Abdul Turay

Meikar and the Poster Boy By Abdul Turay Published Postimees 12 June 2012 "All domestic politics are now European politics," so said Quentin Peel of The Financial Times at last month's Lennart Meri conference. It's has been creeping up on us for some time now. I've noticed it personally. I was at a conference about year ago. I got talking to a senior British journalist, a former head of an international agency. He wanted a detailed breakdown of what was happening with Estonian politics. We discussed Savisaar's problems with KAPO and Russian secret service, which were still current at the time. We scanned a newspaper together, I translated for him. He was sceptical. Now even journalists and investors who have no direct interest in Estonia are fishing for information about what exactly is going on. I spoke to a journalist working in Brussels recently. He was keen to know every detail. He wasn't going to report on it. Nobody died,...

The invisible beautiful Estonian film. By Abdul Turay Published Postimees 3 May This time I will move away from talking about politics and talk about culture. Since it is the 100th anniversary of Estonian cinema I might as well add my 50 cents to the debate. Kevade (1969) Lets borrow metaphor from that eh...em.... “masterpiece” of contemporary American cinema, Shallow Hall, starring Jack Black. There is a scene in film where Jack Black asks his co-conspirator that if he was dating the most beautiful women- Linda Carter if you're interested- would he care if everybody else thought she was ugly?” “No!” his companion says without hesitation “Because everybody else would be wrong.” Let's push that concept up a gear. Male readers, would you rather date someone beautiful and invisible or someone plain and visible. How vain are you? Is there point in dating a model if no-one else can see her? The Estonian film industry is both beautif...

The Austrian Factor By Abdul Turay Published Postimees 4 April 2012 Patriotic Estonians wants two things out of foreigners. They want their country to be noticed, and they want it to be liked. And there exists a small group who are growing in influence in America on talk radio, satellite television and the internet, who do both. They are knowledgeable and successful, one of them is a candidate for president of the United States of America. They are known as the Austrian school economists or Austrians for short. There is just one problem. The world's leading intellectuals from all spectrum thinks the Austrians are crazy people, Nutters. It is a bit disheartening to say the least. What this means is when ever you read something positive in a foreign publications about Estonia, you have to take it with a pinch of salt. What you are reading, as many people think, might just be the ravings of mad person. So let's examine the Austrian school, find out why they like E...

Galojan will not be coming home soon. By Abdul Turay Published Postimees 27 February 2012 Anna Maria Galojan is quite a boring person. I am bored with reading about her case already. Frankly I am not that interested in her, but since I have some insider knowledge with the system she is facing, I thought I'd share it with you. Miss Galojan claims that she is not running away by staying in the UK and if she really wanted to run she would have gone to South America. Anna Marie Galojan Splashing about. The reverse is true. I suspect Galojan choose Britain precisely because it the best place for her or anyone else to evade justice. Britain has a slow and inefficient bureaucracy, especially when dealing with law and order issues. If Galojan has actually claimed asylum like she says, she will be caught in this system, certainly for months and possibly for years. Countries with a history of dictatorship, often have fast and efficient bureaucracies. Dicta...

Veerpalu the new Linford Christie By Abdul Turay Publish December 10 2011 Skiing superstar's Andrus Veerpalu reputation had died and with it the belief of an entire nation. I once said that Estonians act and think like black people. This sorry mess with Andrus Veerpalu seems to confirms it. Something very similar happened to my own people about a decade ago. There are about one and a half million black people in Britain, about the same number as the population of Estonia. We are also called Afro-Caribbean because most of us have roots in the former British colonies in the Caribbean. Estonians tend to think of black culture in term of black Americans or black Africans they do not think about black British culture or black European culture of any description for that matter. This is common ,the World thinks like. It's frustrating. The black community in Britain feels, somewhat, neglected. Our achievements, our literature, our art, our music and our science is rarely celebr...

Socialist have a conscience By Sven Mikser Published 27 August 2010 Columnist Abdul Turay finds in yesterday that the socialist(sotsids) are freaks, The proof, The sotsid are not in government yet their polling rating is in fourth place. Despite Turay's provocative style his opinion story contains questions which deserve an answer. There are many reason why Estonia politics have leaned to the right for the last 20 years. Sotsid propaganda weakness is only one and not the biggest. Yes the Reform political technology has had most skilful, moving from in 1990 gradual competition in paying for education and medical services, to in 2003 the parent's salaries “soft” sphere, and in the year 2007 bronze portable “nationalism”. But this crude right wing agenda still has basic fundamental errors. The centre party(Keskerakond) has corned the “disappointment” niche. And this niche is incredible big and lively nuisance for the right, who ruthlessly casts the weakest to the side. The crud...

Survival of the fittest By Abdul Turay Published Postimees 23 November 2011 Never, ever start a story with a statistic a colleague once told me when I just started out in journalism. Just to be contrary, here's one you are probably familiar with. In Estonia, life expectancy for men is 65.9 years, for women 76.8 years. In the U.K. life expectancy for men is 77.2 years for women life expectancy is 81.6. In Sweden life expectancy for men is 78.7 years and 83 years for woman. Lies, lies and statistics. These statistics aren't actually lies but they don't tell the whole story. I have travelled a bit, so the newspaper asked me tell that story and interpret these statistics. Let's start with what you probably know. Health care and sickness prevention in Estonia, and indeed in the Central and Eastern Europe in general, is better than in the developing world but still not up to the standards of Old Europe. So much so that even though women outlive men everywhere, British and S...