Finland - Ostrobothnia - Kaskinen

Kaskinen, an island in west coast of Finland.

Sent by Alisa from Järvenpää, Finland.

Kaskinen (Finnish: [ˈkɑskinen]; Swedish: Kaskö) is a town and island in Finland, located on the west coast of the country. Kaskinen is situated in Ostrobothnia, along the Gulf of Bothnia. The population of Kaskinen approximately 1,000, while the sub-region has a population of approximately 17,000. It is the 284th most populous municipality in Finland.

Kaskinen covers an area of 10.64 km² (4.11 sq mi) (excluding sea areas) of which 0.16 km² (0.062 sq mi) is inland water (1 January 2018). The population density is 120.11/km² (311.1/sq mi).

Kaskinen is a bilingual municipality with Finnish and Swedish as its official languages. The population consists of 55% Finnish speakers, 28% Swedish speakers, and 17% speakers of other languages, which is well above the national average (read more).

Finland - Vaasa

Multiviews of Vaasa in Finland.

Sent by Paula, a postcrosser from Finland.

This is from Wikipedia : Vaasa (Swedish: Vasa) is a city on the west coast of Finland. It received its charter in 1606, during the reign of Charles IX of Sweden and is named after the Royal House of Vasa. Today, Vaasa has a population of 59,670 (31 January 2011) (approximately 90,000 in the Vaasa sub-region), and is the regional capital of Ostrobothnia (Swedish: Österbotten, Finnish: Pohjanmaa).

The city is bilingual with 69.8% of the population speaking Finnish as their first language and 24.8% speaking Swedish. The city is an important centre for Finland-Swedish culture.

Over the years, Vaasa has changed its name several times, due to alternative spellings, political decisions and language condition changes. At first it was called Mustasaari or Mussor after the village where it was founded in 1606, but just a few years later the name was changed to Wasa to honor the royal Swedish lineage. Mustasaari (Finnish) or Korsholm (Swedish) remains as the name of the surrounding mostly rural municipality, which since 1973 surrounds the city. The city was known as Wasa between 1606 and 1855, Nikolaistad (Swedish) and Nikolainkaupunki (Finnish) between 1855 and 1917, Vasa (Swedish) and Vaasa (Finnish) beginning from 1917, with the Finnish name being the primary name from ca 1930 when Finnish speakers became the majority in the city.