Riga, Latvia

Riga may well be the most beautiful city I've ever seen. To be sure, there are other cities with more beautiful features, but Riga is just consistently gorgeous. It has a rather large old town, full of chuches, castles, and ornately decorated guild buildings. The old town borders on a blue river spanned by only a few bridges. The streets are cobbled and the sound of top 40 hits and techno fills the air, pouring from little cafes and clubs. The music is a bit incongrous, but it actually fits once you take a minute to observe what's going on around you, because Riga is an alive city. The statues are interesting and unique, the art scene is complicated, and the young people dress with great flair.

Out of the old town, in the historic business center, you cannot walk for ten seconds without tripping over some example of art nouveau. There is the more typical style, with brightly colored buildings dripping with ornamentation. There is also a more Latvian style, explained by our Free Tour tour guide, where the building starts with rough, unhidden stone and brick to symbolize man coming out from nature. As it rises, the stone is gradually covered with colorful plaster and symbols of the earth, which Latvians have historically been very connected to.

There is a huge market, filling five former Zepellin hangars, full of little old ladies hawking their wares. There is a towering square building, covered in hammers and sickles, affectionately referred to as Stalin's birthday cake.

We also visited the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia, in a modern, decidely communist-looking building left in the old town for just that purpose. The museum detailed the annexation of the country by first the soviets, then the nazis, then the soviets again. I still cannot get over the fact that these three little countries won their freedom from giant Russia, essentially, through singing in folk festivals. There was some fighting, of course, but so little. It's a very inspirational thing.

We also had a great time in Riga. We happened upon a group of young English speakers, and had some fun parties with them.

Finally, we ate nicely. Several bowls of pelmeni, small dumplings either fried or simmered in soup, provided a few lovely lunches. We also hit up the LIDO, termed by the guide book and locals alike as "if Disney and Latvia had a child," where we sampled some traditional fare and balked at the sheer amount of dill used in the traditional cuisine. I also finally got sushi, and it was amazing.

One very interesting thing is how much the Latvian currency is worth. One LAT is worth about two dollars! And things still cost about on the level of Estonia (or Hungary, for that matter). So it is interesting to order a meal and then pay 2.20 for it, not dozens or hundreds of units. At one point I held a 20 centi Estonian coin in my hand next to a 50 centim Latvian coin, and laughed, because they look almost exactly alike. The only difference is that one is worth about 1.5 US cents, and the other a dollar. Currency is fun, and certainly one of the negatives of the whole continent going Euro.

Oh, and one more thing. The word for spicy in Latvian is "ass." Tell your friends.