We crave a different kind of Buzz...

When people first asked me how my trip was going, I got a little uncomfortable.  I was having a great time.  And for a minute was I questioning my loyalty to Estonia. I kept thinking "If ISEP had a program in Ireland,  that would have been my first choice." Then I started to realize that I do not regret coming to Estonia at all.  Tartu and Dublin are both amazing for their own reasons.

To be completely honest, I was worried about coming to Estonia because I was black.  I googled "Estonians," in hopes of finding pictures of black people in the mix.  Of course I found none. I researched but I only found stories that put a little fear in you.  I never said a word about it because I didn't want people to discourage me from taking this journey.  I wasn't going to let something as superficial as skin color stop me studying abroad.  In Tartu, there may be four other dark skinned people here.  Out of all of us, I am the only African American female.  So as you may have guessed, yes, people stare.  It's not that they mean anything by it; it's just that we are not considered the norm.  As the months go by, the stares are less frequent and I am just as unimportant as anyone else living in Tartu.  Because Tallinn is the capital of Estonia, it pulls in tourists from all over the world.  I feel as though I could blend in there and I enjoy my rare trips to Tallinn.

In comparison to Tartu, Dublin is extremely diverse.  The city felt like a huge mixing pox with a little of everyone in it. It reminded me of home.  The fact that it was an English and Irish speaking country was the cherry on top of a banana split sundae. I could say hello and not feel bad about speaking English.  Though it was funny that someone said hello to me and my response was "Tere!"  Yes, it was five seconds of extreme awkwardness.

I am so serious when I say that I thought the world was going to stop and stare because I was so exotic.  That didn't happen, at all. I had become so accustomed to the stares in Estonia that I was sure I would be "All that and a bag of chips." In reality, there were a hundred people that looked just like me.  I quickly got it through my head that Denzel Washington and Jude Law look-alikes were not going to see me "shine bright like a diamond." Even if they did, I was only in town for five days and that was barely enough time to learn each other's first name.

Everyone in Dublin was sweet as pie.  Everyone spoke, even if you were just passing each other in the bathroom. It was so different from what I have gotten used to.  It is said that Estonians are introverts and very reserved.  I don't really interact on the street like I would at home and for those few days; I had to practice being somewhat polite again.

Food:

The food was awesome, but I feel like I spent a lot of money on food as well. We were in a tourist  city so the prices were inflated just a bit.  I would have loved to go to a market and pick up a few items but the hostel didn’t allow us to hold food in the room.  So we were forced to eat out at every meal.  You would not believe how hard it was not going to places that we could find in the US. There were McDonalds, Burger Kings, Subway, TGIF, and so many more.  We made a pact to eat somewhere new every day. We stayed true to that except for breakfast.  Across from the hostel was this place called Oscars.  Every morning I got a raspberry scone and mocha. The place had such a relaxing atmosphere that I could stay there for hours at a time.  The workers were very friendly and I tried to tip the scale every time I went in (give them a tip)

So here are a few pictures of what we ate each day.  I am not going to lie, I can’t remember the name of most of these places!

This was the first meal we had when we got into town.  It took like 30 or 45 minutes to find it because we had no sense of direction and we had to pass all of the international food chains to get to this place.  Overall, it was good... or maybe I was really hungry.  No, it was good.

This was the Oscars I was talking about. The scone was amazing and they gave us butter and jam with it.  It was to die for.  I'm sorry, I just exaggerated but they are worth going to if you are ever in town. I wish we had an Oscars in Tartu.

This was our lunch on the second day.  Apparently this was a Irish burger.  I don't know how it differed from any other burger but it was good.  I don't have a picture from our dinner on the second night.  We had pizza and we dug into so fast that there was no point in taking a picture.  Breakfast was always the same so I won't post a picture of it again.

I have no idea where this place was.  We were leaving the zoo and starving so we stopped at some place that looked to have good food at good prices.  We got the soup of the day which was like puréed vegetable soup with a chicken wrap. I was fairly impressed at the taste of the soup.  however the wrap just had chicken on it.  No one likes dry chicken so I had to drench it in mayo and mustard and top it with the lettuce and peppers they provided.  After a little "fixin' up," it was really good.

On the third night we wanted sushi.  Anna was in charge of finding this place.  Needless to say we got a little lost and I threatened that if we didn't find it, we would be eating McDonalds for dinner.  Just when we thought all hope was lost, we ran up on "YO Sushi." It was my first time going to a sushi bar with a conveyor belt.  We were allowed water, miso soup, a purple, blue and orange plate for ten euros.  It was a really good price but I wanted some dumplings so I bought an additional purple plate.  The orange plate was the most interesting.  I ordered the octopus balls.  Yes, you read right.  I can't compare the taste to anything but  fried calamari hidden in creamy mashed potatoes.  It was really good and I would get it again!

 

 

 This was a little place called "O'Brien's" I ordered a ham and cheese sandwich with the soup of the day.  It was so good and filling.  I think I was done for the day after that meal but we still had so much to do.

With the Dublin pass, we were allowed to go to this little café and get a free coffee and cake.  I got a caramel cheesecake and caramel macchiato. When I tell you that was some amazing stuff, I almost fell of my stool.  I was almost tempted to buy another one but I was trying to watch my figure.

 

This was our last dinner in Dublin.  I can't tell you want any of the items are called.  I ordered  pasta in spicy tomato sauce with salmon, shrimp & broccoli and a side salad of course. 

Airport food and it cost me around seven euros.  The drink was an amazing white hot chocolate.  I also ordered a yogurt but the oats were stale and I didn't enjoy it much. 

So that is it about the food!

 

My last post will be about everything I seen while in Dublin, so stay tuned!