95-year-old Elma Koskinen lives in our building in Pohjois-Haaga, Helsinki. We visited her to ask how she was doing and to talk about living here.
– Things have been going quite well. After all, age is just a number, almost a hundred, she smiles.
She is pleased that she can live at home and meet her neighbors. In her opinion, the best things about the building are the good neighbors and excellent transport connections.
– All the neighbors are friendly and helpful. As I have sometimes written: “friendships must exist.” If you want to live to an old age, your friendships must be in order.
– It’s certainly pleasant to grow old here, she laughs heartily.
Every Wednesday, neighbors have coffee together
The elderly residents of Elma Koskinen’s home building meet every Wednesday. Every other meeting is a club for elderly care.
– If there’s no club, we hold our own. We just chat. We drink coffee. Everyone takes turns bringing something to go with the coffee, just one kind. I always look forward to Wednesday, Elma says.
If needed, neighbors also help each other.
– We call each other on the phone. And Kari, who lives next door, always knocks and asks if I need anything.
When the weather permits, the residents sit in the yard and meet each other. In addition, Elma’s children visit often.
– As soon as the ground thaws, I can go for a walk with my rollator, she states.
Comfortable living at home
Elma’s cozily furnished apartment has a bedroom and a living room-kitchen combination. Photographs of relatives and a pot of yellow daffodils are arranged on the bookshelf. A grandfather clock ticks.
– I heat the food brought to me in the kitchen, she says.
Near the building is a rhododendron park, where many varieties of rhododendrons grow.
– When my friend and I go there, we have coffee in a thermos. There are benches, and it’s nice to watch the squirrels run in the trees.
Among the first residents of the Haaga building
Pohjois-Haaga Setlementtiasunnot was completed in 2006. Elma Koskinen has lived in the building since the beginning and previously in Malmi Setlementtiasunnot.
– I’m like an original inhabitant, she quips.
Her life, she says, has progressed quite pleasantly. She moved to Helsinki from Iisalmi at the age of 17.
– I placed a small ad in Helsingin Sanomat, saying I was looking for a job where I could work with cows.
She found a job.
– Then love took over, she recalls.
From 2006, a vivid memory comes to mind regarding the new Setlementtiasunnot building. At that time, she still drove a car herself.
– Someone here said then, “It’s going to be warm, said old Elma, who still drives a car.”
She laughs.
