How do I begin this? Following is a story that goes from genuine accusations of “loudness” (if I had my music loud at some point, fair enough…) to false accusations of loudness to just plain stalking* and harassment.
For the past couple of months, I’ve been harassed by one of my neighbours for “being too loud”.
If I have people over for quiet drinks on a Friday (or any other day), she complains.
If I have guests and we happen to come home after midnight, she complains.
If I play music (even at *less than* speaking volume) at night, she complains.
With the exception of walking the floors of my apartment and having sex, this woman complains.
3 times in the last week-or-so: now, given that many Helsingiläinen live in apartment blocks, there are rules and regulations which I’m guessing protect the right of people to, ya know, do stuff in their apartment whenever they please. For me, that time just happens to coincide with the time that there is no light outside.
The first of the 3 events leading up to my getting particularly annoyed by this neighbour, rather than thinking she was just being pedantic, I had a movie on – relatively quietly, I might add.
My understanding is that this sort of thing is counted as “watching TV” under the normal rules – and unlike the first complaint in July from a guy at ~1am asking me to turn the noise down, the movie was at this time well below speaking volume. We were sitting pretty close to the speakers and WE could barely hear it. I think this woman has the ears of a bat.
Anyway, she came up at about 23.30 and asked me to turn the noise down. I replied pretty straightly “no” and closed the door in her face, at which point she threatened to call the police. I told her “do what you want, I’m not doing anything wrong”.
The second of the 3 events was on the Friday just gone – Anna and I had been out to see a couple of Japanese films, and she and 2 of her friends came back to my place to polish off a bottle of vodka. We had music playing *very* softly and very much below speaking volume – when at 2am, the police showed up at my door. She had kept her promise.
Now, normally, I hate cops. This time was no exception. Being slightly drunk I just challenged them by asking things like “can you even hear us in the hallway?” (I know for a fact that they couldn’t because there are 2 big doors in most Finnish apartment blocks for the purpose of noise prevention), and after they told me to “keep it down”, I sent them on their merry way.
After I came back in and told Anna and the 2 friends that the cops had just been there, Anna said to me to run after them – and so the cops were invited in for a friendly chat (in Finnish). Previously that day, I’d written on the back of the official complaint form that I had received from my housing company the things that this lady has done previously – things like… shining torches in to my window to get my attention to turn the noise down – WHEN I WAS SLEEPING and there WAS NO NOISE and accused me of all sorts of things in front of friends and even apprehended me while I was on the phone (long-distance at 1,50€ a MINUTE) to ask me some fairly pointed questions… that sort of thing.
So at the end of it, I asked the police to please file a report and show that we were not actually being unreasonably loud etc so that I would have it in writing to send it to my housing company and file a counter-complaint. They said they would, and that was that.
One of Anna’s friends pointed out that, because the housing company can take the place away from the owner, she could simply be trying to brand me as a troublemaker in order to have it taken away from them, so that she or someone she knows can buy it at well below market value.
Onward to last night (Tuesday). It was about 22:30 and I was watching “King of the Hill” with my headphones on, when all of a sudden my office line had an incoming call. From a Finnish Mobile number. Which I didn’t recognize. So I answered it.
The first sentence was “please turn the noise down” to which my response was “What are you talking about? Who is this?” (I thought at first maybe it was Anna trying to play a trick) – from there the argument quickly heated up from me telling her “I have my headphones on, you can not possibly hear any noise. If you can hear noise, its NOT me, do your bloody research before you go falsely accusing people – if you tell the police I’m making too much noise, I’ll have you done for perjury” (that is, making a false statement) which then led to her accusing me of being a liar and some other things. Whatever.
I’d also like to know how she got that number (not like it’s not public or anything, but still, she must have Google-stalked me or something). *Thats all the stalking that I know of, so far.
I invited her up (she refused to come up), so I told her if she continues harassing me, I’m going to call the police. Of course, as it turns out, after I took my headphones off, I discovered that there was, in fact, noise, however, had she even opened the window, she would have found that the noise was coming from elsewhere and not my place. Hell, if she had even come to my door, she would have heard no more noise than me typing.
So in a slight rage, I grabbed my keys, and flew down the stairs to find the source of the noise. I went around the block, thinking it might have been one of the late-night cafes or a nearby bar or something. Nope, nothing. In fact, I never did find it, however, given that there were 2 young-ish guys hanging around while I paced the yard, who later were standing on a balcony, I suspect it might have been from their place. However, I just don’t know.
Anyway, after I got back to my place, I came in and, upon realizing that this was her third strike, I thought “right, time to deal with this”, and called the police – so it’s official.
Minna Ruckenstein, noted Finnish anthropologist and researcher (yeah, I Googled AND Eniro’d yo’ ass), you have awaken a monster. You chose the wrong guy to cross. Written and electronic evidence is being gathered against you, and you’re going to help me bring you down.
Study *this*.
*edit October 3 – since I called the police, I haven’t heard from her, but that could be a fluke.
