Work & Live in the Finnish Lapland
Lapland, the area of Finland located above the Arctic Circle, is probably as Magic as Expensive. If you are willing to enjoy its beautiful winter on a budget, consider the possibility to work and live there for the Christmas season.
LITTLE RULE about expensive stuff: if you can’t afford it, try to GET PAID to do it!
How to find a job in Lapland
I have to admit I have been pretty lucky with this one. I was randomly looking for new adventures. it popped into my mind the Santa Claus Village.
When I was a kid my mum was willing to plan a family trip there, but she finally didn’t because of the crazy expensive cost. Wandering around websites I eventually ended up in their jobs section, and applied for a Christmas Season position. The idea of being able to write Christamas elf on my resume made me so excited that I put all the available locations as choice in the application form. Obviously, I had no clue of where all that places were, and how to reach them.
Meeting Santa and his elves in their homeland is surely on top of many people’s bucket list, especially children. But what about being one of them?
Moving to Lapland
In a couple of weeks I got an email to plan a skype interview, and a few days later a long call. I have been finally hired not as an elf (too bad!), but as Activity guide.
They did not send me to the famous Rovaniemi Village, but to a small holiday place called Saariselka.
Pretty exciting.. until when I realized I had to find a way to get there. A one-way flight from Italy to the closest Ivalo airport was about 400 euros, spread over something like 5 flights around Europe along 25 hours of travelling.
But giving up is something I forbid myself to do. And I could not wait to move to a place I had never heard before.
Luckily, after the usual researches, I found a more reasonable solution: a flight to Helsinki, a 12 hours bus to Rovaniemi and other 4 after 2 hours spent waiting there. That way was actually as reasonable as it can be a totally 18 hours long bus journey, but at least I could save half of the price.
Then I got there without even know what to expect: I didn’t asked many questions, I just knew I was going to have a place to sleep and a job 250 kilometers above the Arctic Circle, no matter what or how it was going to be.
Start working in Lapland
The first days were all about training and playing in the snow. But I have to admit the work itself was not really the most exciting. As activity guides we basically had to spend the whole day standing in the cold: telling the kids how to ride the toboggans, use the mini skidoos, cross the road and so on, with some shoveling in between. Not the exact definition of guiding.
Thinking about it now, it is not so difficult to understand why they don’t let someone just arrived in such a peculiar environment effectively guiding people. But some guys left disappointed anyways.
But for me the work itself was just a small side of the experience, an added value (and with value I mean salary) to my experience of living in a Winter Wonderland.
Living the Lappish life
On top of that, we had the pleasure to stay priceless in pretty fancy accomodations with traditional saunas and swimmingpool. The possibility to rent the company’s winter gears for free, and a few holiday weeks both before and after the working season to just enjoy the place. And all the best activities Lapland has to offer
I really had the best time especially during the last two weeks, exploring every corner of the National park on the skis before jumping in the most relaxing sauna.
Again, for some of us that free time was just a pointless waste. Same fact, different way of looking at it. It always changes everything.
The working days in the north
It has been a pretty intensive working season: 6 weeks leaving the house in early morning to return after 12 hours, always in the dark. One weekly day off, the bus stopping at the supermarket only on monday, wednesday, and friday. Around 10 hours spent in the freezing cold with just a 20 minutes lunch break. And the same “spaghetti bolognese” waiting for us every day, slightly killing my italian soul.
Being “behind the scenes” also didn’t really encouraged my Christmas spirit.
The final blow has probably been realizing that the big drunk guy we have been singing karaoke with was Santa Claus!
But at least I was happy to not being working as an elf. I don’t really get how those guys were able to jump around, laugh and scream with funny voices for all day every day. And in most cases keep doing it in the pub at night.
I started to believe they were real eves!
I was pretty enthusiast about the whole scenario, but that would have been too much even for me.
The live and work overall experience
Like pretty much everything, working for a big company and with so many people has its good and bad sides:
I have really enjoyed having lots of mates from all Europe to share this experience with. Checking that everyone was ready on time for the morning bus. Watching a movie or playing cards together after dinner. Sharing recipes, going to ice-swimming in the morning or to party in the night. Hunting Auroras during the coldest evenings and swapping position at work when the day was getting too boring.
Of course sometimes the cohabitation is not so easy, especially when it happens to have a very tiny kitchen and coming back all together starved by a long day in the cold. But having someone waving when driving by the loneliness of the small ice fishing lake, starting a snowball fight when the boss is not around or a toboggan-race at the end of the day, bring surely an added value!
I can say I had pretty good time working in Lapland.
Letting the idea of the warming sauna waiting at home before a lovely evening to spend with my friends and housemates. Or planning the Winter Adventure for the next free day, relievingly guiding me through even the thoughest, coldest or darkest day.
Especially before the Karaoke night!
Thank you for taking the time to read this post!
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