We moved into Syrjärinne, the Häkkinen family home, about ten years ago. It is an old, rather modest, wooden house that was surrounded by bare earth, a few shrubs, a potato patch and many beautiful trees. My wife Aino started work at once and has, with dogged determination, built a wild rambling garden to which she is still adding. There are sunken lawns, corners where raspberries grow, wild flowers, exotic creepers and a main lawn nearly 200 metres long and 50 metres wide. She did most of this alone and under the most difficult of conditions.

Many days the noise from the sand quarry on the border was so loud that she had to retreat into the house and close the doors and windows. We called in the Health Authorities to measure the wildly excessive sound level. To start with, every time they came, the noise miraculously dropped to tolerable levels or even stopped all together. However, a new inspector was able to carry out measurements and the nuisance was reduced when the company was forced to cover the chute on the main noise making device, a sand sifter, with neoprene. This helped to some extent. But we were labelled as trouble makers, and far worse, by the owner of the factory when we opposed further development of this commercial venture. The company is an important employer and contributes much benefit to the community. They employ some 70 people and the resulting tax contributions were enough reason alone for the Toivakka Town Council to smile upon them. The result was that our complaints were never taken seriously and things were said about us in public that were quite libellous. One of the Mayors of Toivakka left his job and went to work for the cement company where he stayed for many years.

Now the noise nuisance is becoming bad again. Last night (July 21, 2003) for example, work went on until well after midnight. The noise was appalling and we could not get to sleep. It was so bad that a neighbour across the main road complained, as did I, to the Council this morning. The company has a permit to work from 06:00 to 22:00 on weekdays. These hours are ridiculous in any case and contravene European Union rules. They work on Saturdays and have even worked on Sunday. Sometimes, when the big green excavator shown in a later picture works near our border this whole house shakes, dust falls from the ceilings and I shut down my PC in case the hard drives crash. Microscopy, or photography, is out of the question then.

For some time things had been barely tolerable. But the previous owner died and his heirs are running the company. A purchase of stock by an outside group may have caused the recent rapid expansion of the excavations which has resulted in huge dumps of sand being created within 25 metres of our Northern border. The nearest of these is taller than the roof of this house. Now, when the wind blows from the North, or North West, fine sand is deposited on our yard and house ... lots of it. I have set up a flat PVC covered table-top in the yard. It can be seen in the first picture above. I cleaned the surface carefully and within 8 hours on June 28, 2003, was able to recover ~15 grams of sand per square metre. This was a breezy day. Since then the wind has blown hard and the amount once rose to more than 31 grams per square metre. These huge dumps have been deliberately placed as close to our border as possible, with total disregard for our comfort, health or welfare. Furthermore, the men who work in the pit, without protection from the dust, are also at risk. Silicosis is a dangerous, irreversable and fatal disease and I discuss this matter, and the nature of the sand particles, in 'Part IV'.

We can no longer open windows when it's hot. If the wind is blowing from the pit to here we have to sit inside and stew; going out results in eyes and mouths full of sand. I don't like grilled steak covered in grit. A few days ago I found the window-sill of my study covered with a layer of sand about 2 mm thick. The Mayor of Toivakka, at my insistence, came to see it for himself and in the face of this irrefutable evidence has since contacted the factory people. So far nothing has been done. I collected more than 3 grams of sand from the sill later that morning.