Tag: Estonia

Zooks Visits Tartu. (1)

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Tere!

As my friends know, I love travelling although I normally don’t travel the city or country that I live (since I always think “I can go whenever I want because I live here”). However, this time I couldn’t go anywhere I wanted to go to, so I visited my friend in Tartu! This was my first visit to Tartu in these three years since I came to Estonia.

I took a two-week long annual leave before my work calendar year ended, and spent the first two days of the leave for travelling around in Tartu. Therefore this time the article is about my trip to Tartu. (There will be separately two articles.)

Table of Contents
1) To Tartu by train
2) Walking around in the old town in Tartu
3) KGB museum in Tartu
4) Lunch in Tartu
5) AHHAA Science Centre in Tartu
6) Dinner in Tartu

1) To Tartu by train

At that time I had a routine to wake up just one or half an hour before starting working even though it was summer. My train to Tartu was leaving at 8.10 in the morning. I woke up at 6.30 in the morning for the first time in a while.

I took a trolley at around seven, heading to the Tallinn station (Balti jaam). In addition to waking up early, I had a breakfast for the first in ages too. I had it before the train was about to leave. After that a lady came to me to check the ticket. 

I bought the ticket online beforehand, so I simply showed the QR code to her. If not in your case, you could buy one at the ticket office or from the ticket checker. According to the website, it’s cheaper to buy the ticket online.

There are also buses from Tallinn to Tartu, but at that time the bus ticket was a bit more expensive, so I chose the train. Besides perhaps it was because of the early morning on Saturday, the seats were quite empty.

There was no trouble on the way to Tartu. After spending two hours on the train, I arrived in Tartu.

The train station in Tartu was a proper (?) train platform unlike Balti jaam in Tallinn. 


2) Walking around in the old town in Tartu

My friend and I met at the Tartu station, and we straight headed to the old town. It takes 15 to 20 minutes by walk from the station to the old town in Tartu. Also it is enjoyable to walk there because you can see “Tartu’s banksy’s” pictures here and there.

Although I had many places that I wanted to go in Tartu, I couldn’t decide which one  to go first, so we firstly went to the botanical. When hearing “botanical garden”, you may imagine colourful and a huge variety of flours and plants. (At least I imagined like that.) However, when we went there. It was just all green.

But the botanical garden is quite big, so we walked around, talking. Then we headed to Tartu Dome Church. While Tartu is a small city, the dome was pretty big. It was an exercise to go up there since I was used to the flat city of Tallinn and the dome was on the hill.


3) KGB museum in Tartu

Next we went to the KGB museum. Of course Tallinn also has a KGB museum, but I personally have never been there though I have lived in Tallinn for three years. I had been to only the one in Lithuania, Vilnius. It was quite realistic.

The KGB museum in Tartu is a bit far from the old town and really small, being located in the place that is difficult to find. The address of the KGB museum is Riia street but the museum itself is not faced to the road but faced Papleri street that makes an intersection.

There is a small door on the street and another door that goes to downstairs. It was the KGB cell so it was literally narrow. On the downstairs there is a ticket office, and the ticket for an adult cost 5 euro on the one hand, it cost 2 euro or something for a student on the other hand.

The museum is divided into two parts; the permanent exhibition and the temporary one. We went to the temporary exhibition first. At that time the theme of the exhibition was helmets, where we could have worn a real one (though we didn’t try).

After that, we went to the permanent exhibition.

I omit what we saw because I don’t want to ruin your joy (?), but my comment is that it was a really creepy place.

On the contrary, I recommend there to those who want to know the background history during the Soviet era and general tourists.


4) Lunch in Tartu

After enjoying (?) exhibition at the KGB museum, we went to a German restaurant. 

It’s called Restaurant München.

It looked like a tiny restaurant that was half underground, but the inside was actually spacious. I remembered the German cuisine that I had in Germany last autumn while looking for the places to eat on the map. 

What I had is Schnitzel with onions and sauerkraut.

It was small but it was good. It cost around 8 euro.

We also ordered beer. The dark beer on the right is what I had, which was a small size. The left one is what my friend ordered, which was a medium size but looks huge.

Normally I go to cheaper places to eat, so I thought it cost more in Tartu to eat at a restaurant than in Tallinn, but the potion is big, so it wasn’t that expensive. Since Tartu doesn’t seem to have anything local in terms of food, I recommend you to go to Restaurant München if you have no idea where to eat in Tartu. (Besides it’s in the old town.)


5) AHHAA Science Centre in Tartu

After having lunch, we went to my friend’s place and discussed where to go next. I wanted to go to AHHAA Science Centre, but it costs 13 euro for an adult so I gave up. AHHAA Science Centre has a 360-degree planetarium, which  costs additional fee.

I wanted to go to the upside down house called Tagurpidi Maja, but it didn’t seem that my friend was not interested and she was rather interested in the 360-degree planetarium at AHHAA Science Centre. Eventually we figured out that it seemed to be possible to visit only the planetarium, so we decided to go there.

It didn’t seem that the planetarium had a student price, and it cost five euro for an adult. There was no English description either, and show was in Estonian, Russian or Latvian depending on the timetable. 

The receptionist at AHHAA Science Centre told us to wait for an hour, so we just kept talking to spend time.

We went to the reception again 15 minutes before the show, and another staff member took us to the planetarium. After spending some time again there, we could enter the planetarium. There were three-row seats, but I perhaps recommend to choose the first row because you may feel more 360 degree there.

Before the show the staff alarmed, but it was only in Estonian. It seemed that it was not permitted to eat but drinking water was fine. The most important point before the show was to close the eyes if getting nauseous while watching the show since the resolution is too high. I might have been used to such things at Universal Studios in Japan so I was fine indeed, but my friend seemed to get nauseous at some points.


6) Dinner in Tartu

After the planetarium, it was already before eight in the evening or something, so we just headed to a restaurant.

We went to an Italian restaurant, La Dolce Vita, which is also in the old town.

It kind of took time to make a decision as there were many types of pizzas! And again, I thought it was a bit expensive, but the pizza was huge. (I felt that maybe also because I was wearing a pair of high-waist skinny jeans.) If you are an adult and not a small eater, you perhaps can finish the whole pizza.)

At the end of day 1, I stayed at my friend’s place. (In return I gave her a box of Lithuanian chocolate.) That was a long day but with full of joy.

That’s all about my day 1 in Tartu. The next article will be about day 2!

Aitäh! 🙂

Zooks Goes to Market in Estonia.

ZooksLeave a comment

Tere!

How often do you go to the market? When I was 12, I went to Oregon, the US and experienced a proper market because in Japan supermarkets are apparently more popular. In Estonia, there are quite lots of markets (which is called “turg” in Estonian). Of course not all the Estonians go there, and in winter the vegetables, fruits and flowers shops are closed. 

However, in this season (summer) all the shops are open and I went Nõmme turg to buy something for the first time in an Estonian market. This time the article is about my discovery in the Estonian market.

Table of Contents
1. Meat
2. Fish
3. Veggies and fruits


1) Meat

When I want to buy meat at the supermarket, I tend to choose poultry due to its cheaper price, but from time to time I want to eat something else. If you feel like eating beef, go to the market.

In my opinion the beef in the supermarket costs as expensive as the one in Japan, but in the market the most costly beef is approximately 8€ per kilo!

But!

As going to a butchery shop, I had no idea which part I should have bought, so I chose the one with bones in 6€ as a trial.

That was good though.

The shop is called Sigwar and the owner can’t speak English. This means it was a great time to try my Estonian! I said:

Ma võttan ○○.

Üks kilo.

I still don’t know how the third case of this part of beef is. Probably I made a mistake, but it didn’t matter in this case. If you want to try, you just can say something you want in ○○ when you make an order. The direct translation of this sentence is “I take ○○”. Besides, they sell meat kilo by kilo, so you simply can say how much you want. Then they will scale the weight and you will pay.

I didn’t have any difficulty in that, and since I’m non-Estonian, the owner seemed happy as well (to have communicated with me in Estonian).

By the way, this meat available in Nõmme turg is from Latvia according to my friend.

This is probably because historically the Estonians seem to eat more pork than beef. Of course nowadays it seems that they eat beef also, but I guess the Latvians eat more.

Which do you prefer?

I prefer fish.


2) Fish

Another day I went to Nõmme turg to buy some fish.

But! 

In the shop, the fish names were written in Estonian, and I could recognise only a couple of types of fish by their looking, so it took time to make a decision.

In this shop at Nõmme turg, a fish that looked like makarrel was sold, so I decided to buy one. I had an experience to buy salmon at Rimi (supermarket), and I remembered I could get only from one kilo, ergo I was worried about the amount. Anyways, I said:

Ma tahaksin △△. (I would like △△.)

Then the owner asked me:

Palju? (How many?)

Üks. (one)

Then she took one makarrel and scaled it.

It cost around 2€.

The makarrel in this shop cost 4 euro per kilo, so it presumably weighed 500g.

She sold me the fish even though that was way less than 1 kg (unlike Rimi).

After getting home from turg I sliced the makarrel into three, and cooked half with miso which is a Japanese seasoning and grilled the other half with only salt.

Yam.

3 id=”veggies”) Veggies and fruits

Finally the article is talking about the veggies and fruits. The veggies and fruits look more fresh than the ones at supermarket. Perhaps because of this, they are more expensive than the ones in supermarkets.

At that time I really wanted to buy cherries.

Usually they sell berries in huge boxes, but really occasionally they have smaller boxes. Or maybe you even can ask them.

But! 

I forgot how to say “box” in Estonian, so I looked around and found one shop that sold cherries in a small box. This time I didn’t have to say anything to buy.

However, it seemed this shop accepted only cash. Although it’s said that Estonia is a digital nation, once in a while you may need cash.

That’s all about the story that I went to Nõmme turg!

I recommend you to go there if you like seafood as they have much more options than supermarkets!

Aitäh! 🙂

Zooks Gets Mental. (7)

ZooksLeave a comment

Tere!

So what did I do after having unfunny ideas?

Cocolyne who is one of my Estonian friends accompanied with me, and we went to the regional hospital in Tallinn.

(Praise me ‘cause I at least took such an action.)

After taking some psychological examination, the doctor told me that.

While staying in the hospital, I always thought like this. (Though I already recovered myself quite well when starting thinking of such a thing.)

Aitäh! 🙂

Zooks Gets Mental. (5)

ZooksLeave a comment

Tere!

From the previous episode, I started thinking that Nemesia was not a good colleague. However, she is not the only one — I have another one who is my customer support manager, Datura.

When our boss assigned me for our company Twitter account:

“Please” is not a polite word depending on the context.

Also, when she said by herself that she would do a task which I asked but she hadn’t implemented for one week:

Let me know. (This means “why didn’t tell me if you are not able to do?”)

In addition, I always bring my own lunch, which everyone in the office knows. She sometimes asked me to go for lunch together when she had own, but

What’s the point to have lunch together? Then don’t ask me for it. Consider your colleague.

Such a person is my manager.

Aitäh! 🙂

Zooks Does 5 Quarantine Challenges in Estonia.

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Tere!

I know it’s still trendy but in Estonia the national quarantine period was over in the mid of May.

I thought:





I can’t go anywhere, which does not mean I cannot do anything!



Then I decided to implement some #quarantinechallenge . Mainly there are five things that I have done, but I didn’t intend to do five things. Coincidently I’d got five challenges.

A few of the challenges may be useful for you so perhaps it’s not senseless to read this article.

Table of Contents
1) Exercise x Pokemon GO
 2) Hobby x Skillshare
 3) Instagram x Trip
 4) Skype x Party
 5) Learning x Work

1) Exercise x Pokemon GO

To begin with, this is about Pokemon GO and some exercise. You may have noticed that the quarantine situation is unhealthy, but the thing is that in many counties it was allowed to take a walk. I started taking a walk a daily exercise.

A couple days later, I reinstalled the Pokemon GO app which I immediately uninstalled when it was released a few years ago. My challenge was basically: how many pokemons I could get during this quarantine.

I started this challenge on the 26th of March and finished on the 17th of May.

Here are several fundamental information.

Buddy: Ivysaur

Level: 24
Distance walked: 102.3km (according to the Japanese one)
Pokemon caught: 1,028
PokeStops visited: 503
Pokemon seen: 275
Pokemon caught for the Pokedex: 243
Gym badges: 6

The results about the battles are below.

By the way, you may wonder why I had a Russian-like name for the account. It’s an abbreviation of 

Anti CORONA Virus.

It’s trendy and matched with the purpose, isn’t it?


2) Hobby x Skillshare

The next one is Skillshare. The reason why I used this web service is because my friends — Masho — had a presentation video taken by Skillshare and shared it on her Facebook.

When going from the link that Masho shared on Facebook, it said that I could get two-free months on Skillshare. Therefore I registered and watched five videos including hers.

The genres that Skillshare has had vary from the hobby-level topic to the professional one and not only about art. The lectures are basically in English, and yet if the speaker’s mother tongue is not English, they sometimes have the scripts in their languages. 

During the quarantine, I watched: 

(I might write about my opinions on the details of those videos.)

The videos that I watched during this quarantine are all related to art (rather illustration?). This is because I wanted to enhance my skill while I couldn’t go anywhere. I told you in the beginning — “I can’t go anywhere, but it doesn’t mean I cannot do anything” –.

If you are interested in learning something on Skillshare, you also will get two-free months from here.

(If I remember correctly, you may need to register your bank card information, but given that you stop the subscription before the two months ends, they wouldn’t charge you. However, I remember that it was kind of complicated, so I recommend you to schedule it on your own planner like Google Calendar.)


3) Instagram x Trip

This is, technically speaking, not anything that I did during the quarantine but something that gave me a few ideas so I share this.

I have two purposes on my Instagram:

1. Let the audience enjoy the pictures of what I saw, which are retouched as precisely as possible and;

2. Let them enjoy 9 coloured and maximised pictures that make a national flag of the visited countries on my instagram profile page.

Some of you might remember that I was supposed to travel in March, but COVID-19 forced me to postpone it. For this reason, I decided to post older pictures of two countries as the instagram trips. On these trips I “went” to Latvia and Ireland.

I posted pictures on Instagram randomly while you may see the Estonian flag version at some point already. If you are looking forward to seeing different flag versions, just try to keep being updated with my travel plans 🙂


4) Skype x Party

In Japan, Zoom party was slightly buzzed. You might not use Skype anymore, and yet you should have an account because Skype is still useful and in a sense necessary in business. Also Skype was initially developed here in Estonia!

My friends and I had an online party, and we knew that we could use facebook for a real talk, but we chose Skype. We did the online party twice in total.

Reference

Moreover, I personally achieved one goal that was to drink Corona beer during the quarantine. I know it’s stupid but I enjoyed myself. Otherwise, I just opened a bottle of Jameson and drank it half by myself.

Reference


5) Learning x Work

This is also nothing particularly done during this quarantine, and yet I literally felt that it was very important. 

You may know that social media is usually casual, but you may not have any idea about Twitter in Japan. A number of business people have accounts and are quite active, posting useful information. In my opinion, those who are sales people, marketers or designers are main users, though probably because I follow such types of people more than other types.

On Twitter second by second you can get helpful information. It may be owned media such as company blogs or may be the third platform to share information like note. 

I always bookmarked interesting tweets and even after reading the posts, if I felt it interesting and useful, I sent the tweet links to Slack or Discord (as references).

In business I believe that the developing ability is one of the most important essences. If you just follow what written there with your eyes, you cannot gain it as your own knowledge. The more you consider how to adjust the idea to your business, the more you will grow up. (At least I believe such)

That’s all what I did during the quarantine. How was it? Is there anything interesting or that you may want to try in the near future?

Leave the comments and make me happy!

Aitäh! 🙂

Zooks Gets Mental. (2)

ZooksLeave a comment

Tere!

Previously, Abelia went home in the middle of the film while we were watching with my flatmates.

You may wonder how it is relevant to my mental health.

You will see.

The worst picture by the way.

These are her reactions when I wanted to practise my Spanish with my Customer Support manager but I couldn’t understand, and when I said that it had been taking time to translate at the general meeting in the office.

Some people say I have a friendly looking, which often let people underestimate me.

Aitäh! 🙂