Direct To Tallinn

I just saw a billboard that had a tagline for some transport company’s service that was written in English: “Straight to Tallinn.”

I looked at that sign, I looked out the window, and I had absolutely no idea how anything couldn’t go straight to Tallinn. I’m two hours and fifteen minutes into a bus journey from Riga, the capital of Latvia, to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, and I’ve literally seen nothing out the window that wasn’t either birch forests or farms. I don’t believe I’ve even passed a village, and the only sign of collective habitation there’s been so far was a collection of trucks and a small hostel an the frontier.

It’s beautiful out here. Beautiful and flat and rural. Kind of like where I grew up in Western New York.

Wait…I just saw my first Estonian. He was peeing in the woods just off of the roadside.

30 min later: I see another one. He’s sitting on a log on the side of the road in the middle of a birch forest.

There is something about Estonia that I like already. There’s just nothing here, and, every once in a while, that’s a very good thing.