A small meaningful moment touches you and a thought arises?
Swimming in the Kvarken Sea, the archipelago atmosphere is enchanting
“A golf course, a ski jumping hill, a fitness track, a chewing track, two teams practicing soccer,” my friend walks around and lists what he sees in disbelief. My friend is from Germany, we haven’t seen each other in 30 years. We are standing at the Vöyri sports field on an August evening. The evening is cool.
“Why would we have a field like this in the countryside?” The field belongs to Norrvalla Campus. The training center, created in cooperation between the municipality of Vöyri and Folkhällsan, allows young people to combine sports and education regardless of where they live. There is top-level training for football players, orienteers and skiers. In addition to training, you can complete upper secondary school or graduate to a profession, such as a sports counselor, masseuse or personal trainer. Most students live in a dormitory for weeks.
“Finland is a country of contrasts. A lot is done differently than in Germany. The countryside benefits from strong municipalities,” I explain to my friend. In the evening I show her the silence. We go swimming in the Kvarken, we sleep in old beds, the archipelago farm is enchanting. The summer holidays are over. There are no people in sight.
Rainy day and omega 3
We get up early in the morning. Today is a working day. I have to visit a dairy farm in Ostrobothnia. The farm has participated in my research on milk quality on Finnish farms. For half a year, I have monitored the operations of 14 farms and taken milk samples to Germany for analysis. The end result was that in Finland, the differences in the fatty acid composition of milk are much smaller than in Central Europe. Still, there are farms whose milk contains omega-3 and CLA concentrations that are twice the average. If the omega-3 content of milk were generally as high as in the cows in the Northern Finnish herd on the farm we visited, the discussion around milk fat would be different. Milk could almost replace fish in ensuring sufficient omega-3 intake for humans. Today, I want to interview the farm's people about their livestock feeding practices and photograph the animals. The intention is to publish the research data as a video documentary.
The weather is not in our favor. It's pouring rain. But the hostess is very happy to welcome us, and my friend thinks everything is new, exciting and interesting.
The owner lets a herd of 30 cows out to pasture. The animals low, resist, run, come close, push each other and sniff the milky sap. My friend takes over my camera. He aims and focuses. The stream of images never seems to end.
If cows could talk
The journey home is marked by lively conversation. Finland and the cows had touched, changed something inside my friend. “I haven’t been this relaxed in years!” my friend sighs happily, before boarding the ship in the port of Turku. A rainbow is visible in the sky.
In that moment, it is born: An idea for an exhibition event that takes cows to city dwellers and a piece of Finland to Germany .
A look into the future
The text above was published in the early days of the project on July 3, 2018. After numerous cancelled exhibitions in 2020 - 2021, we are looking forward to a full summer of If Cows Could Talk !
May Mynä-Mynä-Maa (Opening 20-22.5)
June MTK Central Ostrobothnia 100th anniversary! (Opening 9.6 Kalajoki)
July The celebrations continue! (Opening 1.7 Kokkola & 11.7 Kaustinen)
August The exhibition visits Wiershausen, Germany.
Photo: Juha Laitalainen