Tallinn

July 7 - Tallinn

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Every cruise of sufficient length surprises with an unexpected gem. Tallinn, Estonia was this one’s.

First we learned about the uniqueness of Estonia. The people migrated from central Asia long, long ago, so their heritage is distinct from their neighbors. The closest affinity they have is to the Fins. Their language is close enough to Finnish that they understand visiting Finns and Finns visit a lot. Finland is less than two hours away by hydrofoil and Fins come here to shop since prices here are a bargain. Oddly, Finnish products like their cheese cost less in Estonia than in Finland where it is produced. Our tour guide, who has lived in Estonia many years, said that the Fins use to come to get drunk, but now come to shop.

What the Estonian’s do not like are things Russian. Estonia was controlled by Russia for many years up to the fall of the Soviet Union. Russia is a huge country with very limited access to the sea and Estonia provided a wide stretch of coast for them. That is evidence during the preparations for the 1980 Olympics. Russia resorted to building a facility for the yacht competition near Tallinn. A large Russian Orthodox church was built directly across from the Estonian parliament building. The tour guide said “it was too large to move,” depicting the common attitude for anything Russian.

Estonia is a very small country. It has 1.5 million inhabitants, 400,000 of whom live in Tallinn. But the city seems larger when one is downtown among its modern office buildings and hotels. Fortunately the Stalin school of architecture had limited reach into Tallinn. The buildings take their place as equals to the other modern cities of the Baltic that we visited. The few things Soviet stick out like sore thumbs with the crumbling concrete façade as the typical giveaway.

However, the crown jewel of Tallinn is its old town, which we heard was the most complete medieval town anywhere. The city wall built in the twelfth century surround the city and many buildings date back to the time Columbus headed to the new world. It is a delight to walk the cobblestone streets and admire the variety of pastel painted buildings. Many were the homes of rich merchants and others the guild houses of merchant trades. They are now embassies, government buildings, shops, and restaurants.

Several of these shops sell amber in the form of necklaces, broaches, and other jewelry. We found that eight percent of all the amber in the world comes from the Baltic region. But the best shopping was the market in the town square. Every town square in this part of the world has stalls and merchants, but in Tallinn, many of the goods were made by the merchant selling it. Wearing a variety of native costumes, the market was a festive craft show.

You will quickly learn that few Estonians speak English. Unlike other countries we visited on this trip, you will have to do a bit of gesticulation to make a purchase here. However, we successfully did so with one merchant and Ellen now has a beautiful linen wrap handmade by a talented Tallinn woman.

After visiting opulent Russian Orthodox churches of St. Petersburg, we saw a couple of the simplistic interiors of the predominant churches of Estonia, Lutheran. Martin Luther railed against the excesses of the Church and these churches are definitely more modest. The masses of Russia later railed against the excesses of the Russian Orthodox church, among other things, with a more radical solution: close them down and make atheism the official state religion.

In one of the churches, an organist entertained us with a short program of religious music, with fine solo vocal accompaniment. The interior of the church was decorated by a series of paintings depicting stories of the bible. Our guide reminded us that most people were illiterate in those days and relied on pictures for the stories told in the Bible.

We were in port of Tallinn for just a few hours and the time left us wanting to spend more time in this delightful Baltic town.