Estonia

If you had asked me at the beginning of my freshman year what countries I met end up in while studying abroad, I'll be honest, I probably would not have predicted Denmark. However, I think it's even less likely that I would have predicted that I would EVER end up in Estonia. But that's where I found one Sunday afternoon, with my entire public health class.

Sign in the airport

My first impression of Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, was that it was cold and rainy. Did I mention cold? After all, Tallinn is on equal latitude with the middle of Canada, and lies just over a two hour train ride from St. Petersburg, Russia. However, my dreary first impression was improved as soon as we arrived by our hotel and saw the beautiful surroundings. We were staying just on the outskirts of the Old Town, which is filled with beautiful churches, castles, towers, and walls.
We were able to get our first glimpse at all of these sites on our way to dinner the first night, which was at a FANTASTIC medieval style restaurant. This meal was certainly one of the most interesting that I have ever eaten. The staff was in Medieval costume. The restaurant was candlelit. And of course, the food is actually supposed to be pretty authentic in the recipes and cooking methods they use. Even the bathroom looked like an old-style outhouse. (Fortunately there was a regular modern flush toilet). The food was interesting and some of it was very good! I definitely tried a few new things such as turnip, which I liked. (Somehow I've managed to ever avoid trying turnip, even though it's always served at Thanksgiving and Christmas I think). I also tried tongue, which I most certainly did not like. And I'm not just saying that because I don't like the idea of eating tongue. But I'm glad I tried it, because really, what's the point of coming all the way to Europe if you're not going to try new things? The rest of the meal included some chicken, lentils, berries, bread, cheese and more. We were all able to try little bits of everything, since the food was served in a family-style manner, which was excellent.

Sign for the Medieval restaurant, Olde Hansa

Walking back from the restaurant the first night, I learned one important lesson about Tallinn: wear good walking shoes. Really. The streets of the Old Town in Tallinn are nothing like the smooth, flat, bike-friendly roads of Copenhagen. Instead they are narrow, steep, cobblestoned roads which began to kill my feet after just the walk to and from the restaurant. Needless to say, reaching my bed was a huge relief on the first night.
The next morning had a rather humorous start. We were told we had to met our group at nine for a guided tour of Old Tallinn. My roommates and I set our alarms to give ourselves plenty of time to meet up. By just before eight we were ready for breakfast and followed the signs in our room which said breakfast was available in the basement. Down we went to the basement. No one else was down there, so we figured we were just really early. We noticed some paper bags containing food in them, which we took back to our rooms. In our rooms, we discovered that these bags contained only ham sandwiches, which confused us. But we were hungry for breakfast and ate them anyway. Then, thinking we were way ahead of schedule, we decided to just chill in our room until 9. Shortly, however, when our watches said 8:15, the intern on our trip came knocking on our door.
"Hey guys, you planning on going to the guided tour of the Old Town?" She asked.
"Yeah, why wouldn't we be" we all responded.
"Well, it just left..."
"What? It's 8:15! I thought we weren't leaving until 9!"
"Guys... Estonia's an hour ahead of Denmark. It's 9:15..."
Oh... Also, apparently, there hotel had a really good regular old hot breakfast that we missed the message about. We never did figure out what the ham sandwiches were there for.

Anyway, the tour of the old town was AMAZING! Many of the buildings have been standing there since the 13th and 14th centuries. Just think about that. A couple hundred years before Europeans even discovered America, and Estonians were building buildings and towers that are still standing today. Tallinn looked beautiful, kind of like a combination of Soviet Russia and a fairy tale. Old stone towers, churches, walls, gates and cobblestone roads fill the town. We went into one church that remains a Russian Orthodox church today. When we went inside, the interior was gorgeous (no photos allowed) and there was still active worshipping going on, even though it was a Monday. It was not like any church I'd ever seen. There were no pews. People just stand at various altars, or in the middle of the room, praying and listening. It was definitely interesting. Also, we saw the two of the main cobblestone roads, which are called the "short leg" and the "long leg." One is long and shallow, the other very short and very steep. Our guide told us that Estonians often say that "Tallinn has a short leg and a long leg and that is why Estonia always limps," meaning that is why Estonia always has problems.

The Alexander Nevsky cathedral, where we saw the Russian Orthodox worhipping


A view of part of the old town, complete with towers and walls

Cobblestones leading down

Tower where prisoners used to be kept

Estonian parliament

As our tour continued, we got some great views of the new part of Estonia, from the old town. It's so strange to look over the 700 year old buildings and see modern skyscrapers. One of the most interesting buildings that our guide pointed out was an old hotel, which is famous because it used to be that every single room in it was bugged by the KGB.

Skyscapers beyond the old town

The day continued with a lunch of soup, meat, and potatoes, which made me quite thankful not to be a vegetarian in this part of the world. The day also included some academic visits, including one to a health center where we learned about HIV in Estonia and another interesting one to a general practitioner's office. This GPs office wasn't as pleasant as the one we visited in Denmark and seemed much more disorganized. However, they did have a number of jacuzzis which they say they use for medical purposes. And they had a "salt room" which was a small room that was completely coated in salt. The walls and ceiling seemed like they were made of salt. And the floor was covered in salt so that it seemed like beach sand. Apparently, they use this on some viruses, although there is no evidence that it has any medical benefit beyond a placebo effect. Interesting though.
Later that night, we ate dinner at the oldest pub in Tallinn! It was much cheaper than Denmark! I got a burritto (well, they didn't call it a burritto, they called it chicken with beans and cheese wrapped in a tortilla, but it was a burritto) and a blueberry beer for $10. I don't even want to think about how much that would have cost in Denmark. More than ten dollars, anyway. We ended the night at a beerhouse, which was pirate themed on the outside. (Seriously, it had a really big model of a pirate ship) but was German themed on the inside. I didn't really understand it, but I liked it. There was even a beer tap at each of the tables in case people were too lazy to get up and go to the bar. We didn't elect that option, but still enjoyed the beerhouse nonetheless.
The next morning, we enjoyed the very good breakfast provided by the hotel, rather than some mediocre ham sandwiches. Then we headed off to the Museum of Occupation, which focused on the Russian occupation, followed by the Nazi occupation, followed by more Russian occupation. It was interesting, and something I had never learned about before. We saw a boat that many Estonians fled from the country in, lots of propaganda, a collection of doors to prison cells, and much more. The most interesting part of the museum, in my opinion, was the collection of Stalin statues that had been put up around Estonia during the Occupation. They were really big; twice the height of the doors! They were definitely interesting to look at though. After the museum and another academic visit, we headed to the ferry port to leave for Helsinki, which I will write about in my next entry.

Stalin statue