with tattoos are not allowed to appear on TV in Korea.)

Other than that, goatees are big among the Finnish men, as are goatee-braids. And of course, the metal looks. Swedish men, on the other hand, are best identified by long, slick hair. And the Swedish royal guards, guarding the royal palace in Stockholm, are total wussies.