It's just like an Estonian disco


Tallinn :: Estonia

What it's like in the former Soviet Union.

Places: Tallinn

Coolest thing I did: Decided to have a night out without scrimping and saving.

Coolest thing I didn´t know: People here think I'm poor because I drink beer. Being flashy is very important in Eastern Europe. I even heard kids refering to their big cubic zirconia medallions as "blingers".

Estonia has taken me by surprise. I decided to come to Tallinn because it takes the same amount of time on the ferry to get to as Helsinki and I needed to get out for a cheap weekend. Scanders is nice, but it was getting on my nerves having to live like such a pov just to eat properly, let alone go out.

The first thing that strikes you about Tallinn is it's far closer to Sweden culturaly than to Russia, despite the fact it's been nominally ruled from there on and off for the last few hundred years. The old town of Tallinn has been restored to it's Medieval past, which is nice but somewhat fake. Eating out here (which I can afford to do) involves alot of people being dressed in Ye Olde clothes and serving things in gobblets and sword fighting and whatnot. It feels a bit like being in Medieval Estonia Land rather than a living city. It's only once you get out past the walls into the newer bits that the recent past is more evident. On the walk to the bus or train station, you see the same kind of ultra modern buildings that are going up all over Berlin mixed in with the ruins of the former Communist Bloc. Around the stations, you have people selling things at the local markets, which involves alot of bearded, head scarfed old women fighting over the price of cooking oil. It's definetly not there for the tourists.

I'm quite fascinated by the concept of modern ruins at the moment. Like Berlin, the locals here seem quite content to let the old Soviet edifices go into decline, trying to block that part of their history from their collective memories. My favorite is the ferry terminal for shorter hops. It's a big pyramid of steps, much like an Aztec step pyramid, except made out of grey concrete. As only a small part of it is still used, the rest is going into decline, with the steps cracked and alot of grass growing in the cracks. In stark contrast to the ruins of Central America, this was built within even my parents lifetime. It's amazing how quickly things go into decline if you want them to.

It's bizzare to see the contrasts of what's left here. The new parliament building is composed on 3 sides with a 12th century Danish Fortress, which is across the road from a North German style church spire and Russian Orthadox Cathederal. All this overlooks the train station, with it's decrepit trains and flaking paint, which could only have come from a Sovient architect's pencil.

The best thing about Tallinn, however, is the nightlife. In a bizzare mix of locals (yes, they do go out in the old town) and Russian weekenders I've finally found somewhere that my Australian accent actually sounds exotic. The drink prices are about half of what you'd pay in London, the girls are beautiful and the blokes friendly. Like most of Europe, nothing gets properly started until midnight, when all of a sudden everything starts to pump. I was adopted by some English Navy blokes on leave here, who had scouted things out the night before. There is no end of trouble to get into here. Being so far north, the sun was well up by the time I found myself knocking on the hostel door at probably the brightest 5am I've ever witnessed. No being able to rouse the owner, I did get one of the blokes alseep in my room to wake up and open up the window. Which was nice.

I was also promised that Riga in Latvia is a bigger city and thus goes 24 hours on weekends. In a mad dash on my way back from Russia, I may be able to get a Saturday night out there. I've decided to try and get into Poland as quickly as possible after Russia (as my visa there is pretty tight), and the research over the last days seems to indicate it will take a train, ferry and bus to get there from St Petes. A night out on the way will probably do me good.

Let's Sweden the deal


Stockholm :: Sweden

Sorry.

Places: Stockholm

Coolest thing I did: Got all the tips on how to finance an entire winter snowboarding in Austria from a bloke I met in the hostel.

Coolest thing I didn´t know: Lego now has licencees. There are nba legos with little men with lego afros and goatees in one of the shop windows here.

Stockholm is a funny place. In the whole time I've been staying in the hostel, the most regular conversation I have with anyone is "what did you do today" and the usual answer is wander around a bit. For a city that is basically a whole lot of baroque buildings perched on an archipelago of close islands there isn't a whole lot of notable tourist things to do. Which I'm quite liking after the whirlwind of Norway, I don't feel an overwhelming feeling like I have to go and see everything, that I can just relax a bit and watch life go by. This would be an even better place to do it if the weather wasn't as bad as it is. A pity.

The city itself, the new one, seems to have faced a whole lot of engineering/architectural issues due to the fact that it's sitting on a pretty uneven lump of rock. The whole thing is an escher painting of overhead walkways, roadways, raised platforms and stairways that are wider at the bottom than at the top. It could be a nice effect, but for some reason most of it seems to have been inspired by late soviet architecture. The main square (Sergels Torg) for example, has a massive, ugly concrete edifice in the middle of it that wouldn't look out of place in from of Stasi headquarters in the early 60s. It seems that alot of the stuff built this century takes away from the effect of the good work done all around it in the two previous centuries, with churches and opera houses overshadowed by big ugly concrete buildings looking like from star trek.

Which is strange, for a country so renowned for it's skill in design. Whilst there is a whole floor of the national museum here dedicated to the subject of modern design (and you would be surprised at the number of modern mass produced icons that were designed in Scanders), probably the best thing about Swedish design is it's godfather, Carl Larsson. I saw some of his paintings in Gottenberg, but the murals he painted on the walls of the museum here show his true skills. His most famous work is his pictures of his house and family done when they were all still very young at the end of the 19th ceuntury. His missus (who was a bit of a babe, judging from the paintings) had done some inovative work on the interior design and furniture of the house, captured by Carl's paintings. This did (and still does) inspire much of Swedens modern interior design. Quite cool, seeing as no one would have ever seen it if it wasn't for her famous artist hubby.

I did also see the palace, which didn't inspire me a whole lot (all these northern European palaces all seem to be lesser copies of Versailles), it did fill in the gaps I have on Nordic history. Apparently, after the Scanders powers lost prestige at the end of the Viking days, they faced become puppet states of the Hanseatic League, a kind of political corporation that controled the city councils of many of the Baltic and North Sea ports. So the Queen of Denmark got all three kingoms (Norway, Sweden and Denmark) to become one country. This lasted for a couple of hundred years, then the Swedes tried to rebel for some reason no one seems to talk about. The Danes put this rebellion down rather harshly, causing the Swedes to all rise up, and claim independence. Then during the 30 years war, the Swedes (joining the Catholics) handed out a sound arse whipping to the Danes (who were Prots) and kicked them off the peninsula. Then the Swedes got a bit big for their britches a hundred years later and decided to take on the Russians. Europhile and general renaissance man, Tsar Peter the Great didn't take kindly to this. He'd just finished dishing out arse whippings of his own to Poland-Lithuania in the Ukraine and decided to smack the Swedes off Continental Europe. After taking the Baltic states from Sweden, he founded St Peterberg on a swamp. More on this when I go there. The Russians then dished out yet another arse whipping to the Swedes in the early 19th century and took Finland from them. The Swedes did manage to kick the Danes again and take Norway from them. The Noweigens apparently liked the Danes better, and tried to rebel. The Swedish army did a bit of harsh rebellion crushing of their own. Norway finally got it's independence in 1905 and then asked the king of Denmark to be their king, kind of a last spit in the eye of the Swedes. This may explain why then didn't mind losing to them in the soccer. It's funny how ancient fueds all come up in the soccer in Europe.

Speaking of Denmark, the Danish embassy here has big lego men in the window. This reminded me that despite it's proximity to Copenhagen, I didn't visit Legoland. When I was a kid, lego was my favorite toy (as the mound of lego festering in my parents garage somewhere will attest to). I remember going to lego exhibitions in Sydney to see mermaids and whatnot made out of lego touring the world, apparently all made in a magical place called Legoland. I probably wouldn't have got such a kick out of it now, as my appreciation for artistic works in the medium of lego has tapered off somewhat (sorry, for some reason I'm preoccupied with the idea of lego as a valid artistic medium. Very few people seem to agree with me that it is).

At the end of the day, Stockholm is a big city in a region of Europe where it's best attractions are it's natural ones. I like it here, but having to choose, I would take Copenhagen any day. I think more because it's less unwieldy. The fact you can pick up free bicycle and just ride around Copenhagen means nothing is too far (even the wee mermaid), where as the 4 islands you have to traverse to get around central Stockholm make even public transport a pain. Like I said, it's forced me to take things easy and relax a bit, which has been good for me. And we get a whole 4 hours of darkness here a night, so I'm sleeping better.

Right, I'm off to catch a ferry to Estonia, this trip's first dip beyond the Iron Curtain and the cheap beer that lies behind it.

Fjord Explorer


Stockholm :: Sweden

Norway and too many fjord jokes.

Places: Oslo, Bergen, Flam, Oslo & Stockholm.

Coolest thing I did: My entire fjord/railway/mountain thing was pretty cool.

Coolest thing I didn´t know: It is possible to befriend the locals of any European country by watching their team play soccer. Be sure you know who Mark Viduka is and who he plays for though.

Norway is a very different country to the other two nordic places I've seen thus far. As it's a bit further north than anywhere I went in Sweden or Denmark, two things happened: it got colder and it got lighter. Apparently, the suidice rate in Norway goes up during summer (yes, that is the right way round) because so many people suffer from sleep deprivation due to the fact that the sun dosen't really ever go down. I found that I was pretty exhausted after a week in Norway for the simple fact that I'd wake up somewhere around 3am and not be able to get back to sleep. I used to be able to sleep through anything, so this was a little annoying. It did also kind of put me in a worse mood than I would have otherwise been, and as a result, Norway may not get the wraps it deserves.

Norway is beautiful. On the 7 hour train ride between Oslo and Bergen, you get to see all the pine forrests & snow covered mountains, mirrored in flawless lakes that you would expect. As the snow is starting to melt, there are so many spectacular waterfalls and rapids you stop noticing after a while. The snow was a surprise. At times, there was snow right next to the tracks, not high up in the distant mountains, reminding you that this is a pretty cold place all year round. I don't know why I expected it to be a bit warmer than it was, I just did. Summer really hasn't started in most of the country. My trip through the fjords on a boat (as part of the...get this...Norway in a Nutshell tour) was just the kind of peaceful rest I needed after a few days of insomina induced worrying about what everything cost. I could sit back and spend the day watching grassy feilds suddenly drop into sheer stone cliffs that seem to sweat moisture down into the smooth surface of the fjord itself. The whole thing was pictures of little wooden villages nestled at the base of huge waterfalls (mostly there to look after Norway's large hydro electric scheme) and distant glaciers in the background.

I found, however, that I was a week too early for most things. The mountain passes & narrow waterways that lead up to the glaciers and smaller, more impressive fjords open up 7 days from now. Doing the math, I was about a week and a half too early for the best bits. I wanted to walk on the glacier itself, which is a cheap daytrip in July, but can't be done now. I also wanted to go further north, as it was apparent that the best things about Norway are natural, rather than urban. This put me in quite a funk for the last day I was in Bergen, something that's a bit uncharacteristic for me. I was, however, cheered up by the fact that I wasn't bad off in comparision. I met a kiwi who was from Christchurch who had just flown halfway around the world to see, well, scenery just like around Christchurch. Still, I don't know what he expected.

With a couple of people from the Bergen hostel, I embarked on a night out to watch Norway play Denmark in the European Cup qualifiers in (what else) soccer. I've found the best way to befriend locals is to watch their team play soccer. The couple of blokes who we first spoke to gave us some good insights into things. Like the fact the big grudge is between Norway and Sweden, and they were happy enough to see Denmark win (1-0, decided in the first 10 mins). I also found the world record for beer prices. 400ml for (wait for it) 4 pounds and 50 pence. I didn't get very drunk. After our new mates did (and quite sleazy) we were befriended by some Norweigen girls who invited us to go fishing in their home town the next day. I had already bought my ticket back to Oslo, and still thought I could see the glaciers the next day, so I declined. I blame the lack of alcohol in the decision making for this rational (and ultimately wrong, as I saw no glaciers up close and had to return direct to Oslo) outcome. Sometimes I kick myself.

The best thing in Oslo is the Vigeland Park. It's a park with many sculptures made specially for it by Gustav Vigeland, who was an Oslo native. The sculptures are mostly to do with birth, life and death (not too broad a topic), depicted in nudes of both sexes in stages of childhood, love, marriage, parenthood and old age. Very Vigeland. Very philosophical. I also went to the gallery to see the works of Big Eddie Munch (as he's known to his mates). I did a project on him in art class when I was in year 7, so it was good to see things like The Scream and Madonna in real life. He had quite a gift for seeing the human side of people, even if he was a bit mad. His first marriage ended in cloudy circumstances, but involved him being admitted to hospital with a gunshot wound to the hand.

So, after another night in Olso and a train ride that was delayed by lightning striking an earlier train, I am now in Stockholm. I like this place. I needed a good night's sleep and a restful few days after running around like a madman in Norway, and this looks like a good place to get it. I'm staying in a hostel that has half it's rooms on a boat (!!!) but I havn't been able to get onto the boat yet. Here's hoping. I will say more on Stockholm once I've seen more of it.