A last time about karma

Sintra

Maybe I should shut up already...

But the next story might be of some interest. And it talks about my new favorite subject : karma.

So let's start where we left it : the lost luggages.

After a night without my luggages, I put on my only underwears, the same smelly socks, to try to get my visa for brazil. All I have is the address of the consulate. And a confidence which is not doing too well.

Because we'll say the truth : probabilities are against me. Not only because of my socks. It takes about 10 working days to get a visa for Brazil. At least in other countries. About Portugal, I found nothing on the "simple" consulate website. All I know is I'm supposed to fly in seven working days.

I get there around 10 AM. The place is full like the hospital waiting room. And as chaotic. I end up getting, from the security guard, who doesn't speak english, that the visa requests must be handed on the second floor.

There, the room is full too. There are people with numbers. People waiting for I don't know what. I don't know what to do in that confusion.

I go back down and the security guard, still unable to answer my questions, send me to the information desk. The line is long and moves slowly.

After some sights (because it takes a long time and it's hot in Portugal with jeans on), the woman behind me talks to me. She understands english but hardly speaks it. I tell her I wish the woman at the desk speaks or at least understands english.

We start chatting. She looks unsure when I tell her my flight is booked for next Wednesday, even if I don't have my visa yet. Thanks for the encouragement.

My turn.

Like I anticipated, the very not sympathetic woman at the desk doesn't speak english. She gives me a piece of paper, circling words in portuguese and she calls the next client. Thanks for the compassion, Miss!

Except the woman behind me won't let that happen. Oh no! Oh, hell no! Because she's a lawyer.

She gets next to me and explains I needed an appointement to hand my visa request. Me, I don't have an appointement, because I didn't find that information in a language I could understand, even if I made some researches.

The lawyer tells me to follow her. Together, we go up to the next floor and she asks to talk with someone in charge, explaining my situation. What helps is that I already filled all the papers needed for my request (one of them was a form online).

After a serious discussion, the man says I can get to the desk in ten minutes.

That is when the lawyer, whose name I didn't even get to ask, hugs me and leaves wishing me luck. I hope she'll ask for the beer or the meal I owe her one day, if she ever finds me back.

At the desk, the woman offers me the face of the day, the one saying "sorry, can't do anything", when she finds out I have no appointement. But I'm not moving. I repeat I was told to wait there. I haven't sweat in my only clothes, in a room without any fresh air, to be shown the door two hours later.

It worked. A little cooperation.

Forms filled, I was told my visa would be ready... in two days!

Haaaaaalllllelujah! (Can you hear the bells?)

Yes, yes, yes, I went two days later and the visa was ready. Going to Brazil on Wednesday! Who said it was complicated to get that visa for Brazil?

In the mean time, karma caught me for that big luck. My fifth sunglasses, bought right when I walked out of the consulate, did beat a mediocrity record by commiting suicide less than 24 hours after the beginning of our relation. Direction : trash!

The king is dead, long live the king! I now am wearing my sixth sunglasses. Wish me luck!

The Story of The Lost Luggages

Lisbon

I should have shut my mouth!

I should have shut up with my karma stories. Like I said in my past message, when you spit in the wind, it falls back on you. But I'll have a second story that should balance it all. Which would prove I don't know what to think at all about karma.

After saying all those good things about Helsinki airport, I boarded my flight to Prague like I was supposed to. It looks like a stopover of one hour, on my way to Lisbon, was enough for me to walk from gate C4 to gate C7 (about 50 meters), in the airport, but that the luggage handlers needed at least 12 hours more to send my stuff in the right place. Looks like the distance to fill was longer in their kart.

When I got to Lisbon, with the not so good company TAP, the landing was rough. We were 30 minutes late. And while everybody was waiting next to the conveyor, the intercom said it would take 15 more minutes for the luggages to get there. Maybe they needed more time to process that rough landing.

That is where I said to myself : it would be the worst time ever to lose my luggage.

Déjà-vu!

I should have shut up in my head.

I told myself the exact same thing in San Francisco airport two years ago. Magic, that is when my bag went missing the first time, going to New York even if I wasn't traveling through that city.

Feels like my brain felt something was wrong. No luggage.

«Have you looked on the over-sized conveyor?» they ask me.

Sorry! When I said I lost an elephant, I really meant a backpack...

Time goes by. And my luggage is finally declared lost. The computer doesn't tell where it is. Because it's true that if they didn't have enough time to transfer my bag in Prague, four hours later, they probably didn't have time to enter the information in the computer.


By chance, all my valuables were in my hand luggage. But not my tooth brush. No clothes either.

The airline gave me an emergency kit made for women. (with no sexism intended)

Yeah! I got bleaching deodorant with woman perfume in it, a thing to have nice nails, a hairbrush, moisturizing cream, shampoo but no soap. And laundry soap (thanks, but you lost my clothes, so I won't need it) and cotton pieces to wash make-up from one's face. Oh, and an extra-large t-shirt and a toothbrush.

At the hostel where I'm staying (the excellent Goodnight Hostel), they confirm that they call regularly for lost luggages with TAP. Did I recommend not to take TAP?

Next morning, the staff call for me to know where the search is at. I hear them use the words puta and stupido. I let you translate.

Twelve hours after arrival, they still don't know where they lost my bag. But TAP believes it might be in Prague because it left Helsinki like it was meant to be.

Congrats for the deduction! I could have told you as I was getting out of the plane. It is as obvious as the nose in the face, like we say in french.

I had to go buy short pants, because Portugal with jeans is a little too hot. Money wasted.

In the evening, the company finally called to say they would deliver my luggage during the night. 

TAP? Never again... but the flight I booked already for Brazil.

Should have waited before booking with them again.

Karma and Airport

Helsinki

You know karma! You know how you say that when you spit in the wind, it's gonna come back on you... I like to believe the same principle applies to money you throw out of the windows. That one day, the wind is gonna bring it back, at least  part of it, in the house. We can always dream.

You remember that trip from Amman downtown to the airport, happy run that cost me 40 $JD because the driver didn't have change? Well, someone somewhere probably felt guilty I guess. Today, I went to Helsinki airport for free. Yes, free. Zero cent!

I had missed the bus I should have taken by 30 seconds. It just drove passed me while I was waiting to cross the street. Good news are the payment thing was broken. The driver decided it was free.

All in all, it means my taxi from Jordan now cost me 35 $JD. Still have to take three free buses and I'll find full satisfaction.

Airport

About the airport itself, it is well organized. We can print our boarding cards and luggage ID by ourselves. After, we could drop our luggage on the conveyer. The problem is that the place is too small and th queues are very long. But the idea is good.

On a security point of view, Finnish people installed two big tables where you can take your time to put your personnal belongings in the bins, before the queue. You take your computer out, liquids, take the belt off. When you're done, you go throught security. It keeps everybody from getting impatient behind the lady that forgot to take her perfume out of her purse and doesn't seem able to find it back.

The Helsinki airport also sells the best chocolate-cheese muffin with a chocolate truffle in the middle. Yeah, they cost a yearly income or something, because nothing is affordable when you take the plane. But it must be the value of the best muffins in the world.

In the end, I fly to Portugal in a couple of hours. According to my plans, if the brazilian consulate doesn't bother too much and accepts to give me an express visa, I would spend my birthday in one of the most southern point in Europe : Lagos or Sagres. With new sunglasses. Because I desintegrated, in spite of me, my authentic false Rayban, sunglasses number 4, I bought in Cambodia.

And if I have problems with the consulate? Options are still open. Argentina for sure. I was thinking of Peru, but a canadian governement alert says it's not a good idea. Bolivia wouldn't mind being a replacement destination. Only, the flights there are more expensive than from Rio, Buenos Aires or Lima.

Plan, again and again

Helsinki

I won't make anybody cry. That wasn't my intention. But traveling for six months, through discoveries and encounters, is a lot of planification as I go. A lot of decisions must be taken quickly, too quickly sometimes, and I must assume them no matter what. It gets tiring a little bit.

Visiting Baltic countries, wandering day after day from a city to another, means being alert for trains and bus schedules and to book hostels 24 hours in advance.

The problem is even bigger when week-ends come, in a season where everybody is traveling. In Helsinki, where everything is expensive, there is already not a lot of places to sleep. Except if you want to pay 50 euros for a more or less mediocre room.

So I decided to book flights for the next (and last) month, and to plan in a tighter way. Might be an error. Having bought already a very expensive flight from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro, I need to get a visa for Brazil. Problem is I don't have the 10 working days most brazilian consulates demand. I thought it would be easier than asking for the chinese visa. There, at least, I needed no more than five days.

So I cross my fingers for an express visa service to fall from the sky. I checked for Helsinki. No express visa here...

If it doesn't work, I'll need to cancel my flight, which is not reassuring when you think I'm not sure I would be able to get any money back. The plan would then be to go to Argentina first and wish for very efficient border patrols in Foz de Iguazu, where I might get a visa in one day if I'm lucky. That is what the rumor says. I'm starting to consider the option of giving up on Brazil, but I hope I won't have to do that.

In the mean time, I got in Helsinki, Finland, in the morning ferry. I took that occasion to reunite with Tua, a Finnish girl I met in a dorm in China. Each time I see someone I met previously, we make the world smaller. It is crazy to think our first meeting was two months ago already. And the first thing she said when she saw me : "You lost weight!"

Must mean I'm getting thiner by the minute. Two months and she sees a difference.


Another sign of the time flying, I have torn my only pair of shorts. I bought a new one while falling for a new t-shirt. Bored of wearing the same two t-shirts all the time. In the same order of business, my almost non existing soles start showing how much I traveled, like that hole appearing on top of one of the shoes. My bag is, on his side, holding on with duct tape.

I'm trying not to buy anything new as I'm getting closer to my destination. We'll see if everything holds.

Tallinn's Gobelin

Tallinn

Tallinn is only two and a half hours from Tartu on a bus. Even if it's a capital, it is a small city.

Like in other Baltic countries, one will first visit the old town. Like in all other Baltic countries, students have started a free tour company to tell the story of some buildings, adding some anecdotes I believe might be exagerated.

Getting out of the fortifications, a small portion near the port is impressive by its strange and original architecture. I even saw one or two colleagues in this strange gorilla in a glass cage typing on a typewriter... We're talking about a fake gorilla of course.

National Park

The second day, I signed up for a visit in Lahemaa national park (traveller.ee). In Estonia, the notion of national park is not the same we have at home. One can build a house in there. Animals are protected, but the rules are not as strict as one can believe.

Still, in the same day, I saw what is left of a Soviet dam, a German palace, a traditionnal Estonian house, an observatory and a Soviet submarine station and a giant bog.

Since I was sharing a mini-van with an old couple who could barely speak english, I used the time to talk with the guide. He confirmed Estonians are considering themselves to be Finnish and they look at their neighbors when decision time comes. Despite numerous invasions in the past, the Estonians seem to look forward and, supported by NATO, they don't fear invaders.

And thanks Jesus, in Estonia, we can use Euros. It is cheaper than Finland, but I feel I'm heading more and more to the north when I look at the prices.

About the prices, souvenirs in the old town are litteraly scams. For a simple patch with the flag on it, they ask 14 euros... It is the price for two meals in exchange for a little piece of fabric. In Thailand, for that price, I probably could have gotten thirty.

In the end, the best memory will be that hostel where I decided to book,  The Purple Gobelin. I was the first one ever to sleep in the bed they gave me, because that place wasn't even open two weeks ago. I took a chance in choosing a place which hadn't proven anything yet, but I regret nothing.

Owner are well trained travelers who I could talk to for hours. In fact, they transformed two rooms of their appartement in dormitories. They are always there, ready to help, and they travel in the stories of their guests. The last night, the six clients they had, and the two owners, played poker until very late in the night... (I ranked second... Not too bad for a beginner)

That is also part of traveling.

Tartu, the student's paradise

I followed through with my plan. After two complete days in Latvia, I moved to Estonia. The capital, Tallinn, being in the North, I used the occasion to stop on the way.

After about four hours on a bus on the road from Riga to Saint-Petersburg, I stopped in Tartu, a student city in the south-east of Estonia.

Tartu

Being on the bus for a long time makes it hard to find a comfortable position, especially when an old lady takes all the available room. But it seems the antipathy was mutual because she asked if she could change place. And I could use the free wi-fi on the bus.

Tartu is a small town that feels so alive because of its citizens who, like in Sherbrooke, are mostly students. All the interesting sites are close together and it's easy to walk to most of them.

It is the most interesting way of visiting anyway. One of the good spots is behind the city hall, where you get a great view.

Highly recommanded by the guidebooks, the KGB cells museum is not really interesting, especially compared to the one in Vilnius, more shocking and authentic.

The botanic garden is worth the detour (the outdoor one is free) as is the promenade along the river, which crosses the heart of the city.

From the whole trip, that is probably the city where I would feel like moving to. I could live there. Probably like in the rest of Estonia.

But from a touristic point of view, one day, maybe two, is enough. And there are buses every 30 minutes to Tallinn, which means nobody needs to book. You go to the bus station, you ask, and hop, five minutes later, you're on the road.

*On the picture, the sculpture represents the sculptor himself, hand in hand with his son... but both of them are the same size.

Eternal sunshine of the spotless minde

Sigulda, Latvia

As planned, I'm moving fast in the Baltic countries. Fast in the sense that I only spend two or three days in each country. With the time I have and the attractions there is to see, it is probably enough.

I made my way to Latvia. My flight to Vilnius stopped in Riga but I didn't have time to visit the city at that point.

First impressions, the Latvian capital moves more than Lithuania's capital. We can feel the soul of the old town more, people smile more and socialize more. Despite its small size, Riga feels like a big town.

That said, I went around the old town in a few hours only. After, one must just contemplate to slow down. Well, with the eternal sun here in summer, you can easily get rid of the museums while they are open (between 10 AM and 6 PM) and spend the rest of the day walking the streets, until it gets dark, around 11 PM.

Yes, 11 PM. Which is enough to play some little tricks with your brain, because you feel like in an eternal afternoon.

Other than the old town, which looks like any other old town, Riga has at least 800 art nouveau buildings. Arts or architecture lovers can get lost as they wish by looking at every single wall.

In fact, what gives Latvia its particular side is probably its quest for an identity. Refusing to identify with Russia or its two other neighbors, Estonia (Finnish wannabe) and Lithuania (Polish wannabe), according to my guide, Latvians might not have found their inner me, but they still can differenciate themselves from the others.

In Riga, I asked what other town was worth visiting. I chose Cape Kolka and Cesis, trusting my Lonely Planet. In my hostel, I was told not to go there, saying Sigulda is better, one hour on the train from the capital.

I got there and the city is really charming. It's  a mix of the city and the countryside. It offers the possibility to walk in streets surrounded by trees to reach some castle ruins and grottos.

The most adventurous might want to bungee jump from the lift across the river or ride a true bobsleigh. I ran out of time for the second option.

Note that latvian currency, the lats, is very strong (twice the canadien dollar). One must be careful when the prices seem low.

Worth mentionning, the Occupation Museum. We don't hear enough about the problems the Baltic countries faced.

I'm moving on tomorrow to Tartu in Estonia before heading to the capital Tallinn. From there, I should take the ferry to Helsinki in Finland. Looking at my schedule, I'm not sure I can see more of this part of Europe. I will need to think about flying to Portugal, where I might have to wait for awhile to get a visa for Brazil.

One thing is for sure, I must make my way to my original time zone. I bought my flight home and I intend to leave from Habana on August 15th.