Helsinki, Finland - If there is a country other than their own that the Finns will cheer on at the World Championships which opens today, it's Jamaica.

Jamaican athletes are not only carrying the hopes of their Caribbean island nation, but this Nordic country in the far north of Europe, bordering Russia.

"It's like ebony and ivory, hot and cold," said one Mikko, as he sums up the Jamaican-Finnish connection. Mikko, like many others here, is a 'rasta', and if one stays here long enough, one will discover that Finland has perhaps more dreadlocks than Jamaica.

Indeed, it is a connection that goes back to the 1952 Olympics when the legendary Herb McKenley, Arthur Wint, and the 4x400m relay team created a storm in the very same stadium where the 2005, 10th IAAF championships is being held.

It wasn't only McKenley and the relay team that created a storm in 1952, George Rhodens' 400m victory was sensational. "When you speak to older Finns, they remember every bit of it in detail," said Michael Thomas, a Jamaican self-styled musician who has been living in Finland for 16 years.

"For them it was sensational, because of McKenley and Rhoden, their lightning speed and sunny Jamaican disposition. They think it's their happiness that caused them to run so fast," Thomas said. And that happiness is something which Finns - with their harsh climatic conditions during the long winter and high suicide rate - seek. Yet, it is a truly organised, well-kept society that has no class structure and is built on a generous welfare system.

"We've been around town since we arrived and one of the things we noticed is that there is no low income housing or any signs of poverty," said one member of the JAAA delegation. "Jamaica needs lots of what Finland has to offer from transport, organisation and all the rest," he said.

But here, where the games are being held, even if Jamaica do not pick up the expected medals, the national anthem will be played at the official opening today thanks to the world's fastest man, Asafa Powell, as he will be honoured by the IAAF.

Given the fact that Helsinki's Olympic stadium is the place where Jamaicans have picked up gold medals in the past, expectations are running high from the 40,000 spectators that will pack into the stadium today.

At the inaugural World Championships in 1983, Bert Cameron's 400m win paved the way for the current crop of Jamaican athletes to perform at their best.

"In the wake of our successes at last summer's Olympics, I am very optimistic about Jamaica's medal chances at these championships and the prospect of the Jamaican national anthem being played ...," Howard Aris, the president of the JAAA, said in the official media guide of Jamaican athletes.

Performances on the track apart, official team sponsors Puma and their "Go Jamaica" campaign with expensive Jamaican shirts and perfumes will be on show in many of the city's stores. Whatever happens the brand name Jamaica will emerge the undisputed champion.

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