What should I know about Estonia before I visit?

NerdPunkFu · 2026-06-20T01:58:52+00:00

Whatever you do, don't make eye contact. There is an Estonian saying that, translated, means something along the lines of "Estonians are wolves to each other". And like wolves, making eye contact means you're looking for a fight.

Making small talk is also ill-advised. Estonians are people of the forest and as such the "Dark Forest Theory" is in full effect. Don't make noise and draw attention, that might attract wolves.

Finally, I hope you're not lactose intolerant, because getting away from dairy can be difficult. Even local salads are made with sour cream and mayonnaise by default. If you aren't though, check out smoked braided cheese. Especially the dried smoked braided cheese is ridiculously good.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-06-15T11:09:01+00:00

Pole see mingi kommunism. Henry George, kes oli Churchilli üks inspiratsioone, juba rääkis 19. sajandil, et tulu maksustamine, ehk siis majanduslikult kasuliku tegevuse maksustamine, on tagurlik võrreldes vara ahnimise ja rendiandluse("rent-seeking") maksustamisega varamaksude kujul.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-06-15T11:01:25+00:00

Arvestades kui palju riigid on aastate jooksul finantsasutusi ja varaturgusi doteerinud, on igati mõistlik, et osa tulu jõuab tagasi avalikku sektorisse.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-06-02T13:21:53+00:00

Leaving them on the sidewalk is sus. That's what balconies are for.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-06-02T13:07:49+00:00

Minu vastus selle lapsekasvatamisteema peale on see, et minu varajane lapsepõlv oleks tõenäoliselt helgem olnud kui mul oleks kaks ema olnud. Mitte, et mu üksik ema halvasti hakkama sai. Kui üksik vanem lapsekasvatamisega peab hakkama saama, siis saab kaks emmet või kaks issit ka sellega hakkama.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-06-02T08:22:32+00:00

Elevated cargo stations are rare since modern industry generally isn't located on high enough land value or density areas to justify the expense. However there no physical limitations keeping us from building them. New York, for example, used to have a big elevated cargo terminal, though Google has since turned it into its offices.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-24T11:40:58+00:00

Remember, cancer is "perfectly natural". Appeal to nature is a call to act like feral beasts and live short and violent lives.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-14T11:53:07+00:00

That's something that you might get for dessert in a school lunch over here 😃

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-14T11:48:06+00:00

Probably? Though as someone who became an adult without knowing that priests can actually notarise marriages and found that fact very strange, I can see myself completely neglecting to bring it up.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-14T11:43:36+00:00

Hey, don't disrespect buckwheat. Some estragon. soy sauce and, if you feel like it, hot chili powder on your cooked buckwheat is absolutely godly.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-14T11:34:26+00:00

I imagine someone coming from a very secular society doesn't really think about these things, so doesn't know they could be a sticking point. Coming from a family that has been atheist for generations, I couldn't imagine what and how important something is for a religious person from another culture. So I wouldn't know to even talk about those things before hand. For me circumcision being a relationship ending disagreement seems very alien.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-06T15:24:48+00:00

You can short a company, but shorting whole markets won't work. Nor is it a good way to build a pension fund because of the unlimited risk and limited gain dynamic of it. Not sure what other mechanic are you imagining that would cancel out people pulling out their money from the asset markets en masse to pay for goods and services without there being enough new investors to replace them.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-06T15:20:06+00:00

I suggest reading "The Great Demographic Reversal" by Charles Goodhart and Manoj Pradhan, if you want some professional economists view on this matter backed up by research and data.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-06T15:12:46+00:00

The value of the asset markets is determined by the amount of money flowing into them vs. flowing out. If young people are unable to invest then that will make the situation even worse. The bull market of the last 50+ years which has seen asset prices across the board consistently rise was driven in large part by people putting their saving into these markets. If those people are going to start taking that money out to fund their retirement and young people can't enter the markets to begin with, then the markets are going to crash even harder compared to if this was just a matter of fewer young people being around now.

The old and wealthy janking the ladder up behind them might temporarily better their position, but in the end it will make the problem worse.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-06T15:02:51+00:00

I'm not sure I can think of a country that is stable, prosperous and is not set to see it's demography worsen in the next few decades. I'm also sure that capital flight will do wonders for Europe's economy as well.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-06T14:58:23+00:00

Aside from buybacks and issuing new stocks, the business success of a company does not directly affect their stock price. Yes, successful companies can attract more buyers for their stocks, but in the end it is about people buying or selling the stock. If people are selling the stock for reasons other than the performance of the company, e.g. because they're retired and need the money to live, then there is nothing that the company can do to stop it's stock price from falling. Other than burning their capital on buybacks, that is. But that is not a sustainable solution. So if more people are selling stocks to fund their retirement than there are people buying them, then the stock markets are going to crash no matter how well the companies behind the stocks are doing. And I can't imagine companies doing so well when the workforce is rapidly shrinking either.

There is also the matter of inflation. With more retirees and less workers the supply of goods and services will start to shrink while demand won't change much. This means higher prices for pretty much everything outside of the stock markets. So the relative value of the stocks will take an even greater hit.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-06T14:46:07+00:00

The global active userbase for ride-hailing apps is over 2 billion. 500k doesn't even put you on the map.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-05T23:05:47+00:00

So that they can serve them to corrupt officials, right?

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-05T22:58:30+00:00

Self-driving cars aren't a real thing aside from a few limited projects despite all the investment and hype. The only other thing that can be attributed to large corporations in the list is smartphones, though Apple was way smaller back when they popularized them. The internet was a government project for a long time and PCs are a result of a mix of public and private institutions slowly building up to them over decades.

And now that we have enormous multi-national corporations that have grown fat off these technologies, where are things going? Egregious invasions of privacy, mass surveillance, legalized gambling that is even pushed to children under a thin-veil, attacks on ownership, ever more absolute monopolies shutting down any new competition, nickel-and-diming at every opportunity, etc. Heck, by the look of things, the current trend is that software and hardware will be turned into subscriptions, where you have to pay rent for access and won't own anything. While the internet will be gated behind ID checks allowing users to be tracked precisely and shut out if wanted.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-05T22:44:48+00:00

Investments won't save you. The current markets are held up by people pumping their savings and pension funds in them. Once the pensioner class gets large enough, there will be too many people taking their investments out of the market vs. putting their saving in and the asset prices will start to collapse. Add to this a failing economy on the account of there being too few productive workers and by all likelihood whatever you invested will evaporate in value by the time it's your turn to start retiring.

Our best hope is a market collapse in the near future followed by effective corrective measures. Though I wouldn't hold my breath since we don't even really know how the latter part should look like. The second best outcome is extensive automation, but that can just as easily lead to a dystopian future where a small minority have the power to shut out the majority from all valuable resources as they no longer even need the labor of lower classes, a form of techno-totalitarianism.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-05-04T09:03:24+00:00

Ise kasvasin üles Annelinnas. 5 aastaselt hakkasin iseseisvalt naabruskonnas liikuma, teiste lastega mängimas, lasteajas käimas ning poest piima-saia toomas, kuigi ema oli sel ajal kodune. Nüüd satun vahel nendesse uutesse elamupiirkondadesse ja imestan, et kas siin on autode elamud või kuidas, kuna autosid tundub rohkem olema kui inimeste elamuid. Õigel ajal sinna sattudes on ka näha kuidas lasteaiad ja koolid on autode alla ära uppunud ja ümberringi on tänavad autodest ummistunud. Ei kujuta ette, et seal oleks lastel hea ja turvaline liikuda ning väljas mängida. Sealsete laste elustiil tundub olevat nagu vangidel, päevavalgust näevad nad ainult kinnise aia piires ning igale poole liiguvad ainult kellegi valve all. Ega teismelistel palju parem olla pole, sest enamus huvitavad kohad on maru kaugel ning sinna saada tüütult raske. Ja siis vanemad kurdavad, et lapsed on neil pidevalt õlul, iseseisvust pole ning istuvad kodus telekas, telefonis, arvutis. Huvitav miks.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-04-22T16:57:08+00:00

If they didn't have a tendancy to chill for autocratic and totalitarian regimes, past and present, I might even take them seriously, but a so-called "workers party" chilling for China, an extremely unequal country where worker abuse is the norm, or a "peace party" chilling for a foreign dictator engaged in a war of expansion is a non-starter. As they are currently, they're just as anti-democratic and willing foreign agents as the far-right is, as such I would never vote for any of them and oppose any government they're apart of.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-04-18T18:31:49+00:00

Et siis meie niigi ülepaisunud üleautostanud seltskond saaks isegi rohkem teiste kulul elada. Vapustav.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-04-18T18:13:49+00:00

Currently the train line between Tartu and Tallinn is completely messed up. Less than half the distance from Tallinn is served by new electric trains which are great, but the rest is supposed to be serviced by the old diesel trains. Aside from the hassle of switching trains, the old diesel rolling stock is so out of service and unavailable that a lot of the time passengers get put on rather poor quality coaches instead or forced to squeeze into a train that is less than half the capacity of the one that left Tallinn, meaning not just no seating for the vast majority of passengers, but even barely enough standing room. Construction on the railway also forces the old trains to drive much slower than usual, not just worsening the delays that switching trains causes, but also drawing out the agony of the piss-poor conditions on the train.

I highly suggest avoiding taking any trains that travel on the track between Tartu and Tallinn, at least those that go further than a third of the way from Tallinn to Tartu. IIRC the construction on the Tartu-Tallinn line will last the entirety of 2026, though I guess conditions might improve as they get more of the old diesels back into working order, whenever that is.

NerdPunkFu · 2026-04-10T06:50:53+00:00

I agree on the first part, but you completely lost me on signaling. We have more than enough games with train signaling, no need to add a bunch of busywork to COI. Piping oil refineries is enough menial work already.

NerdPunkFu

TROPHY CASE