BE 3000: estonia--->latvia

4 June cont.

Riding in the rain has left me and Dove with runny noses. BLATIC EXTRAVAGANZAH 3000 has been renamed to 'POST NASAL DRIPS & BACKPACKS' for the time being.

Not helluva sure if it's his English or if it's his shirky grasp of recent history, but the guy giving us this communism-in-Estonia tour just said, "Communism started in '94 and ended in '91."

The local beer is named 'A le Coq' here. So when conversations at bars begin with "Hi. Please can I have one cock? No....one A Cock? The 'A. Le.Coq?' Not your cock asshole, a beer cock," you order the wine instead. Just to be safe.

Oh and THIS is why Tallinn has become the new stag do capital of Europe. There are a rather large number of strip joints here. Which will explain the throng of English men walking around everywhar.

We are now about to catch a four hour bus to Riga, capital of Latvia.
This is where we are, and where we are going, by the way:

We are due to stay in a hostel called The Naughty Squirrel. Dove and I could've stayed in hotels like normal 30something year olds, but how BORING would that have been? No. We want to meet the weirdos and pretend we are 19 again. God knows how precious our time is here. 
So Naughty Squirrel it is. Was assured it isn't a strip club, but still have a feeling it may be filled with a few cocks/A.Le.Coqs.

Latvia, here we come. I have a feeling I'm going to like it there.

5 June

Oh my ludicrous lightning speed Labrador LOLzing in fucking Latvia.
We are still drunk, and it's 8am. 

Dude.

This is what happened. I'll try and piece it together. 

Saffa friends from Cape Town back in the day are also on a Baltic trip. I know. What are the chances. 
So obviously, we all got together in Dome Square with the maniacal intention of getting raally raally drunk together.

It started in the Square. I bought an 'I heart Latvia' t-shirt for my collection (I collect I heart t-shirts with obscure places on them, I have about 10 now and I wear them to work,), which culminated in Saffas running amok and leaving a trail of destruction in our wake. 

After numerous Coqs, I went to the toilet to find that someone had self-detonated a bomb in their own ass, resulting in the traumatic viewing of a toilet cubicle that had literally been spray painted with shit. Plenty of pooh talk ensued, my favourite subject, because I don't pooh and therefore find it mysterious.


We went to a small bar owned by a group of American metalheads. I know this because 
a) I wasn't totally intoxicated yet
b) The duke box only had albums from the likes of Sepultura and Pantera in there

Somebody ordered the Jaegermeisters and shit started to slide dramatically and wonderfully downhill. This was the plan, because all I cared about was getting balls deep in a motherlode of karaoke.

Yes. That is a skull blanket. Metalheads only use blankets emblazoned with skulls on them, didn't you know?


We found a one guy from Canada who accompanied us to a place called Casino Royale. Which I'd imagine what Vegas looked like in the 1970s.
By now we'd slammed a few Jaegermeisters, not that I needed any encouragement, because I had every intention to not just sing karaoke - but to really ENTERTAIN a crowd, with a groundbreaking, rod-erecting performance. The performance of my life. 

I ended up serenading the entire casino, which was filled with Russians, to Usher's Love In This Club - twice. Dude. If my voice wasn't so fucking disastrous, I'd definitely say I was in the wrong career. Because I LOVED it. A bit too much. Frankly, I was bloody marvellous.

Then the Canadian left, leaving us with the bill. We got scammed by a Canadian. That's just embarrassing. 

All this time we were told to watch out for the Latvians as they are sketchy little bastards, and then a Canadian pulled a fast one on us.


AND! They charged us for every song. What bar charges for karaoke songs? Casino Royale does. The bill was monstrous. And Latvia has a very strong currency; it's on a par with the pound. 


Off to puke. Bye.