Het was leuk om even terug te zijn in België maar onze voeten begonnen te jeuken en het werd tijd om terug te vertrekken. Om middernacht landen we in Riga. Te laat voor de bus nemen we een taxi naar het Elisabeth Hostel. We vermoeden dat de bestuurder ervan droomt de Letse Senna te worden. De straten van Riga zijn gelukkig niet zijn Imola. Een supervriendelijke madam ontvangt ons met een brede glimlach op dit nachtelijke uur. De dag erop gaan we na een goede nachtrust de stad verkennen. We lopen wat rond in de Oude stad. Het is er niet [View Full Entry]

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We disembarked the MV Oceanic II (The Scholar Ship) on April 19. On April 21 it was renamed the Mona Lisa (it's original name) and chartered back into a cruise ship for the summer. And then the captain ran it into the ground. http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/05/04/latvia.cruise.ap/ http://it.youtube.com/watch?v=DhIROlJsjpE [View Full Entry]

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When Latvians go to the sauna, they keep their swimsuits on. I found this out the hard way when I was standing stark-naked in the middle of the main room of the sauna, with everyone else being dressed and staring at me as if I was the first guy they had seen without clothes in their entire life's. Well, the people I had asked to find this place never mentioned that fact to me, so... Altogether though, it was a very relaxing afternoon. Especially the "salt sauna", where there was a huge basket full of salt to rub your skin with, [View Full Entry]

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Well here is a place I have wanted to go to for a long time, and was really impressed by the city and its history. I went to a museum in Estonia on the occupation of the Baltic States but you didn't see as much there as you did in Riga the capital. As for the history of the area is,well I think this would tell it better then I could http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Latvia (I know but its true and you all know it..) Any way there were all sorts of things to see and do in Riga you could even go out [View Full Entry]

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My dear reader... and my dear myself... I am writing this post during the reflection time in Kick off 2008 in Riga, my first conference managing experience. I feel so weird... but I also feel proud. The reality was not even close to my expectations, but I see that it still somehow became amazing! Just 3 minutes ago 11 delegates and 6 facis were doing the counting game. And I was totally taken aback. They managed to reach 80 with the second normal attempt. I was and still am so impressed... seeing how much they have mixed with each other and [View Full Entry]

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We arrived at the airport in Riga on Friday afternoon. (Both Latvia and Estonia are 1hour ahead of Germany.) As we taxied to our gate, we saw an airport in need of some work. The runways needed paving, the airport terminal itself was tiny, and there appeared to be a Soviet plane graveyard in the middle of it all. Once inside the terminal we found an ATM to withdraw LATS (the local currency). Knowing a bus ride was only 40 LATS cents, we needed to break the new 50 LAT bill we got from the ATM. We walked into a small [View Full Entry]

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In the beginning of February i decided to participate as facilitator at "Natcon 2008 Latvia", Well it was a decision made in the last moment as usually and i ended up in a bus on My way to Riga again but this time with two persons i consider close to me and i like to work with, Laura and Ieva from Vilnius. In four hours we were in Riga and few hours later we were somewhere on the seaside where the conference was taking place, we spent 2 nights in a student house preparing the trainings and after that we [View Full Entry]

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It was yesterday evening when I was considering my next year and how it will look like... and suddenly out of blue air I got this crazy idea of spending my summer somewhere abroad. As I have to start my master studies in September, I have my time only till then. And as I am in AIESEC and are we kind of dealing with internships :P ... hi hi... well, You got my point... I want to go on an internship during the summer. I started to consider the destination... and as I was visiting Anki, I just looked at her [View Full Entry]

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Llegamos a la capital letona cuando ya ha anochecido, y Riga nos recibe durmiente y gélida. A la mañana siguiente pequeños copos de nieve caen perezosamente, y tras abrigarnos concienzuamente bajamos al Hall del Hotel donde nos espera Ieva ( de la oficina de turismo de Letonia) . La ciudad ha recuperado su actividad habitual y cuando llegamos al "Latvian Etnographic Open Air museum" empieza a nevar con mas fuerza. Despues de la visita de rigor al lugar ( o sea casas y mas casas bajo la nieve) volvemos al centro de Riga, donde visitamos las principales atracciones de la ciudad [View Full Entry]

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Having booked our flights to Riga back in November our trip East seemed to come around incredibly quickly after our last jaunt to Krakow. The usual silly o'clock start that we have become so used to saw us arriving in Riga without any problems, and a first for boys club - a taxi driver from the airport that didn't want to either rip us off massively or try and kill us with his dodgy driving. Result! We were booked into the comically named Friendly Fun Franks hostel which proved to be an absolute winner - arranging a couple of great trips [View Full Entry]

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