The city of Pärnu

After a few weeks of adaptation in the city I will stay during the coming months, I will present you the city of Parnu or Pärnu as they write it in Estonian.

5th city of the country, Pärnu is located on the Baltic Sea in the South West of Estonia. Due to her location, she was a key port for the german Hanseatic League since the port was free from ice during winters. More recently, since the middle of the 19th century, she became a famous spa and seaside town. The first spa opened in 1838 and in 2004, the Tervis spa was then the largest of its kind in the Baltic states. The tourism industry strongly developed since the 2^nd independance and they were the first city in the region to obtain the Blue Flag which states the quality of its waters.

The city was also the stage of some landmark events for Estonia. The first ever newspapers in Estonian, the Posttimees, was published there in 1857. The Manifest for independance of the country was read in front of the Endla Theatre on February, 23rd 1918. There is a copy of the speech on the former location of the Endla theater. Every year, they organise the Ice Festival with sport events (ice hockey, cross country ski, ice fishing, basket ball, etc), ice sculpture, music and singing events, etc. The city or organisations from the town organise lots of festivals especially during summer time like the GrillFest (June 8th and 9th), the Porcelain Days (July, 27-29th), the LineDance Festival (August, 4-5th), etc. 

 the coat of arm, the official logo and the flag of Pärnu

Pärnu in facts :

Inhabitants : 44,024 (2009, numbers from the 2012 census unknown)

Area : 32,2 km²

128 km from Tallinn and 180 km from Riga (Latvia capital)

Official website of the city : http://www.parnu.ee/lang/eng/

Tourism information: http://www.visitparnu.eu/

Wikipage : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%C3%A4rnu

Tallinn (1): Capital of Estonia

 Song Festival Ground - on stage, more than 30 000 singers can gather 

and sing with one voice. Impressive.

 City hall of Tallinn

Liberty Square. The monument is dedicated to those who fought for the 1st independance 

of the country between 1918 and 1919.

I’m not biting.

Well, not at the moment.

I went this week to meet the French teachers and their pupils in the local highschools. I found it strange that none of the three teachers are French : two Estonians and one Greek. I was told they haven’t been learning French for too much, usually for several months at most. I didn’t prepare much for them as I didn’t want to scare them away from learning my beautiful language. I just went for some tongue twisters. Those little things are nasty for us, native people.

When I arrived in their classes, they were surprised to see me next to their teachers. I presented myself without revealing too much about me as they wouldn’t have asked me anything after. They were so shy to talk in French, so I said I wasn’t biting, they could talk. I’m actually proud of them as I know French is not an easy language. I was asked the usual questions about my hobbies outside my work, what I like to listen as french music. I also asked in return what they would advise me about Estonian musicians they listen. And of course, I couldn’t avoid answering the classical questions « do you have a girlfriend ? » and « do you like Estonian girls ? ». The former was asked by a7th grader girl ; they were gigling in the back of the classroom so I assume they were going for this question. Quand j’ai répondu non, elles avaient l’air soulagées. Katre the teacher told me they like me a lot. I don’t want to now what they had in mind exactly. The 2^nd question was asked when I went to meet the 10th grades kids. The guy who asked me that question was a bit embarrassed to do so. Talking about this class, when they entered the room, I was wondering how many litres of soup they had each day to be sot all and so thin. I’m not particularly tall nor small but at just 16, they were already taller than me.

There was one class I came back since I was told by the teacher they would bake something for their last french class before the holiday. She didn’t know herself what they would do. I was surprised they did everything without the supervision of an adult. They even almost clean everything before leaving the kitchen. They had baked : waffles, some light vanillia flavoured biscuits, chocolate truffles, chocolate cupcakes, oats cookies and some kind of salty canapés with fish and eggs. The three boys of this class made the latter which coincidentally was the only I repeat because I like it and also because i twas the only I could repeat !! After the degustation, we played as the day before some tongue twisters but not only in French also in Estonian. They wanted to get revenge. After we played a snake and ladder game where the actions were replace by some simple exercises in French like counting from 1 to 10 or answering simple questions. To make it mor fun for me, I decided to do it in Estonian. I was lucky it wasn’t very hard. The kids were looking at me to see if I could pronounced correctly numbers or if I knew the corresponding words. I have to say I was very proud of myself during this game !!

The French Speaking Day (3): "Official Program"

Laupäeval, 24. märtsil Nooruse Majas, Roheline 1 b, Pärnu

Journée de la Francophonie – Prantsuse keele pave

Ürituse korraldaja Pierre-Marie Brianceau, vabatahtlik Prantsusmaalt

Tule omandama teadmisi ja kogemusi prantsuse keelt kõnelevate maade kultuurist ning toidust. Kogu päeva jooksul saad vastata teemakohastele küsimustele ning õigesti vastanuid ootavad ilusad ja maitsvad auhinnad.

10.30 avamine, päeva tutvustus, esitlus, näitus, mängud Prantsuse sümbolitega.

Esitlus „Kui hästi tunned Prantsuse kööki“

12.30 Lõunasöök. Buffet lauas on Pierre-Marie valmistatud toidud. Eelregistreerumine vajalik info@noorusemaja.ee Lõunasöögi hind 3€

14.00 Tutvumismängud, et raputada alla maitsev lõunasöök

15.00 Räägime stereotüüpidest Prantsusmaa ja prantslaste kohta

16.00 Kokkuvõte päevast ja viktoriinist. Räägime erinevatest võimalustest, kuidas ja kus õppida prantsuse keelt Eestis ning kuidas saada informatsiooni prantsusekeelsest maailmast

What? You  got scared? 

Here is the program in english. :p

Saturday March, 24th. Nooruse Maja, Roheline 1b, Parnu
Journée de la Francophonie – Prantsuse Keel Paëv
Come and enjoy some activities about French speaking culture, food and games. During the whole day, you will have some questions to answer for a small quiz to win a beautiful and yummy prize.

Start 10.30: Official opening
Presentation of the events of the day, exhibition and some games involving French Symbols
Presentation: How well do you know French Cuisine?

12h30/13h= Lunch with a buffet made of food cooked by me. "Reservation to be made before at info@noorusemaja.ee, limited number of place, Price: 3€/person"

14h= Energiser Games to digest my beautiful and delicious food.
15h = French People and French speaking people stereotypes

16 = Results of the quiz and Presentation of the different way to learn French in Estonia or have more information about French Culture.

The international French speaking days (2): Ask for the program

In Estonian

In English

What a week-end...

Hello dear readers,

I feel sorry to let you down like this last week. I was called by Saint Patrick to visit him in Tallinn. I couldn't say no to him as I alwasy wanted to meet him celebrating his day with some fellow compratriots from Eire. I will need to write messages about:

• My intervention in the French language classes.
• The program of the French Speaking day (March 24th)
• my visit to Tallinn, the capital city of Estonia

Stay tuned to read the articles this week.

Media Review: on the net

Hello all,

Here is a link to a blog whose owner interviewed us last week. We talkd about our implication in the EVS projects, why we came to Estonia, what our plans are beside working in our organisation.
http://blog.maaleht.ee/parnumaa/?p=39889
Yup, the link is in estonian, the translation will follow (hopefully soon).