Middle of Nowhere, Estonia

It's the day before my brother's birthday. It's (when I started to write) 16.00, I've just finished eating dinner and I'm exhausted. I was shoveling snow even before breakfast and of course I continued after. My back is aching. This is my first job involving manual labor... and I love it! Specially because I'm in the country side. I'm living in the small village of Pudisoo, some 50 km east of Tallinn within Lahemaa National Park limits. 30 min walk and I can witness an imposing frozen Baltic Sea. Air can't get any more fresh. The only times I've seen so many stars in the sky had been when I was in a secluded beach in Guatemala or Nicaragua or Ecuador or Colombia or when I was sailing to Colombia.

How the hell did I end up here? To answer that I have to go back to the summer of 2010. 

Imagine this scenario: second time hitchhiking alone in Europe. The distance wasn't that great, it was just over 300km but involved crossing the Baltic Sea and having someone to take on board the ferry, for free. Long story short: I spent 5 hours looking for a ride when shortly after 21.00 someone picked me up. Not only that he gave me a ride, he fed me that evening (and following morning), let me sleep inside his VW bus and took me 60 kms to the next town so I could catch the train to KBN.

A year later he gave me a job while I was volunteering in a hostel in Tallinn.

Now, he's my boss again. His name is Rauno and I'm working in his guesthouse and soon I will move on board the SV Blue Sirius and share my life between the countryside and the life at sea.

Having grown up in a city, moving to the countryside was something exciting! I have never lived in a place with so many trees before and with air this fresh! A frozen Baltic Sea is only a 30min walk away. By the way, I'm really glad I didn't go to Pirita before. The frozen beach I had the opportunity to see was completely deserted. Walking on a frozen sea was one of the most exciting things I have ever done. I've walked on frozen lakes or rivers but not a sea. Now I would like to walk on a frozen ocean!

Even though life here is good there are some things that (for me) are not: there are no pubs!  I can't have a beer, no well, actually I had a few beers so far. Four in week's time. I don't have anyone to get drunk with. But on the other hand, that's good, is it? The closest shop is 6kms away. I've heard about the existence of neighbours but I actually haven't seen them :-) Today when I was shoveling snow and moving some pieces of wood, the only living being around me was Lady the dog! I. Love. It!

Soon I'll move back to Tallinn and start moving back and forth sharing my time between two opposite places. Let's see what happens...

By the way, it's 20.10 when I finishing writing this post. And I'm publishing it the following day, on my brother's birthday.

Nina, a bit of drinks, el gato and awesome times

I sent yesterday I think an mail asking some of you for stories about travelling/hitchhiking and Nina was the first one to send me hers. She keeps a facebook page in which she writes something everyday. I posted the link a while ago, but here it is again: Charlotte Acrobat's 365. I enjoy her writing very much. You should check Nina's page, I'm sure you would like it.

I met her in Zagreb over two years ago... WOW! Nina is responsible for my love to Borek. Good times in Zagreb, remember "el gato"? 

Without further a due, I leave you with her story, which by the way I didn't expect it to be this one!

I'm Nina. A traveller. A CouchSurfer. A hitchhiker. A Croatian. Specialised in living out of Croatia and refusing to grow up. An aspiring writer.

This is my first attempt to write something 100% autobiographic and on a given topic: travelling or something related to travelling. I'm not sure how it will turn out but let's see.

There are so many tiny stories to share and it's hard to choose only one. I could talk about how it all started, about several turning points, about people's kindness, about keeping your life in a 60liter backpack, about inability to settle down… Crap, I have no idea.

*5 minutes later*

Wait, I do have an idea. I'll write about how I met Ron Navas. And no, you won't have to watch 8 seasons of CBS sitcom to discover how. (Referring to How I Met Your Mother.)

January, 2011. (God it's been that long?!) I accept a CouchRequest of two French guys and a Guatemalan guy Ron. A few days later, they enter my apartment bringing the spirit of the road inside. Sharing a bit of food, more than a bit of drinks and loads of tips and tricks on travelling.

- Hey, have you read this book on low-budget travelling? – Ron is showing a book.

- No, I haven't. Hey, have you heard of this Finnish guy who refuses to be a part of monetary system and doesn't use any money? – I'm reminded of a guy I've met while hitchhiking the Balkans.

- You mean Tomi? – Ron says.

- Yeah, Astikainen or something like that. You know him in person? – I'm surprised.

- Sure, yeah, I've met him in Spain and then we bumped into each other later on the streets of Lyon. – he explains.

Wow, the world's so small, I think to myself.

- You know, this reminds me of when we were in Greece, Tomi and I ended up spending one night at this girl's place, Martyna, a Polish girl on Erasmus in Greece. And then, a few weeks later the very same girl Martyna ended up CouchSurfing in Istanbul at my friends place. – I continue.

- Wait, you say Polish girl on Erasmus in Greece, that rings a bell for sure. Martyna, surname Grzymala?

- Yup, that's her. – I say in disbelief.

- And the Turkish guy, is his name by any chance Orcun?

- Yup, Orcun Akkiray.

The world's smaller than I could believe.

After a few days of spontaneous parties at my place, Ron and the French guys leave to continue their journey. I've been taught how to say: "¿Qué hora es? ¡Es la hora decir salud!" which has proven to be very useful since January when I began living in Valencia, Spain."

July-August 2011. I'm the States on my temporary working visa. In my free time, I'm enjoying Spanish-Italian language exchange with a CouchSurfer named Al.

September 2011. I add Al on the list of my CouchSurfing friends.

- Hey Al, I've seen that we have Ron Navas as a mutual friend. How the hell do you know him? – I'm sincerely shocked.

- Yeah, he was hitchhiking some time ago here in the US and I picked him up once. – he explained.

So peeps, this is a story of how small the world is and how I met Ron Navas.

Travelling, CouchSurfing, hitchhiking – all of that added together breaks the image of the world as a bad place, making you understand why's it said that there are no strangers, only friends you haven't met yet. (In most of the cases it's been proven to be true. Still, there are rare cases that support the image of the world as a bad place. Here's what Amanda Fucking Palmer has to say about that: "If anybody tries to steal your ukulele, let them take it!")

Can't stay away from...

Poland.

I had this long draft ready to be published but I changed my mind and not going to do it. Just going to say that going back to Poland was nice, as always. I shared some great times with great people. Poland will always be in my top list and I will always keep going back. I felt like home when I stayed in my home for the spring of 2011, the Goodbye Lenin Pub & Garden. I would really recommend this hostel, as a super plus, they have their own pub and the receptionists are hot... makes me wonder why did I ever leave that place? Jokes aside, the staff is wonderful and the facilities are awesome. Special thanks to my former boss Paweł for let me crash for a couple of nights.

Will I ever get to see the Tatry, please tell someday I will dammit!

But I had to leave, a job was waiting for me in Tallinn. In the petrol station I found one of my rides there was an Estonian car tanking. I was not that lucky, the car was full. My aim was to make it to Kaunas. I surpassed that and luckily I made it to Riga BUT I was in the same petrol station I was stuck 2 years before for 12 hours. This time though there were several trucks including two with Estonian license plates. Long story short: I spent the night in the toilet and by 5.45 I was already on my way to Tartu. By 9 I was in Tartu but it was still early and I had the option of going to a town 50km from the Russian border so I went. The town's name is Johvi. From there it was easy to get to Tallinn.

 I took this photo before the ride mentioned above, it was before 5.00 in the morning. Before I walked inside the shop and drank two hot chocolates. I was shaking, I have no idea how cold it was but it felt like -20C!

The small white circle on the left it's the moon not a light post.

"Life is like a bad haircut"

I came up with this title because I just got a new haircut a few days ago. If you didn't know or perhaps you already noticed that I like quotes. So here it goes, another one:

"Life is a bad haircut. At first it looks awful, then you kind of get used to it, and before you know it, it grows on you and you gotta get another haircut that maybe won't be so bad. (...) So life goes on, good haircut, bad haircut, until you finally go bad, and it don't matter no more."

My new haircut is awesome by the way! And I can also say that about my life for these past few days I spent in Budapest. Well at least most of it if you take into account that I didn't find the job I was looking for. The hostel I loved couldn't hire me at this time. I had a few offers but they weren't good enough.

The first couple of days I stayed wit Zsuzsi, the loveliest girl I have ever met I think (saying this might get me into trouble!). She replied to my emergency CS request. WOW! The way Zsuzsi and her family treated was unbelievable. They welcomed me like a family member and not like a stinky traveler. From the first minute I was treated like family. I will NEVER forget that when I went to sleep and I said the goodnight, Zsuzsi's dad said good night and gave me a hug.

Like I mentioned before I had a few interviews and Ferci, the owner of The Loft Hostel invited me to stay for a few days as his guest. Not to sound like a review but this hostel in awesome, it's small, nice, cool, cozy; it was the place I would had liked to work. It's the kind of place where you can actually meet and (if you're good enough) remember all the guests. The building in which is located is veryld in the very center of Budapest. It's located in a not so cheap area but there are still lots of options for cheap bastards like me (and you!). I went to other couple of interviews. After 37 seconds of talking to some of the staff I was convinced that even if they would offer me something (which they didn't) I wouldn't take it. The other one it was not good for me.

I wrote before than staying in hostels is not my cup of tea. I love working in them but oh well, let's not go through that nonsense again. I think that's changing anyway. I've met amazing people in the few I stayed in the past few weeks. First in Heidelberg where I met Ailen and we instantly became friends and now in Budapest, where I met Amy (we arrived at the same time) from the US, Alex and Christian (hitchhiking to Chesanau) from Germany but living in Austria and Daniela and Karel from Chile. We were the perfect group and thanks to all of them I have an awesome new haircut. In fact they cut my hair instead of going out to the ruin bars and was all worth it. I felt like a guinea pig but as Karel put it, because I wanted to. Touche!
Our small group started to disband, first Daniela and Karel (too bad we didn't meet in Krakow) left Sunday morning. That day was St. Patrick's day and a United Statian, two germans and one guatemalan went to "celebrate" it in a mexican restaurant with irish servers... in Budapest! Then Amy left to Zurich.

Monday morning came and Alex, Christian and me said goodbye and wished each other good luck for the road. They were hitchhiking East. I was going North.

See you all again, let's make it soon (every one mentioned in this post) :-)

in a nutshell

I had some small posts written in my notebook about the rest of the places I have been but instead of writing about them individually I just going to make a big post. Kidding, I will try to make not too big. And since I don't have the means right now, photos will come soon.

A lot has happened since I left Estonia. I've hitchhiked a couple of thousands of kilometers. I've froze while hitchhiking. I've done some crazy shit. I've met awesome people. I've been to places that were not worth to see and I consider it to be a waste of time but at least I can say that I was right in not wanting to go. I've met with old friends.

The first stop after Heidelberg was the former capital of the Federal Republic of Germany: Bonn. I once knew a girl that lived here, I met her back in Guatemala a few years ago. Not sure where is she now or if she's still in Germany or back in Guatemala. I've lost track of a few people, even with facebook sometimes is hard to keep track of people. I guess some people have lost track of me as well.

Bonn was nice, I stayed with a two italian couchsurfers. I "survived" the cooking of one of them. I wouldn't say survived, it was a great pasta! I'm not a fan of big celebrations so Fasching (carnival) in Heidelberg was great for me. I don't think I would had liked the one in Köln. It's huge! Which brings me to another thing: I don't think I will ever go to Rio de Janeiro during the carnival. Maybe it's awesome but that kind of big celebration is just not my cup of tea. Some might say that is one of those things that you have to go at least once in your life but what's the point in going somewhere just to do what other people might like and you just don't want to go? Maybe I'm full of contradictions but I love going to Roskilde. It's a big festival and I love it! Maybe it's because it's a MUSIC festival and I get to see great bands and also get to see my friends. I'm really looking forward to this year's Roskilde. Queens of the Stone Age and Volbeat are playing. Since Dennis introduced to the latter band a few years ago, they became one of my favorites.

My dad's favorite cologne was 4711 and being in the city that gave birth to it was really touching for me. I don't know, being there made me do some crazy shit that I'm not going to comment here. Let's just leave it there.

I didn't go to Edy and Marinda's wedding last year so if I was going to the Netherlands (I have to stop calling it Holland) I had to visit them. Actually, it's because of Edy that I keep going back to Utrecht. I wouldn't conceive not meeting with Edy if I'm in NL. Too bad I didn't meet Tami this time. Maybe next time. When I met George he was working in the hostel I worked a few months before and it's funny because he even lived in the flat I lived! Talk about "what life is like in Ron's shoes" eh Tristan? "I hope they don't smell!"

I love to go back to Belgium and visit my friends Wim and Kat. This time Kat baked me a pie, yummy! Can't wait to try the Speculoos pie! Too short of a stay but when you are travelling with someone is like that. You cannot stay as long as you want. Actually this was the first time I traveled with a guy in two years. Lately I always traveled with girls, not because I looked for them to travel but just because it happened. Someone posts something in the HHers forum and I was going in that direction.

There are some countries that I just don't feel to go to. I have to feel some kind of attraction to visit a place, for me it's not just flag collecting to say I was there. I actually wouldn't mind not saying I have been to Luxembourg. It was not impressive, it was expensive and it was hard to hitch out. The only thing that made the visit to Luxembourg worth something was that I bought a jar of Speculoos pasta! I had to go everywhere in the parking area asking people if they could take us. Finally I was out of that place only to get stuck in Strasbourg which ended up being a nice experience. The CSer I stayed with turned out to be a really nice person and just confirm how the world is very small: we have at least a couple of friends in common; we tried to make a list but it was useless.

I was a bit hesitant of hitchhiking in Switzerland, specially two guys but my motive for going was heavier than my worries so I went and spent a lovely weekend with Ilona and her family. We met in Colombia last year in a small hostel in a village outside Medellin. Is hitchhiking in Switzerland slow: confirmed. Yes. It. Is. But I knew exactly what laid ahead of me: more hard hitchhiking... Italia! The first time with a girl was super slow, I was expecting the worst now HHing with a guy. I was wrong... it was horrible! But I think alone would make things different. One thing is for sure, I should've paid more attention in my italian class. I don't have anything against sleeping in petrol stations, I've done it several times and I will keep doing it. What I don't like is to do it when it's cold, I mean, sleeping outside when it's cold. Many times the employees let me stay inside. This time was not the exception, I asked in my non-existent italian if I could rest (with my eyes closed) inside and they said yes. I was going to Slovenia through Venezia but after being stuck in a petrol station for the night and only moving about 70 km in one day I took the first ride out of Italy. I was going to Innsbruck. I had never been there anyway so I thought it was going to be a nice experience. I was not wrong. Innsbruck is lovely.

While writing this I'm listening to a song from Steelheart from the Rock Star soundtrack. The name of the song is "we all die young", great song and great movie. I feel like I'm talking about the Schwa, one of the characters in the book I'm reading at the moment. He's invisible to most of the people and even if you're talking about him you end up talking about something else. Where I was, oh yeah, where I went after Italy, hmmm, Austria. I was supposed to go to Padova and then Ljubljana to visit a girl I met in Roskilde 2011 but leaving fucking petrol station seemed close to impossible so I took a ride to Innsbruck. I had never been there anyway and I have been to both Venezia and Ljubljana. The downside is that I didn't meet with Ana. I would have to wait for the festival. Innsbruck was warm and sunny and I hitchhiked alone to Salzburg. It was me and the road. I made it to town without having to blackride public transport. I hitchhiked all the way! I hitched my last ride from the outskirts to centrum.

I'm beginning to see a trend every time I visit Katrin: I only stay a couple of days in SBG (Salzburg) and then we go somewhere else. We were going to Maribor but HHing on sundays tend to be very slow (in my OWN experience) so we were getting to Graz in the evening and decided to stay there for the next couple of days. The weather was on our side, it was super fucking good weather! Graz is a cute town but it was time to leave. Next stop: Maribor and my third time in Slovenia. But this time only one night. I needed to get to Budapest from where I'm writing this. Maribor is a small town, it was mostly rainy and grey but it was still a nice. My CSer gave a complete tour of the city, it was awesome but not entirely given that I was carrying my big backpack with me all the time. Maribor is home to the oldest vine in the world: 400 years old and still produces wine. Super limited edition only for protocol purposes.

I hope I didn't bored you with my nonsense but I was not in the mood to write independent entries for every place I have been. Let's see what Budapest has for me, hope something good.