St. Petersburg - Tallinn - Helsinki - Tallinn

So I left St. Petersburg on tuesday May 22.  Mostly because my visa expired and I didn't want to be thrown in the gulag.  I said that to Tonya (who I was staying with) and she didn't know what I was talking about.  I am still unclear if that's because she didn't know about it, that's not what it was called, or it never existed.  Here's me and Tonya in St. Petersburg:

We both hate this picture.

I took the bus to Tallinn, Estonia.  The only thing I knew about Estonia is that I had a friend in high school whose whole family was absurdly proud of being Estonian.

The border was this ridiculous exercise in getting off the bus.  Gathering your luggage.  Going through Russian border control.  Getting back on the bus.  Driving 500 meters.  Getting off the bus.  Gathering luggage.  Going through Estonian border control.  Back on the bus.  A day later I went from Estonia to Finland to Estonia and nobody even asked to see my passport (they barely asked to see my ticket).  I am starting to feel that all this border control is just to make small officials feel important.  I am pretty sure any real border violations (which would be what? smuggling?) do not happen on the bus line.

Anyway it is such a difference between Russia and Estonia.  Estonia is almost western europe.  Clean and modern.  Russia has just not been well maintained and it looks shoddy and old.  I have a lot of thoughts about this, having experienced it elsewhere in the world.  I hope to share them in a later post.

Then I went to Finland for the day to visit a good friend.  As always, I am so impressed with how clean and well ordered Helsinki is.

Sorry my thoughts are so scattered.

Here's pics of the ferry ride and my friend in Finland.

Speaking of Ferries and Minna, we actually met on a ferry from Haifa, Israel to Cyprus (her) and then Greece (me).  We sailed away the day the shooting started at the Dome of the Rock in 2000 that ended the uneasy peace that had allowed me to travel from Egypt to Jordan and then Israel in the days before. Good timing.

If this blog doesn't get more interesting soon, (and better written) I will be very disappointed in the author.