1 YEAR!!!

One year ago today I moved to Eesti. I can't believe it's been a whole year. A whole lot of very interesting things have happened and I must say that moving here was a great decision for so many reasons. That doesn't mean I don't miss Toronto and want to come home at some point but moving here has really exceeded my wildest expectations as to what may have happened when I moved.

Luxembourg

I spent the last couple of days in Luxembourg because I had some work stuff to handle over there. I had never been to Luxembourg before, it's not what I would call the worlds most exciting place. It's very small and the vast majority of stuff that goes on there is banking, EU official and "off-shore" companies that setup there for tax reasons.

Because I was there for work I didn't get much time to see anything which wasn't much of a problem since there isn't terribly much to see. Luxembourg is quite physically pretty with a winding river valley working it's way through the city but the rest of the city reminds me of a univeristy campus with lot's of 1970's architecture with a dash of old European buildings.

A pretty shot of a Luxembourgish bridge
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A sunday drive

On Sunday Liisa and I decided to get out of town a bit and do a little drive into the country. We decided to first go to Jägala falls which are pretty close to Tallinn. Liisa had never been there even they call it Estonia's Niagara. It was quite dry so the falls where actually half the size that they normally are. From there we drove to Viinistu which is a city 1.5 hours from Tallinn where the former manager of ABBA (an estonian) has build quite a nice modern art gallery and restaurant/hotel. On the way back we passed through an area that used to be closed to regular folk as it housed a Soviet sub base. A number of old, ruined buildings can still be seen there.

Some old busted up Soviet buildings
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Liisa on the edge
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The falls at Jägala
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Windy Weekend

Last weekend Liisa came for a spur of the moment visit. On Saturday we walked around a bit, it was cold and windy but there's lots of talk at work about moving to a new office and I wanted to see the top candidate for myself. The potential new office is right by Lauluvaljak (for those of you who know where that is), it's got a view of the sea and the city as it's up on a ridge. It kind of reminds me of the Playboy mansion. Not sure if that's where we're going but that's the rumour.

We also walk by the new Estonain National Art Gallery, KUMU which is scheduled to open in February. It's got an intereting modern design and it's located steps from the Presedential palace.

Our new office???
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The new national art gallery in Tallinn. It's called KUMU.
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No recend updates but I have been doing things.

It's been a couple of weeks since I last posted, mostly cause I've been busy and haven't had a lot of time.

Two weeks ago I spend 4 days in Stockholm visiting Liisa. It's quite cheap to fly there (30euros one way) and only take about 45 minutes. In fact, it takes longer to get from the Airport in Stockholm to the city than it does to fly from Estonia to Sweden.

I like Stockholm, a lot. It's much more cosmopolitan and lively than Tallinn. I never saw myself as a big city boy but coming from T.O. and moving here you really notice certain differences. In Tallinn there are no late night kabob or fallafal stands, no bustling downtown streets like College or Queen West, Stockholm feels a lot more alive which I like. It doesn't hurt that the city is incredibly beautiful as well.

Now the one thing about Stockholm I could do without is the insane prices on almost everything. A beer in a bar is about $8CDN, a subway ticket $3 and so on. I don't understand how people afford living there but they do.

I have pictures but they're on Liisa' camera so I'll upload them next time I get a hold of her camera.