Oh and I dissagree with the "good taste of the Swedish media" as they were bashing finnish team before the game. And even after only the other paper admided they were wrong. But the other went on bashing Finland for only ever winnig wc twice.
I don't see the people celebrating in the streets as idiots. I think it's cool to show your happines. I think what happened was that people didn't really know what to do with themselfs they were so happy. So they did everything, acting like monkeys running around. I celebrated by going to sleep, but people have different ways of doing things. Also I think in Finland winnig world cup in ice hockey is bigger deal than the olympics. All my life growing up I've been hearing about that magical thing that happened in 1995 (I cannot remember it myself) And it was hard to imagine that it could happen again, since I cannot remember it never happening before. And then it did.
I can't either answer why ice hockey is so important to people in Finland. It just is, has always been I suppose. Well hey look at football fans in Europe. I'm thinking this finnish celebrading is quite small compared to that. Also we don't have ice hockey hooliganism where people gather to kill eachother eather. So all and all this is in very small scale. I think we have things pretty well here.
But for those people who went to start a fight in Haaparanda, that's just disgusting. Nothing else cannot be said.
It might seem to people that Fins and Swedes hate each other. I don't think so. I see the rivalry more as sibling rivalry than anything else. That's why Sweden is often referred as "beloved enemy" in Finland. I remember when I was 13 and kids at my school were often bashing Sweden. But when the teacher asked which country would they want to live in if not Finland, everybody answered Sweden.