From St. Petersburg, I took a 6 hour bus ride to Tallinn in Estonia. The bus was extremely comfortable with WiFi and a TV playing 80s/90s music videos (showing my age?). I slept or dug into my book for most of the journey except at the border town of Narva when we had to walk over the border. The Russian border control asked me the standard questions and couldn’t find my Schengen Visa which was in my old passport - that held up the queue. We then got into the bus for our Estonian border crossing. Now, I am used to the usual “Schengen questions” in the privacy of the booth at border controls but here I was asked the questions in the bus. It was rather embarrassing and uncomfortable at being questioned in front of everybody. Anyways, after a long wait (when they’d taken away our passports for stamping them), we were off towards Tallinn again.
Estonia (with a population of only 1.4 million) has, at various points in history, been ruled by many different countries - Sweden, Russia, Germany, and Denmark – Estonia finally freed itself from Soviet rule in 1991. Since then it has grown economically and technologically - Skype was born here and the last national elections here were conducted online. It is no surprise to find almost all of Tallinn Wi-Fi connected. No wonder the country calls itself E-stonia
Tallinn’s name comes from Taani Linnus (“Danish Stronghold”). It is also known as “the town that will never be complete” – according to a local legend, Tallinn will disappear the moment someone proclaims it to be completed. It is quite a large town with 2 distinct parts – the old town and the not-so-old bit. The latter is where all the communisty / new buildings and the Zaras and the cineplexes are. But the sights and the tourist hub and beauty lie in the old town.
The old town is quite small. On the bus from St. Petersburg I got talking to this British couple, Rudi and Catherine – who were travelling overland from Japan to the UK - At Tallinn, I would bump into them at least twice a day - that’s how small the old town is. Coincidentally, it turned out that we were leaving Tallinn for Riga by the same bus – so on our last evening in Tallinn we decided to go out for a meal together. We went to this nice, small, and inexpensive (which always helps) place that served pies and elk soup (my first time with elks!). There we bumped into a bunch of local drama students - the evening passed rather quickly thanks to the wine/beer and laughs one of the drama students got when he said that one of his ambitions was to play a gay Hamlet (he then proceeded to read lines rather convincingly!)
To picture old Tallinn, imagine a really beautiful medieval town with cobbled streets, church spires, cafes, and crafts shops. And add a sprinkling of people dressed up in medieval garb selling their wares, advertising restaurants, or simply selling roasted almonds. The town does ‘transport you back in time.’ Sadly, all this comes at a cost - Tallinn is a tourist trap, and that is amply demonstrated by the number of tourists that the big cruise liners offload every day. From about 10 in the morning till aound 5 in the evening (when these cruise shippers finally go back to their bases) Tallinn is crowded. And it becomes really difficult to explore the streets in peace if more than one cruise ship is docked in Tallinn’s port.
Old Tallinn is neatly divided into two – lower town and upper town. Historically, the lower town was where the poorer people stayed and the well-off stayed in the upper part (a distinction that probably continues to this day - upper part seemed to be where all the diplomats stayed!). Tallinn has, like any other European city, a formidable collection of churches – the most imposing one is the Orthodox Church which is bang in front of the Estonian Parliament building. During Soviet times, it was said that the KGB operated out of this church (there are many KGB stories floating around in Tallinn in the 60s and 70s). That said, the church itself, with its onion domes, is really beautiful.
Another Church which I visited was Niguliste, known for its 15th century painting Danse Macabre (Dance of death) by Bernt Notke. As I entered the church building I looked for the entrance to the nave and the transept but couldn’t find it, so I asked an officious looking person sitting behind the desk as to how I could enter the church – he gave me a dirty look and rudely said, “look carefully and you will see the sign”. I was taken aback by his rudeness (and that too in the house of God). That was probably the only time I encountered brusqueness on this trip – otherwise I’ve found the Baltic people to be very friendly and hospitable and always willing to help.
One of the tallest buildings in Tallinn is the St. Olaf church (I made the breathless climb up the bell tower for wonderful views of town). When I went to this church, the Sunday sermon was on – it was being telecast on CCTVs strategically positioned around the church. Though the sermon was in Estonian, I could make out that the priest was making snide remarks and jokes about the state of the world - but the ‘faithful’ were not amused. Their attention was diverted by a baby who seemed to have the hiccups. Within a few minutes the entire church was chuckling and the priest wasn’t amused that a little baby had stolen his thunder.
Lower Tallinn is centred around the Town-hall square and its numerous restaurants (including Maharaja run by a sardarji from Rajouri Garden!). The main thoroughfare is Viru street (which somehow reminded me of Sehwag and 3 idiots – Viru Sahastrebuddhe) with the usual mix of shops and restaurants.
The weather vane of the Town Hall has an interesting story behind it – the figure is called Old Thomas – a peasant boy who excelled at cross-bow shooting. He was never allowed to participate in contests because he was ‘low-born’. However, he was given the job of town guard for life. When he died, they erected the weather vane on the town-hall spire.
At Tallinn, I was staying in these comfortable self-catering apartments run by the owner of a jewellery store. The apartments were in a nice art-and-crafty block of buildings with a beautiful courtyard that had a lovely outdoor coffee shop. Unfortunately, I couldn’t spend as much time there as I would have wanted to. There is a coffee shop that specialises in Marzipan (a sweet of almonds and powdered sugar) which was apparently invented in Tallinn – at the Town Hall Pharmacy (which in turn happens to be the oldest continuously operating pharmacy in Europe).
One odd experience which I had in Estonia was with the Estonian word for ‘Thank You’ (Aitah). Everytime I would use it, the recipient would open up a big smile or would blush. At first I found it disconcerting and double-checked my guide book – then I asked some locals who said that they were used to tourists saying ‘Thank you’ and not Aitah.
One of the most touristy/popular restaurants in Tallinn is Ye Olde Hansa which is a medieval styled traditional restaurant. (The restaurant gets its name from the Hansa, or the Hanseatic League, a medieval economic alliance of trading cities. Like you needed to know that!). Anyway, coming back to the restaurant - everything there was as if from medieval times – from the cutlery, the wine chalices, to the candles. When the garçon (they call themselves ‘servants’ in this restaurant) came to the table next to mine, he made the usual polite conversation with the couple there - “Where are you from?” etc. When they told him that they were from Norway he said, “So shall I give you the menu in Swedish? That should do, right?” (he asked this quite seriously). The couple immediately stiffened and the man said, “You should know that you should not say that”. And then they spent the rest of the evening sulking.
Apart from Tallinn city museum (that gave the history of the town), I also visited the Photography museum (housed in what used to be the town prison). The museum was interesting – it had photos and cameras from the early days of photography including the old daguerreotype and ferrotype cameras. Apparently, the minox was invented in Tallinn (here’s a fact you didn’t know. Or perhaps need!).
Speaking of cameras, on one of the walking tours I went for, there was this Portuguese girl who had no camera with her but a sketch book. At every ‘sight’ she would simply bring out the sketch book and start sketching. No need for cameras or memory just one’s drawings! I wish I had that skill.
That’s my update from Tallinn. Next stop, Riga
