Bellingham

On the shores of Bellingham Bay with Mount Baker as its backdrop, Bellingham is the last major United States city before the Washington State coastline meets the Canadian border. The City of Bellingham, which is home to more than 90,000 residents and serves as the county seat of Whatcom County, is at the center of a uniquely picturesque area offering a rich variety of recreational, cultural, educational and economic activities.

On September 17, 2008 the City of Bellingham and the City of Vaasa signed a cooperation agreement to promote and strengthen their relationship. The two cities committed to fostering their reciprocal cooperation based on trust as well as promoting and developing exchange programs in the fields of administration and culture. This agreement was updated in 2010 to become a Sister City agreement.

During these years Vaasa has hosted visitors from Bellingham and vice versa.

During the corona pandemic (2020-2021) new forms of cooperation emerged as high school students from Vaasa had the opportunity to take part in an international video workshop. This initiative provided young people in the sister cities with a chance to meet (although virtually) and connect with youth around the world in order to build empathy and understanding for other cultures. To this end, the Bellingham Youth Media Project partnered with FilmBuilding to host a film making workshop that connects Bellingham and its sister cities around the world, including Vaasa, Tateyama, Japan and Port Stephens, Australia. Working in teams, high school students made short films around the theme “Resemblances”. This theme invited students to think about the importance of international relationships and helped to introduce a new generation of world citizens to what it means to engage in international events and citizen-to-citizen diplomacy.

The Bellingham Sister Cities Association exists to promote citizen diplomacy between Bellingham and its seven Sister Cities including Vaasa.