Coffee Helps

Probably because he had a very strong death wish, if he was in Estonia at the time.

Crossing the road is one of those little things that I’ve generally taken for granted, and it’s never caused me a great deal of difficulty. Look right, look left, look right again. The wise words of the immortal Tufty, and they’ve never let me down. However, a large part of this seems to have been dependent upon a population of non-insane drivers. Crossing the road in Estonia fills me with dread on so many levels, and now my road-crossing endeavours consist of something like this:

• Find designated pedestrian crossing point.     
• Look right.
• Upon seeing no traffic, recall yet again that they drive on the other side of the road here.
• Look left.
• Recoil in horror as maniac driver flies past at twice the speed of light.
• Breathe deeply, unintentionally flattened against lamppost or wall in instinctive act of self defence.
• Tentatively step out on to crossing, seeing next approaching vehicle some considerable distance away.
• A few seconds later, begin to panic as said vehicle continues to approach rather speedily, showing no signs of slowing down to account for the fact that you are in its path.
• Begin to run. Screaming is optional at this point. Although maniac driver cannot hear you, sometimes it’s good to express your feelings.
• Gulp shakily as maniac driver skids to a dramatic halt at crossing.
• Try to complete journey to centre of road in most dignified manner possible, despite ghostly-white complexion and trembling hands.
• Repeat entire terrifying process from centre of road to other side, remembering to adjust ‘look left’ to ‘look right’.

That’s not even mentioning the bizarre, complicated road junctions where it is utterly impossible to tell where traffic might come from, or where the traffic in question intends to go, and indeed when it might conceivably be even vaguely ’safe’ to cross.

And I can’t even begin to express my horrified amusement (or amused horror – I can’t quite decide which) concerning the rather poorly planned tram stop near here, where the trams just stop where they are (i.e. on the tram line, in the centre of the road, between the lanes of traffic) and throw you out, trundling off again and leaving you to either (a) duck and dodge your way through a stream of cars driven by apparently very impatient people, or (b) erm, die.

Mind you, at least it’s not snowing. I don’t think my nerves would survive a winter road-crossing experience.