On a squally morning, as the restless Baltic swept past my cabin, I awoke in a state of hazy semi-consciousness, briefly having no idea where on earth I was. And the Åland Islands were not helping one bit.
The day before I’d cycled and sailed to Silverskär to assume the mantle of ‘Robinson Crusoe of the Baltics’; to be alone on my own tiny island. I’d wished ‘god dag’ to people who spoke Swedish and possessed names like Karlström and Björklund. Yet, as I woke fully, I remembered: I was in Finland. Well, kind of.
Several shades of grey surround the cultural identity of the Swedish-speaking Åland Islands, which in 2021 mark 100 years of being awarded autonomy within Finland. This archipelago of 6,757 islands – only 60 of which are inhabited – lies like rune stones scattered from a Viking’s pouch across the mid-Baltic, between Sweden’s east coast and Turku, on Finland’s western shore. For centuries the islands were occupied by the powerful Swedish kingdom but, after the Swedes lost the Finnish War to Russia in 1809, the Ålands were subsumed into the Russified Grand Duchy of Finland. This status quo remained until Finnish independence in 1918, which left the Swedes and Finns arguing over the Ålands. The League of Nations intervened and, in
