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| Copyright © 2021 All rights reserved - Tüm hakları saklıdır |
Traditional competition between Finns and neighboring Swedes have been going on. The people of the 10.5 million inhabitants, the Kingdom of Sweden consider sometimes Finland with 5.5 million people a bit provincial and some Finns consider Swedes to be arrogant.
Fin-land (beautiful-country in Swedish), which had belonged to the Swedish kingdom for centuries in history, was attached to its eastern neighbor Russia in 1809 during the reign of the Russian Tsar Alexander. When the Bolshevik revolution broke up in Russia in 1918, the Finns took the opportunity to declare their independence and established The Republic of Finland!
The Finns, who were traditionally close to the Germans, sided with the Germans in World War II, out of fear of Russia. In 1942, in the midst of the war, Hitler made a day visit on a Junkers plane from Berlin to Finland to celebrate the 75th birthday of Finnish leader Marshal Mannerheim.
When Russia declared war on Finland, the Swedish people collected money and forwarded it to the neighbor. On the other hand, the Swedish Brigade, consisting of some eight thousand Swedish volunteer Corps arrived in Finland and supported Finland's Defence Forces against the Soviet enemy.
70 000 children were moved from Finland to "safer" Sweden during the Second World War. Over 15 000 Finnish children remained in Swedish families in Sweden after the war was over, as they lost contact with their parents.
When the German
army was defeated in 1944, Finland surrendered to the Russians. Britain,
Soviet Union, and Finland made a peace agreement. With this agreement,
USSR declared that it has annexed occupied Finnish lands: Eastern
Karelia, Viipuri, and Eastern Lapland to Russia. In the 1950s, Finland
paid huge war reparations to the Soviet Union, and the other hand straightened
its weakened economy.
During the cold war period, with the contribution of the Finnish President Kekkonen, Finland did not enter Nato and established a careful balance between the West and the USSR. In this way, Finland ensured its sovereignty and exported agricultural and quality industrial products to the Russians. Finland and Sweden have been a member of EU since 1995.
As the Finnish economy recovered, neighbor competition with Sweden has begun! E.g. when the Finns started producing and selling Nokia phones to the world, Sweden produced Ericsson phones. Finnish and Swedish ice hockey teams respectively became world champions. Anecdotes and insulting jokes about which nation is smarter and more clever have sprung up in both countries.
I witnessed the last competition between the two neighbors. This time Finland won this butter competition 2-1.
Yesterday I went to Post Office to mail official translations of Finnish Passports I have translated for customers. Then I visited the neighborhood grocery market. The normal price of half a kg of Swedish Arla butter (smör) had been 50 SEK / 44 TL. The Finnish dairy company Valio has launched its butter in Sweden at a -20% discount.
Due to competition The Swedish Arla lowered the price and published a -25% discount. A lot of customers among us bought several butter packs... But the dairy company of Finland VALIO made a new unexpected move yesterday by bringing a large amount of fresh Finnish butter to Sweden and selling it with %50 discount: 25 Kron / 22 TL for 500g pack!
This means that the Finnish milkman is campaigning butter below the cost to increase its market share in Sweden. Nevertheless as a result of the competition we consumers benefit. We should go to get a couple more Valio packages tomorrow before the sale ends!
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| Copyright © 2021 All rights reserved - Tüm hakları saklıdır |
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| Copyright © 2021 All rights reserved - Tüm hakları saklıdır |
Today we saw Turkish Quince in Ica-supermarket! Turkish or Arabian grocery stores were occasionally selling quince, but it was the first time we saw it in a mega supermarket. The price per kilo is 40 SEK / 36 TL. We took this opportunity and bought two kilos of quince. What happened then? Then we ate the quince! Ayvayı yedik!
Copyright © 2021 All rights reserved - Tüm hakları saklıdır
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