Rīga - Chapter 1

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We woke early in Pärnu so that we’d have time to grab a quick breakfast -- four pastries and two coffees, ordered mostly in Estonian. My rudimentary language skills hit their limits at the bus station, but I eventually figured out that we had to buy our tickets on the bus. The driver was, charmingly, a bit flustered because he couldn’t give us exact change; we overpaid and got on anyway, but after a few more people had paid he found us at the back of the bus and gave us our change. Aww. Meanwhile we’d struck up a friendly conversation with some Dutch travellers sitting near us. They had not loved Estonia, they said, because they preferred crowds. Well, I said, you’ll probably love Rīga.

The contrast to Estonia really was jarring. Rīga is the most populous of the Baltic capitals, with three quarters of a million people, and you feel it when you’re there -- the city is grittier and noisier, the people less friendly. I realized right away how much I’d been benefiting from the similarity between Estonian and Finnish -- even walking around is tiring when you can’t read anything. The two languages you see the most are Latvian and Russian (in fact, fewer than half the capital’s inhabitants are native speakers of Latvian). You don’t see a ton of English here.

We found our apartment building with minimal confusion. The place was like a Gobstopper of quality: scary on the outside; immaculate on the inside, with beautiful decor and a well-appointed kitchen; but put together in a bit of a rush, so underneath the shine we found a few flaws. For instance, the walls and floor in the bathroom weren’t entirely plumb, so the shower stall leaked and the toilet seat wouldn’t stay upright. Overall, though, it was quite a pleasant place to stay.

I was dragging a bit by this point (despite their merits, Birkenstocks are not serious walking shoes), so we decided to allot the afternoon to housekeeping tasks: exchanging money, shopping for groceries, doing laundry. We had a few comical obstacles -- for instance, when you are at a laundromat, you do not want to hear the words, “Where’s the underwear?” -- but it all ended well. While the laundry was laundering, we paused for lunch (potato pancakes and a chicken hot-pot at a nearly empty cafe) and a little light tourism in the neighborhood. A nearby park had one of the most beautiful churches I’ve ever seen, a beautiful mosaic of an Orthodox cathedral; and right next to the cathedral, an inflatable slide, several stories high and shaped like a sinking Titanic. Okay.

After resting our feet at home for a bit, we headed to Vecrīga (Old Town Rīga) with the intention of being charmed. It worked! My sense of direction is usually pretty good, but the twisty cobblestone had me turned around six ways from Sunday, so we just walked randomly until we found a good dinner spot. We chose well -- Latvian black peas with ham; fresh egg noodles; sour pork soup; and a chicken breast stuffed with cheese and pumpkin seeds. While eating we watched an amusing lightshow on a nearby building, clearly choreographed for tourists. We went home, well-fed and duly charmed.

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Comments

[Laurie]

gobstopper of quality = new favorite way to describe anything