History
Before the 2006 victory, Finland was considered by many as the ultimate under-achiever of Eurovision. It has placed last a total of nine times and scored "nul points" (zero points) three times. Finland's entry in 1982, "Nuku pommiin" by Kojo, was one of only fifteen songs since the modern scoring system was instituted in 1975 to earn no points. (Norway has placed last eleven times and scored zero points four times, but it has also won three times.)
During the 1990s and early 2000s, Finland was arguably the country most affected by the various relegation schemes designed to limit the number of participants allowed to participate in each year's contest. Due to low results, Finland was excluded from the contest in 1995, 1997, 1999, 2001 and 2003. Before 2006, there even was a popular joke circulating in Finland, where a man frees a genie from a bottle:
- Genie: Thanks for freeing me! I will now grant you one wish.
- Man: Bring the Finnish Karelia back to Finland!
- Genie: That's too big a wish, maybe a smaller one?
- Man: OK, let Finland win the Eurovision Song Contest even once!
- Genie: Hmm... let me see that map again...
Read more about this topic: Finland In The Eurovision Song Contest
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“I am ashamed to see what a shallow village tale our so-called History is. How many times must we say Rome, and Paris, and Constantinople! What does Rome know of rat and lizard? What are Olympiads and Consulates to these neighboring systems of being? Nay, what food or experience or succor have they for the Esquimaux seal-hunter, or the Kanaka in his canoe, for the fisherman, the stevedore, the porter?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“A poet’s object is not to tell what actually happened but what could or would happen either probably or inevitably.... For this reason poetry is something more scientific and serious than history, because poetry tends to give general truths while history gives particular facts.”
—Aristotle (384–323 B.C.)
“All history is a record of the power of minorities, and of minorities of one.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)