Summer Holidays

[Stewart]

So, is anyone planning any interesting holidays over the summer? Or been anywhere interesting in previous years?

I doubt I will be, having had two trips away this year already (Latvia and Ireland) although I might consider trying to get a week in Bulgaria, depening on how much of my annual leave is intact after days off here and there for various reasons and shorter trips.

Having been away twice is good for me, given that my last time abroad before this year was to the Czech Republic about three years previous.

[Eric]

I will no doubt, escape to another country for a week or two sometime this summer.

Latvia, eh. They have a whole range of interesting authors, both poetry and prose. But as yet so very little is available in English. Unless you read Latvian and / or German, Swedish and one or two other languages, you would think that Latvia was the Sahara of literature. Wrongly.

I'll start a thread with a few mumblings. As I can't read Latvian, I'm by no means an expert. But I know a few names, and one translator who may be soon doing a modern Latvian novel.

[Stewart]

Originally Posted by Eric

Latvia, eh.

Riga, specifically. It was an enjoyable experience just walking round the city each day. I may go back one day, this time to explore the wider environs. But there's many more places - Tallinn, Oslo, Helsinki, Reykjavik, and Berlin - that I would like to visit too.

[Eric]

Riga. I've been there maybe three times. After living in Tallinn for a year or so, (Greater) Riga seemed vast. In the 17th or 18th century, when Livonia was part of the Swedish Empire, some Swedes fancied moving the Swedish imperial capital to Riga. If they had, the history of the Baltics would have been radically different, as once upon a time, both Sweden and Russia were superpowers. Nowadays, Sweden is a half-forgotten if central part of Scandinavia, while Russia is still a nuclear power, covering a vast expanse of the dry land surface of the globe. But once, they were equals.

When I was in Riga, it was very much an ex-Soviet city: shabby, despite vestiges of former 19th century grandeur, with several wonderful Jugendstil buildings. About half the inhabitants are Russian-speaking. But the Latvians still manage to cling onto a national identity (and literature!) of their own.

Compared with Riga, Tallinn is small. It's like a provincial town that happens to have become a capital, like Bonn used to be before the GDR was tacked back onto West Germany. But Tallinn has a wonderful mediæval atmosphere in its central streets and on Toompea Hill overlooking the Old Town. And some of the city walls remain intact. I read recently in the papers that, mercifully, the British stag-night piss-artists' tourists' trips are leaving Tallinn, little by little. So it will return to its decent self, although there are plenty of loud and drunken Finns to compensate. The new British Embassy in Tallinn is in a glass box. The new synagogue was inaugurated last year, with Shimon Peres present. The Oleviste church has a very high steeple. The KGB used to be housed, fittingly, on Pakari tänav - aka Baker Street! The President of Estonia is an American. Estonia is an interesting microcosm of contrasts: computers and wooden spoons.

Helsinki is much more sober, somehow (and more expensive). I lived there for three months and liked it. Theoretically, it is bilingual, but the last vestiges of Swedish-speaking life are fading fast, although the Finland-Swedes hold their own regarding literature. When living there, I got up very early, once or twice, and went on long walks, to acquaint myself with the city when quiet. It has a few good museums and Alvar Aalto architecture. The central bookshop, Akateeminen Kirjakauppa, used to be one of the biggest in Europe, and one of the first to have a coffee shop in it.

Oslo and Berlin I've hardly visited, Reykjavík never.

[Colette Jones]

Originally Posted by Stewart

So, is anyone planning any interesting holidays over the summer?

Edinburgh, the best place to be in August!

[Stewart]

Originally Posted by Colette Jones

Edinburgh, the best place to be in August!

Ah, so you are going to the Edinburgh Book Festival? It's only an hour away by train for me yet I've never been. To the festival, that is.

[Sybarite]

Berlin is wonderful, Stewart.

I'll be heading to Barcelona again in August, although I'm going to Paris first, at the end of this month. The latter is just a two hour and 15 minute train journey from St Pancras in London – which is only five minutes walk from work, so I'm heading to civilisation after work on the Friday at the start of the end-of-month bank holiday.

I've become completely besotted by the place.

[Eric]

I'd love to go to Berlin, sometime. I've only stood on the station platform there, changing trains, in the days when there were still two Germanys. It is, no doubt, nearly as decadent now as it was in the 1930s when, for instance, Christopher "Cabaret" Isherwood was around.

I'm envious of Sybarite and Barcelona. It's a city I've always wanted to see - and hear. I find the revival of the Catalan language & literature a fascinating social phenomenon. But the Rambles and the Guadí cathedral are surely must.

I don't know where my summer holidays will lead me. I'll tell you when I've been.

[Beth]

Originally Posted by Sybarite

I've become completely besotted by the place.

Headed there in a few days, hopeful of being enchanted by the place as well. For this summer, I'm hoping to take my child either to the ocean for the first time (Myrtle Beach or NC coast) or take him north and west to either Mt Rushmore or Yellowstone. I'm dreaming of lying fully inert in some warm sand with ocean sounds and smells all around. Nothing like it.

[A Common Reader]

For me, its a small cottage in Brittany with my wife, about 250 yards from the beach - a rocky cove. I shall take books and my mandolin and we shall both paint. One week in June.

We have just had a few days in York which we enjoyed immensely.

[abecedarian]

What is a vacation? Five of our kids will be going to two different church camps, so they're taken care of. In a week and a half, we're all going up to Salina Ks to help my daughter and her husband move into their new house...that should be fun. We're thinking of a possible day trip sometime this summer, down to Bartlesville Oklahoma to Woolaroc
If all else fails, we can always go to OJ Watson Park in Wichita and spend the day...Remind me to take along plenty of bread for the geese!

[Anna van Gelderen]

I am going to Kyrgyzstan in July, taking a Chingiz Aitmatov novel with me. Several people I told about my trip had never even heard of Kyrgyzstan, so I can be sure it won't be overrun with tourists. We are going hiking in the Tien Shan Mountains for most of the time, sleeping in tents and yurts, washing in brooks and lakes, eating sheep's eyes and drinking fermented mare's milk, the local delicacies. I will probably lose a lot of weight ;-)

[Stewart]

Originally Posted by Anna van Gelderen

I am going to Kyrgyzstan in July, taking a Chingiz Aitmatov novel with me. Several people I told about my trip had never even heard of Kyrgyzstan, so I can be sure it won't be overrun with tourists. We are going hiking in the Tien Shan Mountains for most of the time, sleeping in tents and yurts, washing in brooks and lakes, eating sheep's eyes and drinking fermented mare's milk, the local delicacies. I will probably lose a lot of weight ;-)

It sounds fantastic. Not too sure about the sheeps' eyes. Perhaps if they were done cajun style, but I doubt that.

[elcalifornio]

Ha! I've just read about such local delicacies in Marco Polo's Travels. Sounds like mare liquor has at least an 800-year old tradition.

Since I'm not quite taking any summer holidays, I'm reading Polo, as well as some Jules Verne and Poe's Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym to get me out of my immediate surroundings. I will be traveling to London and Italy in the fall.

[Irene Wilde]

I hope Stewart will forgive the temporary intrusion. One hears there is a member here with knowledge of Estonia. My summer travels will be taking me to Tallinn and I would like to know from someone familiar with Estonia how to best take advantage of my time there. We also will be making stops in St. Petersburg, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Helsinki, and Berlin. While Petersburg will be confined to official tourist destinations, travels in our other destinations will be much more flexible, so if anyone has any suggestions of places to see or things to do, they also will be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

And Stewart, I do think this place is fabulous and I wish you continued success with it.

[Eric]

I am the one who knows something about Estonia, having translated five books of literature by Jaan Kross, Mati Unt and Friedebert Tuglas from their language. I should be there now on a translators' conference, but couldn't make it. (Look the above authors up with the name "Eric Dickens" on the net; it's not my fault I myself have a literary surname.)

But down to business:

Your trip is a long one, visiting many countries, so the first question is how many days are you prepared to spend in a country slightly larger than the Netherlands, that spent over half a century in Soviet captivity, but is now very computer literate, has a beautiful big bookshop in the capital, but still suffers, in the suburbs, from the chaos and neglect left as a legacy by the Soviet Union? Monty Python actor Michael Palin, in his recent programme, highlighted rather eccentric people. Kirsty Wark was slightly better. The vast majority, both Estonian- and Russian-speaking, are more normal than you would imagine, when Brits go to peer at the natives.

Tallinn. Mediæval city walls. Upper Town and Lower Town in the old city. Nice town square with tables to eat and drink at in sunny weather. Nice big shopping centre. Parks, museums, concerts. Hotels generally up to Western standards (unless you're sleeping on board ship). There's an excellent little travel guide in pocket format in the Footprint series by Clare Thomson:

http://www.buy.com/prod/footprint-ta.../35239931.html

or

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Footprint-Ta.../dp/1903471982

This guide also briefly covers Tartu and Pärnu.

Tartu. University city. Lively during term-time. A good deal smaller than Tallinn. Your namesake, Oscar, is sitting permanently in bronze form on a park bench with his namesake - the Estonian realist novelist Eduard Wilde (spelt Vilde nowadays). I have just been translating a story by this latter author.

Pärnu. The seaside resort of Estonia, termed, for some reason "The Summer Capital of Estonia".

The literature is described and excerpted at:

http://www.estlit.ee/?id=2

and

http://elm.einst.ee/

[Irene Wilde]

Sadly, we are in port for only one day, which is no way to see a city at all, but when life gives you lemons, etc. So with one day I'm guessing if we get to three or four major destinations we will be lucky. Would the city center by easy to navigate by foot? I still believe the sidewalk is the best way to see any place and don't want to spend what little time we have on buses or subways or trains.

Are there particular foods that are a national specialty? And, sorry, but I wouldn't be me if I didn't ask...a national drink?

The Thomson guidebook appears to be sold out at the website you referenced, but I will google around and see if I can pick it up elsewhere. Funnily enough, I think I am looking forward to Estonia second only to Petersburg, just because it is so unfamiliar and I can approach it with absolutely no expectations.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

[Eric]

Even if you've only got one day, Tallinn city centre is pretty small. Walking is the best way to get around. Walk up the cobbled Pikk jalg (Long Leg) or the steps, Lühike jalg (Short Leg) to the Upper Town (also known as Toompea or Cathedral Hill), and you can look out over the city and the sea from various terraces. There are one or two open-air cafés up there, so you can refresh yourself. Also the Cathedral, the Russian Orthodox Cathedral and the pink (!) parliament building.

There are plenty of souvenir shops on the Main Square (Raekoja plats) in the Lower Town. As well as those outdoor restaurants that I mentioned before.

There are one or two central churches worth peeping inside, such as Püha vaim (Holy Spirit), Oleviste (Saint Olaf's) and Niguliste (Saint Nicholas'). The last of these is deconsecrated and doubles up as a concert hall, but the mediæval frieze, with Low German comments written on it, is worth looking at. Tallinn (under its old name Reval) was a Hanseatic port, hence the use of the Low German language, which was the language of sea trade in those days.

There is an art museum on Vabaduse väljak (Freedom Square) and right next to it a restaurant in a cellar called Kuku, which doubles up in the evenings as the hangout for artists and writers. During the day, the restaurant / club is open to everyone. Another art museum is in the Upper Town. There are also a number of private galleries, such as Vaal, dotted around the Old Town.

The Kumu gallery does modern art; it's a short tram ride from the centre near Kadriorg Park, where the President's Palace and the tiny Peter the Great Museum are also situated.

Estonia's most notable contemporary artists are (off the top of my head, and according to my tastes) Jüri Arrak, Toomas Vint, Epp Kokamägi, Reti Saks, plus older artists such as Laikmaa, Raud and Wiiralt from the early 20th century.

If you go to the music shop at the foot of Pikk jalg, you can buy music on CD by Arvo Pärt, Veljo Tormis and one or two other contemporary composers.

Stick to the Old Town in Tallinn if you've only got a few hours; you won't regret it. The Wiki entry for Tallinn is here; plenty of photos there:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tallinn

The reason I reply in detail is because I've been doing virtually nothing but translating Estonian literature these past few years and have visited the country on several occasions, including a stay in Tallinn of over a year in the mid-1990s.

Two quite different views:

[Irene Wilde]

Wow! Thank you so much! I will cut and paste your reply into my trip notes and look for that pocket guidebook. What an interesting life it must be to be able to speak different languages and travel and live in different places as part of your job. Poor monolinguistic shlubs like me have to rely on people like you to broaden our horizons and deliver the world to our doorsteps. So I thank you for that, too.

[Kingbee]

Have just been to Madrid and Andalucia (Granada, Cordoba, Seville)- fantastic for the Moorish heritage and history. Then it's off to China in August (Hunan province) for a year to teach English. Whether that qualifies as a 'holiday', I'm not too sure!