East of East

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Welcome to my final post! Like the others, it's fairly long. Feel free to jump around to your heart's content.

This post covers: Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Russia, Sweden, and a little more of Germany

UKRAINE (Україна!)

LVIV: Back in 2006, when I was on Semester at Sea visiting the city of Dubrovnik, Croatia, some friends and I accidentally found ourselves in a field still containing mines left over from the Yugoslav wars. I can very clearly recall standing in that field, pondering how the heck I found myself in such an unlikely situation. I remember thinking that if before my trip began, someone had told me that at some point in the near future, I would find myself in an active land mine field in Croatia, I would have thought that to be one of the most unlikely outcomes in the world. Similarly, if at some point in 2009, I'd gone to a fortune teller and she'd told me, "Ah, yes... I see that one year from now you will be crossing the border from Poland into Ukraine on foot on a snowy winter night" I would have considered her to be both a fraud and a lunatic. Today I would still consider her a fraud, since I don't believe in fortune tellers, but she would have been spot-on with the prediction.
There is a direct train that runs between Krakow and Lviv, and for 45 euros you can go to sleep in Krakow and wake up early the next morning in lovely Lviv. Or, for a mere 10 euros, you can take a far more adventurous combination of trains, buses, minibuses, and taxis, leaving in the morning and arriving late at night. Which route do you think I chose?
While getting there was a bit hairy, Lviv really is a nice city, far more attractive than I expected. I was anticipating way more brutal communist architecture. There was some, to be sure, but the city possessed charm too. And seeing everything with a few inches of snow made exploring even more fun. My favorite highlights from Lviv included the famous Lychakiv Cemetery, the huge outdoor Folk Architecture museum, exploring the old town on foot, the surprisingly delicious Ukrainian food (especially the борщ!), and the insane Italian-Canadians I met at the Kosmonaut hostel where I stayed. One other interesting sight was the former home of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, the author of Venus in Furs and the inspiration for the term masochism, which is derived from his name. The home of the "first masochist" has since been turned into a funny little cafe where, if you like, between sips of your latte, you can take your shirt off, kneel on the ground, and have the waitresses whip the bejesus out of you in front of everyone. I imagine they must hear their share of whipped cream jokes working at such a place.

KIEV: Ukraine's capital is huge. I spent two whole days walking all over, and I probably didn't even see half the city. It snowed for the entirety of my stay here, and my days in Kiev were definitely some of the coldest of my trip. But by now I was getting used to wearing all my clothes at once. Highlights from Kiev included the famous St. Sofia church, gigantic communist monuments (especially the freakishly huge Rodina Mat statue), receiving a personal city tour from Nataly, a local Ukrainian that Amanda and I met on a boat returning to Athens several months earlier, and learning that Ukrainians celebrate a different sort of Christmas, starring not Santa Claus but instead "Daddy Frost" and "Snowflake Girl".
One interesting thing about traveling from Lviv to Kiev (aside from the fact that you get to take a very comfortable overnight train ride across the country with your own private bed for only 8 euros) is the language change. In Lviv, the vast majority of locals speak Ukrainian. In Kiev, about 90% of conversations are in Russian. Of course it made no difference to me, as I was effectively illiterate either way.
The main "danger" I had to be on the lookout for in Kiev was the police. Being a policeman in Ukraine does not carry the status it does back in the States, and accordingly, their salaries are pretty meager. The stat I heard numerous times (which could be a total lie, I don't know), was that policemen make almost as much from bribes as they do from their salaries. I have no clue how accurate that statistic is, but I heard enough stories from fellow travelers to make me take Ukrainian policemen seriously. From what I heard, the usual encounter went something like this for travelers: 1. Police spot foreigner. 2. Police request to see passport. 3. Police insist there is some sort of fine due. 4. Police refuse to return passport until said fine is paid.
The secret, as I was told by the manager at my hostel in Kiev, was to simply say, "Consulate, consulate, consulate" about 20 times, as even policemen that spoke zero English would understand and back off upon hearing that. I carried only a photocopy of my passport with me when walking around in the city, crossed streets as to avoid being isolated near groups of policemen, and fortunately didn't have any problems during my stay.
It's pretty pathetic, but previously the only thing that came to my mind when someone mentioned Ukraine was Oksana Baiul, the gold medal Ukrainian figure skater. Fortunately, now that I have seen some of the country, I have more than just a tiny girl on skates to associate with the place. I don't think I'd want to live in Ukraine permanently, but it was certainly a fascinating place to visit.

LITHUANIA

VILNIUS: With my flight back to Seattle less than two weeks away, my time for exploring the Baltic states was necessarily (and unfortunately) brief. I only had time to visit the capital cities, but I spent pretty much every waking minute walking around and exploring them. I'd like to come back and better explore this part of Eastern Europe, as there's a tremendous amount of history packed in a small amount of land here.
I spent a full day walking all over a frozen Vilnius. Pretty nice city. The most fascinating part for me was the ex-KGB prison (also know as the Museum of Genocide Victims). The former prison is CREEPY. I cannot imagine what it would be like to be held here during Stalin's time in power. Some of the cells were so small you almost had to stand in them. In some, prisoners were forced to stand on a small wooden platform in the center of a room filled with about two feet of water. If they lost their balance, they ended up soaked and got to freeze themselves to death in the unheated cells during the winter. Seeing the showers, the "exercise yard", and the execution chamber here was truly haunting. The exhibits described life in Lithuania under Soviet rule, and I found myself most blown away by how many people were employed to spy on their neighbors, friends, and family members. No expense was spared keeping tabs on everything that everybody did inside the country. Phone lines were tapped, citizens were constantly observed and followed... You couldn't trust anybody! The feelings of paranoia must have been indescribable. I left feeling extremely fortunate to not live in such a society. Let's hope the KGB (or a similar organization) never attains that level of power within such an influential country again. Maybe I shouldn't have signed my name in the museum guest book...

LATVIA

RIGA: Riga is a truly gorgeous city. I don't know what the term is for this architecture, but it's fantastic. I felt like I was in an animated children's story. Once again, I only had one day to take in the city, but I made the most of it by seeing as much as I could on foot. It snowed for most of the time I was here, and my day in Riga was probably the coldest day I experienced during my trip (I think I was told it was around -15 C that day, not accounting for any wind chill factor). Happily for me, I befriended two Germans and two Bulgarians in my hostel room, and their presence made my time here really enjoyable. Riga was (in my opinion) probably the nicest of the Baltic capital cities.

ESTONIA

TALLINN: Another cold, snowy Baltic capital. Who'd a thunk it? Like the previous two, I only had a day here, but I really enjoyed my brief stay in the birthplace of Skype. The old town was blanketed in snow, the hostel owner was one of the friendliest Aussies I'd ever met, I met some cool German and Spanish guys at the hostel to hang out with, and Estonian pancakes are to die for. This was also my last chance to use the Estonian currency (the Estonian kroon), as they have since switched over to the euro since the start of the new year. I would have loved to stay and explore for a few more days, but the siren song of Finland was calling.

FINLAND

HELSINKI: Helsinki is very similar to Tallinn, except that everything costs about three times as much. On top of this minor irritation, my first day in Finland happened to coincide with the country's Independence Day, so nothing was open! I take that back, the gas station convenience store where I got 80% of my food that day was open, as was the tourist information office. But everything else was locked up tight.
The crazy Italian-Canadians that I met in Lviv had told me that supposedly it was possible to take an overnight cruise from Helsinki to St Petersburg, Russia, without needing a visa. This is some sort of new deal that only started earlier in 2010, as previously it had been impossible for an American to get into Russia (legally) without a visa. I had researched this a bit on the internet, and it seemed to be legitimate, so I had come to Helsinki with the hopes that I would be able to take a cruise that night to Russia! Fortunately, the national holiday seemed to be keeping most Finns at home, which meant that there were still cheap beds available on the cruise.
After a day spent exploring the snow-coated and frigid city of Helsinki, I loaded up on snacks for my boat ride and climbed aboard ye ol' St Peter Line.
My roommates were two older Russian gents. The first, probably about 45 years old, spoke maybe 3 words of English and seemed a bit suspicious of me. I don't know why he seemed so worried, he clearly had an exhibitionist streak. Twice I entered our shared room to find him standing in the middle of the cabin in a man thong, doing his "stretches". My other roommate was a Russian man, probably around 65 years old or so. He spoke much more English and he simply would not shut up. You might think that climbing under my covers, putting my ear plugs in and sliding my sleeping mask over my eyes would discourage him from conversing with me, but some people just don't take easily to social conventions.
As the cruise seemed to be made up of 99.9% Russians (with whom I assumed I could communicate very little) and I was exhausted, I slept almost the entire cruise. Some people apparently don't like sleeping on a ship, but I love it. The gentle rocking back and forth makes me feel like I'm back in the womb. And c'mon, who didn't like the womb?

RUSSIA

ST. PETERSBURG: The catch with the visa-free travel to Russia via the Helsinki ship is that you only get 72 hours in Russia. If you don't leave before those 72 hours are up, Russia has the right to execute you. Or something like that.
But due to the ship's sailing schedule, I had essentially two days and one night to soak up St Petersburg.
After checking in at the Soul Kitchen hostel (highly recommended if you stay in St Petersburg), I walked down Nevsky Prospekt to the State Hermitage, one of the largest museums of art and culture in the world.
As it was in Ukraine, if you are a foreigner in St Petersburg, and especially if you don't speak Russian, it is a far better policy to avoid the police than it is to seek them out. So once again I had my police radar on full sensitivity, crossing streets and avoiding eye contact as needed to reduce the chances of a passport check and subsequent bribe request. My covert act was doing pretty well, but only a few hundred meters from the Hermitage, I wiped out onto my tailbone hard, sending the water bottle in my hand flying a few hundred feet across the ice from me. Lying in snow and ice, I half expected a passerby or two to yell "yard sale!" in my direction, like your average wiseguy on the ski slopes, but I guess people here hit the pavement often enough that no one seemed to even look at me twice. My sore tailbone and I slowly loped the last hundred meters or so to the Hermitage.
With free admission to students like myself (wink), I got to stroll through this mammoth collection for four or five hours in total. While wandering amongst some Picassos, whom should I run into but David, a friend I had made in Krakow when the two of us had shared a dorm room together. The coincidence was particularly uncanny since at the time we parted ways, neither of us had planned to visit Russia. And to top it off, he was staying in the same hostel as I was. I guess even the independent traveler's trail is a pretty small world.
The night was filled with great Russian food, observing how amazingly drunk some Russian people will get in a family restaurant, travel stories from all over the world, and even some Big Lebowski for a nightcap. Watching "The Dude" in Russia was another experience I never predicted I would have, but it's funny how these unexpected events keep turning up when you travel.
The next day consisted of going to see the Peter & Paul Fortress, experiencing prayer time at a local mosque (and being asked to leave), and enjoying kebabs with some friends from the hostel. The typical Russian experience? Maybe not, but I enjoyed myself.
After only two short days, it was time to head back to Finland. But the Russian fun was far from over. I entered my shipboard cabin to meet Denis, a young Russian doctor specializing in helping people free themselves from addiction to narcotics. I think that was what he did anyway, unless "narcotic doctor" is Russian code lingo for drug dealer or something else I don't know about. Our inability to speak each other's language made for all sorts of amusing exchanges. We watched a Russian song and dance show on one of the upper decks, during which many middle-aged Russians got hysterically drunk and lurched around all over the place. After that, Denis and I went and put on our own show at the karaoke bar. I sang Californication, Hotel California, and Heart of Gold. As the only non-Russian in attendance, and the only one singing non-Russian songs, you can imagine how well my performances went over. I wasn't exactly the crowd favorite. I would have loved to hit them with Back in the USSR, but oddly enough, it wasn't available for selection.

SWEDEN

UPPSALA: The overnight cruise from Helsinki to Stockholm was pretty similar to the cruise I'd just taken to St Petersburg. Except that this ship was full of drunk Swedes instead of drunk Russians. I was extremely pleased to find that I had a four person cabin all to myself, as it allowed me to spend the evening in my underwear, enjoying reindeer meat sandwiches while catching up in my travel journal. Upon arrival in Stockholm, a series of buses and trains got me up to Uppsala, the city where my Swedish friend Rebecka lives. After exploring Berlin together a month earlier, it was very nice to see her again here in Sweden.
Perhaps even more than in Austria and Germany, everyone in Sweden thought I was local! I realize this isn't that surprising. Throughout my travels, most people's first guess has commonly been that I'm Swedish. But after visiting 40+ countries where I look like an alien to the locals, it's just really fun to finally blend in somewhere. And when I first arrived, with everyone saying "Hey hey!" to greet me, I thought I was really the man. "Hey hey yourself!" I was mildly deflated when Rebecka informed me that "Hej hej" is simply Swedish for "hello".
I had a great time staying at Rebecka's apartment in Uppsala. We loaded up on Swedish groceries, had music parties in the kitchen, watched Clint Eastwood's "Unforgiven", and even had a glögg (Swedish hot spiced wine) party with her friends one evening. She was the ultimate host. With the sun setting each day at an ungodly early hour, I didn't get the chance to see much of Uppsala. No matter, Rebecka and her cat Fingal (sp?) kept me highly entertained. Really it was nice just to rest and sit in one spot for awhile.
Since arriving back home, I've been asked many times what my favorite country was. I reply that it depends on if the questioner is asking about a place I enjoyed visiting briefly, or a place I'd actually like to live. While most of the countries I traveled through were great fun to visit, I don't think I'd want to live in many of them permanently. Sweden would be one of the few exceptions. Aside from the fact that I already look Swedish, the country was as modern as they come, and the standard of living was among the highest I've ever seen.

STOCKHOLM: I spent a day exploring Stockholm on foot. Interestingly enough, this was the same day (December 11th) that some character attempted to set off a couple off bombs in the crowded city center. Fortunately he seems to have been better at coming up with crazy plans that he was at successfully executing them, and the only person killed was the bomber himself. Luckily for me, this happened about an hour after I had hopped on the train back to Uppsala.

After saying goodbye to Rebecka, I had the pleasure of experiencing again just how criminally generous Ryanair is with the titles it gives to its secondary airports. I took a 2.5 hour bus from Stockholm to what Ryanair calls its "Stockholm airport". When my flight touched down in Germany, I got to take a 3 hour bus from Ryanair's "Frankfurt airport" to Frankfurt itself. Making the trip truly memorable, my few remaining Swedish krona was the only cash I had on me that night, so I embraced my darkest truffle shuffle desires and subsisted for a period of about 20 hours on nothing but a one pound Toblerone bar.

GERMANY

FRANKFURT: It's hard to believe this is the last city of my trip! I came to Frankfurt a day before I was scheduled to fly out, just in case I had any complications getting here from Stockholm.

I spent a day walking around Frankfurt. It's a very modern city, with a small "Old Town". I enjoyed getting lost among the skyscrapers, exploring the Christmas market, and hanging out in the downtown Apple store.

It took about 20 hours to get from Frankfurt to Seattle, but it felt much longer due to the dismal in-flight entertainment offered (curse you Eat, Pray, Love).

Final thoughts: During my last night in Frankfurt, a traveler at the hostel asked me what big lessons I'd learned from my trip. After a little thought, here were the two main answers that came to mind:

1. Humans are the same all over the planet. There are no "good" people here, or "evil" people there, it is simply a matter of human nature reacting to the surroundings presented to it. I know I'm not saying anything new here, but seeing it again and again in very different places really cements it.

2. The media is not paid to give you balanced, unbiased information. The media is paid to grab and hold your attention. Many of the countries I visited had stigmas of being "dangerous". This was almost never the case, at least certainly not to the extent usually portrayed. Travelers I met would say things like, "Serbia? Isn't Serbia dangerous?" Honestly, it's probably about as dangerous as Wyoming. The only things most people had heard about many of these countries seemed to be negative sound bites. Clearly, positive events don't get their fair share of the limelight. Take the Stockholm bombing as an example. Despite the bomber's failure, and the fact that no one other than the bomber himself died, the whole event seemed to dominate the international news for the next week or so. When I got to Frankfurt, I was amazed by how much time the BBC devoted to the story. I didn't see anything during my time in Sweden to suggest that the event had turned Stockholm into a "climate of fear and dread" (as one news reporter so eloquently put it). It seemed to me that the news reports made the event look far more terrifying than it needed to be. The lesson here is to remain aware of what the majority of media outlets are rewarded for: holding your attention between advertisements, not supplying you with useful information.

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Photos

Lychakiv Cemetery, Lviv, Ukraine
"One of the loveliest cemeteries in Eastern Europe"

More Lychakiv
Lviv

From the Museum of Folk Architecture and Rural Life
Old structures from all over Ukraine brought together to one location in Lviv

Public park in Lviv
Yeah, I won't get lost in there...

Monument to Taras Shevchenko
Lviv

The birthplace of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
The world's first 'masochist' and author of "Venus in Furs"

St Andrew's Church
Kiev, Ukraine

Monument to the Unification of Russia and Ukraine
AKA: Metal rainbow all the way across the sky...

Giant Frog/Toad
Park Misky Sad

Locks of love
Kiev

Memorial to the Holodomor Victims
Kiev, Ukraine

Rodina Mat, in all her glory
102 meters tall, weighing 560 tons

Mother Motherland
Also knows as: "Tin tits"