We woke up at 6:45, packed, and caught the 7:39 Hoppa bus to Heathrow Terminal 3. Our Virgin Airlines flight was scheduled to leave at 9:20.
We checked ourselves in, and got through passport control.
In duty free, we found something amazing. Zubrowka vodka, the bison-grass vodka we had had yesterday at Šašlik. It was also far cheaper than it would cost in the states. We wanted to buy two apiece, but we found out that USA restrictions say 1 liter per person. We got one each.
On the plane, there were only 10 or 15 seats open. One was on the aisle next to my dad and my two middle seats (fortunately). And there were two more in the row in front of us and on the right two seats. I snagged one of those for the simple reason that it was the first row not in first class, and thus had massive legroom.
Up in that seat, 31G, I started talking with an English girl on her way for a five day vacation in NYC. Victoria was very excited to finally have reached the "absurd" 21 year old drinking age that would allow her to legally drink in the USA. We chatted on and off for the entire flight, interspersed with movies. I watched Despicable Me and the first episode of Boardwalk Empire.
I started thinking about this vacation too. We visited some very distinct places with fascinating histories. So in an effort to simplify my conclusions in the interest of time, I'm going to rank each country in terms of several very important aspects, based solely on my experiences in this short time.
Accommodations
1. Finland
2. Estonia
3. Latvia
Sightseeing
1. Estonia
2. Finland
3. Latvia
Girls
1. Estonia
2. Finland
3. Latvia
Chocolate
1. Latvia
2. Estonia
3. Finland
Food
1. Finland*
1. Latvia*
2. Estonia
* between Lodi in Riga and Šašlik in Helsinki... There is no way to choose without insulting the other.
Beer
1. Estonia
2. Latvia
3. Finland
Coffee
1. Estonia (Barista champ)
Prices
1. Estonia
2. Latvia
3. Finland
Quality of life of locals
1. Finland
2. Estonia
3. Latvia
But overall, I don't see a way to easily choose a clear winner. I'd like to go back to all three. I'd like to explore more and see more of the countryside. I'd like to not get yelled at by cops or receive fines for speeding. But this is life. I'll come back, but this trip was a fantastic journey into new languages, new cultures, new histories, new foods, and new experiences.
Until then, though, back to school.
We landed just past 1pm. I said farewell and bon voyage to Victoria and gave her a few recommendations for while she's in the City. I met up with my dad and we got a shuttle bus to La Guardia, where we were to meet my mom, flying in from Chicago, and where I was to fly from to La Guardia a little while after.
I met mom at La Guardia and we chatted for an hour until 4:00 rolled around and I needed to check into my flight and head towards the gate.
Got through security and to the gate just as they were boarding my group. I got on, we took off.
We landed just after 6pm, St. Louis time. I got my bags from the baggage claim and took a cab to school.
As I write this, I'm sitting in my dorm room once again, as Finland, Estonia, and Latvia fade into memory, sadly. 8 days spent trying to learn three new languages, and tomorrow I have a Chinese test.
I'm Finnished.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Saturday, March 19, 2011
In Soviet Russia, Bear Eats You
Woke up at 8, again. Today is the day we start our journey home.
Breakfast in the executive lounge at 9:15. Once again, I cannot stress enough the impact that the lox they serve in Finland has on my life.
It started snowing at 10, much to our excitement. I mean, what use is it to spend time in Finland in the winter if it's doesn't snow?
We left the hotel just before noon. Our agenda consisted of two things: the stone church, and Šašlik.
We got distracted almost immediately by a farmers market that was being held in the square directly behind the hotel. While we didn't eat there, we did end up buying a great pair of reindeer-skin gloves for me. I named them Donner and
As we were about to leave the farmers market, my dad spotted a brick building with factory-style windows. We went inside, only to find a larger indoor market, much like the one near the shore that Riku brought us to a few days ago. Father, true to form, kept the camera on his iPhone turned on and at the ready, taking pictures of literally everything.
Next we hopped on the metro to the Kamppi stop, and walked north to the stone church.
Unfortunately, the one touristy thing we wanted to do today is closed for renovations until January. But we saw pictures in a local souvenir shop, so I'll write a little about it. A very little.
Finns built church into hillside. Stone wall and small dome are only visible things from surface.
We wandered around the stone wall for a tad, stepping gingerly on the newly fallen/falling snow, afraid we'd fall in. I did once, up to my knees. Dad slipped twice. One had him performing a very impressive summersault for a 59 year old man. The other was a graceless stumbling as he stepped down to a curb - only the conveniently placed pole next to him kept him from falling, as he grabbed it on his way down.
After that little ordeal we attempted to find a cab to take us to Šašlik. We tried to hail a few until an Oregon native studying in Helsinki stopped us and told us that in this country you call a cab or go to a taxi stand. He called a company who told him that there was a stand a minute walk away, so we went there.
Šašlik (Шашлык) is a Russian restaurant which has a reputation from some as being the best Russian food outside of Russia, and by others as being the best Russian food in or out of Russia. Either way, it was supposed to be incredible. It did not disappoint.
We arrived at two outside the restaurant, about 70m away from Sea Horse, which was adorned with a simple red onion dome awning. Inside the first door was a massive, plush upholstered, red throne, and a door to the restaurant itself.
Inside the restaurant:
--Paintings everywhere, on every wall. Most were of Russian nobility of old, some of children or Russian pastimes, and at least one representation of Father Christmas;
--Stained glass windows, each with a unique design. We sat next to a window with a bright peacock design on it;
--Candles. But not just your average romantic candles. Next to our table was a candelabra that seems to have held at least 100 full sized candles, judging by the size of the total wax drips all over it;
--The rest was, in the interest of time, fancy, welcoming, and whelming.
We started the meal with a traditional Russian dish; vodka. I had a polish vodka to start, called Zubrowka. It was one of the better vodkas I've ever had. After I got Russiya Standart Platinum, while my dad got Zubrowka.
As for food, here's what we ordered:
Dad:
-- Appetizer: Bear roast (with Georgian tea syrup and caramelized garlic cloves)
-- Main course: Chicken breast à la Kiev (Chicken breast stuffed with lemon-parsley butter, served with deep-fried root vegetable rösti)
Me:
-- Appetizer: Sturgeon and snow crab ballontine (with champagne mousse and truffle creme)
-- Main course: Potted bear meat en croûte à la Šašlik (tender bear steak in sour cream sauce served with barley kasha)
We almost ordered the Flambéed bear fillet on a skewer à la Peter the Great (Served with porcini blinis and port wine sauce), but with a price tag of almost double the second most expensive item on the menu, €98.20, we ruled against it.
The bear roast was juicy and tender. The sturgeon was cold and refreshing. Both lifted our spirits and made us happier people overall.
When the main course came, we were presented with empty plates. Both meals were brought on one large wooden trivet, piping hot, and we were given utensils with which we could scoop out our food and consume from the plate.
All I know about the Chicken Kiev is that when dad cut into it, all kinds of butter came spilling out, and he loved it dearly as he ate it. But as for me, I was given a mini bread bowl to scoop my Bear stew into, and a ramekin of mushroom something. One bite brought me to tears. It was one of the most savory things I've ever experienced. I took my time with it, enjoying each bite over the course of at least 45 minutes. I don't think there has ever been as clean a set of plates after a meal as ours were after this one.
At 3:30 we realized it was 3:30 and we had to leave for the airport soon. We paid our bill, left the Russian paradise we had found, and walked down the street to where the sea horse was. Around the corner was a bookshop that my dad had been dying to see, so I let him pop in quickly while I ran down the street to see an historic house - V.I. Lenin had lived there in 1906, probably after having fled St. Petersburg in 1905.
After seeing the plaque and the building I ran back and pulled dad away from the bookshop.
We walked north up to the Esplanade, where we found a taxi at a taxi stand outside a hotel. The driver took us to the hilton, where we picked up our bags and got another taxi at 4:10 for the airport.
In a bizarre twist of fate, though, we arrived at the airport so early that EasyJet hadn't even started checking anyone in. There weren't even EasyJet desks yet. But when the tv screens switched to show our airline, we got in line and got through early.
Security was a breeze, and customs too. We got to gate 35 way too early.
We boarded the plane at 6:20, and left on time at 6:50, on our way to London - Gatwick North.
We landed about 3 hours later, which was only 1 hour later with the time difference, at 7:53.
We picked up our bags at the baggage claim and left the secure area of the terminal to find the bus to Heathrow. Tomorrow morning we have a flight to the USA and we needed to spend the night near or at the airport.
We got a bus almost immediately, remembering the mistakes we made last year, and got a National Express ticket for us both to Heathrow.
From Heathrow, we avoided the "hotel reservation desk" ripoff by booking a reservation online, saving £63 over the £141 that they tried to charge us for the Renaissance hotel near the airport.
We got to the hotel around 10:30, and spent 30 minutes chatting with the women at the front desk, Linda from Sweden and Agele (I think?) from Lithuania. It was quite entertaining, and they even gave us a free glass of champagne apiece while we talked.
Around 11:45 I went to sleep. 6:45 wakeup call in the morning to catch our flight home.
Breakfast in the executive lounge at 9:15. Once again, I cannot stress enough the impact that the lox they serve in Finland has on my life.
It started snowing at 10, much to our excitement. I mean, what use is it to spend time in Finland in the winter if it's doesn't snow?
We left the hotel just before noon. Our agenda consisted of two things: the stone church, and Šašlik.
We got distracted almost immediately by a farmers market that was being held in the square directly behind the hotel. While we didn't eat there, we did end up buying a great pair of reindeer-skin gloves for me. I named them Donner and
As we were about to leave the farmers market, my dad spotted a brick building with factory-style windows. We went inside, only to find a larger indoor market, much like the one near the shore that Riku brought us to a few days ago. Father, true to form, kept the camera on his iPhone turned on and at the ready, taking pictures of literally everything.
Next we hopped on the metro to the Kamppi stop, and walked north to the stone church.
Unfortunately, the one touristy thing we wanted to do today is closed for renovations until January. But we saw pictures in a local souvenir shop, so I'll write a little about it. A very little.
Finns built church into hillside. Stone wall and small dome are only visible things from surface.
We wandered around the stone wall for a tad, stepping gingerly on the newly fallen/falling snow, afraid we'd fall in. I did once, up to my knees. Dad slipped twice. One had him performing a very impressive summersault for a 59 year old man. The other was a graceless stumbling as he stepped down to a curb - only the conveniently placed pole next to him kept him from falling, as he grabbed it on his way down.
After that little ordeal we attempted to find a cab to take us to Šašlik. We tried to hail a few until an Oregon native studying in Helsinki stopped us and told us that in this country you call a cab or go to a taxi stand. He called a company who told him that there was a stand a minute walk away, so we went there.
Šašlik (Шашлык) is a Russian restaurant which has a reputation from some as being the best Russian food outside of Russia, and by others as being the best Russian food in or out of Russia. Either way, it was supposed to be incredible. It did not disappoint.
We arrived at two outside the restaurant, about 70m away from Sea Horse, which was adorned with a simple red onion dome awning. Inside the first door was a massive, plush upholstered, red throne, and a door to the restaurant itself.
Inside the restaurant:
--Paintings everywhere, on every wall. Most were of Russian nobility of old, some of children or Russian pastimes, and at least one representation of Father Christmas;
--Stained glass windows, each with a unique design. We sat next to a window with a bright peacock design on it;
--Candles. But not just your average romantic candles. Next to our table was a candelabra that seems to have held at least 100 full sized candles, judging by the size of the total wax drips all over it;
--The rest was, in the interest of time, fancy, welcoming, and whelming.
We started the meal with a traditional Russian dish; vodka. I had a polish vodka to start, called Zubrowka. It was one of the better vodkas I've ever had. After I got Russiya Standart Platinum, while my dad got Zubrowka.
As for food, here's what we ordered:
Dad:
-- Appetizer: Bear roast (with Georgian tea syrup and caramelized garlic cloves)
-- Main course: Chicken breast à la Kiev (Chicken breast stuffed with lemon-parsley butter, served with deep-fried root vegetable rösti)
Me:
-- Appetizer: Sturgeon and snow crab ballontine (with champagne mousse and truffle creme)
-- Main course: Potted bear meat en croûte à la Šašlik (tender bear steak in sour cream sauce served with barley kasha)
We almost ordered the Flambéed bear fillet on a skewer à la Peter the Great (Served with porcini blinis and port wine sauce), but with a price tag of almost double the second most expensive item on the menu, €98.20, we ruled against it.
The bear roast was juicy and tender. The sturgeon was cold and refreshing. Both lifted our spirits and made us happier people overall.
When the main course came, we were presented with empty plates. Both meals were brought on one large wooden trivet, piping hot, and we were given utensils with which we could scoop out our food and consume from the plate.
All I know about the Chicken Kiev is that when dad cut into it, all kinds of butter came spilling out, and he loved it dearly as he ate it. But as for me, I was given a mini bread bowl to scoop my Bear stew into, and a ramekin of mushroom something. One bite brought me to tears. It was one of the most savory things I've ever experienced. I took my time with it, enjoying each bite over the course of at least 45 minutes. I don't think there has ever been as clean a set of plates after a meal as ours were after this one.
At 3:30 we realized it was 3:30 and we had to leave for the airport soon. We paid our bill, left the Russian paradise we had found, and walked down the street to where the sea horse was. Around the corner was a bookshop that my dad had been dying to see, so I let him pop in quickly while I ran down the street to see an historic house - V.I. Lenin had lived there in 1906, probably after having fled St. Petersburg in 1905.
After seeing the plaque and the building I ran back and pulled dad away from the bookshop.
We walked north up to the Esplanade, where we found a taxi at a taxi stand outside a hotel. The driver took us to the hilton, where we picked up our bags and got another taxi at 4:10 for the airport.
In a bizarre twist of fate, though, we arrived at the airport so early that EasyJet hadn't even started checking anyone in. There weren't even EasyJet desks yet. But when the tv screens switched to show our airline, we got in line and got through early.
Security was a breeze, and customs too. We got to gate 35 way too early.
We boarded the plane at 6:20, and left on time at 6:50, on our way to London - Gatwick North.
We landed about 3 hours later, which was only 1 hour later with the time difference, at 7:53.
We picked up our bags at the baggage claim and left the secure area of the terminal to find the bus to Heathrow. Tomorrow morning we have a flight to the USA and we needed to spend the night near or at the airport.
We got a bus almost immediately, remembering the mistakes we made last year, and got a National Express ticket for us both to Heathrow.
From Heathrow, we avoided the "hotel reservation desk" ripoff by booking a reservation online, saving £63 over the £141 that they tried to charge us for the Renaissance hotel near the airport.
We got to the hotel around 10:30, and spent 30 minutes chatting with the women at the front desk, Linda from Sweden and Agele (I think?) from Lithuania. It was quite entertaining, and they even gave us a free glass of champagne apiece while we talked.
Around 11:45 I went to sleep. 6:45 wakeup call in the morning to catch our flight home.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Fine Fines
We wanted to sleep in today. So we set the alarm for 9.. But we went to sleep an hour and a half later than has been usual this trip, and so actually ended up getting less than ever when we woke up at 9/9:30.
My dad left the room around 10:15, and I followed suit close to 11, leaving my bags at the front desk and finding him several blocks away in the old town, wending my way there not by a map, but by the church steeple visible from the street outside the Radisson. It was a short walk but I made it shorter by cutting across a small park by a Hesburger.
I found my dad in the main square, an obvious choice. He should have made it more difficult -- he was the only one sitting outside at the café he was in.
We walked out of the town, looking for food. But for a city as clean and modern as Tallinn is, we found a surprisingly small quantity of restaurants, and none of them appealed to us.
Around 12:30 we left the old town and walked back to our hotel to get our bags and the car we rented two days ago.
We tried to get a lunch recommendation from the concierge who got us our bags and car. He recommended Madissoni, a Radisson-owned restaurant about 30m down the street from where we stood. We tried to get another recommendation, and got one for Gourmet Coffee, near Peter the Great's old home in the northern part of the city. We had to visit there anyway, so we decided to go to the coffee shop. But as we drove past the Madissoni, my dad looked inside and exclaimed that we needed to eat there.
I ordered an Estonian beer, A. Le Coq, and a salmon risotto. My dad got crusted whitefish and a latte.
When the coffee came, dad insisted on telling Nele, our waitress, "Please tell the chef that this coffee is incredible."
"I made it," Nele replied.
It turned out that Nele was the Estonian Barista champion two years ago... 1.3 million people, and we found the best coffee maker among them.
Dad's second cup of coffee came with a condition. He wanted to watch Nele make it. The two of them went behind the bar and he watched and commented as she made the coffee. He was blown away.
From Madissoni, we got in the car and drove northeast towards Peter the Great's old house. We meandered for a bit and made a few wrong turns before stumbling upon a beautiful mansion in a park. It looked to be the home that Peter the Great's built for his wife. It is called Kadriorg Palace and today it is an art museum - but not a very good one. We walked out before we got past the gift shop.
We walked around the back of the palace and ducked under some police line-style tape trying to keep people out. We shuffled up ice-covered steps and got a beautiful view of the back of the house. We also saw a pink palace in the adjoining lot, on the other side of a low stone fence. I considered jumping it, thinking it was another museum. But we had ducked under dividing lines to get to where we were, were standing next to a sign informing us of video surveillance, and saw what looked like guards patrolling the back yard (the latter item wasn't noticed until we left)
In most other situations -- and based on our past experiences with dividers and boundaries abroad -- we would have probably jumped the stone divider and walked right up to the windows, peering in the back of the palace. It's a good thing we didn't.
It turns out I was one hop from violating the sanctity of the property of the office of the President of Estonia, their version of the White House. It's a good think I had even a little sense. We ran out of there, half expecting a bullet to the back for each of us for trespassing on the Pink House lawn and threatening national security. We had gotten up close and personal with the Presidential headquarters in Helsinki and Riga.. Now Tallinn as well.
We found Czar Peter I's house a short while later, on the other side (front side) of the Pink House. It wasn't that impressive - most of the house wasn't original, it was renovated several times, and Peter didn't build it, he bought it. But the furniture, while reupholstered, was all original and all in great shape.
The two coolest pieces of the tiny cottage (which was somewhere between the size of his house in St. Petersburg and his summer home on the Peterhoff property) were the chest and the table. The chest had belonged to Charles XII of Sweden, whom Peter defeated in a war in the late 18th century. The table was decorated on the top with a large compass in a circle, and a map stretching from Denmark to St. Petersburg, from Prussia to Finland, in the center. It was clear that Peter once used the table to plan his navy's movements during the war with Sweden. Very cool.
We went from that house, at about 3:30, to the ferry terminal to catch our 5:30 back to Helsinki.
When we arrived at the car rental place in the terminal, Rilka, the woman who rented our car to us, came out to meet us. It was just before we started cleaning out the car that my dad exclaimed, "We made it!" to which Rilka responded, "Yes, but you received two fines."
It turns out we were caught for speeding by speed cameras on the highway twice, once while my dad was driving 6km/hr over the speed limit, and once while I was going 3km/hr over. Expecting the charges to be exorbitant, we were relieved to hear that the charge was €3 per km/hr we were over, or €18 and €9. This wasn't too bad, but thank God that Latvia never sends in tickets to Estonia, cuz I averaged 120km/hr through Latvia coming back, which has a 70km/hr speed limit...
We waited in the terminal to board, watching countless Finns rolling carton after carton of alcohol with them across the straits. Riku had told us in Helsinki that because alcohol is so expensive in Finland, Helsinkans (no?) found it cheaper to make occasional runs to Estonia for €60 round trip, just to spend hundreds of Euros on liquor. "You can bring an entire truck of beer back with you," Riku had said, "as long as you say it is for your own personal use."
For a country of 5,000,000, with 2,000,000 of them alcoholics (according to Riku, the same number of Russians are alcoholics, a country with 150,000,000 citizens), this is a ferry attractive deal.
Our ferry left at 5:30. We relaxed for a bit at first, lulled by the now-familiar sound and corresponding vibrations of the ship's hull scraping the ice blocks below.
Around 6:30 the two of us stood on the "sun" deck of the ship, bundled up, and shared a couple of fresh Cuban cigars for a while.
Our boat pulled into Helsingfors around 7:30. Forgetting the Latvian "Paldies," and the Estonian "Aitäh," we had to again say "Kiitos" to every person we needed to thank.
We got a cab to the Hilton, where we were given our old room again, 630. At 8:30 we were relaxing in our room, overlooking the frozen sea.
At 8:58 I received a text from my father, who had gone to the executive lounge on the seventh floor, which said: "Help! Drunks here"
When I finally meandered upstairs about a half hour later, I was greeted by a very drunk man, who pointed to me and asked me to join his friends and I (whom I learned later wanted him there as much as everyone else -- not at all). I blew him off and sat with my dad.
The drunkard pestered everyone in the area and, after repeated requests from several people, including my father, he was forcibly removed from the premises. I mixed my dad and I makeshift Amaretto Sours (DiSaronno, Schwepps Lemon Sour, a wedge of lemon, and half a package of sugar) while we prepared to leave for dinner.
At 10:00 we left for dinner. Since many/most places close then, we chose to go to Baker's, a burger and bar joint near Stockmann's and the shopping district.
We arrived at Baker's at 10:20, which turned out to be across the street from the Dubliner. I had Reindeer Carpaccio and Lambsteak. Amazingly delicious. Especially the reindeer. Oh, and our waiter was a Spaniard, who was about as bumbling as Manuel from Fawlty Towers.
From dinner we passed by the entire population of Finland getting drunk at once. We didn't take advantage of the party.
We did stop at the casino, though, which we didn't stay at since I observed too many strong players and i had not enough energy to spend a few hours playing.
We left and got back to the hotel around 12:40am. I fell asleep around 2.
My dad left the room around 10:15, and I followed suit close to 11, leaving my bags at the front desk and finding him several blocks away in the old town, wending my way there not by a map, but by the church steeple visible from the street outside the Radisson. It was a short walk but I made it shorter by cutting across a small park by a Hesburger.
I found my dad in the main square, an obvious choice. He should have made it more difficult -- he was the only one sitting outside at the café he was in.
We walked out of the town, looking for food. But for a city as clean and modern as Tallinn is, we found a surprisingly small quantity of restaurants, and none of them appealed to us.
Around 12:30 we left the old town and walked back to our hotel to get our bags and the car we rented two days ago.
We tried to get a lunch recommendation from the concierge who got us our bags and car. He recommended Madissoni, a Radisson-owned restaurant about 30m down the street from where we stood. We tried to get another recommendation, and got one for Gourmet Coffee, near Peter the Great's old home in the northern part of the city. We had to visit there anyway, so we decided to go to the coffee shop. But as we drove past the Madissoni, my dad looked inside and exclaimed that we needed to eat there.
I ordered an Estonian beer, A. Le Coq, and a salmon risotto. My dad got crusted whitefish and a latte.
When the coffee came, dad insisted on telling Nele, our waitress, "Please tell the chef that this coffee is incredible."
"I made it," Nele replied.
It turned out that Nele was the Estonian Barista champion two years ago... 1.3 million people, and we found the best coffee maker among them.
Dad's second cup of coffee came with a condition. He wanted to watch Nele make it. The two of them went behind the bar and he watched and commented as she made the coffee. He was blown away.
From Madissoni, we got in the car and drove northeast towards Peter the Great's old house. We meandered for a bit and made a few wrong turns before stumbling upon a beautiful mansion in a park. It looked to be the home that Peter the Great's built for his wife. It is called Kadriorg Palace and today it is an art museum - but not a very good one. We walked out before we got past the gift shop.
We walked around the back of the palace and ducked under some police line-style tape trying to keep people out. We shuffled up ice-covered steps and got a beautiful view of the back of the house. We also saw a pink palace in the adjoining lot, on the other side of a low stone fence. I considered jumping it, thinking it was another museum. But we had ducked under dividing lines to get to where we were, were standing next to a sign informing us of video surveillance, and saw what looked like guards patrolling the back yard (the latter item wasn't noticed until we left)
In most other situations -- and based on our past experiences with dividers and boundaries abroad -- we would have probably jumped the stone divider and walked right up to the windows, peering in the back of the palace. It's a good thing we didn't.
It turns out I was one hop from violating the sanctity of the property of the office of the President of Estonia, their version of the White House. It's a good think I had even a little sense. We ran out of there, half expecting a bullet to the back for each of us for trespassing on the Pink House lawn and threatening national security. We had gotten up close and personal with the Presidential headquarters in Helsinki and Riga.. Now Tallinn as well.
We found Czar Peter I's house a short while later, on the other side (front side) of the Pink House. It wasn't that impressive - most of the house wasn't original, it was renovated several times, and Peter didn't build it, he bought it. But the furniture, while reupholstered, was all original and all in great shape.
The two coolest pieces of the tiny cottage (which was somewhere between the size of his house in St. Petersburg and his summer home on the Peterhoff property) were the chest and the table. The chest had belonged to Charles XII of Sweden, whom Peter defeated in a war in the late 18th century. The table was decorated on the top with a large compass in a circle, and a map stretching from Denmark to St. Petersburg, from Prussia to Finland, in the center. It was clear that Peter once used the table to plan his navy's movements during the war with Sweden. Very cool.
We went from that house, at about 3:30, to the ferry terminal to catch our 5:30 back to Helsinki.
When we arrived at the car rental place in the terminal, Rilka, the woman who rented our car to us, came out to meet us. It was just before we started cleaning out the car that my dad exclaimed, "We made it!" to which Rilka responded, "Yes, but you received two fines."
It turns out we were caught for speeding by speed cameras on the highway twice, once while my dad was driving 6km/hr over the speed limit, and once while I was going 3km/hr over. Expecting the charges to be exorbitant, we were relieved to hear that the charge was €3 per km/hr we were over, or €18 and €9. This wasn't too bad, but thank God that Latvia never sends in tickets to Estonia, cuz I averaged 120km/hr through Latvia coming back, which has a 70km/hr speed limit...
We waited in the terminal to board, watching countless Finns rolling carton after carton of alcohol with them across the straits. Riku had told us in Helsinki that because alcohol is so expensive in Finland, Helsinkans (no?) found it cheaper to make occasional runs to Estonia for €60 round trip, just to spend hundreds of Euros on liquor. "You can bring an entire truck of beer back with you," Riku had said, "as long as you say it is for your own personal use."
For a country of 5,000,000, with 2,000,000 of them alcoholics (according to Riku, the same number of Russians are alcoholics, a country with 150,000,000 citizens), this is a ferry attractive deal.
Our ferry left at 5:30. We relaxed for a bit at first, lulled by the now-familiar sound and corresponding vibrations of the ship's hull scraping the ice blocks below.
Around 6:30 the two of us stood on the "sun" deck of the ship, bundled up, and shared a couple of fresh Cuban cigars for a while.
Our boat pulled into Helsingfors around 7:30. Forgetting the Latvian "Paldies," and the Estonian "Aitäh," we had to again say "Kiitos" to every person we needed to thank.
We got a cab to the Hilton, where we were given our old room again, 630. At 8:30 we were relaxing in our room, overlooking the frozen sea.
At 8:58 I received a text from my father, who had gone to the executive lounge on the seventh floor, which said: "Help! Drunks here"
When I finally meandered upstairs about a half hour later, I was greeted by a very drunk man, who pointed to me and asked me to join his friends and I (whom I learned later wanted him there as much as everyone else -- not at all). I blew him off and sat with my dad.
The drunkard pestered everyone in the area and, after repeated requests from several people, including my father, he was forcibly removed from the premises. I mixed my dad and I makeshift Amaretto Sours (DiSaronno, Schwepps Lemon Sour, a wedge of lemon, and half a package of sugar) while we prepared to leave for dinner.
At 10:00 we left for dinner. Since many/most places close then, we chose to go to Baker's, a burger and bar joint near Stockmann's and the shopping district.
We arrived at Baker's at 10:20, which turned out to be across the street from the Dubliner. I had Reindeer Carpaccio and Lambsteak. Amazingly delicious. Especially the reindeer. Oh, and our waiter was a Spaniard, who was about as bumbling as Manuel from Fawlty Towers.
From dinner we passed by the entire population of Finland getting drunk at once. We didn't take advantage of the party.
We did stop at the casino, though, which we didn't stay at since I observed too many strong players and i had not enough energy to spend a few hours playing.
We left and got back to the hotel around 12:40am. I fell asleep around 2.
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Rifka in Riga
I woke up with the alarm at 8. Dad rolled out of bed a while later. At 9 I was in the lobby grabbing breakfast. He came down later. It was a beautiful morning in Riga.
If we knew very little about Estonia, we know even less about Latvia. As a result, I know nothing about Latvian cuisine, and so I took for breakfast a general sampling of what was there.. Just in case something was a "can't miss" item.
After a hefty breakfast of blinis, eggs, bread (rated 7 on Marshall's 1-delicious bread scale), and lox (OH MY GOD THE LOX!), we departed shortly before 10 to explore the old town.
We stopped first at the Russian orthodox cathedral outside our Radisson BLU hotel. It was gorgeous, freshly renovated, and reeking of paint as a result. While we were there, a woman turned a vacuum on to clean the carpet-- I mean, I always figured someone would clean the carpet, but at 10?
We passed the Latvian liberty monument just before entering the old town, which merges into the rest of Riga seamlessly.
The first stop was the former home of the Order of the Blackheads, a medieval fraternity of sorts between traders and merchants. Their building in Riga is beautiful, made of red brick and stone window frames, with gold leaf and statues lining the exterior walls. In front is a large statue of a knight with a shield on the ground and a sword in the hand, guarding the square.
Across the street from there is the St. Peter Cathedral, an old brick church with spire; interesting, but we didn't spend much time there.
Next to the Order of the Blackheads building is a building called "The Museum of the Occupation of Latvia." we tried to get inside but they didn't open till 11, and it was 10:40 at the time.
We went after that to the Dome church, which we didn't go all the way into, due to the 7 Lat price tag.
We walked to the end of the old town, found Riga Castle, the former home of the leader of the city, and today the home to the Latvian president -- not much has changed.
We walked along the water for a bit and headed back to the museum.
We got back to the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia (1940-1991) at 11:20. As soon as we walked in, though, my dad asked them a question about Nazi-controlled Latvia.
---See, a couple of days ago I mentioned to my Grandfather while speaking with him via Skype from Helsinki that we were considering an excursion to Riga. He reminded us of the story of his sister, Rifka, who had been deported from Auschwitz in 1944 to Riga where she was, according to family lore, shot trying to escape the Concentration Camps. So we decided to spend a few hours today looking for any information we could find about her fate, even considering a trek northwest to Dundaga, where most of the Hungarian Jews were sent after arriving in Riga.---
One of the museum employees knew just where to look. She pulled out a map and gave us a name: Margers Vestermanis. Mr. Vestermanis escaped the prison camps during the war and dedicated his life afterwards to remembering and preserving the history of those Jews who suffered in Latvia at the hands of the Nazis. He started a museum, which we were told was actually on the corner behind our hotel. He is still alive and still working at the museum on some days. We left the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia to go to the Jewish one.
At 11:45 we had walked to and arrived at the supposed corner, but the museum was not there. We walked up each street for a block in every direction but could not find it.
At noon we were back at hotel to ask where the museum was. While my dad waited in line at the front desk to ask, I relaxed at the bar with a Cēsu beer, a tasty Latvian lager recommended to me by the bartender.
We found Muzejs "Ebreji Latvijā" (Museum "Jews in Latvia") one block over from where we were told it was - so one block away from the hotel, not adjacent to it. We arrived there at 12:15.
We had to knock on a few doors and coax a few people to help us before we got the inner doors open on the third floor.
Inside, we waited for the museum curator, Ilya Lensky, who showed up after a short wait.
In the museum was a collection of documents and artifacts from the era and the area. Like many such displays, there were scraps of cloth from Concentration Camp uniforms, scraps of cloth with prison numbers on them, Jew-identifying Stars of David, pieces of mostly-destroyed Torahs, and pictures of the skeleton figures that were most Jewish prisoners after a little while under Nazi control.
We introduced ourselves to Ilya when he showed up, and explained our connection to the area through Rifka Mayer. We asked about Dundaga, records, and burial sites.
Ilya advised against going to Dundaga, since the town might very well be blocked by snow along the access roads. And there aren't good roads out there either. Besides, many burial sites are not marked or are deep in the woods, and those that are marked are not informative.
As for records, while the Nazis kept impeccable records in most situations, there was one shipment of about 5,000 women to Riga in May or June of 1944 that is conspicuously absent from records. It is only from eyewitness accounts that they are even known of. Railroad records and Nazi records don't lend any evidence. Likewise, it seemed unlikely, were it not for eyewitness accounts, that 5,000 women would be sent FROM Auschwitz, the point of no return for most women, and if they were, it seemed even more unlikely they were sent so far from the center of Nazi control so late in the war. But the eyewitnesses exist, and there are some pictures, and a carving in a wall of the camp in Riga written in Hungarian.
We began to speculate about Rifka's fate, and why and where she ran. Rifka had had polio as a child, and would have been a terrible runner, so it always sounded farfetched that she'd run from the Nazis with any chance of escape. But Ilya offered a reason.
There is a long, meandering path from Dundaga to the Latvian coast, and it cuts through the woods most of the way. On either side of the road was a small ditch, and on the other side of those the trees began almost immediately. For those who ran, this was ideal -- once you jumped the ditch, it would be likely that you couldn't be shot through all the trees, especially at night.
My dad and I reached the same conclusion - Rifka probably saw that situation, and realized that it was her only chance. If she could have only made it over that ditch, her bad leg would not have hampered her too much, and survival would have been likely. But she might have been one of the unlucky ones.. And would have been killed somewhere in the woods outside Dundaga, in an unmarked grave. Or no grave at all.
"Is it better to know?" my dad asked.
We left the museum at 1:45, after paying $100 for a map as a method of donation. We checked out of hotel and went to a recommendation of the Radisson Bartender for lunch, a place called Lido.
Lido is a cafeteria-style sit down restaurant, packed with locals. The food was incredible, and we had so much to choose from, we inevitably ended up over eating. Among several other items, the following was available (compiled by my dad):
Telapia
Saimon filet
Stuffed flounder
Filet of fish with onions
Rice salad
Beet root salad
Scallion and leek salad
Chicken croquettes
Turkey croquettes
Kvas
Beer
Peach Cider
Carrots and peas
Veal stroganoff
Pork chops
Ribs
Lamb skewers
Chicken skewers
Salmon skewers
Stuffed cabbage
Home fried potatoes
Boiled potatoes
Omelettes with pineapple
Omelettes with tomato
Fried eggs
Salad bar
Smoked salmon
I got the Tilapia, Rice Salad, Chicken Croquettes, Home fried potatoes, and a fruit bowl with jello. It was the best meal I've eaten since being at my favorite Muslim noodle shop in Shanghai this summer.
And all that was without dessert, which was a coffee mousse in vanilla cream. I don't know what my dad ate -- I was too engrossed in deliciousness.
At 3:48 we got in the car to find the old Synagogue, the religious home to Riga's remaining 9,000 Jews (down from nearly 50,000 before the War). We found it fairly easily in the old town. They say it was not burned down under Nazi occupation because of it's proximity to the other buildings in the old town.
After viewing the beautiful orthodox synagogue, we started driving out of the old town, where I was stopped by a cop car.
"Do you see sign?" he asked angrily in a Russian-style accent, pointing to a sign that, had we entered from that side, would have told us the road we were driving on was reserved for pedestrians and bicycles.
"No, sorry." I said. He asked me for something and, not knowing protocol, I withdrew my wallet and handed over my ID. He looked it over for a while, and then angrily let us go. We apologized and got out of there as fast as possible -- within the law...
Next we crossed to the other side of Riga to find the Holocaust memorial there. It was a trek, and the monument, an attempt to create a large torch from the ground, was hideous, but the scene was moving. We left three stones on the site; one from me, one from my father, and one surrogate for my grandfather -- all for Rifka.
At 4:48 we got in the car and began our trek back to Tallinn. After several roundabout turns, a few guesses, and estimations based on the position of the sun, we found E67 heading towards Estonia, and got going. I drove the first half to Pärnu, my father finished the drive.
At 6:30 we were a few km from Estonia when we stopped at a Neaste Oil/Hesburger stop for some gas. The former company is self-explanatory, the latter is a fast food chain in this region.
The pump at the station is machine controlled; we put Latvian Lats into the machine (we have too many, so we figured we'd spend some), and it let us pump that much gas. I cautioned my dad to not put too much in, so he put in 25 Lats, which is about $50 ---
Yes, the Lat is worth more than the dollar; twice as much. Despite 11% inflation, a low standard of living, and a miniature economy when compared to that of the USA, Latvia has the fourth most valuable currency in the world after, in no particular order, Oman, Bahrain, and one other I forget.
--- and we got 27 liters for it. Then he pumped in another 20 Lats, and we got 11 Lats worth before the tank filled up. Then a receipt was printed... But no change. We went into the adjoining Hesburger and demanded L9, which is $18.. They said they couldn't help. A nice man we met explained in broken English there is a number to call and they'll get us our money. We called it -- and they promised around 6:40 that they'd send someone over with cash within a half hour. We agreed to wait.. Because we could?
About 7, as my dad finished his Hesburger, the woman showed up. We filled out forms for five minutes or so... And then the woman pulled out a huge portable gas container and tried to fill it with L9 of gas! We yelled at them and finally got our L9... Much to everyone's embarrassment.
And then I insisted that we not wait to get the chocolate my dad wanted.. So we spent L4 on chocolate at the same place we had just wasted 20 minutes to get L9, leaving us with a remainder of 5 Lats.
We got in the car and I drove us away from Hesburger; shortly afterwards, we were back in Estonia.
At 8:15 we switched drivers in Pärnu. I fell asleep after a little bit, and woke up to my dad stopping the car so we could both take a 20 minute nap on the side of the road. We locked the doors and did just that.
At 10 we rolled into Tallinn.
We checked into another Radisson BLU, principally because the tall building promised the greatest chance for a fantastic view of Tallinn. We got one in room 1818 on the 18th floor -- a view of the Old City.
It's hard to believe we were here just yesterday.
We went to sleep around 3:30.
If we knew very little about Estonia, we know even less about Latvia. As a result, I know nothing about Latvian cuisine, and so I took for breakfast a general sampling of what was there.. Just in case something was a "can't miss" item.
After a hefty breakfast of blinis, eggs, bread (rated 7 on Marshall's 1-delicious bread scale), and lox (OH MY GOD THE LOX!), we departed shortly before 10 to explore the old town.
We stopped first at the Russian orthodox cathedral outside our Radisson BLU hotel. It was gorgeous, freshly renovated, and reeking of paint as a result. While we were there, a woman turned a vacuum on to clean the carpet-- I mean, I always figured someone would clean the carpet, but at 10?
We passed the Latvian liberty monument just before entering the old town, which merges into the rest of Riga seamlessly.
The first stop was the former home of the Order of the Blackheads, a medieval fraternity of sorts between traders and merchants. Their building in Riga is beautiful, made of red brick and stone window frames, with gold leaf and statues lining the exterior walls. In front is a large statue of a knight with a shield on the ground and a sword in the hand, guarding the square.
Across the street from there is the St. Peter Cathedral, an old brick church with spire; interesting, but we didn't spend much time there.
Next to the Order of the Blackheads building is a building called "The Museum of the Occupation of Latvia." we tried to get inside but they didn't open till 11, and it was 10:40 at the time.
We went after that to the Dome church, which we didn't go all the way into, due to the 7 Lat price tag.
We walked to the end of the old town, found Riga Castle, the former home of the leader of the city, and today the home to the Latvian president -- not much has changed.
We walked along the water for a bit and headed back to the museum.
We got back to the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia (1940-1991) at 11:20. As soon as we walked in, though, my dad asked them a question about Nazi-controlled Latvia.
---See, a couple of days ago I mentioned to my Grandfather while speaking with him via Skype from Helsinki that we were considering an excursion to Riga. He reminded us of the story of his sister, Rifka, who had been deported from Auschwitz in 1944 to Riga where she was, according to family lore, shot trying to escape the Concentration Camps. So we decided to spend a few hours today looking for any information we could find about her fate, even considering a trek northwest to Dundaga, where most of the Hungarian Jews were sent after arriving in Riga.---
One of the museum employees knew just where to look. She pulled out a map and gave us a name: Margers Vestermanis. Mr. Vestermanis escaped the prison camps during the war and dedicated his life afterwards to remembering and preserving the history of those Jews who suffered in Latvia at the hands of the Nazis. He started a museum, which we were told was actually on the corner behind our hotel. He is still alive and still working at the museum on some days. We left the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia to go to the Jewish one.
At 11:45 we had walked to and arrived at the supposed corner, but the museum was not there. We walked up each street for a block in every direction but could not find it.
At noon we were back at hotel to ask where the museum was. While my dad waited in line at the front desk to ask, I relaxed at the bar with a Cēsu beer, a tasty Latvian lager recommended to me by the bartender.
We found Muzejs "Ebreji Latvijā" (Museum "Jews in Latvia") one block over from where we were told it was - so one block away from the hotel, not adjacent to it. We arrived there at 12:15.
We had to knock on a few doors and coax a few people to help us before we got the inner doors open on the third floor.
Inside, we waited for the museum curator, Ilya Lensky, who showed up after a short wait.
In the museum was a collection of documents and artifacts from the era and the area. Like many such displays, there were scraps of cloth from Concentration Camp uniforms, scraps of cloth with prison numbers on them, Jew-identifying Stars of David, pieces of mostly-destroyed Torahs, and pictures of the skeleton figures that were most Jewish prisoners after a little while under Nazi control.
We introduced ourselves to Ilya when he showed up, and explained our connection to the area through Rifka Mayer. We asked about Dundaga, records, and burial sites.
Ilya advised against going to Dundaga, since the town might very well be blocked by snow along the access roads. And there aren't good roads out there either. Besides, many burial sites are not marked or are deep in the woods, and those that are marked are not informative.
As for records, while the Nazis kept impeccable records in most situations, there was one shipment of about 5,000 women to Riga in May or June of 1944 that is conspicuously absent from records. It is only from eyewitness accounts that they are even known of. Railroad records and Nazi records don't lend any evidence. Likewise, it seemed unlikely, were it not for eyewitness accounts, that 5,000 women would be sent FROM Auschwitz, the point of no return for most women, and if they were, it seemed even more unlikely they were sent so far from the center of Nazi control so late in the war. But the eyewitnesses exist, and there are some pictures, and a carving in a wall of the camp in Riga written in Hungarian.
We began to speculate about Rifka's fate, and why and where she ran. Rifka had had polio as a child, and would have been a terrible runner, so it always sounded farfetched that she'd run from the Nazis with any chance of escape. But Ilya offered a reason.
There is a long, meandering path from Dundaga to the Latvian coast, and it cuts through the woods most of the way. On either side of the road was a small ditch, and on the other side of those the trees began almost immediately. For those who ran, this was ideal -- once you jumped the ditch, it would be likely that you couldn't be shot through all the trees, especially at night.
My dad and I reached the same conclusion - Rifka probably saw that situation, and realized that it was her only chance. If she could have only made it over that ditch, her bad leg would not have hampered her too much, and survival would have been likely. But she might have been one of the unlucky ones.. And would have been killed somewhere in the woods outside Dundaga, in an unmarked grave. Or no grave at all.
"Is it better to know?" my dad asked.
We left the museum at 1:45, after paying $100 for a map as a method of donation. We checked out of hotel and went to a recommendation of the Radisson Bartender for lunch, a place called Lido.
Lido is a cafeteria-style sit down restaurant, packed with locals. The food was incredible, and we had so much to choose from, we inevitably ended up over eating. Among several other items, the following was available (compiled by my dad):
Telapia
Saimon filet
Stuffed flounder
Filet of fish with onions
Rice salad
Beet root salad
Scallion and leek salad
Chicken croquettes
Turkey croquettes
Kvas
Beer
Peach Cider
Carrots and peas
Veal stroganoff
Pork chops
Ribs
Lamb skewers
Chicken skewers
Salmon skewers
Stuffed cabbage
Home fried potatoes
Boiled potatoes
Omelettes with pineapple
Omelettes with tomato
Fried eggs
Salad bar
Smoked salmon
I got the Tilapia, Rice Salad, Chicken Croquettes, Home fried potatoes, and a fruit bowl with jello. It was the best meal I've eaten since being at my favorite Muslim noodle shop in Shanghai this summer.
And all that was without dessert, which was a coffee mousse in vanilla cream. I don't know what my dad ate -- I was too engrossed in deliciousness.
At 3:48 we got in the car to find the old Synagogue, the religious home to Riga's remaining 9,000 Jews (down from nearly 50,000 before the War). We found it fairly easily in the old town. They say it was not burned down under Nazi occupation because of it's proximity to the other buildings in the old town.
After viewing the beautiful orthodox synagogue, we started driving out of the old town, where I was stopped by a cop car.
"Do you see sign?" he asked angrily in a Russian-style accent, pointing to a sign that, had we entered from that side, would have told us the road we were driving on was reserved for pedestrians and bicycles.
"No, sorry." I said. He asked me for something and, not knowing protocol, I withdrew my wallet and handed over my ID. He looked it over for a while, and then angrily let us go. We apologized and got out of there as fast as possible -- within the law...
Next we crossed to the other side of Riga to find the Holocaust memorial there. It was a trek, and the monument, an attempt to create a large torch from the ground, was hideous, but the scene was moving. We left three stones on the site; one from me, one from my father, and one surrogate for my grandfather -- all for Rifka.
At 4:48 we got in the car and began our trek back to Tallinn. After several roundabout turns, a few guesses, and estimations based on the position of the sun, we found E67 heading towards Estonia, and got going. I drove the first half to Pärnu, my father finished the drive.
At 6:30 we were a few km from Estonia when we stopped at a Neaste Oil/Hesburger stop for some gas. The former company is self-explanatory, the latter is a fast food chain in this region.
The pump at the station is machine controlled; we put Latvian Lats into the machine (we have too many, so we figured we'd spend some), and it let us pump that much gas. I cautioned my dad to not put too much in, so he put in 25 Lats, which is about $50 ---
Yes, the Lat is worth more than the dollar; twice as much. Despite 11% inflation, a low standard of living, and a miniature economy when compared to that of the USA, Latvia has the fourth most valuable currency in the world after, in no particular order, Oman, Bahrain, and one other I forget.
--- and we got 27 liters for it. Then he pumped in another 20 Lats, and we got 11 Lats worth before the tank filled up. Then a receipt was printed... But no change. We went into the adjoining Hesburger and demanded L9, which is $18.. They said they couldn't help. A nice man we met explained in broken English there is a number to call and they'll get us our money. We called it -- and they promised around 6:40 that they'd send someone over with cash within a half hour. We agreed to wait.. Because we could?
About 7, as my dad finished his Hesburger, the woman showed up. We filled out forms for five minutes or so... And then the woman pulled out a huge portable gas container and tried to fill it with L9 of gas! We yelled at them and finally got our L9... Much to everyone's embarrassment.
And then I insisted that we not wait to get the chocolate my dad wanted.. So we spent L4 on chocolate at the same place we had just wasted 20 minutes to get L9, leaving us with a remainder of 5 Lats.
We got in the car and I drove us away from Hesburger; shortly afterwards, we were back in Estonia.
At 8:15 we switched drivers in Pärnu. I fell asleep after a little bit, and woke up to my dad stopping the car so we could both take a 20 minute nap on the side of the road. We locked the doors and did just that.
At 10 we rolled into Tallinn.
We checked into another Radisson BLU, principally because the tall building promised the greatest chance for a fantastic view of Tallinn. We got one in room 1818 on the 18th floor -- a view of the Old City.
It's hard to believe we were here just yesterday.
We went to sleep around 3:30.
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
The Baltic Sea and Seeing the Baltics
We awoke at 5:15. By 6, we were packed and headed downstairs.
The breakfast buffet was being set up, but wasn't open until 6:30. We dug in anyway, taking full advantage of that smoked salmon we've fallen in love with.
At 6:20 we grabbed a taxi to the harbor. On the way we stopped at the train station to withdraw money from the machine that we know works.
At 6:40 we were dropped off at the ferry terminal. We walked to the ticket counter and picked up and paid for our tickets, then headed to gate C.
After we scanned our tickets through the gate, we were stopped by a woman doing a survey on the effects of tourism on Finland's economy. It gave us a smug sense of satisfaction to answer "0," "no" and "none" when asked about whether we were part of a package trip here, how much we had spent and planned before getting here, etc.
The ship we boarded was no ferry. It was a cruise ship, in every sense of the word. 10 decks, two restaurants, a shopping center, a grocery, a slots casino, hotel room, a pub, and a sun deck. We sat midship in the less formal of the two restaurants.
At 7:23, our 7:30 ferry left. I kept wondering what it must be like to arrive at 7:24...
In the bay, there is very little ice. But no more than a half kilometer off our moorings, stray ice floes wandered past us. A short while later, we were in the channel of pure ice chunks surrounded by solid ice chunks. The ship was constantly vibrating as the massive floes slammed into the hull, and an endless scraping sound echoed through the cabins.
We took turns exploring the ship and watching the bags. Early on we moved seats into the pub, so to be near the drinks, the windows, and the sun deck at once. All the while we were listening to music that could have been considered good karaoke music in China, but not many other places.
Exactly an hour into our trek, we passed a small intersection of broken ice. Our lane, trekking between Finland and Estonia, had crossed over an east-west track; most likely the Russia-Sweden (St. Petersburg-Stockholm) route.
Shortly after that I turned €1.40 into €5.80 on the slot machines.
Hit the shore at 9:45, got off. I won €1 off my dad because he thought there'd be customs agents at the border. But they are both European Union countries, so no border control.
We found a car rental place and reserved a Toyota for 3:00 today. Then we searched for change to pay the €3 to store our bags in locker 121 in the docks station for the day.
At 10 we left the station for the old city of Tallinn, only a few minutes walk away. The walled city is a picture perfect example of a relatively unaltered medieval city that, in modern times, expanded beyond the walls into an urban sprawl. The city of Tallinn holds about 400,000 of Estonia's meager 1,300,000 citizens, and the main city holds nothing of great interest to a tourist, so we felt no need to explore anything other than the old city.
The first historical item we passed is called Fat Margaret's Tower. While I don't know if the Margaret for whom the tower is named was herself morbidly obese, her namesake certainly is. It is only several meters tall, but is 25 meters in diameter on the outside and has 6.5 meter thick walls. The interior was used as a defensive gun battery, but was converted to a prison at some point as well. It would be hard to tunnel out of it..
Next we found Number 29 on Lai street, a home that once housed Peter the Great. It was a pristine example of architecture from fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
I bought a souvenir for myself, an Estonia shot glass.
At 11:45 we stopped for pastries (which was essentially our lunch) at Kalev, a successor store to Tallinn's most famous confectioner Georg Stude (Established 1864). The ceiling patterns were amazing, but the pastries to die for. My dad had a marzipan cake, and I had a meringue thing with vanilla.
I left my father in the pastry shop (which is always a bad idea), and went to the main square around the corner. The town hall, a spired church-style building, took up part of the cobblestone area, but it was mostly open and quite beautiful. A little ways down the square, though, I got distracted by a cigar shop down Dunkri street.
I went inside, where I met Carolina (Carr-oh-LEE-nah), a very cute Estonian girl from Pärnu, a beach town in the south of the country, who was in charge of the shop. She took me to the basement and the walk in humidor, where I was astounded by 60 different Cuban cigars. I picked out a few cheap ones and went upstairs to pay, when my dad found me. We chatted with Carolina for a while, and left for fifteen minutes while she worked out the receipts (she just started working there recently), and bought our cigars and left.
Next on the list was the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, a beautiful Russian Orthodox cathedral in what was formerly the lord's section of town.
Behind that cathedral is the Cathedral of Saint Mary the Virgin, which is the oldest church in Tallinn and mainland Estonia. Inside was incredibly elaborate, with Christianity symbols pasted all over the walls. Coats of Arms hung everywhere, too, all of which was dwarfed by the massive organ on the second floor against the back wall. Someone was playing music the entire time we were inside.
The final stop before starting the walk out of Tallinn's old city was Tall Hermann's Tower. If Fat Margaret's width matched the size of her tower, Hermann was a twig. The tower is adjacent to the Danish King's Palace, a pink royal home left over from the brief stint that the Danes ruled the area several hundred years ago.
On the way out, we stopped at the Tallinn city museum, but there was not much to be learnt - except for a fascinating history of conquering and reconquering by the Danes, Swedes, Russians, and Germans (and I think the Poles too). In the past 800 years, Estonia has been a free and independent state for about 40, and all since the 1900s.
We had a 3:00 car pickup, but it wasn't until 4:12 that we were on the road to Riga, Latvia.
At 5:45 we arrived at Pärnu, and drove through the streets looking for food. We found the beach instead, which was frozen solid, of course. We walked out to sea about a half kilometer.
We got back in the car after the beach, and I took my turn driving.
We stopped for dinner at 6:45 at La Boca Restoran, which we found by chance in Pärnu. It was so cheap! Appetizers were a couple of Euros, the main courses were €10 or so. My dad had three meals, a herring dish, a soup, and a chicken dish. I had Lõhe Carpaccio Röstsaiaga (salmon carpaccio on toast) and Pikantne Lambapada - (oven baked spicy mutton [tomato pepperoni with spicy cous vous and cheese cover]). The total bill was €30. But the service was slow.
The main course came just after 8. We paid and left by 8:20, now severely behind schedule. I started us off driving the next leg.
Around 9 I was falling asleep at the wheel, so I dropped at a rest stop to get a red bull and diet coke.
At 9:25 we crossed into Latvia. No border control? No passport? An EU "Latvija" sign? But they use the lat.. Not the Euro.. What was going on? It wasn't until a few hours later I learned that Latvia had been in the EU for 7 or 8 years, but their inflation has been above 11% for those years (which is absurd!) and they cannot yet gain Euro status.
One thing that did change was the speed limit. It went from 100km/hr in Estonia to 70km/hr in Latvia. I don't know this for sure, but I've heard there are former soviet countries that lower the speed limit because their cop cars aren't fast enough to chase genuinely fast cars. Perhaps Latvia is one of them? Maybe we should outrun some cops..
Ten minutes after the border we performed a Chinese Fire Drill and switched drivers. I was falling asleep. While I was out of the car, I made sure to relieve myself into the Latvian wilderness.
At 10:38 we entered Riga. The old town looks interesting, and the modern part of the city itself seems more lively and exciting. While we were both too exhausted to explore tonight, we will tomorrow.
By 11:33 we had checked into room 6403 at a local Radisson we passed as we drove in. I spent a little while writing this post and then passed out around 2.
The breakfast buffet was being set up, but wasn't open until 6:30. We dug in anyway, taking full advantage of that smoked salmon we've fallen in love with.
At 6:20 we grabbed a taxi to the harbor. On the way we stopped at the train station to withdraw money from the machine that we know works.
At 6:40 we were dropped off at the ferry terminal. We walked to the ticket counter and picked up and paid for our tickets, then headed to gate C.
After we scanned our tickets through the gate, we were stopped by a woman doing a survey on the effects of tourism on Finland's economy. It gave us a smug sense of satisfaction to answer "0," "no" and "none" when asked about whether we were part of a package trip here, how much we had spent and planned before getting here, etc.
The ship we boarded was no ferry. It was a cruise ship, in every sense of the word. 10 decks, two restaurants, a shopping center, a grocery, a slots casino, hotel room, a pub, and a sun deck. We sat midship in the less formal of the two restaurants.
At 7:23, our 7:30 ferry left. I kept wondering what it must be like to arrive at 7:24...
In the bay, there is very little ice. But no more than a half kilometer off our moorings, stray ice floes wandered past us. A short while later, we were in the channel of pure ice chunks surrounded by solid ice chunks. The ship was constantly vibrating as the massive floes slammed into the hull, and an endless scraping sound echoed through the cabins.
We took turns exploring the ship and watching the bags. Early on we moved seats into the pub, so to be near the drinks, the windows, and the sun deck at once. All the while we were listening to music that could have been considered good karaoke music in China, but not many other places.
Exactly an hour into our trek, we passed a small intersection of broken ice. Our lane, trekking between Finland and Estonia, had crossed over an east-west track; most likely the Russia-Sweden (St. Petersburg-Stockholm) route.
Shortly after that I turned €1.40 into €5.80 on the slot machines.
Hit the shore at 9:45, got off. I won €1 off my dad because he thought there'd be customs agents at the border. But they are both European Union countries, so no border control.
We found a car rental place and reserved a Toyota for 3:00 today. Then we searched for change to pay the €3 to store our bags in locker 121 in the docks station for the day.
At 10 we left the station for the old city of Tallinn, only a few minutes walk away. The walled city is a picture perfect example of a relatively unaltered medieval city that, in modern times, expanded beyond the walls into an urban sprawl. The city of Tallinn holds about 400,000 of Estonia's meager 1,300,000 citizens, and the main city holds nothing of great interest to a tourist, so we felt no need to explore anything other than the old city.
The first historical item we passed is called Fat Margaret's Tower. While I don't know if the Margaret for whom the tower is named was herself morbidly obese, her namesake certainly is. It is only several meters tall, but is 25 meters in diameter on the outside and has 6.5 meter thick walls. The interior was used as a defensive gun battery, but was converted to a prison at some point as well. It would be hard to tunnel out of it..
Next we found Number 29 on Lai street, a home that once housed Peter the Great. It was a pristine example of architecture from fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
I bought a souvenir for myself, an Estonia shot glass.
At 11:45 we stopped for pastries (which was essentially our lunch) at Kalev, a successor store to Tallinn's most famous confectioner Georg Stude (Established 1864). The ceiling patterns were amazing, but the pastries to die for. My dad had a marzipan cake, and I had a meringue thing with vanilla.
I left my father in the pastry shop (which is always a bad idea), and went to the main square around the corner. The town hall, a spired church-style building, took up part of the cobblestone area, but it was mostly open and quite beautiful. A little ways down the square, though, I got distracted by a cigar shop down Dunkri street.
I went inside, where I met Carolina (Carr-oh-LEE-nah), a very cute Estonian girl from Pärnu, a beach town in the south of the country, who was in charge of the shop. She took me to the basement and the walk in humidor, where I was astounded by 60 different Cuban cigars. I picked out a few cheap ones and went upstairs to pay, when my dad found me. We chatted with Carolina for a while, and left for fifteen minutes while she worked out the receipts (she just started working there recently), and bought our cigars and left.
Next on the list was the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, a beautiful Russian Orthodox cathedral in what was formerly the lord's section of town.
Behind that cathedral is the Cathedral of Saint Mary the Virgin, which is the oldest church in Tallinn and mainland Estonia. Inside was incredibly elaborate, with Christianity symbols pasted all over the walls. Coats of Arms hung everywhere, too, all of which was dwarfed by the massive organ on the second floor against the back wall. Someone was playing music the entire time we were inside.
The final stop before starting the walk out of Tallinn's old city was Tall Hermann's Tower. If Fat Margaret's width matched the size of her tower, Hermann was a twig. The tower is adjacent to the Danish King's Palace, a pink royal home left over from the brief stint that the Danes ruled the area several hundred years ago.
On the way out, we stopped at the Tallinn city museum, but there was not much to be learnt - except for a fascinating history of conquering and reconquering by the Danes, Swedes, Russians, and Germans (and I think the Poles too). In the past 800 years, Estonia has been a free and independent state for about 40, and all since the 1900s.
We had a 3:00 car pickup, but it wasn't until 4:12 that we were on the road to Riga, Latvia.
At 5:45 we arrived at Pärnu, and drove through the streets looking for food. We found the beach instead, which was frozen solid, of course. We walked out to sea about a half kilometer.
We got back in the car after the beach, and I took my turn driving.
We stopped for dinner at 6:45 at La Boca Restoran, which we found by chance in Pärnu. It was so cheap! Appetizers were a couple of Euros, the main courses were €10 or so. My dad had three meals, a herring dish, a soup, and a chicken dish. I had Lõhe Carpaccio Röstsaiaga (salmon carpaccio on toast) and Pikantne Lambapada - (oven baked spicy mutton [tomato pepperoni with spicy cous vous and cheese cover]). The total bill was €30. But the service was slow.
The main course came just after 8. We paid and left by 8:20, now severely behind schedule. I started us off driving the next leg.
Around 9 I was falling asleep at the wheel, so I dropped at a rest stop to get a red bull and diet coke.
At 9:25 we crossed into Latvia. No border control? No passport? An EU "Latvija" sign? But they use the lat.. Not the Euro.. What was going on? It wasn't until a few hours later I learned that Latvia had been in the EU for 7 or 8 years, but their inflation has been above 11% for those years (which is absurd!) and they cannot yet gain Euro status.
One thing that did change was the speed limit. It went from 100km/hr in Estonia to 70km/hr in Latvia. I don't know this for sure, but I've heard there are former soviet countries that lower the speed limit because their cop cars aren't fast enough to chase genuinely fast cars. Perhaps Latvia is one of them? Maybe we should outrun some cops..
Ten minutes after the border we performed a Chinese Fire Drill and switched drivers. I was falling asleep. While I was out of the car, I made sure to relieve myself into the Latvian wilderness.
At 10:38 we entered Riga. The old town looks interesting, and the modern part of the city itself seems more lively and exciting. While we were both too exhausted to explore tonight, we will tomorrow.
By 11:33 we had checked into room 6403 at a local Radisson we passed as we drove in. I spent a little while writing this post and then passed out around 2.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
I see, is icy...
The alarm had gone off at 8:30, but I didn't wake up for fifteen minutes. My dad had been awake for a little while, and was upstairs in the sauna.
At 9:30 I met him in the executive lounge of the hotel, which we somehow have access to. We had a small breakfast, the same as yesterday... the salmon has not lost any of its taste.
While my dad did some business on the computer in the business center, I spoke with the front desk to book the ferry to Estonia tomorrow. We settled on the first boat over tomorrow morning - a bright and early 7:30 - and the second to last boat back from Tallinn on Friday night -- 5:30pm. We got the cheapest seats possible.
From there, my dad and I left the hotel and headed towards the museums. Since yesterday and the day before we had made the trek around the train station to that side of town several times, we took a different route -- across the Baltic. We walked over the ice for the full mile or so that the Gulf of Finland, a subdivision of the Baltic Sea, cuts into Helsinki before stopping at the train tracks. The ice, as I mentioned yesterday, is two feet thick or more. it's the most ice Helsinki has seen in 40 years. And it is this same thickness of ice that occurred one of the winters during WWII, when the Russians sent a battalion of tanks across the Baltic to attack Finland, who responded in kind by firing shells from the shore in front of the tanks, breaking the ice and sending them to the bottom of the sea. Good thing we're not at war with Finland.
On the way we discovered, to our extreme confusion, a ritualistic site of some sort, frozen into the ice. It was either that or a work of art...
A red picnic table and two red benches were chained together and frozen into the Sea. five poles surrounded them, about eight feet away. There were burnt-out oil-wick torches next to each pole. There were three frames that were also surrounding the table. Two of these were standing frames of wood, as if the part that was a store-side posterboard advertisement had been cut out. The third was a properly shaped picture frame, set on two stakes. These eight objects each had something nailed to it, or hung from it. They ranged from books to shoes to toys. On the table itself were three animal figurines, a few unidentifiable board game pieces, three books (in plastic wrap), and a sheet of paper taped onto the table. The two of us did not disturb the scene..
Our next stop was a boat that had half-sunk in the water before it was frozen into the ice. I claimed it as my own, and named it the Jenny, as Forrest Gump would have wanted me to do.
We departed the water when we reached the train tracks. We crossed over a pedestrian pathway, then walked on a pleasant residential path around a lake, to get to where the museums were. On the way we passed the Finlandia, Finland's most renowned concert hall.
At noon we entered the Finnish national museum. We learned a great deal regarding Finland's prehistoric peoples, their tools, and their evolutionary stories. But the real interest came from debating an age-old question.
In the mid 1800s, a theory was put forth that the Finns descended from what was called the Finno-Ugric people, a branch of Mongolian heritage, and were therefore most related, not to the Swedes or Russians, but to the Hungarians. The languages themselves, while only matching up certain words, have incredibly similar grammatical structure and do match up when it comes to some very common words, like familial relations and common needs words. But recent DNA evidence shows that the genetic make-up of the Finnish people is about 75% European and 25% Mongolian.
My father argued that because of the DNA evidence, it contradicted the theory that the Finns are from the East, because of the dominance of European blood. But I asserted that there is no reason why DNA evidence with that outcome disproves the Mongolian and Hungarian connection. Surely, the three nations peoples today look nothing alike, but walking amongst the natives today, it was easy to see distinctly Mongolian traits, such as the shape, position, and wideness of many Finns' eyes.
I argued that perhaps, and very likely, the Mongolian influence that probably helped create what would later evolve into modern Finnish also greatly influenced, though did not entirely permeate, the genetic make-up of the Finnish people as well. Then, for the 800 years between Genghis Khan's presence in the region and today, the Finns Mongolian roots have been slowly diluted to a mere 1/4 of their genetic make-up. On the other hand, though, there is a possibility that there are simply contradictions in the relationship between the Hungarians and the Finns.. and the Mongolians. It was a heavy discussion, to be sure, and wasted plenty of time in the Museum, before ever getting to the religious revival section within the "Realm" exhibit (Where, I might add, to bolster my point, there was a 17th century painting of Jesus that depicted a Jesus that looked more like Genghis Khan than a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Finn..).
At 1:30 we left the museum, and went to modern art museum, which was closed. That didn't stop my dad from wasting a half hour in the gift shop, though.
From 2 to quarter to 3 we wandered the streets, looking for Lapi, which was recommended to us by the hotel and an online review, but which turned out to be a typical overpriced tourist restaurant that catered exclusively to foreigners and would provide no real enjoyment for patrons like us. So we crossed to the other side of town.
We got to the Esplanade, just east of the shopping district and south of Senate Square, a beautiful park walkway between a boulevard of the same name. We started south, to look for the Root that we couldn't find yesterday, but gave up after passing Chez Dominique, a 2-star French restaurant, where we made a reservation for tonight (though we blew it off).
At 3:00 we sat down at a restaurant on a whim, Ravintola (Restaurant) Kappeli, which was right in the middle of the Esplanade. It turned out to be a fantastic choice. I enjoyed an appetizer of duck and a main course of a Reindeer steak. My dad had a smoked salmon dish with other sea critters floating around the plate as well. Finland has incredible food. Of the five food groups; Chocolate, Wine, Bread, Meat/Fish, and Beer, Finland is only lacking in Wine.
At 4 we parted ways. My father headed south, to the bookshop that the two Wash U. grad students pointed out yesterday. I went north, to Senate square to find a restaurant we wanted to try, Savotta (Which I didn't find), and to look for another restaurant, Kazak, which I did find - though it did not impress me. I wandered north along that road, back to the hotel, which I accessed by walking along the Baltic again.. it's just the easiest way to travel. I got back to the hotel a little after 5 and took a siesta. My dad showed up around 6:30, and we took a long siesta until 9, as the jet lag is finally catching up to us.
When we finally did leave the hotel, we wandered in the general direction of a restaurant suggestion. We didn't find it until 10, even though it is only a fifteen minute walk away. It was called Kolme Kruunua, and it was next to a restaurant called something with a Z (Zinneman?) that I had passed earlier today on my way back to the hotel from Kazak.
We sat down and ordered two dishes identical to two that we ordered at the Sea Horse. I had the Pike Perch a la Mannerheim (which my father had at the Sea Horse), and he had the Finnish Meatballs that Riku had yesterday. I refer at this point back to the comments I have made about every meal so far in terms of quality and taste.
We ate and had our bill paid in about a half hour, as my dad had to get to some big business conference call with the States. We walked back in silence as he listened to the discussion, and got back to the hotel a little before 11.
The rest of the night was uneventful. We had to get to sleep so we could be up in time for the ferry to Estonia in the morning.
At 9:30 I met him in the executive lounge of the hotel, which we somehow have access to. We had a small breakfast, the same as yesterday... the salmon has not lost any of its taste.
While my dad did some business on the computer in the business center, I spoke with the front desk to book the ferry to Estonia tomorrow. We settled on the first boat over tomorrow morning - a bright and early 7:30 - and the second to last boat back from Tallinn on Friday night -- 5:30pm. We got the cheapest seats possible.
From there, my dad and I left the hotel and headed towards the museums. Since yesterday and the day before we had made the trek around the train station to that side of town several times, we took a different route -- across the Baltic. We walked over the ice for the full mile or so that the Gulf of Finland, a subdivision of the Baltic Sea, cuts into Helsinki before stopping at the train tracks. The ice, as I mentioned yesterday, is two feet thick or more. it's the most ice Helsinki has seen in 40 years. And it is this same thickness of ice that occurred one of the winters during WWII, when the Russians sent a battalion of tanks across the Baltic to attack Finland, who responded in kind by firing shells from the shore in front of the tanks, breaking the ice and sending them to the bottom of the sea. Good thing we're not at war with Finland.
On the way we discovered, to our extreme confusion, a ritualistic site of some sort, frozen into the ice. It was either that or a work of art...
A red picnic table and two red benches were chained together and frozen into the Sea. five poles surrounded them, about eight feet away. There were burnt-out oil-wick torches next to each pole. There were three frames that were also surrounding the table. Two of these were standing frames of wood, as if the part that was a store-side posterboard advertisement had been cut out. The third was a properly shaped picture frame, set on two stakes. These eight objects each had something nailed to it, or hung from it. They ranged from books to shoes to toys. On the table itself were three animal figurines, a few unidentifiable board game pieces, three books (in plastic wrap), and a sheet of paper taped onto the table. The two of us did not disturb the scene..
Our next stop was a boat that had half-sunk in the water before it was frozen into the ice. I claimed it as my own, and named it the Jenny, as Forrest Gump would have wanted me to do.
We departed the water when we reached the train tracks. We crossed over a pedestrian pathway, then walked on a pleasant residential path around a lake, to get to where the museums were. On the way we passed the Finlandia, Finland's most renowned concert hall.
At noon we entered the Finnish national museum. We learned a great deal regarding Finland's prehistoric peoples, their tools, and their evolutionary stories. But the real interest came from debating an age-old question.
In the mid 1800s, a theory was put forth that the Finns descended from what was called the Finno-Ugric people, a branch of Mongolian heritage, and were therefore most related, not to the Swedes or Russians, but to the Hungarians. The languages themselves, while only matching up certain words, have incredibly similar grammatical structure and do match up when it comes to some very common words, like familial relations and common needs words. But recent DNA evidence shows that the genetic make-up of the Finnish people is about 75% European and 25% Mongolian.
My father argued that because of the DNA evidence, it contradicted the theory that the Finns are from the East, because of the dominance of European blood. But I asserted that there is no reason why DNA evidence with that outcome disproves the Mongolian and Hungarian connection. Surely, the three nations peoples today look nothing alike, but walking amongst the natives today, it was easy to see distinctly Mongolian traits, such as the shape, position, and wideness of many Finns' eyes.
I argued that perhaps, and very likely, the Mongolian influence that probably helped create what would later evolve into modern Finnish also greatly influenced, though did not entirely permeate, the genetic make-up of the Finnish people as well. Then, for the 800 years between Genghis Khan's presence in the region and today, the Finns Mongolian roots have been slowly diluted to a mere 1/4 of their genetic make-up. On the other hand, though, there is a possibility that there are simply contradictions in the relationship between the Hungarians and the Finns.. and the Mongolians. It was a heavy discussion, to be sure, and wasted plenty of time in the Museum, before ever getting to the religious revival section within the "Realm" exhibit (Where, I might add, to bolster my point, there was a 17th century painting of Jesus that depicted a Jesus that looked more like Genghis Khan than a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Finn..).
At 1:30 we left the museum, and went to modern art museum, which was closed. That didn't stop my dad from wasting a half hour in the gift shop, though.
From 2 to quarter to 3 we wandered the streets, looking for Lapi, which was recommended to us by the hotel and an online review, but which turned out to be a typical overpriced tourist restaurant that catered exclusively to foreigners and would provide no real enjoyment for patrons like us. So we crossed to the other side of town.
We got to the Esplanade, just east of the shopping district and south of Senate Square, a beautiful park walkway between a boulevard of the same name. We started south, to look for the Root that we couldn't find yesterday, but gave up after passing Chez Dominique, a 2-star French restaurant, where we made a reservation for tonight (though we blew it off).
At 3:00 we sat down at a restaurant on a whim, Ravintola (Restaurant) Kappeli, which was right in the middle of the Esplanade. It turned out to be a fantastic choice. I enjoyed an appetizer of duck and a main course of a Reindeer steak. My dad had a smoked salmon dish with other sea critters floating around the plate as well. Finland has incredible food. Of the five food groups; Chocolate, Wine, Bread, Meat/Fish, and Beer, Finland is only lacking in Wine.
At 4 we parted ways. My father headed south, to the bookshop that the two Wash U. grad students pointed out yesterday. I went north, to Senate square to find a restaurant we wanted to try, Savotta (Which I didn't find), and to look for another restaurant, Kazak, which I did find - though it did not impress me. I wandered north along that road, back to the hotel, which I accessed by walking along the Baltic again.. it's just the easiest way to travel. I got back to the hotel a little after 5 and took a siesta. My dad showed up around 6:30, and we took a long siesta until 9, as the jet lag is finally catching up to us.
When we finally did leave the hotel, we wandered in the general direction of a restaurant suggestion. We didn't find it until 10, even though it is only a fifteen minute walk away. It was called Kolme Kruunua, and it was next to a restaurant called something with a Z (Zinneman?) that I had passed earlier today on my way back to the hotel from Kazak.
We sat down and ordered two dishes identical to two that we ordered at the Sea Horse. I had the Pike Perch a la Mannerheim (which my father had at the Sea Horse), and he had the Finnish Meatballs that Riku had yesterday. I refer at this point back to the comments I have made about every meal so far in terms of quality and taste.
We ate and had our bill paid in about a half hour, as my dad had to get to some big business conference call with the States. We walked back in silence as he listened to the discussion, and got back to the hotel a little before 11.
The rest of the night was uneventful. We had to get to sleep so we could be up in time for the ferry to Estonia in the morning.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Riku
We woke up at 8:30 to the sight of ice fishermen wandering the river, looking for places to drill for fish. I can't help but wonder - how do they expect to fit the fish they catch up so tiny a hole in the ice?
A relaxing morning was spent in the hotel. I missed the end of the breakfast buffet at 10, but my dad snagged me a few things, including some of the best smoked salmon I've ever had. There would be more today, but at the time I mourned the time when I took the final bite.
My father and I wandered through Helsinki for an hour. We saw the presidential palace, a small house on the water, guarded by two Finnish guards with guns and fur hats. How they stay perfectly still in freezing temperatures I will never know. We also saw two churches, both beautiful, one eastern orthodox and one catholic-turned-Lutheran.
Around 11:30 we walked back to the hotel, making the last leg of the journey walking on the frozen water to the dock outside the Hilton. We tried not to get too close while walking, so our combined weight wouldn't risk our falling through. In the end, though, we learned how silly a concept like "falling through the ice" was..
At noon, Riku appeared in the hotel. He brought us some candies and chocolate, which we of course stashed in our room before heading out.
We wandered downtown. Riku, since we parted last summer from the Trans-Siberian Railway in Irkutsk, Russia, had been through Beijing, Thailand, Laos, Malaysia, Cambodia, India, and London. There are probably more places but I forget them all. And it looks like he hadn't cut his hair since. Now he's in Finland working as a substitute elementary school teacher until he reports for Finland's compulsory military service in July.
The three of us headed towards the ferry to Suomenlinna/Sveaborg, a fort that has played an integral part in the constant battle over Finland between Sweden and Russia in the latter years of the conflict. Today, it is a museum of the fort, a residential area for about 1,000 residents, and a chain-gang prison, from which a convicted felon for triple homicide escaped a few days ago (and was caught near Riku's home yesterday).
We found the market square right before the boat. In the summer it's a very lively place, though today it was quiet. Riku and I got some sort of minced meat (possibly ham) in a bread pocket thing for €2 each. It wasn't as good as dinner last night, but better value for the dollar.
We got on the ferry without paying, since they were about to leave, and got to the island for free. It's a (relatively) cheap ride, but Finland is one of the most expensive places in Europe, so it's good to save a bit here and there. It was on the boat that we learned that not only was the river outside our hotel frozen, but the entire sea was frozen, all the way accross. It is only because these ferries traverse the distance between Helsinki and Suomenlinna every day that the ice floes don't freeze to join the ice mass connecting Finland to Estonia, Russia, and Sweden. But they do chunk up, and get churned up, en route. We watched massive, probably weighing several tons, ice blocks get turned and tossed aside as we rolled through the water. They were upwards of two feet thick -- a clear indication of the absurdity of thinking we'd fall through the ice earlier.
Suomenlinna was called the Gibraltar of the North, because it could control the straits between Estonia and Finland from its impenetrable perch on the island archipelago. The fort itself was built by the Swedes a few hundred years ago, but control of the fort has been the role of whichever country controlled the rest of Finland at the time (a constant trade-off between Russia and Sweden). It is built in the shape of a star, allowing the fort to have outward protruding turret points while keeping the entrances to the interior receded. It was sulf sustaining, and could survive any seige. Even in 1854, when the British bombarded the fort from farther than the fort could reach with cannon fire, they were unable, despite an un-checked bombardment of the walls and interior, to take the islands. It was really quite a sight.
We caught the 3:40 ferry back to the mainland, where we wandered to the Center. My dad went into a department store to look for potential gifts for his lovely wife, my mother, while Riku and I ditched in favor of a bar down the street. We ended up at the Dubliner, an Irish pub playing American music and serving Finnish alcohol. Riku paid for the first round, which was Sinebrychoff Gin Long Drink, a gin-based drink that tasted like a cross between that and lemonade. It was delicious, and about the same strength as beer. We had a pint. Then Koff, a Finnish beer, which was good, but no Sinebrychoff.
For an early dinner, we decided to follow a recommendation of a friend of my parents, and wandered through the downtown to find a place called The Root (I forget the Finnish name for it). But we couldn't find it after walking down the entire street. At the end of the street, though, Riku saw a place called the Sea Horse, which his mother had happened to mention as a recommendation before he left home this morning. So we went there.
Right before we got to the Sea Horse, I was stopped by two American girls, who saw my Wash U. sweatshirt and had to let me know that they are Wash U. grad students studying architecture in Helsinki. We chatted for a bit, then went our separate ways.
Dinner was a fancy version of traditional Finnish dishes. Riku had the Finnish Meatballs, my dad had Pike Perch with wild mushrooms and grilled onions, and I enjoyed the Scandinavian Hash, a hodgepodge of ham, potatoes, onions, and some other unidentified creatures. My father drank a pear cider, and Riku and I took another Sinebrychoff. We got frozen cranberries and Finnish pancakes (i.e. crepes, i.e. blintzes) for dessert.
Oh, and I learned a new way to say "Cheers!" "Hölkynkölkyn!" (hOHlkin kOHlkin)By far my favorite term for drinking yet. Second in line is the Swedish/Danish/Norwegian "Skål!" And third is Germany's "Proost!"
We rushed out of dinner around 9 and sped-walked to the train station so Riku wouldn't miss his ride home. We arrived with several minutes to spare.
Apparently there's a YouTube craze in Finland which consists of foreigners saying "Turku is the asshole of Finland" in poor Finnish. Riku insisted I record a video, and record one I did. Turku was once the capital of Finland, before Helsinki, and the videos are going viral on the web. I'm not sure if I want the video of me to catch on or not...
We said goodbye to Riku and started to leave the train station. On the way out, however, we figured we might as well take a metro ride.. so we could say we did it.
There were three machines to buy tickets. They were different colors. None had English... but after clicking randomly through some buttons we discovered the way to grab two tickets and went downstairs.
The subway is plain, and hardly extensive. There is one line, and it goes from east to west. We flipped a coin and got on the train the coin told us to get on, then went one stop. When we wandered out of the stop, though, we found ourselves standing next to the casino, across the street from the train station! What a waste! We walked farther to get to the train and get out of the station than it would have taken to walk twice to the casino on the surface..
It was 9:40 when we entered the casino. Our passports were checked to make sure we were of legal age (the gambling age is 18 in Finland).
Apparently, gambling is illegal in Finland, except in specially licensed places. These places, after paying employee wages with winnings, pay the remaining money to the Socialist Bureaucracy of Finland to help pay for social welfare programs. In essence, poorer Finns come to the casinos to lose money to a state that then invests it in poor Finns. That, plus a 50+% income tax rate, a 12% food tax and a 23% sales tax is what funds the €500 a month that students get paid to be students and the €2000 a month that poor immigrants get paid to assimiliate, as well as the universal health care and other government welfare programs. Finland is the second most ridiculous bureaucracy in the world, after India. It is also, as I wrote earlier, one of the most expensive cities in Europe.
So I took €120 and got into a poker game. €50-200 buy-in and a €2 anti for big and small blinds. I got bled dry for about thirty minutes, dropping my stack down to about €60. I went all in on a pocket pair of 9s against what I figured was a low pair in the man across the table. I was right, and was holding €180 as a result. I got to chatting with a Lebanese man to my right, who managed to lose €500+ while I was slowly eating into my positive earnings. Then I lost a big hand, where I was holding Queens and Fours, against an inside straight that was made on the river. It was bad luck, but I found myself back down to about €50. Again, though, I climbed my way up, raising all in when I got a pocket pair of fours and flopped a third four amidst two spades. Two players called me (including the one who had beat me with the straight), and I watched in horror as the eight of spades flipped out on the turn, completing a flush draw. Both remaining players checked, and the river came out; an 8. I had a full house. I breathed a sigh of relief, and waited for the other players to show before proudly throwing my hand down. I was up to €169.
About this time, a Russian Oligarch sat down and immediately started cleaning up. He targeted me in particular, baiting me with comments including "Nobody folds at this table!" When I folded to him, and "You'll never win if you fold!" To which I calmly responded, "You can't lose what you don't put in." I decided it was time to get out. But I held out for a few more hands.
I picked up a Jack-Ten off suited. I called the €4 preflop, and saw a queen and a king appear in the flop. I raised big, and was called by two people. Then a 9 appeared on the turn. I had a straight; and a damn good one. There was no flush possibility and no full house potential. And that was made certain when the river came out and didn't help anyone. I had won. Another player raised €40. I tried to raise by throwing in my last €100, but I didn't say "raise" when I did, so by the rules of the casino I had only called. It was a poor blunder. But the third player called the €40 as well, and I pulled in a huge pot.
I left the casino after that, at 11:30, with €330 in my pocket, worth a little over $460. Only 2 hours of playing, and I was making $230/hr.
We walked back to the hotel and got to bed.
A relaxing morning was spent in the hotel. I missed the end of the breakfast buffet at 10, but my dad snagged me a few things, including some of the best smoked salmon I've ever had. There would be more today, but at the time I mourned the time when I took the final bite.
My father and I wandered through Helsinki for an hour. We saw the presidential palace, a small house on the water, guarded by two Finnish guards with guns and fur hats. How they stay perfectly still in freezing temperatures I will never know. We also saw two churches, both beautiful, one eastern orthodox and one catholic-turned-Lutheran.
Around 11:30 we walked back to the hotel, making the last leg of the journey walking on the frozen water to the dock outside the Hilton. We tried not to get too close while walking, so our combined weight wouldn't risk our falling through. In the end, though, we learned how silly a concept like "falling through the ice" was..
At noon, Riku appeared in the hotel. He brought us some candies and chocolate, which we of course stashed in our room before heading out.
We wandered downtown. Riku, since we parted last summer from the Trans-Siberian Railway in Irkutsk, Russia, had been through Beijing, Thailand, Laos, Malaysia, Cambodia, India, and London. There are probably more places but I forget them all. And it looks like he hadn't cut his hair since. Now he's in Finland working as a substitute elementary school teacher until he reports for Finland's compulsory military service in July.
The three of us headed towards the ferry to Suomenlinna/Sveaborg, a fort that has played an integral part in the constant battle over Finland between Sweden and Russia in the latter years of the conflict. Today, it is a museum of the fort, a residential area for about 1,000 residents, and a chain-gang prison, from which a convicted felon for triple homicide escaped a few days ago (and was caught near Riku's home yesterday).
We found the market square right before the boat. In the summer it's a very lively place, though today it was quiet. Riku and I got some sort of minced meat (possibly ham) in a bread pocket thing for €2 each. It wasn't as good as dinner last night, but better value for the dollar.
We got on the ferry without paying, since they were about to leave, and got to the island for free. It's a (relatively) cheap ride, but Finland is one of the most expensive places in Europe, so it's good to save a bit here and there. It was on the boat that we learned that not only was the river outside our hotel frozen, but the entire sea was frozen, all the way accross. It is only because these ferries traverse the distance between Helsinki and Suomenlinna every day that the ice floes don't freeze to join the ice mass connecting Finland to Estonia, Russia, and Sweden. But they do chunk up, and get churned up, en route. We watched massive, probably weighing several tons, ice blocks get turned and tossed aside as we rolled through the water. They were upwards of two feet thick -- a clear indication of the absurdity of thinking we'd fall through the ice earlier.
Suomenlinna was called the Gibraltar of the North, because it could control the straits between Estonia and Finland from its impenetrable perch on the island archipelago. The fort itself was built by the Swedes a few hundred years ago, but control of the fort has been the role of whichever country controlled the rest of Finland at the time (a constant trade-off between Russia and Sweden). It is built in the shape of a star, allowing the fort to have outward protruding turret points while keeping the entrances to the interior receded. It was sulf sustaining, and could survive any seige. Even in 1854, when the British bombarded the fort from farther than the fort could reach with cannon fire, they were unable, despite an un-checked bombardment of the walls and interior, to take the islands. It was really quite a sight.
We caught the 3:40 ferry back to the mainland, where we wandered to the Center. My dad went into a department store to look for potential gifts for his lovely wife, my mother, while Riku and I ditched in favor of a bar down the street. We ended up at the Dubliner, an Irish pub playing American music and serving Finnish alcohol. Riku paid for the first round, which was Sinebrychoff Gin Long Drink, a gin-based drink that tasted like a cross between that and lemonade. It was delicious, and about the same strength as beer. We had a pint. Then Koff, a Finnish beer, which was good, but no Sinebrychoff.
For an early dinner, we decided to follow a recommendation of a friend of my parents, and wandered through the downtown to find a place called The Root (I forget the Finnish name for it). But we couldn't find it after walking down the entire street. At the end of the street, though, Riku saw a place called the Sea Horse, which his mother had happened to mention as a recommendation before he left home this morning. So we went there.
Right before we got to the Sea Horse, I was stopped by two American girls, who saw my Wash U. sweatshirt and had to let me know that they are Wash U. grad students studying architecture in Helsinki. We chatted for a bit, then went our separate ways.
Dinner was a fancy version of traditional Finnish dishes. Riku had the Finnish Meatballs, my dad had Pike Perch with wild mushrooms and grilled onions, and I enjoyed the Scandinavian Hash, a hodgepodge of ham, potatoes, onions, and some other unidentified creatures. My father drank a pear cider, and Riku and I took another Sinebrychoff. We got frozen cranberries and Finnish pancakes (i.e. crepes, i.e. blintzes) for dessert.
Oh, and I learned a new way to say "Cheers!" "Hölkynkölkyn!" (hOHlkin kOHlkin)By far my favorite term for drinking yet. Second in line is the Swedish/Danish/Norwegian "Skål!" And third is Germany's "Proost!"
We rushed out of dinner around 9 and sped-walked to the train station so Riku wouldn't miss his ride home. We arrived with several minutes to spare.
Apparently there's a YouTube craze in Finland which consists of foreigners saying "Turku is the asshole of Finland" in poor Finnish. Riku insisted I record a video, and record one I did. Turku was once the capital of Finland, before Helsinki, and the videos are going viral on the web. I'm not sure if I want the video of me to catch on or not...
We said goodbye to Riku and started to leave the train station. On the way out, however, we figured we might as well take a metro ride.. so we could say we did it.
There were three machines to buy tickets. They were different colors. None had English... but after clicking randomly through some buttons we discovered the way to grab two tickets and went downstairs.
The subway is plain, and hardly extensive. There is one line, and it goes from east to west. We flipped a coin and got on the train the coin told us to get on, then went one stop. When we wandered out of the stop, though, we found ourselves standing next to the casino, across the street from the train station! What a waste! We walked farther to get to the train and get out of the station than it would have taken to walk twice to the casino on the surface..
It was 9:40 when we entered the casino. Our passports were checked to make sure we were of legal age (the gambling age is 18 in Finland).
Apparently, gambling is illegal in Finland, except in specially licensed places. These places, after paying employee wages with winnings, pay the remaining money to the Socialist Bureaucracy of Finland to help pay for social welfare programs. In essence, poorer Finns come to the casinos to lose money to a state that then invests it in poor Finns. That, plus a 50+% income tax rate, a 12% food tax and a 23% sales tax is what funds the €500 a month that students get paid to be students and the €2000 a month that poor immigrants get paid to assimiliate, as well as the universal health care and other government welfare programs. Finland is the second most ridiculous bureaucracy in the world, after India. It is also, as I wrote earlier, one of the most expensive cities in Europe.
So I took €120 and got into a poker game. €50-200 buy-in and a €2 anti for big and small blinds. I got bled dry for about thirty minutes, dropping my stack down to about €60. I went all in on a pocket pair of 9s against what I figured was a low pair in the man across the table. I was right, and was holding €180 as a result. I got to chatting with a Lebanese man to my right, who managed to lose €500+ while I was slowly eating into my positive earnings. Then I lost a big hand, where I was holding Queens and Fours, against an inside straight that was made on the river. It was bad luck, but I found myself back down to about €50. Again, though, I climbed my way up, raising all in when I got a pocket pair of fours and flopped a third four amidst two spades. Two players called me (including the one who had beat me with the straight), and I watched in horror as the eight of spades flipped out on the turn, completing a flush draw. Both remaining players checked, and the river came out; an 8. I had a full house. I breathed a sigh of relief, and waited for the other players to show before proudly throwing my hand down. I was up to €169.
About this time, a Russian Oligarch sat down and immediately started cleaning up. He targeted me in particular, baiting me with comments including "Nobody folds at this table!" When I folded to him, and "You'll never win if you fold!" To which I calmly responded, "You can't lose what you don't put in." I decided it was time to get out. But I held out for a few more hands.
I picked up a Jack-Ten off suited. I called the €4 preflop, and saw a queen and a king appear in the flop. I raised big, and was called by two people. Then a 9 appeared on the turn. I had a straight; and a damn good one. There was no flush possibility and no full house potential. And that was made certain when the river came out and didn't help anyone. I had won. Another player raised €40. I tried to raise by throwing in my last €100, but I didn't say "raise" when I did, so by the rules of the casino I had only called. It was a poor blunder. But the third player called the €40 as well, and I pulled in a huge pot.
I left the casino after that, at 11:30, with €330 in my pocket, worth a little over $460. Only 2 hours of playing, and I was making $230/hr.
We walked back to the hotel and got to bed.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
"The country where I quite want to be..."
We landed just prior to 7:45am at London Heathrow. Both my father and I had a fantastic rest, stretched out on our chairs. I tried to watch The Town, but it was, well, bad, and I slept instead.
We got off the plane and began the obligatory mad dash past the herded cattle on their way to immigration, which, as happens all too often, was empty and not worth the run. We officially entered the UK at 8:06, after inquisitive looks and astonished reactions from the customs officer who asked "where are you in transit to?" and "so you're just picking a place today?"
We trekked through several tunnels and an elevator before arriving at the Central Bus Station, which gave us some trouble last year. This time we just bought tickets to Gatwick South by credit card (under the assumption that we wanted the south terminals, and that we didn't need Pounds in cash first cause we weren't staying long).
The 1:25 bus ride over, we discovered our assumptions to be correct---ish.
When we got to Gatwick, we wandered quickly to the EasyJet desk, the location of which we remembered from last year.
Our choices this year:
On EasyJet:
Copenhagen, £407.98 for both tickets
Helsinki, £257.98 for both
Sofia, Bulgaria, £177.98 total
Zagreb, Croatia, £197.98
RyanAir:
Oslo, Norway, £323.68
Stockholm, Sweden, £393.68
We debated them for a bit. Then checked the weather. Zagreb and Sofia had rain all week. Copenhagen was foggy and cloudy, Oslo and Stockholm were alright, and Helsinki was sunny all week. We debated over a cup of coffee at Cafe Nero on the second floor of the terminal, as we did last year. At 11:07, we shook hands in agreement.
We decided Helsinki was the place to go. Sure, it'd be cold, but it'd also only be 2 hours from Estonia by ferry and sunny in both places all week. It was also not nearly as expensive as our second choice - Oslo-Goteborg-Copenhagen. The flight was leaving five hours later, at 3:45.
Time was spent for a while looking up hotels we might want to swing by tonight, contacting Riku, my friend from last summer on the Trans-Siberian Railway who lives near Helsinki, and trying to figure out just what to do in the city itself.
At 1:15 we tried to find our way to the gate, or at least past security, only to find that the flight to Helsinki left from Gatwick North. We took a shuttle to the other Terminal.
After a short skirmish with the EasyJet check-in desk, who insisted we could bring one carry-on, not two, onto the plane, we checked our bags by paying online (for £18 instead of £40 in person), and went through security.
Around 2:30, we ate our first meal since Virgin Atlantic served dinner yesterday evening. And I indulged in a pint of Beck's.
I slept most of the plane ride, waking up only to hear the occasional dull dronings of a pilot who found himself to be exceptionally witty.
We landed close to 8:30, Finnish time, after three hours or so in the air. The woman in our row on the window taught us "hello" and "thanks" in Finnish - Jeff of course struggled immensely to figure them out.
Our course of action last year was to rent a car to explore with. But no rental place will allow their cars to be driven onto the ferries into Estonia, and as we discussed our options, we realized it was perhaps best to rent a car for a day or two from the city center.
From our preliminary research, we found ourselves with three unanswered questions as we left the airport:
1) How many days do we realistically need in Helsinki? Everyone says the city can be seen in a day, and Riku is meeting us tomorrow to wander with us, and there is just so much around here to see.
2) How far away is Lapland? Home of Father Christmas, reindeer, and vast expanses of snow-covered nothingness, it's supposed to be beautiful.
3) What is the best way to get from Tallinn to Riga? It's supposed to be a four-hour drive, but we can't bring a car over the straits. So do we take a bus, a train, or do we rent a car in Tallinn and drive?
Took the bus from the airport to the city center, and walked from there to a hotel we found online, but didn't book - the Hotel Hilton Strand.
First impressions about Finland/Helsinki:
-it's mid-March, and snow is everywhere.
-Spruce and birch trees must make up the majority of total land usage in this country.
- Everyone is blonde.
- Monty Python's aptly named song entitled "Finland" keeps popping into my head.
- Incredibly modern - there's hardly any sign of soviet influence.
- the country is expensive as hell. Cabs starting rate is €8, just for getting in.
We got off the bus nearish to the hotel we wanted to book and walked the remaining distance, only making one wrong turn.
When we arrived at the Hilton Strand we found it to be a beautiful site. The building is modern, elegant, and right on the water (though the water is frozen solid and covered with snow). We went inside and met Kim and Jani, two gentlemen running the front desk.
There was some confusion about pricing, so we went online to book there, and saved a few €. Then Kim gave us a tour of Helsinki by tourist map. He pointed out the only restaurant in all of Helsinki open past 10, for tonights dinner (at this point it was 10:45); several other restaurants, including Finnish, Russian, Kazakh, and French places; a modern art museum and a Finnish history museum; Finnish parliament building; the location of the ferry lines to Tallinn, etc.
We got to talking, and it turns out Kim studied in Redding, CT in 1987, at Joel Barlow High School. Small world.
At 11:15 we made it up to our room, which has a gorgeous view of the river (ice). We may try to join the ice-fishers tomorrow..
We relaxed for a while and then wandered out into the street to get food at this one restaurant, Manala. We had the taxi stop at an ATM first, so we could pay him. It didn't work.
Manala was mostly empty, so we sat at the bar. The food was expensive, the bartender was friendly, the steak my dad had was delicious, though there was enough and my Reindeer stew was named Prancer -- I mean, it was fantastic. It came in a croc pot plain, with another pot of mashed potatoes, and a smaller cup of elderberries ("your mother smells of elderberries!"). I mixed them onto my plate and enjoyed each bite.
At 1 we left Manala and walked back to the hotel, passing the casino (with a €50 Hold em buy in table) on the way. We might go back later.
It is ten to 2am and we are back in the hotel. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow. I'm exhausted. Time to sleep...
We got off the plane and began the obligatory mad dash past the herded cattle on their way to immigration, which, as happens all too often, was empty and not worth the run. We officially entered the UK at 8:06, after inquisitive looks and astonished reactions from the customs officer who asked "where are you in transit to?" and "so you're just picking a place today?"
We trekked through several tunnels and an elevator before arriving at the Central Bus Station, which gave us some trouble last year. This time we just bought tickets to Gatwick South by credit card (under the assumption that we wanted the south terminals, and that we didn't need Pounds in cash first cause we weren't staying long).
The 1:25 bus ride over, we discovered our assumptions to be correct---ish.
When we got to Gatwick, we wandered quickly to the EasyJet desk, the location of which we remembered from last year.
Our choices this year:
On EasyJet:
Copenhagen, £407.98 for both tickets
Helsinki, £257.98 for both
Sofia, Bulgaria, £177.98 total
Zagreb, Croatia, £197.98
RyanAir:
Oslo, Norway, £323.68
Stockholm, Sweden, £393.68
We debated them for a bit. Then checked the weather. Zagreb and Sofia had rain all week. Copenhagen was foggy and cloudy, Oslo and Stockholm were alright, and Helsinki was sunny all week. We debated over a cup of coffee at Cafe Nero on the second floor of the terminal, as we did last year. At 11:07, we shook hands in agreement.
We decided Helsinki was the place to go. Sure, it'd be cold, but it'd also only be 2 hours from Estonia by ferry and sunny in both places all week. It was also not nearly as expensive as our second choice - Oslo-Goteborg-Copenhagen. The flight was leaving five hours later, at 3:45.
Time was spent for a while looking up hotels we might want to swing by tonight, contacting Riku, my friend from last summer on the Trans-Siberian Railway who lives near Helsinki, and trying to figure out just what to do in the city itself.
At 1:15 we tried to find our way to the gate, or at least past security, only to find that the flight to Helsinki left from Gatwick North. We took a shuttle to the other Terminal.
After a short skirmish with the EasyJet check-in desk, who insisted we could bring one carry-on, not two, onto the plane, we checked our bags by paying online (for £18 instead of £40 in person), and went through security.
Around 2:30, we ate our first meal since Virgin Atlantic served dinner yesterday evening. And I indulged in a pint of Beck's.
I slept most of the plane ride, waking up only to hear the occasional dull dronings of a pilot who found himself to be exceptionally witty.
We landed close to 8:30, Finnish time, after three hours or so in the air. The woman in our row on the window taught us "hello" and "thanks" in Finnish - Jeff of course struggled immensely to figure them out.
Our course of action last year was to rent a car to explore with. But no rental place will allow their cars to be driven onto the ferries into Estonia, and as we discussed our options, we realized it was perhaps best to rent a car for a day or two from the city center.
From our preliminary research, we found ourselves with three unanswered questions as we left the airport:
1) How many days do we realistically need in Helsinki? Everyone says the city can be seen in a day, and Riku is meeting us tomorrow to wander with us, and there is just so much around here to see.
2) How far away is Lapland? Home of Father Christmas, reindeer, and vast expanses of snow-covered nothingness, it's supposed to be beautiful.
3) What is the best way to get from Tallinn to Riga? It's supposed to be a four-hour drive, but we can't bring a car over the straits. So do we take a bus, a train, or do we rent a car in Tallinn and drive?
Took the bus from the airport to the city center, and walked from there to a hotel we found online, but didn't book - the Hotel Hilton Strand.
First impressions about Finland/Helsinki:
-it's mid-March, and snow is everywhere.
-Spruce and birch trees must make up the majority of total land usage in this country.
- Everyone is blonde.
- Monty Python's aptly named song entitled "Finland" keeps popping into my head.
- Incredibly modern - there's hardly any sign of soviet influence.
- the country is expensive as hell. Cabs starting rate is €8, just for getting in.
We got off the bus nearish to the hotel we wanted to book and walked the remaining distance, only making one wrong turn.
When we arrived at the Hilton Strand we found it to be a beautiful site. The building is modern, elegant, and right on the water (though the water is frozen solid and covered with snow). We went inside and met Kim and Jani, two gentlemen running the front desk.
There was some confusion about pricing, so we went online to book there, and saved a few €. Then Kim gave us a tour of Helsinki by tourist map. He pointed out the only restaurant in all of Helsinki open past 10, for tonights dinner (at this point it was 10:45); several other restaurants, including Finnish, Russian, Kazakh, and French places; a modern art museum and a Finnish history museum; Finnish parliament building; the location of the ferry lines to Tallinn, etc.
We got to talking, and it turns out Kim studied in Redding, CT in 1987, at Joel Barlow High School. Small world.
At 11:15 we made it up to our room, which has a gorgeous view of the river (ice). We may try to join the ice-fishers tomorrow..
We relaxed for a while and then wandered out into the street to get food at this one restaurant, Manala. We had the taxi stop at an ATM first, so we could pay him. It didn't work.
Manala was mostly empty, so we sat at the bar. The food was expensive, the bartender was friendly, the steak my dad had was delicious, though there was enough and my Reindeer stew was named Prancer -- I mean, it was fantastic. It came in a croc pot plain, with another pot of mashed potatoes, and a smaller cup of elderberries ("your mother smells of elderberries!"). I mixed them onto my plate and enjoyed each bite.
At 1 we left Manala and walked back to the hotel, passing the casino (with a €50 Hold em buy in table) on the way. We might go back later.
It is ten to 2am and we are back in the hotel. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow. I'm exhausted. Time to sleep...
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Everywhere at once and Nowhere at all
Perhaps the greatest joy of not knowing where you'll end up is the mental state in which anywhere is possible, though you have yet to leave home. For the past few weeks I have fantasized experiences in countries as diverse as Finland and Egypt, or Luxembourg and Moldova. In my mind, I travel to each place, experience the wonders I choose to give it, and then quickly travel through a dream cloud to the next country. But all great dreams eventually end - and a decision regarding this years' destination must be made.
Last year my father and I went to Portugal. We flew to London Heathrow on Virgin Atlantic, took a bus to Gatwick, and asked the EasyJet desk where they were flying that day with two extra seats. We chose Faro, a small city on the southern coast of the Iberian Peninsula, and spent three days wandering the Algarve region of Portugal by rented Fiat.
We created a set of rules to guide that decision to go to Portugal, and those rules still apply to this trip. If at all possible, all four rules will be adhered to, but the lowest number rule trumps each below it if it comes to violating any of them.
Our rules for our spontaneous adventure are:
1. We must travel to a place that neither of us have ever been before.
2. We must travel to a country that neither of us have ever been before.
3. The place must be interesting -- it seems this wouldn't be difficult, but if our only choices were a small backwater town in Belarus or Paris... Well, we'd go to Belarus, of course!
4. We should not speak the official language of the destination if possible.
But I digress.
I wish we could just go everywhere, but we only have a week. And while we must make a decision where to go, we can do that tomorrow, when we get to London.
We left my home in Westport around 4:15, and sat in horrible traffic for 1.5 hours, the aftermath of a bus accident that killed over a dozen Chinese tourists headed back to Chinatown from Mohegan Sun earlier tonight. We actually passed under the bridge with the bus on it...
Our flight was at 7:30. We arrived at JFK International Airport at 6:30. Supposed to get there 2 hours before for int'l flights...
We shot through ticketing, cut the line at security (being 10 minutes from the gates closing for the plane, 40 minutes pre-takeoff), and ran to Gate B28. We arrived with 4 minutes to spare.
We found the plane to be half full, which meant we could forego our row 53 seats for rows 40 and 41-- yea, my dad and I each got 4 seats to ourselves.
Virgin treats its passengers well, with TVs in every seat-back and a pillow and blanket provided. I had four of each.
As I write this we are about to take off, and I find myself looking forward, not to the moment of truth at the EasyJet desk tomorrow, but to the in-flight movies I will get to choose from and from the full spread of seats I will convert into a bed shortly after takeoff.
Last year my father and I went to Portugal. We flew to London Heathrow on Virgin Atlantic, took a bus to Gatwick, and asked the EasyJet desk where they were flying that day with two extra seats. We chose Faro, a small city on the southern coast of the Iberian Peninsula, and spent three days wandering the Algarve region of Portugal by rented Fiat.
We created a set of rules to guide that decision to go to Portugal, and those rules still apply to this trip. If at all possible, all four rules will be adhered to, but the lowest number rule trumps each below it if it comes to violating any of them.
Our rules for our spontaneous adventure are:
1. We must travel to a place that neither of us have ever been before.
2. We must travel to a country that neither of us have ever been before.
3. The place must be interesting -- it seems this wouldn't be difficult, but if our only choices were a small backwater town in Belarus or Paris... Well, we'd go to Belarus, of course!
4. We should not speak the official language of the destination if possible.
But I digress.
I wish we could just go everywhere, but we only have a week. And while we must make a decision where to go, we can do that tomorrow, when we get to London.
We left my home in Westport around 4:15, and sat in horrible traffic for 1.5 hours, the aftermath of a bus accident that killed over a dozen Chinese tourists headed back to Chinatown from Mohegan Sun earlier tonight. We actually passed under the bridge with the bus on it...
Our flight was at 7:30. We arrived at JFK International Airport at 6:30. Supposed to get there 2 hours before for int'l flights...
We shot through ticketing, cut the line at security (being 10 minutes from the gates closing for the plane, 40 minutes pre-takeoff), and ran to Gate B28. We arrived with 4 minutes to spare.
We found the plane to be half full, which meant we could forego our row 53 seats for rows 40 and 41-- yea, my dad and I each got 4 seats to ourselves.
Virgin treats its passengers well, with TVs in every seat-back and a pillow and blanket provided. I had four of each.
As I write this we are about to take off, and I find myself looking forward, not to the moment of truth at the EasyJet desk tomorrow, but to the in-flight movies I will get to choose from and from the full spread of seats I will convert into a bed shortly after takeoff.
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