“Tales From Estonia” Chapter Ten: The Tongue

As it turned out, Kristi’s mother was the only English teacher in the only school on the island of Muhu. That explained why everyone in her family spoke the language, to a certain degree. It was an accent I had heard only that day, as Kristi, whom I knew well from our time working together in America, had a slightly different pronunciation, likely due to her having traveled extensively.

The first syllable was invariably stressed, even if it shouldn’t be, and the letter “o” in English was always elongated for some reason, and seemed to end with the letter “u”. Diphthongs in my language became two-syllable affairs in Estonian. Raul said his name “RA-ul”, and when he greeted me, he’d said, “HE-looo…uu!” Just like Estonians said the name of their country: Estoounia.

The language itself was called the “Estonian tongue”. You couldn’t just call it Estonian, in Estonian, you had to call it the Estonian tongue, when speaking the Estonian tongue. The tongue part was very important. Without it, someone might misunderstand what was being said. For example, if I wanted to say I was speaking Estonian, but I omitted the tongue, then people would invariably think I was speaking the country. As I learned more about this National Tongue, this body part everyone somehow shared, I learned that context had no place in their conversation. Tonight, I’ll speak Estonian at eight. That sentence would be complete gibberish in the Tongue. It was only possible to say that I would speak the Estonian tongue at eight o’clock. These little quantifiers were of paramount necessity in this fascinating language.

The letter “r” was also rolled, or trilled, something I could not do. Perhaps my tongue was too thick? And if it were even possible, it almost sounded like they were trilling their “l’s” as well. Not exactly rolling the “l”, but more of a click at the end of the letter. For example, “letter” itself would be “edLE-tterrr”.

I asked how to say “hello”, and they tried to teach me how to say “tere”. Of course the simplest of words in their language were impossible for me to say because of the rolling. The closest I could come to accuracy was “TE-deh”, the “e” pronounced like “egg”. Whenever someone new walked in (there were lots of brothers and sisters and uncles and aunts and neighbors and even estranged carpenters who were in the employ of ex-wives, for all I knew), each person would say “Tere!” to everyone. The house was full of teres. It truly seemed that each person gave each other person their own personal tere.

Then they would notice me. No one tered me. But I was tereble, just like they were! Just like that pun. No one knew what to make of me. At one point I counted twelve individuals standing in the room, six of whom I’d not met, so I took it upon myself to stand up and tererize them with my pronunciation of one of the few words in Estonian I knew. I looked at each of them individually, as I thought they had done, and quickly tried to say “Tere!” before moving on to the next one, and repeating myself.

There was silence. There were stares. There were smiles, then there were laughs. All six of the new people rushed toward me, returned my inadmissible greeting so I could reuse it to entertain someone else another time, and said what I presumed to be their names. Most of the names weren’t even based on any familiar root name I had ever heard, so I remembered none of them. All shook my hand, and appeared most hospitable, eager even, to have met me, though we could not communicate. One of them even smiled, which I would later find out was very unEstonian.

It was awkward for me, being mistakenly on an island in a country I knew nothing about, having walked for hours with no direction or idea of where to go, and then eating sandwiches with people whose names I could not remember, or pronounce even if I could remember. But I was glad they were there. We had already finished the sandwiches. I had deftly avoided any of the fish, though I could not eat any more dill. Soon the stuff would be colonizing my stomach, and I didn’t want to add fuel to the furry feel of it.

Kristi’s mother called my name, and I turned toward her, my back to the table of empty sandwich plates.

— Now it is time to eat dinner, she informed me. I smiled graciously, and turned back to the table. Miraculously, it had been cleared. I did not see anyone do it, I did not see anyone carrying away dishes. It just vanished. I looked back at her, but she was not there. Standing there perplexed, watching the guests and residents stare at me, I heard voices behind me. I turned once more.

The table had now been reset, with bowls and serving plates throughout. Clean plates and silverware were laid out, glasses and shot glasses accompanying them, and people were sitting down. The same people I had just been watching. I looked back once more, and that side of the room was empty. From behind me, she spoke once more.

— We have ancient Estoounian proverb: hunger grows when eating. Please.

“Thank you”, I replied, as she motioned with her hand where I should sit. Somehow, someway, the table had been magicked into being an extra four places long.

Raul poured everyone a shot of vodka. I think it was vodka. It was clear, and it was in an unmarked bottle. When everyone had a glass, they all stood up to toast one another. But this wasn’t just a table of people raising their glasses before drinking, they really toasted one another. Each one, and each other. This was a lengthy event, because it was explained to me that when two people toasted, they had to make eye contact, leaving the actual clinking of the glasses to blind luck. What’s more, no one’s arms could cross. If you wanted to toast the person on the other side of a person who was already toasting, you had to wait until the air was clear between you. I clinked my glass to every single person’s glass there, as they did to each other. Then we drank. It was vodka alright, but nothing like I had ever tasted. This was better. Most likely stronger, too. The effect was immediate, although my body was already stuffed with bread and dill.

There were two serving platters, each containing a different type of white-fleshed fish. A third platter was adorned with a succulent chunk of meat. When I enquired what it was, I was only told, “It’s meat.” A deep, broad bowl of boiled potatoes, on top of which a dill farm had been slaughtered, steamed away in people’s hands, as it made its way around the table. And finally, there was some sort of tomato salad, with chopped onions in it, mixed with a creamy white substance.

I sampled everything, and everything was delicious. The white cream in the salad was sour cream, but of a texture and taste I’d not before experienced. Even the boiled potatoes, although the skin had been peeled off, were perfect. My favorite, however, was by far the mystery meat. I believe I identified it as pork, and asked about it. “Yes, it’s meat”, I was reassured.

For the first few minutes of dinner, barely a soul spoke. As the plates began to empty, so did the words from people’s mouths. The conversation picked up as quickly as people teleported in this part of the world. It was the first time I’d heard the language truly spoken, in whole sentences, and with enthusiasm.

I understood nothing, of course, but I preferred it that way. When you speak a language, especially if you speak it well, or even as your native language, it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to hear the language. Every tongue is a song, and it was, frankly, impossible for me to recognize the song that was English. I couldn’t even hear what my own name sounded like, because it was too close to me. Only other people could be the judge of that. But the Estonian song — that was quite something. No semantic satiation for me there.

A quick and staccato cacophony of clicks, pursed lips, perfect enunciation, frequent use of the sound of the letter “x”, seemingly randomly injected with lengthy trilling of the letter “r”, and that was only the spoken language. The body language was also completely foreign to me. When the men spoke, they had no expression in their faces. They just spoke, as if reciting unwanted poetry as quickly as possible. If one of them interrupted, the speaker merely increased his volume, to drown out the rude one. And it sounded like every man at the table was rude, because every man at the table repeatedly raised his voice.

Yet no one was angry. No one seemed offended. And maybe no one was being rude. This was just how they talked.

The women, especially the older ladies, added extra emphasis about every three seconds of speaking. I can’t say it was every five or six words, because the language was continuous, flowing. Yet when they added this additional stress to these words, they bobbed their heads down, ever so gently, almost imperceptibly. Their heads, when they did this, never went higher than where they’d been. Only down. Maybe it was this perpetual movement that added the new thrust of airflow to their words. Two of the ladies there, probably in their seventies, used their normal speaking voices most of the time, but when it was time for their heads to bob down, they switched to falsetto. When the bob was over, they returned to their normal speaking voices once more.

It was like watching turkeys talk. It was fascinating, and beautiful.

But wait, there’s more! This perpetually flowing language never ended when spoken. Yet speakers of the Tongue did in fact breathe in fresh lungsful of air, without missing so much as a letter of a single word. They continued speaking when they inhaled. It was perhaps one of the strangest manners of speaking I had seen or heard of. If they ran out of air mid-sentence, the sentence did not stop, they merely managed to squeeze three or four syllables out of that awkward voice that is emanated if one chooses to combine voice with inhalation.

Furthermore, when one person was speaking, others did not always interrupt, as seemed their wont, but they would agree. They would agree by inhaling. For example, “This is something they said” would be interrupted by the neighbor enthusiastically and inwardly belching a “Jah!”, which I quickly learned meant “Yes!” This practice was so bizarre to me, so incredibly foreign, that it could not get any stranger. But stranger it did get. Very often, if a listener wanted to interject a “Jah!” into someone else’s conversation, they would first exhale so that they could say “Jah!” specifically while inhaling!

All of this continued for no more than ten minutes, when a secret alarm sounded on an unknown frequency. All the guests at the table stood up together, said last words, looked at me and nodded, and left. Only six of us remained: Kristi’s parents, three children, including Kristo, and I sat in silence. Suddenly, Kristo stood up and made an announcement.

— It is time for saun.

“What’s that?” I asked. The word resembled “sound”, but without the last letter.

— You do not have saun, in America?

“Maybe. What is it?” I curiously asked.

— Estoounian tradition. Very hot room, where you sweat.

“Oh, sauna?”

— Yes, saun.