TBT- Where the hell is Estonia?

If you can for a second, imagine a place that is both Russian and European at the same time. It exists, and its called Estonia. Maybe its the border they share with Russia, or the Soviet occupation they endured but this place was different!

In one of my earlier posts it mentioned my first trip to Europe was a “Travel to Italy” flier at DePaul University in 2012. Well the fine print on that was ” and Estonia”.  I did tons of research on Italy (because I’d always wanted to go there, who doesn’t) but literally none on Estonia.

Since this was a grad school trip for me, it was hella educational. Like that building pictured up there, looks kind of like a Mosque, but its actually a christian church. This particular day, during our walking tour, I’d only brought my portrait lens so, I had to get far away to even get this much of the building.

For those interested in the history, here’s a cool site about it: Estonia Cathedral

I enjoyed my time in Tallinn, the capital of the small country. I frequently caught people staring at me uncomfortably, and was later informed that those black and brown folks in our group may have been the first these people had ever seen.

One of the parts of our trip was a tour outside of the city. We drove through the country side a bit, and then stopped on a cliff that had warning signs every where about how the cliff could potentially collapse in to the water.

Hell we even took pictures on the potentially collapsing cliff. Look at this shit.

And then as if having just 5 people on the edge of the cliff wasn’t enough. The rest of the damn group came and stood in the danger zone. (seriously y’all wtf is wrong with us)

Okay but I digress.

Interesting trivia fact: Estonia had concentration camps during WWII. By the time we got there in 2012 they’d all been destroyed, but for anyone who is sensitive to energy, that area where we stopped to grab a drink and take some pictures was overwhelming. That cliff is probably in danger of collapse because of all of the pain and secrets it holds.

I don’t know who came up with this idea, but the gays in the group (myself included) decided we should find a gay club, in Estonia, a country still recovering from Russian/Soviet/communist occupation.

But whatever, its 2012! A quick google search yielded one gay club. We were going to find it!

Yes, find it we will, come hell or high water or very uncomfortable Estonians on the street. The short version is this: At that time, Estonia was still not a great place to be gay. We EVENTUALLY found the gay club behind some buildings tucked in an alley with a very small illuminated lgbt flag in the window. After chatting with the locals we found that most of the gay community there were still very much closeted. I know I answered a ton of questions about what its like to be gay in America.

Would I go back?! YES! The atmosphere was a little intimidating for a first time international traveler, but I absolutely loved the group and professors I traveled with. We found an Irish pub during a world cup game, and it was absolutely nuts!

I’ll leave you with this gem. A photo I took of what we would have landed on should we have collapsed in the to Baltic Sea.

BTW– if you’re going to Europe, please get some power adapters, get them in the US on amazon, cuz they’re cheap!
I got these Euro Power Adapters (grounded)
AJ