Hannes Hanso says hard work justified his place in family

Politician, diplomat and world traveller Hannes Hanso said he had to do exhausting work as a child to justify his existence in his father’s eyes, ERR’s Vikerraadio reported.

Hanso described his father, Andres Hanso, as a strong character with a deep interest in the world. He had joined expeditions when he was young, enjoyed partying and was “quite a man about town” in his youth. He was also strongly opposed to the system, and worked as a teacher and school principal.

“As a teenager, I was afraid of my father,” Hanso said.

Hanso said his family lived relatively poorly by Soviet standards. While the parents of some of his classmates worked as milkers or tractor drivers and had higher incomes, his own family had to grow and raise almost everything it needed. They kept cows, pigs, chickens and nutria.

As the oldest child, Hanso had to do much of the work. He carried a manure fork, killed chickens behind the house, milked cows and skinned calves. His father had an arrangement under which all stillborn calves were brought to the family. The dogs ate the carcasses, while the hides had to be returned.

“I had to deal with all those calves and nail the hides to the door,” Hanso recalled. He was 12 years old at the time.

“There was an enormous amount of work to do at home to justify my existence,” he said.

He saw his mother cry often

Hanso also recalled seeing his mother cry frequently. He said she had acted as a lightning rod in the family, resolving tense situations.

“To this day, when I see women crying, I also come off the rails and cannot cope with it. I think it comes from seeing my mother move around the household with tears in her eyes. It puts you in such a weak and helpless position,” he said.

Hanso’s mother, Lia, was born in Pärnu. Her father was a musician who played the accordion in an orchestra, while her mother worked as a postal clerk. Lia was the family’s only child.

She said that girls three or four years older who lived across the street bullied her severely. During her school years, she became more sociable and stopped being afraid of people. As a lonely child, she found comfort in reading books.

Lia said her father played music in a restaurant and became closely attached to alcohol at a young age. She said this affected both his music and the course of his later life. Her parents divorced when she was 10.

“My father did not support me in my development, but I still regarded him with great respect because his interest in the world was enormous. He knew a great deal about what was happening in the world,” Lia said.

She described her mother as an exceptionally hardworking woman who held several jobs. When her mother lived with the family during retirement, she devoted herself to caring for the animals. She was a great fan of horses, a passion Lia said her daughters had inherited.

“When I did indoor work, my mother was the foreign minister who took care of the animals, tended the potato rows and looked after the other beds,” Lia said. “Unfortunately, I was not emotionally very close to my mother.”

“We do not always follow our parents. Sometimes we also want to set ourselves against them. I had quite ambitious goals. I wanted to go to university and surpass my parents’ level,” Lia said.