Dave's Travel Journals
Back in the (Former) USSR
Tallinn, Estonia: May 22, 2003
By Dave Fox
It's been nine years since my last visit to Tallinn. The Estonians have done well for themselves since then.
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Tallinn's labyrinthian old town is one of Europe's best preserved medieval towns. Modern Tallinn bustles outside the city walls. |
Take restaurant service, for example. In 1994, just a couple of years after the revolution, you could choose from two styles of restaurant: Soviet or Capitalist. The Soviet restaurants were the less annoying option. The way they worked was: (1) You went up to the counter and ordered your food, and (2) the cashier yelled at you for ordering wrong. This system worked fine except that sometimes they would kick you out for not standing in the correct line, and you'd have to skip lunch.
Capitalist restaurants, on the other hand, were places where you would order at your table, and no less than three waiters would hover behind you, straightening your beer glass on your coaster and patting you on the back every now and then to help you burp. They meant well, but friendly service was a new concept in the former Soviet Union, and they overdid it.
Back in those days, you could go to a fancy restaurant with candles and cloth napkins, and order a Snickers bar off the dessert menu. I always wanted to order one just to see how they would present it. Would they plop it down on the table, wrapper and all, or would they cut it into bite-sized morsels and serve it on delicate china?
I missed my chance to find out. Snickers bars are no longer on restaurant menus here, and that's a good thing. Estonians today seem more relaxed.
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| Tangles of scaffolding are everywhere — not so much eyesores as signs of new prosperity. |
"Welcome to transforming Estonia and to Tallinn, which looks like a giant construction site," reads the introduction to the tourist brochure, Tallinn This Week. "Old buildings are disappearing from the center of the city, and new, unexpected vistas are taking shape.... The wrecking ball did a ruthless job at the Trade Union Building.... One must admit that we live in very interesting times."
Tallinnites seem comfortable with their transitionary phase -- unapologetic, and looking to the future. In the modern part of town, cranes and scaffolding clutter the skyline. They're more attractive than the bread and vodka queues Estonians used to contend with.
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| The noise of construction in the modern city fades as you enter the peaceful old town. |
The old town center remains not only intact, but classily under-restored. It has not been Disney'ized like trendy Prague, which feels artificially shiny. Even the old town McDonald's (an inevitable side-effect of capitalism) sits in a centuries-old building -- located, as tastefully as possible, on the fringes of the old town rather than the main square.
Religion was once banned. On this trip, I saw a happy gang of cymbal-clinking Hare Krishnas -- an odd sign of freedom. In the early '90s, the towering Hotel Viru was the place you went for prostitutes. Today, it's where you go for bus tours of the city. The hotel has gone from creepy to classy in a remarkably short time.
A decade ago, black market currency exchange was big business. The only black market offer I encountered on this trip was from a guy who tried to sell me Viagra. I'm not sure why he singled me out of the crowd. Did I have an impotent look on my face? I declined his offer, though I admired his entrepreneurial spirit.
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| A painful memorial amid the remnants of houses: Signs in Estonian, Russian, English, and German explain, "Tallinn was bombed by the Soviet Air Forces during the evening of March 8, 1944. 53 percent of living space was destroyed. Ca. 20,000 people lost their homes. 463 people were killed and 659 were wounded." |
Tallinnites suffered in Stalinist times. Before the Soviets invaded, Estonia and Finland were like two odd twins on the fringes of northern Europe. Linguistically, culturally, and economically, they were nearly identical - and unique among the rest of Europe. But in 1994, when I traveled by ferry from Helsinki to Tallinn, I went in four hours from a shiny, modern city to a depressed and crumbling other world. The contrast was the most striking example I have seen of how badly the Soviet Union failed. Today, Estonia is a phoenix rising from the ashes.
Nine years ago, Tallinn had a spooky edge. I felt like I always needed to look over my shoulder. The city was just beginning to awaken from a long Soviet slumber then. Along with hopes for a prosperous future came greed and crime among a small but scary minority that targeted tourists from the affluent West.
Everything has changed since then. Tallinn feels safer than Oslo today -- safe from crime, and safe (at least for now) from the Americanization that has watered down the culture in so many other European capitals.
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| The Maiasmokk Café has soothed the Estonian sweet tooth since 1864. The chipped tile floor is original. The cash register is new. |
On my last morning in Tallinn, I went for breakfast to my old hangout, the Maiasmokk café. The interior hadn't changed since the '90s. And in the '90s, it hadn't changed since 1864, when it first opened. In 1994, I would stop in a couple of times each day to scarf down gooey pastries and slurp tea from chipped porcelain cups. In those days, you ordered your food in one line, paid in another line, and then waited in the first line a second time to show your receipt and claim your pastry.
Today you only have to wait in line once. The pastries are as tasty as they always were. You can still get tea for 30 US cents, but they've invested in new cups. And now they will ring up your purchase on a modern, electronic cash register. They've thrown away their abacus.
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