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of whom later died in Siberia) and coming here with masses of Estonians to
sing. Overlooking the grounds from the cheap seats is a statue of Gustav Erne-
saks, who directed the Estonian National Male Choir for 50 years through the
darkest times of Soviet rule. He was a power in the drive for independence,
and lived to see it happen.
Cost and Hours: Free, open long hours, bus #1A, #5, #8, #34A, or #38 to
Lauluväljak stop.
Lasnamäe Neighborhood —In its attempt to bring Estonia into the Soviet
fold,MoscowmovedtensofthousandsofRussianworkersintoTallinn,using
the promise of new apartments as an incentive. Today, two generations later,
Tallinn has a huge Russian minority (about 40 percent of the city's popu-
lation) and three huge, charmless suburbs of ugly, Soviet-built apartments:
Mustamäe, Õismäe, and Lasnamäe. Today, about one of every two Tallinners
lives in one of these Brezhnev-era suburbs of massive, cookie-cutter apart-
ment blocks (manynowprivatized). Seventy percent oftheresidents wholive
in Lasnamäe are Russian-speaking. Some parts are poor, rough, and edgy (not
comfortable after dark), with blue lights in the public toilets so that junkies
can't see their veins. Other sections are nicer, and by day, you can visit here
without fear.
Forging Russians and Estonians into a single society, with the Estonian
language dominant, wasanoptimistic goal inthe early 1990s.Ethnic Russians
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