As part of the nationwide curiosity day (Uudishimupäev) Narva Museum, housed in the town's iconic castle, joined over 20 other museums across the country in opening up their storage rooms to showcase intriguing items from their collections, which are not normally on public display.

A museum is like an iceberg, much larger than what an ordinary visitor gets to see. Sometimes showing that is needed, as right now we only have a little over 400 objects on display, whereas there are 83,000 in the collections," Jaroslavna Nazarova, curator-collections manager at Narva Museum, explained.

Among these include paintings by Jüri Arrak (1936-2022), several cabinets filled with fabric samples, made at the local Kreenholm factory, and a large variety of old household items.

One highlight is a tankard made of glass which contains uranium. When a UV light is shone on the tankard, it fairly glows.

This was "glass that was very fashionable in the 19th century. It contains a tiny drop of uranium salts. It's not dangerous, especially when you don't drink from it," Nazarova added.

Some of the visitors said they were truly astonished by what they had seen.

"We haven't seen even a tenth of it. It's such a pity the museum collection is so overcrowded. All of this is kept away from the visitor, and it's impossible to get a full overview in an hour and a half," said one museum visitor, Olga.

The museum's cramped collection rooms can hold only about a dozen visitors at a time, meaning care is needed when moving around, to avoid brushing against the valuable artifacts.

Gloves have to be worn before handling the museum's 5,000-year-old stone axe.

Museum staff remain hopeful that sooner or later more of the artifacts will make it from storage to the exhibition hall, but the process may take years.

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