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ESTONIA. What would people ask…. Is Estonia the smallest country in Europe?. No, it isn’t. With an area of 45 000 sq km it is larger than Denmark, Holland or Switzerland and twice a size of Slovenia. Located in Northern Europe beside the Baltic Sea it streches 350km E-W and 240 km N-S.
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ESTONIA What would people ask…
Is Estonia the smallest country in Europe? No, it isn’t. With an area of 45 000 sq km it is larger than Denmark, Holland or Switzerland and twice a size of Slovenia. Located in Northern Europe beside the Baltic Sea it streches 350km E-W and 240 km N-S
Do polar bears live in Estonia? Sorry, but the nearest polar bears live 2000 km further North. Estonia shares its latitude with southern Sweden and northern tip of the Scottish mainland We do have sheep though and the best known is Ruhnu Sheep (maalammas)
Does Estonia have thousand islands? That’s true! More than thousand small islands scattered in Baltic Sea, most of them uninhabited, providing an escape from civilization with their unique landscape and untouched nature reserve. Osmussaar
There are of course bigger islands with people and towns and cars and buses… With its Sõrve Peninsula – Sõrve säär The biggest of them is…
Do fern blossom in Estonia? Well, that’s a myth, of course, but due to Estonian location, we get only 6 hours of daylight in winter as opposite to ‘white nights’ in summer… and during Midsummer Eve – who knows what you can find when wandering around on Estonian meadows…
Can you see all of Estonia standing on top of its highest mountain? Almost true. Although it’s a hill – 318m – we call it Suur Munamägi - Big Egg Mountain - and it is the highest peak in all Baltic region. From observation tower one can have a view of over 50km to every direction
What about thousand lakes? No. That’s Finland’s area of expertise. But – we do have a fifth largest lake in Europe and it acts like a border between Estonia and Russian Federation. Fish included… ESTONIA RUSSIA
Where did Estonia get its name from? First humans arrived on these lands some 11,000 years ago and they allegedly named Peipsi but we are not sure who they really were… Greek explorer Pythias mentions OSTIATOIin 320BC Roman Tacitus writes about AESTI in the 1st century Vikings named us AUSTERVEGR around 800 AD During Swedish time we became ESTLAND Our kindred nation knows us as VIRO Southern neighbours name us IGAUNIJA We ourselves call us EESTI And mostly we are known as ESTONIA Maybe because of an old myth…
…according to which the ancient Estonians turned every visitor into the rocks also known as STONES… For that reason, people always avoided going to Estonia, as its people never changed their old habits… this is why there are so many STONES all over ESTONIA… Must be a very old visitor…
Does Estonia have a king? Indeed, we have had many kings ruling over us, like Danish Valdemar the Victorius Sigismund II Augustus of Poland Gustav II Adolf of Sweden … and Aleksander II of Russia Who founded University of Tartu in 1632
… but for the last 95 years we have tried to take care of our country and people ourselves Having first Estonian Republic in 1918-1940 Being Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1940-1991 And getting the second chance as the Republic of Estonia in 1991
Why are Estonians called a singing nation? ‘Cause we sing all the time… We had our first Song Festival already in 1869 And we have not been able to stop ever since… We sang through the first republic… And through soviet times… And in 1988 we helped to regain our independence through Singing Revolution… So… don’t ever underestimate a singing Estonian!
So, you are basically living on small islands surrounded by forest, singing all the time? Not really. 2/3 of Estonian population actually lives in towns… as we don’t have cities… Followed by university town Tartu Biggest of them being our capital Tallinn And then some other more or less bigger… villages
You do seem to speak some kind of weird language… Oh yes. We have an especially great passion towards vowels and words like TÖÖÖÖ KUUUURIJAD work night ÕUEAIAÄÄRNE explorers of the Moon the edge of the place in your garden which… oh well… something… JÄÄÄÄR the edge of ice which may sound and seem like jibberish but carry an actual meaning not to mention 14 cases, different for singular and plural, three degrees of phonemic length, 36 diphthongs and… well… decide for yourself
Tallinna vanalinnapäevade ajal toimusid öised laulupeod, kus noorte inimeste massid liikusid sinimustvalgeid lippe kandes Lauluväljaku poole. Alul stiihiline rahva omaalgatusel toimunud üritus kasvas lõpuks välja Laulvaks Revolutsiooniks, mille lõpptulemusena taastati Eestis iseseisvus ja omariiklus ning mille käigus esitatud isamaalised laulud ei kustu eestlaste kõrvust ja südamest enne kui maapinnalt kaob viimase kui eestlase jalajälg…
So you all know each other, don’t you? Sadly not. Out of the whole population of 1,3 million there are 2% UKRAINIANS 69% ESTONIANS 26% RUSSIANS and altogether there are over one hundred different nationalities living in Estonia, so unless you are a multilinguist…
What can you do, having only 6 hours of daylight in winter? There’s an old Estonian saying – vara üles hilja voodi nõnda rikkus majja toodi – up early, to sleep late, gets you wealth and turns your faith. We still try to prove it right by wearing ourselves out with or FARMING FISHING or TEACHING CHILDREN
The rest have found other ways for spending their days in One can only guess which ones are closer to wealth…
ACADEMIC HIGHER EDUCATION Do you have to go to school? HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTION UNIVERSITY Obviously. It’s called lifelong learning. UPPER SECONDARY EDUCATION VOCATIONAL EDUCATION BASIC SCHOOL AGE 7-17 COMPULSORY KINDERGARTEN – AGE 3-7 FAMILY Estonian tree of education
Some basic wikipedia information, please… • Republic of Estonia • Declaration of Independence – 24 February 1918 • Legislature – unicameral parliament – Riigikogu • Official language – Estonian • Population – 1 340 000 • Area – 45 228 sq km • Capital – Tallinn • Currency – euro € • Member of: UN (since 17 October 1971) NATO (since 29 March 2004) EU (since 1 May 2004)
Is there something else? You mean, except the fact that Estonia is the most beautiful and fascinating country in the whole world and people who live there are mostly quiet and modest, unless there’s a football game going on where our national team is out there facing some major football experts or when 37 000 people are singing together under the arc on song festival grounds or during Midsummer Eve when every Estonian vanishes into the woods on the search of fern blossoms… not much… but – COME AND SEE FOR YOURSELVES!
Useful links: http://estonia.eu/ http://www.estonica.org/en/ http://www.visitestonia.com/en/about-estonia/estonian-culture/estonian-language http://www.elfond.ee/en/what-we-do/estonian-nature And thousand more… This presentation has been compiled in the framework of Comenius Multilateral School Partnership project Let’s First Understand our National Heritage in order to Define and Build our European Identity by Lohusuu School in Estonia OCTOBER 2013