My afternoon in Tallinn was back on my own. Tõnis had left me and I found myself sitting in the cafe of a museum, eating a sandwich and writing furiously about my morning (read about it here) so as to avoid sitting up for two hours at night writing it all at once. As I adjusted back to being by myself again, caught up with my mother, and ate some food I finally got the motivation to take a look around and do what I came to the museum to do - be educated on the maritime history of Estonia.
The inside of the museum was really cool. The floor was painted with some kind of sea map and there was a giant submarine in the middle of the floor surrounded by other smaller boats and giant buoys. I wandered around reading about all of them and stumbled upon the interactive exhibits - one of which was a VR version of how the building was built with its concrete domed roof.
I thought I was done with the museum and when I walked outside into the setting sun and the strong ocean wind until I saw a small black sign with a boat and an arrow on it pointing to go behind the building. I turned around and saw a bunch of ships. As I walked towards them I noticed a bunch of people getting on and off the ships. I wasn't so much interested what was on the ships but learning how each one got there was fascinating.
Having seen all I could see at the maritime museum I turned my attention to, what Kaito and Tõnis would call, the general direction of my hostel. I walked along the water like Tõnis told me to and found myself back in old town. I am forever greatful that Tõnis and and Martin took the time yesterday to show me around and what the difference was between the long leg and the short leg streets because before I knew it I was in the heart of old town.
Thank goodness I had such excellent tour guides the day before because about half way through the maze of old town my phone decided to give up on me and I was navigating blind. I remembered what Tõnis said about going in the general direction of your destination (a bastardization of a Monty Python joke) so I just kept walking along and hoping I would find my way out. Of course I made a few stops as well. I picked up a magnet for my mother who I hadn't gotten anything for yet (whoops), then stopped off in a pub for dinner.
The food was very good and as I sat there, literally the only patron, a strange feeling of loneliness set in. I realized that I hadn't made any new temporary friends yet and my trip was almost through! I've never traveled alone and not met at least a few new friends along the way. I thought about how I probably should have gone and joined the pub crawl the night before instead of writing and going to bed. But then my eyes started to close and I thought no, I really need to sleep more. As the restaurant got more crowded I decided it was time to head back and take a nap before going out and being social again.
I eventually did make my way out of the Old Town maze thanks to all the little stories and bits of history from the men the day before. Their tales of peasants, long legs, short legs, mud roads and knights helped me to figure out where I was headed. Back in the hostel I collapsed into bed almost immediately, not even bothering to change from my street clothes. When I awoke again the soft thumping of the music from the bar slash reception area upstairs was gone and I wondered what could have happened. It was 9:30 in the evening and the bed felt so comfortable even while still wearing my jeans. "No!" I yelled at myself, "get up and do something!"
In just my socks, since shoes are not allowed past the front door of the reception slash bar, I climbed the icy cold concrete steps to the third floor and walked in to the bar. It was nearly empty and soft guitar music was being played while a group of guys played snooker and another group was crowded around a coffee table sitting on the couches. I realized that they were playing trivia, and having quite a time doing it so I bought myself a beer and pulled up a seat to watch them. After a few questions one of the guys turned around and saw me. In the thickest Scottish accent I had ever heard he invited me to join their team. At first I passed but at the end of the round I said sure and found myself sitting with them but not really helping at all since all the questions were about alcohol.
Trivia ended with a pretty bad loss for my team but the night wasn't over. Back on the couch I found out that most of the people there were also employees, or volunteers as they called themselves, James the scot had up and quit his job to travel and get a fresh start, a tall British blonde girl was only 20, and then they asked me what my story is. When I turned 27 I met someone and told him my real age, and he replied, "oh so who is watching your children then? You have two or three?" Since then my policy has been to lie about my age and when I started working for a large media company I started not telling people who I worked for either. Thankfully I still look sort of young, it's often my stories that arouse suspicion that I'm much older then I look. Back to the conversation on the couch, when asked what I did and how old I was I said I worked in tech and I'm 20-something. Eventually James and the blonde Brit got the truth out of me but were nice enough not to hold it against me. They all started "playing" Tinder and I started giving speech lessons on American accents and words. Apparently my New York accent isn't authentic enough, which is what one of them told me. Before long it was just James and I in the reception slash bar talking about life and travel, making note that it's often easy to bare your soul to a stranger you meet on the road. When we realized we were both going to Riga the next day and staying in the same place we exchanged Facebook info so we could hang out again in Riga.
By the time I made it back to bed I realized that it was 5am, even later then the other nights, and I had missed another chance at sleep.
Location:Tatari,Tallinn,Estonia
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