BONJOUR L'ESTONIE

Midsummer to be widely celebrated in Estonia

TALLINN - In a week, the streets of Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius will be eerily deserted as people throughout the region retreat to the countryside for the night-long festival. The holiday is the largest annual celebration in all three Baltic States, as they reconnect with their pagan roots. Traditions include building a bonfire, dancing and singing traditional songs until dawn. Revelers build crowns of leaves as flowers to wear through the night.
The holiday dates to pre-Christian times, but was renamed “St. John’s Day” after the arrival of Christianity in the 13th century.

The holiday is always held on the night of June 23 and is meant to mark the longest day of the year - when the sun only sets for a few hours and the night never gets much darker than twilight.
Traditional foods include Jani cheese, (usually lots of) beer and grilled meats. The holiday is known as Jaanipaev in Estonia, Jani in Latvia and Jonines in Lithuania. Midsummer Eve is a beautiful summer evening filled with mysticism, love, flaming bonfires and feelings, dancing and music, “swinging songs” and folk games. All of that can be experienced at the Estonian Open Air Museum on the night that is the most important holiday of the year for Estonians.

Estonian believers shop a spiritual "marketplace"

In Tallinn's medieval Old Town, the primary tourist attraction of the Baltic seaport capital, Estonia’s Christian heritage is ubiquitous. Gothic church spires and crosses are the architectural leitmotif.

Despite prominent symbols of faith in public spaces, Estonia is noted as one of the world’s most agnostic nations. A history of foreign occupation and cultural imposition has left an ambiguous relationship between Estonians and the role of religion in their lives.

But Estonia is not so much a nation of atheists – France led the way in that category in the latest poll of European religious sentiment, the Eurobarometer survey of 2010 at 40 percent – as an amalgam of the utterly indifferent and the spiritually seeking.

“The image of Estonia as the most atheistic country seems to exist only in the Estonian popular imagination,” explains Atko Remmel, a scholar of Estonian church history at the University of Tartu, the country’s leading research institution.

Indeed, many Estonians have faith of a sort. Half of respondents to the Eurobarometer poll expressed belief in “some sort of spirit or life force." Where Estonians are irreligious is in lack of church attendance and specific religious affiliation, in part due to the country's historical legacy.

May, 1st : Lucky charm

At the beginning of the 20th century it became tradition in France to sell lily of the valley on international Labour day. May 1, by labour organisations and private persons without paying sales tax (on that day only) as a symbol of spring.

Estonia's Seto minority strive to protect traditions

Decked in the finely-crafted silver jewellery that symbolises her tiny minority, folk-singer Oie Sarv hums a refrain and reflects on what centuries of tradition mean in the Internet age.

Estonia's Seto, a group of only 15,000 in this Baltic nation of 1.3 million, are struggling to keep their way of life alive as young people leave their close-knit communities to seek new opportunities.

For many of the estimated 2,000 who live in what is known as Setoland, a cluster of villages in southeast Estonia, tradition is key.

Sarv, 56, is a folklore expert and one of the best-known practitioners of the "leelo", an ancient polyphonic singing style that in 2009 was recognised by UNESCO for its value to the world's heritage.

"The leelo is part of our lives, we sing on all kind of occasions, both joyful and sorrowful," Sarv told AFP in Obinitsa, her home village which lies some 280 kilometres (170 miles) from the Estonian capital Tallinn.

"The most famous singers in the first half of last century were able to sing up to 20,000 rhymes. The leelo also helps us to keep our ancient language alive," she said.

The origins of the Seto are shrouded in mystery.

Seto seek endowment from state for wedding tradition

The Seto people of southeastern Estonia are looking for state funding to be handed out once a year for one couple to help revive the culture's traditional three-day wedding.

Saajad  (the becomers), as weddings are called in the local language, include all of the key characteristics of the culture, the news program Aktuaalne Kaamera reported.

The program reported that most young people today do not have the financial means to hold such an extravagant wedding and thus some customs are scrapped. A solution considered in Setomaa is to pay one couple per year a wedding grant that would help them learn the old customs and keep them active.

A similar grant has been paid out for several years on the island of Kihnu, which appears on the UNESCO heritage list.

The funds could come from the Setoland Culture Program financed by the Ministry of Culture, even though it has been halved in recent years.

Concert to feature sacred music and Estonian folk hymns

The Concert Series at Lenoir-Rhyne University will present a concert by the ensemble group Heinavanker on Sunday, Oct. 3, at 3:00 p.m. at P.E. Monroe Auditorium on campus. Heinavanker is a vocal ensemble the activity of which is inspired by older sacred music.

The concert is free, and the L-R Friends of Music invite the entire community to experience this group.

Heinavanker (The Haywain), a music vocal ensemble from Tallinn, Estonia, has performed since 1988. The ensemble is named after the famous altarpiece by Hieronymus Bosch, which depicts a huge wagonload of hay rolling through a world vexed by agony and greed. From atop the Haywain, angels make beautiful music to heal the misery below.

Since 1988, the Heinavanker ensemble has undertaken many concert tours: including Finland, France, Germany, Poland, Scandinavia, America and Switzerland. The Heinavanker ensemble has also participated in many festivals, such as the Moscow Early Music Festival, the Aarhus Festival (Denmark), the Summer of Music in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern (Germany), the EXPO 2000 (Hanover, Germany), the European Middle Ages Festival in Horsens and the Vendsyssel Festival (Denmark), the Falsterbonäset Sacred Music Festival and the Lysekil Sacred Music Festival (Sweden), the Haapavesi Folk Festival (Finland) among many others. Known for their exquisite vocal quality, amazing blends, and perfect intonation, this group embodies the qualities that delight us when we listen to the human voice soar in harmony, unaccompanied.

Estonians celebrate ‘white nights’ during festival

TALLINN - The tiny Baltic state of Estonia went wild yesterday, as people lit thousands of bonfires nationwide and were set to party into the early hours of the next day in their traditional Midsummer festival.

The annual "Jaanilaupaev" celebrations, held every June 23 to mark the summer's "white nights" in northern European countries, are rooted deeply in the pagan traditions of Estonia, which converted to Christianity in the 13th century, far later than western Europe.

Similar festivals take place in neighbouring Baltic states, Lithuania and Latvia, and are also celebrated worldwide by expatriates from all three countries.

"First of all, it's a celebration of the sun and sunlight. The most important Midsummer ritual is lighting a bonfire," Maarja Kouts, organiser of one of the biggest parties in the Estonian capital Tallinn, said. "It's believed in Estonia that fire has the power to cleanse the surrounding area of bad spirits and to grant prosperity and a good harvest to people who attend the ritual," she said.

Flax Line, Raekoja plats, 13, Tallinn

This shop will only bring you the best "stuff" and to please you, you also will get the best service around town. Since it is located in a place that everyone passes by at least 10 times a day, then you have to walk into this fantastic boutique.

This is what Leena says about it :

"Here is a picture of something we have in our shop. You can see the napery I was telling about in the previous posting.

This is the right time to come shopping for Christmas, to decorate your home and create christmas spirit with these beautiful colors !!!

We also provide ordering service. For example if you need something in special sizes, then it is possible to order it from us, or if you want a product you have seen on the home page and it is not possible for you to visit the shop, then on mutual trusting we can reach an agreement.

You can find the most interesting and original ideas in our shop. The products are designed only for our shop ; they are unique and added to that, they are of very good quality."

So, now that Xmas is well on its way, don't wait any longer. I am sure that you all have so many more presents to make to someone you love.

You may drop a line to Leena at [email protected] and her site is here (there are many more pictures so that you can forge yourself an opinion). Happy hunting !

Biggest Trees : an Estonian tradition

There is a tradition in Estonia of preserving and naming the biggest trees of each major species, and also for large groves or unusual trees. My map of Estonia contains perhaps two hundred such marked trees, and all the ones I've visited so far (something like 30 or 40 of them) have signs or other markings, and usually some parking and a path to the tree or trees. I have no idea of the origins of this custom, and I have not yet ever found anyone else visiting the trees to ask. But I like it, and I've very much enjoyed finding and visiting various trees.

The tree at right above is called the Mäe-Lehtsoo Tamm, and it's located near the small lake (Punde) pictured at right, near the town of Urväste in south-central Estonia. If I understood the sign correctly, it is the second-largest oak in all of Estonia. The area around the tree had recently been cleared of brush, along with the hillside above it, giving a clear view of the entire tree. This was a nice presentation, but the tree itself looks like it's not in such good shape. There are many large broken branches, and much of the tree looks quite sickly.........

Olesummer Festival much more than beer

TALLINN - The Estonian Ollesummer (Beer Summer), once again hits the historical Song Festival grounds of Tallinn this week. First held in 1994 as a local beer trade fair, Beer Summer has made a considerable leap to becoming a massive national event that celebrates the diversity of Estonian culture from contemporary urban to ethnic.

Spanning five days, July 6 -10, the Estonian Beer Festival recreates a world of its own, where the proximity of the sea and the taste of the sudsy brew enhance the festive mood. For beer drinkers, this is the best place to sample something new -with over 100 varieties, the beer comes in all colours and varieties. “Beer Wall”is the place to get your brew – a row of beer sellers greet you at the main alley. But if you hesitate to dive into the beer right away, the drink can be also purchased in giant beer tents and stands that are scattered all over the site.

Common knowledge tells us that in order to appreciate the best taste of beer, it should be accompanied by a ...........

SLEEP IT OFF, THEN DRIVE !

*This message on a public awareness campaign poster at the intersection of Kreutzwaldi and Raua in central Tallinn didn’t penetrate the awareness and/or conscience of all jaanipäeva (St. John’s Day / Midsummer) revellers on the eve of June 23. Estonians were enjoying a 4-day long weekend and a record number of people visited the islands – 16 000 people and 9000 cars to Saaremaa alone.

The tabloid newspaper SL Õhtuleht (Evening paper) was the only paper that went to print last Saturday, but it got its sensationalism. Its front page read: Jaanipäeva kurb lõpp (A sad end to St. John’s Day) : 2 tapetut ja 122 joobes autojuhti (2 murdered and 122 drunk drivers). That figure jumped to 317 (the weekend total) in Monday morning’s papers. Perhaps there were more patrols out this year, but in comparison, a mere (?!) 83 drunk drivers were stopped on jaaniöö (the eve of St. John’s) last year. This year’s statistics also included a total of 144 underage drinkers and 68 speeding drivers being charged.

The highest incidence of violations was on the west coast where 12 traffic accidents were reported in which 2 people were injured. Local police fined 59 people under the influence and 42 underage drinkers for consuming alcohol in public ......

The Estonian Native Religion

*The Estonian native religion is the only native nature worship in Estonia. It was never created, it has arisen and changed in this country together with maarahvas (1)(Estonians) during innumerable generations. Estonia has been inhabited for about 10000 years. Maarahvas and their religion are considered just as old.

Being an inseparable entity together with our land, traditional culture and aboriginal languages, its something more than a religion. It is a consistent worldview, tradition and way of life, which in this form exists only here, in Estonia.

Variants of the Estonian Native Religion

Just as maarahvas and maakeel (aboriginal language) (2) vary in different regions, so does the religion. We meet somewhat different customs in different regions. For example, in the southern region the powers of nature are called ema; isa (mother, father) but in the northern regions haldjas (guardian spirit). In the southern and western regions the arrival of spring is ........... 

Autumn market at the Open Air Museum

September 16 - 18 : AUTUMN MARKET

Autumn farming days in the Pulga household are filled with harvest tasks and chores, as well as cooking. Guests can buy and taste fresh vegetables and sweets, and buy handicraft and much more.

Not to be missed.

Create your own Tallin during Old Town Days : 03rd-05th June

TALLINN - Old Town Days are like a regular Botox injection; they make Tallinn’s ancient face, wrinkled with history, resemble a city brimming with youth over and over again.

Each June, thousands of tourists flock to Tallinn in search of pretty-pretty things to buy. Under a glowing summer sky, the town looks superb. Even if it’s overcast the festival’s bright handicrafts, fresh food and spinning folk costumes lighten the dreary sky.

Whatever the weather may be this year, there are so many activities on the Old Town agenda you’ll probably need a consultation - either that or a map and program in-hand. If you can’t choose whether to see the ..............

Eesti etnograafilised eksponaadid Lakewood muuseumis

Estonian artefacts join Lakewood museum

Published in the Asbury Park Press : 07/01/2005

By RICHARD QUINN
TOMS RIVER BUREAU

LAKEWOOD, USA -- A used linen shirt, an orange wool skirt and a well-worn pair of leather shoes need some special qualities to be in a museum.

Oh, they're 216 years old? Yep, that'll do it.

And so the Lakewood Heritage Museum accepted a traditional folk costume from the Lakewood Estonian Association. Thursday in the first official partnership between the two groups.

Juhan Simonson of Lakewood, a current member and former president of the Estonian American National Council, said he wanted the museum to have an Estonian presence because his community has been prevalent in the township since World War II.

Estonian refugees came to Lakewood -- via New York City -- in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Many became hard labourers, as evidenced by the Estonian Lutheran Church built on E. Seventh Street in the 1960s.

The Lakewood Estonian Association will celebrate its 60th anniversary later this year in part by donating more artefacts to the museum.