Tere!

It’s been nearly four years since I came to Estonia in 2017. I always take public transport or walk when going out. In Tallinn, if you are registered as a Tallinn citizen, the public transport doesn’t cost. So you don’t need to worry about transport fees.

However I have wanted something for a long long time: a bike (bicycle).

In Kyoto, Japan, I bought a bike for 8000 JPY (= approx. 70 euro), and had used it for four to five years, but in Estonia you cannot find a new bike at such a price. If you buy a new bike in Estonia, it costs at least 150 euro with discounts as far as I know. It’s expensive, isn’t it.

Then it’s time to use Facebook marketplace!

There many objects are sold and purchased cheaply. Actually this was not the first time for me to use Facebook marketplace because I bought a microwave oven for 30 euro when I moved to my current place. (It looked a bit old because of the yellowy colour, but the inside was clean, and it works without any problems. In Estonia if you buy a new microwave oven, it costs at least 50 euro.)

Besides there is a point (trick?) of using Facebook marketplace, which is to use Estonian instead of English when searching objects. (Sometimes English works enough as it did when I was looking for a microwave oven.)

In Estonian a bike is “jalgratas”. As you search with this word, you can get results about bikes for kids, women and so on. I’m not small as an Asian girl, but since I had trouble riding an e-bike when I visited my friend in Germany, I was worried about the bike saddle. (The e-bike that my friend’s family had had a too high saddle for me.) For this reason, my condition was that the bike had to be for women.

★A 130 Euro Bike

Then I found a bike for women for 130 euro, which was within my budget. It had a stopper stand (?) and a basket.

When I contacted its seller, he said he would let me know once he fixed it. Then the lockdown started (it was in March), I had been waiting for his message for three months, thinking that maybe he had not been able to repair it because the repair shop had been closed during the lockdown. However, even in June there was no message.

I absolutely wanted to get it before it starts snowing, so I messaged him and he said:

The bike was sold.

What. I have been waiting for it since you said you would let me know when you fixed it.

He bought it broken.

I got it.

I gave it up, and started looking for another bike.

Then I found a Swedish bike.I was also pretty worried about the height of the bike saddle because the Swedish are big.

Anyway I contacted the seller, and met him on the 8th of June. He lowered the bike saddle as low as possible. It was still slightly high, but I could ride. My German friend’s bike was a bit higher than that, so I bought it. It also cost 130 euro, so it was within my budget.

The happiest thing about getting a bike is that I don’t have to walk to a supermarket for 20 minutes in summer. 

Finally some of you may wonder about how to pump up the bike wheels. I may write about it when I need to. Maybe.

Aitäh! 🙂