Panic!

Yesterday, Tallinn experienced a rush among some of Estonia's Russian-speakers to sell local currency due to rumours of a devaluation. Hoards of Russians were storming the currency exchange booths, changing their kroons into euros. Upon some investigation, it turned out that it was a rumour started by the Notšnoi Dozor - an activist group of some Russophones, who also started the riots back in April. The KAPO (defense police) is currently in the process of pinpointing the person who started the rumour, as it is essentially an outside attack at Estonian economy.

From my perspective, all this incident really proves is how little Russia actually cares about the Russians in Estonia. The message from Kreml is that Estonians are bad and treating Russians poorly (no reference to the billions of integration programs and social support networks of course!), but now they are using the local Russians as pawns to screw with Estonian resources. It's not like the Estonians will be going to the "Dozor"'s website to check the daily polls and rushing to the nearest currency exchange kiosk... At this point, the repeated attempts to affect Estonian politics are just becoming more and more pathetic, creating bad press, and even hurting the Russians who the "Dozor" is set out to save. (So why even bother - do these people really have nothing better to do?)

On a slightly different note, I am going to attempt to relieve some of that nationally borne tension and stress by seeing an acupuncture therapist today. I'll let you know how it goes.