Well, it’s been a week since I moved to a foreign city where
I can barely pronounce the word for hi. Luckily, I’m really good at smiling and
saying “spasibo” (thank you), so I haven't gotten into too much trouble. Plus,
I’ll talk to anyone, whether I know the language or not.
In
my short time in Riga I’ve uncovered a secret that the world must be in cahoots
to hide: Riga is beautiful. Maybe the country is too far and small for
Americans to suspect it. Or maybe, upon leaving the country you have to sign a
waiver agreeing to keep the country’s beauty a secret to deter travelers. After
all, anyone from Portland or Asheville will tell you a place ceases to be cool
once everyone knows its cool. In that case, sorry Riga, but I’m here to
proclaim your wonder.
First
of all, the buildings. And the parks. And the markets. There’s an Art Nouveau
street that is just pretty buildings grouped together to make sightseeing easy.
And so many parks! I find a new one every time I go running. I often get so
excited by the sun, the pretty flowers, and the fountains that I just start
sprinting for no reason. If that’s not joy, I don't know what is.
And I get to
do most of my grocery shopping at an open market that has 4 train stations
worth of food PLUS an outdoor section. And half a train station is dedicated to
pickles! If you know me, you know I like pickles.
So, just to orient you all a little, I live in the City
Center, around the corner from the Jewish Community Center. The JCC is really
nice, with a Jewish Museum and a new room for the youth. I’m completely
obsessed with my apartment, partly because I get it all to myself. Talk about
the dream. Plus, nothing is more than a 10-15 minute walk
away from my apartment. My favorite place to go so far (besides the market, of course) is the Old City. It's windy streets of old buildings with shops, cafes, restaurants, and
historical buildings. I got a lovely tour from my boss, Martin. My favorite part of the tour was hwne he told me that on the unimportant side of the moat/outside the city, all of the houses
used to be made of wood. The reason: if an army came to attack and lit one building
on fire, the fire would spread, thereby distracting the army and allowing the Old City to prepare. Nice protection of the peasants in the wooden houses...
Now that you have some vague sense of where I am, or at least how pretty it is, you may want to know what I've been doing. If not, you probably should have stopped reading a while ago. To be totally honest, I'm not sure what I've been doing, but I know it's been great. I went to my first
hockey game: the Latvian Dinamos vs. the Moscow Dinamos (come on guys. A little
creativity with names puhleez). Best first hockey game ever.
The Latvians tied it in the last second, no one scored in the first over-time
and the Latvians won in the final shoot out. Plus I got a weird looking
paper hat. And tried their game snack of choice: deep fried garlic bread. I won't be going back for seconds on that.
I also got to see the sea. About 20 km outside the city (I love when people think I'm going to know what that means. It's about 15 minutes drive) is a sea town, much like the beach towns in the US. There's a pretty main street, a beach, and the most gorgeous houses I've seen because they're all owned by the rich and Russian celebrities. I'm glad I could see where I will be spending a lot of my time come spring.
Work wise, I’m still getting to know the community, so I've mostly been sitting in on meetings that are entirely in Russian. At least everyone's been nice and welcoming. A few seem to think my name
is “fellow” and most have no idea why some girl is watching their activities, but at least they're friendly when I can introduce myself. Once I start to know what's going on, the work will come. In the meantime, I'm happy to just enjoy living somewhere new and spectacular.
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