[.38sw]

I have a cousin who lives in Finland and teaches English to college students. He doesn't have much nice to stay about his students - he calls them dumb cows, and says that they lack in initiative, drive and creativity. He assessment is that since the government provides so many "services" for them, they don't need to have any drive or ambition. He was in the US recently for a visit, and he and his wife shopped like crazy to buy things that were unavailable there - things like large, fluffy towels! His descriptions of life there make me very happy I live here in the US.

[tertiary01]

I worked for awhile with a nurse that emigrated from Finland. She was always checking up on what the other nurses on the unit were doing and comparing her work loads to the others. As a result she was always behind in her work and trying to get the other nurses to pickup part of her caseload.
When I would bring up how she was always putting herself behind, she would say that in Finland the workloads would be apportioned equally, that there would be a supervisor to insure this outcome, and she was just checking to make sure it was done that way here. No amount of argument could pursuade her that this was futile and a waste of her time.
It was exasperating working with this person, as she spent so much time nonproductively. I eventually moved to another unit to save my sanity.