2017 January 13th, 2300h Central European Time Zone

When we returned to our room after finishing laundry just after I concluded the last entry, we met our roommates: Maria and Dimitri from Athens, Greece; who were perhaps a little bit older than us and travelling together as friends.  We only had a brief conversation with them though before everyone turned in for the night, but in the morning after breakfast in the hostel cafeteria we talked to them a bit more and compared plans.

We learned that Dimitri was a huge fan of Opera and travelled the world seeing shows as often as he could, and so he was here to see as many shows in a long weekend as he could at the world renown Vienna State Opera, as well as some of the smaller opera houses here in the city.  He explained to us though that he had figured out the secret to seeing as many operas as he does, and that if we were interested he could help us get what he described as literally the very best view and sound in the house, for only 4 Euros!  We were a bit skeptical about his claim that we could see an opera at what is often considered THE première opera house in the world, but to have an opportunity to see one in such a location did not sound like an opportunity we wanted to miss out on.  We made arrangements to meet Dimitri and Maria at the opera house later that day, and then stepped out to begin our explorations for the day.

The first stop was to find an apothecary, as Nick had been coming down with a bit of a cold, and I was running out of ibuprofen for my sciatica.  We found one quickly and were able to get the medicines we needed, but it was an interesting experience for how it was different from the process in the United States.  Rather than just finding a box of cold medicine on a shelf of a corner store, one goes into one of these special apothecaries and stands in line to have an opportunity to speak with someone who asks you questions about what you feel is wrong with you, and then they suggest a medicine which they have in a back room, and then “prescribe” you with advice about how to take the medicine and any other things you should be doing to care for your health.

We got on the U-bahn train to the Schonbrunn Schloss, which was the hunting lodge palace of the Hapsburg monarchs.  Once again, the architecture and wealth in the building itself was astounding, similar to the other palaces we had visited.  There were some notable differences however: in keeping with the German character of these rulers, the palace was less ostentatious and more functional.  The monarch had to run the empire from this building, after all, and we learned that Emperors like Franz Joseph took that responsibility very seriously, saying things like “One must work until one is exhausted.”  Building an empire that will last for 640 years is not for the lazy, it would seem.

After taking our time with the grand tour of the palace we walked through the gardens to the back side of the palace, facing Schonbrunn Hill which is crested with a gloiratoire if I’m remembering the word correctly.  Before the hill however is a huge square where extravagant summer parties would be held with military parades and the like, with magnificent statues on each side and flower gardens interspersed.  Then at the foot of the hill is the neptunium (again if I’m recalling correctly), which is a large pool with impressive statues of Neptune and his retinue.  We walked all the way up the steep hill to the gloiratoire which boasted a very impressive view of the city, and then we took a path through the beautifully kept forest back down the hill to the gardens.  We really wanted to explore the labyrinth and garden maze, but sadly they are closed during the winter; so I guess it’s just one more reason why we’ll have to come back in the summer.

After taking the long way through the gardens we exited the royal grounds to a section of the city with a bit of a different feel to it than the 1st district where we had spent most of our time so far.  I’m not sure what the number of the district was, but it felt a bit more like a place that typical Viennese folk actually lived and worked.  A very short distance into this district was Plachutta, an expensive but very worth it Viennese restaurant with a fancy, high-class feel to it.  We were seated right away, and decided to warm ourselves up with an aperitif: hot spiced plum wine- holy cow was it good!  We were served some delicious bread, and we ordered our dinner: Nick got the traditional wiener schnitzel, which is breaded veal that one squeeze a lemon over, with scalloped potatoes in a buttery garlic sauce on the side.  Meanwhile I got the traditionally boiled beef that Vienna is famous for and was “The Emperor’s Favorite Dish” according to the restaurant.  In particular, this restaurant specializes in these boiled beef dishes, which are called “tafelspitz”.

Tafelspitz has a whole procedure to being served, which the waitstaff helped us with.  Firstly the whole pot in which the beef has been boiled is brought to the table on a special holder.  The beef hasn’t just been boiled in water, but has actually been cooked as part of a broth soup with all kinds of vegetables and marrow from the beef.  This soup is then served into bowls as an appetizer, while the large cuts of beef are kept in the broth, continuing to stew and marinade in its own broth.  Then the next step is to take a piece of very hard toast of dark bread, and spread the bone marrow from the soup on it like butter because it has gotten so soft at this point, and then shake a little salt and pepper on it, eating it with your hands.  Finally, the cuts of beef are served, along with vegetables and potatoes.  Both a chive sauce and an apple-horseradish sauce are available to spread on the meat or potatoes, both of which are excellent options.

We had our dinners with some elderflower sparkling wine, and then were offered desert.  The meal had been quite large so far, but the deserts looked so good, and the meal had been so good so far that we could forget how much we had eaten already, so we gave in to temptation… and ordered three deserts even though there was only the two of us.  Nick had an espresso with mouse that looked scrumptious, I had a large glass of glace- homemade caramel ice cream just like the Hapsburgs liked to have after their dinners of Tafelspitz, and then we shared a plate of crackers and spicy blue cheese infused with sweet red wine, served with almonds and apricot jam.  We finally walked away quite stuffed, but feeling like royalty.  We really did eat SO MUCH food though, I ate until I was full, and then probably ate as much or more again past that point.  But it was that good, I simply had to make room for it.  I should also separately mention though that the quality of the service in the restaurant was phenomenal, as well.

From the restaurant we took the U-Bahn to the center of the city again, directly to the Wien Statsoper, where we met up with Dimitri.  He was standing in a short line outside of the opera house near a side door, where he and Maria had laid down a few sheets of newspaper to save spaces in line for the two of us.  Once our presence was established to the others waiting in line, we all dashed off for a quick coffee (or more accurately, they did, while Nick and I struggled to understand what this word “hungry” means, since we couldn’t conceive of the concept at the time.  Then we said goodbye to Maria, who was opera’d-out after having gone to see two different ones the night before, and rushed back to our places in line.  Shortly afterwards the line started shuffling through the door, into the building.  Inside we were given the opportunity to queue through a long set of ropes which led to another door.  We probably waited in that line for about 30 minutes before the door was opened, and we were led through another set of queue ropes, where we waited for a little more than an hour.  The good news was that Dimitri had gotten in the first line early enough that we were nearly to the front of the lines during the whole process, though throughout all of the waiting the line behind us got longer and longer and longer.

Finally the last set of doors in front of us opened and we bought tickets for the lower standing area, for a mere 4 Euro.  As soon as we had out tickets though we had to speed walk past the coat check area as fast as we could, managing to pass up everyone else except for just two men, finally getting stopped before some glass doors- our final queue line.  Eventually they opened these doors too, and now we quickly rushed into the standing area to pick our standing positions on a first-come first-serve basis.  The standing room area is interesting, there are tall and sturdy banisters set parallel to the stage, directly in the center of the auditorium, though at the back and slightly raised.  Each of these banisters has a cushioned top and ledge to it which allows for people to stand behind one of the banisters and then lean their weight on it, taking some of the weight off their feet- it’s a lot like standing at a bar ordering drinks, but more comfortable than that, and with designated spacing (as if there were seats, essentially).

Being almost first in line, the three of us rushed down to the very first banister, and took the standing positions just barely right of center.  With no other banisters in front of us, and our standing position raised by a significant amount over the last seats of the ground floor, the backs of which were pressed directly against the wall underneath our bannister; we had an ASTOUNDING view, directly over the heads of the seated audience, in the center position.  The view really was just incredible, you wouldn’t believe our good fortune- and for only 4 Euro like I had said!  Meanwhile it was a madhouse behind us as people scrambled into the rows of bannisters, desperately trying to claim a spot.  Once everyone was fitted in, the staff at the opera house gave us instructions to tie scarfs or shoelaces around our position that could be used to claim our spot for the night- being at the front bannister with the wall underneath it (unlike the other bannisters which just had railings below them) we had to get inventive to claim ours as there was no way to tie a scarf around our position.  We had some plastic bags on us from souvenir shopping at the Schonbrunn Palace, and we managed to squeeze the thin plastic in between our banister and the wall behind the seats ahead of us, and now were free to roam about the opera house.  

After dropping off our coats at the cloakroom Dimitri suggested taking pictures of the building’s interior, especially as the house was yet to totally fill up with regular seated patrons, and so we seized the opportunity.  Dimitri was excited to play photographer for us, and so we took a couple dozen pictures of Nick and myself in different places around the opera house, showcasing the building’s beauty and some of the famed composers who have performed there- particularly Gustav Mahler, who was one of the first composers Dimitri became enthralled with many years ago when we first started appreciating opera- though many, many other famous composers have performed here such as Mozart, Strauss, and Beethoven.

After pictures we toasted to the arts with a glass of white wine, and then returned to our bannister just in time for the show to start.  And it started quite dramatically!  I was reminded of the opening sequence to Star Wars, where suddenly dramatic brass music plays while a brief exposition is given, and then the audience is thrown directly into the middle of the core action- «in media res» as it's called.  The opera was “Die Tote Stadt” by Erich and Julius Korngold between 1916 and 1920.  It a fascinating psychological drama about a man who’s beloved wife has been dead for nearly a year, but the man Paul has become obsessive in his mourning, spending all of his time admiring huge paintings of her that he keeps in a special room in his house, along with other treasures that remind him of her- including somewhat creepily, a full wig of her long golden hair.

By happenstance however, while he was walking along the river banks in the city of Bruges (where he used to walk with his wife) just one day prior to the opening of the play, he met a woman with a very similar name and appearance to his wife, also walking along the river banks.  He convinces this woman, Marietta, to meet him socially at his home, and the play begins with Paul, his maid, and his best friend eagerly waiting to meet this mystery woman.  She turns out to be not only a very pretty woman, but also a vain, sexually flirtatious, and jealous woman who deliberately, but capriciously seduces Paul while he becomes more and more convinced that this woman somehow IS his long lost wife, mysteriously back from the dead.  Her flirtatious nature however makes her sought after by all of the men in Paul’s social circle, and he rapidly becomes quite jealous and infatuated with her- eventually falling into a prolonged feverish state where he ultimately dreams of them having a terrible relationship- him constantly criticizing her for failing to be his beloved wife, and she constantly disappointed and bored with his split attention between her and his wife’s memory.

The conflict comes to a head when in the dream he strangles Marietta to death using his wife’s hair as a rope.  When he finally wakes from the dream he finds himself with an opportunity to woo the real Marietta as he did in the dream, but rejects the opportunity knowing now how that would turn out, but also finally letting go of the oppressive obsession he has had with his wife’s love which had been making him feel guilty about moving on.  He finally decides to leave Bruges, the dead or “silent city” from which the opera gains its title.  Paul’s experience is a bit like Ebenezer Scrooge from “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens, as his obsessions come to influence his dreams, but his dreams also provide a path to understanding, and by the end he is a changed man for it.

The acting was fantastic, the technical elements of the production were very impressive, the stage direction clear and understandable, and then of course the singing was literally some of the very best that there is in the world, with an incredible score in the background being provided by a magnificent live symphony orchestra.  Dimitri had been a little worried that we might find opera boring, and in particular he was concerned about the possibility that the music of this one might be a little boring as he was not familiar with this particular one (this opera is actually somewhat rarely performed for a few reasons: the plot complexity, and particularly the difficulty of the singing; only the very best operatic singers can manage these particular parts) but honestly I found the music of the opera to be really fantastic, something I would listen to again.

It really was an incredible experience, to attend a world-class opera with a perfect view next to an expert on opera, and I’m glad Nick and I seized the moment to do something like this.  After the show we all met back up with Maria and together went to a bar that Maria informed us had the largest mirrors of any bar in Europe, and I believe her.  Nick and I were getting quite tired though, so we agreed to all go back to our hostel room (remember all of this started as Maria and Dimitri were our roommates) where they convinced us to stay up bit longer having really excellent conversation while eating some delicious snacks that they had with them.

In the morning I had to rush to pack my things after sleeping in a bit, as we needed to check out of the hostel by 1000h.  We managed to do it just in time, and then after storing our stuff in the hostel’s luggage room we went off in search of breakfast (delicious bagel sandwiches and coffee) and then to acquire an additional luggage piece for myself and some souvenirs for the two of us.  We enjoyed wandering around the oldtown area, but were nearly running out of major things to explore there, and time to explore with, when we discovered a museum we had been unable to find previously: Vienna Time Travel Tours 5D!

The museum offers a slightly campy, but nevertheless very effective historical overview of the city’s history, starting with its time as a Roman encampment during the era of Emperor Marcus Aurellius, and going past WWII to Austria’s eventual reforming as a democratic republic outside of the Soviet sphere of influence.  I actually really appreciated the chronological approach to the topics, as that was something sorely lacking in our other historical explorations- in fact we remarked that it really would’ve been great to have this be the first thing we did, and then afterwards go to the Hapsburg crypts and palaces, etc. as it would’ve given us a better understanding of where each puzzle piece we were examining fit into the overall puzzle.

The 5D element was also fun, combining 3D movies with a gimbalized pneumatic platform that creates rollercoaster like sensations, with elements of physical touch like wind, things moving underneath the seats or inside of the seats, and more- plus high-quality animatronic models and wax statues as well.  We do recommend it, even if it is a bit campy in places.

We got out of the museum experience with no time to spare, but unfortunately my back/leg sciatica problems were really starting to flare up hard, which then caused other problems.  I always experience a low level of pain in my life, just 24 hours a day, ever since my original injury in Afghanistan.  However, most of the time the pain level is low, and being something I’ve lived with for about three years now I’ve also gotten somewhat used to it; so generally my injury doesn’t affect me much and oftentimes other people don’t even know I have this problem.  Extended walking or standing however, or particularly heavy lifting, running, or other high-impact/high-strain exercise can make the pain much worse sometimes though, as well as reducing some of my motor control over the affected areas (mid-back, lower-back, right buttock, right leg and foot).  When the pain gets bad enough I’ll start to favor my left leg and eventually even limp, sometimes quite badly.  Limping however can put a lot of strain and work on that left leg, which then sometimes will get shin splints as a result, leaving me with two not very useful legs- not to mention intense pain.

Such was the case as we tried to get back to the hostel to pick up our stuff, and eventually I had to insist that we take public transit to get back to the hotel as every step I was wincing hard.  The U-Bahn got us back quickly though, and we gathered our things quickly and headed right back out the door.  As we took first the U-Bahn, and then the S-Bahn to the airport this gave me a little time to work out the shin split in the left leg, and take some ibuprofen and be off my foot with the right leg; all of which was necessary preperation for what was to come next.

When we arrived at the airport we still had quite a bit of distance to cover between the station and check-in, we didn’t know precisely where our airline’s check-in was, we needed to get through security, and then finally get to our gate- and we had about 15 minutes to do it all in.  Nick graciously offered to carry one of my two bags for me, and now despite the difficulties I was still experiencing with my back and leg, we ran through the airport transit station and through the airport itself, racing against the clock to catch our flight.  Almost immediately we realized we didn’t even know what terminal our airline was in, and almost ran to the wrong terminal, but thankfully we managed to catch a sign and correct our direction quickly.  We ran up several escalators and down long halls, looking like the scene out of “Home Alone”.  Finally, out of breath and sweaty, we made it to our gate just in time for our flight to be delayed by half an hour.

We flew through Dusseldorf, Germany where we had an hour layover which allowed us to grab food and a German beer, and then we got on another plane to Prague, Czech Republic!  This time our seats were in the very first row (Eurowings Airline doesn’t do first class seating) on a half empty flight, the other half being a troupe of about 20 drunk Germans who were yelling and clapping and generally acting like drunk people do, which I found slightly amusing but I think Nick found a bit irritating.  Thankfully though, they were all at the back of the plane, so we didn’t notice them much.  Meanwhile, since the plane had so many empty seats, we stretched out in luxury in the completely open first two rows of the plane.

Arriving to Vaclav Havel Airport, Prague we tracked down where our hostel would be for this leg of the trip, and “figured out” the public transit system in addition to getting some cash out in the local currency (Czech Republic is not on the Euro).  A little less than an hour later and we were coming out of the subway system directly in front of a huge national museum, and walking up the hill towards “Prague 1 Hostel” which presently became quite clear would be an amazing deal.  Unlike most of the hostels we’ve stayed in so far which have had a dormitory feel to them, this one is more like a large old apartment building, and we’ve got what’s essentially a three room apartment on the top (fourth) floor overlooking a beautiful garden in the middle of the city…  All for just $24 a night.  Freaking awesome!

We went out to celebrate, but had some difficulty finding a suitable bar- we had forgotten with all our traveling what day it was, and it was Friday night so every place was quite busy.  We also ran into some difficulty with what appeared to be unwelcoming attitudes towards Americans/tourists, as a few places tried to semi-politely explain to us there was no room in their establishment for us as we tried to enter- which seemed strange.  In America it’s up to the patron to decide if an establishment is too busy for them, not the staff.  Still, we’re not sure if we were really experiencing some kind of anti-American prejudice or not, we’ll continue to feel things out over the coming days.  Finally we did find a bar that at least didn’t outright refuse us (though they did inform us that there was only time for one beer before they closed) so we went in and ordered Pilsner-Urquels, which is one of the roughly 10 extremely famous Czech beers, the Czechs making a claim to be the inventors of beer even.  We were somewhat surprised to enjoy the taste, as neither of us would claim to be huge fans of pilsners, but we liked it!  Nick described the Pilsner-Urquel as being like “the Guinness of pilsners” for its heavier, creamier, somewhat nitrous like feel.

However, even the taste of the beers was somewhat soured by our first Czech bar experience: smoking is not only allowed inside the establishments, but would almost appear to be encouraged considering how nearly everyone (not an exaggeration) is constantly smoking a cigarette (also not an exaggeration) the whole time their inside.  That was pretty disappointing- in none of the other cities, in any of the bars we had been to (and we’ve been to quite a few! :-p ) was it like this.  In fact, the only place we saw any indoor smoking was St. Petersburg, and it was still rare there.

Well, it’s still all new to us, I’m sure we’ll find some cool places here soon!  It’s time for sleep, and hopefully some recovery for my back!

2017 January 11, 2150h Central European Time Zone

Sleep did not come easy.  Shortly after finishing up last night’s entry another backpacker type walked through the completely desolate Warsaw airport, and rather than sit in any of the seats that were anywhere else, chose to sit all of 10 meters from us in silence, occasionally grinning at us weirdly.  With an audience like that, we weren’t going to sleep anytime soon.  Eventually we mean mugged him hard enough that he wandered off to a more reasonable and safer distance of 100m instead of 10, but it took about an hour and a half for that to happen.  Then we tried to go to sleep, but between the cold environment outside the huge glass windows surrounding us, and the air conditioning that was constantly pumping through the vents above us, the floor got COLD.  Really cold.  I managed to get about an hour and a half of sleep in 20 minute stints before we both finally called it quits around 0400h.  We got our things together, put on warmer layers in the bathroom, and then managed to get a better nap of about 40 minutes before the airport started coming alive at 0500h.

We grabbed a great breakfast from the “Business Shark” café in the Warsaw Airport of egg and avocado bagel sandwiches with cappuccinos.  Then one super short flight later and we were landing in Vienna, Austria!  The first order of business after “taking care of business” was to figure out where we were going to sleep for the next two nights, because we hadn’t made those plans yet.  Yup, we flew to a foreign country without even bothering to ensure we wouldn’t be homeless.  Sometimes you just have to trust in the Force.  Nick managed to get some wi-fi on his phone and we selected the Wombats hostel not far from the center of town.

Next up was figuring out how to take the train to the hostel so we could drop off our bags before exploring.  It turns out this was no small task.  We found a ticket agent who let us purchase our train fares and then explained too rapidly how to actually get aboard the correct train, and we were too proud to go back and ask her for the instructions again, so we desperately hunted in vain for a comprehensible route map and departure schedule.  Language barriers weren’t the issue as most materials have English side-by-side with the German, and meanwhile I can decipher a enough written German words just looking at them to make do- no the problem was that the train system is complex and the materials provided really were insufficient, as they assume that the user already knows some basic facts about how the Viennese train system is organized.  We knew from our tickets that we were supposed to have a 0930h departure from the airport, but that was almost all of the useful information that was on our tickets- they were really more like receipts than tickets.  Time was ticking down, as we ran from platform to platform trying to figure out which train was which and where they were going, and if they were going someplace that could take us in the direction we needed to go.  It turns out that the train we needed didn’t actually depart at 0930h, but at 0945h instead, which we managed to figure out with about one minute to spare.  The discrepancy in the times didn’t seem to matter though, as there was no ticket taker or even an electronic gate to check us either on the S-Bahn or the U-Bahn we ultimately took to the hotel.

After checking in we dropped off our bags in the luggage room and set off in search of some interesting food.  Just a few blocks away from the hostel, and in the direction of the city center (called “first district”) we found a great place that did Tapas with a local flare called Sud Lander Bistro.  We ordered Serbian sausages, grilled pimento peppers, sautéed artichoke hearts, and squid stuffed with blood sausage, plus some grain that was a bit like couscous, along with some local beers we hadn’t heard of before but liked.  The food was absolutely delicious, and a between that and the incredible views we had already seen just in our short walk, we were rapidly learning to like Vienna, or Wien as it’s spelled in German.  As we worked our way through the meal I scanned a travel guide I had snagged from the hostel, and read out possible sites for us to see, which Nick and I then narrowed down and formalized into a list.  Nick then took the list and found the addresses for each site, and saved its coordinates in his phone for easy navigation later.

We decided that our first destination would be the Capuchin Crypt, where the bodies of the Hapsburg imperial family lay in state, and so we set off around 1230h.  It was deep underground but the crypt was surprisingly spacious and well lit, pleasant even.  The caskets and sarcophagi of the kaisers and their family members however were beyond impressive.  Usually giant metal structures, they were embellished with the most magnificent metal sculptures, carvings, reliefs, and more.  It was really fascinating to see just how truly regal these containers were- despite the massive amounts of wealth that was obviously required to create these caskets, they were not gaudy in the slightest, or even particularly ostentatious.  Of course there were two famous Hapsburgs who were notably missing, Marie Antoinette who was beheaded during the French Revolution, and Franz Ferdinand whose assassination triggered WWI.  Still, it was interesting to consider that this crypt was once the private domain of absolute monarchs who passed their power in hereditary fashion; and to imagine what it would’ve been like for young members of the Hapsburg family to come to the crypt knowing that it was their immediate ancestors who were contained so reverently, and that one day such honors would duly be bestowed on them.

After the crypt we walked to the Vienna Jewish Museum and spent well more than an hour examining the exhibits there.  It was a fascinating and eye opening gallery- they really don’t cover the Holocaust at this museum, despite the Holocaust (or Shoah as its known within the Jewish community there) being a particularly Austrian experience, along with Germany and Poland.  Instead they focus on the story of the multiple Jewish communities that had been living in Austria for the previous 1,000 years and then the experiences of Viennese Jews and Jews living in Vienna (two distinct concepts) since the end of the Shoah.  As I mentioned, Jews had a community here off and on for roughly a millennium prior to WWII, and as such the Jewish population there at the eve of the war was roughly 160,000 (if I’m remembering correctly).  After the war it was roughly 5,000 making it one of the only (if not the only) places declared by the SS to be Jew-free; something we saw quite sickeningly in one of the SS’s own internal charts being proudly presented with graphs of the rate of decline of the local Jewish population.  Learning about the plight that Viennese and other local Jews had suffered both before and since the Shoah was disheartening but important to know- the problem was not and is not only the Holocaust.  Progress does seem to be happening, but it’s a sad statement about how much hate continues to fill the world that an alert security guard stands on duty outside the museum at all times.

We felt very educated by our experience there, but eventually it was time for a pick-me-up and so we headed to Stephansplatz in search of coffee and pastries.  We found them in spades, as we sat in a what I can only describe as a department store of a bakery-café, overlooking the plaza with all its cool architecture and people, eating strudels.  From there it was just a 60 second walk across the plaza to its namesake: the St. Stephans Cathedral which towers over the first district with incredible Gothic architecture.  We found our way inside, stood awestruck at the incredible views from the interior, and then took a speedy elevator to the top of the belfry- 314 meters above the ground- and stood awestruck once more at the incredible views not only of the city, but also of the exterior of the cathedral visible from this position.

From there we walked to the church which is the headquarters of the Order of the Teutonic Knights, but they were closed, so we walked the block from there to Mozart’s house (and the several floors of museum on the levels above the one he rented).  It was interesting, but surprisingly a bit obscure compared to some of the other museums we’ve seen on our European adventure so far.  The best parts were the sections that detailed Mozart’s involvement in Freemasonry, and seeing his actual apartment and realizing things like, “Mozart used to look out of this window every day”.

We left the Mozarthaus and found the Archives of the Austrian Resistance but it turns out they really were an archive and not much of a museum, so we decided to hustle over to Beethoven’s apartment.  When we got there it was definitely dark and there were basically no tourists around as we pushed open the heavy wooden doors that led to the courtyard of the building.  From there we found a sign indicating that Beethoven’s apartment was on the 4th floor (5th floor by American counting- in Austria the ground level is the 0th floor) and so we pushed open that door to the stairs, and found them completely in darkness.  We figured we had come this far, so we started climbing the old stone spiral staircase in total pitch black.  Floor after floor we climbed with no light, wondering if this could really lead to a museum?  Finally we reached the top, found a door that opened into the light of the museum, and then were told by museum staff that with only 10 minutes till closing, we should really just come back another day.

We hustled back to the hostel from there and asked for some advice about what to eat, which led us to a pretty good Thai restaurant a block and a half away where I got red curry and Nick ordered some surprisingly spicy glass noodles.  We returned to the hostel to do laundry using actual laundry machines in the basement!  It’ll be awesome to have clean socks again.  So that’s where we’ve been sitting, typing up our journal entries, occasionally interrupted by a bevy of cute Spanish and Brazilian girls who needed help figuring out the washing machines.  I think Nick will probably go straight to bed after we’re done here, but I might try to go to the hostel bar to see what the vibe is like before cashing out myself.  Even if it’s pretty slow there, it’s been a great first day here in Vienna!

Prost!

2017 January 10th, 2209h Central European Time Zone

Well, once again I have way too much to catch up on.  It's difficult because every day is so loaded with events, which means that there's little time for writing, and then writing about the day's events takes more time to record all of it.  It's been a great few days though!

We arrived to Tallin around 1900h on the 6th, and immediately went to our hotel, the St. Barbara which was built over an only recently discovered crypt with hundreds of skelletons.  It's located across the street from Freedom Square, on the edge between oldtown Tallinn and downtown Tallinn, which was fantastic.  Nick and I became roommates once more, with a room on the ground floor with convenient access to the lobby, etc.  We had a late dinner in their restauant, which was a German pub located underground, and despite the great ambience and even waitresses wearing cool barmaid outfits, the restaurant was the one part of the hotel that I found lacking- it took absolutely forever for us to get our drinks and food, it was a bit expensive, and the portions were literally too large.  Still, it was cool to imagine the historical Baltic Germans while eating and drinking in this setting.

The 7th of January started off before dawn with a guided walking tour of oldtown, which was led by a smart lady with a wry sense of humor whose name was Miina Puusepp.  She took us first past the gigantic crystal cross erected to memorialize those who lost their lives fighting for the original Estonian independence (made out of crystal despite the freezing climate to remind everyone that freedom is fragile, and must be actively maintained), past the giant walls made of local limestone in the 14th century, and up the hill past the giant tower «Kiek in die Kurk» (if I'm spelling it correctly) which translates into «peak into the kitchens» because the watchmen could supposedly look down from the tower through the chimneys of the city's homes to see what the townsfolk were cooking.  We heard the bells ring with the song played at sunrise and sunset, and saw incredible examples of architecture from all of Estonia's periods: Danish, Baltic German, Russian Empire, Independence, Soviet Occupations, and the modern era.  We visited the oldest cafe in Tallinn, and also an apothocary which claims to be the inventor of marzipan deserts.  We saw incredible views from the top of high walls, and most of all: we were cold.  Absolutely freaking freezing!  It was snowing the whole time, which was beautiful and fun, but also an intense wind had picked up over the city and was whipping through the narrow alleyways and along the cobblestone streets with a vengence.  It was bone chilling- but a very fun adventure nonetheless.

The late morning and afternoon were spent in lectures taught by Dr. Kasekamp, who provided another brief overview of the 11,000 year human settlement of Estonia, as well as a much more detailed examination of the modern history of Estonia, after reclaiming its independence in the final days of the Soviet Union.  He had a lot of excellent material to cover, and I really appreciated his critical examination of the era- frankly acknowledging the difficulties the newly revitalized nation faced, without sugar coating things.

In the evening then Nick and I went to have dinner with Patrick and an Estonian woman he became friends with while in Tartu, who happened to be in Tallinn that evening.  We ate at a restaurant called Wabadus directly on Freedom Square, which had the most amazing soups: I got the best borsch I've ever had in my life, while Nick had an absolutely incredible pumpkin soup.  We also shared some garlic shrimp that was just perfect, and to top it off, we were very impressed at how reasonable the prices were too.  As we finished dinner, Patrick's friend texted a couple of her friends who lived in the city and invited them to join us, so shortly thereafter we met Kristel and Trinn, who were super cool.  Kristel was an accountant, but was quickly deemed our «translator» for her fantastic command of our two languages; while Trinn worked in protecting the historical buildings in Tallinn, but now would be our «tour guide».  As we talked with them Kristel taught me a few Estonian words while Trinn gave us the lowdown on local sites that were less «touristy».  Specifically, both ladies insisted to us that there was a bar just around the corner that was literally «legendary» and that it had a real creative devil of a shot there that they were infamous for, but that they would not think less of us if we were not brave enough to try it.

Their reverse psychology worked perfectly on the Trio, and minutes later we were opening the door to the Valii Baar where theres is always standing room only, and ordering three «Jellyfish» shots while the girls looked on in fascinated horror.  It's made with some kind of digestif liquer (like Jagermeister, but not actually Jager), possibly a mystery ingredient, and a very healthy shaking of Tabasco- the drops of which then become suspended in the translucent liquid and become more yellowish in color, looking startlingly like a fluffy little jellyfish floating around inside your shot glass.  We toasted with calls of «terviseks!» while most the of the bar looked on at us, and we tossed our glasses back with a single gulp each.  It was, no joke, one of the best shots I've ever had in my life.  In fact, my first reaction was to think it was some kind of joke that the girls had put us up to with how much fear they had talked up this drink.  But the whole bar, and particularly the girls all seemed legitimately impressed when we all put our glasses down without a sputter, but instead with smiles.

Patrick and his friend ended up calling it an early night, but Nick, Trinn, Kristel, and I stuck around to have another drink before they suggested that we go around the corner once more to a club called «The Kuku Club» which was having a 24-hour David Bowie music dance marathon to celebrate the anniversary of his birthday (and if I'm not mistaken, I had the understanding the club would repeat the marathon a few days later for the anniversary of his death in 2016).  Obviously, we were not about to say no to this.  So we went, and we danced, and we talked, and we danced, and we talked- until about 6am when we all left together to go get some pizza from a 24 hour place across the street, which in addition to pizza, featured drunk Estonian 18 year-old young men singing Estonian national songs at the top of their lungs, which we did our best to join in on.  We made sure the ladies left for home safely, and finally got back to the hotel room a little before 7am, where we just slept on top of our beds still in our clothes for an hour before we had to wake up for the next day's events.

The 8th of January had us groggily step out the door in time to join the group for an excursion to The Museum of Occupations, which describes the experiences of Estonians during its three back-to-back-to-back occupations: the Soviets, the Nazis, and the Soviets again- and the horrors they experienced under each one.  We actually had a private tour of the museum by one of the museum's top curators, and the narrative he told was stunning and passionate.  Hearing about the frank presentation of the atrocities endured at the time really helps one understand why the focus on Estonian independence is such a prominent feature of the culture.  Nick and I were both very glad that we decided not to skip the tour in favor of sleep- it was worth it.

Afterwards, we returned to the school building downtown for additional lectures.  We briefly contemplated skipping out on those, but decided that we could power through it with the help of the black tea provided at the school.  I think it's worth saying at this juncture that it was my distinct impression that several of our younger colleagues were under the mistaken impression at the beginning of the program that due to our age, we must be boring, and as such didn't invite us to very many of their «parties» which consisted of just pounding a bottle of liqour in a hotel room followed by unappologetic absence from large swaths of the program.  Despite their misimpressions, I think we've consistently proven that if you're tough enough, and yes, self-disciplined enough, you can in fact be both a great student AND have a much grander time than merely getting drunk.  As such, Nick and I simply stayed awake and actively participated in the very interesting lectures we had that day.

Both on the 8th and the 9th we recieved a series of lectures from Dr. Andrey Makarychev, on the topic of Russia's perspective on international affairs.  Dr. Makarychev was quite clearly an expert on the topic and really did an impressive job of illuminating both the macro cultural perspective of Russia (both its leadership and its people) and also examining several specific case studies which demonstrated Russian strategies to foreign policy in action.  I particularly appreciated the specifivity, which really got into technical details of how Russia attemtps to divide its policy opponents or arranges its propaganda campaigns.  It's easy for people who only know a little about foreign affairs to say something cliche like «Russia uses propaganda and election manipulation to advance their goals», it's another thing entirely to explain HOW it is done in a very technical manner.  His lectures were the latter, which made them very fascinating.

After the lectures were over for the day we finally went back to the hotel to shower and relax a bit.  Nick decided to stay back at the hotel to get some rest, but I was surprisingly still feeling some energy left in my system, not to mention being pretty hungry at that point, so I ended up walking around oldtown with Digeo, Chase, Ricardo, and Claire looking for food.  Somebody had looked up a bunch of Trip Advisor reviews of restaurants in the area, and when we bumbled into the Kompressor pancake house it was remembered that apparently this place had been reviewed as «legendary».  Given how awesome my night had gone the last time someone used the word «legendary», I was sold on it and we walked right in.  Pancakes in this part of the world refer to what most Americans call crepes, though slightly thicker.  I ordered a delicious pancake with smoked chicken, feta cheese, tomatos, and pesto sauce; but also got to try some of Claire's great strawberry and quark cheese pancake as a bit of dessert, along with a cappacino made with Vana Tallinn- the signature liqueor of Estonia that's a bit like Bailey's, but I would say more almond tasting.  Poor Diego however didn't totally understand what was going to be in the pancake he ordered and got one just chock-full of dairy products, when unfortunately for him he's lactose-intolerant.

After dinner some of us had indicated an interest in going ice skating, but when we actually got to the rink near Freedom Square, a few of the group ended up bailing, and so just Claire and I went.  It was great!  Unlike the ice skates I had rented in Oslo, these skates were inexpensive, brand new, and most importantly, actually good.  The ice itself was a bit uneven and pitted, but with skates this good it didn't matter much and I did much, much better than I had with the Trio in Norway.  Best of all was the view from the ice rink: it sat about one story up along the hill of oldtown, and so on one side it looked directly across the cobblestone street to some quaint germanic houses, and on the other side it looked up the hill to giant limestone walls with a tall medival church above it!  We skated until the rink closed at 2200h, and then decided to go exploring through the quiet city streets in directions our tour hadn't taken us.  We found our way to the top of the hill, and wandered around the tiny alleyways and tunneled passages, and found several incredible views from the top of the highest walls and ramparts, all covered in a couple inches of picturesque snow.  In particular I remember walking through a courtyard that had a streetlamp casting some bold shadows that looked exactly like a scene out of a Nikolai Chiryatev painting from the Erata exhibit we saw on our first day in St. Petersburg.

The morning of the 9th brought us back home, in a manner of speaking.  We visited the American embassy in Tallinn, which by international convention is considered to be a tiny piece of the United States inside the country of Estonia.  We had a short presentation there by the Foreign Service Officer in charge of public affairs, whose name was David, but quickly broke it down to an extended question and answer session about a wide range of issues, mostly dealing with careers in the Foreign Service.  It was really interesting, and I'm glad it was included in the tour.  I got a free souvenir out of it too, as they gave us some high quality Estonia/U.S. flag lapel pins, which I'll be proud to wear.

After the final lectures in the series given by Dr. Makarychev we recieved our certificates of program completion, and it was time for one final party- and boy was it something!  We were taken to the medieval guild hall of Tallinn, which now houses a museum dedicated to all things in Estonian history, but particularly features elements from the building's heyday as the guild hall.  We had a medium length tour which taught us about the traditions of the guild masters during the middle ages, the celebrations that were held in the hall, and the business these men conducted here.  One key element of business was the spice trade, Tallinn being part of the Hanseatic League.  To this end, they had an exhibit on the spices traded during that time, which included a game of sorts- a blind smell test of eight different medieval spices, which I volunteered myself to be the public guinea pig for.  Amusingly, but also somewhat frustratingly at the time, our guide (whose English was a bit slow) didn't seem to understand that I was actively involved in taking the smell test, and kept resetting the test on me, mid-test, making the process significantly harder!  With such a handicap, I only managed to correctly identify 6 out of the 8 spices, but that's still not bad.

The tour continued however into the great hall of the guild house, where we were all served a portion of a local beer, and a costumed young man and woman stood holding medieval musical instruments!  The woman had a tamborine, while the man had both bagpipes, and even a hurdy-gurdy.  While he played music for us, she taught us all the steps to the traditional dances that were performed in the hall centuries ago.  Patrick, myself, and Nick naturally were the first volunteers to get up and try the steps with her, and soon we had the entire group enthusiastically learning the dances, especially the «horse dance» where we danced «like horses».

Following the dance lesson, our minstrels guided us through the dark evening streets of vana Tallinn (the Estonian words for «old Danish town») still playing their musical instruments.  The Trio led the procession behind them, encouraging the whole group the leap and prance to the music as we wound along the cobblestones through the main village square (not to be confused with Freedom Square) and to the medieval inn which would offer us food and drink for the evening: Olde Hansa.  There the minstrels handed us off to other costumed hospitality providers who led us into the large house, and up the stairs to the dining hall we would eat our feast in.  We washed our fingers according to ritual tradition, had our tablemaster (Dr. Greb) break the bread and bless it with salt, and made a toast to our tablemaster by wishing his good health in Latin with cups of «Monk's Wife» (the strong brew that monks would make to keep them warm on cold nights since they had no wife to keep them warm).  Then we ate medieval foods which were all delicious- my favorite was the cruscader's lentil recipe.  Of course, this was all washed down with copious amounts of beer- honeybeer, spicebeer, and cinnamonbeer- in giant clay mugs clanged together and slammed down upon heavy wooden tables.  Dessert was packets of roasted almonds covered in cinnamon and honey, while the maids poured more beer and called us lords and ladies.  Meanwhile more medieval music played, and ancient medieval art adorned the walls around us, for a truly immersive experience!

The party continued on at other, more modern venues over the course of the night, which was all great fun until we got kicked out an Irish pub when some of our group brought some McDonalds french fries into the establishment in their drunken need for fried potatoes that were not conveniently available at the pub.  We were a bit bewildered by the proprieter's decision to evict us so suddenly and so sternly considering how many drinks we had bought and would've certainly continued to buy, but as we reflected upon the situation during our walk back to the hotel, we may have been much more rude than we thought we were by bringing the food into the pub.

In the morning everyone made their goodbyes to each other, with most of the group getting on ferries to Helsinki, which usually offers cheaper flights than Tallinn if your destination is the U.S.  For Nick and myself however, the U.S. is not yet our destination, so along with Claire (who is travelling to Germany to see her brother) and Patrick (who was just taking a much later ferry) we spent several hours exploring the more residential and industrial regions of Tallinn which we hadn't yet seen much of.  We found our way to a tiny bakery hidden away in a residential neighborhood- but by no accident, as the bakery was founded by an old friend of Claire's mother.  Sadly, the owner wasn't there, but we tried the baked goods and were VERY impressed with the Congo Bars and the macaroons.

We took a taxi back to oldtown, which we thought was surely going to involve vehicular manslaughter but thankfully did not, and purchased some souvenirs and then found our way to the post office so we could mail all of the souvenirs thus far acquired back home.  Finally, after a late lunch, it was time to part ways with Patrick and the remaining three of us headed for the Tallinn airport, where we then had to make our goodbyes to Claire.  Nick and I passed our short flight to Warsaw by playing a couple games of Viking Chess, which we hadn't tried before, but I found fascinating.  It helps that I was winning, I suppose :-p  Unfortunately however, during the flight Nick became a little concerned that he was coming down with something quick, as his energy was fading fast; and combined with the fact our stay in Warsaw was actually scheduled shorter than I had understood it to be, we ended up deciding that Nick need to get some sleep and exploring the city would have to be forgone this trip.

Thus it is that I sit here at 0120h in an otherwise completely dead airport in Warsaw, with Nick snoring softly on the floor next to the metal benches they have here, waiting for our 0650h flight to Vienna, Austria where our adventure continues.  It's time for me to do likewise as Nick though and catch a few Z's before the airport becomes noisy again.  In the meanwhile friends, as they said in the middle ages: vivat!

2017 January 6th, 1110h Russia Time Zone 2

Saint Petersburg has been awesome.  There hasn't been very much unstructured time at all here though, so obviously I haven't written anything for a few days, which now puts me in the challenging position of trying to catch up, but the bus is just pulling away from the station for our trip back into Estonia, so there should be some time to do it.

On the 4th of January we piled into the bus early in the morning for a 40 minute trip out of the city to Pushkin Town, so named for being the location of famous Russian poet Alexander Pushkin's lyceum education as a boy and young man.  The main attraction of Pushkin Town was the Summer Palace of Catherine the Great, which like the Winter Palace we visited the day before, has now been converted into an art museum.  While the art contained by the palace was very impressive (particularly they are known for their collection of 2nd and 3rd century Greek sculptures) it's really the palace itself and the grounds it sits on that takes one's breath away.  The Summer Palace has endured worse hardship than the Winter Palace in the years since its use by the Romanof family, particularly since it fell into NAZI hands during «The Great Patriotic War» whereas the Winter Palace remained just beyond the occupied region; but nonetheless it was simply stunning.  One really has to see it for themselves to understand just how magnificent these spaces are.  We also visited Paul's Palace (the unloved son of Catherine the Great) which was also marvelous, but there's only so many times that I can say these palaces are stunning, so I'll leave it at that.

I should mention some other people who have been part of our trip: first of all Svetlana our tour guide in Saint Petersburg.  She has been so incredibly friendly, useful, and so amazingly knowledgable about the city and its history.  In Saint Petersburg, each museum and major cultural site has very difficult exams that they offer, which must be passed in order to become a certified tour guide for that institution- and Svetlana has been certified in aproximately 20 different museums around the city.  Everywhere we go, every room we go in when we get there, Svetlana knows every imaginable detail about the original artifact or artwork, and the story of how it came to be presented in the museum.  It's incredible.  But as I mentioned, she's also just very friendly and helpful.  I grew up in a town with many Russian speaking immigrants, and there's a lot about Svetlana's looks, voice, and mannerisms that remind me of the older Russian women from my neighborhood as a kid, which is fun.

Then there's also Dr. Greb's wife, Nina, who I've heard so much about over the last couple years, but have finally had the opportunity to meet.  Nina is a resident Moscovite, and since Dr. Greb obviously teaches and advises my academic program in San Diego, their main opportunities to visit with each other currently is when Dr. Greb is leading a study abroad program, and then Nina will travel to spend time with him and his students during the program.  As such, she came up to Saint Petersburg with her high school aged niece, Katya, and they've been doing all the tours with us too.  Nina speaks a fair bit of English, though perhaps not quite comfortably, while Katya speaks almost none.  Nina's certainly done quite a bit to help us out communicating with locals and has a fun sense of humor, though I felt a little bad for Katya- kinda being dragged along to spend time with older, total strangers that she can't even really talk to at all.  There's really only one guy in our group, Dale Bullington, who speaks Russian with any degree of confidence at all and so he's tried to do a fair amount of mediating conversations from the rest of our group to her, but he can't be expected to be her personal translator all day, so since I'm comfortable trying to speak languages that I really don't speak at all by just looking up words as necessary and gesturing, I've tried to help her feel less like an outsider too as she spends all day listening to these Americans constantly yabbering in a foreign language.  It seems like she's got an artistic streak, and it seemed like she did the best job out of everyone of documenting by photograph all of the museums we've visited, so that was another more selfish reason to befriend her too.

Then lastly there's been a whole family of Estonians travelling with us: Mari-Anne is our program director for Saint Petersburg and Tallinn, similar to what Margot did for us in Tartu, but with the assistance of Svetlana as our dedicated tour guide for Saint Petersburg.  She's a lovely lady, very friendly and practical.  She's joined on our trip by her husband Mart, who is a human rights lawyer; and their two children: 9 year old Alexander, and college aged Astra (pronounced more like Austra or Ohstra).  Alexander is just the cutest kid ever- he doesn't speak much English, but makes up for it with energy and playfulness.  My roommate Diego has become Alexander's best friend apparently, and basically wherever Diego goes, Alexander goes.  We joke that Alexander is Diego's kid, and so sometimes if Alexander is running around crazy or being loud someplace, we jokingly yell at Diego to «control his child.»  Astra was a little bit reserved around the group for the first day or so, but by the time we finished our tour of the Summer Palace on the 4th, she and I were having a great conversations and she has been the life of the party since.  She's stunningly pretty and very interesting (she's an aspiring classical music composer, for example) and so now that she's opened up to everyone, she's often found holding court, surrounded by the guys from our group- which I think she's enjoyed very much.

When we returned from our tours on the 4th I asked Svetlana and Nina for help arranging some plans for the next day, which I'll come back to shortly, and then Nick and I sat down to fight with the horrible wi-fi in the hotel to make our travel plans for after the study abroad program ends.  We're on the bus to Tallinn, Estonia right now which is where the program will conclude on the 10th, whereupon almost all of the students will return to the United States.  Nick and I however, will continue on- traveling first to Warsaw, Poland; then to Vienna, Austria; and then to Prague, Czech Republic.  We'll part ways in Prague, where he'll go to Amsterdam briefly and then fly back to LAX; while I'll go on to Kiev, Ukraine; and then fly back to the U.S. but to Washington D.C. where I'll be testifying at an important hearing for a close friend of mine.  After spending a few days in D.C. I'll then finally return to San Diego, where my classes for the spring semester will have already been in session for a week- and then almost immediately go on a ski trip in California that a good friend of mine and I planned a couple months ago… meaning I'll have a good bit to get caught up on when I finally settle in.

Figuring out our plans, and then actually purchasing the tickets was significantly more difficult than we had hoped, and took much longer than we had wanted to, so we were starving and had missed out going out for dinner and drinks with the group.  We managed to get some information about what restaurant the group was at in the city, and tried to find them, but it turns out there was some miscommunication and we were never able to find the rest of the group so we found an interesting looking Irish pub that was underground, and had some great Russian food with excellent Irish beer.  It was funny though- we had a cute waitress to whom we were trying to order food and ask questions in Russian, but despite not speaking much English she clearly spoke more English than we did Russian, and almost every single time before we could even begin to sound out a word to her she would cut us off with exactly whatever we were about to ask her for, in English.  It got to a point of feeling almost like mind reading- we would just start to open our mouth and she would suddenly say exactly whatever it was we wanted to know about, in English.  Maybe she just didn't want us to butcher her language, but in any case we all thought it was pretty funny- her included.  Oh, there was also a group of pretty friendly Russians sitting in the booth behind Nick who got into a playful little war of pranks with him; stealing Christmas decorations from each other, back and forth, which was fun.  We were glad that they were friendly though, because the USA-Russia hockey game was on, and we were winning.

Walking along the city streets both to and from the pub was certainly an interesting experience- first off, Saint Petersburg is COLD.  It's gotten progressively colder as the week has gone on, starting around -10 celsius, and now hovering around -20 degrees.  There's also a fair amount of wind, and humidity in the air, meaning that after just a few seconds of being outside you start thinking of ways to get yourself back inside.  Or at least that's what Nick and I thought.  Apparently St. Peterburgians don't mind having their face exposed to the air as they walk along, and the women don't think twice about wearing stiletto heels on the icy sidewalks.  Of course, this is just early January.  I mean, I've certainly experienced this kind of cold before; every winter growing up in Boston.  The difference is, this is the coldest it would get in Boston, at the worst part of the winter.  This is the semi-mild part of the Saint Petersburg winter, I don't want to think about what the temperature will be in early February.  Boston does get quite a bit more snow than Saint Petersburg though, I suppose.

It's not just the cold that's interesting though- it's how busy the city is.  Even as Nick and I returned to the hotel around 1am the streets were completely busy with cars, lights were on everywhere, and the city sidewalks were completely packed with people busily walking to and from places.  Many of the bars, restaurants, grocery stores, and more operate 24 hours a day.  Saint Petersburg is a city of five million people, and so it has a distinctly big city feel to it, especially in comparrison to our previous stop of Tartu.

Yesterday morning, the 5th of January, we went to the National Ethnographic Museum which was another stunning building.  It could easily be confused as another converted Romanof palace, but in fact it's actually a modern building built expressly to house the museum.  The Ethnographic Museum is essentially a museum of the cultural artifacts and traditions of the different nations within the Russian borders and former Soviet territories (Russia being a multinational state, like the U.S., after all).  Our guide for the tour wasn't Svetlana this time (though she still provided interesting commentary throughout) but did show us a lot of interesting traditions from various folk styles, and in particular taught us a lot of fun children's games.  We played games that were like «Simon Says» «Duck, Duck, Goose» and «Ring Around the Rosy» but each was distinctly its own game.  I also wandered around a bit to find the exhibit they had on Uzbek culture since one of my best friends is Uzbek; and then I tried to watch this incredible dance performance being put on by children and youth in the main hall, but unfortunately I was totally out of time and couldn't even discover which national culture the dance was from.  They actually sent in Alexander to duck and dive between the legs of the crowd to find me and pull on my shirt to tell me it was time to go.

We returned to the hotel around lunch time, but didn't take lunch.  Instead, everyone learned about the plans that I had been arranging with Svetlana and Nina the day before.  We were scheduled to attend a ballet at the Saint Petersburg Ballet later that night, but since most of us travelled without any formal clothing (the Trio traveled with just a single backpack each, for example) I had worked with Svetlana and Nina to find places where men could either rent tuxedos or buy suits, and the ladies could likewise find evening gowns or dresses.  Nina had made a great number of phone calls on my behalf calling various places to find what would work, and ultimately took the larger portion of our group who wanted to purchase suits or dresses, while Svetlana helped the smaller number of us who were interested in renting tuxes figure out the complicated logistics of how that would work.  Once the options were communicated to the group, we split off to go actually acquire our choices.  Oh, I should mention that as we made our goodbyes to Svetlana who we wouldn't see again, Nick gave her a hug, to which she proudly remarked that she was excited to get a hug from «the hottest American guy!» in her words.  We all got a pretty good chuckle out of that- apparently Nick is the type for older Russian women!

Myself, Nick, Patrick, and Chase were the only ones who opted for the tuxedo route, so the four of us (which I soon after dubbed «The Four Horsemen») hopped in a taxi and found the shop.  It was a small shop on the third floor of an indoor mall, but the tuxedos and trappings on display were very nice indeed.  They even offered top hats!  Valentina, the proprietor, was expecting us after the phone calls from Svetlana and Nina, and so she immediately began pulling out jackets for us to try on for size.  It quickly became clear that she spoke just about zero English- in fact I probably speak more Russian than she speaks English- which made this quite the experience.  Getting fitted for tuxedos is already a bit of an adventure, domestically- doing it with a nearly complete language barrier was one hell of a challenge, but an exciting one!

I can't remember if I've already mentioned in this blog that Nick has done three semesters of Russian in university so far, but he still doesn't feel very confident with it.  However, between him occasionally recognizing a word that Valentina had said in the middle of a whole paragraph of her talking to us, my own limited Russian skills but willingness to try them out and a natural facility at picking languages up, and Patrick's good «caveman skills» of pointing at different objects and gesturing, the four of us managed to get everything sorted out well.  In the end things were a bit more expensive than we had originally understood them to be, but as we found the right ensemble of clothing pieces we each felt so sharp and Valentina called each of us «Superman».

We took the tuxedos in garment bags and headed out to the street level, where I managed to have enough Russian skill to badger a cab driver who didn't really want to let us in the car, into taking us back to our hotel.  He was a giant of a man, and almost a poster of what Americans might think of when it comes to a Russian taxi driver.  Once the vehicle started moving he asked us, «Your country, which one?» to which I replied, «America, U.S.A».  He grunted and made a face, clearly indicating that he was now regretting letting me convince him to open the doors.  Nick sarcastically chimed in with perfect timing, «Americans?  GET OUT.»  To which we all laughed, and even the driver got a pretty good chuckle.  Patrick or Chase then asked if America meant bad, to which the driver just shrugged his sholders without saying anything.  After a minute of silence, he quitely said «Trump, bump, bump» to indicate what he thought of America.  We didn't really understand what he was implying at the time, whether he liked Trump or not (as it's absolutely possible that people in Russia might like Trump), but in retrospect we've determined that he didn't think much of Trump, and was indicating that he wasn't impressed by a country whose people elected someone like Trump.  Of course, that's a little rich from a place that continues to show massive popular support for someone like Putin, but it doesn't invalidate his opinion either.  Once he was convinced that we were neither Trump supporters nor dastardly Americans in general he started trying to act a bit of a tour guide as we passed various sites, saying things quite simply like, «children's theater» while pointing out the window at something.

We arrived at the hotel and after giving him a generous fare we went up to our rooms to pack for the next morning's departure, and to get ready for our night out on the town.  We agreed to meet up for a drink at 1740h in the hotel's top floor bar which has impressive views of both the orthodox cathedral across the street, and the seven floor indoor shopping center directly behind the hotel.  The four of us arrived in our tuxedos, perfectly coiffed and ready for the evening, each of us drawing eyes from everyone we passed, especially all the ladies.  Nick had a White Russian, Patrick a Black Russian, Chase some kind of whiskey; and I ordered a Killer Instict as it sounded both appropriate to the James Bond vibe we were not only feeling but hearing (Chase had 007 soundtracks playing from his phone in his jacket pocket), but also the ingredients sounded right up my alley: vodka, tequila, cherry juice, grenadine, shaken over two ice cubes.  It's a strong, blood red drink they served to me in a high-ball glass.  I had return something to my room quickly, and we were out of time as we were instructed to meet everyone in the hotel lobby at 1800h sharp, so I just took my drink with me through the halls, eventually sauntering out of the elevator to the rest of the waiting group- dressed to the nines, drink in hand.  It was fun to get so many gasps of «wow» like that!

Our bus zipped through the icy St. Petersburg streets until we arrived at the Saint Petersburg Ballet for our viewing of «The Bronze Horseman», the story of which focuses on the life of two residents of the newly founded city of Saint Petersburg, and the changes the city went through.  We actually visited the real Bronze Horseman on the 3rd of January- a gigantic and impressive statue of Peter the Great (founder of Saint Petersburg) atop a rampant horse.  Some of the group dropped their heavy coats off at the coat check, and then we milled about for a while enjoying the architecture of the theater and people watching.  Certainly there were lots of people who were people watching us, as the Four Horsemen strode around together, glasses of champagne in hand.  A lot of photos were taken, including a number of strangers who thought it would be awesome to get a photo with this dapper young Americans.  In one instance, Nick was in such a rush to accept a pretty young lady's request for a photo that his tuxedo shoes slipped on the marble floors and he nearly went bowling into her.  Thankfully no harm was done, and everyone thought it was hilarious.

The ballet itself was fantastic- the Saint Petersburg Ballet company demonstrated to us that they truly are world class, if somehow their reputation hasn't already preceded my review to you.  Everything, lighting, costumes, stage effects, sound, and of course: the dancing, were all truly excellent.  I will say that while there were songs that I found quite good, in general I found the music of The Bronze Horseman to be less interesting than other ballets I've listened to, but the story was quite interesting.

A young man and woman who live in St. Petersburg right at the time of its founding fall in love, but then the Neva River floods and other disasters strike (it was a little unclear to me if the war campaigns of Peter the Great are supposed to be among these disasters) separates the man and woman, and the woman dies during the cataclypse.  The man meanwhile is shipwrecked in a deserted place and slowly goes mad with loneliness, dreaming of his lost love.  Eventually the city enters a period of peace and rapid growth which catches up to the madman, who now lives as a beggar in its streets.  He sees the statue of The Bronze Horseman which has been erected in Peter the Great's honor after his death, and eventually becomes convinced that all his woes are Peter's fault- and even begins to blame The Bronze Horseman itself as the personification of Peter, for his lost life.  The statue torments him in his frenzied dreams, and eventually he dreams himself trampled to death by the bronze horse- and dies in real life.  Then the city continues to grow and expand in a period of Pax Russia and ends on a «happy note».

Of course it's only a happy note because audiences desperately need something to clap for at the end of the show, and to end on a fully sad note would make the author's criticism of Russian culture too obvious, so the author kills two birds with one stone: making the ballet palatable to the masses, and obscuring his critique that as long as Russians are fed and safe they're too willing to forget history and ignore tragedy.

My only complaints with the experience were that it was far too warm inside the theater, making it difficult to stay awake despite how engaging the performance was; and that the man sitting next to me was on his phone all the way through the first and second acts, until I finally hissed at him in Russian in the third act to knock it off.  He was the only one in the entire audience that I could see doing something like that, and somehow he thought the bright light of his phone wouldn't distract the people around him in the dark hall?  Fortunately he did put his phone away, and even apologized, which is something I hadn't seen any Russians do the whole trip.

After the ballet we all returned to the top floor bar at the Hotel Doestevsky for food and drinks, late into the night.  Early on it was decided that we would toast with a shot of vodka, to which Dr. Greb asked me to provide the speach for, having done this kind of thing well at past events.  I was caught a little off guard, and struggled to find the words for a minute while everyone looked at me waiting for me to say something, and then finally I toasted us to, «New friends in far away places, and close friends in close places».  We had a grand time, and overall it was fantastic to end our trip to Saint Petersburg in such style.

Diego still had some packing to do after the party ended, so we didn't get to sleep until about 0400h, but not before discovering a crisis.  The day before we had both put our passports inside the hotel room safe, and I had locked the safe with a code of Diego's choosing.  Just before 0400h though, Diego tried to open the safe and it wouldn't open.  He tried several times, and nothing happened.  We were a little too tired to worry about it then, so we decided to just go to sleep, but it certainly laid heavy on our minds.  When we woke up at 0800h, he tried again, and still nothing.  I had him try a code that I might've thought of- I was pretty sure that I had locked it with his code, but maybe I hadn't?  That didn't work either.  I told him to try permutations of his code, nothing was working.  Now maybe, it was time to panic- we were leaving Russia at 0945h, sharp.  Diego started just pushing random numbers into the key pad, nothing nothing nothing CLICK!  The safe door swung open, and our passports were there for the taking!  Considering it's Christmas Eve in Russia (they don't do Christmas on Dec 25th, instead it's after New Years) this fully qualifies as a Christmas Miracle.

Well, we've crossed the border back into Estonia, where we'll continue on to Tallinn to finish off the program.  It's snowing here in the countryside, very picturesque.  I'm pretty tired though, so I might try to get some sleep as we still have a couple hours until we arrive- I'll try to post this entry when we get to the hotel there.  New adventures await!

2017 December 3rd, 2230h Russia Time Zone 2

It’s been a busy couple of days!  New Year’s Eve was a blast.  I spent it dancing all night at a tiny but absolutely packed club that required a secret password to get in, which we managed to get by just asking other people walking up to the club.  After finally collapsing into my bed in the hotel room around 0600h, I slept until the mid-afternoon, unfortunately missing out on an excursion that Nick went on exploring a section of Tartu that we hadn’t been to before- a section of the city still built out of wooden houses.  I was glad to get the sleep however, though when I woke up I was definitely ready for food, so after showering and getting ready I went in search of an open restaurant.  I found a really awesome Asian place called “Hot Pot” near campus that offered an incredibly vast menu of Indian, Chinese, Thai, and more; and then amazed the servers by ordering and then eating what was essentially two large dinners for myself and then eating all of it.  I mean, I hadn’t eaten in about 24 hours (not counting alcohol consumed) and had burned who knows how many calories in the roughly six hours of dancing and four hours of walking I had done in that time.  I’ve had trouble with my card being accepted in Estonia, so when it didn’t work at the restaurant I just left my phone as collateral while I wandered off to an ATM to withdraw cash to pay the bill with, which thankfully was no problem and the restaurant was also cool about it.  Afterwards I returned back to the hotel in time to go out for drinks and dessert with my professor Dr. Greb, Nick, Kyle Rasmussen, and our incredible Tartu program director Margot and her awesome boyfriend.  We had a lot of really fantastic conversations with them- talking with Margot about life in Estonia has been one of my absolute favorite things about this trip so far.
After a bit of bar hopping with them, we made our goodbyes to them and returned to the hotel around 0100h to pack.  Nick and I efficiently did so, and at 0200h we were in the lobby, and then directly onto our bus which would take us across the border and into Russia!  The bus was fairly comfortable being another luxury bus (like the one we took from Tallinn to Tartu- unlike the one we took from Oslo to Stockholm) and I got at least a couple hours of sleep on the ride.  

Eventually we had to get off the bus to go through Russian border control, which the rest of the students were clearly anxious about given their uncontrolled nervous joking and laughing.  Frankly, I found it quite annoying.  Their jokes weren’t funny in the first place, and secondly were a really bad idea.  It seems to me that many of the students fail to be aware of their surroundings; there were (obviously) many, many Russians aboard the same bus as us; and even if not all of them understand English perfectly (and I’d confidently bet that a great many of them understood English well enough) it still doesn’t take a genius to realize that these jokes were totally insensitive stereotypes about the nation that was about to graciously host us, especially given the current international tensions.  It’s interesting- in the past I’ve somewhat resented the idea that Americans are seen as bad travelers because I couldn’t imagine behaving in any other manner than politely whenever I travel- even domestically.  But sadly, I’ve seen for myself in a couple instances with some classmates why the stereotype of the dumb, loud, rude Americans might exist.  There’s been some of that.  I don’t mean to criticize my classmates too hard- mostly they’ve been great, but there have been at least a couple of them that have consistently shown their ass on this trip, and a couple more who have had some bad moments.  But I shouldn’t throw stones- I’ve probably had some bad moments too but can’t see them easily due to egocentric bias.

In any case, border control was not a difficult process, or even a particularly interesting one.  In fact, my description is simply: efficient but repetitive, as we had to present our passports some three or four different times.  When we finally arrived to Saint Petersburg the sun was starting to come up, revealing snow both on the ground and in the air!  We were definitely excited to start seeing snow in some significant amounts.  We changed buses to our tour bus, where our tour guide Svetlana took us directly to have a meal at a restaurant that may have been called “The Belorussian” but I can’t remember for certain.  It was interesting for its décor- all commemorating the defeat of Napoleon when he made his invasion into Russia- but frankly the food and service at that restaurant were startlingly bad.  The snow was a nice first impression of St. Petersburg, but the restaurant was a particularly bad second impression.

I think we were all feeling a bit skeptical about what our stay here would be like; especially as it began to dawn on many of the students that Russia would not be anywhere near as English-language friendly as Estonia had been, and most of the students had little Russian skills and those who had been bragging that they did were now facing the reality that they had far less than they had previously advertised.  Fortunately however, Saint Petersburg was determined to give us a third impression that would impress us again.  We went to Erarta, which is Saint Petersburg’s museum of contemporary Russian art, and it was truly awesome!  We had a fantastic tour guide, a young man who was apparently a genuine fan of the arts and knew his art history extremely well.  He did an excellent job of providing context as we visited quite a few of the museum’s many different exhibits; and helping us understand how to interpret and interact with the art.  Almost all of the art seemed truly thoughtful and considered compared to some other modern art galleries I’ve visited, and some of it was extremely provocative and critical of Russian culture and government (particularly the Soviet government).  Out of all the exhibits that I wandered through though, I particularly loved the exhibit they had of Nikolai Chiryatev’s work- incredible light and dark contrast in realistic oil paintings of mundane St. Petersburg streets at night.

After our time in the museum concluded, we finally went to our hotel, the Hotel Dostoevsky (so named because of the author’s propensity to spend time in this neighborhood) and checked into our rooms.  We were assigned new roommates, and so I’m rooming with Diego Avila, whom I didn’t know previous to the trip, but has really impressed me as a cool guy.  It turned out that I got less sleep on the bus than I thought I had, and so while he and most of the others apparently went out for dinner, drinks, and a great time; I crashed in the hotel room and slept for about 10+ hours until the next morning.

I woke up feeling refreshed however, and after breakfast in the hotel’s restaurant I got my things together for the day’s events.  First up was a bus tour of the city, notably including an opportunity to walk both around and inside of Saint Nicholas the Miracle Worker’s church.  It’s amazing sky blue color and absolutely jaw dropping to look at, both on the outside and on the inside.  I may be wrong, but I’m vaguely under the impression that the patron saint of this church is the same as the Saint Nicholas of Santa Clause lore- but I could definitely be wrong about that.  In any case, being a Nicholas myself (my name is Nicholas S. Colin Campbell, for those who didn’t know my full name) I have a certain natural inclination to like this miracle worker guy, whoever he is.  What I do know about him for certain is that he’s a patron saint of sailors, and St. Petersburg being a “city of two anchors” for its seaport and riverport, this church is sometimes known as “the naval church” of the city- and all religious rites involving naval affairs are conducted at this site- for example the funeral for the Russian submariners who sank a few years back.

After visiting the naval church, we visited another interesting naval site: the Aurora, an impressive gunboat commissioned by the last czar of Russia- Nicholas II- but continuing in service all the way through WWII.  It’s most famous however for “firing the first shot of the Russian revolution” in the form of a blank cannon cartridge being the signal to revolutionaries in the city to attack and arrest the provisional government then seated.  We had a tiny, elderly Russian woman there as our guide, who gave a truly impressive tour of the ship.  She was a little girl during the siege of Leningrad (residents typically refer to the city by the title it had during the era they are making reference to) and clearly felt a great deal of pride in the ship and its crew.  She spoke with such passion and patriotism for the men of the Aurora (in both its Czarist and Soviet service) that it was infectious, and it was interesting to me to realize that this might be what it’s like for foreigners who come and visit the USS Constitution or the Gettysburg battlegrounds.  I also particularly enjoyed the military history and nautical history elements of the ship, as those are both particular interests of mine.  I’ve found that ever since my own military service, I’ve found it much easier to understand the significance of various military and armament terminology, and to imagine myself in the shoes of the poor souls who had to swab the decks and stand long hours on post.

We then had a quick lunch in a café that was MUCH better than the lunch we had at The Belorussian.  I got a cold calzone sort of thing with potatoes, cheese, and mushrooms that was pretty good, as well as a café latte- Peterburgians don’t seem to much fans of drinking water, but there’s always a wide variety of other things to drink with meals.

Finally it was on to the main event of our whole trip to Saint Petersburg: The Hermitage and Winter Palace.  Words will utterly fail to describe this place.  Such incredible opulence, elegance, wealth, and craftsmanship in every nook and cranny, in every direction, for two million square meters.  Yes, two MILLION square meters.  The architecture astounds at every turn; the walls, ceilings, floors, moldings, furniture, doors, windows, chandeliers, and everything else you can think of are mind bogglingly ornate; and then there’s the “actual art collection” which is one of the largest and most respected art collections in the entire world.  Sculptures, tapestries, mosaics, frescos, paintings, jewelry, costumes, dioramas, and more- much, MUCH more!  We spent several hours there, and I may have glanced at as much as 15% of the museum?  If I’m lucky?  The pictures that my friends and I have collectively posted to Facebook cannot be considered to represent anything more than %1 of the museum- if they can even be said to represent the art and museum at all, as it is nowhere near an exaggeration to say that pictures do not give the same impression of any of the things I’ve mentioned as seeing it in person.  It’s like the Grand Canyon…  I had seen pictures of it all my life, but actually seeing it with my own eyes was a totally different, and vastly more impressive experience.  The same with The Hermitage.

Myself and a few others stuck around the museum until closing time, and then walked back through the surprisingly throng-filled St. Petersburg streets to the hotel.  Myself, Nick, and Nicky got some Italian food next door while we decompressed the intense sightseeing of the day, while Nick and I also planned more of our logistics- mainly planning to plan certain specific details the next day, come hell or high water.  Afterwards, we returned to the hotel, and I spent some time fighting with the wi-fi to catch up on social media before giving up and working on this journal.  It’s now 0100h on January 4th, so I should get some sleep, but I’ll try to get this posted to the blog first.  Hope all is well for all of you back at home in the States- I’m doing great out here!  :-)

2016 December 31st, 1845h Eastern European Time Zone

Today we didn’t have any classes, but we did have some cool field trips.  We started with a historical tour of Oldtown, Tartu; which was really interesting.  Tartu (and Estonia, and the Baltics in general) has long endured the refining effects of the crucible of conflict- frequently there are tragedies, but there are some interesting ways in which the city and culture has rebuilt stronger each time.  In particular on this tour, I found it interesting that after the city was bombed nearly to rubble during WWII, that the city planners decided to mark the ground to preserve knowledge of the location of the original streets and buildings.  As a result, when one walks around near the University in Tartu, the cobblestones are of two distinctly different colors, which serve as a map for where the streets used to run.

After the tour we hustled back across Oldtown to just behind our hotel to visit the Ahhaa Science Center, an AWESOME and very hands on science museum.  It was so much fun!  We went to a planetarium show, and walked through an optical illusion tunnel that made us cling to the railings thinking we were going to fall off even though it wasn’t moving.  I rode a bicycle across a wire suspended 20 meters in the air.  We had private conversations from across gigantic and crowded rooms just by whispering, thanks to carefully crafted acoustics.  I lifted up a car with almost no effort (a small car, but still a car) using a gigantic fulcrum.  I saw carefully preserved brains in jars, as well as hearts, lungs, livers, fetuses, and even a pig fetus that had two heads.  I flew a fighter jet in a fully gimbalized flight simulator, doing barrel rolls and loop-de-loops.  I made a stop-motion animation film using Lego’s.  And so much more!  It was a blast!

We had a late lunch there, and then most of the class wandered off afterwards, though I stuck around to play with more of the exhibits.  I finally left around 1615h, and wandered over to the nearby shopping malls to find myself a small lightweight backpack to use as a day bag.  I managed to find one- a bright neon yellow Adidas bag for just $10 that will do the job quite nicely, though I kinda wish I could’ve found it in a different color as it really clashes pretty hard with the rest of my clothes.  At least it’ll make it easy for my friends to spot me out in a crowd, and it’ll be easily visible in the many hours of darkness.

I came back to the hotel after buying the bag, and have spent some time getting ready for tonight- New Year’s Eve!  I’ve prepared my suit and gotten spruced up, so in less than an hour we’ll all go as a class to have dinner at a fancy place called Atlantis that hangs over the river.  Amusingly, as we learned on the tour this morning, sometimes during the spring the river overflows violently, and a few years ago after Atlantis was first constructed the river flooded to historical levels- putting Atlantis under water.  After dinner the plan is to go to this local student pub called “Genialistide” that’s infamous for serving a shot called “Sparta” that supposedly just knocks everyone who tries it on their ass- and I’ve been dared to try one.  I’m drinking plenty of water now in preparation for the evening, because supposedly all of Oldtown Tartu turns into a gigantic and wild party, so I’m expecting that I’ll have a good amount to drink but there’s no need to be irresponsible about being irresponsible.

I certainly hope that wherever you find yourself as we transition calendar years today, that you are in good health and good spirits, with good plans for the coming year and good reasons to hope it will be a successful year for you!  I certainly am and do!

Happy New Year, and remember: be excellent to each other, and party on!

     Terviseks, from Estonia!

2016 December 30th, 1940h Eastern European Time Zone

Ahhh…  right now I’m taking a load off my feet, sitting in big comfy chair, drinking a local Estonian honey beer called “Saku” (comes in both light and dark versions, drinking the light at the moment), and listening to classical piano music being performed live across the room.  It’s the jazz club café that’s below our classrooms, and it’s rapidly becoming the go-to hang out spot here for its convenience, good food at good prices, excellent service, and fantastic ambiance.  It’s a nice way to relax after a good but grueling day of intellectual and physical effort.

After finishing my last entry I shaved my neck with a razor I had bought at a supermarket the day before, and dried some still damp laundry using the blow dryer included in the room, and then woke Nick up at 0800h so we could get breakfast before heading to school.  He wasn’t exactly happy about it, but one cool thing about him is that he’s at least professional about it- he just does whatever it is he’s got to do, even if it’s not pleasant.

We got to school just in time for class, this time taught by Professor Eoin McNamara who is an Irish PhD student here at the University of Tartu, and a regular contributor to international periodicals on the topic of his expertise, which is NATO related security affairs.  His lecture was a long one- more than three hours long, but certainly an interesting and relevant topic: the intersection of NATO, Estonian, and Russian concerns, and the history of NATO expansionism in the region.  It’s certainly an interesting story of how Estonia went from being a member of the USSR until 1991, all the way through a long but determined path to membership in NATO by 2004.

After 3+ hours of lecture dense with material however, we were definitely ready for a lunch break though.  I ended up spending lunch with Professors Eoin and Greb in the jazz club after mentioning to them how much I liked it, where we continued to talk about international security issues, but also a bit about differences in higher education pedagogies and graduate studies between various nations.

After lunch we returned to the classroom to watch a documentary titled “The Singing Revolution”, obviously about the revolution of that name- the absolutely incredible story of how Estonia literally, LITERALLY sang its way to freedom from the oppression of the USSR.  It was stunning, and I highly recommend the movie.  After it was done, our program director Margot spoke a little about her own personal experiences as a youngster during the transition period between the Soviet era and regaining Estonian independence.  Estonia may be an almost unknown name to most Americans, but from all I’ve been learning I’ve been very impressed with the bravery and good character of the Estonian people, especially in the face of all the suffering they faced.

Almost immediately after we were hurried onto a bus which took us across town to the Estonian National History Museum, which was a massive and very modern installation that covers the history of this region of the world, from the stone age all the way through to modern times.  We had a tour guide who with seemingly characteristic Estonian humor zipped us through a whirlwind tour of the museum, but in the nearly two hours we were there we must have seen less than 15% of the museum.  I was particularly interested in the section they had on the linguistics of the populations originating in the Ural mountains, but the sections on the Protestant era, and of course, the Vikings, were also interesting.

We piled back in the bus towards the hotel, and then after a quick change of socks, Nick and I headed back to the school to listen to the classical performance and relax.  Since I’ve been sitting here typing some of our fellow students have shown up: Patrick, Claire, Morgan, and Kyle; and right now we’re all enjoying a nice relaxing start to the evening.  We might go out in search of a more energetic party in a little bit, especially as it’s Friday night, but we’re playing it by ear.  

Tomorrow will be New Years Eve, so we’ll see if I get time to write during the day at all, but it’s possible I’ll just try to catch up on the 1st.  In that case, a very Happy New Year to everyone!

2016 December 30th, 0600h Eastern European Time Zone

Yesterday Nick and I woke up promptly at 0745h, got ready, and went downstairs to the hotel café for breakfast.  Breakfast is simple here at the hotel, but good- bread and jam, scrambled eggs, bacon, even American cereal and milk is available.  Oh, and plenty of lox for the people who actually like that kind of stuff.  After breakfast we met up in the hotel lobby to be guided to our class location by Margot, but one of our students and a friend of mine, Andrew Hill, was nowhere to be found.  We waited for him for a bit, and finally sent his roommate up to go check on him- apparently he was still completely asleep!  What made it funny though, is that in his groggy reaction to his roommate Chase busting open the door and asking if he was ready, he responded that he thought we were all waiting on another student, Claire to show up.  Claire Schmitt had her flight into Tallinn from somewhere else in Europe the previous night abruptly cancelled, and so had to take another one and get her own bus ride to Tartu.  Funnily enough, after Chase came down and reported Andrew’s groggy blaming of sleeping in on Claire’s absence, Claire came strolling in the front door of the hotel, having just got off her bus!  Anyway, we’ve all decided that it’s a brilliant idea to tease Andrew by “blaming” Claire for anything that goes wrong at all during the rest of the trip.

Margot led us through the city streets of Tartu, past several brand new shopping malls, across the river, and through medieval plazas to the school: the University of Tartu.  It’s certainly a very pretty campus.  We settled in upstairs in our class, with myself, Nick, and Patrick taking our seats right at the front.  Shortly, our first class began, a lecture taught by Dr. Piret Ehin, who was a strikingly brilliant and beautiful Estonian woman with perfect English skills.  Her lecture, titled “Russian-speaking minorities in Estonia 25 years after the collapse of the USSR” was absolutely fascinating, and also open to questions from the class, which Andrew, Nick, and myself provided plenty of.  I think the whole class really learned a great deal about modern Estonian history, the relationship between ethnic Estonian and ethic Russian populations, and in particular about the Estonian perspective on international affairs.  One thing of particular note is to know that Estonia originally gained its independence in 1918 from the Czarist Empire of Russia, but then during WWII it was overrun first by the Soviets, then by the NAZIs, and then by the Soviets again.  Estonia particularly resistant to Soviet rule as a result of its longstanding history of connection with western neighbors- the Nordic countries, and particularly Germany; and eventually this culminated in Estonia reasserting its independence at the end of the Soviet era, precipitating the collapse of the Soviet Union as a whole.  As such, Estonians consider the whole era of Soviet rule to be an illegal occupation, with Estonia having maintained a government-in-exile the whole while.  As such, when independence was reasserted, any Soviet Union citizens who were not previously recognized as citizens of Estonia by the exiled government, lost their citizenship status; and while it’s a bit more complicated, it could be said that for a time (and perhaps even until today) they are stateless persons.

After Dr. Piret’s class we took a break for lunch, but not feeling very hungry, the Trio decided we’d go wander around town, eventually looking for some small items we needed.  We walked along the riverfront, and eventually to the shopping malls where I bought a shaving razor in a supermarket, and Nick bought an electric socket adapter and a tablet stylus from an electronics store.  We walked back to our class building and discovered an awesome jazz club/café in the bottom floor, where we ordered some yummy and inexpensive meatball soup (a bit like minestrone) and ate dark bread with garlic butter, and chatted with the cute server Angela (pronounced Ahn-ga-lah).  She informed us that there were live performances and dancing in the evenings, and suggested that we come back not that day, but the next evening for a show, so we think we might try to do that.

Class started up again, this time a lecture on the economic history and policies of Estonia, taught by Dr. Viktor Trasberg.  His lecture covered a lot of interesting material, and I think there was particular interest in his explanations of how Estonia transitioned its economy from Soviet style socialism to a vibrant and healthy free-market economy in such a short period of time.  Frequently privatization programs don’t go well as they’re easily corrupted, but Estonia had the right combination of solid economic fundamentals, good neighbors in the Nordic countries and Germany, a peculiar situation with their real estate and agriculture markets, and finally just some plain old dumb luck that made the process work so well for them.  Despite the interesting material, the combination of being post-lunch and his less confident English skills meant that it didn’t quite have the engagement from the class that the earlier lecture did.

After the second class Margot took us on a tour of the university campus, which culminated in our walking up the hill to the ancient Cathedral of Tartu, which became the university library for many centuries, and now has finally been converted into the university’s museum.  We got a tour of the museum there from Palma, a smart and funny young woman who provided numerous humorous and fascinating anecdotes about the history of the University- ranging from teenage directors, vain bishops, secret dueling clubs, brave acts of rebellion against the Soviet overlords, and amazing feats of research and exploration done here at the university.

The tour ended and the Trio walked back to our hotel where we met up with Nicki for dinner at the café there- I got a delicious chicken and cheese pasta with caramelized onions and a very flavorful sauce.  From there, Nick and I returned to our hotel room where we did traveler’s laundry- just washing our clothes in the sink, and then tying string back and forth across the bathroom to hang our clothes to dry.  I had washed basically all of my clothes and was just hanging out in my swim trunks, while Nick had saved some clothes that were still good to wear, so he decided to catch up with Patrick and the other students to go get “one drink” and probably come back early.

While our clothes dried, I got caught up on social media, and then tried to do a small amount of journal writing but discovered that I was just bushed, and passed out on top of my covers with the lights still on.  I woke up around 0200h and noticed that Nick still wasn’t back, which I thought was unusual since he’s normally a morning person and not a night owl, and is probably the most responsible of the three of us when it comes to crazy partying.  I figured that they would probably be back soon though, so I managed to crawl under the covers (but not shut off the lights which were across the room) and went back to sleep.  I woke up again around 0330h to the sound of other students returning to their rooms, but still no Nick, so I sent him a text message checking if everything was okay, but I didn’t hear back, and figuring that he probably had managed to hook up with some cute girl, I went back to sleep.

My sleep was suddenly interrupted at 0515h though, when Nick and Patrick came stumbling through the door quite noisily.  It turns out that they had quite the adventurous night, including several near misses of getting into fights with local off-duty Estonian soldiers in some of the bars.  I still don’t know all the details, but it seems like I missed out on an exciting time- although maybe that’s for the best?  Patrick eventually wandered off to his room, and Nick fell asleep as soon as he left, but I couldn’t sleep so I finally just got out of bed to write this entry.  It’s now 0705h and the sun isn’t up yet, but I’m looking forward to another day of exploring this cool country!

2016 December 29th, 1430h Eastern European Time Zone

We started our day in Tallinn yesterday by reaching out to fellow students in our study abroad program who had arrived in town the night before to find out where they were so we could link up.  We learned from Kate Simi that she and a few other students were in the main public square of Oldtown, Tallinn at a cafe, so I grabbed my map and plotted out a route for us to get there.  Logistics proceeded to slow us down however, as we encountered some difficulty in acquiring a locker where we could lock up our backpacks.  Finally we managed to get our bags secured in the locker room of the hotel directly across the street from the ferry terminal, which was the hotel where our fellow students had stayed.  This was all not before we had managed to have multiple close calls of crazy Tallinn drivers nearly hiting us with their cars as we crossed various streets.
We found Kate and also two other fellow students Paul and Nicky in the cafe (though not before having a terrifying experience of nearly being ran flat over by a speeding van in the tiny Oldtown streets), where I ordered a hot chocolate and Nick ordered a really delicious honey beer.  After catching up with our fellow's travel stories, all of us excepted Nicky decided to go out in search of some local museums.  We were headed towards one when Nick realized that we were passing by an interesting looking one right there in Oldtown, so we stopped in and discovered a really fascinating exhibit on the Viking history in Estonia and the Baltic, especially in the Tallinn region.

The museum was located inside the «Fat Margarite» tower at the northern edge of Oldtown, where it used to serve as an artillery tower back in the age of cannons.  The museum also had a great exhibit on the age of sail in the region, as the Baltic peoples have always been presitigious sailors and fishermen.  Paul and Kate sped through the museum and decided they were going to take off in search of a bar to hang out in, but Nick, Patrick and myself took our time, and really felt like we learned a great deal from the experience.

But our museum tickets included tickets to another, somewhat more famous museum a couple kilometers away on the waterfront, so we decided we'd go right on and find that one.  Several more close calls with crazy Tallinn drivers later, and we were at the «Seaplane» museum, which was very impressive.  We started by exploring various naval technology, particularly modern age naval weaponry like 100mm+ size naval guns, and then explored the entire Soviet submarine contained inside the museum.  We saved the best for last- you guessed it, another gigantic Viking exhibit.  Did I mention that we like Vikings?  The great thing about this particular museum was that throughout its exhibits it was very hands on, which also provides a different persective and understanding, even if you're covering the same information.

We hustled our way back to the Seaport Hotel where we had stored our bags and were to meet up with the entire school group.  I should mention that asides from the drivers, we really enjoyed the feel and look of Tallinn, for it's incredible mix of being an ancient midieval city and also a hub of cyber technology.  The city provides some remarkably beautiful vistas, and the people we interacted with were friendly.  Indeed, it's been very interesting to us how each of these cities has had a unique feel, and how we've enjoyed different things about all of them: Oslo, Stockholm, and Tallinn.

We got to the hotel where we met up with our program's advisor, Dr. Allen Greb, whom I'm quite pleased to have as a mentor and friend in my academic career at San Diego State University.  We also met Margot who is our local program coordinator here in Estonia, and a very cool person.  The rest of our fellow students were there (except for one who arrived the next morning due to a cancelled flight) waiting for us, but then it turned out we actually had to wait on vans to arrive to take us to a bus station, so I bought a delicious pizza and a locally brewed dark beer, which Patrick, Nick, and I shared.  We managed to scarf it down just as the vans arrived, and then we were whisked away to a bus station somewhere on the edge of town.

From there we loaded ourselves onto a luxurious tour bus which would convey us to our next major destination: Tartu!  Tartu is an ancient city in eastern Estonia, and the home of Tartu University, which is our main educational partner and host for our study abroad experience.  Nick was ridiculously excited by the fancy bathroom aboard, and even more so by the complimentary espresso machine that was located across from our seats.  We got ourselves settled in for the 3 hour ride, with Nick watching «Edge of Tomorrow» on his in seat entertainment system, Patrick watching «Warcraft», and myself writing journal entries.

Finally we arrived in Tartu, at the hotel we'll be staying at for several days, but most excitingly, finally saw snow for the first time on our trip!  Tartu was in the middle of receiving just the lightest dusting as we arrived, but we were excited nonetheless, having expected to encounter quite a bit more from the get-go.  After getting arranged in the rooms (Nick and I have a room together, Patrick is down the hall with a guy named Kyle) we went downstairs to the cafeteria where we had dinner and celebretory drinks to the calls of «Terviseks!» which is the Estonian word for cheers.  We got to know some of our fellow students a little better, as well as getting to know Margot better, and finally turned in for bed.  Everyone was really optimistic about the start of the program, and we were instructed to be in the hotel lobby no later than 0845h to walk to the university and start classes!  I've got to run now, but an entry about today's experiences later tonight hopefully!

2016 December 28th, 1805h Eastern European Time Zone

Back to the story of yesterday!  In Gamla Stan, Stockholm we started by wandering around the little shops and cafes, poking our heads into a few, but also enjoying the people watching.  As we wandered around, we accidentally bumped into the Royal Palace (which is hard not to do in Gamla Stan) and began walking around it, appreciating the architecture, but also the incredible views available from its dominant position on the island.  In the process of circumnavigating the palace we discovered an entrance to the Royal Treasury, which is where the official regalia of Sweden's royal family is kept- things like the crowns, scepters, orbs, keys, ermine cloaks, and other treasures.  No photographs were allowed in the display area, but I can testify to the very impressive oppulance of the items.  Each item, whether sword or shoe was inlaid with countless gems, perls, and precious metals; all of the finest handicraft, and perhaps most shockingly of all, not gaudily.  Seeing these crowns was an almost cartoon-like experience, because the royal crowns look exactly like what one would think of when they think of a royal crown- opulent, but also elegent.  One thing of particular note that I appreciated was noticing that one of the royal orbs was etched with the features of the globe, as it was known at the time.  The symbolism is obviuous: the monarch literally holds the world in their hand.  Nick made a good observation on this point, of considering how repeated exposure to such symbolism would impact the worldview of the monarch themselves- such as the pressure to perform things that would register on the world stage; but also including the conviction it would build inside of them that they had a right to rule, and even to invade foreign lands as they would believe the world was really meant for them anyway.

After visiting the Treasury we began working our way southward, out of Gamla Stan and into Sodermalm.  Each district of the city certainly had a distinctive feel, and Sodermalm was evidently the hip part of town.  We made our way all the way down to the Ringencentrum mall to meet with a friend of a friend, Oskar Olai, whom I had gotten in contact with prior to our trip.  Oskar had provided some really excellent advice via email about what to see and do, and offered to take us to the Teatern food court at Ringencentrum to get to know each other better and give us a chance to ask as many questions about Sweden as our hearts desired.  The Teatern food court is not just any food court, however.  It is actually an incredible dining experience where people can try food from some truly world-class chefs without all of the expense that normally comes with that.  The dining area is like a «theater in the round» where stadium seating surrounds a central «stage» if you will, except the center of that stage is a large circular building with at least eight different kiosk fronts facing outward towards the diners.  Each one of these fronts is run by a different top-chef, some of whom apparently have multiple Michelin stars in their primary restaurants.  Diners then have the opportunity to walk in a circle around the central structure, and consider the unique and delicious sounding options each chef is advertising at this location.  You place your order, and then find seating in the stadium which allows you to watch your cooks in action as they prepare your meal per the chef's signature recipe.  Oskar told us that this is a great way to give famous chefs a «test run» before committing to the extreme expense of attending one of their flagship restaurants.  Also unlike American food courts, craft beer and wine are available for purchase, which is exciting for craft beer fans such as ourselves.  Oskar, Nick, and Patrick all opted for the ramen kiosk, which offered some really fancy looking Japanese style gourmet ramen bowls, while I got my lunch from a kiosk that claimed its artistic focus as being «functional food».  My order was a pastrami sandwich with pesto sauce, but the pastrami was unlike any I had ever had in the U.S. as it was a densly packed patty of pastrami, rather than thin slices of it.  It reminded me slightly of a falafel burger, and ultimately it was delecious.

Oskar was great to talk to while we had our lunch, explaining to us many fascinating elements of Swedish culture.  We talked about Swedish security issues, the Swedish educational system, what sort of economic difficulties young Swedes face when they graduate university, the social structure, recreation and sports, customs and traditions, and more.  After lunch, Oskar offered to give us our ride to our next destination, which with his help, we had identified as the National Historical Museum, in the Ostermalm district.  We really appreciated his generosity, but especially appreciated his company- part of why we're on this trip is to gain deeper appreciations and understandings of foreign cultures, and being able to spend time with locals, picking their brains with all our questions is a great experience for us- not to mention far more memorable than just souvenir shopping.  Also worth mentioning at this point was that there was a young family seated next to us with twin boys and a younger boy as well, and the youngest boy decided almost instantly that Nick was his new friend, and proceeded to show off all of his toys to him.  The older twins also thought Nick was sooo cool when I told them that Nick was in the Army, because they were wearing camoflauge sweaters.  Super cute.

We said goodbye to Oskar who had to get home to his wife and kids, and made a beeline for the extensive Viking section of the history museum.  There we were deeply impressed by the thoughtful approach the currators had taken to tackling the subject.  Before even entering into the exhibit there was a large printed statement about the reasons for studying history and its importance in understanding who we are today.  Then almost immediately afterwards was an interesting section describing the historical cooption of the Viking past to justify a very wide and diverse set of idealogies, social, and political movements over the generations.  It showed how depictions of Vikings have shifted over time to conform to the social mores of the day, and challenged the museum goer to consider how current depictions of Viking people may be ignoring factual history in favor of advancing certain agendas.  Then the museum proceeded to display a wealth of information, artifacts, and models covering every element of Viking society.  One thing we were particularly excited to see were more runestones, like the ones we had visited the previous day with our tour guide Jonathan, but some of them having been faithfully repainted to look like how they would've looked anciently.  This, and several other things in the museum did a remarkable job of bringing to life both small and large elements of what we had learned from talking with Jonathan, which was quite exciting.

By the time we finished our tour of the museum's Viking sectiuon (sadly, we did not have time to see the other exhibits) we had to rush to the subway to make our way back to the central station to recover our backpacks, and then return on the same train line past the history museum and out to the deep water port near Ropstan.  After getting directions from a fellow transit user, we walked along a long, dark industrial road, hoping to find the seaport and dock for the overnight trip to Tallinn we had booked a few weeks previously.  The road continued on, and on, and on though- making us quite nervous eventually that we might not make it to the boat on time before it departed.  We started running, which is when we noticed a Pakistani man running through a giant abandoned industrial park, clearly looking for an entrance to a building that had the logo of our cruise line on it, but as far as we could tell had no available entrances to it.  We caught up to him, and sure enough he was in the same metaphorical boat (and same absence of not being in a physical boat) as we were; where he knew that the seaport was somewhere in this part of town, but exactly where was anyone's guess.  We saw a long, LONG skybridge stretching from the building we were near, all the way through the industrial park, and decided we would try to follow that skybridge to its other end.  We started running again, and after quite a ways we found a staircase that led up to the skybridge.  Now we had to run through the skybridge, back the way we had came, but 10 meters above the ground now.  Finally it reached the logo'd building, only to make a sharp turn to the right, and stretch off at least a kilometer into the distance!  Despite how tired we were having done as much walking as we had all day, and now all the running we had done with our backpacks on, we were running dangerously low on time until our boat departed, and we still couldn't even see our boat.  So we ran.  And then we ran some more.  Finally we came close to the boat, but still we weren't done as we had to run through several hundred meters more of zig-zagging ramps that got us to the boarding level for our massive cruise ship, the Victoria, run by Tallink lines.  Thankfully we made it, as did the Pakistani fellow we had bumped into earlier, but it was uncomfortably close!

As the boat pulled away, we found our way to our private cabin and cleaned ourselves up from our little workout.  Putting on the sharper clothes we had available to us (out of the small selection we managed to bring in our single bag each) we stepped out to explore the ship.  The first order of business was food, which led us to nice restaurant with a professional pianist playing in the corner.  Patrick and Nick ordered veggie burgers while I ordered BBQ ribs, all of which was great.  During our dinner we noticed advertisements for a fancy cognac apertif served with capiccinos and a swanky chocolate candy.  The cognac was Remy Martin, which normally is way, WAY beyond the price range of students like ourselves- but evidently the cruise line did a «cognac of the month» for these apertifs and this month it was the Remy Martin, meaning we could each have a glass (plus the capiccino and chocolate) for only 15 Euros each.  Considering that sometimes a regular cocktail in the U.S. can cost that much at some bars, we decided that we should spring for it- when else would we have the opportunity to try something so exclusive?  It was absolutely very enjoyable.  If I can be completely frank, it's not my personal favorite cognac I've ever tried, and so even if I could afford a bottle of it I don't think I would buy one, but it's great to have had a chance to figure that out, and it was still a very, very good drink.  The chocolate was scrumptious too!

We considered going to one of the bars aboard ship, but realized that they would likely charge us an arm and a leg for each drink, and we were in the mood to party it up having successfuly made it aboard and having enjoyed our trip so much so far.  We decided then that instead of going to the bar, we would go to the tax free shop aboard the ship and purchase some alcohol at a better price per unit ratio.  The tax free shop was incredibly low cost, and so we acquired the fixings to make both screwdrivers and mudslides, and returned to the room to mix them up.  After serving ourselves a couple rounds, we remembered that there was supposedly a caberet show that would happen that evening in the ship's theater, so we wandered down that direction (a somewhat tricky task given the very noticable rolling action the ship had picked up in the choppy waves, combined with our medium level of intoxication) and found ourselves decent seats shortly before the show began.  A dance troupe led by both a male singer/dancer and a female singer came out on stage in stunning Las Vegas style costumes, performing routines to covers of classic American music sang by the leads.  They started off a little rocky, to be honest (though they also had to combat the rolling ship) but as the show went on it only got better and better as the dancers and singers gained confidence in their act.  Reguiar quick costume changes and fantastic technical direction in both lighting and sound helped round out the show, for a very entertaining hour, even if some of the dancers were a bit on the inexperienced side.

After the show we thought we would head back to the room for another drink and then investigate the dance club aboard, but one drink turned into a few as we got caught up talking, laughing, and even fighting about a variety of interesting topics.  Finally, we realized that it was getting quite late, but that none of us were really feeling very sleepy yet, so now was the time to go check out the dance club (the time now being 0245h, haha!)  Predictably, we were a bit late to find much of a dance scene- mostly it appeared to be a bunch of late-teens who had snuck out of their family's cabins who were hanging around the dance floor, looking bored.  Patrick, who had quite a bit more to drink than either Nick or myself, was pretty determined to dance anyway, but I wasn't particularly feeling it and was about to walk away when the DJ managed to start playing more interesting dance music than the mediocre material that had been thumping when we first arrived, so I relented and agreed to help Patrick get the club hopping once more.  Our presence on the dance floor helped break the spell for the others, and soon the dance floor began to get crowded despite the late hour.  Patrick had gotten several young men to start pantomiming passing an energy ball back and forth amongst the dancers on the floor (including myself) and the energy ball got larger and «heavier» with each pass, until the participants were pretending they could barely move it and needed the assistance of nearly everyone around just to pass it off- until someone would finally collapse under the weight and drop the ball, and Patrick would promptly start the whole process over again with a new, but smaller imaginary energy ball.  We finally managed to get to sleep shortly before 0400h.

When we awoke at 0830h we showered and went to have breakfast at the same restaurant where we had dinner the previous night, which was now a buffet.  Nick and Patrick both got lox, and Patrick got caviar as well, while I, not being able to stand the taste of fish, got crepes with yogurt and jam, pumpernickle bread with cottage cheese and a sliced and salted tomato, and some bacon.  We cleaned up the room, went to go outside on the deck to see the Baltic Sea for ourselves, and then I sat down to try writing a bit but was interrupted by our ship pulling into our next destination: Tallinn, Estonia!

2016 December 28th, 1035h Eastern European Time Zone

Shortly after finishing breakfast yesterday we returned to our room to pack, and met our roommates- Mitch and Tess from Australia.  They were really cool folks, people it seemed like it would've been fun to spend more time with if we had more time, but we were on the move!  We went and dropped our bags off at the transit center, and then after a minor navigational error on my part, we were on our way.  We started by walking down one of the main tourist avenues where we stopped into a couple shops to look at souvenirs.  I ended up purchasing a Swedish flag and shot glass, as these are both things I collect from travelling.  We also stopped into a chocolate shop with some absolutely amazing looking chocolate, but we narrowly managed to avoid the temptation and continued on with our journey.

We crossed the bridge into Gamla Stan, which is the center point island of Stockholm and home to the Royal Palace, other government buildings, and a lot of cool shops.  -Our ship is pulling up to the dock in Tallinn, Estonia right now, so I'll have to come back to the story later.

2016 December 27th, 0700h Central European Time

We got zero sleep on the bus.  Despite the impressive recline of the seats considering it was a bus, we were apparently aboard with many Arabic speaking immigrants/refugees from Africa (Sudan, if I was recognizing the dialect correctly) who evidently believed that 2am was the ideal time to begin making several consecutive 1+ hour phone conversations at a very loud volume.  The guy sitting in between the three of us was having a particularly «interesting» conversations of sweet nothings with a girlfriend, though not exactly very quietly.

We arrived to Stockholm around 0630h yesterday, and afer paying a little more than $2 each to use the bathroom (standard practice in Scandinavian public places apparently) we found a locker to store our bags, and then went in search of some food.  We got some pastries from a shop in the transit center, and then got on a train, and then a bus north, towards the city of Vallentuna, Sweden.  There we met with our tour guide, Jonathan Olsson of Time Travel Tours.

He took us through the nearby neighborhoods until we reached the edge of a large lake, where an ancient Norse «thing» stone ring was located, as well as two very impressive runestones set into the hillside.  A «thing» is an actual term, I'm not just referring to a noun I don't know the name of.  A thing is a meeting of important Norsemen and women, to discuss legal and judicial matters, as well as upcoming raids, and more.  We learned of some interesting laws and the punishments that could be set forth at a thing, for example calling your neighbor a dog or slandering him by saying that he had sex with his horses could net heafty fines of money.  The stones were also quite interesting as well.  While they did memorialize the dead quite often, they also served more practical purposes of deeds to the land they stood upon, and also for social status effects- putting one up was the Norse method of humble-bragging.  You had to have the money to put one up, you usually put one up to honor someone else, but you also «tagged» yourself in your «post» to show that you were the one responsible for honoring someone else- so obviously you must be a good person.  Jonathan was extremely knowledgeable and friendly, and let us pepper him with all kinds of questions, which I'm sure comes as a surprise to exactly no one reading this, I had tons of.  We learned about their religion, their agriculture, social structure, diets, laws, warriors, superstitions, social norms, international relations, boat building, and more.  Also, we learned through experience just how freaking freezing the wind coming off that lake was.

Jonathan helped us figure out how to get transportation back to Stockholm, which ended up involving us walking all the way into the city of Vallentuna to buy a train ticket, as tickets were not for sale neither on the train nor in the local train station.  When we arrived in Stockholm we went off exploring the city, spending quite a bit of time aorund the Kungstradgarden park and the whole area bounded by the roads: Sveavagen, Kungsgatan, Birger Jarlsgatan, and Hamngatan; as well as some of Ostermalm as well.  In particular we went in search of food, hoping to find some at the Ostermalms Saluhall based on the recommendation of some family, but it turns out that it's under rennovation and wasn't open.  After much searching, we finally found a place that looked like it was the right mix of the kind of food we were looking for, the ambience we wanted, and an affordable price: «John Scott's».  Unfortunately, we were somewhat dissapointed there.  The customer service was distinctly lacking, and it took an absurdly long time to get our food.  When the food arrived it was delicious, but our energy levels were definitely failing at this point.  Zero sleep, lots and lots and lots of walking, and getting extremely hungry were taking a toll on our moods, so we decided that we had better find our way to the hostel and call it an early night.

We returned to the central transit center to pick up our bags and exchange some money, while trying to avoid being trampled by the massive mobs of people packing the station in post-holiday travel, returning to their homes.  It was quite the contrast to the relative silence and ghost-town feel we had experienced since arriving in Scandinavia.  We walked the short distance to our hostel, «Generator» which it turns out is astoundingly nice.  Extremely chiq design and shared spaces, very friendly customer service, and really nice rooms.  We got to our room and after cleaning off our feet which had been stuck in boots for more than 24 hours, we all passed right out.  We definitely needed the sleep, and we're all feeling much better now.  One nice thing about us as a group of friends, born out of both our friendship and our military backgrounds is that we still work together well even when we're in bad moods or things aren't going perfectly, which really helped us yesterday in our sleep deprived and hangry state.

We gained some roommates during the night, but thankfully they all seemed quite respectful of our sleep, and so when we woke up at 0630h we tried not to bother them as we came downstairs for breakfast.  We all ordered open faced egg sandwhiches which were absolutely delicious.  Goat cheese was spread on a dark rye bread toast, with avacado, sprouts, onions, watercress, cucumber, some tasty but unrecognizable vegetables, and remarkably a cold over easy egg- as in it wasn't room temperature, it was refrigerated to be cold!  Anyway, it was absolutely scrumptious.

We'll gather up our things soon and figure out where we'll store them- probably in the locker room here, and then head out exploring again!  We're excited to meet a friend of some family of mine today for lunch, and hopefully to start seeing some museums as things should start being open as of today.  This evening, we'll depart for Tallinn, Estonia by taking an overnight cruise across the Baltic Sea- but we've got a private cabin for that so we should be able to actually get some sleep on that trip!

2016 December 25th, 2320h Central European Time

Our day started by arranging for our bags to be left in a secured luggage room at our hostel even though we were checking out.  This was extremely fortunate for us, because our bags aren’t exactly light, and we had a lot of walking planned for the day.  We started by heading down the street towards a “konditori” or pastry shop that I had seen the previous day and believed might be open, but sadly we couldn’t find it- it turned out to be on the opposite side of the street from where I was sure it was, and somehow none of us managed to notice it at the time, only discovering the fact some 12 hours later.  Forgoing breakfast for the time being, we continued to wander south in search of the famous Asker Fortress of Oslo, which was originally built some 800 years ago and has grown in size over the centuries since.  The streets were completely empty, with not a soul to be seen for almost all of our walk.  Eventually we came down a road where we could see two soldiers standing duty as gate guards, and we figured we were at the right place.  They were quite friendly, and informed us that it didn’t cost anything to go see the castle, and that we didn’t need to present any ID- basically they were there just to be helpful directional agents apparently.

The castle was quite impressive, built upon a series of high ramparts directly overlooking the harbor.  The path takes one in a slow spiral around and up towards the main keep, where soldiers dressed in ceremonial uniforms and armed with M4 variants with bayonets attached march sharply back and forth at various posts.  Sadly, there was no apparent access into the castle itself, just freedom to walk all around the walls to the buildings themselves.  There were also signs that some of the buildings had been repurposed as visitors centers and museums, but they all appeared to be closed given it was Christmas Day.  Still, the place was very impressive, and especially given our military backgrounds we appreciated observing some of the strategic, tactical, and logistical considerations that would’ve been involved in the planning, building, and running of a medieval castle like this one.

After leaving the castle we began to see more people filtering through the streets, and we set out in earnest to find some food.  We were fairly committed to find a sit-down venue with relatively “authentic” local fare, but with the entire city closed, our options were somewhat limited and we settled on a café located inside the large and relatively bustling Oslo Central Train Station.  I ordered a waffle with cream cheese and strawberry jam (which was delicious) and also a plate of Sanderbiff which was small bites of interesting tasting beef with grilled potatoes, bell peppers, and a buttery sauce called bearnaise.  During the meal we also finally deduced that krylling was simply the Norwegian word for chicken, and that the beef in my meal was very similar to some beef that had been on our pizza last night in addition to the chicken and other toppings.  The taste of this beef is difficult to describe- it certainly seems like the beef we’re accustomed to in the U.S. with regard to look and texture, but the taste has a truly unique flavor, and we’re not certain if it’s due to the way the cattle are raised or from the way the meat is seasoned during cooking, or both.  While the taste is somewhat surprising for an American unaccustomed to this distinct flavor, ultimately we concluded that after having gotten accustomed to it through both the pizza and my meal, we really liked it.

Sufficiently fed we left the train station and began trekking west, towards Vigelands Park.  Eventually we left the international district behind and found ourselves in a very regal looking district, with many very impressive civic buildings and small park spaces.  Towards the southwestern end of this district we found ourselves in the Asker Brydge neighborhood where I grabbed a very delicious but very tiny Belgian mocha latte and a yummy banana muffin; and also where we found a charming bar that was open: Lannister’s, named for the great house from Game of Thrones.  We briefly chatted with the cute bartender there, and promised to return for a drink later.  Continuing westward we found a palatial building that apparently serves as the place where the King of Norway receives international dignitaries, as well as meeting the public on “Meet the King Day” in May.  The views from the hill this building sits on were quite impressive, but still we needed to travel further west to see our ultimate destination.

We continued to walk through ritzy neighborhoods of extremely fancy (but all closed) shopping, until eventually we finally arrived at the Vigelands sculpture park.  It’s so named for the name of the single sculptor who provided all of the many, many sculptures the spacious and stunning park contains.  The sculptor’s style is fairly consistent: nude men, women, children, and babies; in a variety of scenarios both mundane and bizarre; but done in a variety of mediums: stone, metal, and designs in wrought iron gates.  Some of the statues are quite moving and universally relevant, others are comical in their absurdity.  My particular favorite was the one I called, “Get the hell off of me, babies!” which shows an angry nude man, kicking away multiple nude babies at his feet while throwing several more nude babies who had apparently been (viciously?) clinging to his arms, back, and neck just moments before.  Certainly all of the sculptures took great skill to create, and impressive artistic vision.  The park meanwhile is a lovely and luxurious plot of land in what is otherwise a very dense urban city.

Having gotten our fill of naked people in intriguing poses for the time being, we began working out way back, eventually finding ourselves at Lannister’s once more.  The bartender recognized us, and welcomed us in out of the cold.  Patrick and Nick were particularly hopeful of having a “hot toddy” as a drink, but apparently that wasn’t something the bar could make, though at Nathalie’s suggestion, we decided to have Irish coffees- made with some brown sugar at their bar; a novelty we found fantastic.  The bar was far from busy, and before long we found ourselves deep in conversation with our barkeep, who plied us with scotch (a very nice Glenfidditch kept in IPA barrels, and a local Norwegian “scotch” which was surprisingly good in our opinions) and also a local Norwegian “Christmas beer” which was pretty good too.  It turns out that Nathalie was actually Swedish, but had moved to Oslo in search of work; which answered a question that had been percolating in our minds: how much travel and interaction occurs between the two nations- which we’ve been learning is relatively significant.  Nathalie was also able to explain to us why it was that nearly every Norwegian and Swede we’ve met so far has impeccable English skills: they’ve studied for at least 10 years, and relatively seriously at that- plus anyone in the service industry in Oslo uses English quite frequently, even with other Norwegians.  It really puts the typically four or fewer years of casual foreign language study most Americans do to shame.
Despite the grand time we were having hanging out with Nathalie, we were getting hungry again, and so with almost all restaurants in the city closed, we found ourselves settling for the Oslo Hard Rock Café.  The food was good, but being the only open restaurant for several kilometers they were also quite busy and the staff seemed slightly stressed.  We tried to eat quickly and be on our way.

We made the rest of the walk back to the hostel to pick up our bags, and then work our way towards the bus depot.  We had about an hour left until we would board our overnight bus towards Stockholm, so we broke out my tablet to play an electronic version of the boardgame “Pandemic” which I recently introduced them to while we were on our flight to Oslo.  It’s a cooperative game of Center for Disease Control workers travelling the globe in an effort to combat dangerous new superbugs threatening the global population.  It’s a game that tests the players teamwork, creative problem solving, and risk tolerance; and ultimately the game is VERY difficult to beat.  So far we’ve completed two games, both of which resulted in our loss, despite having managed to cure most of the diseases afflicting the world.

Finally the bus arrived, whereupon the rest of the passengers swarmed the door- preventing us from exercising the priority boarding we had purchased, so unfortunately we’re sitting separately for the time being.  It might be for the best though, as we really need to catch what sleep we can on this bus ride, as shortly after we arrive in Stockholm we’ll be boarding another bus for a Viking tour we signed up for while still in the States.  Hopefully the wi-fi aboard this bus will work well enough for me to post my journal entries so far to my blog, and then it’ll be time to sleep!

2016 December 25th, 0830h Central European Time

Yesterday we arrived in Oslo!  The first part of the experience came when we got off the plane.  We had seats very close to the door, so we were among the first off the aircraft.  All three of us immediately made a beeline for the restrooms in the airport, which were located just before passport control.  I was the first out of the bathroom, and the line for passport control was just a few people long.  Nick came out a couple minutes later, and now the line was about 30 people long.  Then Patrick didn’t come out.  And still didn’t come out.  Finally I went back in to check on him, and he was just casually brushing his teeth, haha!  Well when he finally came out, the line was now hundreds and hundreds of people long.  :-/  Well we got in line, but thankfully almost immediately afterwards they started routing people through alternative checkpoints (people with non-EU passports were allowed to go through the EU passport line) and we were whisked off to stand before a passport control officer.  Nick was ahead of me and got grilled on all kinds of details- dates, times, proof that we were students who would do a study abroad, intense questioning about why he had a visa for Russia in his passport… all of which he stumbled through awkwardly.  Finally he was given a Schengen Zone stamp in his passport, and was granted entry into Norway.  Then I walked up to the counter and was stamped without having to answer a single question.

Next was finding our way to the express train into Oslo, as the airport is actually a bit of a distance away from the city.  It wasn’t very hard to find the Flytoget (express train) where after a brief kerfuffle of accidentally leaving Patrick behind the toll-gates, we were on our way!  The view of the fields and trees was nice, although we were slightly surprised and disappointed that there wasn’t any snow here in Oslo.  As we began to pull through the city, our first impressions were that the city had a definite “alpine” feel, but also had a surprising amount of graffiti.  We also spotted numerous pizza places from our train windows, which continued to be an amusing discovery throughout the day just how many there were- apparently Norwegians really like pizza.
At Oslo Sentralstasjon I bought a street map and we navigated our way to our hostel, only a short distance away on Storgata Street.  We were intrigued to find that this part of Oslo is evidently the international/immigrant district, with lots of Mediterranean, Arab, African, and East Asian food places and markets.  Being the international district and among relatively non-Christian cultures, there were also many other people walking about who evidently had no Christmas Eve plans keeping them home.

We got to our hostel, checked in, and got our dorm room set up.  We were in a room with eight beds, only one other one apparently occupied, though as of yet we knew not by whom.  Our dorm room was locked by an electronic key though, so after locking our bags shut and to each other’s bags, we decided to leave them behind while we went to explore the city.  We went in search of an ice bar that was supposedly open, but sadly it was not, so we continued to just wander around on foot looking for anything that seemed interesting.  We passed by a museum that was closed but had some interesting statues outside, and then by a gigantic inverted Christmas tree sculpture? that was in the middle of a roundabout, where we started hearing church bells ringing non-stop.  We walked along the road following the sound of the ringing bells when eventually we discovered what we seemed to be a Korean church that was holding Christmas Eve services.  After poking our head in briefly, we decided we were starving and it was time to find food.  Before we found anyplace open, we came across the Akerselva river running through the city, and discovered a pleasant park walkway running along the riverbanks that we followed for a while.  Eventually we came upon a pizza place near the river banks where we ordered a large "Thornvald’s Special" pizza which had a bunch of things on it we didn’t recognize the name of, particularly it seemed to be loaded up with what was perhaps beef, and also “Kreiling” which we still don’t really know what it is.  It was also drizzled in spicy mayo!  While waiting on our pizza to bake, we met an Australian traveler named Julian who, like us, was vainly looking for entertainment on Christmas Even in Oslo.  We invited him to come eat our pizzas in the riverbank park, where we decided that while it took a little while to mentally adjust to the unique taste of Norwegian pizza, that it was delicious.

Julian and ourselves then managed to check our reference materials to find what was supposed to be an open tavern in town, but of course was not.  As luck would have it though, we found the Buddha “Sportsbar” which turned out not to mean TV sports, but barsports like darts, billiards, and shuffleboard.  We all grabbed a local pilsner beer except for Nick who found a local IPA in a bottle- all delicious.  Julian had never played shuffleboard before, so we broke into teams of myself with Julian, and Patrick and Nick.  After losing our first game narrowly, and losing our second game dramatically, we agreed that the third game would be the winner-take-all championship round… which after going into extra rounds, Julian and I won, meaning we won the championship!

We said goodbye to Julian, returned to our hostel where we discovered that our additional roommate was a pro-Duerte Pilipino man who wanted to convince us that it was necessary for the President to murder criminals in his country, but we were too tired to argue, and were asleep by 2100h.  Now it’s time to head out in search of breakfast!

2016 December 23rd, 2055h Pacific Time

The adventure has begun!  I woke up this morning around 0730h to a text from Patrick Dooley, one of my two travel companions and a close friend of mine, reminding me that he and a girlfriend of his would be picking me up from my house in an hour.  I had packed all my things the night before, managing to put everything into a single carry-on bag (albeit a fairly large carry-on bag) so there was almost nothing left for me to do to prepare.  I was particularly proud of myself that I had managed to stay under the challenging 10kg weight limit while also finding a way to pack a nice suit and dress shoes, in addition to all the cold weather gear I would need for this trip.  I took a shower and got dressed in the clothes I had laid out for myself the previous night, and proceeded to enjoy a nice breakfast while watching educational YouTube videos as I waited.  It wasn’t much longer until Patrick and Katelin arrived, and after a couple of hugs my bag was already in the car and we were off!

Our next stop was to pick up my other travel companion and close friend Nick Nelissen.  Patrick, Nick, and I had all met in the late summer of 2015 as we all transferred from different schools into San Diego State University’s International Security and Conflict Resolution program (abbreviated to ISCOR) as juniors.  All three of us were veterans of the U.S. Armed Services and the conflicts the U.S. has participated in since 9/11…  Nick was Army Airborne and had done both Iraq and Afghanistan, while Patrick and I are Marines, with Patrick having been to Iraq and myself having deployed to Afghanistan.  In addition to the military experiences we have in common, and the fact we’re all of a similar age (significantly older than most of our undergraduate cohort by being in our early 30’s), we also have personalities that mesh well together- and so with a little luck in meeting before classes started, and then helped by taking a few classes together that first semester, we became fast friends.  Patrick is extremely gregarious, funny, and great at spurring us into fun new ideas.  Nick is extremely practical, observant, and always ready to help out anyone.  And myself?  Well, you’ll have to keep up with this blog and decide for yourself!  We’ve gotten up to some fun semi-local adventures together in the past, notably skiing in Big Bear as a group, and Patrick and I have done Vegas together; but this will be our largest and grandest adventure yet.
After picking up Nick, we were on our way north from San Diego for a two hour drive up to Los Angeles International Airport, our point of departure.  Katelin had graciously offered to give the three of us a ride up to L.A. which we gratefully accepted.  As we rode, we talked about our plans, joked around, and I tried to get us to learn a handful of Norwegian phrases (since Oslo is our first destination) via Omniglot like: “This gentleman will pay for everything / xxx” with the laws of nature dictating that whoever learned the phrases best stood capable of using these phrases to the consternation of the other two- good motivation for trying hard to learn!  We also studied up a bit on Norwegian culture with the help of some impressively specific websites.  Interesting tidbits included the Jante Law which expresses radical humility as an admirable trait for Norwegians to espouse.

We got hungry for lunch around the time we were passing through Anaheim, CA so we stopped at Café Misora, which is absolutely a hidden gem.  Excellent sushi at great prices (although just spicy California rolls for me, as I really struggle with fish) plus delicious bulgogi sandwiches, plus good service and even some free green tea ice cream for desert!  I highly recommend it to anyone passing through the area.  Our hunger sated for the time being, we proceeded on to LAX.  We made our goodbyes to Katelin, and grabbed our boarding passes- three seats together in the middle aisle near the front of our Boeing 787 as we make the 9,000km journey from Los Angeles to Oslo.  We had managed to get our tickets astoundingly inexpensive- only $140 each.  This miracle comes at a cost though: we’ll be arriving in Oslo on December 24th, which is the main day Norwegians celebrate Christmas, and so many things will be closed and people will be home with their families- unavailable for us to meet.  Thanks to some incredible friends of friends though, we’ve got a list of possible activities to keep us occupied, a list of bars and restaurants that will still be open, and plans to visit with some of these friends of friends while we’re in town!  Our point of view is anyone generous enough to visit with some strange American tourists is probably exactly the kind of person we would want to become friends with!

After getting past security we spent some time just relaxing and catching up on social media, and then grabbed pizza inside the International Terminal.  Unsurprisingly, while the margherita pizzas were delicious, they were ridiculously over-priced and the service was pretty terrible.  Unlike our lunch, I can’t say I recommend eating at LAX- but of course the security procedures hold travelers somewhat hostage.  We decided to grab drinks before boarding the plane to celebrate the start of our journey: Black Russians (like a White Russian but with Pepsi instead of milk) for Patrick and myself, and Goose Island IPA for Nick.  After toasts of “skol” (Nick’s heritage) and “slainte” (Patrick’s and mine) were made, Nick invented a signature dance move for our trio at Patrick’s prompting, which I promptly named “the freestyle stroke” after the swimming move which it resembles.  It hasn’t impressed any chicks yet, but that’s only because it’s just come out of research and development- I’ll provide updates on its success in field testing as it occurs.
We’re over Canada now, headed in the direction of Greenland, and we expect the plane to land in Oslo shortly after 1300h local time.  We’ll dive right into exploring, and I can’t wait for it!