Today at noon, President Lennart Meri and Mrs. Helle Meri received the best university and high school graduates in the garden of the Kadriorg Palace. The President wished to the 50 graduates of the 22 Estonian universities and colleges that they would carry a marshal's truncheon, which is also the Estonian Nokia, in their bosom on their road to Arcadia, as Karl Ristikivi, a poet born in a sauna, had once carried his.

To the 150 best high school and vocational school graduates, who had been invited to the palace garden for the afternoon, the President spoke of his own graduation ceremony at the Tallinn 10th Secondary School. The President wished every graduate to write to him, within one week, about what they liked and disliked most during their school years. As the President said, it is necessary to understand the past in order to know how to proceed in the future.

The best high school graduates were also addressed by the Minister of Education Tõnis Lukas. Reet Hendrikson, who had graduated from the Tartu University as a philologist of the Estonian and Finno-Ugric languages, spoke on behalf of the university graduates and Diana Timoshova, a graduate of the Võru Kreutzwald Secondary School, spoke in the name of the high school graduates.

The jazz orchestra Wild Wind Wactori, which consists of the students of the Estonian Music Academy, played at the receptions. A joint photograph was taken of the participants at the end of both receptions held by President Meri and Mrs. Helle Meri. The speeches held by the President today are available at the homepage of the President's Office in the Internet.


Press Service of the Office of the President
Kadriorg, June 21, 2000

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