Sunday, May 18, 2014

A Giant Block Party

My second weekend in Tallinn happened to coincide with Kalamaja Päevad or Kalamaja Days.  Kalamaja is a neighborhood in northern Tallinn. Everyone at work calls it a hipster neighborhood. It's a cute area with these old wooden buildings, some painted in bright, candy colors. Anyway, there was a festival-flea market feel on Saturday.  I got some lunch there and listen to Marten Kuningas. It was warm and sunny and a great way to spend some of the afternoon (before I had to go into work). Marten Kuningas (I'm not sure if I should refer to it as band, since I think that's the lead singer's name) lost power during the last song. It was kind of funny, but it was enjoyable to see them try and power (or is it acoustic) on. There was a guy standing by the stage, I don't know if he was just random old guy or their manager, but he was air guitar-ing and air drumming through the entire set. It was funny.

On Sunday, people opened up their homes, really their backyards and sold food. It was like a giant scanvenger hunt, complete with a map.

There was BBQ, burgers, quail, quiches, cakes and cookies galore. It was a lot of fun and a nice opportunity to see some cute backyards.




It was fun to see all the people that were out and about for this event.  I even got to break out my Estonian to ask for food. Although, if there was something I was unsure of, most people understood English.  My favorite was one of the houses that was selling baked good. Instead of opening up the backyard, they opened up a window. It was a walk-up window (there were two wooden slats you had to step up to to give the money and get the goods) selling brownies, lemon bars and chocolate cake, among other things!


No comments: