Ii, Finland

Ii (Swedish: Ijo) is a municipality of Finland.

It is situated by the Bothnian Bay, at the mouth of river Iijoki, and it is part of the Northern Ostrobothnia region. The municipality has a population of 9,671 (30 June 2015) and covers an area of 2,809.23 square kilometres (1,084.65 sq mi) of which 1,256.69 km² (485.21 sq mi) is water. The population density is 6.23 inhabitants per square kilometre (16.1/sq mi).

The municipality is unilingually Finnish.

Ii merged with Kuivaniemi on 1 January 2007. The formed municipality is called Ii but it adopted the coat of arms of Kuivaniemi. Ii is notable for having the shortest place name in Finland, and also one of the shortest ones in the world. The etymology is not definitively established; options are either Germanic origin or Sami origin. In the latter, it would mean "a place to stay overnight in"; cf. Northern Sami idja "night".

Beginning in 2008, Ii is home to the ART Ii Biennale of Northern Environmental and Sculpture Art, an international art fair.

Finland

Finland (ⁱ/ˈfɪnlənd/; Finnish: Suomi [suomi]; Swedish: Finland [ˈfɪnland]), officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, a peninsula with Gulf of Finland to the south and Gulf of Bothnia to the west. It has land borders with Sweden and Norway to the north and Russia to the east. Finland is part of the geographic region of Fennoscandia, which also includes Scandinavia and parts of Russia.

Finland's population is 5.5 million (2014), staying roughly on the same level with only about 9% increase in 24 years since the last economic depression in 1990. The majority live in the southern regions. The single largest group of foreigners living in Finland are Russians and Estonians, 36% of all of the foreigners (2014). In terms of area, it is the eighth largest country in Europe and the most sparsely populated country in the European Union. Finland is a parliamentary republic with a central government based in the capital Helsinki, local governments in 317 municipalities, and an autonomous region, the Åland Islands. Over 1.4 million people live in the Greater Helsinki metropolitan area, which produces a third of the country's GDP. Other large cities include Tampere, Turku, Oulu, Jyväskylä, Lahti, and Kuopio.

Finland (comedy song)

"Finland" is a Monty Python comedy song written and performed by Michael Palin and arranged by John Du Prez with a guitar accompaniment. It features on Monty Python's Contractual Obligation Album from 1980, is also included on the CD Monty Python Sings, and was incorporated into the musical Spamalot.

It purports to be a celebration of Finland, a country that is overlooked when travelling abroad as "a poor second to Belgium", despite the fact that it "has it all" with lofty mountains and tall trees and pleasures including: pony trekking, camping or "just watching TV". In reality "mountains so lofty" are not characteristic of Finland as the Scandinavian Mountains only just touch the northwesternmost corner of the country.

Palin gave an impromptu rendition of the song while travelling through Finland for the 1992 travel documentary Pole to Pole.

References

Finland (European Parliament constituency)

In European elections, Finland is a constituency of the European Parliament, currently represented by thirteen MEPs. It covers the member state of Finland.

2014 election

The 2014 European election was the eight election to the European Parliament. Finland's representation remained at 13 MEPs.

2009 election

The 2009 European election was the seventh election to the European Parliament. The number of seats was decreased to thirteen.

MEPs 2009-2014

At the end of the Seventh European Parliament:

2004 election

The 2004 European election was the sixth election to the European Parliament.

Both the Finnish Social Democratic Party and the Finnish Centre Party improved their vote at the expense of the conservative National Coalition Party and the Greens.

1999 election

The 1999 European election was the fifth election to the European Parliament.

1996 election

This was the first European election in Finland.

References

External links