Everywhere in the world teenagers are quite the same. They have wishes of freedom and want to have fun with their friends. In Finland, teenagers do have a lot of freedom and seem to be very responsible. In this article, we will tell you about their life after school and their leisure in their free time.

As school finishes at 3:45pm in Martinlaakso, pupils come back home and start a new part of the day. Of course they sometimes go and see their friends in order to spend good time with them. But what is quite different from French teenagers’ habits is that, as they are more autonomous, they often go by themselves to their friends’ places. For example, they go by bus or on foot, which can be quite long when you have to walk in the snow with freezing temperatures. And in winter, they are used to doing specific leisure related to coldness and snow. As there are beautiful trails in the forest, they sometimes go sledding or skiing. A lot of teenagers have their own ice-skates so they go on special areas like frozen lakes or rinks and they play hockey or just have fun. But they also enjoy the nice temperatures in swimming pools and saunas. Indeed, sauna is a traditional activity which is also practiced by teenagers, and believe us, it’s definitely hot!

An example of a sauna wich can be at home or in public places

Even if they are open to other foreign music, Finnish teenagers have their own musical artists among whom: Nightwish (metal rock), Cheek (rap), Jenni Vartianen (Finnish song) and Lordi, a hard rock group who won the Eurovision contest in 2006. They are well-known in Finland but not appreciated by everyone, as you will see in the interview.

After ten days spent with our Finnish partners, we discovered that their freedom helps them to be more self-assured and responsible but also that they are not so different from us.

Anne Sophie, Mathilde, Romain