Boys vs Girls

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What's so special about Johnny Depp?

[Tal]

How to Make Money Fast
Need a little extra cash in a hurry? Follow these steps and you're bound to have a fuller pocket by the end of the week. It may not be much, and it may not be reliable, but your options are limited if you're short on time. Later, you can read up on long-term ways to make money. Otherwise, hurry up and follow these steps so you can make money ASAP!


Consider day labor. There are employment agencies that specialize in this type of arrangement, and you can get paid at the end of the workday. The jobs you find through an agency can vary, but are usually in construction, factories, offices, and manufacturing. An alternative to finding day labor is to go where other day laborers meet (usually street corners or parking lots) and wait for employers (building contractors, landscapers, home owners and small business owners). If you go the non-agency route, you might get paid in cash. You can also check your local newspaper or internet classifieds to find quick labor gigs, like painting, mowing, or moving work. When considering a day labor opportunity, keep in mind that less formal arrangements could result in you not getting paid or worse, you getting injured without any kind of compensation.

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Finland
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Finland en-us-Finland.ogg /ˈfɪnlənd/ (help·info), officially the Republic of Finland (Suomi_Finland.ogg Finnish: Suomi; Swedish: Finland (help·info)), is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of northern Europe. It borders Sweden on the west, Russia on the east, and Norway on the north, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland. The capital city is Helsinki.

Around 5.3 million people reside in Finland, with the majority concentrated in the southern part of the country. It is the eighth largest country in Europe in terms of area and the most sparsely populated country in the European Union. The native language for most of the population is Finnish, a member of the Finno-Ugric language family most closely related to Estonian, and is one of only four official EU languages not of Indo-European origin. The other official language of Finland, Swedish, is the mother tongue of 5.5 percent of the population. Finland is a democratic, parliamentary republic with a mostly Helsinki-based central government and local governments in 348 municipalities. A total of a million residents live in Greater Helsinki (including Helsinki, Espoo and Vantaa) and a third of the country's GDP is produced there. Other major cities include Tampere, Turku, Oulu, Jyvنskylن and Lahti.

Finland was historically a part of Sweden and from 1809 an autonomous Grand Duchy within the Russian Empire. Finland's declaration of independence from Russia in 1917 was followed by a civil war, wars against the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, and a period of official neutrality during the Cold War. Finland joined the United Nations in 1955 and the European Union in 1995 and participates in the Eurozone. Finland has been ranked the second most stable country in the world, in a survey based on social, economic, political, and military indicators.

Finland has good results in many international comparisons of national performance such as the share of high-technology manufacturing, public education, health care, the rate of gross domestic product growth, and the protection of civil liberties.

According to archaeological evidence, the area now composing Finland was settled at the latest around 8500 BCE during the Stone Age as the ice shield of the last ice age receded. The artifacts the first settlers left behind present characteristics that are shared with those found in for example Estonia, Russia and Norway. The earliest people were hunter-gatherers, using stone tools. There is also evidence of carved stone animal heads. The first pottery appeared in 3000 BCE when settlers from the East brought in the Comb Ceramic culture. The arrival of the Corded Ware culture in southern coastal Finland between 3,000–2,500 BCE coincided with the start of agriculture. Even with the introduction of agriculture, hunting and fishing continued to be important parts of the subsistence economy, especially in the northern and eastern parts of the country.[citation needed]

The Bronze Age (1500–500 BCE) and Iron Age (500 BCE–1200 CE) were characterised by extensive contacts with other cultures in the Fennoscandian and Baltic regions. There is no consensus on when Finno-Ugric languages and Indo-European languages were first spoken in the area of contemporary Finland.

The first verifiable written documents appeared in the 12th century.


Swedish era (1249–1809)

Swedish speaking settlers arrived in the coastal regions during the medieval time. Swedish kings established their rule in 1249. Swedish became the dominant language of the nobility, administration and education; Finnish was chiefly a language for the peasantry, clergy and local courts in predominantly Finnish-speaking areas. The Bishop of Turku was the most socially pre-eminent person in Finland before the Reformation.

During the Reformation, the Finns gradually converted to Lutheranism. In the 16th century, Mikael Agricola published the first written works in Finnish. The first university in Finland, The Royal Academy of Turku, was established in 1640. Finland suffered a severe famine in 1696-1697 and almost one third of the population died. In the 18th century, wars between Sweden and Russia led to the occupation of Finland twice by Russian forces, known to the Finns as the Greater Wrath (1714–1721) and the Lesser Wrath (1742–1743). By this time Finland was the predominant term for the whole area from the Gulf of Bothnia to the Russian border.


Russian Empire era

On March 29, 1809, after being taken over by the armies of Alexander I of Russia in the Finnish War, Finland became an autonomous Grand Duchy in the Russian Empire until the end of 1917. During the Russian era, the Finnish language started to gain recognition. From the 1860s onwards, a strong Finnish nationalist movement, known as the Fennoman movement, grew. Milestones included the publication of what would become Finland's national epic, the Kalevala, in 1835, and the Finnish language achieving equal legal status with Swedish in 1892.

The Finnish famine of 1866–1868 killed 15 percent of the population, making it one the largest famines in European history. The famine led the Russian Empire to ease financial regulations, and investment rose in following decades. Economic and political development was rapid.The GDP per capita was still a half of United States and a third of Great Britain.

In 1906, universal suffrage was adopted in the Grand Duchy of Finland. However, the relationship between the Grand Duchy and the Russian Empire soured when the Russian government made moves to restrict Finnish autonomy. For example, the universal suffrage was, in practice, virtually meaningless, since the emperor did not have to approve any of the laws adopted by the Finnish parliament. Desire for independence gained ground, first among radical liberals and socialists.


Language

Most of the Finnish people (92 percent) speak Finnish as their mother tongue. Finnish is a member of the Baltic-Finnic subgroup of the Uralic languages and is typologically between inflected and agglutinative languages. It modifies and inflects the forms of nouns, adjectives, pronouns, numerals and verbs, depending on their roles in the sentence. In practice, this means that instead of prepositions and prefixes there is a great variety of different suffixes and that compounds form a considerable percentage of the vocabulary of Finnish. It has been estimated that approximately 65–70 percent of all words in Finnish are compounds. A close linguistic relative to the Finnish language is Estonian, which, though similar in many aspects, is not mutually intelligible with it. These languages, together with Hungarian (all members of the Uralic language family), are the primary non-Indo-European languages spoken in Europe. Finland is one of three independent countries where a Uralic language is spoken by the majority, the other two being Estonia and Hungary.

The largest minority language and the second official language is Swedish spoken by 5.6 percent of the population. Other minority languages are Russian (0.8 percent), Estonian (0.3 percent), Finnish Romani, and Finnish Sign Language (spoken as a first language by 4,000–5,000 people). To the north, in Lapland, are also the Sami people, numbering around 7,000 and recognized as an indigenous people. About a quarter of them speak a Sami language as their mother tongue. There are three Sami languages that are spoken in Finland: Northern Sami, Inari Sami and Skolt Sami. The right of the minority groups (in particular Sami, Swedish-speaking Finns and Romani people) to cherish their culture and language is protected by the constitution.

In a 2005 Eurobarometer survey studying languages of the European Union, 60% percent of adult residents claimed to know English, 38% claimed to know Swedish as a second language (41% in 2008), and 17% claimed to know German. Ranking those claiming a knowledge of English, Finland ranked fifth behind Malta, the Netherlands (86%), Sweden (85%), and Denmark (83%). Relatively many Finns knew German, while relatively few knew French or Spanish.


Politics and government

The Constitution of Finland defines the political system. Finland is a representative democracy with a semi-presidential parliamentary system. Aside from state-level politics, residents use their vote in municipal elections and in the European Union elections.

According to the Constitution, the President is the head of state and responsible for foreign policy (which excludes affairs related to the European Union) in cooperation with the cabinet. Other powers include Commander-in-Chief, decree, and appointive powers. Direct vote is used to elect the president for a term of six years and maximum two consecutive terms. The current president is Tarja Halonen (SDP).

The 200-member unicameral Parliament of Finland exercises the supreme legislative authority in Finland. The parliament may alter laws, the constitution, bring about the resignation of the Council of State, and override presidential vetoes. Its acts are not subject to judicial review. Various parliament committees listen to experts and prepare legislation. Proportional vote in multi-seat constituencies is used to elect the parliament for a term of four years. The Speaker of Parliament is currently Sauli Niinistِ (National Coalition Party). The cabinet (the Finnish Council of State) exercises most executive powers. It is headed by the Prime Minister of Finland and includes other ministers and the Chancellor of Justice. Parliament majority decides its composition and a vote of no confidence can be used to modify it. The current prime minister is Matti Vanhanen (Centre Party).




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Whats going on??????!????!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!

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48.. dont knw !!

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[Clank]

what is happening to the world

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[GODA]

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Hello clank you have a new avatar. i like it.

[Clank]

Hey GODA, ahh its an old one really I used it back in October

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[Hitman]

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