EVS in Estonia

Couple of weeks ago, we went to the very south-east of Estonia, in a place called Värska where lives a minority of a few thousand people (4 000 in Estonia, 3 000 in Russia). We chose this particular time of year because on the 2nd of August the Setu people elect their king. Actually, this king is the representative of the god Peko, which symbolises fertility.

The Setu people are said to be “half believers” but they should be called “double believers” for they are orthodox and also have their own divinities. They also have their own dialect which is closer to estonian than russian and they are famous for their songs dances and food. Their costum tells a bit their strory : they carry long necklaces and heavy silver plates (between 4 and 6 kilos) because the Setu people fled with all their richness and therefore made necklaces with rings, coins and melted all the rest. They have a strong oral tradition and hopefully some songs have been transcribed from an old lady called Hilana Taarka, the mother of Setu music. Though she was illiterate, she had memorized up to 30 000 verses of leelo songs (eight syllable verses to a repetitive simple tune).

We were able to discover this event with two other french people that we had met during one of our guiding tours in Tallinn, with whom we spent two days. There was lots of good food, we even participated in a cheese contest to elect the members of the court. That is when we met some people from our village which we learned had some Setu origins and authorized us to vote as well for the Setu king. After some songs in which each candidate was praised, people were invited to stand in a line in front of the person that they chose. Lembit Lennuk (his family name means “airplane” !!!) did not win but we didn’t mind, we were happy to see the other man parade on a horse with the Setu flag, followed by his “army”, a burlesque crowd of supporters in costum marching and taking their role seriously.

Recently, during the last training we participated in, we were lucky to be able to test a smoke-sauna or the authentic estonian sauna. This is the time for us to explain a little more of this tradition is in Estonia. Most people know the finnish sauna which is broadly spread in the scandinavian Europe.

Without getting too much into the details, it is basically a fire which is lit under some granit stones (sometimes this is replaced by an electric heating) in a pretty small room, more like a closet, but very well isolated, in which you get in with a few friends if possible to enjoy the heat. It is a very dry type of heat, so you can pour a little water on the stones to make it more humid. The humidity actually brings down the temperature slightly but it feels suddenly much warmer and some find it hard to breath. In reality, it takes time getting used to going to the sauna and it should be done gradually (without trying to beat reccords) to fully enjoy the experience. Each one has his own technique but the options are usually between :
a) jumping into a river or lake
b) rolling yourself in the snow or in a hole in the ice
c) taking a cold shower or pour bucket of water over your head

This stimulates the blood circulation as you can imagine and also cleans your body (and your mind as well, for the only thing you can think of is “it’s hot in here, it’s hot it’s hot !”

The estonian sauna is based on the same principle, but the heating is different, instead of an electric or wooden stove, it is an open fire which is done inside a small house (well isolated), the smoke accumulating inside and the heat warming up the stones.
A person has to maintain the fire going for at least four hours before it gets warm enough inside (that’s probably why they are not so common as the finnish sauna), then the smoke is let out very quickly and you can enter the small cabin with a plank of wood to sit on. You have to try not to touch the sides for the walls are hot but also because of the soot.There was always a little smoke left which gives it a peculiar smell. Some throw beer on the stones in addition to the water to have a nice smell similar to that of baked bread. Purist will go as far as whipping themselves with branches of birch to help stimulate the blood and the sooting. Personnally, we liked this new type of sauna, which we hadn’t tested yet and which left our skinks very soft. This by itself would have been a reason to come back to Estonia !!!

The picture is that of a smoke sauna being prepared in Soomaa during our mid-term training last year, unfortunately we had not been able to try it at that time.

Since we were in Estonia last year at the same time, we also wrote about this major event in the estonian summer. St John’s day, or rather this particularly short night is the time to get out of the cities and celebrate the arrival of summer together around a fire.
We were working the next day, so we had to stay near Tallinn, and since we liked it a lot last year in Viimsi, we came back, this time with Zsofia our hungarian friend (and volunteer) who was with her mother and sister. Ifat, a british volunteer was there as well, with three of her friends. We had a little dificulty finding a bus, so it was a group taxi that we took to and from viimsi, but a little comfort once in a while doesn’t hurt.
The weather had been very bad all day, with rain showers. We even wondered if they would be able to light the bonfire ! But it all cleared up and we had a magnificent sunset.
This year we could try the swing, at least, for some time, before it became too dangerous (it was falling appart) but it was very pleasant to be there again, at the same place, and listen to the estonian popular songs, eat greasy food and admire the fire on the beach.

The music in the video is from an estonian group we know and like called “indigo lapsed”.

While visiting Tallinn or in other cities of Estonia, one is bound to find a flower market. Generally open every day, even during the cold months of winter, these colourfull stands are very popular. From roses to jonquils, or even sunflowers, there is usually a large choice for all occasions.

Indeed, estonians tend to give flowers to each other very often : to visit a friend, to give to work colleagues, at any small ceremony, all excuses are good to offer some flowers. Men can give a bouquet to women without any misunderstandings on his intentions, moreover, men can even receive flowers, without putting aside their virility (this takes a little time to get used to, but it can become very pleasant !).

Students give each other lilies of the valley, not on the first of May (as it is the tradition in France), but to celebrate the end of the school year and success in their exams in June. This comes from the fact that these flowers don’t bloom as early in Estonia as in France.

Another difference : if we tend to wrap our bouquets in a nice clear paper, estonians like to keep the surprise until the very end and not show everybody in the streets what they’ve just bought. They therefore wrap their flowers in an opaque sheet of paper, almost like newspaper, and stapple it up so no one can see. Receiving flowers is then like opening a present !

Last Saturday, we participated in a song festival (laulupidu). It was a big event for the reserve, for it have been in preparation already since last year. In addition to the 500 singers, there was also an exhibit about previous festivals which have been going on at this site (at the meeting point between two rivers, closed to Jägala waterfalls) for ages.

Most of the participants were wearing Jõelähtme’s traditionnal dress, with a stripped skirt, with green yellow red blue, the villages colours. For those who were not lucky to have a traditionnal costum to wear, we had made some tee-shirts, on which were printed some of the local designs.

Jonathan played some flute to accompany the singers and it was very rewarding to be part of this event. The exhibit took quite some preparation to put in place, but the team work we did with Margit and her son Josep paid off.

Enjoy the video which will give you an idea of the atmosphere of this singing festival !

We were hardly back from Pärnu, that we went to dance at our local culture house, with Zsofia, a hungarian volunteer we had met during the training. It was sunny and pleasant outside, so we started dancing in the grass, the musicians perched on the branches of an apple tree.

Our usual dance group has changed quite a bit. The musicians but also the dancers, who not only come from Jõelähtme, but also from Tallinn. It is not so bad after all, for it teaches us new dances and we can meet new people.

Zsofia did quite well, (better than us actually) and danced with everybody. You will see on the video, how good she was.

Yes, Again ! As you can see, we are enjoying the last moments of our stay in Estonia as much as we can ! Last Friday, we went to our traditional dance session in our local culture house. We had been to Parnu, and tought some bretton dances, but this time we were ready ! Amélie and I had practiced some real dances and we knew this time, there would be more people than usual and also some of the musicians from Parnu. It was even better than we had thought. Undoubtedly, this was the best we’ve had since we’ve been here. We danced all our favorite dances (and filmed them too!) there was candlelight for all saints day, which gave it an intimate atmosphere, and the session ended with some singing. Our breton dances were a success and I was able to play some Irish music with Eike, a violin player (the one we’d brought back from Parnu). We spent a great evening. We don’t know if this was our last dance session, but it sure was the best ! Enjoy the video !

Quite suprising that we should be telling you about us dancing in Parnu. Why ? Well, first we do not usually dance except for our monthly session in Joelahtme, but also, Parnu is at the other side of the country. Estonia is really small of course, but still, it’s a good two hours drive to Parnu. It Just happened, that last sunday afternoon, when nothing could have suggested other plans than going back home after church, that Silja (pronounce “Celia”) mentionned about something in Parnu. She asked if we wanted to come, and as we know never to say no to experience the real estonian adventure, we agreed instantly. We could only make out that there was something “greek” going on. Our minds started imagining greek singers and dancers giving a show and people from all over the country coming to see them. Not at all, it ended up it was a dance session just like in our village, but with a little more musicians and older dancers.
We were not displeased, that we hadn’t understood right, but we were not dressed for dancing at all. We had put on polar expedition-like clothes which were not appropriate at all for dancing. It happened that a good group of our Joelahtme crew was there and the dances we knew the parnu people didn’t. Never would I have imagined Amélie and I along with Silja and other of our friends showing older estonian people from Parnu how to dance their dances. Worst, the musicians insisted that we taught the rest how to dance french dances ! What is a french dance ? The only one we could think of which would be representative and not totaly ridiculous was a breton dance. They usually go with people holding little fingers (which the estonians had a hard time believing this could be true) and Amélie and I made up something to match the music which was being played. It was a bit hilarious, but we did our best not to laugh too much, for we didn’t want our dancers to feel like they had been fooled (which they hadn’t. We found out later, that we came very close to some real breton dances! it must have been in our genes…)

anyway, we left for Parnu at 6pm, came back at midnight, with one of the musicians in the car, with whom we had a good talk. A good way to end our weekend.

Last Saturday, it was one of the most beautiful day we’ve had this fall. The perfect day for a wedding. We had rehersed some songs with Silja and Kaiman, our estonian friends, and were to sing “In this Heart” by Sinead O’Connor, with 4 different voices. The result was not so bad, you’ll be able to hear it on the video…

I had already played a tune on my Irish Tin Whistle for a wedding in August, but Amélie hadn’t been there and this was her first time. It was a pretty wedding, as they usually are, but though people were glad, they were not over-happy as you could expect, the estonian flegm I guess.

We really loved being part of the ceremony, and to be asked to play was an honnor.

Last friday, our little dancing group met again, after having been busy all summer with festivals all over the country, the musicians and dancers from our village are back again and renewed the traditional meeting every first friday of the month. It was a pleasure to see some faces we hadn’t seen for a while, though it was not always easy to remember the steps.

I played some tin-whistle to accompany the bagpipe, and we danced along all evening. Our good friend Helen, a local english teacher, gave us a CD from a group from Quebec which we had met this summer in Viljandi festival. It was very nice of her and she had sewed a little linen bag for it.
we can’t wait until next month !

With the coming of winter and Amélie’s birthday last week, we thought it would be the perfect time to get what we had been looking at since we arrived here : some warm woolen estonian sweaters. We took advantage of our day off to go shopping in Tallinn and found these nice ones, with grey and white traditional designs.
Now, we will be ready for the cold weather (lets hope) and can show off our new estonian style in Jõelähtme !

The day after the pilgrimage, took place as every sunday the mass at the Jõelähtme church. But it was a more festive ceremony than usual because 3 women of the church were celebrating their 50 years of confirmation. At this occasion the church was pretty well decorated with colourful flowers and rubans and people sang very nice prays a capella.

As usually, we haven’t so much understood the topic of the pastor’s speach, but we still have laughed a lot with Madeleine (the pastor’s daughter) trying to sing the only estonian words that we knew.

After the mass, a big party was organized for inaugurating the new swing some people of the community had been built behind the church. Everybody was here : children and adults, even a baby with his father who seemed to have a lot of fun, and some grandmothers who stayed almost 2 hours on the swing. Another good excuse to make a party, to meet each other and have nice time together.

Concerning the music in the video, it is from Genticorum, a group from Québec we discovered during the Viljandi festival. Emily one of our friend from the village offered us their cd, the song is called “cascou” (in french) and that exactly the feeling that we had when we went up to 90/110 degrees with the swing !

Yesterday, after work, we went to the village fair of Vandjala, a small village located in our reserve. We were to meet two French photographers there, who had asked us where to meet “real” estonian people. It was the perfect occasion : a very small local fair where everybody met each other to spend some nice time together. There were among others : traditionnal games, dances, songs, election of the chief of the village (not really like a mayor but just to represent the inhabitants during the meetings of the community district), cakes, home made beer (very sweet), false russian champagne and very good mood !

We met some very nice people there, very welcoming, as if we were part of the village. We almost managed to make a whole conversation in estonian with a kind lady. We even received the official tee-shirt of the village.

It was also the occasion to learn more about local stories and traditions, very interesting !

Finally, at the end of the day, we made a small tour of our reserve to Cyril and Julien, the two French photographers, and share with them a good meal.

Here is a little article about one of our numerous gastronomical discoveries…
These pelmeenid, as we call them here, are very similar to ravioli. It is made with pasta filled with small pieces of meat. As our estonian teacher told us, the students are crazy about them, because it is really easy to cook, you just have to heat them up in a pan. “Head isu !” (Enjoy your meal, bon appétit!)

The day before the Singing festival, the same thing, for dancing takes place. This event also brings thousands of young people together to dance in costume to traditional tunes or others written for the occasion. The Tantsupidu is classified by the UNESCO as a world imaterial heritage. How could it not be ? It’s simple, there’s nothing like it anywhere.

It looked a bit like what certain bands do while playing. Crossing and making shapes on the field, except this was done with real dancing movements and thousands of people at once. The visual effect it produced was incredible.
Though I’ve always liked traditional dancing, I never would have thought that I’d ever have tears in my eyes watching people dance in costume… Pictures can’t really show how it felt. You couldn’t even see all at once through the camera !

If the spectators were singing along and enjoying the show, the dancers themselves, mostly children, were seemingly enjoying themselves as well ! they were laughing and smiling and it all looked like a lot of fun. One could see in older people’s eyes that they were proud of their youth. They could be !

Last Weekend we assisted to this fabulous event called “Laulupidu”. A song festival where 18500 people came together from all over the countryin traditional dresses to sing songs about love, nature, unity…. Estonia is a singing country, since it gained its independence through singign, in what was called “the singing revolution”. Since then it has kept its traditions. Everybody wore a traditional dress, which was amysing how many different costumes they could come up with for such a small country !

here are a few facts about it :
- 831 choirs with more than 26 000 singers in all
- 47 orchestras with more than 1600 young orchestrants
- alltogether almost 100 000 people, that counts for apprx 8% of Estonian population.
- Estonians (though it’s a very small country) have the biggest song festival in the world !

For us it was just amaysing to see all of this hapening. How can we have never heared about it before though it is in Europe ! These thousands of children and young people getting together to sing ! about being together, peace, love … I don’t kow that many places in the world which have that. And the worst is that this was supposed to be the “small” one. There is a much larger event, with 30000 people (adults) every 5 years. We were at least lucky we could see it when we were in Estonia.

We’re so grateful Margit and Merle gave us these tickets for my birthday, it probably will be one of the highlights of our stay here.

A very important date in the estonian calendar is the 23rd of June, Jäänipaev (or St John’s day) is a big party here in Estonia and in some other northern countries. This tradition is very old, it dates back even before the arrival of Christianity in Estonia. Jaanipäev is celebrated in the night between 23rd and 24th of June, a few days after the summer solstice, when night seems to be non-existent. Estonian people celebrate at this time the arrival of the summer as well as an important victory for the independance of the country. The lighting of the traditional bonfires became linked with the ideals of independence and freedom. But it is also a good excuse to have fun and meet each other, in family or with friends. All the generations are together to celebrate this day, most of the time in the countryside, rarely in cities.

We saw the official flame coming in Tallinn in the afternoon. Then, we went to Viimsi, on the other side from the bay of Tallinn, on the coast, in a small open-air museum. We had never been there before, so it was a good occasion. It was really nice to participate to this great national event, and to share moments with local inhabitants. In addition to the big fire (as big as a house !), there were some traditionnal games. Jonathan even tried to do some rope pulling, but it was so hard that he was almost dragged on the grass. We also listened to some concerts, with both traditionnal and modern songs.

This nice place, near the sea, and the good mood, helped us to have a very nice evening. Some other volunteers, joined us and it was pleasant to chat with them.

Head Jäänipaeva ! (Happy St John’s day in estonian !)

During our weekend in Kihnu, we were able to test a wood-heated sauna. It’s a building as big as a house, composed of a large main room, where people can play games, guitar, relax or savour some of estonia-brewed beers.
The second room is a small change-room, before entering the shower-room, last step before getting in the darkest and warmest room : the sauna itself. It was pretty dark inside, with a smell of burnt wood and a light smell of beer, which is added to the water, before it is sprayed on the hot stones. These are heated by a fire in the back of the house (which a lady had to keep adding logs !) and the smoke is captured by a chimney.

Some of the estonians with us told us that this intimate room is usually where estonians tell each other secrets or personnal things. It is not rare that during a seminar, a CEO chooses this place to tell about his private life to an employee or to get to ask him about his family (which are things rarely done here).

As for us, it enabled us to spend some good times with our volunteer friends…

The visit of kihnu’s museum really interested us and we thought we’d give a little more info about what we discovered. This is a little article about the traditional costume of Kihnu.

Our guide (left on the picture) explained to us that there were several types of dresses they wear, depending on the occasion, but also on their mood. If one is happy, (as they ussually are) the worn colour is red. Otherwise, it’s a blueish dress or, in case of a funeral black. But Always, whatever dress, there is a thin red galon at the bottom, symbolizing hope which still remains.

The costume is not fixed in time, like in a living museum, but evolves depending on the years and the fashion. for example, in the 60’s, the dress for womens were much shorter, whereas today it goes down almost to the heals. People will recognise, depending on the design, what type dress one is wearing and if so and so is in the fashion or not. This keeps the people sewing all winter and the tradition alive.

We loved these explanations, as well as all the other details our guide gave us about traditional weddings, funerals… and everyday life !

Sometimes, when walking by a river or in a forest, one might find these locks on bridges, or around trees. This tradition is still followed by many young couples who put these in places they like and throw the key. The symbol is nice, so we wanted to share it with you… so here are two pictures we took of these locks, on a suspended bridge in Rebala Heritage Reserve.