Canadians Living in Finland

What is CLIF?

CLIF is an unmoderated email mailing list for Canadians living in Finland running on the yahoogroups mail server. CLIF includes over 75 subscribers who post and read messages of general interest to Canadians living in Finland.
There are no CLIF association meetings and no membership fees. CLIF was started in 1997 by AJ Rocklin and is currently administered by Robert Piché.

What does it do?

Connects people to: inform of job openings, housing, informal happenings, stuff for sale etc. Yes, it even serves as a sounding board for your joys and sorrows of living in another land.

How does it work?

A CLIF subscriber who wants to broadcast a message to all other CLIF subscribers just sends it as email to

Only CLIF subscribers can send messages to the list.

How to join?

To join the mailing list, go to the web page http://groups.yahoo.com/group/clif/join and follow the directions.

There is no fee. Anybody may join the list: you don't have to be Canadian and you don't have to live in Finland. We only ask that any message you post should be of general interest to Canadians living in Finland.

How to unsubscribe?

You can unsubscribe at any time through the webpage http://groups.yahoo.com/
Or, just send email to clif-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com

You know you've been in Finland too long, when...

1. You rummage through your plastic bag collection to see which ones you should keep to take to the store and which can be sacrificed to garbage.
2. It's acceptable to eat lunch at 11.00.
3. Your front door step is beginning to resemble a shoe shop.
4. You think it's normal that 22 year olds need fake ID
5. When a stranger on the street smiles at you, you assume that:
      a. he is drunk
      b. he is insane
      c. he is American
      d. he is all of the above
6. You don't think twice about putting the wet dishes away in the cupboard to dry.
7. A friend asks about your holiday plans and you answer "Oh, I'm going to Europe!" meaning any other Western European country outside Scandinavia.
8. You no longer scrunch up or fold your paper money. You always put your money in your wallet.
9. Silence is fun.
10. The reason you take the ferry to Stockholm is:
       a. duty free vodka
       b. duty free beer
       c. to party...no need to get off the boat in Stockholm;
           just turn around and do it again on the way back.
       d. all of the above
11. Your coffee consumption exceeds 6 cups a day and coffee is too weak if there is less than 10 scoops per pot.
12. You pass a grocery store and think "Wow, it is open, I had better go in an buy something!"
13. Your native language has seriously deteriorated; you begin to "eat medicine", "open the television", "close the lights off", and tell someone "you needn't to!" Expressions like "Don't panic" creep into your everyday language.
14. You associate pea soup with Thursday.
15. Your idea of unforgivable behaviour now includes walking across the street when the light is red and there is no WALK symbol, even though there are no cars in sight.
16. Your notion of streetlife is reduced to the few teenagers hanging out in front of Helsinki railway station on Friday nights.
17. Your bad mood becomes your good mood.
18. Sundays no longer seem dull with all the stores closed, and begin to feel restful instead.
19. "No comment" becomes a conversation strategy.
20. You finally stop asking your class "Are there any questions?"
21. The fact that all of the "v's" and the "w's" are together in the phone directory seems right.
22. Your old habit of being "fashionably late" is no longer acceptable. You are always on time.
23. Hugging is reserved for sexual foreplay.
24. You begin to understand Jussi Jyylanpaarvi's broadcast of the hockey game.
25. You refuse to wear a hat, even in -30 degree weather.
26. You hear loud-talking passengers on the train. You immediately assume:
       a. they are drunk
       b. they are Swedish-speaking
       c. they are American.
27. You give up on trying to find fat-free food and pile on the butter, cream and sugar.
28. You know how to fix herring in 105 different ways.
29. You eat herring in 105 ways.
30. You no longer look at sports pants as casual wear, but recognise them as semi-formal wear.
31. You can now reconstruct the missing letters on a building. For example MERI.........LIITTO OY.
32. You have undergone a transformation:
    a. you accept mustamakkara (Black-blood sausage) as food
    b. you accept alcohol as food
    c. you accept.
33. You understand why the Finnish language has no future tense.
34. You no longer have to search for the flushing mechanism on the toilet.
35. You no longer see any problem wearing white socks with loafers.
36. You no longer correct people who say MAC Donald's.
37. You just love Jaffa.
38. You've come to expect Sunday morning sidewalk vomit dodging.
39. You know that "religious holiday" means "let's get drunk."
40. You enjoy salmiakki.
41. You know that "mens public bathroom" is another phrase for sidewalk.
42. You know that more than three channels means cable.
43. You get all the Swedish jokes.
44. When you're hungry you can peel a boiled potato like lightning.
45. You've become lactose intolerant.
46. You accept that 80 degrees C in a sauna is chilly, but 20 degrees C outside is freaking hot.
47. You don't think twice about wearing sandals indoors and Wellington's outside.
48. You stand in a bus if you can't find a vacant pair of seats.
49. Finland winning a medal at the world hockey championships is less important than beating Tre Kronor.
50. You pass the point of spending more than 50% of your salary on phone calls and alcohol.
51. The only couple talking in a tram or a bus always seems to annoy you.
52. You refuse to cross a totally empty street until there is a green light.
53. You are immediately suspicious when somebody starts talking to you in the street.
54. You seriously consider visiting the sauna more than three times a week.
55. YOU CAN'T UNDERSTAND WHY PEOPLE LIVE ANYWHERE BUT IN FINLAND!!!!