I had a very late night out, and probably a touch too much to drink. Sorry to all those people who received festive text messages but that’s just how I am. We had driven further south in Finland to a student town called Jyvaskyla. I was up for a night out seeing as I had behaved myself much too much on the tour. A large group of us made our way into town after dinner. First we went to a place that was in the midst of a lovely happy hour. I had become quite attached to pear cider and decided to sample their wares at these bargain prices. Next was an “Irish” pub. Pear cider again (a lot pricier too!) but they did have lovely restrooms. Finally we went on to a nightclub. The music was pretty dreadful, but at least most of it was in English. It wasn’t really all that busy for a Thursday but I suppose there were a lot of places in the centre of town so maybe everyone was a bit more spread out. Drinks were very cheap here too (one euro!) some sort of student type thing I suppose. Needless to say I sampled some of their wares that I wouldn’t normally wish to try. (A word of advice – do not drink a black cat shot- its aniseed and yuck – if you do make sure you have a beer or cider chaser! Pear cider makes everything go down better!). At this stage I needed to pee again and off I went to the bathrooms. The only dilemma I had was working out which was the men’s and which was the ladies. They didn’t have symbols and I couldn’t remember the Finnish word for ladies! I hung round outside for a bit waiting for someone else to go in or out so I could work it out but no one came. So I decided to make an educated (and slightly inebriated) guess and head for the one on the left. There was no one in there and I didn’t see any urinals or anything so I assumed I was brilliant and had made the right choice. I left feeling very proud of myself….until I walked past a little later and saw a guy coming out! Oh well! I’m a tourist!
At about 3am we decided it was about time to go back to our hotel, seeing as we had to be up and ready to go at about 8. This was easier said than done because we were momentarily waylaid by a pizza place (nice pizzas! Mmmmm drunk food!) Lindsay (the Canadian) and I decided to share one and once we got it we joined the very long taxi queue. In front of us was one of the most annoying men on earth. He looked in his late 30’s and asked us if he could have some of our pizza. We said sorry no – I mean you don’t just give complete strangers pizza unless they are incredibly good looking! And this guy was no oil painting- dreadful teeth, coke bottle glasses etc. And then he just wouldn’t leave us alone. As we got closer to the start of the line Lindsay told him that she was 4 months pregnant and from ‘Canadia’ so he should be a gentle man and let us go first. He didn’t the whole taxi line abused him when he got into a maxi taxi by himself. Irritating man! We tried to push in front of him fair and square after he repeatedly tried to steal our pizza- I mean who wouldn’t let a drunken pregnant woman from ‘Canadia’ and her angel of a concerned friend go first!
We ended up getting back to the hotel at about 4am. Tomorrow is going to be a killer! I think I may have to have a nice long nap on the bus!
By the way we weren’t the last of our group to get back. Some others got in at 6am, and one girl at about 6:45. Sleep is overrated. That’s what the bus is for!
