Lapland

Painting of Sami Culture

Our primary visit today was the SIIDA Sami Museum in Inari. The starting point was a picture of a 1723 which represented Sami culture: skiing, herding and milking reindeer. Today there are about 100,000 Sami who speak nine different languages. The language and culture had been suppressed in modern times, but all three Finnish versions of the language (Inarii, Northern and Skolt) are now taught in the schools along with Finnish, Swedish and English.

Bear Trap

I found the outdoor even more fascinating with their cabins, portable tents and storage huts to keep the stores from animals as well as a variety of traps: wolf, wolverine, bear, and fox, which captured their feet as they stretched for the bait. I also got to practice lassoing a reindeer with soupinkik, their version of a lasso.

Sami with Soupinkik

Then we visited the Inari reindeer farm. Here we had the chance to feed the reindeer. About 10% of reindeer are albino. Both male and female have antlers, but the female lose them sooner, right after giving birth. Most reindeer meat comes from calves, slaughtered in the winter, largely to control the population, but the locals told us they prefer the taste of adults. Reindeer can be trained to pull sleighs, but it takes about 5 years. (So it's sleigh or be slain.) The farmers clip the ears of their reindeer to recognize their herd members. We were lucky because it has been a cold spring. The mosquitoes aren't here, the reindeer will move to higher ground with more wind until the mosquitoes die off in late August.

Albino Reindeer