eesti vabariik

this & that, various & sundry, one thing & another led me to a mild curiousity about the land of estonia which i googled, thereby landing in (duh) wikipedia where i have learned quite a bit about the fascinating and quiet little land of estonia.

the country is in northern europe, between finland and russia. it borders latvia and russia, and finland lies to the west across the baltic sea, on which estonia has over 2000 miles of coastland. estonia is in the temperate climate zone, but it's northward in that zone, and the temps there are on the cool side. july is the warmest month, when the average temps are right around 64º, and in february the temps are the coldest, around 18º. in the summer, it's a bit cooler on the coast, and in the winter, it's a bit warmer on the coast. the overall average year-round temp in estonia is 41º. (all temps fahrenheit)


estonia maintains a democratic government with representatives from each of the the 15 counties which comprise the state. these administrative subdivisions were first chronicled in the 13th century. 13th century! the tiny republic is known for high tolerance, respect of human rights, free speech, individual development, and privacy. in estonia, citizens can vote for public officials on the internet! the prime minister is called andrus ansip, and he is the longest tenured prime minister in europe.

estonia was formerly a part of the USSR, but most international authorities agree that estonia didn't want to go - russia took her. in 1918 she regained her freedom, but estonia's main trading partner remained the soviet union and later, former soviet states, but now sweden and finland are the biggest importers of estonian goods. estonia has a flat-rate income tax and a non-welfare-state model.

whew. the wikipedia article just goes on and on. maybe it's estonian propaganda, but man, it sounds like a great place to live. i mean, duh, you have to like snow, but otherwise, its people are forward-looking, innovative, and industrious. the public debt is negligible, the air is clean, the land is fertile, and the babies are fat.

there is just so much to learn about the world.