Welcome to our site!
This website is made for everybody who wants to get to know more about
Estonia. What we want is to inform people on this beautiful and
extraordinary country. And of course we hope that you'll get curious this
way and that you'll pay this country a visit yourself once.
Estonia
Some facts on this country: Estonia is a North-European country, located on
the North-Eastern coast of the Baltic Sea. Estonia is the smallest of the
three Baltic states Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
With a surface of 45.200 square kilometres it's about as big as The Netherlands or Denmark. It has
1.4 million inhabitants. It borders Latvia, Russia and the Baltic Sea, which
contains many beautiful islands. The official language is Estonian, which
belongs to the group of Finnish-Hungarian languages. A quarter of the
inhabitants is Russian, that's why also the Russian language is still used
today. Because of the high level of education of the people, a lot of them
do also speak English and German.
Tallinn
Three quarters of the people of Estonia live in this medieval capitol.
Tallinn is situated 80 kilometres south of Helsinki. This former Hanze city
draws 6 million tourists a year. It is one of the best reserved old European
cities, containing many cafés and many good restaurants, hidden in the
narrow streets between the big city walls. All the museums, festivals and
galleries make Tallinn a cultural centre as well.
Nature
Because of the fact that the country is so sparsely populated, anyone who is
fond of nature will be able to enjoy the rich flora and fauna that can be
found here. As a matter of fact the biggest part of the country consists of
forest and many lakes. The country is seen as one of the most beautiful bird
watch locations of Europe. Many different species of plants and animals like
bears, wolves, lynxes, moose and many others, which can't live in
Middle-Europe anymore, because of a lack of space, are found here.
History
Estonia has got a long and turbulent history. The first signs of inhabitancy
date back to 9500 B.C. The country was occupied almost all the time by one
of the surrounding countries, like Sweden, Denmark, Germany and Russia.
Between the two world wars Estonia was independent for the first time for 22
years, but after the war it became a victim of Stalin. He made Estonia a
part of the Soviet Union. This final occupation lasted half a century and
ended in 1989 with a revolution without violence (also known as 'the singing
revolution'). On the moment Estonia is an example to nearly all of the
European countries because of its large economical growth and its high level
of education. It's even the only European country having a budgetary excess!
Besides that, their technical developments, like internet and mobile
communication, are the most progressive of all the European countries.
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