News flash

If you can read Finnish, the picture is self explanatory. If not..

Depicted is the leading newspaper Helsingin Sanomat this morning so it is official: it is dark in Helsinki these days. "Kaupungin päivä on lyhyt ja hämärä" is Finnish meaning "the city day is short and dusky". The sun is above horizon barely six hours in Helsinki. In Oulu, a more northern town, the day only lasts for four hours and if you move further north still the sun doesn't come up at all.

The article was about the negative effects of darkness, such as depression, weight gain, constant tiredness. It said that although only 1% of population in Finland can be diagnosed with major seasonal depression, about 40% of those above 30 have some of the adverse symptoms at least. November and January are the worst months, December is a little easier because of the Christmas spirit, candles, artificial lights etc. Whenever there is snow it helps by reflecting the little daylight there is, but as a result of global warming or something else it seems that we have less and less proper white snow each year. When the polar darkness sets, people sleep 1-3 hours more than they do during summers and still don't feel refreshed in the mornings, and they seem to crave more food in general and sweets & chocolate in particular. Plus they avoid exercise and prefer to stay indoors just nesting.

Well, nothing in the article was news exactly, the same story appears in papers each year around this time. We are still somewhat at nature's mercy, the yearly cycle affects us no matter how much we fight it. Maybe the root of the problem is that we fight. In the agricultural Finland few decades ago people accepted the nature's rhythm, they were busy sowing and reaping in the summer but when the winter set there was not much that could be done except sleep. These days we are expected to be active and cheerful all year round and who's able to do that, without daylight, all our hormones and internal clocks telling us that it's night?

The photo in the article shows the main street in downtown Helsinki at 10am. The dawn is breaking and the sun is slowly creeping up but on the street down below, between the buildings blocking the rays of light, it is still pitch black.