While I'm fully aware I've done something very similar to this before, this years stint of adolescent debauchery at Estonia's premier bmx/Skate competition has given me fresh food for some kind of "10 reasons tourist guide" so here it goes:
1. The language: Any country which has phrases such as "Kaks teist Kuud" (pronounced cocks taste good) or "Kaks teist Pussy" to say something as simple as twelve months or twelve buses has at least one good thing going for it. Couple this with the fact that hot Estonian girls will happily repeat this to you with very little idea of whats funny or slightly arousing and your onto some guaranteed cross language comedy in any bar. see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgEKyD6v89Y.
2. Onto a marginally more mature reason why you should visit, the average Estonian woman is on average 1,000 times hotter than her average British equivalent. Apply the statistic that only 1 in 10 Estonian girls is ugly compared to the reverse ratio in Britain and you get the picture. Add to this the fact that for some reason Drunken English boys (particularly bmxers and skaters) are considered highly desirable and trustworthy enough to follow back to a hostel and a lay isn't too far away.
3. Its proximity to Latvia: Latvian people are possibly the most amazing race of people on the face of the earth, whilst managing to be slightly irritating at the same time. Why i here you ask? well while English are incontestably the greatest binge drinkers on earth this tends to be a weekend 'flash in the pan' thing, Latvians on the other hand are down to party whether its 10am on a cold Monday morning or 2am on a Friday night.
4. Lax policing : A couple of years ago an unnamed friend spent a night in Tallinn city jail for a jacket related crime, 200 backhanded kroones later and he was back out on the streets partying, whether this relaxed attitude to justice is a good thing for Estonia i don't know but it certainly is to drunken English boys who have a knack for getting into some kind of trouble wherever they go.
5.Road safety: Estonia is the only place I've ever been where its not only acceptable but encouraged for taxi drivers to 'drift' round corners in the center of a city, mount footpaths and pack 10 people into a 7 seater car, enough said.
6.Estonian boys seem to be invisible/overcome with some degenerative disease: I say this because literally every bar, club or supermarket i visited seemed to be 90% female, which means lots of vajay jay for foreign boys and girls.
7.The measures: An Estonian 'double' consists of three quarters of a pint of spirit with a dusting of mixer, if that's not a recipe for success my idea of success is seriously misconstrued.
8. In a vain attempt to seem at all cultured i should probably say something like 'Estonia has a rich and vastly enthralling history due to years of occupation by the USSR but I'd rather you went to see the whacked out art gallery which looks like a crack den/prison and has 6ft plastic heads outside.
9.The fact everything is guilt generatingly cheap, I'm not sure why this is but 5 nights in a hostel which looked something like a London townhouse for about £36.00 is amazing as is 20 cigarettes for £1.20 or a litre of blueberry cider for £1.50, i could go on.
10. Simpel session: this is pretty much the sole reason I've visited a country which has winter temperatures of anything from -5 to -30 degrees for the past two years straight. To be frank even if you don't skate or bmx if you can find any fault in partying with some of the most beautiful women Europe has to offer in one of its cheapest countries then i doubt you can be happy anywhere other than Skegness or somewhere equally picturesque.
Peas out
oh and most of the photos are by fellow Estonian convert Ross penny find some more delightful snapshots here.
