Tallinn: Old Town in Depth - Part 18

If you’re interested in Estonia’s 20th and 21st-century history, it’s an easy five-minute walk from this square to the next sight.

The Museum of Occupations (Okupatsioonide Muuseum)

Locals insist that Estonia didn’t formally lose its independence from 1939 to 1991, but was just “occupied”. First by the Soviets for one year and then by the Nazis for three years. They were then again occupied by the USSR for nearly 50 years. It was built with funding from a wealthy Estonian American and this compact museum tells the history of Estonia during its occupations.

Cost and Hours: €5, June to Aug Tue to Sun 10:00-18:00; Sept to May Tue to Sun 11:00-18:00. It is closed Mon year round, don’t bother with the €4 audio guide as it’s not good. It’s located at Toompea 8, at the corner of Kaarli Puiestee.

Visiting the Museum: Entering, you’ll walk past a poignant monument made of giant suitcases—a reminder of people who fled the country. After buying your ticket, pick up the English descriptions and explore. The ticket desk also sells a good range of English language books on the occupation years.

The exhibit is organized around seven TV monitors screening 30-minute documentary films with dry commentary, archival footage, and interviews, with each focusing on a different time period. At each screen, you can use the mouse to select English. Surrounding each monitor is a display case crammed with artefacts of the era. The footage of the Singing Revolution is particularly rousing.

Before settling into the film loop, take a quick clockwise spin from the ticket desk to see the larger exhibits, which illustrate how the Soviets kept the Estonians in line. First, you’ll see a rustic boat that a desperate defector actually rowed across the Baltic Sea to the Swedish island of Gotland. Look for the unsettling surveillance peephole, which will make you want to carefully examine your hotel room tonight. Surrounded by a lot more of those symbolic suitcases, the large monument with a swastika and a red star is a reminder that Estonia was occupied by not one, but two different regimes in the 20th century. You’ll also see vintage cars, phone boxes, and radios that give a flavour of that era. Near the centre of the exhibit, sombre prison doors evoke the countless lives lost to detention and deportation.

Near those prison doors, take the red velvet staircase down to the basement. There, near the toilets, is a collection of Soviet-era statues of communist leaders. They once stood proudly as they lorded over the people, now they’re in the cellar guarding the toilets.

Continued in part 19.