Vacation update - Riga,Latvia

[Scruffydog777]

This post doesn't have a whole lot to do with Alizee, but starts off with something that remotely concerned her. The rest is more or less about 'things' in Latvia that have nothing to do with her so If you're looking for something more Alizeeish, you might be wasting your time with this.
After I arrived in Riga, I ran into some credit card problems which led to some cash problems too. This caused me to have a lot of dealings with one of the women who worked in reception at the hotel I was staying at. Her first name was Inga. I'm guessing she's about 10 years younger than me. She gave me a link to her FB page so you can check it out if you are so inclined after.
She's of Russian ancestry. For those of you who don't know the history of this area during ww2, before Germany invaded Russia, the Russians moved into several of these Balkan countries. They either killed or shipped off to Siberia most of the political and cultural leaders and brought in many Russians. Any native people who didn't vote for Russian candidates in the upcoming elections too, were either shot or on the next train to Siberia. Even many years befire that war, Latvia was a part of Russia for a while. So there are a lot of Russian people in this area.

Now this woman is very proud of being Russian but is very proud of her efforts to rebuild some of the historic sites that were destroyed during the war and now that these countries got their independence several years ago, they are working to restore them. So she said her and her family paid for all the bricks of one of the inside walls that was recently completed of a building that had been popular with a lot of people.

Anyway, our chat led to her other hobby. In her spare time, she's a professional dancer. She often goes to Paris to meet up with different groups for different happenings. I asked her if she ever heard of Gregoire Lyonnet who I thought she'd be more likely to know, but she hadn't. I showed her some videos of A&G's performance in DALS and she was very impressed with Alizee's dancing, but that's about as far as that went.

The rest of this is just kind of an economic report on Latvia that I got from talking to her. She said her and her husband had a business of pressure treating wood. They would ship a lot of it off to the U.K. But the government was running out of money to pay for their retirees pensions, so they've been raising and raising their property taxes. Her husband used to pay her a salary to work as an accountant, but because of the taxes, he can no longer afford to keep her on payroll, so he does that work himself. That's how she wound up getting the job at the hotel.

She spoke of her mother who is living on a pension that can't barely cover her expenses.

She also spokeof the immigration situation. She says they allow about 200 immigrants a year in and pay them about 200 euros a month. She said one of the other benefits they give them is free travel and she said most of them head for Sweden because of the higher amounts of money they are paid. 'She' also brought up the many rapes that happen there and if you follow European news at all, you'll often here of Sweden referred to as the rape capital of the world.

Another thing Inga said, because of the bad financial situation in Latvia with taxes going up and up, a lot of young people are leaving, making the situation worse..

One other thing. On the 4 + hour bus ride to Tallinn, they have movies available and they just so happen to have 'It's a Good Year'. So at least I got to listen to part of Moi Lolita.


good year 2.jpg

https://www.facebook.com/inga.vijupe

[kulli]

I saw your photos on Facebook. It looks like a beautiful place to visit. Have a wonderful time and enjoy your trip.

[Scruffydog777]

I'm in Riga. I haven't heard anyone speaking French around town or at my hotel where there are many foreign guests. I have a Corsica t shirt I wore yesterday along with a 'Chamonix' hat from Mt Blanc that says France on the back, that I wear often, thinking if there were any 'French' people around, I might get a comment, but nothing happened.

This morning I got on the elevator going down to breakfast. When I got on there was a couple already on. I said 'Good morning' and they said the same in return. When we got down to the bottom floor, I motioned for them to leave first and the guy said 'Merci!'. So the woman happened to come up next to me in the buffet line.

Conversation was somewhat difficult. She said she was from the south of France, near the Spanish border, maybe she's near that place where Alizee has a gig I think next month. After telling her I was from the states, she said she's going to Yellowstone next year.

I tried to explain to her about my favorite singer and being to Corsica as well as some other things and unfortunately she didn't seem at all to understand what I was talking about. She was very friendly and seemed eager to talk, but her and her husband met up with another couple so I didn't get to continue the conversation.

But I thought it was pretty ironic, I flew the French flag, sort of speak, yesterday and nothing happens, then the first people I see today are from France. Go figure.

[CleverCowboy]

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

She spoke of her mother who is living on a pension that can't barely cover her expenses.

She also spokeof the immigration situation. She says they allow about 200 immigrants a year in and pay them about 200 euros a month. She said one of the other benefits they give them is free travel...

This type of insanity seems to be a global phenomenon. Natives of a country who have worked all their lives are struggling to survive, while the door is opened to immigrants who have their living expenses paid for.

Edit:

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

I'm in Riga. I haven't heard anyone speaking French around town or at my hotel where there are many foreign guests. I have a Corsica t shirt I wore yesterday along with a 'Chamonix' hat from Mt Blanc that says France on the back, that I wear often, thinking if there were any 'French' people around, I might get a comment, but nothing happened.

Is English prevalent among the native population? Have you bumped into anybody visiting from the States?

[Scruffydog777]

Originally Posted by CleverCowboy

Is English prevalent among the native population? Have you bumped into anybody visiting from the States?

I would say it's definitely not prevalent, but usually in touristy places like Old town Riga or Old Town Tallinn where I am now, you have many natives who work in the travel industry and I'm sure speaking English was a job requirement. Also you are more likely to find either college students or college grads down town who I'm sure in most cases have had some English.

In just about all my travels, I found it's relatively easy to find someone down town, who speaks English, but when you get out into the country side, it's a different story.

One thing I read on line that people in Latvia weren't that friendly, but of the several good looking young woman who I stopped to ask directions (funny how that works), they were all very friendly and just about all spoke English, but this was down town.

I did a very short trip to Narva today which is about a 100 miles east of Tallinn where I'm staying and is right on the Russian border. Most of the people here are Russian. I stopped to ask numerous people walking along a question or two. None spoke English except 2 who work in industry where it's pretty much a necessity. One was a pretty woman who worked at the ticket office of a castle I visited here. The other was a cute young waitress who work at a restaurant that was part of a hotel here.

I have run into a few Americans here. I was at an outdoor restaurant in Riga the other day and there were 2 guys who were obviously pilots from the states and one of them was on the net, looking at different pilot jobs around the world. Normally that's a situation where I would have loved to say hey, where you from, but one sounded pretty obnoxious, so I passed.

I saw another couple that I'm quite sure were from Hawaii because as they took photos of each other, they flashed a little sign to each other I've seen before there. I said hello to them and made a little comment about the house we were both photographing, but they didn't seem the least bit interested in conversation.

I met a woman from Ireland and her very pretty young daughter who would be continuing on to Finland. I ran into a couple from the U.K, who with there dog, were also headed over to Finland and going up to the Polar circle via Finland. I ran into a couple of woman from Germany, but they couldn't speak a word of English so that conversation never got off the ground. I met a couple today in Narva from the Netherlands. The next day, I saw what looked to be several Russian troops walking around Old town.

But the most surprising meeting I had was when I got to my hotel here in Tallinn, as I was getting on the elevator, a U.S. Army soldier in camo fatigues, was getting off. He seemed to be in a hurry so I just thanked him for his service and he was on his way.

[CleverCowboy]

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

the several good looking young woman who I stopped to ask directions (funny how that works)

Why would you ask anybody else besides pretty women?

Speaking of, you have used words like good looking, pretty, beautiful, etc. to describe some of the women you have come across there. Is it true what they say about young Russian women? Blond, blue-eyed, and beautiful. Or maybe they say that about Ukrainian girls

[Scruffydog777]

I did see a lot of good looking woman both in Riga and Tallinn and I was surprised by that though I'm not sure why. I'm sure some were Russian and some Latvian.

[CleverCowboy]

I know a guy who took a trip to Poland recently. He said the young women there were incredibly beautiful.

[eru777]

Polish girls are pretty, I agree. Eastern girls in general.