Ester Vee with her husband Veljo Vee

This is me and my husband Veljo Vee, photographed on our wedding day in Tallinn in 1957. My husband and I went to the photo shop to have this photo taken after our wedding registration ceremony.

In 1954 I graduated from the Leningrad Teachers' Training College with honors. Since I came from another Republic, I went back to work in my country. Other graduates had work assignments to work in various locations of the Soviet Union. Many went to Siberia or to the north of the Soviet Union. I returned to Tallinn.

I went to work as a lecturer at the Department for Pre-school Education of the Tallinn Teachers’ Training School where I met my future husband, Veljo Vee. Our school also housed a vocational school where Veljo was a student. Later my husband told me that he often saw me in the lobby of our school and thought that I was a student of the Teachers’ Training School. Had he known I was a lecturer, he wouldn’t have dared to talk to me. It was fortunate that he believed me to be a student and approached me. For me, it was love at first sight: it was either to be him, or no one else. We met in May 1956, and in late 1957 we got married.

After finishing the 8th grade at school, Veljo entered a vocational school in Tallinn. When a student, he was drafted into the army, and after the service he continued his studies. Veljo finished the school with honors, and afterwards he went to work as a metalworker at the Ilmarin mechanical plant. At that time, we were married already. At first we lived with my parents, and in the 1960s Veljo received an apartment at the plant.