weather and motivation

It is hot and sunny out here around the DC area. The normal weather for this time of the year - real warm, but not yet intolerably hot and humid. As a classic Estonian who is used to see weather this warm for about a total of maybe 20-30 days in a year, the temptation to drop everything and storm into the sun is irresistable. So I took a stroll, grabbed a coffee and headed back home - 2 more weeks of schoolwork to push myself through.

But time and again, when I happen to be in an area with really nice warm climate I find myself coming back to a thought I first developed on a trip to Portoroz, a small Slovenian town on the shore of Adriatic sea. Me and my friends were walking down the seaside and bought that Italian type of delicious ice-cream. When we sat down on the lawn and enjoyed the gorgeous view on the sea and the sunny warm weather, I started contemplating whether I would have been ever motivated to work that hard and get where I am now if I had been born and raised in this place. Because if you have a constantly enjoyable weather, warm sea and good friends, you could just as well simply sell the ice-cream and enjoy life. Not that I would change my life for that now, but I have certainly developed a better understanding of why many people in California prefer surfing to school :)

Up in the north, a much better paid job is needed to live an enjoyable and comfortable life. And with half of the year rainy, muddy, cold and windy, it was much easeir to stay inside and dig yourself into the world of books.

So at the end of the day, I still stand by my view that it is good to be born up north. I bet the weather has also at least some role in why the Protestant work ethics works so much better in the Northern half of Europe than it does, say, in Italy or Spain :D

missing office life

Albeit I love the long mornings and the freedom of studying/working at home, I still miss having an actual office to work at - the need to wake up early and be productive in the mornings, get a good start to the day and lots of work done - so you can feel good about going out at 9pm to grab a drink with friends before you head home and plunge into the bed only to get up at 7am again.

Freedom is good, but requires way more self-discipline. I get my work done, but usually at the expense of staying home in the evenings and weekends to get the work done that would have been finished had I not taken longs showers in the mornings and spent two hours reading news. School can be chill, but it also tends to work in waves of very intense effort. And like all my friends in gradschool say .... we want our weekends back!!!

Well, I think I needed to write this down here, so that when I start my job in a month and a half and want my lazy mornings back I will have a reminder of why it is good to start work bright and early :D

Estonia in the Economist

And once again - damn those Economist journalists are good. I have to admit that it never stops surprising me as an Estonian how well and adequately the Economist journalists manage to portray the situation in Estonia. Part of this is probably the advantage of having a third party perspective, but they are remarkably perceptive to the general opinions in the country as well as insightful of the true nature of things. The latter is something that most Estonians know, but might not want to talk about. Current turmoil about our Bronze Soldier is one example - this is the notorious Second World War memorial that Estonians see as a memorial to our occupation, and Russians see as a basic commemoration of Soviet soldiers that died in the Second World War.

So if you want to see a really good and concise analysis of the situation in post-election Estonia, definitely read the Economist article "Floreat Estonia". You can find more good analysis on Estonia in their other arcticles you will see in the left hand corner of my blog under "Interesting Readings".

.....

Yes, one correction. As I was just reminded by a friend of mine, indeed, the Economist and all other Western commentators seem to have an overly positive image of Mr Mart Laar. Not to say that he did not do good things as a Prime Minister, but some of these things were not his personal achievements as much as those of a good team and good advisers. In addition, his party is also known to have supported many controversial issues, and some of them not so progressive and innovative at all. It is sad that the Reform Party refused Mr Laar the position everyone expected him to take, yet by the same token, I think in some ways Mr Laar was lucky to stay out of the Cabinet, because at this point the West appears to have clearly exaggerated expections for him.

.....

And for the local interpretation of the Economist article see (those that can read Estonian) "Economist: Ansip oleks pidanud Laarile võimaluse andma"