Anyways, here is what I started writing when I got back from Tallinn and Helsinki last week. This is where I left off:
I am currently drained both physically and mentally. I turned in my Cold War final earlier this afternoon, which should be ashamed to even call itself a final exam, and I just finished the season finale of Grey’s Anatomy. I know that most of the male population tends to automatically tune out after those two words are uttered by any female, which, I feel is a battle I cannot fight, but it doesn’t matter. I don’t care if you watch the show, but you gotta believe me when I say that the pain I’m feeling right now is REAL. Have you ever gotten attached to TV or book characters? I mean REALLY attached? I feel that I am the perfect subject for any author or director; I’m not that analytical enough to see characters as simply characters, and as a result, I feel every emotion an author or director would want their audience to feel. I am the perfect pawn. I get lost in shows and stories, and my god, I think I sincerely believe that these characters really DO exist somewhere in this universe, and my god do I love them as if I’ve known them for years.
Last night at 9m (EST), the world said goodbye to one of TV’s best beloved characters, Christina Yang (yes, I’m actually going to do this right now). I don’t think it’s possible for me to describe to you what watching Grey’s Anatomy has meant to me over the past seven years (= my adolescence and young adulthood), so I won’t even try, but AHH. I feel as if I have just said farewell to a good friend. I’m sure my host mom is convinced that I’m on drugs after hearing all the weeping and laughing and “OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD?! OH MY GOD!!!”s that have seeped through my wall and into the kitchen over the past hour...
On second though, I probably shouldn’t have decided to blog in such an emotionally crippled state.
Apologies, apologies. You probably want to hear about Finland, or maybe even my adventures in St. Petersburg, considering that’s what you really signed up for when you decided to check my blog out in the first place (you poor, poor soul).
So, Helsinki. We took the 7:30 am ferry to the Finnish capital, which took about two hours. The ferry that we took ended up looking like a cruise ship, and we sat in a cafeteria and watched a hockey game as our ferry sped through thick fog over the short distance across the Gulf of Finland.
When we arrived we took a tram to the center of the city. Unfortunately, our hostel wasn’t too close by. We ended up walking in a circle for 15 minutes before we were able to orient ourselves and find the right way. Our hostel, Cheapsleep, ended up being a 45 minute walk from the city center, but I’m sure it could have been worse.
I’m confident that the overcast weather influenced my opinions of Helsinki because I found it a little too modern and grey for my taste. It was such a contrast to Tallinn and Petersburg, but I’m glad we went! I don’t know how big the city actually is, but it didn’t seem too daunting from the one day that I was there. On the way to the hostel we walked past the opera house, the parliament building, the main train station, a contemporary art museum, the national museum of Finland and through a giant green park that outlined a bay of sorts which reminded me of Baxter Boulevard (somewhat).
One thing I noticed in particular was that there were runners and bikers EVERYWHERE. The sidewalks have separate walking and biking lanes, and chances that we walked past someone in fancy athletic clothes, black spandex and neon nike sneaks was extremely high (I was totally into it). We walked past what looked like a giant race tent, but as the day went on I began to think that this is how many people actually run and bike through Helsinki on a regular basis. Actually, now that I think of it, most of the people we saw there were fit. Good for them!
After we got our things settled at the hostel and a sandwich from the grocery store below (this hostel was more legit, thankfully), we set back out to where we came. Adam broke off on his own, and Sean and I headed back through the park. We ended up going to a Lutheran church which just happens to be built literally into a rock. Check out these pictures below.
Then we walked a little further out of the city into a more neighborhood like setting with the intent of finding one of the beaches nearby. We walked past a pretty cemetery and strolled through that first. By the time we finally got to the beach, Sean and I were exhausted. We ended up on the pavement next to the beach, and lay on our jackets in the sun. Sean definitely fell asleep, and I lay there with my eyes closed for at least an hour. I desperately wanted to go back to the hostel to take a nap, but on second thought I'm happy it was far enough away to prevent me from actually doing that. When we slowly got up, we made our way back to the city center. The neighborhoods we walked through were quiet, but clean and tidy. Apartment buildings are tall, and there were parks every so distance away from each other. There was an abundance of cafes and bars all around, but unlike Russia, everything was super expensive because they use euros (coming back to the US is going to be hard - what is the US dollar anyway? Do I even know anymore? [Steve Kautz, you will have to give me a lecture]). We walked through the city center, which included a handful of tall malls and eventually made our way to the harbor. The sections of the city we walked through later in the afternoon were super nice; they definitely had a luxurious shopping air about them... if that makes any sense.
Walking around the harbor reminded me of Portland. It didn’t smell like Portland, nor did it come anywhere near close to how quaint, charming and hip Portland is, but I walked on docks past the water, and there were fishing boats. We crossed the harbor and climbed a hill to the Uspenski church (cathedral?). It was closed so we couldn’t go inside, but it had a nice view at the top.
Shortly after we met up with Adam and went to dinner. It seemed like we all weren’t too pleased with the ruble to euro conversion rate, so we tried finding what we thought would be the cheapest place for dinner: Pizza Hut. I think the one and only time I had actually gone to a pizza hut before then was when Tommy Ryan’s mom Marybeth took us out when we were on a play date... in first grade. Anyways, it wasn’t cheap, but it was REAL PIZZA. Hallelujah! And the waitresses smiled! When they said welcome or thank you, they actually looked genuine! I had no idea how much I missed a friendly face, regardless if it was fake or not. Russians may be proud of their honesty and their lack of smiley appearance, but I am 110% American and I don’t care if people are fake about being happy or not. I can’t tell!
Sean, Adam and I barely made it onto the ferry to Tallinn the next morning. We checked in at the ticket booth and after a few minutes of walking on the platform, I wondered aloud where everybody else was. The answer was that they were already on the ferry, which was about to leave the port in a few minutes. We made it to the ferry on time, but I cannot tell you how little excitement and positive adrenaline I get out of close calls. In fact, I hate any sense of adventure that could possibly be derived from anything along the lines of missing a ferry/plane/bus/[insert transportation] (I’m going to have grey hair by the time I’m 30). Ohhh the STRESS!
The ferry ride back to Tallinn was pleasant. When we got back though, we had a lot of time to kill before our bus went back to Petersburg at 5:45 pm. So Adam and I spent an hour and a half at a cute little Mornings-in-Paris type cafe, where I had a hot cocoa, a lemon poppy seed roll and read more Poe. We then spent another few hours at a McDonalds, and then walked to the bus station, where we waited for another hour or two. Five minutes before we were supposed to leave our bus showed up. There was no sign telling us which platform to get to or anything. I was radiating a lot of panicky vibes which I’m sure Adam and Sean appreciated. Luckily, we made it home around midnight, and I was fast asleep by 2 am. All in all, I’m so glad we took the trip. It was a lot for a few days, but I think we got a significant amount out of it. And now I get to check off two capitals on my travel list: Tallinn ✓ Helsinki ✓ Ура!
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