Estonia?

When I was telling people that I was going to Estonia for a course, the usual reaction was something along the lines of "that really exists", "What's Estonia?", "Where's Estonia?", and there was one person who actually knew about Estonia.  He was an ambassador to Estonia during a summer internship in Washington DC.  Thank you, Kevin for knowing what, where, and why Estonia is.

Let's start with the where:

It took me about 24 hours to get to the course site in Tartu, Estonia.  That's a bus from Milwaukee to Chicago, a flight from Chicago to Stockholm, a layover in Stockholm airport, a flight from Stockholm to Tallin, and another 2 hour bus ride to Tartu.

It interesting because the weather and landscape in Estonia almost reminded me of home.  It was snowy and open.  Instead of what I consider to be the typical European style houses that are masked by gates, there were yards and you could see the houses.  They were mostly made of stone and wood.  and people had dogs playing in their yards.  

My former supervisor, Kate taught me to travel by hotels.  You can really travel the world by anything.  Some people travel the world with a fascination for chocolate, or coffee, foods in general, or by magnets or T-shirts.  Anyways, Kate taught me to appreciate the different hotel rooms.  So you will probably see a theme of hotel rooms as I travel.  Above is my room in Tallin.  It was a really nice hotel.  To the left is the view outside of my skylight window.

Tartu is a city that was under various reigns and wars throughout history.  I found it interesting that typically everyone there speaks Estonian, English, and Russian.  They also typically learn one other language in school.  Being bilingual suddenly seems like a simple feat.  I would love to attempt another language, but am still apprehensive about ever returning to school.

Modern day Tartu is dominated by the university.  The city is very proud of it's University, which is the oldest in Estonia, and has a huge student population.  Above is a statue in the main square.  It is called the 'kissing students', as a tribute to the University students that dominate the city.

There are a few interesting other things about Estonia.  Randomly, EVERYWHERE we went there were free coat checks.  They really were over the top in that respect.  I think it is related to the cold temperatures and the fact that everyone walks to their destinations a lot more often so the coat check becomes essential as everyone arrives very bundled up.  Another interesting thing was that they had WIFI throughout all the cities and believed that the internet should be a free resource for everyone.  The below, was also their creative solution to sitting in the main square in cold weathers.  They have fur topped chairs and heaters!  I think Wisconsin could learn a thing from them.

This is a leaning house.  The higher side was built on the ancient wall that surrounded the city, hence it hasn't sunk along with the other side of the building.

After running the course.  We headed back to Tallinn, where we spent the night until our planes left the next morning.