Baltics
BALTICS TRIP - August 3-17, 2007
THURSDAY, 8/2/07: 3:40PM: Just can't get used to the idea of taking my heavier, more expensive, not-quite-used-to laptop, which doesn't fit into the most convenient bag, so I'll take this instead!
FRIDAY, 8/3/07: The last hour before 2:30PM was extremely hectic. Went to the gym 12:10-1:30, showering only in cold water, which was all that was working, even though the sign said there was NO water, and back to keep packing, and KEEP packing, moving things back and forth, and then at 2:25 Tris calls and I brush him off after he tells me he's been talking to a number of people about the website while updating his hardware and software. I keep finding things to add, ending up with a black bag of 16 pounds and a blue one of 13 pounds, a total not quite of 30, where Ken is happy to be just under 44. Downstairs at 2:50 and the car comes at 3PM, Ken not aware he can't be seen through the black windows. Slow traffic-filled drive gets us to an almost empty Finnair terminal at 3:50, Ken having to phone for his taxi credit-card approval of $71.50, and I get a CUTE check-in guy and we're through security by 4:10 and to gate 4 for Ken to check that it's a full flight, a seven-hour time difference, and dinner will be served after an hour or an hour and a half, and sunset is just before 10PM and sunrise is at FIVE! I feel not like typing more at 4:26. We're due to board at 5:10 and leave on time at 5:55, let's hope. No sign of evening thunderstorms. Board 5:35. Announcement at 5:55. I'm just BEHIND engine, but can see pretty well. Crowded airport and schedules. Move back at 6:20 and sit and sit and off at 7:18. Lightning on left in dark clouds that we keep turning right to avoid but which seem to keep ahead of us anyway. Poor, somewhat bumpy flight by 8:32, over 6 hours to go of 7:13 announced flight, with 7 hours' time difference. No sign of dinner because of turbulence, which really isn't that bad. Put in my own earphones (I was sitting on the ones they gave out) and listen to stuff, but it's not very good. Finally above clouds and some striking setting-sun effects through cloud layers at 8:40. At 9:02 I get up for john, in a long line, and then serving carts come out and I have to wait a long time with food on my tray, and get a red wine and an apple juice on my way back. Take all my evening and night pills and an Ambien at 9:55, 4.75 hours left, hoping for sleep despite Ken bumping back from in front of me, dozing girl bumping from my right, and woman behind kneeing my seat from the rear. Actually sleep for a few hours and change my watch from 12:56 to 7:56 as light outside is bright above clouds, and though the screen shows we flew just south of Greenland, there was nothing visible through clouds.
SATURDAY, 8/4/07: Breakfast of ham and cheese on roll, orange juice, peach yogurt and sugared tea to 8:30, getting camera out for only flat clouds below at one hour to go. Roll 1: #5 of first Finnish town at 8:44. Land at 9:32 for 7:14 flight. #6 airport at 9:35. 66° out. Off plane at 9:45, quick through customs, and on bus for 7.2€ at 10:22 to central Railway Station. Store stuff in Hotel Seurahuone storage at 11:10 and go to church. #7 Railway Station at 11:12. #8 Las Meninas statues on Esplanade 11:25. #9 Uspenski Orthodox Cathedral and fish fountain 11:32. And #10 harbor 11:43. Video Russian Cathedral to 11:54, tired. #11: "Great Church" Cathedral. #12 harbor 12:06. Reindeer meatball lunch with too much potatoes for too much money, Ken with poor bouillabaisse and more potatoes and not-coleslaw. Climb stairs to "Great Church" to find there's a wedding, and back to Atheneum for poor art with some nice pieces, and get to hotel to find no rooms air conditioned, and move to new room after being treated to drinks for inconvenience. I say I just don't want to move, and doze from 3:15 to 5:35. Down to dinner with great cloudberry cocktail and mediocre gazpacho, while Ken has bread-shrimp and I have lots of reindeer filet and carrots and onions and artichoke with a glass of champagne, and then a Violetta of Sambuca and Sprite and grenadine and other stuff, and out at 6:55 to Central Bus Station corner to watch tons of people: groups of Vietnamese men waiting in train station, one VERY handsome man who seems to be for sale, many bicyclists on path, lots of many-colored hair, lots of Blacks and Orientals and families and gangs of guys and clumps of girls and just about anyone as I sit and try to absorb sitting watching people in Helsinki, Finland, before leaving tomorrow. Find my eyes closing, so I'm back to hotel at 8:05 and bed at 8:30 to fall quickly asleep.
SUNDAY, 8/5/07: Wake at 2:06 to pee and lie a long time thinking about past and future trips, happy that my flight here is over, and bed is comfortable after taking sheet off duvet under too-fast fan and think of slanted-floor bathroom with raised shower-edge and Ken moving about, coming into bathroom OF COURSE after I finish peeing and am trying to remember anything to type of dream. Finally fall asleep and have more long elaborate dreams that I just don't remember. Wake again at 6:50 and shower awkwardly in small space, finding it difficult to raise my feet to wash them, and slather on hydrocortisone on increasingly raw crotch, and type while Ken clears throat and makes snide comments as I catch up-to-date at 7:30, when he said he'd set alarm. Down to breakfast buffet at 7:37, starting with a sugar-and-cinnamon-needing porridge, then a good marmalade with an unmarked container of butter, lean bacon with what I hope was a yolk-less portion of scrambled eggs, since it was so very pale and tasteless, a good fruit smoothie, and croissants. Up at 8:30 to type and pack. Turns out that I have nothing to read, so should probably get out yesterday's Times to pass the time between the 18.75€ taxi at 9:25AM and the 10:50AM ferry departure. Felt GOOD before breakfast, but large amounts of food make me tired again. Downstairs to wait for the taxi, which comes very elegantly with Sergei in a black suit, and for 18.75€ we get in at 10:06 to a jammed lounge, where we manage to snag the last two seats. Put in earplugs and read Times and get ticket and board at 11AM. #16 across top decks at 10:06. #17 depart at 10:42. #18 Helsinki panorama 10:45. #19 Eckero ferry at 10:54. My VIDEO camera says there's no FILM, and the film is bound up and I can't get the machine to accept it. Sit in peace and foment. Get bags at 12:10PM after meeting Ken's awful "friends" from Norfolk in a crowded lounge. #20 coming into Tallinn. #21 Tallinn and end of Crystal Symphony. Dock at 12:35. Out at 12:51 in big jam of people. Meet driver and each gets 1000K from ATM and into car 1:13 with Boris. Ken pays pizza lunch at place he insists on, with beers, and to St. Nicholas Church at 3:41 for good altarpieces and a half-hour organ concert with a live flute, who isn't very good. My eyes close from time to time, and then we go sit in the square and I have an ice cream in milk and get back at 6:30 to rest for almost an hour before shitting a bit and down at 7:31 to be second last to Mitchell and Alex, and a late-arriving old Kristen and cane-carrying Dick, with salad for which no one uses oil and vinegar, a big piece of salmon and huge potato, but at least two free glasses of wine, and Ken hates his dessert. Finish at 9:05, Alex taking the cake with 305 countries visited, and I excuse myself after Rita gives plans for tomorrow: leave at 9AM after 7:30 wake-up call to city tour, lunch on our own 12-2, then to out-of-city Ethnographic village, back at 5 and dinner at 7 at Karl Friedrich II on the square. Not too busy, thank goodness, and I get up to room to not be able to put on my bed light until guy we phoned for pulls aside my pillow to reveal the switch on my headboard. I finish this at 9:33PM, almost too tired to go to sleep, still VERY light out, but shutters close fairly darkly. Full from not much dinner. NOT the best group in the world! Decide to give a quick tooth-brush. Bed and sleep fairly quickly.
MONDAY, 8/6/07: Wake twice with dreams, and finally get up at 7:20AM with Ken up and in the bathroom and I record my third dream, but still feel vaguely woozy from lack of sleep even though I probably had more than eight hours. Really tempted to unpack, but uncertain as to what I'll actually do now at 7:27AM with our wake-up call due in three minutes and a possible shower to rid my crotch of its still-existent rot. Quick shower, more hydrocortisone, and down at 7:50 for breakfast, finding the two guys with FOUR plates of food on their table: did THEY put them there to avoid neighbors, or did the other couple join them and then move away? Asked for hot chocolate and they furnished a FULL cup of molten chocolate pudding, to which the addition of two small containers of milk served hardly to dilute it at all. Very tasty pieces of what might be muskmelon, but the same yolk-less-seeming eggs and pallid bacon and good-tasting pastrami or beef or something else to go along, trying hard not to eat too much, along with a bright red tasty slice of watermelon. Back to the room to put all the stuff that isn't clothes into the three tiny drawers that represent the ONLY storage in the tiny room, with my bed-foot even blocking the opening to the bathroom. Huge double-paned windows, but we need them open for some circulation, and I still couldn't prove whether we have air conditioning or not, probably not, since they'd hardly ever need it: we were told that this was the best weather after three weeks of rain. Wear the comfortable slippers to breakfast, very few in the room except those speaking English and a very boisterous baby who did nothing but crawl around and scream while the mother followed: clearly she didn't want to clutter her own room with her own child's noise. Very pleasant, though slow, service, and a good variety of foods, though all on the pallid side, with Ken having to ask for a German-manufacture saccharine. Back up to finish taking all non-clothes out of my bag and putting it off the armchair, which Ken promptly claimed, so I took my AlphaSmart to the desk, put my spare pillow on the chair, and stuffed the coverless duvet and bedspread under our common night table, hoping they might take the hint, but I feel quite sure my duvet will be stuffed again when I return. 8:40AM: The difficulties with the typing remain, but I still think this lightness and portability is worth the effort. Now at 8:50 it's time to put on my shoes and get downstairs, hoping my now-seeming-to-work videocamera is ACTUALLY working, and doesn't need to be permanently connected to an outlet to do so. #29 view from Savoy Boutique window in Tallinn 8:57AM. Onto bus just after 9AM, each having a single seat, and our local guide Tina, younger and thinner than Rita, takes over. #30 Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, built a hundred years ago under Russian rule and newly cleaned, particularly the gleaming mosaics, and I video inside but again something seems to be wrong with the camcorder. #32 Three cruise ships in, and the forecourt of the Cathedral and the Parliament building, and the two overlooks that I photo and video, are all jammed with tourists from the boats: the guides hoisting flags or colored poles, the tourists all with color-coded and numbered lapel stickers (though most of the language seems to be English), the Crystal Symphony holding 2800 passengers the largest, photo at 9:42. St. Olaf is the highest church-tower. Tina describes the Russian-built housing projects with "apartments so small they tried to join the floor to the ceiling," if I heard her right. 10:30 to open-air Ethnographic Museum, again hoping to beat the crowds, but there were already four busses parked in the lot and the souvenir shop was jammed, again mostly with English. Lots of thatched roofs, artefacts in the rooms, people of all ages including babies in costume, and there was a dance show at 11AM, when everyone circled about to the music of a violin, bass fiddle, and accordion, and I tried to take pictures but again my camera protested that I didn't have a cassette in it, and when I opened it, the cassette would come out, sometimes with the film somewhat crimped, but when I tried to put it back it wouldn't go in, and I felt terrible frustration trying to make it work as a man chased a laughing woman around a circle of jokers until he caught her and carried her off; other antics caused sporadic applause from the watchers. The benches seemed to be restricted to certain classes of tourists, but I simply claimed a seat on the end and watched the rest of our group standing while most others sat. They went into a bar for some coffee, and I went around the entire building following the false sign for the johns and entered to see tempting arrays of cakes and coffee and tea spread out on tables for the ship's passengers, but just peed and told Tina that I'd be walking toward the windmill toward the water, stopping in at various other complexes of three or four buildings moved from existing farms, mostly in the 1970s and 80s, and the whole thing seemed to have come together in the 90s. Lots of "inhabitants" read books or scrubbed or swept floors, and we should have talked to them, but didn't. Enjoyed the mute swans and ducks upending for underwater food, and took a picture across to the town, then along the edge to find a chapel with a few people sitting listening to recorded music, took a flash photo of a perfectly set-up bedroom while the attendant swept the kitchen, and walked along paths hoping not to be late, seeing a schoolhouse (which I didn't go into) and other sets of farmhouses, stores, and animal shelters, and took a few more pictures just to more or less prove that I was there, including a picture of the horse-cart, whose Chinese riders waved smiling to me as they passed. Found my way back to the bar, peed again and took a dry piece of cake, and went into the shop to find the couple sitting dourly on a bench, so I sat behind them, watching others buy stuff, and then the rest returned (oh, I took another still of a dance program in the distance in another area that featured some kind of black plastic-looking horn, which Ken later said he heard). #9 swans at 11:36. Chapel at 11:46. #10 dance in second place. Back to shop 12:03 and to bus at 12:12, tired. To hotel to go around corner to Must Lammas Georgian restaurant, empty when we entered, having convinced them that we wouldn't be back until 2PM, and had shared appetizers of which Ken loved the chicken with walnuts, and some of the odd yellow grains were tasty. I had a glass of poor Tbilisi wine, we had two bottles of gassy water, and Ken had lots of trout while I had an appetizer of very tasty, very filling, chicken and mushrooms and cheese in two roasting pots where I thought I might have only "deserved" one, but the lovely waitress thought to treat me. Had very sweet cherries (with other fruit mixed in) and cream cheese for dessert, and got out about 1:44. #11 Peeping Tom on walking tour of the hot, crowded town at 2:51. Deconsecrated Holy Ghost Church had incredible altarpieces, paintings, carvings, a "Dance of Death" disfigured by glass, fogged, put over it to "protect" it, and an organ recital that Ken had to point out included a singularly inept live flute. Not to mention the cell-phone conversation and talkers during the concert. #12 cliff view 3:20. Back to bus at 3:23 and to sub-base at 3:34, touring the icebreaker Suur Toll and then I was the only one who took the thin blond's tour of the sub Lembit, for which I took an Estonian brochure, remembering the funny story that they claimed 26 "kills" but only used 9 torpedoes, having changed the "luxurious" shower to a radio room and the wood-paneled officer's bunkroom to a more Spartan surround. Tina stuck her head in to say everyone was dying of heatstroke when they were actually sitting in the bus, and I didn't even think of taking a PHOTO of the inside of the ship (from 1918, VERY dated) (with a pane of stamps from 1996) or the sub. Leave sub 4:11 and back to town, #13 two wall towers at 4:44 after being left off at modern shopping mall to locate a Sony shop, get told to go to the fourth-floor repair room, joined in the elevator by a strange guy who turned out to be the repairman, who gave me the key to the john and fixed "the contact" when I peed, by 4:33, and refused payment for the job, so I smilingly shook his hand with great gratitude and got back out to the sweltering, crowded streets to follow the good maps back to the hotel at 4:50 to find Ken out, so I lay down dressed to join group at 6:45 to walk to Karl Friedrich third-floor elegant empty dining room for sodden salad with good sweet-pepper flecks around plate's rim the best part, and then tilapia, poor, rather than the promised pork, but Ken talked me into a wonderful Riesling Kabinett before the mediocre dessert, and when the birthday party joined us at 8:37 I said I was allergic and walked out. The oldest apothecary was closed, and Ken insisted the only way I could have a scoop of garlic ice cream was to SIT IN THE RESTAURANT and eat it, so we went back to the hotel, where I undressed and flopped onto the bed, finally shutting the shutters about 10:10PM and getting to sleep fairly quickly.
TUESDAY, 8/7/07: Woke to dreams at 12:04AM, again at 2AM, remembering none, peeing both times, then up at 6:06 to type dream, then decide to stay up by showering, lathering on the hydrocortisone and antiperspirant, and out to get Ken to go into the bathroom while I started typing to catch up on the journal in my towel at the desk at 6:22, finishing now at exactly 7:01AM, glad to be caught up with the current events, ready for the future. Oh, could NOT find my calcium lunch-pills, so I MUST have forgotten them. Breakfast 7:11-8, sharing a table with Mitch and Alex, Mitch getting us orange juice and champagne glasses and sharing his enormous ham-and-cheese omelet with us even though we really didn't want it. I asked for and got a greatly diluted hot chocolate: two pots of milk were enough to dilute it to drinkability. Up before Ken to watch TV, all 30 channels, and brush teeth GOOD to 8:20, and shit a bit (and make the mistake of putting no tissue up my crack as I briefly thought so to do) and to bus at 8:29. To one manor at 9:30. #14 manor at 9:32. #15 map of manor 9:37. Later remember that I totally FORGOT the Museum of sea-junk and painting we stopped at for a few moments, just because it was there, and I looked out the window to see a four-story fire-tower-like structure that Tina says I can climb, so I do so, steeply, and get out my videocamera to take a slow panorama of the entire peninsula-point and am delighted it works, even taking Alex (without his permission, it occurs to me later) as he climbs the ladder, and I feel very good about the stop. To Kolga at 10:17 and stop at peninsula. #16 Baltic shore (which Tina calls the Baltic Pond, because it has NO tides!) at 10:26. #17 rock-return hill (Ken's rock slid down the hill to where he'd picked it from below the base, mine stayed very near the top) 10:30. #18 coastal "bunker," which turns out to be an ice-storage basement that with winter ice can keep fish fresh until August. #19 people at Kasmu point at 10:30. Back to bus at 10:43. Yesterday's ship was the Suur Toll. To Altja at 11:32. Video stream 12:02, with plane passing coincidentally, happy that the camera WORKS! Chat about Bergman's death, as well as Antonioni's, and I mention Antoniennui, which Tina remarks to mean "dark," and I think it's a wonderful word-play on Antoni-en-nuit, but Ken doesn't think the words would be connected. #25 brook at 12:08, just to capture the magical quality of the countryside only 60 miles east of Tallinn in the Estonian northern countryside, the south being even more "rural." Get to park restaurant after long walk in hot woods, only Ken and Tina and me, eating blueberries and sour (not yet ripe) red lingonberries, and back to see others eating on benches outside, which looks like murder, but then they point out our table for 9 inside and I go to the john to find my worst suspicions justified: the sliminess in my ass-crack translates into a VERY brown stain in my just-put-on-today brand-new shorts, so I clean myself and stuff myself with toilet paper and get to the table in the corner to take the three kinds of fish: mackerel with mustard, herring naked, and prickly dry sprat which I don't care for at all. Then good barley and mashed potatoes with a wonderful cream of mushroom gravy, some few salad vegetables and starting with what I thought was lingonberry juice but turned out to be cranberry juice, and then ordered a dark beer for 35K, drinking lots and eating lots, ending with blueberry cheesecake with good whipped cream and Earl Grey tea with lots of sugar and milk, and get full to bus at 1:25, tired as usual. #26 and #27 of Sagadi Manor House 1:39. #28 Palmse House at 1:58, even grander, trying and failing twice to make a video when they play the old music box, and wandering all rooms upstairs and down, though missing the winetasting in the basement, and going around the whole place taking picture after picture, going into mediocre wintergarden and missing the longer greenhouse farther along, and wearily back to bus in heat to take #32 of map at 2:40, more tired. Bus goes at 2:47, leaving Alex and Mitch off at a synagogue to which Ken said he'd have gone had he not needed the john more, and back to hotel at 3:48, having nodded much of the way back, though admittedly much of rural Estonia looks quite a bit like rural Ohio, though I missed a few cranes and of course we saw no moose, bears, or wild pigs. Ken dashes into room to shit and I sit in discomfort as he flushes at least three times. I get a new pair of shorts to put on to disguise my shitty backside, and he then comes out to say he'll be writing and mailing three postcards and then going to the pharmacy, which I say I won't join him at, and I shit with LOTS of red blood on toilet paper, can't figure why since I've showered EVERY morning on the trip so far, and flush twice and try and try scrubbing my shorts with the soap but it still stays quite brown in the central back, and I wring them out as much as I can. He leaves and I spread them to dry in my lower drawer, hoping they'll dry through both wooden barriers, and think to lie down, but decide at 4:18 to keep up with this, and do so until 4:42, when there's a knock on the door and I answer in my shorts to the cute dark-haired clerk, who says Ken requested two weather reports for Riga and Kaliningrad, which he says is really for Klaipeda, which is right nearby, and I ask him about the strange card in the slot and he doesn't know anything about it, so he just leaves it and I thank him and finish this to 4:48, not having that much time left before meeting outside at 5:45 to walk to the winetasting at 6PM before going to the Gloria for a fabulous (supposedly) dinner at 7PM tonight, having said our final goodbyes to Tina (Ken having conveniently read that the ONLY guide we have to tip is Rita) at the bus, and going over the border to Latvia tomorrow, with 692 Estonian krooni to spend before tomorrow. Finish now at 4:52, ready for resting in bed before Ken comes back. Ken insists he's not going to the winetasting, so I pee and dress and get downstairs at 5:45 and make excuses for him, and we walked to the tasting place and had three of the most awful wines: apple and black currant, tasting nothing like cassis, and everyone mercifully left in time for me to get back at 6:37 and Ken wants to leave early now at 6:43. We get to the elaborate stage set of Gloria and are seated in a stuffy alcove with seats about a foot from the table, and are moved to a corner table with a fan directed toward us. The waiter reminds me of Edgardo, but knows not from "butler" as I say "butter" and nothing about a tasting menu, but when the Armenian chef comes out we agree to Ken's blini with caviar and my snails, just wonderful, preceded by foie gras on beetroot that the chef immediately rushes out to apologize to Ken about, followed by well-prepared shrimp, three large ones with mushrooms, and the over-salted guinea hen with carrots and cherry-tomato berries and mushrooms, with a sorbet with cardamom liquor palate cleanser, and then three desserts that Ken doesn't care for: a creme brulée topped with three lingonberries, a chocolate mousse under an enormous blueberry, and "Estonian cheesecake" with a red sauce and whipped cream. We collect 1100 krooni between the two of us, leaving 1315 for a balance, and having decided the 18% habermaks is a tip (though our girl downstairs says it's a TAX, and NOT a tip "and you can go back and give him his tip"), my credit card to 1315 is given a "tip" of 150 that he brings my card back to sign for, and we leave at 9:20, stuffed, and up to room to undress while Ken packs and I put stuff away and type this to 9:33, VERY loud motorcycles outside for the first time. We schedule a wake-up call at 6:30, bags out at 7:30, and leave at 8AM for Riga---Latvia after a 3-4-hour drive, depending on traffic and weather, maybe raining tomorrow for the first time of the trip. Decide to go to bed on a full stomach now at 9:35PM and pack tomorrow morning.
WEDNESDAY, 8/8/07: Felt discomforts of reflux through the night, getting up about 2AM to type a dream, pee, and then have to wipe up the floor extensively though I THOUGHT I took care to direct my pee into the toilet bowl. Not pleasant. Wake again at 6:24AM and decide to shower before the 6:30 phone call, and was barely toweling myself off at 6:32AM when Ken asks if I'm "typing or bathrooming" as the wake-up call comes. I finish typing this at 6:41, ready for total packing before breakfast. 7:01AM: Rapid orgy of packing, separating the stuff in the three drawers into 1) future papers, 2) past papers, and 3) hardware. Put the raincoat and umbrella in my shoulder bag in preparation for rain this afternoon in Latvia, [to file 2 at 7:02AM 8/8/07] and at first think that I packed my last comb in my bag, but find one on the desk with which to comb my unruly hair, not washed this morning. Will stuff toilet paper up my ass after coming back up here after breakfast. Loaded shoulder bag with stuff to read at a maybe interminable passport wait, and don't feel much like EATING at all. Had to reopen my suitcase to store my slippers and some maps from Tallinn from my shoulder bag. Now everything seems in order, Ken already down for breakfast, now at 7:05AM. Bag out and last-minute check at 7:09AM, and I get down to breakfast. 7:43AM: AT breakfast Ken reminded me that the Gloria is a HOTEL, which would be open 24 hours, so I take his 10€ and write a note and get to a restaurant door closed until noon, and a CARD-SLOT for the residence, which MY card won't open. Woman who speaks only Russian comes from a garage, and any try of mine for "Gloria Kommandant" or "Supervisor" gets nothing from her except, "Why don't you speak Russian?" So I'm back and type, and Ken comes out to ask about "Hooligan," which I don't know. Woman demands 6K from Ken as we leave for the bus, for printing the weather reports, and we get on bus that stops to get gas at 7:59AM and we're told we'll be driving over 300 km today to get to Riga. Alex sits in front, which turns out to be hot and stuffy and so is usually empty, and talks to driver, who seems sweet, in Russian. Ken and Mitch continually grill Rita about Estonia, Latvia, travel, education, labor, politics, vocabulary, pronunciation, and lots else that I try but don't succeed in ignoring. Couple is silent for the most part, except when Kirsten asks a stupid question or Dick hazards a stupid remark. She stops bus early to make sure her carry-on is really in the back, after we all checked everything twice. 9:45 we stop in Parvu for john and much-needed stretch, looking at few people in very shallow bay with lots of frontage sand, and I try and fail to find an interesting picture, even very few nice male bodies. Walk along boardwalk to end, then back. #33 Parnu beach hotel at 9:52. #34 Parnu beach (bore) at 9:54. #35 Estonia has 1000 islands, plans for a bridge and connection shaped like a man. Leave 10:09. To Latvia border at 11:09AM, woman collects all passports, looks at them and stamps them in four minutes, and hands them all back to me; I find mine and pass others back. Alex recommends BestWayToursAndSafaris for individual travel to islands East of Bali, and for his trip to location 306: East Timor. I should ask for Chi (pronounced Chee), who's good and I think is a woman. You LOSE Jugoslavia as a count if it dies, also East and West Germanies as TWO, but if you went to Montenegro when it was part of Jugoslavia, you can count it as Montenegro now. His "Number 6" rating isn't from Century Club but from another that has about 400 destinations. He seems pleased with my questions, so I'll be asking more: how much does Chi charge? Difficulties of travel alone, illnesses. Ken says he found Alex is 70. #36 Witch's Table and Ken and Rita at 1:21PM for good egged-pork lunch with potatoes, very salty, and lemonade and a good creamy, fruity cup of dessert, leaving me full. Bus leaves Raganas Kekis at 1:26. #37 Kekis (with flash through window?) at 1:28 as we turn away from it. Roll 3. Stop at Museum Reserve in Turaidas for #2 church and clouds and trees at 1:56 after sexy body on sculpture in garden in heat, depicting strength of 1.5 million Latvian folksongs at 2:03. #8 prison with flash at 2:42, after climbing tower and taking pictures and videos trying to be interested in a sort of "produced" sightseeing. Leave in bus at 2:57, stop at cave at 3:01: lots of graffiti in shallow indents and a few tanned shirtless men that I try to take sexy shots of, and climb stairs to next level to see everyone leaving and have to plow across cut-grass uneven field to catch up, risking a twisted ankle, bemoaning lack of calcium lunch-supplement. #9 cave 3:05, to bus at 3:15, tired and hot. Stop at Sigulda Castle at 3:21, #13 castle gate at 3:22. #14 Manor across valley at 3:26. Lots of video of 300 kids practicing for play tomorrow, some sexy bodies. Video went OUT and then came back ON, to my relief. Pee and to bus 3:48, Riga 47 km at 4:03, getting in direct at 5PM, some traffic jam, some ugly suburbs, and I think old town is rather decrepit and glad we're not staying there. To Hotel Radisson and room 746 at 5:07. Rest, get 50L from machine, and to bus at 6:42. #20 Peace Monument 7:01. To tacky Kalku Varti Restaurant at 7:07, disgusting salmon and potatoes and vegetables, Ken messes up two bottles of wine with five people for our 18K, and dinner goes to 8:20. #21 bus at 8:33, taking Rita home, #22 bridge (Vansu) at 8:54PM. Hotel at 9:03, FINALLY finish difficult last Sun puzzle, Ken not sleeping until his pill takes effect, and bed at 10:15, Ken's alarm set for 6:45.
THURSDAY, 8/9/07: I pee and record dream early, then incredible ZolnerBlog idea at 2:27AM: Finished typing a dream and tried to get back to sleep, but an incredible series of tasks took hold of my imagination: 1) Keep a list of ZolnerZone correspondents that I update on files being added to the site. 2) Set up a ZolnerBlog that PEOPLE can add their favorites to, and talk about the site to other enthusiasts. 3) Set up a ZolnerProof file in which VOLUNTEERS could submit Word 2007-edited/change-added/what IS that facility called [tracking?] to assist Marj in her proofreading a hundred-fold. 4) Set up a ZolnerPublicity site that would encourage others to participate in all the previous sites with their TRACKING (the term for which I was searching previously), and write memos MYSELF to add to the history, as Marj and Tris would, to start a MULTI-PERSON task of making ZolnerZone even RICHER than before. 5) And I should start transmitting unedited TRAVEL to Tris, since these ALREADY don't have title-pages, only dates, and can be submitted for proofing by people who might have BEEN there. 6) PRESSURES on me to produce more for the site and get more to PROOF the stuff on the site as I add it ALL VERY QUICKLY. Type, stoned, now at 2:33AM. I can't stay in bed after 6:24AM, shit a small shit, put powder on crotch, put on deodorant, comb hair, clean shoes, and finally his alarm goes at 6:45, I open windows and type from 6:46, finishing now at 7:13 for breakfast. Suggest we avoid Alex and Mitch, since their plates seem to take up all four spaces, but vaguely wonder they might think we're avoiding them. Wonderful buffet, though Ken says the omelet man is "new" because he only uses one pan at a time, necessitating a lengthy wait, so I have a small spoon of scrambled eggs as usual, a nice serving of Singapore noodles, grapefruit juice, an absolutely perfect in sweetness and chocolate-ness and appearance with a mound of whipped cream on top tall cup of hot chocolate that doesn't need cooling. Lots of pithy orange and grapefruit, but wonderful small tangy cherries and well-aged brie and good local cheese a little like Muenster. Ken asks me for orange juice and cherries, since I finish ahead of him, and he rather agrees that what we've seen of Riga so far doesn't compare favorably with the advanced development in Estonia and Tallinn. But, as he says, we haven't seen much of Riga yet. We compare our appreciation of the scant nice male physiques. Back up at 7:54AM and he makes a noisy shit while we stare out at the perfectly blue sky and appearance of no immediate danger of any of the predicted thunderstorms. I can't think of anything useful to say, except that we both agreed the couple has very little of interest to say, and "How could we be the only two to have seen Invasion of the Body Snatchers?" Told Ken I'm taking an umbrella but NOT a raincoat, even though we're going to be out all day. Stop typing at 8:02, maybe to go down and sit in the lobby, but I walk out to an artificial spit labeled A-B dambis on the map 8:08-8:22. Bus goes 8:29, off bus 8:43. #23 fountain, garden, opera house 8:48. Then videocam goes OFF again as I try to photo guards at Peace Memorial #25 park 9:10. Parks and walls from 10AM. #27 9:44, St. Jacob's Catholic Cathedral and bell on side for warning, finally dropped into river. #28 Lutheran Dome tower 10:06. Tired already. To Riga History Museum 10:12. Exhausting Museum to 10:53. To Occupation Museum 11:06. Misery to 11:57 with tall, thin guide who stalks off when he's finished and totally ignores us when he passes us by chance on the street later, and it turns out Rita didn't tip him. #29 cat house, non-guild member's revenge. Lunch at Restaurant Livonia: peach juice, carrot soup, chicken and potatoes and carrots. Then pink jello cake and we leave quickly to elevator up St. Peter's tower at 1PM to get back to bus on time. Up to wait at 1:10, and woman with kid butts in line and forces Ken and Alex to wait for next elevator to top, from which they climb higher and I don't even see steps, taking lots of photos. Down 1:25. To end roll 3. 1:34 put in roll 4. Ken shops to 1:45. back to Occupation Museum 1:50 in sun, tired. Bus goes 1:52, off at market 2PM. Roll 4: #1 market and tower 2:03. "Audio-visual teknick" has nothing for my broken Sony, but Kirsten has an address of 46 Brivibas for Sony, which Rita says I'll be near sometime. Hot and bored and back to bus 2:20. Share chocolate-covered fruit from Mitch from market, then bus goes at 2:22, to chocolate SHOP in Berg Hotel 2:39. Leave chocolate shop after strawberry, black bread, light nut, cannabis, and chocolate sprinkles with great hot chocolate at 3:02 for BOAT. To bus at 3:09, to boat 3:19, #4 part of new 3 km bridge 3:52. #7 FULL bridge 4:03. #10 THREE towers (?) at 4:15. Boat 3:33-4:33, to bus 4:36. To hotel 4:55. Stop to see Alex's view. Leave room 5:45, but car-shuttle to city is full. Walk bridge. #16-17 house of Blackheads and Dome with crotch 6:10. Chat with Latvian couple. #18-19 from Dome Square 6:25. Wait in museum to 6:50, concert 7:07-8:50, Ken driven wild about missed Gutenburgs Restaurant at 8PM, but we're in with live music, loud crowd, he has three appetizers: gazpacho, shrimp, and tuna sandwich while I have strawberry soup and ice cream with Sancerre then pork chop with potatoes and vegetables to 10:24, lights on church and flight of WHITE birds, then walk bridge to hotel 10:53, start typing 11:10 when Ken wants to read, and I finish with sheet over me, listening to possible fireworks outside, to 11:31, wake-up call for 7AM!! Bed at 11:35, fall asleep quickly enough.
FRIDAY, 8/10/07: 5:07AM: Wake with dream and start typing at 5:09AM. Shit a bit and type to 5:15AM, nose running a bit in the cold. Phone rings at 7:01AM and Ken's finished in the bathroom, so I take a quick shower, deodorant swipe, powder swatch, and start typing my dream at 7:16AM. Ken leaves for breakfast as I finish typing dream at 7:18AM. I follow him down at 7:20 and he's eating with Alex and Mitch, who go through the whole meal pointing out how old-fashioned I am, and Mitch, probably in jest, is now also sending me his old iMac, which he never uses and INSISTS is impervious to ANY computer virus, which I find hard to believe. We chat nicely to 7:50, complaining that my hot chocolate isn't topped with whipped cream and that I have the NERVE of wearing slippers to breakfast. Have little but STILL feel full, while others get multiple plates. Back up and finish this at 7:57AM, a half-hour to kill before the bus. Do sudoku, pee, and leave room at 8:24AM for bus. Bus goes 8:29AM. Off bus 8:35. #20 Dome organ 9:32 after great organ music 9:05-9:30. To bus 9:51 after walking old streets and buildings. Off bus 9:48. #22 Art building at 10:01, architect Eizestein. Buy Riga book for 5.5L and see it later for 7L. Pay Rita 1L for peach yesterday lunch. #24 Alberta Street built in 1901 at 10:32. #25 Alberta facade 10:38. In bus 10:45 after GREAT streets and lots of redoing and reselling. Off bus at Open-Air Museum 11:14, more traffic outside center of town than inside. #26 church from Kurland, painted by manor-owner for peasants, 11:30. #27 rotating windmill 11:44. House talk about fish and nets and lampreys versus eels to 12:10. To john to shit and stuff paper. To bus 12:17, TIRED. To lunch at enormous place (have guide) 12:55. Look downstairs (grim) and upstairs (posh) and sit in middle with Kvass (barley?) and "Gourmet's Delight" (chopped chicken and mushrooms and nuts and great cream sauce), and apple tart with rhubarb coulis all for 2.6L, great bargain, and even the kid stopped screaming when I sat down to eat. Ken complained about little time for our stay, but we still had a half-hour left at end. Watched bungee jumpers and other kiddy-amusements while looking for Alex, who was in the bus the whole time. Lunch to 1:47 and on bus 2:03, still stiflingly hot. Off bus 2:15 at Art Museum, up long stairs to awful pictorial hundred-year-old faded-looking art, no bodies whatsoever, the only "bright" spot a couple dozen by Roerich, who lived here before moving to Kulu, and his son took care of them here until 1993 or so. Leave 2:45 after watching odd cartoon on Death courting a just-married maiden with cobalt-blue eyes. On bus 2:48, and off bus 2:56 at Opera to wait outside, into Opera 3:01, #29 Opera chandelier: 1050 kg and 100 bulbs, at 3:04, taking picture #30 from balcony at 3:20. Champagne from Riga in salon, leave 3:42. To bus 3:44. [Luggage out 8, leave 8:30.] To hotel 3:55PM, undress and pee to 4:02 and lie down 4:35 after trying sudoku with closing eyes, and get up 5:35 to dress and down at 5:50 for bus into town to 6:10 with cute Norse father. Walk slowly to Vincent's past numerous embassies and even looking into an 800€ rental apartment at Ken's curious request, and ask to eat in air-conditioned downstairs (when we exit, upstairs outside is totally full, downstairs barely half-full), and when they don't have beef carpaccio, and I've said I don't like seafood, order VERY tasty marinated eel with VERY raw foie gras and good sauce with frozen fruit inside foie, and lots of honey-sugar-coated pear, then they MAKE sorbet with fruit syrup, mineral water (fuss with bottled water because tap water no good, but ice cubes made with machine from tap water?), and liquid oxygen, whipped up and formed into boules very tasty. Then my pig is not so great, good sauce with vegetables, and Ken's fish is not that great, after he dismisses waiter for insisting that tagliatelle is NOT a vegetable when Ken orders it as a vegetable, and his Moet Kir Royale is only 9L, the whole bill 131L, very high for not that great. Dine to 9:35, when I convince him to walk back through park, which he does at ENORMOUS speed until I ask him to slow to FAST speed, and we're easily back and across bridge in more light than last night, to 10:20, pee, tired, undress, and write last note at 10:33, too tired to type. Sleep fairly quickly.
SATURDAY, 8/11/07: Dream, type, phone wakes at 7AM, shower to 7:20, pack and to breakfast 7:33-7:55, Ken alone with other four together, and up to type from 7:56 to 8:17, relieved to be caught up, but with LOTS in shoulder bag, for rain, which it doesn't look like NOW, but may be in Klaipeda this evening. Down at 8:22 and onto bus at 8:27. [Ken tells Reagan joke: Nancy and Ronald go to a fancy restaurant, where she orders a filet mignon and a baked potato. "And for your vegetable?" "Oh, he'll have the same." To 1736 Palace of the Duke of Kurland. Bus goes at 8:30. #33 Rundale Castle, stork on right (two, if the picture goes far enough to the right) 9:40AM. #34 exhibit 9:52. #35 welcome at 10:03. #37 public dining room 10:26. Roll 5: #1 garden 10:38. #2 spinet player 10:48. #3 dual keyboard. Latviga Black Balsam in cafe to 11:23, Ken paying 80 sentimos but letting me taste quite a bit of it. Bus leaves 11:39. SOME 10AM rain while we're in the bus, but the day is blessedly cool for the most part, not totally sunny, and not nearly as humid. Leave Latvia PRECISELY at noon, and drive into Lithuania at 12:08; at Audruvis at 12:22 for lunch. #4 and #5 1:19PM. #6 ensemble of restaurant-bridge and motel 1:24. Two wines, both bad, white and red, which I pay with Visa without tipping. Salad and venison, tasting much like liver, with good sauce, and potatoes, and nut cake with a too-small spoon and then a too-small fork. Still full. Bus leaves at 1:36, stop at Hill of Crosses 1:56, #7 1:57. Take through #13, including wedding party in two pictures, trying to get SCOPE of multiple hills with a distant white altar-mass area, and absolutely hundreds of thousands of crosses on crosses, and I make a tiny one of stones on the arm of a metal cross (which will be blown away by the first wind, as on some level I feel this whole melodramatic scene---complete with violin duo playing soupy American music---would do). Bus goes at 2:18, I doze, not really much to see, grain is wheat or rye, some storks at last (which will leave in two weeks for Morocco for the winter), and roads can go up to 140 km/hr for cars in summer, 120 in winter, but only 100 for buses. At 3:15 Klaipeda is 108 km, which she says will take an hour. Pit stop 3:58, called by Ken and enthusiastically seconded by Mitch, and everyone goes, and bus leaves at 4:07. From 4:30-4:33 Ken and I get 300 cash from machine at gas station, and we're going tonight to Kurpe (shoe) Restaurant, meeting for bus at 6:45. To Hotel Radisson SAS again, far from midtown though the map says 0 km to Centre, at 4:45, settle in to room 202, largish, at 4:54, Ken showers, I unpack to 5:27 and re-sort "past" and "future" envelopes, keeping out a schedule for the next six days, which I hope SPEED by, and he steals BOTH new pillows, so I have to shift mine from typing seat to bed. Take duvet apart and he comes out of shower and bitches and I finish typing this at 5:46, ready to join him for drink in what he calls "an attractive bar with lots of drink choices." He's not dressed yet at 5:52 when I decide to record that we have two nights in Klaipeda, two in Kaliningrad, and two in Vilnius, and then home. I even counted the meals, can't wait to get away from the couple, and even Mitch, though not yet Alex, are beginning to wear. Short trips are certainly the things of my future, even though it'll cost more per day for flight expenses, though I do hope to start using frequent-flyer miles. Ken's now dressed at 5:55 and I'm ready to go. Into car 6PM. Ken reminds me that my drink last night was maybe named Bulgari! I have a White Russian while he has a fiercely alcoholic (140 proof) Zhalaji that I sip and it's just plain burn with no taste. I'm up at 6:38 to change from my slippers to my shoes and bring down his bag. Bus goes at 6:45 to junky-looking Jazz restaurant off the main square in the old town where, afterward, there's yet again a THIRD wedding party, Rita pointing out that it IS Saturday. The bartender below sends us upstairs to a timbered room where Ken orders a dark beer, we have a bulky, herby tomato soup in large white tureens, followed by what they call beef Stroganov, but it's over potatoes, rather than noodles (as I think proper) or rice (as Ken thinks proper), though Alex assures Ken that potatoes ARE proper. The gravy is good but the loads of pickled gherkins and cucumbers and red peppers alongside are fairly disgusting. Others order red wine, and she asks if they want sweet or dry, so I ask for a glass of sweet red wine, made better with ice cubes, and when I ask for my second glass they say it's from GEORGIA. The bill is 16 Litas, a bit much, but at 2.5 times the dollar, "just" $6.40 a glass of not-bad wine. Ken's too full, so I finish his ice cream from the apple cake (which is mainly gelatin around strawberries over a pink moosh) into my green tea, which makes it pretty good with the two packets of sugar, and he remarks about my appetite as I finish Alex's ice cream and Ken's beer. Pay with cash, getting 84L back and tipping 2L, then we leave at 8:22 and Ken refuses to entertain the thought of walking back, even though we don't go off tomorrow morning with our local guide until 9AM, the latest in ages. Back to hotel about 8:35 and I put on TV to see a BBC World with Albert (?) Cruikshank about the death of the Egyptian godhoods by Christianity, the last evidence being 3XXAD in Pylae, which is where I think the Met temple comes from. Ken deigns to watch while I finish my teeth by 8:58PM, but he refuses to watch anything more, so I put my tooth-stuff away and type this until I'm caught up-to-date, not yet wanting to start sudoku more than 10 hours before our 7:30AM wake-up call, obviously leaving me lots of time for weird dreams and their recording. Relate my coming trip to Kirsten, and Ken is VAGUELY interested in setting up OUR INDIVIDUAL trip to Egypt that would include Alexandria, Aswan, and other places we may both have been, including Petra, except he keeps insisting he has no money. Then he farts VERY loudly, I ask where his matches are, he snidely replies, "I don't know," to which I respond, "Then I'll have to find them," and do, finding a booklet in his top dop kit, and burn one, and leave the box on the desk, at which point he asks what I did with the rest of the matches, and I point to them on the desk, and he says I should put them back, and I ask, "Is that the last time you'll fart this evening?" and he explodes with "For god's sake, you're so sensitive, like you never fart in front of anyone else" (do I?) and grabs them up and throws them somewhere into his dop kit. Great! Stop typing now at what I judge to be 9:15PM, but which is really 9:21PM. Ken reads, and I do sudoku from 9:28 to 10:15, finishing one game when he turns out the light and goes to sleep without saying goodnight, which annoys me, and I finally get tired enough to turn out the light at 10:15 without finishing a last one. Sleep quickly.
SUNDAY, 8/12/07: 12:54AM: Wake with dream and go pee. Can't remember a thing as I try to determine whether I shut light off at 9:21 or 10:21PM---and honestly don't remember---as I STILL don't remember dream! Stop at 12:59AM. Up at 7:20AM as Ken gets up and grumps a good morning, and check my notes to see that it was 10:15 that I went to sleep, and with maybe an hour's waking for dreams, I slept for over 8 hours for the first time in a couple nights. Ken comes out, announcing unnecessarily that the bathroom's all mine at 7:30, then says the street's wet, so it must have rained last night, and I say, "Better then," and go into the bathroom at 7:31 to shower. Tell Ken from shower, from soap that won't wash off easily, that he can go to breakfast (which is supposed to be super here) whenever he likes, but he says, "I'd like to use the bathroom first," so I get out almost wet and type this to 7:47AM. 7:55AM: Medical problems piling up: 1) after two days of using only powder on my crotch after my daily shower, the outer areas are cherry-red again, so something's clearly wrong that the hydrocortisone isn't curing; something to check with Dr. Chin. 2) A few nights ago, at Vincent's, I felt something strangely crunchy in a mouthful, and then yesterday I definitely felt that I chipped a corner or a tooth or a filling in my lower right jaw, on the throat-ward outside of the last cusp of the third-last tooth: something to check with Dr. DiMatteo. DRAT!!! Now to dress and join Ken at the trough at 8AM. Ken's book's description of great buffet was quite wrong: they didn't even offer hot chocolate! Ate with Alex and Mitch since Ken joined them, and Alex says that---now I've forgotten the name---Torcello, Pinturicchio, Palombo---PALLADIO designed the first indoor theater with the five streets, which I remember Cecilia Bartoli singing in front of on a TV special, and then they leave and I'm up to type to 8:31 and prepare to waste time before putting shoes on and going downstairs to bus. Sudoku to 8:50. Bus goes 8:57 with Emilia, older and not so great with English, with lots of strained locutions and "Umms." Off bus 9:23 in Palanga, large resort town, and start walk at 9:18 past hotel area toward Amber Museum, which only opens at 10AM, so she has lots of time to kill, with lots of stories to tell about maidens falling in love with grass snakes, and into Amber 10:06; only .4% of amber has inclusions! 7% of inclusions are spiders, 500 kinds. #15 inclusion types at 10:19. 20% SEA amber, which is self-polished. Biggest is 3.5 kg, which still floats in very salty water. #16 human forms from Neolithic period---all duplicates, since originals burnt at some invasion time---at 10:38. Leave 10:58, no book, with Emilia's recommendation to wait until shop tomorrow before hitting Kaliningrad. #17 garden of museum at 11AM. Onto bus 11:20, sunny and HUMID. Off bus 11:24 down toward beach, which features lots of very brief bathing suits but rather few nice bodies to look at. #18 sea at Palanga 11:28. Back to bus 11:40. Off bus 12:31 in Opera Square, everyone exhausted and hardly walking. On bus 12:47. Off bus 12:53 to Vivalavita restaurant on the 20th floor of the D or K building overlooking the river and the Curonian Spit across from the harbor entrance in the distance. #20 Klaipeda from 20th floor 12:58. #21 poor and sloped building 1:02. #22 front to rear: restaurant, Clock Museum sundial, main street at 1:05. #23 entrance to Klaipeda harbor 1:09. Salad and chicken and a vodka/lime drink that Rita pays for on HOT 20th floor, bored stiff by 2:35. Out 2:42. To Clock Museum 2:48, totally flaked out by 3:22: looking at everything but not really even WANTING to understand. We meet for bus to Kaliningrad at 8AM tomorrow. 3:43 back because we're exhausted, but Ken suggests bar and has two local drinks while I have a 10L glass of tasteless Avila champagne, joined by Mitch for Jewish and Polish jokes. To room 4:51, lie for a bit, then up to sudoku to 6:35, when I dress for the dinner that we walk to at Navalis Hotel restaurant, including huge salad with inedible squid but good veal in mustard sauce, a bottle of Tokai not bad for 60L, and poppy seed cake, while I tell Mitch about my favorite drug: LSD, while he gets marijuana seeds from a friend from Amsterdam. Back to hotel at 9:04, tired, Ken pays bill for our drinks for 85L, leaves a wake-up call for 6:30, and I finish this at 9:35PM, less than an hour left to get eight hours' sleep tonight. Counting days to end of trip. Bed at 9:40, no trouble getting to sleep.
MONDAY, 8/13/07: 6:21AM: Peed at 2:25AM, not being able to remember dream---or did I? Then back to sleep and wake again at 4-something and keep thinking, almost deciding to get up and type in file 6, which I decide to do now at 6:22AM, when Ken's alarm kept me thinking it was the phone, which rings NOW for some reason at 6:23AM. I type some in file 6 at 6:23AM: Lie awake this morning, depressed with the trip, wishing it were over, wondering how much of my depression might be that I haven't bought any easily available stamps here to put on postcards that I can write in the next few days and mail when we return to Vilnius after two days in Kaliningrad. Then, also, maybe buy three or four cheap amber bracelets to give to, say, Rita and Sherryl and Carolyn as thanks for their nice thoughts of me, and maybe even some nice inclusion for me to represent the trip in its positive, rather than negative, aspects: like Dick and Kirsten, whom I can barely face at any time as she makes her inane statements or questions, or when he asks for a beer and steadfastly refuses to remember any name or description that would help the waiter fulfill his relatively simple wish in any relatively simple way. Then the destinations aren't that great, or when they are in any way distinctive it's because of their awful history of vindictiveness from one or another group, killing someone for calling to a dying mule in a gulag, "Die, Stalin," or the opposite kindness of a Mitch or Alex that make me feel ungrateful that I haven't treated them as nicely as they treat me. And now at 6:28AM Ken comes out of the bathroom and perfunctorily orders "Next," that I use the bathroom, and I sit and placidly continue to type, and at 6:29AM he RETURNS to the bathroom and I hear terrible farts that will undoubtedly leave terrible stenches, which he can smell, since he now loudly blows his nose, and then he comes out at 6:30AM and I caustically remark, "And if I HAD gone in?" and he doesn't even deign a reply, coughing his terrible deep coughs that make my little coughs trivial, though worried I might wake him, but I take out an earplug to hear his regular snoring, so I obviously haven't bothered him, and he yawns and says, "It's too early," and snuffles in, and I get tired of recording moment-by-moment---as he goes yet AGAIN into the bathroom for something, and I stop typing at 6:33 determined to shower again and use the ineffectual hydrocortisone on my still-red crotch. And when Ken vacates the john for the third time, I go in to shower, but someone (probably NOT Ken, but why the maid?) left the shower head directed into the room and the [to file 3 8/13/07 at 6:52AM] partition slightly open so that the floor gets drenched with the first amount of water, and then the temperature control is anticlockwise, so I keep making it hotter when I want it to be cooler, and then even the SOAP won't wash off, but I take a long shower and hydrocortisone and deodorant up and take my stuff out as Ken announces he's going downstairs, so I should give him my card, for which I search and finally say, "If that's not my card, then where IS my card?" and he searches in his wallet and excuses himself since it IS my card, and leaves before the 7AM breakfast-room opening, as I understand it, unless it's open early this morning, since we're leaving at 8AM. I type this to 6:55, feeling vaguely pissed about everything, but determined to buy five stamps, take cards and books along to read at what may be as bad as a three-hour delay at the Kaliningrad border, and prepare otherwise to get into my day, having checked that the sky outside is still quite clear but ALSO clearly have to take my raincoat and umbrella in my shoulder bag and now start to pack at 6:57, my cap-lock key again destroying my last line of type. 7:08AM: As I almost suspected and LEFT FOR THAT REASON, letting my videocamera sit with the tape OUT results, in a day or two, with the tape having gone IN, the battery remaining completely charged, and it WORKS---of course, until the next time I try to use it and it DOESN'T work, but that means I have to add it to my ever-increasing shoulder bag load. Also note, now at 7:10, that Ken hasn't put out his bag for 7:30, so clearly "He'll be back," or there'll be some other solution, like his taking his bag down himself and getting Andrus to load it for him. Bag out at 7:14 and prepared to dress and go down and buy five stamps, then later after breakfast come up to bring down my shoulder bag. 7:48AM: Great breakfast with Mitch comparing what we'll spend money on and what we won't, stemming from my paying 2.2L for each of five 1.7L stamps, just because they're here and not at the post office. Mitch will go first class, but never give a valet $4.50 to park his car, even if he has to walk eleven blocks, as he says; even telling people he hires whom they have to work for and how they have to do things HIS way (use the unused half of a fax for another fax; he's even tempted to buy my Brother-type fax because I can rewind the carbon paper, where HE throws out the fax and buys a new one rather than spending $55 for new toner). Ken goes up in time to take his bag down, and there are six bags lined up downstairs. I put the stamps in with my postcards and finish this to 7:52, ready to go down as Ken goes. Pee and down at 7:55AM. Bus goes 8AM. TO ferry at 8:10; to SECOND line 8:14; Emilia talks CONSTANTLY. #24 ferry line 8:24AM. OTHER line goes, then bus goes AHEAD of us. COMMERCE takes priority, Emilia says. Emilia goes ON about amber to "entertain" us. "Zalgiris" (Ken's first 140-proof drink) truck leaves 8:32. We load (can't see our boat's name) 8:46! Start over at 8:50 and land 8:54. Off to highway 8:57; #25 map at 8:58. Stop at Control at 9:05 and continue at 9:07. Stop at Hill of Witches at 9:19. #26 entry to Hill of Witches 9:22. #27 Pasakorius 9:30, forest spirit. #28 Giantess who made Curonian Spit (later book bought for 10L explains ALL these stories) at 9:33. Videocamera GOES again!. #30 and 31 witches 9:50. #32 St. George and the dragon at 9:56. #33 me and Satan 9:58, taken by Ken. #34 TONGUES as love seats 10:01. #35 Ken at Gate of Hell 10:03. #37 needs bra 10:06. Roll 6: #1 fuck at 10:13. Me: "When the cock crows, the crock goes." Ken says he doesn't remember the saying Alex said that I translated much more succinctly. Pee, out at 10:30. #3 lagoon 10:34. Bus goes 10:37. To Nida 11:03. #4 amber show at 11:09. #5 Mann's house and swings at 11:23. Leave house 11:45, jammed with tourists. On bus 11:48, off bus 11:56 at lunch place. Good ice water on outside table, relieved that Emilia left as we left Lithuanian park. Rita orders me chicken, which is a blessing because Mitch tasted the fish and asked for chicken, which Rita said would take 15 minutes, so I gave him a hunk of mine. Rice and salad and ended with VERY dry cheesecake and I didn't have coffee or tea, but took #7 weathervanes on Nida coast 1:07, then went to the pee line 1:09 behind Alex and Mitch, and on bus 1:15. To Lithuania border 1:24, past 1:25. To Kaliningrad border 1:26, fill forms to 1:42, Maria meets us outside hot bus, to "Passport Control" 1:43. All people stamped by 2:09, but Andreus missing, then keeps looking for papers. Pass gate at 2:23, at last, 42 miles to Kaliningrad. Into first traffic jam in town at 3:45, grim buildings, and she enumerates 7 squares and 8 prospects, or vice versa. To large hotel on busy intersection at 3:50, take a while to check in, and in to HOT room 605 at 4:03PM while Ken waits for his bag. Put on A/C full force, but it does no good, though my HIP card substitutes for our only room key card. Unpack to 4:29, and type from then to 4:48, taking time to take off my shirt and pants because it's SO hot, and put in earplugs because Ken clears his throat AT EVERY BREATH, which drives me mad! Room for the barest essentials on bathroom shelf, though there are actually some SHELVES for my stuff in addition to closet space for clothes, and desk space for AlphaSmart with my de-duveted duvet for chair-support, with quilts stored away permanently. Ken says something and seems not to remark that I didn't hear him. Decide now at 4:50 to go and get some rubles downstairs. Down at 4:54. EVERYONE's bitching about heat, and the couple gets an unusable (for us) queen-size bed. Ken, incredibly, gets Natalia to give us her MANAGER'S fan for OUR OWN ROOM! I make a BIG note under my computer to remember to take my HIP card from the slot. At 5:02 I get 200 rubles, only to find from Alex that it's 25 rubles to the dollar, so I probably paid a $5 service charge to get $8 worth of rubles, but it may actually be all I need. Onto bus at 5:05; hotel built in 1976; in August, 1944, 92% of the city utterly destroyed by bombing. #8 Old Cathedral, #9 new slab, building stopped because it went against the law, at 5:35. Off bus 5:30 in rain: first time many of us used our umbrellas. #10 Kant's tomb at base of old cathedral wall 5:42. #11 facade at 5:52: it will become the largest concert hall, with two organs supposedly already installed, due to open next year, but NOTHING was saved from inside the old cathedral. On bus 6:01, rain stopped. Life expectancy is 58 for men, 72 for women, with 3500+ AIDS infections. #12 main gate (flash) and #13 main gate (no flash) 6:14. #14 side of MAIN gate, 6:20, Putin-opened, in 2005 for 750th anniversary of first Koenigsburg castle started in 1255. Off bus at 6:31, and Ken DOES get fan, and it DOES go on and rotate, but HARDLY helps room. We meet tomorrow at 9AM and spend the whole day away until after dinner. Type to 6:53, wash face, and down to dinner. Everyone's sitting around until Alex decides to announce that the other three are sitting behind a pole, so we go in and luckily Alex joins Ken and me so Mitch sits in as fourth, leaving the awful couple to the two guides. At the END, the awful woman says that we have to come BACK to the hotel to break up the time tomorrow, which, maybe, may not be such a bad idea after all. Meatballs aren't quite as good as the "Gourmet Delight" from the huge lunch place, but the starting salad was good and the 550R South African Chardonnay (served because it was the only cold wine) was not THAT bad for $22. We have lots of laughs and I get up to type this at 8:32, thinking to take a cold bath before going to bed in this incredibly uncomfortable room. But Ken uses bathroom, I start sudoku, and at the astounding hour of 9PM Ken announces he's about ready for bed. I finish a puzzle at 9:04, type this to 9:06, and wonder what could be wrong with going to bed so early? Despite a full stomach? And a tacky body thinking of going to sleep under a fan, probably with open windows? And tomorrow not starting until 9AM? Maybe type more in file 6 at some ungodly hour this coming morning? Give him his way? I AM tired. Maybe start another sudoku now at 9:08 until he terminally bitches---and at this moment do I hear a snore from him in bed on his back, naked with only his glasses on? 9:25PM: Had it: to bed! He doesn't move as I get into a warm bed, push aside all covers, and enjoy the play of the fan over my warm body. Fall asleep relatively quickly despite the early hour.
TUESDAY, 8/14/07: 12:55AM: Wake with a vague dream and pee to transcribe it. Finish a section of file 6 by 1:17AM, hot and sweaty on the toilet. 2:28AM: not able to fall back to sleep, incomplete early tries at Actualism not working, I take Ambien, I record, until I search dop kit and find none, then get out bags and find only Paul's noctamide, which I take one of, not knowing what the results will be. Seem to remain awake at least a half an hour. 6:53AM: Wake with vague dream and urge to shit, so shit and type. Type to 6:57, wondering where I'll find a match, then Ken asks, "Are you typing or using the bathroom," and I respond calmly, "Using the bathroom," and finish a copious, dirty, smelly shit, and exit saying, "I've run out of matches," and he gives his silent, dopey shrug and goes in, and I decide he'll be undoubtedly staying up, so I decide to finish this to 7:09, definitely still needing to pee. He comes out, I shower and bring down another rack, and he insists on going to breakfast early. We sit with the guys, who offer us a frozen bottle of water from their fridge, and I come up at 8:25 to watch TV and brush my teeth, and now at 8:43 Ken can't find his hat and has ordered me down to get 1000 rubles. [TELL KEN TO OPEN SPIDER IN GLASS CASE.] Bus goes 9AM after I get 500R more. To Yatarniy, amber excavated from mines inaccessible from main road. #15 Cathedral domes (on bus) 9:07. #16 Five storks' nests 9:32. 9:42 stop for storks in field, and my video DOESN'T work. #18 storks. Then disk goes IN and camera WORKS. 10:05 out at amber factory. #19 amber grind 10:13. Buy TWO insects for 300R, $12, at 10:36. Then necklace for 225R, or $9, because I can't resist the idea of putting it around the base of my ebony head, at 10:49. Onto bus 11AM. #22 Baltic (relatively 4 parts/million salt versus Atlantic's 43 parts/million salt), and Anna mine, now unused because of cave-ins 11:07. Amber HEATED to 160° darkens and hardens it. Mine was so cheap because it was so light and of such small pieces. Off bus 11:35 (due back 12:45) in Svetlogorsk for #24 beach-hotel and elevator 11:40. After eating 20R bilash (meat patty) at the greedy insistence of Alex and Mitch, we walk down to beach past obtrusive hotel, get to boardwalk, and take #25 whole-beach at noon. #26 largest (10 meters) sundial in Europe at 12:11. Elevator turns out to be broken, so we walk back across entire beach, Ken getting 100R from me so he can buy a spider pin; to funicular at 12:34. Onto bus (starting to tire) 12:42. Lunch in Hotel Russ dark dining room on hot cabbage borscht and FILET when they can't decide how many besides me don't want fish, and lovely ice cream for dessert, and I borrow 60R from Mitch for my 120R Pauliner beer, perfect with the meal. 1:05PM: Found Alex with his hands folded in prayer, and he said, "I can't wait for the four days left of the trip to end." I had asked Ken how he thought the trip was going, and he thought the places were interesting. Alex was asking, "Why am I here?" in Kaliningrad, where he knew nothing significant had been done since he was here in the 70s while the Kremlin debated whether Koenigsberg was actually THEIRS and worth pouring money into its development, so it was basically still a ruined city. Mitch had agreed with me that one of the problems was that each of the countries was so similar it was difficult to remember what happened when and where to differentiate one from the other, and most of yesterday I was terribly depressed by Maria's relentless sequences of "A invaded B, but then C collapsed and A left, but B killed 30,000 men in this one battle, recreated each year, even though it really hasn't been decided who the real winner was." Swedes and Poles and Russians and Prussians and Catholics and Lutherans battled and persecuted and killed and declared war, and nothing of the LAND was really changed except for some map boundaries and bomb-destroyed cities with major cathedrals reduced to ruined walls almost incapable of reconstruction, while rebuilding efforts were plagued by cheating that caused expensive projects to be halted, leaving incomplete "Monsters" on the horizon to succumb to the elements to the point where it was difficult to decide whether to proceed or just tear down what's been done and start over with something distinctly better and more useful. And still the lists of dead soldiers, destroyed families, ruined dynasties, impoverished moving populations, attempted resettlements, and starting desperately over again with little money and less international support to produce a new prosperity for people with nothing left to invest or hope for. And now only Tuesday to finish, Wednesday and Thursday to go through, and Friday to return gratefully home. Lunch to 2:06. Putin was a SAMBO wrestler, a master, explaining his good body, while his wife came from Kaliningrad, which meant he visits his mother-in-law here often. At lunch Alexander Goshansky (818)343-4656, agmg37@gmail.com writes out a slip for me, after I give him my e-mail address, noting here that Mitch wants BOTH my website address AND James Beard's connection. #28 Ken and me in Russ big red chair, taken by Rita at 2:19. To hotel to pee at 3:40, then camera's CLOSED now, hopefully ready for the folkloric show tonight at dinner. Bus goes 3:57, to bunker 4:10-4:30, not willing to pay 100R for photos of dioramas of wreckage from 1945, and quick look at more carnage, death, and stupid militarism. #30 MOVING view of 19th Century Dohna Tower at 4:36 near the Brandenburg Gate, site of the Amber Museum, which Mitch and Alex avoid, and Ken and I look at great stuff, no decent English book available, to bus 5:03, flagging, and to room at 5:13 after checking that hotel bookshop sells no good books, either. Finish this at 5:41, needing to go down for bus at 6:30, elevators seeming to be working again from morning when they walked down to be met by me elevatoring up two floors then down all eight at once. Sitting in shorts in blowing flag, still hot out and not a TRACE of rain today, and hoping videocamera will work at dinner tonight, not being driven by Andreus because "if he drives 10 straight days they won't let him across the Lithuania border tomorrow." Look over the itinerary for the next two (LAST!) days and put stuff away at 5:47. Sudoku to 6:16, when I wash my face to get away from Ken's clearing his throat, and get dressed at 6:19 to leave for dinner at 6:25. Into SMALL 8-passenger bus at 6:30, arrive 6:52. Dine to 8, deciding not to get ANY wine, since I sit on the side to avoid obstructions in videotaping, AND I have no rubles, AND there's nothing in particular I want to drink. Odd mushroom salad to start that I eat half of, then Mitch and I have potatoes and chicken while the rest have potatoes and codfish. Then comes a cake for dessert about 8, then five players come in: a contrabass balalaika, a prime balalaika, a harmonium (if that's an accordion with buttons), a woman who plays a zither, a ram's horn, and a flute, and a singer who plays various percussion instruments and instructs and dances with everyone. I, miraculously, tape the ENTIRE fifty-five minutes, not wanting to stop for fear I'd never start again. They finally leave, everyone finally pays for their drinks and takes their pee, and into bus at 9:11 and back to hotel at 9:31 and up to room by 9:35 and I shit and type this, but then decide I just have to break in new earplugs, deciding, at least not yet, to take a noctamide. The new plugs feel VERY cottony, but I'll just have to try them tonight. Ken's set his alarm for 6:30, since we can't start breakfast before 7:30, bringing our own luggage down at the end, and I finish this at 10PM, latest in a bit, hoping to get a solid night's sleep in the last night of Kaliningrad heat. And DO get to sleep easily.
WEDNESDAY, 8/15/07: Wake twice and write dreams and both times adjust the fan so I get MORE of the stream. Ken wakes me at 6:35 and I look for my only empty bottle of shampoo and borrow some from him but can only take off one top. I ask him to open it for me and he fusses with it: "Dios mio, what did you do with it?" and fusses with it and hands it back to me exactly the same way! "What did you DO?" I ask. "Didn't you watch me? I opened it and then I closed it." "Very intelligent, thank you very much," I respond. Shower nicely until 6:52, then pack, re-unlocking the bag three times to put in 1) dop kit and pills, 2) slippers, 3) second sudoku book, and leave it OPEN so I'll be sure to add nothing else. About to dress in steamy room, when I decide to do this first to 7:17AM. Finish up by 7:22PM and pack this. 7:56AM: Of course the dining room doesn't open until the DOT of 7:30, a Casino guard startling me with his stony face at the dark door as I turn around from the still-closed dining room at 7:29AM. Sit with Alex and Mitch, who is perversely insisting that we leave ten minutes late, though Rita clearly wants us to leave as soon as possible to avoid what she thinks will be heavy traffic even going OUT of town at the AM rush. I finish this after Ken comes up at 7:57, use the bathroom in various ways, and I have ALL of our yellow cards, which I fantasize I can sell back when someone says we absolutely have to produce them. Rita says it'll be even hotter today than yesterday! Incredible! Stop now at 8AM, ready for the elevator. Couple arrives ONLY at 8:15, when we leave. 72 miles to Lithuania. #30 Simpsons movie going up 8:18. Russians reached Paris in WWI, said they wanted food FAST: "bistro," so they became Parisian bistros. 9:24 Sovetsk STILL 37 km away. We drive steady 80 kph, 70 kph in urban areas, 40 kph in towns. Stop for gas and Ken's vodka and pee to 10:06. To line at Kaliningrad border at 10:16. Maria says goodbye; we stop in wrong line? Three guides go to talk. To truck booth at 10:20, Maria gone. Andreus's back, bus goes through at 10:31. To Passport line individually at 10:34. Then to duty-free shop, give Mitch 2.6€ for his lent 60R yesterday, for M&Ms that he shares with everyone, though he says he still owes me. Across borderline bridge over Nenunas River, #31, at 10:48. Lithuania takes passports 10:53. Passports back 10:57. Clouds to sun by 11:40. Stop for pee and look-around 11:50-11:57. To Kaunas by 1:08 to Avilys (beehive) basement restaurant at 1:17. Too much food of salad and smoked beef and mushy vegetables and good dark beer (4L for small, 8L for large, Ken pays for, causing accounting problem) to 2:14. To bus 2:20, NOT that hot. Kaunas was CAPITAL of Lithuania 1920-1940 (as Vilno). #32 Kaunas from above at 2:32, with working video also. #33 map as we leave at 2:45. WE were on Prussian side, looking over Russia. #34 16th Century "House of Thundergod" which is now on hill that I didn't take a picture of. #35 on Main Square, 3:03, first town hall, 16th Century-19th Century built, "White Swan" symbol of city. #37 Castle wall and dry moat at 3:47. Roll 7 (?) #1 tower to #4 walls and tower by 3:54. #5 Russian, new Catholic church and #6 fountain and bridge over Nenunas marked #6 on map at 4:10. #8 three sculptures (I hope) in square. #9 Greek church on hill. 12-15 thousand years ago, at end of last ice age, Indians speaking (not writing) Sanskrit came all the way to the Baltics, which formed basis of INDO-European language group. It was PRESERVED because it was only ORAL, not written. In 1009 first WRITTEN notation of Lithuania and Lithuanians, as self-referred by residents to missionaries, so they're preparing for their millennium in 2009. Vilnius was FIRST capital in 1323. Emilia talks to 4:41, then privately so as "to let others nap." Stop for pee at 4:53 to find no john at the gas station. Wonderful rolling countryside, scattered clouds, soaring hawks, good four-lane divided highway, no great traffic. Pee stop 5-5:04 a kilometer off highway at a Conference Center that Rita called an "old Manor House." Enter town of Vilnius 5:39. 5:52 stop at Radisson. Up awkward way to room 334, unpack, Ken showers, and I type from 6:24-6:45, now, and suggest we go for walk. He says no, I dress and decide to go straight north (according to the map), past City Hall, down the avenue to an east-pointed sign to a church, in a large circle back to the main square with the cathedral with the tower facing and watch kids skateboarding, doing wheelies on bicycles, and mostly wasting time, mostly feeling sorry for myself, start back at 7:27, buy three postcards for 3.9L, to hotel 7:42, meeting everyone, Ken WALKED for a half-hour and found no postcards, and Kirsten's bitching. I go sit outside and we leave 7:49 to walk south to #10 and #11 of balloons over city, to Medininkai at 7:56, for pea soup, ground chicken in a dough-coating, ice cream for dessert, and a $56 bottle of Gewirtztraminer that was pretty good, and MAYBE set up a possible trip to Azerbaijan, Armenia, and somewhere else with Alex, if he can get rid of Mitch, which he seemed inclined to do. Leave and get back at 9:22 to get a call from Rita: Kirsten picked up my bag from the restaurant! Go down, thank her profusely, find the spare card for the door-slot for Ken, and do this to 9:44, totally worn out. Get to bed at 9:56, after he figures out what restaurant we'll try for lunch tomorrow, and he's surprised I'm going to sleep so early, but in my notes I write "Go to bed at 9:52, catatonic." Follow this by "Send South America itinerary to Alex." Open my eyes under my facemask a few times to see that his light's still on, but then seem to fall asleep quickly.
THURSDAY, 8/16/07: 12:53AM: Finish typing my dreams and type this while finishing peeing, light from bathroom ever-bright under my mask. 3:05AM: Finish transcribing dream clearly connected with my concern about doing things when I get back to NYC in about FIFTY HOURS! 6:08AM: Wake with a depressing dream, check my watch, and decide it must be transcribed. Finish doing that by 6:20. Squeeze out a shit by 6:26 and decide to take a Valium and lie back down until Ken wakes up so I can write my five postcards and start the last full day of this vacation. Ken's into the bathroom at 6:42, so I get up, open the drapes, and get my postcards together. Hunt and HUNT for my address list, finally finding it, and Ken leaves for breakfast at 7:07AM, assuring me we're not leaving until 8:30AM. I start writing cards at 7:09. Finish at 7:24 and start shower. Shower to 7:43, seemingly slower and slower. Down to breakfast 7:48, not taking bag yet. Back from breakfast 8:20 with lots of brochures on Vilnius: more papers! Brush teeth. Down at 8:25AM. Church of Three Saints to 9:01. #12 Black Madonna of Vilnius 9:07. #13 (flash of above) 9:10. #14 Atmosphere 9:15. To bus 9:16. #15 Orthodox Church 9:30. #16 towers 9:38. To Sts. Peter and Paul 9:47. #17 9:49. #20 crystal "boat of life." #21 organ 10:03. 10L for book at 10:10, 2000 human sculptures. #22 tower 10:20. #23 telephone pole 10:21. #25 lower church 10:26. #26 phonies on poster 10:33. Everyone (but me) pees 10:44. Bookshop to 10:54. St. John's church in Vilnius University 11:05. #27 Tree of Christ 11:13. #28 500-year-old St. Anne Church 11:33. 33 forms of bricks plus new forms = 65 kinds of bricks. #29 crown across from hotel, TV tower 330 meters, restaurant 165 meters up, rotating, "Not good view." #30 to right 11:43. Off bus at hotel 11:51. To Zemaiciai Restaurant, downstairs of course, at 12:03. Clean ass in john. Mushroom soup is all chanterelles, meat pie comes at 12:32, and we leave at 12:49, full. To hotel 12:55, no one there yet. On bus 1:02, into Trakai 1:35, off bus 1:39. #31 carving 1:46 (4L for camera use). #34-35 castle at 1:55. Roll 8, #1 castle 2:07. #2 ceramic tiles 2:11. 27 hoards of 27,000 coins found and in museum! Video them. #6 yacht wedding 2:36. Away from castle 2:45. #10 towers 2:48. To Karaime Museum to 2:58. #11 Three-window Karaime houses. #12 house and castle 3:03 Kirsten goes to BUY. On bus 3:06, hot and tired. [Meet for concert then dinner at 5:45 this evening.] Bus goes at 3:08, back to hotel 3:44. Ken wants drinks to 4:30, I having two LOVELY gin and tonics. To church to video and RESCUE video from being off in St. Kazimiero to 4:41. To room at 4:45, brush teeth, took Valium this morning at 6:30AM, so 8 hours would be 2:30PM, so I take another at 4:55PM, behind time. Ken enters as I'm doing teeth to 5:22, and then finish this to 5:36, having to dress for evening in less than ten minutes! Save newpaperss for reading later. We leave 9:15AM tomorrow morning. Down at 5:48, LAST. Walk to Ciurlionis's exhibit at 6:08, look at a lot of his fuzzy mystical paintings, then get a flutist and pianist playing such music that I ask at the end if he was by any chance influenced by Gurdjieff, of whom they hadn't heard. I recorded much of it, but it wasn't terribly interesting, and when they got into a recorded symphonic piece I went around videoing some of his artwork, which didn't quite work with the music, but there it was. Oh, had the advantage of TWO glasses of champagne as a welcome drink to make me feel good. So far the score for the day was a small dark beer at lunch, two gin and tonics at the bar, and two glasses of champagne even before dinner. That lasted until 6:45, when everyone ignored their sales pitch for his CDs, and we went to Stikliai Tavern at 6:50, not even underground, with salad, three biggish veal chops, lots of vegetables and potatoes with lots of butter, and a trio of small harmonium, guitar, and percussion that my video DOESN'T work for, though they were sort of fun. Fill up, Ken has an after-dinner drink that he likes, we have beers after our first glass of white wine, and leave at 8:45 so Ken can race to Remi before it closes to find an 11.90L bottle of Suktini, or something like that, and I find it VERY hard to climb the stairs to the street to get back to the hotel at 8:55, to pee, and type from 9:05-9:16, really tired, though we don't have to go to breakfast (with the couple, since Alex and Mitch are leaving at 3AM for an early flight to Moscow) at 8AM for a 9:15 departure. Ken scurries around finding his electronic ticket while I just type away, knowing that at the NEXT sunset I'll be in my APARTMENT! Had dumped all my stuff from the bed back into the closet, Mitch being the only one to mention that I "cleaned up pretty well" by wearing, for the first and only time, my white shirt and khaki pants, saving my black pants and long-sleeved blue shirt for the flight back, which might take place at almost any temperature. VERY tired now at 9:20, ready to take my night pills with water and a noctamide and simply go to BED. Collapse to bed 9:30PM. Almost instantly to sleep.
FRIDAY, 8/17/07: 4:14AM: Wake with only memories of dreams so vague there's nothing to transcribe. Look at watch and marvel that noctamide gave me almost six and three-quarters hours' sleep! Pee, feeling somewhat foggy, but relieved the morning is so far along, with wake-up call coming at 7:30AM. Take Valium at 4:30 "just to be sure." Get right [panic on 8/23 at 10AM when I transfer files, because I can't figure why this stops HERE, but then find that I'd started file FOUR!] [start file 4 8/17/08: 7:36AM] back to sleep, though I remember sessions of sweet silent thought, and then wake about 6:30 and start fretting a bit, then get up at 7:10 to shower, hearing the phone ring right at the end, and hydrocortisone and deodorant up and comb my hair, and am amazed that Ken leaves the TV music on, to which, of course, he merely dumbly shrugs when I comment on his leaving it on, so I also leave it on as I catch up with this at 7:39AM, long day ahead, but before the sun sets I'll be HOME!! 7:59AM: Well into packing and find that I have the EIGHTH roll of film in my camera now. Ken goes down to breakfast. Take another Valium at 8:08AM; basically, I just don't give a shit: I just want to get home. Down to breakfast at 8:11AM. Small breakfast with Ken and Rita, who's coming to the airport with us, despite Ken's prominent "Rita" envelope displayed in his chest pocket, and Kirsten joins us at the last and we shake hands, as I do with Dick as I leave and come upstairs, dazed, to type this to 8:39, ready for final packing. Pack all away except Rita's envelope by 8:52AM. I have 20L Latvian, which Ken says is $40 US, added to 100 Lithuanian, which Ken says is ALSO $40 US, to which I add $50 US for a total of $130US, which is what he gave her. Hope this is all OK. IT's now 9AM and I have nothing left but a last possible shit when Ken gets out of the bathroom. Do that and leave room at 9:07, check out, and car is already THERE for Rita and Ken and me. Into car 9:12. To airport 9:30. No desk OPEN yet for 11:30 flight. Rain and VERY cloudy. No desk means a delay? Into line at 9:38, but something's wrong with the computer or the clerk, because her partner has to come over every other minute to help her out. Three people processed in the other line while I wait, finally getting off line at 10:03. Through passport line 10:15. To 10:19 through luggage check. Asti Spumanti is 9.1€ here, MORE than in Brooklyn because the dollar is so weak against the Euro? Sit and stew at 10:19. Through gate at 10:55, announced boarding time, after saying goodbye to Rita, who sits with us toward the end, for the last time. Crowded bus, rain stopped for the moment, clouds gray. Board 11:06, ON wing, ALL engine AHEAD! One-hour flight. Taxi at 11:24, off at 11:31, into clouds 11:32. Lunch at 11:43, clouds half-clear by noon. Start down 12:07. #16 Finnish coast 12:16. Land at 12:22, only 52 minutes. Sunny. Exit from BACK at 12:30. Into terminal 12:34, sit at gate 32 at 12:39. Buy duty-free lingonberry and cloudberry liqueurs at 1:16. To inner waiting room at 1:30. Start boarding 2PM, to seat at 2:09. 8:15 flight, so home about 11PM, 4PM NYC time. Off at 2:35. #17 Tampere 2:45. THOUSANDS of islands in Gulf of Bothnia! #18 east coast of Sweden at 3:10. Finish lunch at 4:15, only one-fifth there! 5:29 maps shows that we flew NORTH of Iceland! #19 GREENLAND at 5:43. 6:08 video fuckin' STOPS! #21 closeup of Greenland at 6:09. #23 two icebergs 6:20, and more to #28, left Greenland over-flight before 6:39. 9:14 plane slows up, about 100 minutes to go. 10:01 cloudier and cloudier to south, as we turn EAST. 10:09: "We land in half an hour." 83° out. #32 at landing at 10:35. To gate at 10:45, raining lightly at 10:50. Off plane from front at 10:51, pee at 10:57, onto passport line 10:58, and through at 11:11, to baggage carousel. At 11:15 "Rain and thunderstorm prevents taking off any more luggage now!" Applause at OK announcement at 11:44 and carousel starts again at 11:49. Get mine at 11:56, Ken's comes at 12:01. On taxi line at 12:06, into cab at 12:14AM Saturday Baltic time and get home 6:10PM Friday NYC time. Note from John on table: "Your computer was whistling," and I hear sound and [just now call APC to order a new battery for $46.02] try restarting battery, but it won't start, yet both computers are still working. Check e-mail and get 20 messages to 6:25, one of them from Susan Wesending of Springer-Verlag with an index on sociology, but when I phone she's on vacation until Tuesday, and when I phone her Tuesday she's given the index to someone else. Get three phone messages: 1) Sherryl, to whom I talk 6:30-7PM because she "didn't even know I was away," and 2) Charles, who said the same thing, from 7-7:30, and leave message with 3) Carolyn, who welcomed me home. Decide to jerk off at 2:51AM Baltic time and get to bed at 9:34PM, 4:34AM Baltic time.
SATURDAY, 8/18/07: Wake to pee at 2:20AM, take a noctamide, and get up to jerk off 6:15-7:15, finding that my last box of bidis has vanished: could Paul have TAKEN it? Have breakfast and just want to play Spider until 1PM, leave word with Spartacus, leave word with Mildred (who calls back and we talk), Piri calls and talks for a half hour (no Games Group tomorrow), Carolyn calls back, and I leave word with Bill Petersen, who calls back, and I go down and pick up two weeks of New York Times and get the start of a new set this morning. Watch Woman Chases Man just to stay up, but my eyes close and I quit halfway through. Look through mail and do puzzles and get to bed totally exhausted at 8:48PM, having accomplished nothing.
SUNDAY, 8/19/07: Pee at 6:10AM and up at 6:39AM but am STILL tired. Do the 8/4 Times puzzles from 6:42-10:50AM, finishing a TV Guide puzzle to 11:47, eating some food, but finished with the Times through 8/5. Watch Ken's God's Little Acre. Finish all the mail from the trip. Spartacus has DVDs of The Prestige, with Jackman, and Thank You for Smoking, with Aaron Eckart. Ken calls, wanting to have lunch tomorrow, so I make reservations at Asiate at 12:30PM, having no luck with Kittichai, Zoe's Townhouse, and some other place. Do the rest of the Times puzzles all day, getting to bed at 10PM, exhausted.
MONDAY, 8/20/07: Pee at 3:51 and 4:20! Try Actualism, but can't get back to sleep. Up at 8:30 to start busy day. Finish Scarface, wash dishes, pick up food they sent when I called both Saturday and Sunday, and at 7:44AM start FINAL papers and puzzles. Make a do-list: 0) Watch tape with breakfast so I can give two tapes back to Ken at lunch, 1) call for prescriptions, 2) handle the Visa bill---and THEY call ME and accept my "sent check on 8/1," 3) clear up desk, 4) go to gym, 5) lunch at Asiate with Ken, 6) buy bidis, 7) Kodak produces CDs?, 8) Tris OK?, and 9) Spartacus lends me my missing August 20 New York Magazine. Do all of them and talk again to Marj to say that my "e-mail fan" is Tris's son-in-law, and finish frustration with Kodak at 5:15PM, exhausted. Watch TV 7:30-10, jerk off 10-11, loving bidis, and go to bed 11:05PM, latest yet.
TUESDAY, 8/21/07: Up at 8:45AM, having had a wonderful dream, play much much Spider and still going down in score, wasting time, becoming disgusted with myself, and get to bed at 11:30, jerking off again, playing at the peak with great pleasure, but still exhausted.
WEDNESDAY, 8/22/07: Pee at 5:45AM and can't sleep, so I'm up at 6:41 to write the letter to Eric Guy (now that I know his name) and slip it under his door after his wife leaves. Paul and a helper show up to move my furniture because I'm getting new windows on FRIDAY!! Make a list for today: 1) Sharon 5:30, 2) call for A/C, 3) pick up prescriptions I got last night from Dr. Lee for only 7 Ambien CR and for Ketaconazole for my fungal jock itch, 4) take last 4 photos of #34 my desk-top crammed with stuff, #35 my floor with 30 mail-stacks, #36 my new slide-cabinet arrangement, and #37 my stuff unpacked on the table, AT WHICH TIME Paul comes in, and I'm glad I'm dressed and had put away the rubber bands from my jerk-off the previous day. Play Spider until I remind myself to put the film into an Express Mail envelope and take that and my Tuesday Evening Hour check and my AAdvantage check to the post office, get to Sharon, and back to write up her report, then watch TV, recording the end of God's Warriors to finish tomorrow. Did not yet e-mail Mitch and Alex and put stuff away. Bed at 9:55 after tiring and nodding off watching TV.
THURSDAY, 8/23/07: Pee at 5:48, can't go back to sleep, get up at 6:55, watch stuff from TV from last night, eat breakfast and talk to Shelley and have lunch at noon, then caught up with stuff while I transcribed the AlphaSmart to the Dell, then Spartacus called and bored me, and I finish this up-to-date at 2:33PM, ready for the gym.
BALTICS TRIP SUMMARY
FRI,8/3: Gym, pack 29 pounds, off from JFK at 7:18PM, 7:13 announced flight time. Take all pills and Ambien at 9:55PM, light always bright above clouds.
SAT,8/4: Change watch to 7:56AM, seven hours ahead, nothing visible through clouds. Land in Helsinki 9:32: 7:14 flight. Walk to Esplanade, Uspenski Russian Orthodox Cathedral, "Great Church" Cathedral, South Harbor Market Square reindeer meatball lunch, then Atheneum for poor art. Dinner in Hotel Seurahuore with champagne and a Violetta, sit at Central Bus Station corner. Bed 8:30.
SUN,8/5: Wake 6:50AM to great hotel restaurant breakfast buffet. Taxi to Tallink ferry at 9:06 to depart 10:42, but video camera doesn't work! Dock in Tallinn ESTONIA 12:35PM. Check in to Hotel Savoy Boutique, pizza lunch at Pizza Grande, to St. Nicholas Church for organ concert, sit in square and tourist-watch until hotel dinner and bed about 9:45, extremely tired.
MON,8/6: Tour Alexander Nevsky Cathedral and Toompea Castle: two overlooks. Estonian Open Air Museum, lunch in Must Lammas Georgian restaurant, museum and organ in Holy Ghost Church, icebreaker Suur Toll and U-boat Lembit tours, Karl Friedrich restaurant for dinner, walk around Town Square, bed at 10:10PM.
TUE,8/7: To Lahemaa National Park and tiny museum and tower at Kasmu, resort of Vosu, walk in woods around Altja before lunch in Altja Tavern, then Sagadi Manor House, grander Palmse Manor, fruit-wine tasting, expensive Gloria dinner.
WED,8/8: Parnu Beach stretch, to LATVIA border 11:09AM. Raganas Kekis (Witches' Table) for lunch, then Museum Reserve in Turaidas for sculptures and Castle, Graffiti Cave, Sigulda Castle with kids rehearsing for a play, and Hotel Radisson in Riga at 5PM. Tacky Kalku Varti dinner, Vansu Bridge, bed at 10:15.
THU,8/9: Riga: Peace Memorial, city walls, St. Jacob's Catholic Cathedral bell on side, Lutheran Dome tower, History Museum, Occupation Museum, Restaurant Livonia lunch, St. Peter's tower, market walk, Berg Hotel Chocolate shop, Daugava River boat-tour 3:33-4:33, walk Blackheads House and Dome, Museum for concert of Monn, Boccherini, and Mendelssohn, late for Gutenburgs Restaurant.
FRI,8/10: Great Dome organ music to 9:30, walk streets, buy book in Art Nouveau Riga, Alberta Street, Open-Air Museum, Lido Recreation Center lunch, Latvian National Museum of Art for Roerich's highlights and odd cartoon, Opera House tour with champagne, Ken's "apartment," Vincent's for dinner, walk to hotel.
SAT,8/11: Rundale Castle impressive, with spinet concert, Latviga Black Balsam in cafe. Leave Latvia precisely at noon, into LITHUANIA for lunch at Audruvis, Hill of Crosses, Klaipeda at 4:45 for Radisson SAS Hotel, drinks, then walk to Kurpe (shoe) Restaurant, an upstairs dump. We argue in hotel until 10:15 sleep.
SUN,8/12: Bus to Palanga's Amber Museum in Botanical Park, then to the beach resort, to Opera Square, exhausted, and lunch in Vivalavita Restaurant on 20th floor overlooking Curonian Spit. Exhausting Clock Museum, drinks at hotel bar, then walk to Navalis Hotel Restaurant, counting days to end. Bed at 9:40, easy.
MON,8/13: Long wait for ferry, to Hill of Witches 9:22-10:30, Nida for amber show and Thomas Mann's house and lunch at beach restaurant. Enter KALININGRAD at 2:23PM. 3:50PM: non-air-conditioned Hotel Kaliningrad. Bus to Old Cathedral and tiny bit of rain, Kant's tomb, city gates. Dinner at hotel, bed early 9:25.
TUE,8/14: Bus to Yatarniy for amber and shop, Baltic for Anna mine. Svetlogorsk for beach, hotels, sundial, funicular. Hotel Russ dark lunch, then Bunker Museum, then ride small bus to countryside "ethnic dinner" with show, bed 10PM.
WED,8/15: Back to LITHUANIA over Nenunas River at 10:48AM. To Kaunas for Avilys (beehive) basement lunch and good dark beer. View down on town, then to Main Square with Perkunas House, "White Swan" Town Hall, and Castle wall and dry moat. Enter Vilnius 5:39, Radisson Hotel. I stroll town streets, walk to Medininkai dinner; I leave my bag and Kirsten returns it! Bed 9:52: catatonic!
THU,8/16: Black Madonna, Orthodox Church, Sts. Peter and Paul, Vilnius University. Zemaiciai Restaurant lunch, Trakai Castle, Karaime Museum, St. Kazimiero, Ciurlionis exhibit and music, Stikliai Tavern dinner, music trio.
FRI,8/17: To airport 9:30. Fly Vilnius 11:31AM-Helsinki 12:22PM, lunch on plane. Fly Helsinki 2:35, over Greenland, lunch, land JFK 10:35PM, home 1:10AM.