The weather this week was very cold, with snow flurries and snow showers almost every day. The hard part about the weather is not the cold but the darkness. Today, the sun rose at 8:56 AM and set at 3:32 PM, which makes for very little daylight. Most Estonians take daily Vitamin D supplements since the country rarely sees sun for six months out of the year. People also use light therapy lamps (kind of like tanning salons but using natural light) to decrease the risk of depression and lackluster energy levels.
Since Tartu is an urban center, I rarely see wild animals, but the people here love their cats and dogs! My landlady has a very fat cat named Sofi that she keeps around to kill the mice that sometimes sneak into her apartment. Estonia also has a large assortment of local bird species, such as larks, swallows and grebes, that I see quite regularly. One unusual animal that I saw this week was an alpaca! It turns out that there is an alpaca farm close to where I live.
