Starving Estonians

hüljes rasv

My trip to Estonia was truly eventful. I came back with a host of new friends, scores of inside jokes that no one now gets (nurrrr, political science is like my failing marriage because x, "you know what this is?" "Jenga?" "You're f@*%ing right it's Jenga, only blown up!" just to name a few), and a whole lot of love (name that vague tv reference). Thanks to all the participants (none of whom read this blog) that I stole photos from.

Outdoor:
I made that hole, then jumped in it several times


The lodge


Skiing



The always lovely Olya and Liza at the top of the tower


CLASS
Group Project


Good friends made in Estonia


Tartu

Tartu: half of a library

Alternate hot and cold...

Estonia left me feeling restored. The bite of the cold mixed with the warm of the sun on my face as I skied through Estonia's forests in Kääriku. I get silly thoughts about how it's good to know that I can still feel both, and how I can feel them at the same time.

I love to muse about this duality expressed in life as well. This is strangely how the entire Estonian school felt to me. I would be sitting in the most enthralling lectures on sovereignty, nation-state, memory, identity, or a host of other topics when I would stop and think to myself, "this is complete garbage." After a few minutes of bitterly thinking about the program, someone would make a comment that sparked my interest again, throwing me into a whirlwind of theoretical political science.

The sauna was a definite highlight of the trip. Eastern Europeans have an absolutely splendid tradition of going to these hot saunas, then dipping in cold water. The sauna at our ski retreat was possibly the most picturesque sight I've ever seen. Picture a quaint cabin on a lake surrounded by forest, with a chimney poring smoke into the clearest sky I've seen in months, with a hole in the lake acting as the cool water part of the ritual. I got to be the lucky participant who hacked a hole in the ice (which, of course, I did almost completely naked). The feeling of an overheated body dipping into a tiny, dark, icy hole is inexplicable. The real rush is when you run back into the sauna and feel your lungs and skin throb as your body fights for equilibrium that doesn't exist.

There will most likely be pictures, and a better explanation of the trip itself to come. I just wanted to get some of my weird ideas down before they weren't here anymore.

Some Estonian Humor

This is just a bit of Estonian humor to pique your interest in the posts to come when I have time to write them. To bring up the subtitles, click on the cc button, and turn on english. If you like this one, there are lots of others on youtube under Tujurikkuja eng subtitles.

Hang in there kitty

I have a lot of time to read while I'm sitting on the metro here, and I just finished reading a novel completely in Russian (it was hard for me, so that was my bragging moment). I chose to read The Master and Margarita by Bulgakov. The process of reading this novel was, for the majority of reading time, more interesting to me than the novel itself, but I did manage to gleam a few great ideas out of it by the end. The basic plot of the book is that Satan (Woland) comes to Moscow with his merry crew of hooligan demons Begamot, Koroviev, Azazzelo, and others. While in Russia, the group raises hooliganary among Muscovites including a beheading, a black-magic show, and a witch’s ball. There is a dual plot of the condemnation of one Yeshua Ha-Nozri by Pilate. It includes Matviey the Levite—the somewhat insane, but devoted disciple of Yeshua. I don’t want to ruin the story for any of you, but at the end of the book, I finally was able to grasp some of the deeper themes of the novel. The book puts a twist on familiar stories: the first on Faust, the second on the Gospels.
The first is a conversation between Pilate and the Levite in which they are discussing the already dead Yeshua. Keep in mind that this novel challenges what we may consider as black and white, and doesn’t really apply to religion (in my mind anyway) at all. Pilate says:

"You, I know, consider yourself a disciple of Yeshua, but I tell you that you have acquired nothing of what he taught you…Remember—before he died he said that he blamed no one…You are harsh, yet he was not harsh."

I often see this ultimate flaw in myself and others through self-proclaimed beliefs that are not lived, and ultimately artificial(again, not intending to restrict this conversation to religion). Where bigotry is spoken against, it shows its face in some warped form. Where equality is preached, it is not found. Humans are often so weak in resolution. Yet, there is a dual side to everything as is explained by Satan himself later in the book, again to Matviey:

"What would your good be doing if there were no evil, and what would the earth look like if shadows disappeared from it? After all, shadows are cast by objects and people. There is the shadow of my sword. But there are also shadows of trees and living creatures. Would you like to denude the earth of all the trees and all the living beings in order to satisfy your fantasy of rejoicing in the naked light?"

Thoughts? I have some, but this is getting too long.