Touko Aalto was the star of her party until she fell ill with depression – “I spoke about it, even though I got a stamp on my forehead”

I hope so Acting municipal manager Touko Aalto suggests a description of Paikkalanvuori’s sports field.

“I arranged things so that I can ski for a while in between,” he says.

Aalto skis about ten runs in the middle of the work day. Then a quick shower at Toivakkatalo and behind the wheel of the car. An evening meeting awaits in Peurunga, Laukaa, 40 minutes away.

But now he’s approaching the parking lot like an elite skier racing to the finish line. There’s no mistaking the person, because on a March afternoon, acting the mayor is allowed to tour the well-maintained trails alone.

After bending in front of the camera, Aalto hangs on his poles in a way that reminds me Hannes Heikuran the famous photo of the person who gave everything to the Tervaneva swamp in the draining exercise Mika from Myllylä.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence.

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“If there is a bigger social megaphone, you have to use it, even if you get a stamp on your forehead.”

AALTO was the chairman of the Green Alliance from June 2017 to October 2018. When he started Ville Niinistön after the greens, the party was even talked about as a possible prime minister’s party.

Aalto, who was born in Savonlinna, grew up in Joensuu and came to the University of Jyväskylä to study political science, was seen by the Greens as the right person to show Finns that the party can also manage outside the tram network.

But Aalto did not become prime minister, he fell ill with depression. In September 2018, he lost his ability to speak and act at a meeting of the Green leadership group, and the doctor ordered him on sick leave. At the same time, the chairmanship remained, Aalto fell from the parliament in the 2019 elections.

However, during his stellar career, Aalto had time to raise a fuss. In the summer of 2018, pictures of Aalto were spread, in which he is partying shirtless at the Swedish King Kong club.

Can they be seen as an extension of the politician’s public image in the same way as the ones who raised their eyebrows accordingly? Alexander Stubb as a human dart board 2014 or Sanna Marin dancing at a house party in 2022?

Touko Aalto will reflect on this later in the interview, which will be conducted via video connection.

“I am a child of nature who goes and does things. Sometimes there could have been better consideration,” he says.

“I also recognize that I do things in a different way than I am used to. It arouses discussion and becomes part of the imagery, which is interesting in itself.”

Now Aalto is representative in the traditional way. The suit jacket fits, the collared shirt looks ironed. Before the interview, there was an important opportunity. He has taken the municipality’s greetings to the hero of the day at Soivakka nursing home, who turned one hundred years old To Aini Kuusela.

“It’s moving how almost the whole village gathered for the birthday party. Here in Toivaka, everyone has their own place in a way. This is a community!”

There is no need to ask Aalto to comment on his relationship with Toivakka, compliments come unbidden.

He and his spouse have also acquired a plot of land, and construction work on the detached house is scheduled to begin in the summer. When Aalto eventually moves from Jyväskylä to Toivakka, he may already be the mayor, not the acting mayor. municipal manager. The appeal of two basic Finnish municipal councilors against Aalto’s election is being heard in Hämeenlinna’s administrative court.

LAUGHING Aalto says that now that he is turning 40, he feels “adult”.

“There is already enough perspective and views on oneself, others and the surrounding society that it enables interesting thinking.”

He was only 29 years old when he started as vice-chairman of the Green Party, and in his early thirties he was given the leadership of the party with great expectations. Now he estimates that the Greens had all the conditions to grow into a big party in the last decade.

“And those conditions have not disappeared anywhere. The recipe still exists. We are present, we are close. And let’s go where you don’t necessarily expect, say, a politician with a green background to go – and talk with people who disagree. We should learn from disagreement and not form warring tribes.”

Aalto says that politicians do want corporate social responsibility, but their own speeches may not be evaluated on the same scale.

“You should think about what kind of social responsibility your own actions are.”

For social reasons, Aalto has also talked openly about his depression in public.

“It may not have been smart in terms of personal individual protection, but I feel that talking about exhaustion and depression has had a social order. If there is a bigger social megaphone, you have to use it, even if you get a stamp on your forehead.”

AFRAID skiing, birthday coffee, interviews and praising Toivaka are not currently available. the daily life of the mayor. We end the video call on Friday in the early evening, and Aalto, while it’s still getting dark, starts to “ready the film set” for Monday regarding the just completed municipal financial statements.

The “two-hundred-page puma mask” is also a kind of mystical swamp of Tervaneva, a statement about the multi-channel network of facilities and services for social, healthcare and rescue operations in Central Finland, from Toivaka’s point of view.