Shocking Truth About Finland



Ikea names sofas, coffee tables and bookshelves after places in Sweden; beds, wardrobes and hall furniture after places in Norway; carpets after places in Denmark and dining tables and chairs after places in Finland.

  • Finland is the world's happiest country, according to the 2019 World Happiness Report.
  • The population of Finland is 5.5 million as of 2019, with a density of 18 inhabitants per square km, the lowest in the EU.
  • After WW1, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland emerged as independent nations.
  • Finland is part of Fennoscandia, not Scandinavia.
  • At the Wife Carrying World Championships in Finland, first prize is the wife's weight in beer.
  • There's a Golf Club on the border of Sweden and Finland: half the holes are in one country and half in the other.
  • In Finland, 9 out of 10 plastic bottles are returned for recycling and almost 100% of glass 
  • bottles are also recycled.
  • From the Middle Ages up to 1809, Finland was part of Sweden.
  • There's a cruise ship that runs between Stockholm, Sweden, and Helsinki, Finland, just to purchase cheap alcohol.
  • In Finland, when someone earns their Ph.D., they are given a top hat and a sword.
  • There are tuition-free Universities in Finland, Austria, Norway, Germany, and Sweden with careers in English for international students.
  • Declawing cats is legal in most U.S. states but banned in at least 22 countries including Germany, Finland, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand and Japan.
  • In 2010, Finland became the first country in the world to make Internet access a legal right.
  • Every year, Finland increases in surface area by about 7 sq km (2.7 sq mi) per year because it is rebounding from the weight of ice-age glaciers and rising out of the sea.
  • There's a resort in Finland where you sleep in a glass igloo to watch the northern lights.
  • Mobile Phone Throwing is an official sport in Finland.
  • Finland has more heavy metal bands per capita than any other country in the world.
  • Around 1 in 10 convicts in Finland escaped prison in 2013, making it the prison-break capital of Europe.
  • In Finland, slot machines are monopolized by a non-profit company that gives all its earnings 
  • to charity.
  • The Brown bear is the national animal of Finland.
  • A Burger King in Finland has an in-store sauna.
  • The prehistoric Finns, along with most Siberian peoples, considered the bear as the spirit of one's forefathers.
  • Finland celebrates "National Sleepy Head Day," where the last person in the house to wake up is thrown into water by the early risers.
  • Swedish is also an official language in Finland.
  • Passports issued by the UK, Sweden and Finland offer visa-free travel to more countries than any other passports.
  • There are 2 million saunas in Finland for a population of 5 million.
  • 99% of Finns take a sauna at least once a week.
  • Finland will give $587 to 2,000 jobless citizens each month from January 2017 until 2019 to see if basic income works.
  • Gambling in Finland is controlled by the government and all of the profits go to charity.
  • In Finland, people call their country Suomi.
  • Finland's passport became a flipbook when it was redesigned in 2012. It features a moose that walks across the page as you thumb through it.
  • Iceland and Finland have the lowest infant mortality rate in the world.
  • Finland refers to itself as the “Land of a Thousand Lakes”, but it actually has 188,000 lakes to be precise.
  • Finland had the third smallest gender gap in the world in 2017.
  • Finland is the only country in the developed world where fathers of primary school-age children spend more time with their children than mothers.
  • There are more saunas than cars in Finland.

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