My Dear Hard Drive

I saw this video for the first time today. I have always loved Waltari since the first time I heard their music uh… Some 15+ years ago. *Sigh* I haven’t really followed the music scene lately, so I have, amongst others, lost the touch with this band. This is not what I was going to write about though.

Do you notice the difference in mood, when the song switches from Finnish to English? The Finnish part of it is musically of course different to the English chorus, but it represents quite strongly the difference between English and Finnish as languages. What ever is said in English, seems somewhat easier to handle, lighter, not that serious. Finnish crabs you by the balls (if you have any) and kind of… Drags you through the mud while at it – even if it was funny and humorous. It is difficult to explain the difference of these languages to a person who doesn’t understand both in a very deep level.

I love both English and Finnish, but for different reasons. Finnish of course is the language of my country, making it special as it is, but English is special because it’s the language of the world. Finnish is the language of my secret society of Finns, but English allows me to speak to everyone and be understood. Both have dialects and nuances that make me smile, both have humour that is not completely translatable to the other language. I am funnier in English, even though it is my second language it is more humorous than Finnish is. The humour of these languages is completely different.

My husband has been trying to learn Finnish for years now without much success. He has grasped the main thing though. How not to sound gay in Finnish. He has to drop his voice down when speaking Finnish, or he simply sounds gay. You can hear that in the song as well, in which the difference is drastic, but very descriptive of it. Finnish just has more umph to it.

I am not completely sure if all this is because of Finnish language or because it’s my native language. How it resonates stronger, how everything in Finnish seems more real, serious and more… ominous. I would be interested to know how people who speak more than one language react to the other languages compared to the one of their own.

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