Well, that was quite the weekend in Duluth (or 5 days, if you were one of the lucky ones to participate in all 5 days of programming!). FinnFest is a time to make new connections, while saying Terve! to the people you know well already. It is never the same year to year, but it is always a powerful driver of new connections and edification of continued ones.

This FinnFest was arguably the most fruitful for me personally. It was the first one since attending as a teenager where the festival was open to me to explore without strong affiliation to any one particular organization. I was a vapaa lintu (free bird) and I loved it. As expected, familiar faces were around every corner, but there were also many new folks to meet — Finns and friends of Finland alike.