The skies continue to threaten us with rain so we looked for indoor activities today. We went to the Palamuse school museum with my father and his wife.

This museum is built in and around an old parish school, which is famous in Estonia because of a book & movie (“Kevade”) that takes place here. We started planning this visit with my (step)parents already some months ago. I read “Kevade” with Adrian in the spring so that he would understand all the references and know what the story is about.


We visited both the schoolroom with its benches and blackboard etc, and the rooms where the parish clerk / school headmaster lived – bedroom, kitchen, living room etc. In the schoolroom Ingrid practised writing with a nib pen and ink. Adrian tried writing on slate, and ringing the school bell. Meanwhile I browsed old schoolbooks. I loved the maths problems, very practically oriented!

The kitchen maid gets a salary of 96 rubles a year; after 8 months of service she left her job and got 29 rubles from her master. How much salary had she withdrawn during the year?

A farmer sold 8 chetverts of wheat and 12 chetverts of rye, for the wheat he got 72 rubles. How much did he get for the rye, if 9 chetverts of rye costs the same as 5 chetverts of wheat?

There was also a modern annex with an exhibition that has information about the book, schools in Estonia in the late 19th/early 20th century, the history of parish schools in Estonia, etc. Quite interesting and well-presented, I thought. The annex also had hands-on exhibits, based mostly on memorable scenes from the book. You can spin Toots’ red wooden globe and find all the landmarks on it, and dig through all the stuff in his pockets, and climb the pantry shelves to get to the “Lati pats” wine bottles.

In the afternoon we did a quick tour of Tartu’s latest and greatest graffiti paintings.