They were Hungarian Pollaks and it is a common name, but it is possible this was a relative. (It's quite possible that during World War II, some Pollaks from Hungary fled in this direction and ended up in Riga.) So when we told the couple this morning we didn't have relatives here, that might not have been true. (If anyone in Riga is reading this, are there any Pollaks in the telephone directory or anywhere else you know of?)
We completed the circuit on the number 11 trolley. This goes through much nicer neighborhoods than the trolley we grabbed at random the previous Saturday. The neighborhoods were more up-scale. The route included the zoo and some metroparks.
Two absolute staggering drunks got on and without realizing it did a drunk act that put the early Chaplin to shame. First they stumbled to a seat, taking full disadvantage of the trolley jerking them. They carried on an animated conversation. At one point one of them looked at the other's head, pulled out a comb, and proceeded to change the configuration of hair to another but one not noticeably better by any objective criterion. One kept his arm around the other so that the two stayed upright in much the manner that two playing cards stay upright in a card house where neither could remain upright by itself.
Also of some interest was a partially blind daughter leading a fully blind mother. No, they weren't begging and it wasn't a put-on. These were genuine unfortunates. Most of the real ones don't beg.
We saw some nice examples of art nouveau on buildings and the ride was really over too soon.
Next order of business was dinner. The best place for this was the Bistro Argentina.
After they were out of the first thing Mark ordered he settled for Beef Stroganoff again. How very sad. :-) A local favorite fruit is the black currant. You see juice, soda, candy, all sorts of things in the flavor black currant so Mark toasted our last night in Riga with black currant juice.
From there we went to the train station. Retrieving our luggage, we went to the well-lit but none-too-fresh-smelling waiting room near our platform. (There was another waiting area but it was rather dim.) We had about 3.5 lati left. Mark went out to spend it on candy bars. The man in the kiosk could not believe someone would want six Mars bars and six Snickers. That enormous purchase was 3 lati. Of course, that isn't really small money even in the United States. That's about US$5.36. They are made in France and shipped to Latvia and sell for 44 cents. When they are made in the United States and shipped to our convenience store they are 65 cents. Something's wrong someplace.
The waiting room in the Riga train station has the same drunks sleeping and panhandlers you'd find in a New York City train station. They just don't speak English. Actually, we're not sure the ones in New York do either.
The train came and we went to our sleeper car. Same model as the last one, but this one had been better maintained. The door jammed a little but was easier to unjam. There was a full set of overhead lights and bedside reading lights. Both had fold-down trays for pocket goods, but these stopped when horizontal rather than dumping your things on the bed as the last ones did. There were hangers.
The radio was worse here: it could not be turned off or even down. (But they apparently turn it off at a master switch at night.) Both had broken shades that would not stay down. After a few minutes of fooling with it, Mark took one of the hangers and hung it from the shade, then attached his suitcase to the hanger. That kept the shade most of the way down. Mark had to find the way to collapse the table but it kept the shade almost all of the way down. Luckily it was on the west side of the train.
This train line goes from St. Petersburg to Berlin. We think the trains were Russian-owner and operated, designed and implemented at the time of the perfect workers' state. The train left at 23:39.
May 17, 1994: At 2:30 the train stopped and the knocking on the doors started. Mark shook Evelyn who at first was not happy he was waking her when it was still dark out. He could tell she blamed him for a second or so, then realized that he had a good reason. First they wanted to see passports. Then suitcases. Particularly that one hanging from the shade. Oh, so up goes the shade. We opened the suitcase and there was the Free World's largest stash of Mars candy bars. Well, ten anyway. Evelyn had taken two. Well, we suppose it isn't illegal to smuggle candy bars out of Latvia. We shut off the lights and tried to go to sleep. Mark told Evelyn there'd be another passport check. 'There was only one last time.' 'No,' he said. 'There were two at the last border, one each side.' 'Only one.' A few minutes later the train stopped again and they started knocking on doors. Another passport check. We closed the door. Another knock. Baggage check. Evelyn opened her bag. Mark started to unhook his bag from the shade. 'No,' said the woman inspector. 'No?' 'No!' she said, closing the door. Nice of her. Or as Mark said, 'Of course the checks here have not seemed punitive the way they seemed in India. India is the only country where I think we were intentionally treated badly by people we dealt with. I like most of the Indians I know in the United States, but India was by far our hardest trip. We genuinely were not having a good time for much of it. I would never do anything to harm a country I visit, but customs checks make me a lot more nervous even this trip than they ever did before India. Most countries have rough edges. India has sharp edges with barbs.'
Well, at 6:45 or so we woke up. The train had changed direction at some point and the window was on the east with the sun coming in the few inches below the shade we could not pull it down.
It was about 8:15 when we pulled into Tallinn, Estonia. 'The Baltics & Russia Through the Back Door' had said the train got in at 9:30, so we were somewhat surprised, though a glance at the schedule on the wall indicates that 8:15 is indeed the arrival time. 'The Baltics & Russia Through the Back Door' also said there was an 8:00 train to Tartu, but the tourist office listed a 7:15 and something around 11:00, so probably many of the schedules are still in a state of flux. We did not know what to expect from Estonia. We had fewer pre-conceived ideas than for the two previous countries. Immediately Mark was struck by with fusion of traditional and modern. The previous two cities had a modern section and an older section. It may be just that the train station is further from the older part of the city, but the two seem better integrated. Maybe that was true in Riga also. He is not sure why immediately he liked Tallinn so much.
Mark relates, 'I strapped my luggage to me. Hey, I am a big fan of luggage that hangs on to me rather than expecting me to hold on to it. L. L. Bean sells suitcases with standard handles and straps that also has backpack straps. That's pretty convenient. I also carry a bag that is really a soft-sided briefcase. It and my camera hang off me on straps. I carry all my luggage and my hands are empty.'
We got off the train and started looking for phones. None were to be seen. Mark suggested we buy a couple of bananas for breakfast and ask where the phones were. The seller pointed. (Incidentally, there are public phones, but no pay phones. Calls within the city are free.) One of the books liked the Hotell Mihkli, so we called. No doubles left, but we could have a suite for 680 EEK (about US$52). That's less than half the price of the Hotel Riga. We decided to try it.
It was maybe a fifteen-minute walk from the train station. The town is more spread-out than Riga or Vilnius, with lots of green and lawns on most houses. The room turned out to be very nice. It was on the third floor with no elevator, but it has a nice sitting room with a television (which has what appears to be the European equivalent of CNN), a big refrigerator, and much more furniture. It also has hot water and may have some kind of heating--at least it's warmer inside than outside.
We paid with our Visa card, as we had at Litinterp and the Hotel Riga. Credit cards seem to be catching on--even the Bistro Argentina, not a fancy place by any means, accepts them. Since we weren't sure who'd take what, we ended up bringing more cash than we'd need, plus more travelers cheques, plus the Visa card. Well, we'll spend it all eventually after we get home.
Oh, the exchange rate posted here is 13.24 EEK per US dollar. (The rate we got from Visa was 13.12 per US dollar.) So we lost 30 EEK, or about US$3, by changing our litu directly to krooni. On the other hand, we didn't have to worry about changing money as soon as we arrived. All in all, it's not worth spending valuable vacation time on the chance you might save a couple of dollars.
We settled into the room and washed up. Mark had a hard time getting the adaptor to work, mostly because it was an inexpensive adaptor and it just was not making the proper connections. He got it working, but he may have to get himself a new adaptor.
We then went out to see Tallinn. There is apparently less concern here about a Russian-speaking minority. The street signs still have the Cyrillic while it has been painted out in the last two countries.
We checked to see if there were any operas playing while we were in town. Yes, a different one every night, and a music concert every night. Nice town. Friday night they have Verdi's LA TRAVIATA That sounds like the best to us. (Tonight they have Rossini's BARBER OF SEVILLE, but we think we're too tired for one tonight. Tomorrow was something by Benjamin Britten--a bit too modern for Mark's tastes.) But the ticket office was closed because it was Tuesday so we'll have to come back another day to buy the tickets.
We stopped at a bookstore on the way to the Old Town and got a Tarzan book (7.40 EEK, or about US$0.55) and a Sherlock Holmes book (13.30 EEK or about US$1), both in Estonian. We're bookaholics, especially Evelyn, who adds, 'One of the first places we went *in* the Old Town was a recently opened bookstore called Homeros on Mundi which has a large stock of foreign-language books (and not much in Estonian). Books are cheap here--well, cheaper than Finland or England, and some even cheaper than in the United States. Books in the United States are pretty cheap compared to most of Europe (and Canada). However, Homeros did have a series called 'Penguin Popular Classics' (Dickens, the Brontes, etc.) for 25 EEK (about US$2) each. Since I have only one reading book left (everything I've been buying has been in languages I don't read), I may end up buying Anne Bronte's TENANT OF WILDFELL HALL, as she is an author hard to find back home. I had read Marge Piercy's SMALL CHANGES earlier this trip--and disliked it, so I abandoned it on the Vilnius-Riga train. I'm now reading Herman Melville's TYPEE, which I also have in an omnibus volume at home, so if I finish it by Turku, it goes to the science fiction club there. (Well, it's sort of a first-contact story.) And I need something for the plane.'
We walked around the Old Town for a little while, seeing the Town Square. We had lunch at a nice restaurant, the Eeslitall. Mark had Russian vegetable soup with some meat and sour cream ('Seljanka a la Jazz'), salad, and coq au vin. Evelyn ordered mushroom soup flavored with garlic ('Sennesupp') and 'dragon chicken.' Mark expected the soup to be nothing special and the chicken to be imitation Chinese. Wrong on both counts. The mushroom soup was very good and the chicken was a chicken leg and thigh in a fiery cream sauce spiced with turmeric. Evelyn found it too spicy (always a good sign!), so let Mark finish it. 'Oh, was that good! It was creamy and piquant at the same time. The food had been good this trip, but this was the best single dish so far.' The service was very slow, but the food was very nice. With Coca-Cola for Mark and a glass of white wine for Evelyn, this all came to 160 EEK, or about US$12. |
