Joune

Friday, May 12, 2006

The Russian border..

(Ha Ha that was a good one! I should tell them that!)

So i made it Saint Petersburg.. And in the process i had to cross the Estonian/Russian border..
So we're stopped at the Estonian side, and they collect the passports and stuff.. and they even have a dog come in the bus to sniff everyone! So i'm thinking "ok that's some serious border we have here"..

Then we cross to the Russian side and there, no collecting of passports; everyone has to actually get down the bus, with all luggage to go through the control point..
Ok, so we go.. it's 3:30 in the night but we go..
Fill the form, go through control, go to the guy who tells you how to properly fill the form, go through control again!...
Good, passed!
But then after the passport check, i see everyone line up in front of some closed office and enter one by one.. I'm thinking "they're really not joking here, individual luggage control in a private room!!"...

...

until i realised everyone was actually just waiting to go to the bathroom before going back to the bus!!

well, we all get confused don't we?!

Before entering Russia..

So there i come to the limits of Europe..
And before entering Russia, there are a couple of rules to respect. One of which being "thou shalt not look like a tchechen!!"
So as promessed, I had to shave..

I just wanted to take the opportunity to suggest our female readers a little poll in order to make this blog a little more interactive!
So according to the before and after pictures below, which looks best?! (i didn't say good, i said "best"!)
...we'll work on the haircut some other day if you don't mind! One thing at a time!

Wanted! Cute French men..

My friend Laura asked me to publish an important communication here!
She, along with a couple of friends, is planning to set up a (non?)profit organisation in order to recruit some cute french men to move to Latvia.. Anyone interested?!

Not yet?
Ok. According to a preliminary -and pretty thourough- market analysis, it turns out that Latvia has 57% girls (and with the highest "gorgeous to ugly" ratio i have ever encountered!) And the 43% of men include a good portion of rollerbladers and other gay/ugly men! (allright, i'm kidding.. rollerbladers are not necesserely ugly!)
So, to quote the president of the organisation, it leaves "an average of 5 girls to one man"! and "the girls are waiting!"

Did you just read that guys? I repeat: "5 girls to one man, and the girls are waiting!!"
Laura alone could probably drive half of the french male population out of france! But imagine hordes of Laura, Dana, Liva and other names in A! (or don't imagine.. people have gone mad for less than that!)
I'm talking land of honey and milk here, so move it!

Oh i know, now you're wondering why i'm still on the road and why i ever left this paradise!
Well, I guess i should stress the fact that this is intended for cute guys only! No matter how hard i tried, my application got rejected and i was very kindly encouraged to pursue my journey! So i'll just have to go get my honey and milk at the supermarket with the other ugly ones!!

So if you're wondering what's "cute" according to the president, we could mention Mikael as portrayed here during another hard day at work (you win this battle Mikael, but not the war! you bastard!)

..while i'm here, i'll just throw in a couple of views of Tallinn's old town.. it can't hurt, and after all, i shot them for you!

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Beware of the Russians!

"I'm not trying to scare you, but you should be careful with the nazi punks and the dunken russians.. we have quite a lot of these around here!"

That's all i hear of around here.. well, thanks mate.. now i'm scared!

Anyway, for the little story, after visiting the occupation museum in Riga and talking to the locals here and there, i learned a lot about the situation in these baltic states..
After about a hundred years or so of German occupation, they finally got there independance in the 20's.. for about 20 years, it worked out pretty well.. but!
But then came the communist russians.. occupation again, nationalisation of all companies.. loss of property..
Then barely one year later, bang! Germans again! Kicking some russian asses, so the locals were pretty happy at first, since the Germans gave back some of their property.. (the small stuff at least, they kept the bigger ones!) But soon they discovered the Nazi ideology, propaganda and other killing of jews.. not mentioning that the Germans were not just freeing the locals from the Russians, they were occupying themselves...
So that was it for the time of the second world war.. and the people here (that i keep calling "the locals to avoid saying "the Lithuanians, the Latvians and the Estonians"!) were even forced to enroll in the German army, to help colonise their own country.. pretty fucked up mess..
A few years later, end of the war, the Russians come back, super angry, to kick some German ass.. and they do!.. So the Germans loose, the two giants split the world, and our poor locals become Russian again... new occupation, new nationalisation.. and for 50 years the Russians kept sending new settlers..

Only in the 90's did the baltic states gain their independance again.. the russian settlers got to choose wether they wanted the local nationality or not, and most of them, probably thinking it wouldn't last refused it.. yet they were not granted the Russian nationality either! So they became official "non citizens"! (with a passeport that says so!) And now about half the population of these countries are actualy non citizen russians!

So anyway, that's the story.. but it helps understand the people here.. and also the whole nazi punks/drunken russians mess.. From what i hear, the russian non-citizens are pretty frustrated with the whole situation.. and now (i leave it to you to make a proper correlation!) their favorite activity is to get drunk and start up fights for no reason..

So beware of the drunken Russian!

I thought these works i found at the Tallinn museum express the nazi/russian thing pretty well..