Estonian break time, part III -- Do I have to leave??

I arrived back in Tallinn on a beautiful mid-early May afternoon.  I stepped off the bus at the Central Bus Station almost as if I were a local.  As if I done it so many times before and that a seat in an old town Tallinn beer garden was awaiting me.  Yet, that nervous looming thought of having to return to Petersburg was in my mind and I really couldn't avoid it no matter how much I tried.  No matter how much I walked around futilely trying to prolong my wonderful break time, I had to go back.  I think the moment that I had to grow a backbone and return was slightly after I took the picture below in Tallinn's old town that evening.  I guess motion of the bicyclists was a cue to me that it was time to head back to my hostel, go to bed and wake up early in the morning for the seven hour bus ride.  Party time was over.  Back to the reality of Petersburg ... which in many ways is straight out of a Dostoyevskian dream sequence.

But I don't wanna go!

The next morning, I got on the bus at 7AM, and hit the Petersburg-Tallinn highway.  We passed windmills and forests until we got to the border checkpoint in the castle town of Narva.  Formerly the site of many battles and sieges from Russians, Danes, Germans, and Swedes, Narva has still not become entirely Estonian.  In fact, it's 90% Russian speaking and the multiple stops the bus made to pick up people visiting family in Russia was certainly testament to that.  I've even read that one-third of Narvans are Russian citizens classified as legal aliens by the Estonian government.  Since Estonia does not allow dual citizenship and since most Narvans are an ethnic and linguistic minority in Estonia, such a statistic is not surprising. 

Narva and adjacent Ivangorod, Russia sit across from each other only separated by the narrow Narva River.  From certain angles, it looks like nothing separates Estonia and Russia, and it's no wonder that both these cities were so easily invaded.  Physically and technically speaking (let's forget about modern day legal boundaries for a minute ... and even then ...) little effort would be required to stomp on over from either side.  You'd really just have to pretend that you were Bear Grylls and grin and bear the current of the river making sure the machete doesn't drop from your pit bull jaws.  More on Narva and Ivangorod in the proceeding post so stayed tuned.

Customs was fast and efficient, and the bus proceeded into Russia.  Even without going through customs, I would have known we were in Russia anyways by all the potholes in the road.  That made having to use the restroom on the bus a ... challenging experience.  In the lavatory, you apparently have to sit down on the dirty seat so fluids don't go flying around everywhere.  There's even a sign, aimed mostly at gentlemen, instructing one to do so.

No, Eurolines is not some femi-Nazi, man-hating enterprise.  They just don't want pee all over the place as the bus motions about.  Of course, one is also bound to move a bit too much on that toilet seat as the bus moves ...

Potholes and all, the bus managed to pull into Baltiysky Station a half an hour ahead of schedule.  In Petersburg early.  It's like Eurolines knew what I wanted.  I got off the bus and the decrepitude of my enthusiasm went with me.  The perks of Petersburg were doing nothing to resuscitate any warm, fuzzy feelings.  I mean ...

From buildings continually crumbling...

... to trash-talking graffiti (this says that a girl named Malvina has stupid shoes and smelly socks.  I think Malvina needs to kick some @$$)...

... to obstructions in walkways ...

... to beer swigging moms ...

... to dimwit drivers ...

... to landfill and sidewalks being indistinguishable ...

... to less than attentive animal control.

...I was really f^cking happy to be back.  And the day after I returned, some speed racer tried to "herd" me around the block (I wasn't really that scared.  I wasn't even walking faster) and actually got out of his douche-mobile that was something of this ilk ...

...so he could meet a foreigner.  It took smashing a half-empty beer bottle in my hand after multiple obscene hand gestures and savagely yelling terrible language in English and Russian for Dima Bilan's inbred cousin to step off.  I guess angry, aggressive, I-don't-give-a-f^ck-if-I-have-to-use-that-rusty-electrical-wire-over-there Westerners weren't beings he met every day.  I just hope he's actually taking English classes and can present this experience for show-and-tell.  But at least I had my Shokolodnitsa devushki who have memorized my order so I could sulk over coffee all the more efficiently.

Oh, Tallinn, with you I hardly had to try.  Petersburg, I just take what I can get from you.