University of Tampere (UTA)

In Finland almost everybody speaks at least some English so I had no greater difficulties at this. After a while I became familiar with inscriptions and packages of the products and I could communicate through Internet with the majority because the use of it is wide-spread and services are offered in a big quantity here. Just one thing that is a Finnish feature - they don't seem to be very talkative and never start converstation first!

my fluency in English..deteriorated a bit since all internationals spoke s.c. Erasmus English. at the other side, i've learnt to write serious essays in English. Finnish: trying to study Finnish made me feel more comfortable, as i was in Finland. nontheless, it did not help me much to be able to communicate w/ locals in their native language. All in all, i'm very happy i had a chance to learn a bit of that not so often heard language.

My major was finnish and after that year I could already manage very well in it. The finnish people I could talk with were helpful and very nice. The lecturer in finnish language didn't want to talk in english even if we sometimes didn't understand and it is the best way to be motivated to learn.

The language is very difficult, and I couldn't get the hang of it in one semester. Most beginners stuggled.However, Finns acknowledge this and speak english but they are glad to hear a few basic phrases make the effor tand get into the culture in other ways.

at first time I had fear because I didn´t speak english so well, but I have got a good level for being able to solve all problems that I had got. However It was difficult trying to learn finnish because they use another alphabet and a so strange grammar.

Most young Finns speak english, this is pretty good. However, speaking to begin with is not their strong suit, so it was challenging to make Finnish friends even if they spoke English. I really recommend learning some basic Finnish.