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Turn the pages of the guide.
 
What is a Personal Planner?
Other Resources
Finland Links: a personal webpage that collects the best Finnish resources on the Web.
Virtual Helsinki: a very cool clickable map of Finland's capital city.
Travel in Finland: a detailed hyperlinked list of cultural events, hotels, and recreational areas.
The Finnish National Gallery: a nicely designed site featuring Finland's major art museums.
Live View of Finland: a current camera shot of the Helsinki harbor.
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The Berkeley Guides:
Berkeley Guide to Europe:
Finland
By Pete Craig
Chances are, your idea of a prototypical Finn has ice cubes for eyes and all the personal charm of granite. True, there's no fawning affection among Finns, and their characteristic disdain for wasting words may leave you feeling chilly, but they are of an eminently honest, hard-working stock that engenders admiration, especially in light of their tumultuous past. Today, the Finnish people are a high-tech, worldly bunch, but years of hardship have left permanent scars. Through six centuries of Swedish rule, another 100 years under Russia's czars, a bloody civil war, and, of course, the perpetual subarctic winter twilight, Suomi (Finnish for "Finland") emerged self-sufficient and prosperous. Whether this melancholy independence was the result of the country's battles against brutal winters or its turbulent political past, the Finns have made the philosophy of sisu--grim perseverance and inexhaustible stamina--a national credo.
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