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13.2.2006

Helsingin Sanomat’s views on Conan’s visit

Tags: Uncategorized — Author: @ 11:52 pm
 

What’s difficult about Helsingin Sanomat International Edition is that you never know if the story is regular news or an editorial – the two often blend with one another. Today’s article about Conan O’Brien’s visit is very much an editorial, with a dash of misleading journalism thrown in…

The similarity gag was taken a step further with a young O’Brien lookalike in attendance. The comic’s personal manager went and jotted down the details of 15-year-old Viktor Wikström for possible future engagements.
“Hey, you’re better looking than me”, said O’Brien.
“Absolutely”, replied Wickström.

He didn’t say “absolutely”, he said “yes”. See for yourself from videos of the press conference (video #3).

O’Brien began his press briefing with a few words in passable Finnish

Hardly. My girlfriend says there was only one word she didn’t understand. Watch the videos or listen to the audio and decide for yourself.

“Thank you, thank you”, he said to the room, displaying all the gestures of a visiting statesman. However, behind the role-playing one could see that the star was nervous and clearly astonished at the reception he had encountered. Close up, he could be seen blushing.

I dunno about “nervous” or “blushing”. I was two feet away from him for about 20 minutes. He was cool and calm, maybe a bit tired looking. He didn’t have his make-up on like on his TV show.

The show is aired on NBC and relayed – at a few days’ delay – to Finnish audiences via the teens & young adults cable/digital entertainment channel, subTV.

SubTV the teen and young adult channel? I’d like to hear how the author would describe YLE’s programming. Heh.

Finland is ultimately just another entry-stamp in Conan O’Brien’s passport: he has filmed past segments for his show in Canada, the Republic of Ireland, Germany, The Netherlands, and Australia.

No, I think Conan is quite sincere about his genuine curiosity and interest in Finland.

…and hey, don’t you think “phonetic” should be spelled with an ‘F’ ??

  • Perkele

    Maybe the Sanomat is lifting quotes from other sources…I found this article about 5 days ago, and if you look at the last paragraph, its EXACTLY the same as what Phil quoted on the post…

    a wee bit odd….

    http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2006-02-08-conan-obrien-finland_x.htm

  • iJusten
  • bluedr

    I was wondering about the same things as you pointed out in your article :) Thanks!

  • http://oldwhig.blogspot.com AErkkila

    The guy, Conan O’Brien I mean, probably probably has better command of Finnish than I do. I only get to practice with my mother-in-law, and we’re both a bit embarrassed by our ineptitude.

    I think it’s admirable that he was conscientious enough to learn as much as he did.

  • Paper

    Learn…? The guy had a phonetic paper to read from.

    Passable does not always mean understandable.

  • Hank W.

    Conan speaks Finnish like he was hairy and lived in a zoo, came on a really short bus and is on acid.:lol:

  • Joonas

    One reason for those inaccurate quotes is probably the fact that the Intl Ed story has been translated from Finnish, so the mistake was either made by the original journalist who translated Conan’s lines into Finnish or then by the Intl Ed guy who again translated those back to English.

    As for the last chapter, I noticed the same thing. Apparently Hesari used the AP story that has been run with CNN etc. as background information and failed to mention it – a common practise nowadays.

    As for Subtv, from their website: “Our main target group is young urban adults aged 15-44 years.” ;)

  • http://www.axis-of-aevil.net/ hfb

    If any of the Finns in the crowd understood even one word of what he was saying without saying MITÄ?, I’m never going to take shit from bitches in cafe’s who can’t understand my trying to order a ‘iso kahvia ja korvapuusti’.

    And SubTV is for teens/younger crowd. Think of it as the Ikea of TV channels since those who can afford Canal+ and other packages, do so and thus really don’t have a need for SubTV. YLE is for their parents, people who love documentaries and everyone else who can’t or won’t pay for digiboxes and cable.

    Joonas…doubtful that the HS translator fucked that one up as he’s a native English speaker so I’d guess the reporter either exaggerated or they just used the wire story, i.e. I don’t know that there was much Finnish in the mix. Either way, it’s not like the inaccuracies are that…important. :)

  • Eino-Vainaa

    “those who can afford Canal+ and other packages, do so and thus really don’t have a need for SubTV”

    Canal+ sucks, MacGyver rocks!!

    “YLE is for their parents, people who love documentaries and everyone else who can’t or won’t pay for digiboxes”

    But you can’t watch Uri Geller twisting spoons on YLE Teema without them dang digiboxes.

  • http://www.tundratabloid.blogspot.com KGS59

    One should know by now that the media, especially the written media, combines personal opinion with news stories on a regular basis. The fact that words were included into the story that never happened, is not due to translation problems, but the journalists own opinions.

    The ‘blushing’ of Conan (sounds like teen movie) is an obvious ‘tell tale’ sign of an over ambitious reporter trying to make a news story, instead of letting the news story tell itself.

  • Joonas

    Yeah, I really don’t see those small inaccuracies as a problem either.

    Subtv, or really it’s predecessor TVTV!, was originally started by the parent company MTV Oy as a competitor to Nelonen and also the underground cable channels MoonTV and ATV. As MTV had a lot of excess programming that they had got while buying shows for MTV3 (TV-shows aren’t often sold separately), they probably thought that they might as well make use of them. TVTV! started out with a lot of old sci-fi shows and it was also used to test new ideas like those horrible SMS chat shows that now seem to be everywhere.

    Late Night with Conan O’Brien,taht has been a part of the channel since it’s start, was probably the first “real” programme on TVTV! and the brainchild of Marko Kulmala, the managing director back then. He had previously worked as the executive producer of Jyrki, a daily music programme on MTV3 that was broadcasted live from Lasipalatsi in downtown Helsinki. The show was made in co-operation with Canada’s Much Music and before it’s cancellation it was located in the same space that Free Record Shop has it’s store in today.

    What was my point with all this? Dunno, got a bit carried away… ;) I like Conan and the other channels – even YLE – have good certain programmes too, but the flaccid Finnish TV scene could still use some new ideas like those that came from the tiny underground cable channels a few years back.

  • sarha

    Someone commented about Conan’s Finnish, that what he spoke could not be understood. I understood every word except one :D

  • http://www.finlandforthought.net Phil

    I’m never going to take shit from bitches in cafe’s who can’t understand my trying to order a ‘iso kahvia ja korvapuusti’.

    YEAH!!!! :-)

  • http://www.finlandforthought.net Phil

    heh, but the word that got lost in translation was “yes”. It doesn’t get any easier than that.

  • http://www.finlandforthought.net Phil

    Ryan O’Neal (in the guise of “Rodney Harrington” from Peyton Place), William Conrad (the creator of the role of overweight detective “Frank Cannon” in the long-running TV series of that name)…. Ken “Wiseguy” Wahl,

    Okay, I won’t cheat and Google this first – Who the fuck are Ryan O’Neal, William Conrad, and Ken “Wiseguy” Wahl? Am I too young for these shows or is it some British mumbojumbo?

  • mapleleaf

    …and hey, don’t you think “phonetic” should be spelled with an ‘F’ ??

    Ah, a classic :)
    - why is abbreviated such a long word?
    - one goose, two geese … one moose, two meese?

    There is a short amusing essay on this sutff: http://rogersreference.com/crazyenglish.htm
    and these are gems too…
    - The bandage was wound around the wound
    - It was a windy windy road
    - After a number of injections my jaw got number
    - Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear
    - The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert
    - I had to subject the subject to a series of tests
    - The buck does funny things when the does are present

  • Joonas

    Okay, I won’t cheat and Google this first – Who the fuck are Ryan O’Neal, William Conrad, and Ken “Wiseguy” Wahl? Am I too young for these shows or is it some British mumbojumbo?

    Hey, I remember William Conrad from the 80s show “Jake and the Fat Man” and even that Wiseguy show was on some years back, I think. And I’m not even that old, scary! :D

  • Ducky

    …and hey, don’t you think “phonetic” should be spelled with an ‘F’ ??

    Uh oh, actually no (heh, it rhymes). Grab your dictionary and check. It starts “ph” in English. There’s many words what makes you wonder “Ph” or “f” (photo -> foto etc.)

    What comes to understanding Conan’s Finnish, I understood it all, you just have to listen to it in a bit different way than you listen to native Finn to speak it. And I think it’s just great that he did something like that, Finnish after all is the world’s 3rd hardest language and when you compare pronouncing between Finnish and English – it’s totally different. And how many times you’ve wondered “what a…?” when some Finn has spoken English?
    So what’s the big deal?

    Keith Armstrong has lived in Finland for 25 yrs and still speaks Finnish in a weird way.

    And of HS comments… I don’t read such a garbage ;)
    ….just kidding.

    -Ducky

  • jenkki immigrant

    never had problem ordering coffee before, but once i went to the bar to get my old lady a cider. i had asked her what she wanted and she said “dry omena siideri”. i went to the bar and said “”drai” omena siideri”. the bartender opened 3 bottles before i noticed what he was doing, said some german-sounding grunts which i must assume were numbers, then said danke. i laughed my ass off..

  • jenkki immigrant

    oh, and the bottles do say “dry” on them in case no one has noticed.

  • A Finn

    The meanings have greatly changed from the article in Finnish. The problem with turning Finnish into English is that English lacks a lot of words conserning the same thing in a different perspective, so there may only be negative one/two-word ways to express a Finnish word with a “pretty good, but not perfect”-meaning*, or only positive one/two-word expressions for a “absolute crap, but there’s a bit of positive about it”**.

    *reference to articles “passable Finnish”
    **reference to the way too positive phrase “it was ok” I’ve seen in all kinds of music review translations

  • Anonymous

    What else SubTV is than a teen channel? There’s hardly anything worth watching on MTV3, SubTV etc. At least YLE has scientific documents and culture programs, not commercial crap like MTV3 and SubTV.

  • http://www.axis-of-aevil.net/ hfb

    Christ, I must be getting old as I know who Ryan O’Neil is (as in Tatum’s father) and William Conrad from the Cannon series in the 70′s.

    And Jenkki Immigrant :) Quite funny. For some reason I’ve never had a problem ordering booze. Maybe when I’m drunk I speak Finnish as she is most often spoken and understood…with a slur :D

  • Miriam

    Wiseguy was a TV-series in the late 80′s and possibly early 90′s, where Ken Wahl played an undercover cop who infiltrated the Mob.
    Ken Wahl was, I believe, brought to Finland by the celeb manager Hessu Reijonen, who was also later responsible for inundating us with Bold and Beautiful people.
    I do have hazy memories that Wahl, too, was flown around Finland in a helicopter from tanssilava to tanssilava some Midsummer Night back in the days. He was also chronically drunk, which is why he made some headlines misbehavin’ around Finland.

  • Hank W.

    Keith Armstrong has lived in Finland for 25 yrs and still speaks Finnish in a weird way.

    Yes, but then again we have Neil Hardwick ;)

  • Pave

    Haven’t seen anyone post this link yet so… It’s Conan on the Today Show. http://video.msn.com/v/us/msnbc.htm?f=00&g=43db59e5-4931-4aef-9094-beee16d7b76e&t=m5&p=Source_Today%20Show

    Not the same Conan i’m used to seeing, seems kinda nervous too… :P
    Btw, is that press conference footage yours Phil? At least it was taken very close to you. That laughter sounds familiar… :)

  • M
  • M
  • Ducky

    “By Hank W. Yes, but then again we have Neil Hardwick”

    Ah yes. Englishman who speaks Finnish better than any of us Finns.

  • jorma6484242

    no one speaks finnish better than me

  • kyrasantae

    Can someone let me know what Conan was attempting to say (in Finnish) and what it means in English?

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