Not vibing with it. But once I kinda did.

Sometimes the most random of thoughts make way to this blog, instead of accounts of what I’ve done and where I’ve gone. Never been much of a fan of making detailed reports of already happened events. Most likely why it took me so long to establish my blogging habit.

So instead of my weeks’ ago weirdly adventurous trip to St.Petersburg (in short – Factory areas and surprising air pollution, hotel booking fail, epic Hatari concert, Winter Palace and St.Isaac’s Cathedral on foot, Russian skills successfully applied, bus broken down on the way back), I am musing more on the contemporary Estonian cultural/subcultural scene.

St.Isaac’s Cathedral interior

It’s a thing I admired from afar before I went to study cultural heritage. There, everyone seemed like cultural giants, slow and timid with vast knowledge, relaxed speech and mannerism as opposed to my rash and rushed energy. Needless to say it was an infectious environment. I was certainly the “mass media” person of our course, at least I felt like that. More caught up with following the Marvel Cinematic Universe than the local cultural happenings. I felt out of place at first and wondered how I managed to secure a spot in the school at all.

With time, I started getting context, immersed and I felt I fit in. Still, there was a few times I felt out if place and I still feel myself removed ever since I dropped out (yes, I did drop out with my last exam being an A). This is an insight of someone who’s looking things from the surface. An amalgamation of impressions. The local punk music scene. It seems to be a point where culture and subculture share a merging bridge.

With university, there seems to be a certain pattern of wording and self-expression that develops. A very similar one seems to develop in the local punk and musical nostalgia scene. Sometimes I feel like I’ve been transported to the 80s-90s when hearing or reading conversations. Lots of appreciation and veiled references to either the music or local literal classics that I directly don’t get. But the energy signature is there.

So what is it in this, that I’m not vibing with? The melancholy. I like earthy and warmth usually, a factor that is definitely there, but shadowed by an air of weariness of past struggles, like a windy November night where you don’t have your scarf and gloves with you. It’s too much of something for me. Too much sentiment laced with an unfamiliar nostalgia? Perhaps.

It’s an eternal dilemma. I don’t feel connected, yet some part of me shames me that I should. My favourite cuisine is Indian. The city I love and miss the most is Munich. My most used language is English by far. My best childhood memories are with the Brazilian drum orchestra I used to be a part of and our collaborations with a Belgian one. Maybe that’s what set me on a different course. Maybe I’m just spinning incoherent thoughts. Maybe all of this actually holds little weight but it’s a thought that got stuck and I wanted to expand on. There are more subcultures that are present here, but this one really stuck out for me for a long time. All in all, I am who I am.

Thanks for hearing me out and Have a Superb Day!

-Ann

Listening to: Bruno Pelletier – Le Temps des Cathedrales