Minu Eestimaa - Estonia and me, an exhibition in France

Hello Everybody,

Long time no see!! or no writting better said. I haven't forgotten Estonia. Not the least. I am preparing a photo exhibition like I did in my organisation just before I left the country. I would like to raise 500€ to print the pictures in a foam-board to give better results.

If you want to help me in this project, go to this page. It's a crowfunding website like Kickstarter if you know it. It is safe as it is regulated. The money will not be withdrawned from your account before the end of the period (April 10th) and only if we reach the goal of 500€. According to your pledge, you could receive a great reward: a copy of one of the pictures I will pick up for the exhibition. The higher you pledge, the bigger the picture could be. 

Don't wait more and visit the page for my exhibition, Minu Eestimaa - Estonia and me.

Merry Christmas!! Joyeux Noël!!

Merry Christmas and all the best for my readers, their family and friends and everyone in between for who health, joy, good fortune and work will bless them in the coming new year.

Experience from Estonia by Hanka

Hanka, the new volunteer in Nooruse Maja my organisation, has made a new blog about her experience in Pärnu. She just arrived so for now there is not much. It is up to your people, especially from Estonia to make it lively, suggest places she can visit in Estonia or other Baltic countries, etc.

Don't Hesitate to visit her blog and comment.

Experience from Estonia

Dinner's Ready!!!!

    A few days after I arrived in Estonia, I was invited to a cooking class for a dinner with a south-african Chef working in Tallinn, Paul Senosi. Uudo told me then I had to see how he was doing since I would need to do the same sometime in the future. When I was what Paul did, I was a bit worried of what I would have to do as we had a feast that night. I ended up with all the rest of food in doggy bag since nobody wanted it. I had enough food for one week!! Some months passed without notice about this until Uudo asked me to think about what I would do for a training he will have a few weeks later. So I had to think about one or two dishes to do for around 25 people.

   He advertised very soon about the French and Macedonian cooking classes as he knew since October last year. The people divided themselves like 2/3 for French cuisine and 1/3 for Macedonian cuisine. As we expected nice weather for that day, I had to prepare something really French, easy and cheap for a barbecue. That BBQ part was the most difficult one. I couldn’t think about something we are doing especially for bbq. Uudo went to France last year and he told me he really enjoyed the brochettes he had there. When he told me that, I thought it would be a good idea to do it since in Estonia, they don’t really have it the way we do in France. 

    I didn’t want to use pork in my recipe as I had enough and beef was a bit too expensive for so many people. So I choose marinated chicken as it was easier and I finally had an occasion to try it. I went online to find good recipes, mixed them somehow and ended up with something I like. I decided to try it a few days before just in case I had to change it. I used Provence Herbs and this proved to be quite successful. All participants took it in picture to try to find it in Estonia. I was sorry to break it but this mix of herbs is hard to find outside France. It is used for BBQ mainly but it is not imported in Estonia where BBQ is like a national sport in summer. Everybody participated more or less actively in cutting the chicken, the peppers, press the lemon and lime, pour the olive oil and leave it to rest for one hour at least. Then we prepared the brochettes before grilling them. It was actually the longest part of the whole day since everybody eat it in a snap!!

Minu Eestimaa - L'estonie et moi

    Now, I'm in the final month of my European Voluntary Service in Nooruse Maja. So I have to think about how to arrange things to go back to France and how I can leave a footprint here. The latter being of course exceptional because I will do it. XD

   When I arrived here in Estonia, my tutor Uudo told about an exhibition we should do by the end of our EVS with Katerina. He told us to think about this when we are travelling around the country to take some very good quality pictures to be used for this exhibition.

   And now have come the time to do it. We agreed on the dates (Sept 8th-19th), the preview (Sept 8th, same day as our open door afternoon). I selected about 19 pictures from which I should only take half since I have to share the frames with Katerina. I also asked for some help from Hana, the new volunteer from Czech Republic who will take our place. She did a really great job for the photo montage I kindly request her to do for the exhibition. You can see it on the poster i made today. It is a montage made of pictures I took, except one I must say (thanks Daire ;) to recreate a map of Estonia and its provinces. 

   I'm trully happy with this work. The montage also shows the effort of dissemination and collaboration between EVS, the handover of our work here to the new person volunteering in our organisation. During my EVS, I had to help Uudo about reports for projects he took part in and lots of times we had the question how we could do follow-up and dissemination. Having Hana preparing this with my pictures can be also a good presention of her skills. 

    So if you want to join us for this exhibition, please come in Nooruse Maja, roheline 1b, Pärnu 80036 from Saturday Sept 8th to 19th and enjoy our pictures and arts about how we see Estonia, the places we visited. I haven't thought much about it, but if there are some pictures you like, it might be possible to make a reproduction so you can get it back home for a fair price.

Estonian LineDance Festival - Pärnu, Aug 4&5th

    We had a great time this week-end with all the participants of the linedande Festival in Pärnu. thanks to some our volunteers, we could have this video. One more is coming and I'll post it when I will receive the link.

Just a little bit more...

Hello dear readers,

    Just a reminder about our Linedance Festival. I've juct checked and we should have a normal weather, not so hot but not rainy. So please come and join us. 

    Not only we will have this record attemps but also a nice concert on sunday in Vaalikaar. Our visitors will be able to buy food and drinks from Kaia and her kitchen. I've been here 6 months and not a single time she disappointed me with the food she made for us in the organisation. 

    So please come, better if you register before but not necessary. Check our facebook page to know the latest updates.

A little help for my friend Gaia

Hello dear readers,

Today I bring you the video of my friend Gaia, an italian volunteer in Tartu. Her project is to make videos of NGOs, organisations, youth centers, etc, etc to make them visible. I asked for her help to shoot the video of our linedance festival and in particular of our Guiness world record attempt. She kindly accepted to do it so I return the favor for her project.

Please people of Estonia, share it, like it or sleep on it if you like but Help her. She needs our help.

The Porcelain Days (July 27-29th, Parnu, Nooruse Maja)

    In my early days in Nooruse Maja, I was doing some porcelain painting with a very nice lady who came earlier to the office to teach us some porcelain painting. At first I was ok, let’s do it once. But she kept on coming back. We did a few things like a tea mug, some plates and one jewelry case. The latter was proposed by her since I did something for my mum for her birthday. Mai, the porcelain teacher told me I had to do it. We did over a few weeks as it needed different layers of paint. I was a bit afraid it would continue too long as I would like to take everything back home when I will get back to France. 

    The main event for her is the porcelain days we are organising in Nooruse Maja. During days, people can come have some classes on different styles, techniques from teachers coming from other countries and Estonia. We even had a few years ago, a teacher from Japan. They made some calligraphy on porcelain and it was so beautiful. A Shame I wasn’t already here because I would have participated in this workshop. 

    Now, the porcelain days are just in a few days. People will have the chance to study how to paint nostalgic country houses, small animals and the tinga tinga technique or how to paint berries. Visitors can enjoy an exhibition of the items painted during those workshops, arts brought by people from our winter classes. The exhibition is free so you can come and enjoy a nice drink.

Open-Air music concerts are for summer!!

     In my home town in France, I love summer time, who doesn't??? I'm especially wiating for the "Café de l'Eté" or Summer Café which is a music festival spread over end of june until early august. Music groups or singers come and entertain us in the townhall garden, just behind the main square.  I always go to one or two concerts at least. This year i won't be able to enjoy it as I'm in Estonia. but not anywhere in Estonia, in the summer capital, Pärnu. 

    That means lots of activities, festivals to attend after work. As I'm missing those open-air concerts in France, I was very happy to see they organised the same thing here. This one is every week on wednesday at 7pm, close to the beach. They decided to focus this year on swing and jazz music and they asked groups from around Pärnu or close to the city. That's really cool they opted for that. This way, groups will have at least a few dates to promote and will be enjoy a wonderful public. 

Estonian Linedance Festival (Aug. 4th & 5th, 2012): record broken!!!

Dear Readers,

We received a thrilling news a few days ago. A group of people in the USA broke our record by around 200 people, the official number being 2569 beating our record of 2354 people. So now we definitely need our 3000 people to come!!!!

Please register now in our website (linefest.com) for the chance to get a  discount for registration before July 1st!!! You can contact us through our website, or write us directly at kaie@estonianlinedance.com or info@noorusemaja.ee or simply drop me a email.

Come one, join the fun!!!!

Share the news with your friends, colleagues, families.

We can accomodate people in wheelchairs if needed!! 

Parnu International Choir Festival and the Wingate University Choir

     When I was asked by Uudo to take care of a group of American students coming to Pärnu for this Festival, I decline coz I already planned to do some activities with two groups of pupils learning French. With those two classes, I just played « Drawing is winning ». I show them cards with words or expressions on it they had to draw. Of course they couldn’t speak or use any letter on the chalk board. It was really fun with the second group since they were really looking for the clock (each person had one minute to draw and make his/her team mates guess), they were really into the game. The team made only of boys were a bit disappointed not to win, especially since they lost to a group of girls !

     So when I had to go back home I decided to go the gelato shop who happened to be open for the first time just that day. So I decided to go there and check out the new flavour they had. I couldn’t resist the Belgian Chocolate, Kiwi and Vanilia flavour. It was awsome to eat it. When I had to leave, I met some of the students who were chaperonned by Katerina in the end. They were really friendly. So we decided to go meet again after their performance of the night somewhere to grab a drink or two or three or…… We ended up on one of the playground on the beach. We basically talked until 3 or 4 am, when the sun was coming up.

    The next morning they had to be on the beach to take some group pictures before their performance on Ruutli square. Let say some needed more time to freshen up before taking the pic. ;-) At some point I had to leave them for lunch and after eating just before going back home, I stumble upon a small group of them. They were looking for the donuts place famous in Pärnu. So I took them there. They couldn’t get away from the counter and kept on ordering again. Of course, they had to share the information to the rest of the group. After their performance in a Tori Church, a few kms away from Pärnu, some of them came to the little bar where we were enjoying our evening. To get some music, some people decided to put on the tv to watch the eurovision song contest. Those American students who came were surprised some of our group were so much into this show !! 

video of Walking the Light by the Wingate University Choir and Finland's Phonik Choir

    (sorry can't post the vids directly for now)

     The next morning, they had their final perfomance at the City Hall with a group from Finland. They managed to get their hands on some estonian choir music while in Tallinn, song they practice while on the bus to Pärnu or to the diffrence places they performed. It was very nice of them to do it even they were not obliged. It was a great gift to the Estonian people who great them. They made another surprise. While they were in Tori Church, they decided with that fininsh group to do a song in common (video above). Their last performance of Sholosa (video below) was just before the reward ceremony where they finished first place !! congrats to them, they deserved it.

video of Shosholoza by the Wingate University Choir

(sorry can't post the vids directly for now)

Pakri Island, Estonia

Two panoramic pictures taken during my mid-term training when we went to Pakri Island, 

at about 60km from Tallinn, next to Padilski.

When in Pärnu?

    I took this picture recently just outside my house, my new house next to the river. I've been told about this before I arrive here in Estonia but I didn't belive it. So when I had the opportunity to take this pic, I seize it. 

    The most surprising feature about this is the time when it was taken. Make a guess about it, I'd love to know your idea about it. Please give me a good laugh. 

My first official Italian ice-cream

     Ah it was a great day for my stomach on Friday.  After participating in some activities with some French learning pupils in a local school, I went shopping and bring the food back home. I had to check my emails and i saw this very good news: Mama Toni's gelato is officially open!! I just send my friend a message and set off for the shop. I drive my bicycle pretty fast for once since I really wanted to get my hands on the new flavours they had to offer. 

     So when I arrived there, I checked directly what's on offer and decided for Belgian Chocolate, Pistaccio and Vanilia. What a treat!! The nice and warm weather invited me to have it on their terrasse while talking to Paul, Toni's husband who help setting the shop, Bas, deputy gelato maker and when I was inside, talking with Toni, my delicious American friend who decided to set this up in Little Pärnu. 

Estonian LineDance Festival (Aug 4th & 5th, 2012)

Hello everybody,

     As Summer is coming very fast, you have to decide what to do for your holidays. Here is an excellent idea. You can come and enjoy a few days in the Estonian summer capital dancing with lots of people. We need your participation as we want to beat a guiness world record, the longest single line dance. So please visit our webpage to register or send me an email,  we will do you best to answer you as fast as possible. Do not hesitate to share the poster or any information about our festival to anyone who might be interested.

And the winner is…..

    Early last week, we were told by our tutor Nooruse Maja will the place where a children and youth theater competition will be held the Friday after this conversation. I was curious about it and already wanted to check this. Uudo asked us if we wanted to be part of the jury who will give away some awards for best group and best actor or actress. We were a bit afraid at first but the challenge was appealling. The only downsize I saw from this was the time of start for this contest. At 9am, it’s a bit early for me. As I work mainly in the afternoon,    I can go to bed late and sleep through the morning.

    So when the day finally came, I went to my organisation for 9am to meet with the last of the jury member. This old lady was very friendly and at the nice age of 73 years old, she was still pretty active in the drama are. The day was divided into two parts. The 1st one was dedicated to after-school clubs when we had 3 groups to judge. This was more easy than I think since we agree on all the awards we had to give away. The 2^nd part of the contest was for school drama clubs. As we already had some experience before we all thought it woulld be very similar but on the contrary, it was harder. Even with the list of actors, some times we couldn’t get who was who in the play. Even the last memver of the jury who was Estonian couldn’t make the difference between all the actors and actresses. We managed to overcome this difficulty but i’m pretty sure if it was not that hard we would have made other choices.

    I was pleased with our choices. We were there to judge for drama acts not musicals as some of them turned out to be. It was a shame as two classes were very good and made a huge effort on the decoration. We went for those with the less songs, and we elected the first group who played something about the twelve months. Apparently it was some kind of fairy tale know in Eastern and South-East Europe. We give them the Mask for the 2012 best school drama club. I really like the idea of the trophy being a Mask. Instead of having a ugly cup with which you cannot do a thing, on this mask, they could write all the winners from the first year of this contest. I also appreciate the white chocolate with strawberries we had as part of the thank you gift for being in the jury.

Mr Spring is here, will he stay?

Everything is possible, even "hot temperatures" in Estonia. Let's hope it ill stay that way.
edit: no he didn't stay. someone must have scared him away.

The weather is a tad too strange

Hello guys,

Some times we said people have nothing to talk about so they just talk about the weather. But here, it's actually a topic of conversation. The past week, it was a bit strange. well, completely strange I should say. At the beginning of the week, the snow had completely melted so we were all very happy about it since it meant the end of the winter time and the coming of better temperatures. Someone forgot to get some snow for Christmas so he decided to give some for Easter. Damn him!! if only he had made it the normal way. I might have been using my bicycle already. I really want to do it as I will be able to do some kind of sports (note to self: get a monthly card for the swimming pool).

So before we got this nice 10cm/3.5inch layer of snow, I went after work to take some pictures of some place in the city, Valikaar (the old fortress remains) and the beach. My tutor told us about an exhibition he would like to do about our views on Estonia. I really like this idea. That's why I decided to start already to take some pics I could include in this exhibition. I need to pay attention about the quality of the pics as it should be printed on A4 paper, hence the need of high quality pics to avoid a pixelisation of the images. I got one I want to include but heh, I won't show it now as I don't want to spoil the fun! ;)

6 things you should know before doing an EVS in Estonia

Hilarious video I found on the Internet about what you should know before doing an EVS in Estonia.

Enjoy!!