The Retriever Weekly_Foreign Desk: Russia (October 23)

Take a short trip with me. It's only a five hour bus ride, but we had better plan on seven hours to give us time to go through boarder control. Meet me across from the really colorful church with all the spires and we will leave at 7 a.m., while it's still dark and the streets are somewhat deserted.

As we stash our bags in the belly of the bus you may ask, "Where are we going?" I tell you, "Estonia, the last country to 'join' the Soviet Union and the first to leave." You might feel disappointed, having never heard of this country, much less its capital Tallinn, where we are going to stay. Allow me to reassure you. You will not regret this journey. I certainly did not. In fact, I am currently feeling guilty for wishing that I were still in Estonia rather than Russia. Let me explain.

Estonia was so refreshingly European and quaint versus the sprawling mass of the Russian landscape and bureaucracy. We stayed in a five-star hotel previously occupied by Hillary Clinton. The hotel staff assumed we were all doctors because of a mix-up in the names and everyone had "Dr." added onto their name cards. We had free Wi-Fi (one of the hardest things to live without, spoiled American that I am). We only stayed a few minutes walk away from the center of "Vana Tallinn," or the old part of the city.

The day we arrived in Tallinn, we were greeted with hurricane force winds and admonishment not to go to the upper part of town where we might be blown out to sea. We were then treated to a walking tour of the old part of the city's center. In the hurricane force winds, mind you. Our guide was very informative and pointed out the narrowest street, the widest street, the longest street, the shortest street and all kinds of other useful information. I am joking; I mean he really did tell us all about the streets which are different lengths and widths, but told interesting tidbits along with every house, church or store that we passed. The cobblestone streets were made with the help of all the citizens. When someone wanted to enter the city, they had to bring at least two stones with them to lay down for roads.

Our guide showed us buildings from the early 1400s, walls built by the Swedes, churches built by the Danes, bridges built by the Soviets, and the occasional store built by Estonians. Estonia has spent relatively little time in freedom. It had been constantly governed by some other country until the end of World War I, when it had short-lived independence until the Soviet Union swallowed it up sometime closer to World War II. It was the first country to remove itself from the Soviet Union. Part of its rebellion from the Soviets occurred in the form of massive gatherings singing Estonian songs.

Estonia had none of the characteristics of Russia and it was refreshing, to say the least, however guilty I feel writing that. It was outwardly friendly, especially clean, quaint, and small, everyone spoke English, and the clothes were on sale. I kept feeling like it would be a place my parents would enjoy. I say that because every time I try to imagine any of my friends or family attempting to vacation in Russia, I just have to laugh out loud after I recover from the shock of imagining them getting thoroughly lost in the city.

The next day, thank God, brought wonderful sunny weather. It was still cold and windy, but made bearable with the sun. We took a bus tour around the city and the outskirts. We got off the bus about every 10 minutes to take touristy pictures and have our guide explain a building or monument in greater depth. We walked along the beach and I still haven't got the fishy smell out of my coat and boots. I think that is the only bad thing I took home from Estonia.

We visited Tallinn's massive amphitheater, which holds annual chorus festivals. The choir bleachers alone can hold over 30,000. The field surrounding the stage was large enough to encompass over 300,000, as it did when about a third of the country gathered there to sing national Estonian songs at the fall of the Soviet Union. The stage was in a valley so the audience would be able to sit on the large hill and listen. Most of us Americans who were feeling cramped after hours of bus riding took off running down the massive hill and arrived at the bottom, where the many steps of the amphitheater greeted us and begged us to continue running all the way up them. At the top of the stairs (see pictures to understand this concept) we all broke out into song and the acoustics spread our not-so-talented voices far and wide over the city. Needless to say, the trip back up the hill was excruciatingly hard and my lungs are still complaining from being put to so much use.

We had the rest of the day free and took the time to spend our Eeks (form of Estonian currency and coincidentally will be put out of use after Jan 1st because Estonia is joining the European Union, a pity only because Eeks are just so pretty). That evening under the organization of one of the more ambitious study abroad members, about 20 of us began an international game of capture the flag in the center of the city. This was about the most amazing game of capture the flag you could ever hope to play. We divided the old town into upper and lower sides (known affectionately by the Estonians as the "short leg" and the "long leg," which supposedly explains why Estonians can't dance. I am not passing judgment, just repeating what I've heard.) We had the huge town center as our main territory and our blue plastic bag of a flag was displayed in between the pillars of an ancient church. It was about 10 p.m., but there were still at least a hundred people in the town square. I think they were quite amused by the crazy Americans, Italians and Spaniards who were chasing one another around the old streets and yelling to each other in languages they couldn't understand. In the end my team lost both games. The last game was not our fault because a totally random drunk Spanish exchange student, not part of the game, was talking to the American girls guarding the flag and they were explaining to him the point of the game. When he thought he understood, he simply grabbed our flag and ran off to the other side of the city. The rest of the evening we took advantage of the real beds, free Wi-Fi and T.V. shows in English.

On our way out of Estonia, we stopped at the castle Narva, which lies on the boarder of Estonia and Russia. The castle and the town hall are the only buildings that were not completely destroyed in WWII. The castle had been restored and we climbed set after set of stairs to reach the top observation balcony, which gave us a great view of the border, the river between the countries and the remains of the fortification that Russia built to rival Narva. The Russian building is now in ruins and looked much more interesting than the refurbished Estonian option. After that it was goodbye Estonia and hello to Russian border control. I hope you brought a passport, registration and multi-entry visa. Have I mentioned that Russians are crazy about stamping official documents?

We arrived home in St. Petersburg late Sunday night and were given the next day off to sleep off our vacation. Needless to say, the first day back at school was hard. And the day after that, and the next day...okay, maybe it is just school being school. My teachers have started assigning papers and my first one is due next week, three pages of my impressions of Russia. In Russian. One of my favorite teachers admitted to us that he just realized that he actually has to assign us grades and said that he will try to find the least excruciating way to do that.

This is my life so far. If anyone wants to email me a three page paper written in Russian, I would appreciate it. And if anyone would like more crazy stories from Estonia, contact UMBC's own study abroad adviser extraordinaire, Brian Sounders, who I am sure would be more than grateful to share his own experiences.

The Kroon (or EEK, its international currency code) has been the currency of Estonia since 1928. For more fun facts, contact Randi at leysra1@umbc.edu.