Tallinn

From Tallinn

One of the reasons for coming to this area of the world was to meet up with Helen Sumro , our young Estonian friend and erstwhile crew mate. She was skippering a 42 footer in the Baltic Tall Ships race and was due to end the first leg of the race , from Denmark , just offshore from Tallinn. We were planning a trip home for ten days which meant we might miss her , so we set off across the Gulf of Finland from Helsinki a few days early and arrived in Pirita a few hours before her.
Pirita is the artificial harbour built by the Russians for the 1980 sailing Olympics at Tallinn, and is a typically Soviet structure of unimaginative brutal concrete , and showing its age. The contrast with the pristine and elegant surroundings of Blekholmen in Helsinki was massive , and on arrival we wondered at the wisdom of coming here . By the next day all such misgivings were swept away as we were entertained by Helen’s family and young friends , and then taken on a tour of Tallinn and the surrounding areas. These young people took such an obvious pride in their young country and its achievements in its 20 odd years of existence that we suddenly stopped noticing the crumbling concrete structures of the little harbour , but instead noted the 2 chandleries , the busy little businesses doing brisk trade , the relative affluence of the people and above all the friendly “can do “ attitude of everyone we met. As for the old city of Tallinn itself , we were blown away by its beauty and wonderful state of preservation.

From Tallinn

I doubt if any of the commercial guides that take tourists round the city would impart the same pride at seeing the Estonian flag flying on the highest tower of the fortress that towers over the city, or ironic pleasure that the ghastly Soviet theatre building has fallen on hard times and is now known as the “Hollywood”. The mostly peaceful revolution that led to “escape” from the Soviet union in 1992 was known as the singing revolution ,as night after night many thousands of people met in the park and sang together to let their Soviet masters know that they could no longer be controlled by Moscow. I have heard from several people how choral music and mass singing is still their most important cultural activity as it reminds them how their country came into being in the first place.

From Tallinn

Actually , a trip round the area with these youngsters should be mandatory for those who doubt the importance of the EEC. These Baltic states have been fought over for millennia . More recently they were ruled by Tsarist Russia , but essentially governed by German families descended fron the Teutonic knights. Like Finland , they obtained independence in 1918 as Tsarist Russia succumbed to the communist revolution , but unlike Finland were overrun in 1940 by first the Russians , then the Germans , and finally the Russians again. The Russians wiped out the political classes and the Germans wiped out the Jews and other dissenters. Finally the Estonian peoples are once more governing themselves and I can think of nothing more important than the rest of Europe continues to combine to keep these young democracies alive and thriving as a reminder of, and bulwark against, the appalling atrocities of the last century.

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