Narva, Estonia: A conversation with Misha (b. 1997)
Misha, or Mikhail, is a busy man.
I catch him in between meetings, and as he tells me about his passion projects I can see why he feels a sense of urgency with his work.
Misha was born and raised in Narva — a city located in the far northeast of Estonia that shares a physical boundary with Russia. About 97% of the city’s population reports Russian as their native language.
The Russian-speaking community is not a culture — there are many different nationalities. For example, Ukrainians, Belarussians, Russians, from Kazakhstan, and many others.
The question of Russian language and Russian identity is very important for people in Narva. There’s a sentiment that Russian speakers are treated unequally. That they are not allowed to study in their native language, and they are discriminated against as a minority. My parents say that when they grew up in the Soviet Union and Estonians got their independence, it was a period when the Russian-speaking community was discriminated against. People still feel it. They still have a fear that they will be abandoned here, and that nobody will care about them.
I can recall when I was a child with my dad, in a shopping center. My dad pointed to a lady who was cleaning the shop. She used to be a top manager at Krenholm. Do you know about Krenholm? It was a huge textile factory. Over twelve thousand people worked there. She used to be an important manager, and now she is a cleaner in the shop — simply because she does not know Estonian. The same thing with my dad: he was one of the bosses of the factory, but now his opportunities are fewer and fewer. If he knew Estonian, many organizations would want him and his experience. He once was a very important manager, and because he does not know Estonian he is now useless.
Many people who were at Krenholm can now only work simple jobs. We call these take-and-bring jobs: because people are told to take something, and bring it to someone else. You do not need the Estonian language to do this.
There was also something called a language inquisition. It’s a language inspection, where people come here and make sure workers have the proper skill in Estonian. Then, they prescribe some sort of exam or say the worker must be fired, then they go back to Tallinn. It used to be more common, but I have not heard of this in a while.
We called it an inquisition because they used to come, ruin peoples’ lives, go back to Tallinn, and end up changing nothing.
The biggest obstacle is language, and the second is the attitude toward each other. Russian-speaking youngsters, for example, are afraid to use their Estonian — even if they speak very fluently. They have a fear that comes from school. They had a lot of assessments, and a lot of teachers who told them they were speaking Estonian poorly.
Young people want to find their identity — you can find different variants of identities here. For example, there are Russian-speaking Estonians, Russian-Estonians, Estonian-Russians, and other identities here. Some Estonians tell these people that they cannot be truly Estonian. You can be a Russian-speaking person, but you cannot be an Estonian. Other people accept that there is a Russian-Estonian identity.
We do not share the same Estonian cultural narrative, because the family culture is totally different. So, we’re still somewhere in between.
When we bring together Estonian-speaking and Russian-speaking youngsters, there are difficulties in communication — not just because of language, but cultural background.
Estonian-speaking youth get more pop culture from the West, and Russian-speaking youth get some from the East and the West.
Russian-speaking youngsters do not really understand what the word democracy means. Theoretically, yes. Practically, no.
They learn in school that democracy is when the power is divided, you have the right to vote, et cetera. When you start talking about direct or representative democracy, they are already lost. They are afraid to speak up, and they are afraid to look for help. They don’t even know where to find help. We don’t have the same institutions that support you. Student councils might start a discussion about a problem, and the school administration will say no, we are not interested.
Student councils should be able to go to the Department of Culture here, or the Youth Parliament, and look for help. But, the Department of Culture will just go back to the school and say this is not our problem. Can you solve it? Our institutions just cannot give young people the confidence that they are supported. You feel lonely.
One time we did a reflection activity with some young people. We asked them if they wanted to wear school uniforms or casual clothing. It was such a new question for them. We can think about this? We can discuss this? We can have an influence on this? We had to tell them yes.
They don’t understand that they have a right to disagree with certain things. Young people should be able to make change, but they don’t know this.
For example: here in Narva, some youngsters didn’t like the food in their school. They saw bad dishes with worms, or hair in the food. They took pictures and created an Instagram account. It became very popular, and a discussion about food in the schools got to the city government. So, they had some influence. But we don’t know who they are. It’s an anonymous Instagram profile.
This was done in a school with a very authoritative school principal. The students were afraid. If you go against the policy of the school, you will be expelled from the school. That’s why they could not take the mask off and say, we were the ones who did it.
If you ask people in Narva what they think about moving Russian-speaking schools to Estonian-speaking schools, many people will say no. They’ll strictly say no. If you ask them to explain why, they’ll say that youth must get their education in their native language, otherwise it will not work.
When I was in school, I did a keelekümblus (language immersion) program. I learned all of my subjects in Estonian even though my mother tongue is Russian. It was hard, but I cannot say that the language influenced my education. I think it influenced my university experience, but that is another story.
I like one idea that has come up in politics lately — creating common spaces for youth. Places like common youth centers, common schools, et cetera. The concept is that there is one building for Russian-speaking and Estonian-speaking schools. It is one school, and inside you can learn in Russian or in Estonian. It doesn’t matter — it’s the same school.
This way, we create a space for Estonians and Russians to be together somewhere. Right now, even our youth centers are separated: one for Russian-speaking youth, and one for Estonian-speaking. When Tallinn discussed the issue of childcare for night-shift workers, they decided that they will establish one building for Russian-speaking childcare and one building for Estonian-speaking childcare. And, kids just sleep there!
You cannot build an Estonian-speaking bed. Just build one house for all of the children. Already, on this level, we are separated.
This is part of a conversation series centered around the country of Estonia. Click here to read the introduction.
