Best Day So Far - Valentine's

So I got up to go on my long run of this week, which is reduced to 10 miles as I get adjusted. I wake up at 9, eventually get out the door at about 9:30. I get to the gym, start dressing... where are my running pants? I need them... Why? Because it's snowing outside and it's 27 degrees. Oh, COME ON!! Where are my pants?! Of course, they are back in my dorm room, a .6 mile walk... Let's go.

Begrudgingly I go back to the dorm room, and I just change there and start my run from Raatuse (the street the dorm's on). Run past the Sports Hall, across the river, and down along the river to get to this park that's 5k long, but it takes a little jog to get to it. But since it as been snowing the whole night... It was beautiful. Absolutely gorgeous running through these huge snowflakes. The "park" is a trail that's maybe 6 feet wide, and it just goes through trees and across small bridges, I loved it!! At one point, you come to an open field, and I just looked out and it was just a totally empty plain of snow with an emotionless grey sky. It was beautiful.

Of course, I did get lost though, and added a good 2 miles onto my run, but it's good for me, right? And the trail comes to this part that a where a bridge used to be (collapsed in the winter) so you have to walk across the jagged fragments of frozen pond water. Yet, conveniently next to the jagged ice is a house with a backyard that comes right up the trial. And these people own a freaking werewolf. I'm serious. This German Shepard is why people thought there were werewolves. I actually thought about this point for a good portion of my run.

I get back from my run, and I hardly have time before our Valentine's Sledding Event, organized by Niels (Netherlands). So I have a pizza in the pub downstairs, and race back to get ready to sled. HOW FUN!!! On the other side of the river, beyond the town square there are the "hills of Tartu". Back there also is the Language Center and the Faculty of Law, so I have to walk back there several times a week (when classes are in full boom). But across from the Language Center is just a huge crater (a bowl would also be a good description). It's about 150-200 feet deep and really wide (several thousand feet). But this is sledding paradise. Why? Well, all the obvious reasons aside, this entire crater has a foundation of 3 inch ice covering the entire crater. It's ridiculously slick. AKA awesome. But there are two main sledding paths. A short one, that's very steep and bumpy. Or there's the LONG one. Well, it takes almost 20 seconds to get down, so that's pretty good for a sledding spot in a residential area.

But it was amazing. We had purchased "sleds" (plastic circles with handles) the day before with contributed funds, and Kelsey had some broken luggage from her flight over, so she cut the top of it off, and we used the top and the suitcase body as a sled too. Other vehicles were plastic bags, inflatable inner tubes, and good ol' fashioned butts. We went down that hill in every way imaginable: backwards, forwards, on our chests, two person bobsled, 8 person train, two 10-person trains put together (last one was huge and surprisingly fast). The champion of the crater would undoubtedly have to Slava (Lithuania), who is also training/studying to be a gymnastics coach (undoubtedly the most fit person I've met in many years, and every guy in the program wants Slava to train him... to look better. hahaha). But Slava went down standing up, down in a "plank" stance, even down the hill doing push-ups as he went. Crazy amazing. There are pictures and a video below!

After that, I went and had a pizza in the pub (a normal part of my routine now, because you can get a huge pizza for $5.70, can't beat that). But then I reunited with people upstairs, and we had some chocolate truffles, potato wedges, and some drinks for Valentine's Day. Then we watched Love Actually (a wonderful film!). A great way to celebrate Valentine's.

After the film, we headed to a free jazz concert, but we were late and all the tables were taken. So then we started picking what pubs we wanted to go to... but the Gunpowder Cellar was rented for a "men's auction", and none of the guys wanted to either watch men be bet on or be somehow dragged into the auction ourselves (drunk people yelling at you in a totally foreign tongue is the worst kind of peer pressure). Headed to Wilde Pub, and awkwardly stood there trying to see open seats, of which there were none. Then headed to Big Bend Pub, and finally there was a table open for all 12 of us... but there was an Estonian band BLARING Estonian music. Eventually it became entertaining as they started playing "Cotton-Eyed Joe" and the "Numa Numa song" in Estonian. Then we headed to another pub, Ilegard, which may be my favorite thus far. And then I called it an evening.

But it was the best day so far of the trip for me. Because I felt productive from the run, but then we did a huge group activity during the day, and just kept up the socializing up for the entire day. It felt like a real Saturday - nothing but good times. Yaay! Okay, picture/video time!