A rain shoe throwing competition, carrying your wife through an obstacle course, kalsarikännit (i.e. ‘drinking in your pants’), and alongside that sisu and sauna - Finnish culture is truly unique! Finland was the focus of the ninth Nordic Focus Festival, a festival of Nordic cultures hosted annually within the walls of the University of Gdańsk.

‘The Nordic Focus Festival came to the University of Gdańsk for the ninth time,’ says Tomasz Pupacz, deputy head of ACC UG “Alternator”. ‘Every year, the festival develops, expands - it is such a positive snowball into which we involve artists and institutions from Poland and abroad. I think this concept is going in an excellent direction.’

This year's edition of the festival, specifically dedicated to Finland, was opened on Friday evening by the Vice-Rector for Student Affairs, dr hab. Urszula Patocka-Sigłowy, prof. UG, and the Ambassador of the Republic of Finland to Poland, Päivi Maarit Laine. The first artistic event was a screening of the film The Best of Muminki with live music by the band NAGROBKI and Mikołaj Trzaska.

As in previous years, language workshops were held, this time in Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish. Participants were able to learn the basics of pronunciation and a few phrases in their chosen language. ‘We have very little time to learn a language, but it's enough to fall in love with it,’ said Alicja Szczudlińska, one of the festival's co-organisers, who runs the Norwegian language classes.

Students of the Finnish line of Scandinavian Studies at UG introduced the guests to some of the peculiarities of Finnish culture. Monika Zarajczyk and Łukasz Sankala shared interesting facts about the rather unusual ways Finns spend their free time, while Laura Czernysz and Florian Huzar talked about the peculiarities of Finnish cinematography. Among the uncommon Finnish hobbies, a competition in throwing a rain shoe or a broken mobile phone (the latter based on the noble idea of recycling electro-waste), as well as races in carrying wives through an obstacle course, aroused widespread amazement. The leitmotif of the presentation was praise for otherness and strangeness, which do not have to have negative associations: ‘Let's have the courage to be strange like the Finns,’ Laura Czernysz told the audience.

Laura Santoo, lecturer in Finnish at the University of Gdańsk, talked about what it is like to be Finnish in Poland: what is inspiring in our country and what can create difficulties. The opposite perspective - that of a Pole living in Finland for many years - was presented by Aleksandra Michta-Juntunen, author of the book Finland: sauna, sisu and salmiakki. In turn, the outstanding Finnish translator Sebastian Musielak, author of the outstanding translation of Juhani Karila's novel Fishing for the Little Pike, shared the various translation challenges he faced in translating a book written largely in one of the Finnish dialects, including how - and why - he created an ‘artificial’ dialect for the translation, which was a compilation of features of various local varieties of the Polish language.

A special guest at the festival was Oliver Lovrenski, author of the novel Back in the Day, which is set in a community of lower-class Oslo teenagers caught up in drugs and violence. The writer has won many prestigious awards despite his young age, and his book spices up the idyllic picture of Norwegian society with a hint of bitterness.

Why the Eurovision Song Contest is so popular in Scandinavian countries was discussed by Maja Wojcieszek in her presentation ‘We just love Eurovision too much’. The speaker outlined the history of the contest, preparations, organisers and accompanying events. She focused mainly on this year's edition, which she had the opportunity to cover as a journalist. She talked about the difficulties the organisers had to face this year, having to do, among other things, with the protests caused by the political situation between Israel and Palestine.

Dr Agata Rudnik, director of the Academic Psychological Support Centre, introduced festival participants to the three pillars of Finnish happiness: sisu, sauna, and kalsarikänni. She talked about why Finnish culture inspires people all over the world through its philosophy and healthy lifestyle, education system, closeness to nature (friluftsliv), social trust or sisu - maintaining fortitude in the face of difficulties. Dr Agata Rudnik devoted a large part of her presentation to kalsarikänni, understood as the art of wide-ranging relaxation in solitude. According to the Finns, it is an antidote to overwork and social pressure. The speaker concluded that the key to Finnish happiness is a balance between perseverance (sisu), regeneration (sauna) and relaxation (kalsarikänni).

Another interesting event was the author meeting with Emiliana Konopka and Anna A. Prorok, co-authors of the book Nordic Tales, hosted by Anna Ratajczak-Krajka. Among other things, the authors talked about their choice of characters from Nordic folklore and the difficulties of translating texts from Norwegian. The guests at the festival also learned about the contemporary perception of legendary characters in various countries - whether society still believes in their existence, or whether they have become just an element of pop culture. The speakers also answered numerous questions from the audience, including about their favourite characters in Nordic folklore.

The festival also abounded with accompanying events: a photography exhibition, a unique walk through Oliwa Park, artistic events prepared in cooperation with the Ethnography Department of the National Museum in Gdańsk, a karaoke room in the UG Library, and popular Nordic board and party games, which could be played in the lobby of the Faculty of Languages and the Faculty of History. The final touch was a concert by Jaakk Ein Kalevi and Michał Jan Ciesielski in the UG Library.

‘I have been co-organising the Nordic Focus Festival with the University of Gdańsk and Tomasz Pupacz for nine years now,’ said Krystyna Weiher-Sitkiewicz of the National Museum in Gdańsk. ‘It is moving to see how our festival is developing, how it is evolving, how different its faces are. There are only a few Nordic countries, and how many stories can be told about them! It is an inexhaustible formula. We know that next year's edition - the tenth - poses challenges for us as organisers, but looking at the one now, we feel that we are truly fulfilled. There is a huge turnout and the programme is wrapping up with more and more issues.’

Detailed coverage on the Facebook event: Nordic Focus Festival | Facebook

Executive producer: Association of Artistic Initiatives ‘Jantar’.

Subsidised by the City of Gdańsk.

The project was supported by the National Plan for Reconstruction and Increasing Resilience and subsidised by the European Union NextGenerationEU.

Festival curator: Tomasz Pupacz

Event coordination and public relations: Alicja Szczudlińska

Social media: Aleksandra Mętel, Zuzanna Rumińska

Hosting author meetings and discussions: Krystyna Weiher-Sitkiewicz, Anna Ratajczak-Krajka, Nordsterna Scientific Circle, Students_of_Finnish Line (Institute of Scandinavian and Finnish Studies, UG)

Festival team: Laura Santoo, Zofia Bełdzińska, Krystyna Weiher-Sitkiewicz, Waldemar Elwart, Agnieszka Grzegowska, Jagoda Reszko, Paweł Herman

Volunteers: Dominika Majkowska, Malwina Woźna, Laura Czernysz, Agata Bączyk, Florian Huzar, Monika Zarajczyk, Łukasz Sankała, Daria Rybarczyk, Filip Zemfler, Marta Kudła, Karolina Krzyż, Julia Grau, Mateusz Tomaszewski, Antoni Majewski, Ariel Grala, Dominik Raciński

Videorecording and editing of footage: Janusz Wojtkowski

Photo reportage: Zuzanna Litwinko, Maciej Moskwa

Technical support: Wiesław Cyganik

Festival graphic design: Ula Awdankiewicz

Animation: Krzesimir Jagiełło

Honorary patronage: the Rector of the University of Gdańsk, prof. dr hab. Piotr Stepnowski, the Embassy of the Kingdom of Denmark, the Embassy of the Republic of Finland, the Embassy of the Republic of Iceland, the Embassy of the Kingdom of Norway and the Embassy of the Kingdom of Sweden, the Honorary Consulate General of Sweden in Gdańsk

Organisers: JANTAR Association of Artistic Initiatives, National Museum in Gdańsk

Partners: University of Gdańsk, UG Academic Cultural Centre ‘Alternator’, UG Institute of Scandinavian and Fennist Studies, UG Film Discussion Club Love Blonde, UG Main Library, NORLA - Norwegian Literature Abroad, Polish-Swedish Chamber of Commerce, ArtRage Publishing House, Marpress Publishing House, Poznan Publishing House, Bezdroża Publishing House, Moc Media Publishing House, University of Gdańsk Publishing House, Salomonsson Agency, THULE Portal, UG Academic Psychological Support Centre, Nordsterna Scientific Circle, University of Gdańsk Academic Choir, Tactic Games, Silplito, Finnish Kalevala Village, Language School Językonauta, ulillu, Smak Słowa Bookshop, Coffee-Moose Gdańsk, Dom Oliwski & Fischgarten.

Media patronage: Portal Trojmiasto.pl, Radio Gdańsk, Magazyn Skandynawski Zew Północy, Szwecjoblog, ‘Gazeta Uniwersytecka’ Pismo społeczności Akademickiej UG, Radio MORS, Prestiż Magazyn Trójmiejski, MojaNorwegia.pl

The project was realised as part of the statutory activities of the Association of Artistic Initiatives JANTAR.