Entry tags:
The return
Tallinn turned out to be my least favorite city on the itinerary, owing to its reluctance to give up any signs of actual existence. The Old Town was empty of habitation except by tourists - stag parties, large groups of elderly folks being led around by a tour guide, younger folks trying to pass off their dodgy passports in order to buy beer - and places that might attract these tourists. A German beer hall. A Depeche Mode-themed bar. A marzipan museum. The density of souvenir shops nearly reached Chinatown levels.
We made it out of the Old Town for an afternoon, strolling out to Kadriorg park where no fewer than four recently married couples waited for their turn to pose in front of the palace there, which resembles a pink plastic Barbie dream house. On the way back to the hostel, we saw the same musical group that had perplexed us in Vilnius - three or four men, dressed up in full stereotypical Sioux costume (feather headdress, mocassins, war paint), playing pan pipes over taped, diluted new age music. They attracted a lot of attention - apparently the Wild West is in vogue in the Baltics - but not a lot of revenue, as far as I could tell.
Our Esperantist hosts in Riga were more welcoming than we could have imagined. They fed us ceaselessly, to the point where I was sure they were fattening us up in order to eat us, and kindly drove us into town. A young Russian man approached Josh and asked him if he'd like to buy a greeting card, the proceeds of which, he was assured, would go toward the promotion of morality. Josh pretended not to speak English. I was making a recording of some kind of wind-driven sculpture at the time. (I have a lot of recordings from this trip, which I hope to share with everyone soon.)
If a trip to the Baltic states is in the cards for you, I highly recommend visiting the various Occupation museums - there's one in both Tallinn and Riga. We visited both. The museums helped me understand what the Cold War period was like for people living on the other side - a story that wasn't really available to folks from the U.S. until very recently. I had no idea that the deportations to Siberia were so extensive, that the press and the local languages were so censored. Some of the exhibitions in the museums had press clippings from the New York Times next to them, which professed vague knowledge of whatever important event had just happened but were helpless to give any details, since that it was so difficult to get any information in or out of these countries. Now, of course, what a change - you can't spit in Estonia, for example, without hitting a wireless access point or Internet cafe.
The journey back to New York was exhausting. A flight from Riga to Stansted; a bus from Stansted to Heathrow (which cost circa $40, nearly more than all the money I spent on bus travel in the Baltics put together); an eleven-hour wait in Heathrow (made easier by the presence of music and book stores in Heathrow's mall-like terminal); a flight from Heathrow to JFK (which I mostly slept through); a subway ride from JFK to my apartment (which are about as far away as two locations can get and still be on the A line). The immigration officer said "Welcome home" as he checked my passport, and that was comforting. I'm glad to be home.
Top five favorite places that I visited on the trip.
1. Tahkuna Peninsula, Hiiumaa, Estonia
2. Vilnius Old Town, Lithuania
3. Cathedral Hill, Tartu, Estonia
4. The Baltic Sea off of the Curonian Spit, Lithuania
5. Upe Record Store, Riga
Top five places that sucked on this trip.
1. The Tallinn Bus Station. This is the worst bus station I've ever been to. The food choices consisted of weird pink stuff on toast, coffee, hot dogs, and kiosk junk food. An old woman wandered around the place aimlessly dragging a broom behind her. It cost 4 EEK to use the filthy bathroom. Dear whoever is in charge of Tallinn: Your bus station is truly terrible. Sincerely yours and concerned, Adam.
2. Wherever it is that I lost my debit card.
3. There was this bathroom in one of the places that we stayed, and I feel bad about complaining, because our host was very nice, but it was a pretty disgusting bathroom. More disgusting even than the guy who didn't have running water in his house.
4. Hausma Hostel in Kärdla. Don't go to this hostel! You will feel threatened by the dead in the middle of the night and the people who work there will be mean to you, and also the water tastes like rust.
5. The filthy bathrooms at JFK. All public facilities in the Baltics are next to immaculate - coming home to such second-rate hygiene didn't exactly make me proud to be an American.
We made it out of the Old Town for an afternoon, strolling out to Kadriorg park where no fewer than four recently married couples waited for their turn to pose in front of the palace there, which resembles a pink plastic Barbie dream house. On the way back to the hostel, we saw the same musical group that had perplexed us in Vilnius - three or four men, dressed up in full stereotypical Sioux costume (feather headdress, mocassins, war paint), playing pan pipes over taped, diluted new age music. They attracted a lot of attention - apparently the Wild West is in vogue in the Baltics - but not a lot of revenue, as far as I could tell.
Our Esperantist hosts in Riga were more welcoming than we could have imagined. They fed us ceaselessly, to the point where I was sure they were fattening us up in order to eat us, and kindly drove us into town. A young Russian man approached Josh and asked him if he'd like to buy a greeting card, the proceeds of which, he was assured, would go toward the promotion of morality. Josh pretended not to speak English. I was making a recording of some kind of wind-driven sculpture at the time. (I have a lot of recordings from this trip, which I hope to share with everyone soon.)
If a trip to the Baltic states is in the cards for you, I highly recommend visiting the various Occupation museums - there's one in both Tallinn and Riga. We visited both. The museums helped me understand what the Cold War period was like for people living on the other side - a story that wasn't really available to folks from the U.S. until very recently. I had no idea that the deportations to Siberia were so extensive, that the press and the local languages were so censored. Some of the exhibitions in the museums had press clippings from the New York Times next to them, which professed vague knowledge of whatever important event had just happened but were helpless to give any details, since that it was so difficult to get any information in or out of these countries. Now, of course, what a change - you can't spit in Estonia, for example, without hitting a wireless access point or Internet cafe.
The journey back to New York was exhausting. A flight from Riga to Stansted; a bus from Stansted to Heathrow (which cost circa $40, nearly more than all the money I spent on bus travel in the Baltics put together); an eleven-hour wait in Heathrow (made easier by the presence of music and book stores in Heathrow's mall-like terminal); a flight from Heathrow to JFK (which I mostly slept through); a subway ride from JFK to my apartment (which are about as far away as two locations can get and still be on the A line). The immigration officer said "Welcome home" as he checked my passport, and that was comforting. I'm glad to be home.
Top five favorite places that I visited on the trip.
1. Tahkuna Peninsula, Hiiumaa, Estonia
2. Vilnius Old Town, Lithuania
3. Cathedral Hill, Tartu, Estonia
4. The Baltic Sea off of the Curonian Spit, Lithuania
5. Upe Record Store, Riga
Top five places that sucked on this trip.
1. The Tallinn Bus Station. This is the worst bus station I've ever been to. The food choices consisted of weird pink stuff on toast, coffee, hot dogs, and kiosk junk food. An old woman wandered around the place aimlessly dragging a broom behind her. It cost 4 EEK to use the filthy bathroom. Dear whoever is in charge of Tallinn: Your bus station is truly terrible. Sincerely yours and concerned, Adam.
2. Wherever it is that I lost my debit card.
3. There was this bathroom in one of the places that we stayed, and I feel bad about complaining, because our host was very nice, but it was a pretty disgusting bathroom. More disgusting even than the guy who didn't have running water in his house.
4. Hausma Hostel in Kärdla. Don't go to this hostel! You will feel threatened by the dead in the middle of the night and the people who work there will be mean to you, and also the water tastes like rust.
5. The filthy bathrooms at JFK. All public facilities in the Baltics are next to immaculate - coming home to such second-rate hygiene didn't exactly make me proud to be an American.