Saturday, March 18, 2006
For some reason I always wanted to be a wildlife photographer. Not that I'm a particularly good photographer, but simply because I get a lot of satisfaction out of watching animals in their natural environment. I've seen moose and buffalo in Yellowstone way back when. I've seen reindeer and foxes and jackrabbits here in Finland, snakes and other lizardly things in Texas. Not too many wild creatures in New York except for all those out and about past 3am. But on the trip back from Tallinn I saw one that takes the cake, a seal and her cub(?) floating on a chunk of ice as we passed. They bobbed around a little and as the Tallink boat got closer and began to cut through the icy area, the seals dived into the water. I think I watched them for about 5 seconds, just long enough to call Kelly and Frank over to look and see, but not long enough to get my camera out and take a picture. Like I mentioned, not a very good wildlife photographer. And this is one I really would like to have had a picture of because as it turns out, not too many people believe me. But here's a picture of what the scenery was like from the boat, and I don't think it takes too much imagination - or photoshop skills - to paint an image of a seal and a cub(?) out on the ice.
The seal was one of many highlights from the past week. The Sunday we returned from Stockholm to find Helsinki bathed in sunlight and half of the city's inhabitants out on the frozen Baltic Sea. Before we began our walk we stopped at Cafe Ursala which was packed with people, most sitting outside (It's in the background of the picture posted below, behind the guys on the right). It looked just like a ski resort. Then we trekked out onto the ice, out towards what we thought was a nearby island. But it's not like paths are easily created out on the snowy, icy sea and so we only made it half way, but it was just far enough for me to take what is perhaps the funniest picture of Karoliina that I have taken in years.
Sunday night we went out to Helsinki's biggest gay club - not the most eccentric, as that would come at the Mann's Street Bar, where we sang heavy metal gay Krakow, and brought the house down with a duet of Paradise City. At least I thought we brought the house down, and so did our crazy opera singing fan who danced like a maniac as we sang and hugged us endlessly when we were finished. The club is called DTM which stands for Don't Tell Mama and a Turkey lives there. Only this is not a turkey any of us had ever seen before. This one likes boys stomachs. We were having a drink and talking, when all of a sudden a guy approached me, lifted up my shirt and tried to rub my belly. I grabbed his arm and said, "No thank you." and then he walked off. A few seconds later, while we were discussing how weird what just happened was, he does the same thing to Kelly and then to Frank - who earned top 10 stomach honors in his book. Finally he introduces himself to us and tells us his name is Turkey, like the poultry and not the country. At least that's his queen name when he's in drag. He also hosts Turkey, drag, bingo. The Finnish word for Turkey is Kalkkuna, which might very well be the only Finnish word Kelly and Frank remember.
Monday was an easy day because Tuesday morning we were off to Tallinn for a boat ride that, from the passengers looked like it was a cruise through limbo. It was so depressing and boring that we started to drink before 11am, on a Tuesday, and compared to the others on the ship, we got a late start. Tallinn was beautiful. At least the old town where we spent the day and night. And easily one of the coolest bars any of us had ever been in was Karollina's bar, which was just a tunnel built into the old wall. That was it, but it was great and it had a nice name.
We had lunch in a Caucasian restaurant that served up specialties from Georgia and Armenia and other dishes from the Caucasus. And of course there were vodka shots as appetizers.
In Estonia, Finns have a horrible reputation. They come over for the day or the night or both and drink and drink and make crazy fools of themselves. Moreso in the summertime, but we would not be the exception. We had dinner in Olde Hansa where the wenches served us and the players played the lute and other medieval instruments.
And, luckily for us the night ended quickly after dinner.
On Thursday night we celebrated Kelly's birthday and Karoliina's which will be on Monday. And we decided to celebrate in style, heavy metal karoke at a gay bar. When Kelly and Frank send us the pictures I will post them and tell a bit about the night.
The seal was one of many highlights from the past week. The Sunday we returned from Stockholm to find Helsinki bathed in sunlight and half of the city's inhabitants out on the frozen Baltic Sea. Before we began our walk we stopped at Cafe Ursala which was packed with people, most sitting outside (It's in the background of the picture posted below, behind the guys on the right). It looked just like a ski resort. Then we trekked out onto the ice, out towards what we thought was a nearby island. But it's not like paths are easily created out on the snowy, icy sea and so we only made it half way, but it was just far enough for me to take what is perhaps the funniest picture of Karoliina that I have taken in years.
Sunday night we went out to Helsinki's biggest gay club - not the most eccentric, as that would come at the Mann's Street Bar, where we sang heavy metal gay Krakow, and brought the house down with a duet of Paradise City. At least I thought we brought the house down, and so did our crazy opera singing fan who danced like a maniac as we sang and hugged us endlessly when we were finished. The club is called DTM which stands for Don't Tell Mama and a Turkey lives there. Only this is not a turkey any of us had ever seen before. This one likes boys stomachs. We were having a drink and talking, when all of a sudden a guy approached me, lifted up my shirt and tried to rub my belly. I grabbed his arm and said, "No thank you." and then he walked off. A few seconds later, while we were discussing how weird what just happened was, he does the same thing to Kelly and then to Frank - who earned top 10 stomach honors in his book. Finally he introduces himself to us and tells us his name is Turkey, like the poultry and not the country. At least that's his queen name when he's in drag. He also hosts Turkey, drag, bingo. The Finnish word for Turkey is Kalkkuna, which might very well be the only Finnish word Kelly and Frank remember.
Monday was an easy day because Tuesday morning we were off to Tallinn for a boat ride that, from the passengers looked like it was a cruise through limbo. It was so depressing and boring that we started to drink before 11am, on a Tuesday, and compared to the others on the ship, we got a late start. Tallinn was beautiful. At least the old town where we spent the day and night. And easily one of the coolest bars any of us had ever been in was Karollina's bar, which was just a tunnel built into the old wall. That was it, but it was great and it had a nice name.
We had lunch in a Caucasian restaurant that served up specialties from Georgia and Armenia and other dishes from the Caucasus. And of course there were vodka shots as appetizers.
In Estonia, Finns have a horrible reputation. They come over for the day or the night or both and drink and drink and make crazy fools of themselves. Moreso in the summertime, but we would not be the exception. We had dinner in Olde Hansa where the wenches served us and the players played the lute and other medieval instruments.
And, luckily for us the night ended quickly after dinner.
On Thursday night we celebrated Kelly's birthday and Karoliina's which will be on Monday. And we decided to celebrate in style, heavy metal karoke at a gay bar. When Kelly and Frank send us the pictures I will post them and tell a bit about the night.
// posted by Howard @ 12:21 AM 
