Life is too important to be taken seriously - O.Wilde
Kristina's blog
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Buried history
The streets of medieval Tallinn have always been narrow. But some of the historic buildings of the old town were destroyed in WWII. When the Soviet power in Estonia collapsed, some 15 years ago, ruins of ancient buildings on one of the streets in the old town were unearthed and exposed for people to see and remember.
A few years ago, the most populist mayor our town has ever had, decided to take things in his hands and “bring some order” to the notorious street with exposed ruins. After a mock referendum, which represents nothing of the Tallinners opinion, he decided that the town needed a useless green patch in the middle of the old town. First, green patches do not belong to the streets of medieval towns. Second, the green patch is planned over a historical monument. Finally, Tallinn has plenty of greenery and parks – more than any other city of this size that I can think of.
This summer, bulldozers are neatly covering the ruins with sand, burying history and memories. I wonder why it is happening. Why are historical monuments used as political arguments?
Vishen was very surprised when I spent most of my holiday in Malaysia sorting out music. I told him that music had always been very important to me, and then I started doubting. For several years, I have been complacently listening to the radio. I guess it was my favourite pink (iPod) mini, which brought good music back into my life, and funny enough – I got it as a gift from Vishen last May.
When I was about 12 or something, I earned my first money by translating a Tallinn city-tour into English and, without second thoughts, I spent all of it on a ticket to a rock festival – the first of a kind in our country.
I still get funnily excited in the anticipation of hearing a new piece by my favourite singer. And I tend to attack other people’s iTunes if I hear them saying a code-word – some not very famous name, which I like. And what about my private singing lessons, which I started at the age of 25? Or going spontaneously to London to gatecrash a concert?
I have always considered myself somewhat hyper-emotional. May be that is where my little passion comes from. Witty Oscar Wilde, as usually, put it the most frankly: “Music is the art which is most nigh to tears and memory.”
Anyway, today, I caught myself thinking that I should learn to play piano. Who cares that I am pushing 30.
One of these afternoons, I was having a morning tea, slash jewelry exhibition, with the wives of ambassadors to Malaysia in a private club. It made me feel very good – not the fact that I was hanging out in a fancy place with very important ladies, but the realization how much I appreciate my own experiences and how easy it is to waste life even, or perhaps especially, if you have everything you may ever want.
If you think it is a big stress to hang out in high society, you are wrong. All you need to do is shut up and have fun listening to the useless chit-chat. I tried having (meaningful) conversations with a few ladies, but after meeting blank looks of misapprehension, I downgraded my language to “it is so nice” and “how interesting” and shifted my full attention to munching Iraqi delicacies.
Considering that the group was predominantly from Arab countries, I was excited to hear discussion about the war in Iraq. The conversation was soon started to my delight, and finished within 5 minutes to my great dismay. There was just nothing more to be said. In fact, there was no argument – every indignant comment was backed by agreeing nods and left as it was without further elaboration. I could go on saying that the causality of argumentation was flawed and conclusions were illogical, but what is the point of giving serious criticism to a conversation, which I could not help comparing to the one you hear among preschoolers when they throw out arguments overheard from their parents.
At this point, I realized that I should better not try to challenge any views. I generally don’t like discussing politics with non-professionals, and especially at social events. Such discussions are usually overridden by speculative theories and conspiracies, and I prefer a little more structured and academic view of the world events. But in the case of my very important ladies, their conspiracies and speculations were, besides being ungrounded, also delivered in such a primitive manner, that I thought it better if I held my tongue.
After one of the ladies declared, with a thick air of sensation, that Americans started the war because of oil, another lady added that they also wanted to pave the way for Israel to the Middle East. Then, the Americans were blamed for destroying museums, libraries and the whole ancient civilization of Iraq. The exact term ‘weapons of mass destruction’ got stuck on one lady's tongue on the word 'weapons', but she was saved by a friend who declared that there was no order in Iraq and that was why the criminals from neighboring countries were coming there and creating all the mess (together with Americans). And the discussion was concluded with the logical “it is all because there is no order, no leader – Iraq needs a leader!” Let me now guess the name of a possible candidate for the good leader.
This brief sidekick to politics was the brightest highlight of the event. Conversation then shifted to the same old topics – jewelry, children, presents, travel. But to give the full credit to these conversations, I must say that none of them lasted beyond 5 sentences. - Have you been to place A? - It is so nice, isn’t it? Place B is nice too. You haven’t been there? - I have been to place C. Isn’t it nice? Conversations about children were more like forced monologues due to the absence of genuinely interested listeners. Only discussions about jewelry caused general elevation.
By the end of the tea-drinking, I caught myself wondering how such narrow-mindedness was even possible. It must take a very determined effort to prevent oneself from growing mentally if you have all the opportunities and doors open to you, and you insist on not wanting to know anything beyond your wardrobe and jewelry box.
If you are looking for Kristina from Estonia, who studied in Tallinn Humanitarian School, Tallinn Technical University, worked for AIESEC in Estonia and Norway, then in Harju County Government, then was stuck in New York for a year, then worked for CARAM Asia in Malaysia, and finally ended up studying international politics in the University of Edinburgh in Scotland and writing a research project for Oxfam in Oxford, then here I am. I have a husband Vishen, who is an entrepreneur, and a son Hayden, who is a sleepy-hungry newborn baby.
