I recently read a though provoking, well written article in the Estonian language newspaper published in the United States. (“Vaba Eesti Sõna”) It described how Estonians tend to be unique, individualistic and like to be their own bosses. It also pointed out that there were differences in outlook, past and present, between generations as well as those who had recently arrived from the fatherland. It concluded by saying that despite these differences, we should now all try to work together.
I translated the gist of the article to my wife who replied with a snort that almost every Estonian she knew was certainly individualistic, stubborn and with the memory of an elephant when it came to perceived injustices or wounds. In particular, I fit the bill perfectly.
I had to think about this for awhile and I remembered thinking somewhat the same thing about a friend and neighbor of ours who had recently had an accident. By way of background, I met this person who is of my parents’ generation many years ago walking dogs. One day after I asked him where he was from since he had a bit of an accent. He replied that he was originally from North East Europe, from a place that I probably had never heard of — namely “Estonia”. “Where in Estonia?” I asked. He paused and looked at me somewhat strangely, and said “Oesel”. I replied — “you mean Saaremaa?”
Anyway, to make a long story short, his parents were “Baltic barons” who had their estate expropriated just after the Estonian War of Independence. Their manor house and estate had disappeared completely. It was located only a few kilometers from where my parents grew up. All that was left was their coat of arms on the castle wall in Kuressaare and several family tombs which I subsequently located in Kaarma cemetery. His parents left when he was very young and settled in northern Saskatchewan. He spoke Baltic German, but he said that when his parents didn’t want the children to understand what they were talking about the conversation was always in Estonian which they spoke, but not very well.
Anyway, my friend, now in his early 80’s, slipped and fell on the ice at the local shopping centre awhile back. He was down for about five minutes or so before somebody came along and helped him up. He called his wife to come and get him with her car since he felt he couldn’t drive home. I got the call about half an hour later from the wife and went over. I took one look at him and said “perhaps we should go to emergency at the hospital and get this looked at”. Never a big talker, he replied “I think so”.
Well, when we got to the hospital, they whisked him right in with almost no red tape. It turned out he had a badly broken shoulder, bruised face and required an operation to put things back together. When the doctor asked him if he was hurting he replied “a bit”. The doctor pressed him with the old “one to ten scale of pain”. He replied “about nine and half, about the same as when my jeep went over a land mine during the war”. Later, his wife described him to her friends as looking like a raccoon, with two black eyes and a black nose.
I thought to myself how much like those first generation Estonians, made of real stern stuff. No complaining and no fussing. Anyone else would have called an ambulance instead of his wife and been moaning for pain killers.
Anyway, my friend was eventually transferred to a special hospital for veterans to recuperate. I went to visit him shortly thereafter and he informed me that it was indeed a small world since the day orderly looking after him and who he really liked, was from Tallinn. This person had come over about ten years ago. I was interested since the opportunities for speaking Estonian locally are quite limited, so I made a point of visiting during day time. Sure enough, the person was on duty and when I saw him, I greeted him in Estonian. He smiled and said in English “Oh, you speak Estonian do you? I’m afraid I only speak Russian”. Turned out his parents had moved to Estonia shortly after the war and he had lived there all his life. That turned out to be OK with my friend who knew Russian from his days in the military and now got to practice it.
I came away from all this wondering just what exactly an “Estonian” is. Is it someone like me who speaks the language, but has only briefly visited the country a few times, or is it somebody such as my neighbor, born there and whose family had been there for centuries but never really learned the language? Or was it the newcomer who described himself as “Estonian” having been born and lived there for almost half a century, but not knowing the Estonian language at all.
Anyway, we all get along well despite not speaking Estonian to each other.

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