Almost every article that ponders Finland's ranking as the happiest country in the world brings up the concept of "trust". They talk about there being trust in the government, the society and each other. But what does that actually mean in practice anyway? The trust is based on the inherent assumption that no one in Finland is out to intentionally "screw you" and that ultimately the government is there to support you too. Of course there are dishonest people and criminals in Finland as well (for example bike thefts seem pretty common in Helsinki) but it is unlikely for you to, for example, get pickpocketed, carjacked, robbed etc. It seems on the whole Finns are a pretty trustworthy and trusting group. (However, I don't think this level of trust gets extended to non-Finns. To me it feels like there is a fair amount of racism/xenophobia and Finns assume - not sure what data actually says about this - that most of the crime in Finland is committed by people who weren't born in Finland whether it be refugees, immigrants, gypsies or criminals working for some Russian mafioso. I suspect this distrust in itself may create a viscious circle, for example, it is likely harder for a newcomer to get a job etc).
In any case, being a native Finn/Finnish speaker with an obviously Finnish name I've personally benefited from trust here in many ways already. For example, in the fall I furnished the whole house through numerous 2nd hand purchases. I drove all around the Helsinki area picking up stuff alone. I had a lot of faith in the sellers: I thought their online photos and descriptions of the merchandise and its condition would be accurate (they were for example I bought a large flat screen smart TV without ever seeing it) and that I could safely meet them (I did). Often we didn't find a suitable time to meet in which case the sellers would just leave the item on their porch. They trusted that I would pay them electronically when I picked up the stuff (which I did). In one case I picked up ski boots from someone's porch where they had a baby napping in a pram (a common Finnish practice with babies even in the winter - also very trusting!) and the mom just warned me to be quiet in picking up the stuff to not wake up the baby. Another time I bought a 200€ nearly new gas BBQ. I had hired help to pick up heavy items for me that day and told the seller the movers would come by and that I'd just pay the money into his bank account. I hadn't seen the BBQ but he told me it was only used a few times and I trusted that to be true. Meanwhile, he wasn't able to see whether I had actually paid at the time but still he happily helped the movers load up the BBQ after literally tellling me "I trust you". Nice of him given we'd never even met beyond a phone call.
Another great example of trust was my used car purchase. I was really busy with work, kids and furnishing the house so a friend, who had an interest in cars, offered to look online for me based on what we'd told him we'd need. He found a couple of good candidates but wasn't able to go test drive them for me at the time. He asked if I'd be ok hiring a friend of his, an unemployed taxi driver/fellow car enthusiast, to do the leg work for me. What a great win-win situation. The friend would make a little money and I'd save a ton of time not to mention I wouldn't even know what to look at in the used cars. (This was when Joel was still in the US.)
So this friend-of-a-friend went to look at used cars for me. He interviewed the seller, looked under the hood, took the car for a spin and even negotiated a discount for me (which covered the pay we'd agreed on so no extra cost to me!). Then he called to tell me the car looked pretty good and asked if I'd like to test drive it. I did so he drove it to our place and we went for a test drive. The car seemed fine to me and it gave me peace of mind to know someone else felt it was a good purchase especially because it had the most miles I'd ever had in a used car: 280,000km (174,000 miles). We then together drove to the used car dealership. I filled out a simple form and then went to use the dealership computer to get onto my bank account to pay electronically. The bank website was having some sort of a technical glitch and I couldn't get into the account to pay. The used car salesman told me, "Don't worry. Just pay when you get home". Wow! So I drove off the used car lot with a car that I hadn't even paid for! (And paid for it the minute I got home... And by the way called the insurance company from the car and had insurance activated before I even got home. I then spent 5 minutes on registering the car online.)
By the way, related to cars, here is another example of trust: There are still gas stations here where you fill up and then go in to pay for the gas!
The above examples are pleasant and make every day life simpler and stress free. But the most impactful "trust" phenomena to us relates to kids. I'd kind of forgotten about the level of paranoia about kids we dealth with daily in the US. I was reminded about it recently when I saw a discussion on social media about kids returning to hybrid school with some online and some in class. One mom commented her child was the only person who showed up to class live to which another mom right away piped: "I wouldn't trust a teacher alone in the classroom with my kid". Really!? Even with the rest of the class watching online? I remember also not feeling comfortable with our daughter playing in the front yard alone and she certainly wouldn't be able to go on bike rides or to the store etc on her own back in California. That feeling of pervasive constant worry gets to you and you only really notice it when it is finally gone.
In Finland we've been introduced to real free-range parenting. Or rather for me this is a re-introduction given I grew up as a latch-key kid in 70s Finland where I literally roamed around the forests for hours and did all kinds of potentially unsafe stuff like go swimming in a pond for hours. Just like all the other Finnish kids, ours walk/bike to school rain, shine or snow. It is normal for our 8 year old daughter to call me to ask if it is ok for her to go play in the park or stop at the store for some candy with her school friends after school. At first this took some getting used to. When she forgot her phone a few times and didn't show up right away after school I got a bit nervous and walked towards the school to meet her along the way. She was probably wondering why.... Some of her (8 year old) classmates come from further away because their local schools don't have the Finnish prep class and take a normal city bus to school, on their own. Totally normal here but that would be unheard of back in CA.
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