All hail the Chief Architect!

In the 1000 words of a recent report on a "British Estonia Chamber of Commerce"* seminar, The Baltic Times has pointed out what most of us already know: that amongst other things, modern architecture in Tallinn is uniformly ugly. Joel Alas reports.

Tallinn City Council’s chief architect has revealed a worrying snapshot of the city’s development – there are no controls over building aesthetics, public transport expansion plans are dependent on European Union funding, and authorities prefer a “self-regulating” traffic system to road expansion.

Endrik Mänd said the council had little power to encourage or direct development, but relied on developers to drive the city’s future. He added that there were no plans for the construction or expansion of roads - the city preferring a “self regulating”* system where pressure points are allowed to build as a way of deterring drivers. “There should be problems... Drivers will learn to avoid certain areas. If we widen certain roads we just invite drivers,” he said.

Mänd also revealed why many new buildings are being created with little architectural vision: the city’s building act contains no mention of aesthetics. “We have no legal support to say no to a building because it is ugly,” he said. “It’s just a question of persuasion.”

www.baltictimes.com/news/articles/18891/
*note the inconsistent use of a) correct titles and b) hyphens

Beating a retreat

In the aftermath of a Postimees exclusive this week uncovering the barbaric treatment of the drunk and disorderly at Hotell Viru's classy Cafe Amigo - deplorable scenes of victims bound hand and foot being beaten for extended periods in dingy back rooms by thuggish security staff - there has been a call in such newspapers as the Helsingin Sanomat for Finns to boycott the hotel.

Every cloud has a silver lining.

Some of my best friends really ARE black

Many Russian-speakers in Estonia may be finding themselves in the unlikely position tonight of saying those very words. You see, Doudou Diène*, the UN's man on racism mentioned in the previous post, has caused a bit of a stir. Less than two days after being assured by the prime minister that such things are officially frowned upon in the country, he has come out and slammed the state's record on discrimination.

Several articles appeared online in quick succession after Diène spoke at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs today, including UN rapporteur concerned about discrimination and Diene: Language Inspectorate seems harsh. He claimed that the Estonian government paid no attention to discrimination as an issue and failed to listen to the citizens on whose behalf it purports to work.

Diène also highlighted the sticking point of citizenship, and pointed out that the very existence of a Language Inspectorate is viewed by many as discriminatory in nature. “The fact that there are still people living in Estonia who have no citizenship status is evidence enough that there are serious problems,” he said. “The system as a whole needs to be reviewed.”

However, it was the Special Rapporteur's recommendations regarding the language situation in the country that proved most controversial (and which have, predictably, incited the biggest backlash). Diène insisted that with the Russian minority forming such a major part of Estonian society, Russian should be given national language status.

“Estonia needs to move from a defensive position to one that is more multicultural,” he advised. “If 30 percent of the people in society are Russian speakers, it's not wise to ignore the fact.” He nevertheless conceded that requiring citizens to be able to speak Estonian was perfectly understandable, and that everyone in the country should do so.

While Diène pulls no punches, he certainly throws a lot of them. A summary of one of his reports states: "The members of foreign communities and national minorities who spoke to Diène explained, often with great emotion, how they experienced on a daily basis racism, discrimination, a xenophobic atmosphere, a feeling of loneliness within the population and fear of certain institutions." And that was about Switzerland (see link below). Seems no one is immune, however different their circumstances.

Still, for reasons of history alone, it's never going to happen. Russian being adopted as a national language alongside Estonian, I mean. Harri Tiido, someone high up in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, has already come out denouncing the UN guru's findings, pointing out that everything Diène has said is purely his opinion, and that none of his recommendations are binding - they are simply that: recommendations.

"He went looking for discrimination and he found it," Tiido countered tonight in a presumably rather hastily organised interview on Eesti Raadio. "It's all about how you perceive things. Just because one person thinks they're being discriminated against doesn't mean you're dealing with discrimination in any legal sense."

Tiido alleges that Diène twisted the few tangible facts he was presented with into a nationwide epidemic of racism and xenophobia. "Of course there are pockets of racism in Estonia - we all know what's been going on in Tartu. When I spoke privately to Diène, I told him that was a case of a group of skinheads we know about and whose numbers are relatively small, but by then he'd already decided what he was going to say."

In a fairly typical response to someone championing the rights of minorities in a country where they tend not to enjoy any, Tiido concluded by saying that the Senagalese envoy had taken a very one-sided view of the local situation: “Talking to Diène, it was obvious he feels that any group that constitutes a minority has certain rights. But in thinking that way he forgets that the majority have rights too, and that in fighting for the rights of minorities, the rights of the majority have to be respected as well.”

But why is granting rights to minorities always interpreted by the majority as the loss of their own?

http://www.swissinfo.org/eng/swissinfo.html?siteSect=43&sid=7662246

*now with an è!

Some of my best friends are black

Two days after prime minister Andrus Ansip assured Doudou Diene - the United Nations' Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination and xenophobia and related intolerance, himself from Senegal - that although racism is not unknown in Estonia it is denounced at the highest levels comes news of yet another local attack on a black student.

"Racism is condemned in Estonia in the strongest terms," Ansip said, adding that Estonia has been a cultural melting pot throughout its history, and remains so today, with 120 different nationalities represented in the country. "And the state will do everything it can to ensure that Estonia is a good home for these minorities in the future, too."

He and his government might want to concentrate on the present, though: September has seen another black student attacked by nationalist skinheads in Tartu, the educational heartland of the nation and self-proclaimed 'City of Good Thoughts' (which, given a better translation of heade mõtete linn would be 'city of good ideas', makes me wonder whether the irony is lost on them in any of this).

Ansip would praise Eesti Päevaleht Offline for the censorious line they take on the matter: "It goes without saying that the idiocy of considering someone lesser than yourself purely on the basis of the colour of their skin should have no place in a civilised society. One black student is worth a million times more to Estonia than a gang of narrow-minded, egg-headed, fatherland-venerating high school dropouts.

"Why, you're asking? But let me ask you: did this student come to Estonia to live it up on the generous unemployment benefits? Or because of the thousands of euros he could stuff his overalls with in some blue-collar job? Or so he could hijack a plane from Raadi airfield and fly it into Tartu's one and only highrise tower? No. He came here to get an education. A foreigner came to Estonia to get an education! That's a real I bow to you to the people who have managed to build up the kind of educational institutions that entice people to come here to study from far-off places. But if they're subjected to a hail of stones as soon as they get here, all they'll take away with them is a view of Estonia as some tiny, backward, xenophobic state."

Of course, if it weren't for the skinheads, they would never get that impression.

http://www.postimees.ee/260907/esileht/siseuudised/285521.php

http://www.epl.ee/artikkel/401839

What do Edgar Savisaar and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have in common?

They both deny what is blatantly obvious to just about everyone else in the world.

A couple of days after the preposterous Persian president insisted there are no such things as homosexuals in Iran, our mayor and saviour has made the [far less offensive but just as wilfully blinkered] claim, to all intents and purposes, that there is no such thing as underage drinking in Estonia. Or at least that if there is, they're not buying their alcohol from anywhere that shouldn't be selling it to them.

The issue kicked off in the last few days when it emerged that a check-out operator working at Prisma in the Kristiine shopping centre had sold a couple of cans of beer to some 17-year-olds. Hardly the most heinous of crimes, you might think, but it has since cost the supermarket its liquor licence - due in no small measure, I suspect, to Edgar Savisaar sanctioning such a move in the media.

Makes you wonder what City Hall's going to do when every shop and supermarket in Tallinn is found to be selling fags and booze to teenagers, something Northern Police Prefecture head honcho Raivo Küüt has gone on public record as describing as 'out of control'. Of course, you have to believe that's actually the case, and that the city's police know what they're talking about. Our Itkar does not.

"I'm sure the case of Kristiine Prisma is an exception to the rule," he said. When quizzed on the degree of justice that would be brought to bear on a store not caught selling beer to the almost-of-age but, say, vodka to a 13-year-old, Savisaar gave the kind of answer that is the verbal equivalent of sticking your head in the sand. "Impossible," he stated. "But if it were, if a 13-year-old were to be sold vodka in Tallinn, City Council would have to have a serious discussion about it."

You have to feel sorry for Prisma, since they're very clearly being made an example of here, but in a totally pointless and unsustainable way that quite possibly also has no basis in law. I'm not making excuses for the check-out operator who failed to ask for ID, and I'm not saying that 17-year-olds drinking beer isn't an issue. But there are much more effective ways of making your point than reacting in such a knee-jerk manner with your eyes closed to the heart of the problem.

A Single Nation. A Million Voices. An Unstoppable Dream.

Here is a link to the website promoting the documentary The Singing Revolution. A user called Tanvir seems determined to advertise it in response to everything I say, so I might as well head him/her/it off at the pass and devote an entire post to it. If you were wondering, it is rather good. (The documentary, I mean, not the website.) It is for this reason alone that I am pandering to a spam merchant.

http://www.singingrevolution.com/cgi-local/welcome.cgi

Estonia are the new Hooky World Champions!

Continuing the trend of vaguely linked posts, today's Eesti Päevaleht highlights the results of a UNICEF report issued late last week which reveal that Estonia leads the world in high school truancy.

Specifically, as many as 45% of students in Year 8 maths classes are skipping class. Or at least they were in 2003, which is when the figures date from (and which begs the question: why did it take them four years to write the report?).

Of course, officials are scoffing at the numbers being thrown about. Someone from the Ministry of Education the paper managed to get hold of claimed that the figures in the UNICEF report were not based on any statistical data, only to admit that that's because no such data exists. At least, not in the MoE.

School principals are also frowning upon the report's findings, stressing that the 10% of students who are dropping out of school altogether is a much bigger problem, and pointing out that while there is a problem with truancy, it is 'no worse than about 1 in 5'.

Even that says something though, I would have thought. I can't say I blame the kids myself, really, if Year 8 maths here is anything like Year 8 maths was when I was at school, and given the numbingly rigid structure of the education system in this country. If they had more say in what they learn, perhaps they would be more inclined to stick with it.

http://www.epl.ee/uudised/401257

Kati Come Home

If president Toomas Hendrik Ilves had his way, Mary Tamm (see story below) would know lots of Estonians - because she would abandon her life in England and return to her ancestral home to live!

On a trip to the US of A to speak at the UN on behalf of Europeans everywhere, Ilves popped in to Estonia House in New York to have a chinwag with the local emigres and urge them to think about dropping everything to migrate to a small, cold, foreign country.

“Thank you for keeping Estonianness alive,” he said, using a phrase that is difficult to translate without it sounding silly. “But you should know that Estonia has moved on, and awaits you. It is no longer a poor country, but has grown powerfully, and I urge you to come to Estonia and see all this for yourselves.

“We have come so far that you might even think: perhaps my income in America is a little higher than it would be in Estonia, but my children could be educated in Estonian, we could eat Estonian bread, and live an Estonian life,” the president continued. “So think about coming home. We need every Estonian we can get.”

Now, much as I love rye bread, it hardly constitutes a convincing argument for moving half way around the world. Nor would the Estonian education system form much of an incentive, given how inflexible it is. And it's easy for our Toomas to exhort others to follow in his footsteps when they led him to the presidency: salary is probably not quite the issue for him that it would be for others contemplating such an upheaval.

There's something wonderfully romantic about these calls to home, although they're completely pointless: the only ones likely to heed them are the elderly, and they're hardly going to contribute to the gene pool any more than they already have. But then Ilves is a diplomat to the last, and what else are you going to say to a bunch of lifelong expats frankly. “It's charming in a quaint sort of way that you maintain some semblance of being Estonian despite the fact you would obviously never consider leaving your comfortable life here to actually live in the country” wouldn't exactly cut the mustard.

The Key to Tamm

Warning: the following post will mean nothing, or at most very little, to anyone unfamiliar with the (entire history of the) BBC's Doctor Who. It does, however, have a tangible Estonian connection, so bear with me.

British actress Mary Tamm was interviewed on BBC Radio today in a shameless plug for the release of the box set containing her entire body of work on the sixteenth series of Doctor Who in 1978. Eagle-eyed viewers may already have spotted the clue to where the Estonian connection comes into this story: the actress' surname, Tamm, which is pretty much the local version of Smith (although it means 'oak tree').

I had always wondered - that is, since coming to Estonia - whether there was anything to her name linking her to the country, but had never bothered to check. What was revealed to me as I listened to the interview has probably been common knowledge for at least thirty years, and it is rather a blot on my fandomness to only discover it now. But, well, whatever really.

Turns out our Mary, who was born and raised in Bradford in England, was the daughter of Estonian refugees who fled the country after World War II. She spoke Estonian as her first language right up until she started school, and claims to still speak the language today, although not all that often, as she doesn't know that many Estonians.

I say 'claims to speak' because at the beginning of the interview the host attempted to greet her in Estonian with the phrase 'meeldiv teiega kohtuda' (i.e. 'pleased to meet you', as you might reasonably guess), and while it ended rather badly, it had started rather well - and yet our Mary asserted that whatever the host was trying to say, it certainly wasn't Estonian. I mean come on, even I could tell what the woman was getting at.

I wonder if I should write a long letter to Mary in Estonian and see if she replies. I could ask her all sorts of things about about her time on Doctor Who, since the DVD box set she was there to promote, The Key To Time, is currently winging its way to me courtesy Amazon.co.uk (and I've seen the episodes in question a million times before). I'd have to brush up on my science fiction/fantasy vocabulary a bit, but then I suspect if I did it might all be for nought.

At the very least, Estonia now has another actress with a tenuous link to the country it can parochially claim as its own.

Honey, I'm home

Continuing our run of 'Only In Estonia' stories comes this shocking news from the Sakala gazette in Viljandi County:

A break-in was reported on a farm in Sudiste village this week in which around a ton of honey was stolen from the beekeeper's shed.

The crime is thought to have been committed some time between Tuesday and Thursday.

The honey thief also stole a saw. The damage to the owner comes to a total of 70,000 kroons.
_____

I suppose you have to ask: what does the sticky-fingered pilferer plan to do with a ton of honey? Make a beeline for the nearest bear sanctuary? And how will the police crack the case? Viljandi CID must be a hive of activity at the moment... etc...

...but I couldn't eat a whole one

If it's girth you go for, look no further than Tapa's own Vaino Rei. A man who knows his mushrooms, he was nevertheless taken aback on Tuesday to come across a rough-stemmed boletus weighing in at a whopping 1.4 kilograms. "We've never seen one that big before," said his friends.

Rei himself, a seasoned picker, understandably made headlines with his find. "I couldn't pick any more mushrooms after this one," he said. "They wouldn't fit in the basket!"

Clutch[bagg]ing at straws

It's nice to know that even on the slowest of news days you can find someone with their finger on the pulse. In the latest issue of the ever-topical Just!, editor Anu Saagim talks about things that really matter...

In America, expensive luxury items have been part of the everyday scene for years, as have ladies flitting about with designer bags costing thousands of dollars. More and more of Estonia's beautiful women dream of the cool luxury brands and designer clothes worn by their idols Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie in glossy magazines.

I don't mind at all if you call me a bag freak. I prefer to buy expensive bags than brand-name clothes. I wear the same cocktail dress once, twice at most, so it would be pointless to spend a huge amount of money on them. But I can carry around an expensive Gucci or Chloé slouch bag for years without ever getting bored of it. Some people think my lust for luxury designer bags is sick. And it is, given how expensive a hobby it is.
But when you're buying stuff like this, you have to bear in mind that true classics never go out of style. They go with any outfit, whether you're at work or at a party, and they bring a little bit of luxury to even the greyest of ordinary days. Go for luxury!

I think there's something in that for all of us.

Masterstroke

Ille Grün-Ots writing for Ärileht reveals plans are afoot that will make pen pushers the length and breadth of the nation question why they ever bothered spending so long at university...

How would you feel if your salary was slashed by ten percent overnight - if you were getting, say, 15,000 kroons on Friday but come Monday 1500 kroons of that had simply disappeared? You haven't been slacking off or skiving; you're simply getting paid less for doing the same job you've always done. Well, it seems such a scheme is to be implemented right here in Estonia: rumour has it that the ten percent bonus paid to state workers with Master's degrees is set for the chop.

Ms Grün-Ots gets the hard word straight from the horse's mouth:

“The Public Service Act needs to be reviewed and some changes introduced in terms of qualifications,” explains Sille Uusna, an adviser with the Ministry of Education and Research. The solution she proposes may come to many as an unpleasant surprise: “Doing away with bonuses like these has been in the pipeline for years, so it's likely that if amendments are made it will lead to a reduction in the number of people eligible for such payments. It may be the case that people with Master's degrees are no longer rewarded for it.”

However, this shocking concept is not necessarily one that will be warmly embraced:

Paying people less than they're already getting is not something most state authorities would want to risk. In the Office of the Parliament, for example, there are 23 employees with Master's qualifications. Jana Sedrik from the Personnel Department says that if the proposed changes are made to the law and the bonuses are no more, the office's salary system will have to be reviewed and decisions made as to whether and which positions are worthy of the payment in the first place.

In the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications, meanwhile, there are 30 members of staff with Master's degrees. Anne Marjapuu, deputy director of the ministry's Personnel Department, says that anyone with such qualifications is informed of their right to a bonus as soon as they take up their post. If anybody already working there completes a degree and submits their diploma, they too are immediately signed up for a bonus. Marjapuu admits that if these perks disappear, as has been rumoured for several years, they too at the ministry will have to look at the way they pay people so that they don't end up worse off.

But it's not all bad news - a lucky few in the public service will find that they are not affected by the potential cut in wages in the slightest, as confirmed (for example) by Marika Lepikult, director of personnel at City Hall:

“The City of Tallinn has never rewarded its workers for their academic achievements, language skills or long service.”

This little article should tell you a thing or two about the importance that is placed on higher education in Estonia. Answers on the back of a postcard though to the question: where's the logic in getting rid of the bonus system - presumably in a move to save money - if everyone is then simply going to up salaries to cover the difference?

http://www.arileht.ee/artikkel/400399

How much can a polar bear?

The pathetic story of the polar bear who died of an overdose at Tallinn Zoo last week reignited the flames of my love/hate relationship with the exploitation of animals in captivity. The 20-year-old male understandably chose to flee his depressing concrete home when his handler accidentally left the door open, and was killed as a result of being cack-handedly tranquilised in an effort to get him back inside his cage.

I'm a great lover of animals, and a great supporter - in spirit at least - of animal rights. I'm also very much for education and understanding when it comes to animals, which is why really good zoos will always get the thumbs up from me. Tallinn Zoo, sadly, is not one of them. Don't get me wrong: it's through no real fault of their own, as they subsist on about half a shoestring at the best of times, and despite this they have done quite a bit to improve the lot of many of the animals they keep.

But I have seen few more depressing sights in my life than 'bear alley' at Tallinn Zoo: magnificent animals forced to live in rusty grey cages tens of thousands of times smaller than the space they would be free to roam in the wild. Watching them pace back and forth like madmen is made all the worse by the realisation that the distress you feel in watching them for the minute or two you can bear it can't be anything like the distress they're in their whole lives.

And now poor old Franz is having his insides hoovered out at the taxidermist's so he can be stuffed and mounted somewhere. Even in death he is fated to be gawped at. I only hope it serves some educational purpose, and that we learn from it.

Hold your tongue

Edited highlights of an article by Joel Alas in the indomitable Baltic Times:
_____

Estonians should be taught to be less hostile and more sympathetic to people learning their language, according to the chief architect of the nation’s new integration programme.

A week after Russian-speaking 10th grade children began a new set of Estonian-language literature classes, Ain Aaviksoo from the Praxis Centre for Policy Studies suggested Estonians should also be given classes in how to be more embracing of new speakers.

Aaviksoo, whose think-tank has been hired by the government to help formulate its integration policy for 2008-13, said Estonia should drop its defensive attitude toward its language, which is often perceived as a hostile barrier to those seeking to learn it. Instead, Aaviksoo said a more positive promotion of the language and a kinder attitude to new speakers would improve the situation.

“There are things we can’t change about history and our past issues, but we can change our attitudes toward our compatriots,” Aaviksoo said. “Our constitution says that one reason for the existence of the state is to preserve our language and culture. The problem is how to interpret that. If you adopt a protective approach, then in a way you create enemies of every outsider.”

Instead, Aaviksoo said the language could only survive if others are positively encouraged to learn it. “You can’t be hostile to outsiders: you have to be capable of embracing them. Many people who speak English know that it is spoken in different ways, so it is possible to understand someone who can’t speak it fluently. In Estonia it isn’t so. Many Russians tell me they feel more comfortable speaking Russian because too much attention is placed on them because they speak Estonian differently.”

Full text: http://www.baltictimes.com/news/articles/18768/
_____

I wonder how Joel's Estonian is coming along. As far as I am aware he is a fellow Aussie, so it would be interesting to find out the experiences he's had compared to my own.

For the first couple of years I was in Estonia, anyone who discovered I was making an effort to learn the language was suitably impressed and encouraging. Stammering attempts at ordering things in restaurants and cafes were met with patience, a smile and charitably simplified responses. Students I became increasingly able to help out in terms of vocabulary if they gave me the Estonian word were chuffed I was going to the trouble, especially off my own bat.

Fast-forward a couple of years and the feedback started to take on a different tone. Most reactions to the fact that I was still even in Estonia and learning Estonian were "why?" and "why bother?" respectively. My answer to the latter at least would always be the same - "because I live here" - although this would rarely satisfy the dumbfounded people who had put the question to me in the first place.

It would also invariably bring out the hipocrisy in them too: since I spoke English, "the world language", what was the point in studying Estonian beyond the charmingly perfunctory? When I parried with the argument that Russian-speakers speak one of the world's biggest languages too, so why should they bother if I needn't, their answer was always: "That's different." But it's no different at all. And nor is that an answer.

I'm one of these people who likes to learn at least a handful of pleasantries whenever I'm going somewhere new, whether it be a few hour's stopover in Kuala Lumpur, Oslo for the weekend or two weeks in Spain and Portugal. I'm also a languages person, which helps. But actually living somewhere is a different matter. I could and in many cases do get by perfectly well on English in Estonia, but that hasn't stopped me wanting to learn the national language. In fact how anyone can live in a foreign country and not try to learn its language, out of respect alone if nothing else, is beyond me.

But I will admit it is more difficult to do so these days than it was when I first arrived seven years ago. If your speech or accent gives away the fact that you're not Estonian and not a Russian-speaker, everyone automatically switches to English with you whether you want them to or not. I've had countless bizarre conversations where I insist on sticking to Estonian and the Estonian insists on sticking to English; I guess we both need the practice, so it works out in the end. Can't be of much help though to people just starting out with the language, and it doesn't change the fact that the attitude to speakers of English (and other languages) attempting Estonian remains starkly different to that of Russian-speakers doing the same.

Nothing's insurmountable though. The fact that my almost exclusively self-taught Estonian is good enough for me to be working as a translator after the first five years of my life here were largely spent in an English-language environment should be proof enough that anyone can do it. I would certainly advocate them trying. You get to know so much more about a country and its people when you can view things through their language.

Pig takeover secretly backed by state?

ETV24 reports that Estonian farmers are pointing the finger at government authorities for the sorry state of the annual potato crop, which has been decimated by the thriving populations of wild boars roaming state forests.

The farmers claim that the powers-that-be are endangering the nation's tuber harvest by deliberately keeping the animals' numbers up in order to cash in on hunting. With some simple arithmetic they show that a day's hunting fees from people who enjoy shooting things are worth more to the officials in their ivory towers than one of the cornerstones of the Estonian diet.

In Rapla County, once the agricultural heartland of the nation, there are said to be so many wild boar ravaging the fields in search of starchy snacks that large swathes of the population may be looking for something else to boil and smother in dill this season.

“The worst of it is where I have two whole hectares where there's simply nothing to retrieve," lamented farmer Mait Värk. "They've done away with the lot of it. If there were maybe five pigs out on the field I wouldn't make a fuss - but hunters are sighting 70 pigs a night! It's gone beyond a joke.”

While someone called Peep Männil from some lesser forestry centre with a very long name admits that the numbers of wild boars are being artificially inflated, Kalev Männiste from the Hunting Management Department of the State Forest Management Centre insists that the shooting of innocent animals that goes on in the country's forests does so according to law. If farmers are incapable of defending their fields against attacks from pigs, he adds, that's their problem.

Last but by no means least

Doctor Who

ABC, 7.30 pm, Saturday 22 September

Mis russofoobia, kus?

Karmo Tüür, a political scientist from the University of Tartu, had this to say on relations between Russia and Estonia in an article on Delfi yesterday:

There is only one country in the world that has a problem with the Baltic States, as it pretty much does with all of its neighbours: the Russian Federation. A great and powerful nation that seems to think it is constantly under threat.

Even its closest allies like Belarus get a cuff around the ears from time to time for deviant behaviour. Sociological vox populi show that it is their tiniest neighbours — the Baltic States and Georgia — that Russians consider most hostile.

The typical accusation the country levels at its former Soviet cellmates is that of 'Russophobia': that these tiny little countries are afraid of their great big neighbour and therefore constantly stirring up trouble. The best evidence of this is meant to be the way these countries behave towards Russians — the self-same Russians who descended upon the wretched outposts of the red empire in days of yore, bringing with them a bright future and socialism for all.

Latvia and Estonia are mauled with particular savagery for it, and Lithuania is regularly roped in for its share too, in a 'one in all in' kind of way. Discrimination is the most trivial of the charges laid at the three countries' doors: genocide, apartheid and ethnic cleansing are terms that are bandied about all too often.

And all because these countries — now fully-fledged members of the European Union — are alleged to flaunt a panoply of European norms. They forbid their residents and citizens from speaking Russian, you know, and, worse, force them to speak the national language!

I'd recommend to the people making these claims that they think about things a bit and look at the situation with eyes that have not been blinkered by propaganda.

Read the rest of the article (in Estonian) at http://www.delfi.ee/news/paevauudised/arvamus/article.php?id=16901720.

How to become homeless in 26 easy steps

Fare dodgers beware: a Tallinn resident known only as Nikolai has had his house confiscated and put up for sale by bailiffs for failing to pay any of the 26 fines issued to him between 2005 and 2007.

The inveterate 'rabbit', as fare evaders are affectionately known in Estonia, owed ticket inspectors the princely sum of 16,140 kroons (about $1700) when evicted from his home, having also failed to contribute to the coffers of a myriad other wrist-slapping agencies the length and breadth of the capital.

Nikolai's story is not unique. In August alone ticket inspectors issued 5020 fines on buses, trams and trolleys throughout the city, with the City Hall piggy bank benefitting to the tune of 2.1 million kroons. These figures do not necessarily bear any resemblance to the number of people actually caught dodging, however: the top ten recidivists in 2007 to date account for almost 200 of the fines that have been handed out. The likes of 21-year-old Arlis, who leads the way on 29, had better watch out: if Nikolai loses his house for 26, Arlis might wake up one morning without a roof over his head and wondering what happened to his left kidney.

Opportunity knocks, but nobody answers

Terror struck at the very heart of Tallinn on Sunday night when an explosion rocked Viru Street, the gateway to the city's medieval Old Town.

Passers-by fled in panic as the blast erupted close to the area's famous flower market, leaving a crater in the pavement that must have measured a good 30 cm and showering half a dozen plastic vases in grit. There were no reports of injuries, although the shockwave from the explosion is said to have snapped the stem of at least one carnation.

Apparently an electrical cable running beneath the pavement blew a fuse or something. But I ask you: where were the news stories and stop press! reports citing terrorism as a possible cause? Where were the claims that some local refugees from Kabul, secret Taliban insurgents, had detonated a remote device in retribution for Estonia's mission in Afghanistan?

If the Estonian media ever wants to be taken seriously by the rest of Europe, it's really going to have to up its game. Terrorism is a scapegoat we cannot afford to sacrifice.

Take a chancellor on me

It may come as no surprise to hear that the Social Democrats (SDE) have come out in strong support of Allar Jõks, the man with two hands firmly on the tiller of Estonian justice. The embattled Chancellor has rankled the Right by actually doing his job rather than just kowtowing to the government, and with his tenure up early in the new year, the knives are out.

However, Eiki Nestor and friends have ridden to Jõks' defence and will be voting for the man to continue in the country's top judicial post for another seven years when the lease comes up for renewal in March. "Unlike some parties, the SDE hold Jõks in high regard for the courage he has shown in taking decisions that have gone against the wishes of the parliament and the government," Nestor said, highlighting the Chancellor's championing of constitutional and human rights and his strong social conscience.

Nestor and current SDE leader Ivari Padar are reported to have pressed the issue today in a meeting with Toomas Hendrik Ilves who, as president, is charged with the task of selecting the candidate for the Chancellor of Justice post for approval thereafter by the parliament. For those of you who don't know, Ilves is a former leader of the Social Democratic Party.

For what it's worth, I think Jõks has done a good job.

Here come the drums

Doctor Who
ABC, 7.30 pm, Saturday 15 September

In your dreams

Someone called Vilja Kiisler was full of praise for City Hall's crackdown on alcohol in an article entitled The Centre Party's Wet Dreams on Delfi today:

Curing the nation's drinking problems with restrictions on alcohol sales is no longer the business of the Centre Party alone: Tartu's Reformist mayor has also come to the conclusion that selling vodka in the wee hours will have to be done away with. But back in Tallinn, the Centrists plan to turn the taps off even tighter.

City Council mouthpiece Toomas Vitsut has announced that even tougher restrictions are in the pipeline — because the ones they've put into practice thus far have failed to reduce the amount of drinking. A bit of common sense here might make them question whether the restrictions make sense in the first place if they're not even getting close to doing what they say on the tin. But no. Loyal footsoldiers cannot afford the luxury of common sense. Particularly not Vitsut, whole sole reason for being of late seems to be to play up [party leader Edgar] Savisaar's great ideas.

And now Vitsut is going even more Savisaaresque on us and promising that if one ban isn't enough, we'll impose two — and keep on imposing them until they produce results, without bothering to ask whether it actually helps anyone break their debilitating habit.

We can talk about it till the cows come home, but common sense says that no restriction is ever going to break the habit of a lifetime — it will only make people hide it even more. If you know you won't be able to get your beer or your vodka from the shop after 8 o'clock, you buy it earlier, and voila, problem solved. In fact you buy more, just so you won't have to face the inconvenience of running out. Who does Vice Mayor [Jaanus] Mutli (hooray! - Ed.) think he's fooling when he says that vodka shopping sprees are a thing of the past and that people aren't drinking as much as they used to?

http://www.delfi.ee/news/paevauudised/arvamus/article.php?id=16848162

"Estonia is in the grip of mass hysteria!"

So says Jürgen Ligi anyway, Chairman of the Parliamentary Finance Committee and former Defence Minister. Rather boringly, he was commenting on the use and abuse of credit cards and SMS loans by portions of the population who should know better, i.e. those living hand to mouth, and not some potentially much more interesting outbreak of random insanity.

Another deposed paper-pusher, Aivar "Best Finance Minister in the World" Sõerd, weighed into the debate with tuppence of his own, claiming that people see no point in trying to save money because the intractably high inflation in the country devours it as soon as look at it, and shows no signs of abating.

Heido Vitsur, not a former minister but instead the resident Expert with the Estonian Development Fund (is that what they're called in their job description??), adds that a lot of companies are falling into the same trap: instead of investing their money where they should - in development - they are busy stocking up on status symbols in the mistaken belief that this will be of any long-term benefit to them.

I've often said that Estonia in 2007 is like the rest of the western world ca 1987.

Banana republic?

In a recent essay entitled Where is Estonia's pura vida?, Martin 'Everyone Thinks I'm Gay But I'm Not I Tell You' Kala draws comparisons between the Central American nation of Costa Rica and ye olde Estonia. ("It's not hard to find similarities," he assures sceptical readers.)

Why don't Estonians simply want to enjoy life instead of always striving to cause problems, asks Martin Kala.

[In Costa Rica] pura vida is about taking it easy and enjoying life as it comes, regardless of how much you have or how big your neighbour's property is. [In Estonia] we value personal wealth and we talk about economic growth; we are proud of the fact that we are independent, that we have our own national colours, our own anthem, our own money and our own president. We love our nation and culture, and although we do not trust our government, it promises to raise us up among the five richest countries in Europe before we know it.

But you often register anger and bitterness in the attitudes of Estonians: a negative way of thinking that in future will leave us depressed and unemployable, at which point we will question whether we wanted an Estonia like that, without asking ourselves what we contribute as a nation to the process of change. If you want things to change you have to start from the individual. How do you marry subjective satisfaction and success at the national level?

We need to feel that we truly are a nation and that we are all responsible for its future, and for our own wellbeing and shared sense of security. We need to start thinking more along the same lines, for as long as we fail to try, we will never see any results. And until then our successful little country won't be characterised by pura vida, but rather that old chestnut mañana. Except that its meaning to Estonians will not be the hope-filled tomorrow or one day, but rather the disappointment-laden not today...

http://www.postimees.ee/010907/esileht/arvamus/280331.php

Driving it home

President Toomas Hendrik Ilves tells it like it is in an interview for Postimees:

Nothing seems to be able to stop the driving situation in Estonia from getting worse and worse. Maybe there are just too many cars?

It's not a case of there being too many cars - there are too many stupid people. In the 16 years since Estonia regained its independence, 4041 people have been killed in traffic accidents. That's the entire population of a small town. 35,572 have been injured in the same period. That's the entire population of a small county.

These figures tell us that arrogant indifference reigns in Estonia. What else is it if not indifference when someone knowingly gets behind the wheel while drunk, or runs the gauntlet by recklessly overtaking on our highways, or fails to take their foot off the accelerator as they approach a pedestrian crossing, or takes no notice whatsoever of a single speed limit? Worse, we continue to see people boasting in the press about how fast they managed to make it from Tartu to Tallinn.

We'll make no inroads into this arrogance if we leave it up to the police and harsher punishments. We'll only overcome it if we all take a stand against it: show our disgust and intolerance of careless, speeding or drunk drivers. Because they're only ever a few metres away from killing someone. And the tragedy, as we see every day, is that many of them already do.

http://www.postimees.ee/010907/esileht/arvamus/280329.php

Now that's entertainment!

The Bloodhound Gang played at Club Hollywood over the weekend. The band's clearly shy and retiring guitarist had a special treat in store for fans when he ripped off his singlet and proceeded to baste it in his own juices before flinging it into the crowd in search of a lucky owner. And here's a picture:



An action shot if ever there was one. For the full series of shots go to http://pilt.delfi.ee/album/37184/?page=1.

Open letter to Agnes Männiste from Postimees and all those other Estonian journalists and editors who think Sydney is the capital of Australia

Dear Agnes Männiste from Postimees and all those other Estonian journalists and editors who think that Sydney is the capital of Australia,

It is not. Check on Wikipedia if you don't believe me. Canberra might not be the most exciting place in the world, but somebody *please* do a story about it (preferably someone who's actually been there) so that at least a few thousand readers do a double-take. They'll probably think you're wrong, ironically, but at least I'll be happy.

All my love,

Greg

See what happens when Estonia says no?

Bloody brilliant it was too! I was there with my friend Anu, flying the flag for Finland. There were about a dozen of us in the studio audience at BBC Television Centre in London supporting Suomi (the rest Finns, needless to say)... and think what you like about the whole Eurovision thing, but it was fabulous with a capital F. Of course, if ETV had two sents to rub together, I would have been there for Estonia. But since they weren't, my loyalties traversed the gulf for the night to lay with the neighbours. And we won!

It doesn't really exist, you know

Doctor Who

ABC, 7.30 pm, Saturday 8 September