Published by Sanshusha, a Japanese publishing house, and with an initial print run of 3,000 issued in September, the 150-page book was snapped up very quickly, and plans are in place for a reprint of 2,000 copies.

The popularity of the book and its accompanying audio component took the authors by surprise.

Kojin Kumagai, one of the co-authors and also an organizer of Japanese-Estonian cultural relations, told "Aktuaalne kaamera": "We have to say that we are are very surprised that this book has sold many copies.. If you just compare the numbers with other language books that this company has published, they are quite close to the popularity of English or French [books]."

The book was completed in just six months, and leaned heavily towards Saaremaa, and includes some essential background knowledge about Estonia's largest island, and the rest of the country.

Ivo Visak, director at Saaremaa Gümnaasium, was responsible for recording the audio files.

"I recorded 200 lines of Estonian text for the book. So, when a Japanese learner starts practicing these expressions, it is me who is helping them with the correct pronunciation," he said.

There was one caveat here though – while originally from the mainland, "it might be the case that some Japanese learners of Estonian have a bit of confusion with their 'õ' and 'ö' sounds," Visak joked, referring to a classic phonological distinction natives of Saaremaa have in comparison with the rest of Estonia.

Visak, who has traveled to Japan many times, noted that direct flights between Tokyo and Helsinki make Estonia not so far away as might at first be thought, and from this sense Sansusha's move was a sensible one.

Both Estonian and Japanese were included in the umbrella of the now-abandoned, hypothesized Ural-Altaic family, now seen more of a linguistic convergence zone – in short, they have very little connection in real and practical terms.

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