Hey there. Remember us? The two Austrians who were sooooo excited about starting a blog together and then stopped posting two weeks in? We are back! Kind of. At least I hope so.

Lena is currently traveling Thailand, having the time of her life while I am sitting in grey Estonia taking on too many responsibilities to handle and kind of freaking out. (Let's face it, I need the drama. And freaking out is worth it since I am super excited about all the projects I am working on.) In any case, Lena probably won’t be able to write anything until she is back from her travels - she has jungles to explore and beaches to lie on. I think we can forgive her. 

But I am in good old Tallinn and have a couple of stories to share from last month’s trips to Brussels and Lapland. Besides that I might have spent quite some time in the coolest coffee shops, bars and restaurants Tallinn has to offer – would explain why I am already broke at the beginning of the month – that I have to tell you about.

So I’m pretty sure we’re back for good this time. One half for now, at least. But before I start posting about all the great places to go in Tallinn I figured I should tell you how I ended up here in the first place.

Back in New Hampshire, shortly before I met Lena, I heard about another new Au Pair that just moved in with a family I knew. My host kids liked playing with this family’s children and I liked meeting new people, so we invited them over for a playdate. Because I was obsessed with baking back in the US and because sweet stuff is always a good bribe when working with kids, I made a batch of cupcakes before their visit. I remember that I was late to the playdate at my own house and that she was already in our backyard, super confused because nobody was there. Her name was Tiana. She was from Estonia. And she ate ALL the cupcakes that day.

That was probably the reason I liked her instantly. A couple of weeks later Lena and Tiana met at an Au Pair meeting. Right after the meeting Lena called me and told me that the person she liked most was “this one girl from Estonia”. And two minutes after our phone call Tiana texted me “I pretty much only liked one girl. Lena. She is from Austria as well, isn’t that funny?” Now, I don't believe in destiny, but this was a really, really cool coincidence.

Back to why I ended up in Estonia: When I first met Tiana I asked her the typical questions people up here get all the time. Which one of the Baltic countries is Estonia? Is there anything special up there? Tiana patiently answered all of them and changed my perception of the Baltic countries completely. When I had to decide on where to do my Erasmus semester two years later I really wanted to go to Australia. But since Australia didn’t want me, I had to choose a city in Europe. And Estonia was the only place that got me excited enough to apply. Almost the same thing as Australia, right?

So here I am now. In a country that has a total population of 1.3 million and that is so flat that people get excited about a 318 meters high “mountain”. It is grey, it is cold most of the time but for some reason I fell in love with it. And I’m sure you will do too over the course of the next couple of months. (Just for the record, right after I moved here, Tiana left to study in England. Not sure if it was me or the cold...)

xx Kathi

Photos taken in: Tallinn, Estonia