Riga Episode Four

 Hello, Easter greetings and welcome to this final edition of An English Fool Abroad Spring 2023. I was travelling home yesterday which is why I didn’t post.

To be honest I haven’t got a great deal to say. That’s never stopped me in the past, I know, but as trips go this has been a remarkably foolishness free zone. I mean, there was the standing about 10 yards away from the door of the guest rooms and then walking off in the opposite direction when I arrived in Riga on Tuesday, but even then I don’t think I was entirely to blame. In four days I never saw any sign bearing the name of the place as it was given on Booking.com. Never mind.

The flight yesterday was due to leave at 2:10 pm, so I didn’t plan on catching the bus to the airport until about half past eleven. I ended up checking out quite a bit earlier than I had planned, though. You might remember how I was woken up on Thursday night by some very noisy fellow guests at about 3 am. Well, on Friday night I was woken at 2:30 am by an entirely different set of fellow guests. I have to ask myself whether this is a particularly Latvian thing, to talk as loudly as you can until an irate fat git comes storming out of his room, pointing at his watch and asking you to have a little thought for people who are trying to sleep? This time I didn’t just confine myself to gestures, but favoured them with such choice phrases as ‘have some respect’. And if that’s not proof that I am rapidly heading towards senior citizenship then I don’t know what would be.

I didn’t get back to sleep, so after checking and rechecking that I’d packed everything I needed to pack I eventually checked out about 7am, and headed off for some breakfast and 2 cups of coffee. I felt better after that and even better after my last tram ride in Riga. It was another very bright and clear day – although chilly at that time in the morning. This isn’t really surprising when you consider that Riga is actually the 6th most northerly capital city of an independent sovereign nation on Earth. I’ve previously visited the number 1 and five on the list in Reykjavik and Stockholm. Not so chilly that sketching was out of the question though. So I made two sketches. Firstly, of some of the houses in Livu Laukum.

You may remember that I sketched the cat statue on the roof of the Cat House a couple of days ago. Well these houses are just a few yards away. Oh, and while I was sketching a family came up and looked at the sketch, and so I offered them the book to have a look through. They gave me a thumbs up and one even slapped me on the back, so Riga and Latvians have proven themselves to be appreciative of sketchers and sketches, which is another mark in the positives column. I’ll come back to that in a moment or two.

I walked through the old town – without getting lost. It’s typical. I’ve got my bearings and understand how the street layout works, just in time to leave the country. The old town backs onto the Daugava River and I walked to a spot where I got a good view of the Railway Bridge, and made the sketch.

What can I say – I have a thing about bridges. The first railway bridge built here was a box girder bridge built in the 1870s. This current bridge was built right alongside the original bridge and it opened in 1914. Not exactly brilliant timing, since it was shelled during world war I and had to be rebuilt. Then the same thing happened in World War 2. It was 11 years before it was rebuilt and then reopened in 1955, during the Soviet period.

I completed the sketch and even though it was earlier than I planned, my sketching hand was aching a bit, so this was the last sketch that I made in Riga. So I made my way to the bus stop. And that was pretty much it. The journey home really was uneventful. Even the passport control at the airport was nice this time round. Yes, it was still a case of death by question but at least the guy at the desk had a smile on his face. A big thank you to my son-in-law Dan for picking me up from the airport yesterday. If I’d had to get the bus again it wouldn’t have been the end of the world, but it was nice not to have to.

So that was Riga. I was asked yesterday where I would place it on the list of sketching trip cities I’ve visited. That’s a tricky one. It’s a lovely place and I thoroughly enjoyed my trip. I certainly enjoyed it much more than last year’s Warsaw trip – no disrespect intended towards Warsaw, just a case of speak as you find. I wouldn’t rate it as highly as Berlin, which is my Mary Poppins destination (practically perfect in every way), but I would certainly rate it highly. In particular, Riga has the best value public transport of any city I’ve visited. Most cities I’ve been to have some kind of travelcard system, but many don’t let you use it to and from the airport. On Tuesday evening I bought a five day travelcard for 10 Euros, and never spent another cent on transport for all the time I was there. I don’t know how they can do it for the price, but I’m very glad that they do. It all speaks of a very enlightened attitude to public transport which I guess they must heavily subsidize.

Thank you Riga, and thank you for tuning in. Next trip planned is Copenhagen in the Summer. Hope to see you then.

Riga Episode 3

 Good evening and welcome to An English Fool Abroad with his Sketchbook, Easter 2023 Edition, Episode 3. And it’s been an absolutely beautiful day in wonderful downtown Riga today. We had snow on Tuesday and Wednesday, rain and mist yesterday, but today there’s been non-stop sunshine. Mind you, the day didn’t start quite so beautifully. It was about 3 o’clock in the morning when I was woken by the sound of voices – male voices – loud male voices. Very loud male voices. And they were going at it for a very long time. So much so that I even got up, went into the sitting area, and then pointed at my watch. Then, for good measure, I made the yakitty yak sign with my left hand as well- you know, the one where you make your hand go like a crab pincer. One of them gave me a cheery wave, and they did – eventually – give it a rest. I, on the other hand, got no more rest for another hour or so before I fell back to sleep again.

So I was a little late getting out and about this morning. But was I downhearted? Yeah, actually, I was a bit. But there was nothing wrong with me that two coffees couldn’t put right. I was interested to see just how seriously Riga takes Good Friday, and I was delighted to find that it takes it about as seriously as we do in the UK. So while a lot of places were closed, the Supermarket , the market, and Costa Coffee were all open for business.

So I made my way first to the Blackheads House, and was a little disappointed to see that there was no Clearasil House (other skin care products are available) opposite it. The name is all to do with Merchants, apparently, who used to wear black caps. Riga was an important Hanseatic League trading port back in the day. I didn’t sketch the building itself, but I did make a sketch of the statue of Roland (or for readers who grew up with Grange Hill, Row-Land).

Roland is the hero of probably the most famous of the French Chansons de Geste, the Chanson de Roland, originally written in Anglo Norman French and probably within a decade or two of the Norman Conquest. Basically, he was the hotheaded nephew of Charlemagne who was ambushed with his men by Moors in Roncesvalles in the Pyrenees, where he had his bottom handed to him on a plate, to use the vernacular. Why this is celebrated with a statue in Riga, that I don’t know.

Now, I did tell you all about the Swedish Gate, didn’t I? Incidentally, am I the only one who thinks of the words ‘hurdy gurdy’ when I see references to the Swedish anything? Oh, I am. Okay. Well, this time I went back to it to make the sketch that you can see with this post.

Being out in the open air sketching when there were far more people about than in the last two days, I was able to assess the locals’ reaction to an open air sketcher. It’s funny the different etiquette that seems to apply in different cities. Here nobody, not one person, passed a comment on any of the sketches I was making. In fact most of them went out of their way to pretend that they weren’t even looking. Maybe it’s a Baltic thing – my recollection is that it was a similar thing in Kaunas in Lithuania. Or maybe they just thought they were all crap and didn’t want to hurt my feelings.

The trams were running, albeit rather less frequently so it wasn’t difficult to get to the market. It was lunchtime you see. I took the opportunity to sample Latvian curry sauce with my baked potato. All I can say is that it wasn’t very hot, and was distinctly more pale than I like to see in a curry sauce. Well, there you go. I can’t see me giving the Michelin guide a run for the money any time soon with reviews like that.

Back out again, and I took a quiet walk by the canal. Now, you have to hand it to the Rigans. When you say the word canal to me I can’t help thinking of the Grand Union which has cleaned up its act a bit recently, but when I was growing up frankly wasn’t the most salubrious of places. Well, the Riga Canal may not exactly be the Grand Canal in Venice, but it’s rather lovely, passing through a rather lovely park area as it flows past the National Opera House. I took the opportunity to sit for a while, and as I did my sketching hand became itchy so I made a sketch of a nearby fountain, which you should be able to see with this post.

And it was while I was making this sketch that I had a rather lovely experience. Stop that – you’re making up your own stories. No, I saw my first butterfly of 2023, and what’s more it was a small tortoiseshell which is one of my favourite spring butterflies too. On the negative column of the ledger I believe that I did catch a bit of sun while making the fountain sketch, since my face is feeling it a bit now.

I mentioned earlier that I had wondered how seriously Latvians take Good Friday. When I walked back into the Old Town there was actually a procession of sorts going on which stopped at the Dom Square. The Dom is the Cathedral in the Old Town. Is that name because of the German influence on Riga’s past? I only ask because I recall it’s what the huge Cathedral on Museum Insel in Berlin was called , or rather the Domkirche.

Those of you who know me well will probably know that I am easily worried and when I get a bee in my bonnet about something I can’t rest until I get it sorted out. This is why I hastened back to the room. Honestly, in terms of location close to where I want to be in Riga, you couldn’t have done much better. However. . . there is the little matter of the 70 odd steps on the winding staircase to get up to it. Oh well, good exercise I suppose. Mind you, I’ve always thought that good exercise is an oxymoron. Anyway, back to the story, and what was bugging me. Tomorrow I’m flying home at 14:10. Unless you’re paying extra to choose a seat, you cannot check in online until 24 hours before the flight is due to take of. And it really is true. I tried at 14:09 today and got nowhere. A minute later – Bob’s your Uncle.

So, after awarding myself a large pat on the back, it was back out again. There was one particular landmark that I wanted to sketch. I like clocks, you see. I like bridges too, and have seen a couple of rather nice ones since I’ve been here, but hey, the clock was nearer.

If you look on the sketch you should see that the letters down the side spell Laima. Laima is the largest producer of chocolate in Latvia. And Laima are very, very proud of the fact that unlike similar firms in the Baltic and Scandinavia they have never been taken over by a giant conglomerate like Kraft foods and are still a private company. As you should be able to see from the sketch it stands close to the Freedom Monument. It was erected in 1924, but during the Soviet Period all reference to chocolate was removed and instead it was used as a political propaganda stand. Tells you all you need to know about the Soviet period really. Why feed the people with chocolate when you can feed them lies instead? It was put back to its original design in 1999, although it didn’t actually ring again until 2012. And I can vouch for the fact that it has a very nice, mellow ring as it chimes the hour. – If you look at the time on the hands of the clock in the sketch, which were amongst the first part of it I drew, then think that I was still there when the hour chimed it should give you an idea how long it took to make. Well, good people, that’s just about it for this episode. Last night’s disturbed sleep has just about done for me, and I have a long day of travelling tomorrow. So I’ll wish you good evening.

Riga Episode 2

 Hello, and welcome to an English Fool Abroad with his Sketchbook, Spring 2023 Edition. Episode 2. Right, do you remember that I signed off yesterday telling you how extremely tired I was? Well, not that long after posting I lay down on my bed, and started reading. My eyes closed. Next thing I knew the phone was ringing. Now, I had to drag myself back into consciousness from way, way deep in slumber. It was my middle daughter Zara. I was about to ask her what she thought she was doing ringing me at this time of night, but then I though I’d better see exactly what time it was. Half eleven Latvian time to be precise, or 9:30 pm at home. So the rant I had ready on the launch pad was stood down. To be fair to Zara she wanted to tell me that my Mum and Step Dad are fine. She and partner Matt have been visiting, so it was nice of her to let me know. She did say that my Mum had shown her a poem I wrote about my nan some years ago, and that reading it had driven her to tears. I didn’t think it was THAT bad, but there you go.

So, then, back to sleep it was, and I woke again about 6am – which is actually quite late for me. Now I don’t think that I mentioned the showers yesterday, did I? When I arrived in the early hours of Wednesday morning the guy on the desk did tell me 2 things about the showers. One was true and the other wasn’t. “When you first switch them on, they will probably be very cold.” That was true. “If you wait for a few minutes, then they will warm up.” That was not. Look, these things are sent to try us. The way I look on it when you put that in the negative column against everything about the trip so far that has been in the positive column, I reckon I’m still well ahead.

I did confess yesterday to having a McDonalds breakfast. Yeah, I know, eating in McDonalds is not big and it’s not clever. So at about half past eight I wandered to the tram stop and took the tram to the market. Cheese pancakes and a good cup of coffee thank you very much. I mentioned yesterday that there’s a Maxima Supermarket which is part of the market complex, and so I picked up a few bits and pieces, and had a rather unpleasant experience at the checkout. My purchases came to exactly 9.99 Euros. I produced a 10 euro note. The lady on the checkout, who bore a remarkable resemblance to the late German actress Ilse Steppat (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service) looked at it as if I had just spat on her hand. I’d guess that what she said to me was – haven’t you got the change? –. She then proceeded to say something to everyone else in the queue, and there was much tutting until one of them changed the money for her. “Danke, Frau Bunt.” I said to her in my head and left.

While in the vicinity of the Market/Station area I’d set myself the goal of finding where the airport bus will leave from on Saturday. I achieved my target – blimey, listen to me. Achieved my target? I’ve been teaching too long if I’m even starting to sound like one. So the next thing was to head off and start sketching. I mentioned Milda, the Freedom Monument, to you yesterday, but I didn’t sketch her, so this was something I wanted to put right today. As I was walking , I noticed that I was passing by the Latvian National Museum of Natural History. It was closed, but opened later, and so I made a mental note. I won’t go on about Milda, but there’s something about her face which put me in mind of Christ The Redeemer in Rio.

Back, then to the Museum of Natural History. Look, it’s like this. I owe it to the 7 year old boy inside me who was mad about dinosaurs to go into every Natural History Museum I come upon. I have to say that – and I’ve been enjoying Riga so much that I don’t actually want to say anything negative – it’s okay, but not much better than that. Somehow I felt that it contrived to be less than the sum of its parts. Although there are four floors, the rooms on each are pretty small. I didn’t see a great deal more than stuffed and mounted animals – birds and mammals for the most part. Mind you, I did get the impression that the Museum is not going all out to attract and cater for international tourists, Nothing at all was subtitled in English. Even the Natural History Museum in Kaunas had English subtitles – and that and the Vytautas the Great Museum were the only places that did. Still, at least I did find an impressive skeleton to sketch. Bearing in mind there was a model of an orca underneath it, I’m guessing it was a skeleton of an orca, anyway.

Even taking time to make the sketch I don’t think I could have been much more than an hour in the Museum, which is a bit of a shame. I always think that the mark of a good museum or gallery is that you suddenly realise that you’ve already spent two hours in there.

Onwards, then and back into the old town. I did think twice about this bearing in mind how hard I found it to get back out of the old town yesterday, but hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained and all that. There were two places in particular that I wanted to see, both of which I was sure that I’d walked straight past yesterday without noticing. The first was the Swedish Gate. I haven’t sketched it yet. The Swedish gate is the last of the original 8 gates to the city which is still standing. There’s rather a gruesome tale attached to the name. back in the 17th and 18th centuries Latvia found itself caught up in the conflict between Sweden and the Russian Empire. Apparently around the time that the gate was constructed young ladies were forbidden from dating Swedish soldiers. One unfortunate girl was found breaking the prohibition, and she was allegedly bricked up inside the wall where the gate was being constructed. Nonsense? I hope so.

The other place in the Old Town I did make a sketch of. This is the famous Cat House.

Now, if you’ve ever read John Steinbeck’s “of Mice and Men” let me tell you straight that what Steinbeck meant by the phrase ‘cat house’ was a very different kind of establishment to the one in Riga (probably. I didn’t actually go in.) The Cat House is so called because of a pair of very prominent cat statues on the roof – one of which you can see in the sketch. There are two versions of the story about them. One says that the man who had the house built had been turned down by the Merchants’ Guild opposite, and so the cats originally bared their bums to the house to show displeasure. The other version is that it was the Town Hall the builder was displeased with. You pays yer money and takes yer choice.

Oh, you want to know whether I got lost again today? Well, yes, I did, although not in the old town. As you can see from the fact that two of today’s sketches show statues, I was having a bit of a sculpture day today. Near the Freedom monument runs the Riga Canal, and I’d read that on one of the banks there are several sculptures. Indeed there were. One of them depicted three young women, each of whom had forgotten to put their clothes on, doing a version of what looked for all the world like a game of ring-a-ring-o’ roses, facing inwards and baring their buttocks towards the casual viewer. The title of it was “Peace Dance.” Now, I’m not a good enough accent spotter to be certain whether the couple looking at it the same time I was were American or Canadian, but the man, who seemed to be of a similar vintage to me, made the comment, “Peace Dance? Piece of Ass Dance more like.” I do apologise for ruining your enjoyment of this episode with crudery, but you already know my fondness for schoolboy humour.

What, trams? Yes, of course I was riding the trams again. I was particularly enjoying some of the destinations on the headboards. Let’s play word association. If I say the destination name – Pinki – be honest, did the word Sminki also come into your head as well. If not, then maybe you weren’t a fan of the Fast Show. You probably won’t be surprised if I tell you that I got on a tram today with the destination Jugla, just so I could say that I was going for the Jugla.

There was no snow today and I dare say that it was a little bit milder than yesterday and certainly milder than Tuesday night when I arrived. Nonetheless, by the time I’d made the trolleybus sketch I was feeling the cold. Yes, I did try to do it on the spot, but I used a photograph on the Kindle to help me finish it off. When I did finish it off I was comfortably ensconsed in a Costa. And do you know the thing which struck me about Costa in Riga? It’s this. They don’t call Millionaire’s Shortbread Millionaire’s Shortbread. They sell it, but they call it Caramel Shortbread. More accurate but somehow lacking in poetry, I dare say.

You’ll be glad to know that there’s not a lot more for me to say today, other than to mention my second Museum disappointment. I did say yesterday that I was going to look in on the Museum of the Occupation. Well, I tried. It was closed to day. So I had to find something else to occupy myself with. Pizza as I recall. Well, there we are. Tune in for more of this nonsense tomorrow. See you.

Riga - April 2023

 Hello, good evening and welcome to the first edition of An English Fool Abroad With His Sketchbook, Spring 2023 edition. What, you didn’t know I was going on a sketchpedition this Easter? Well, be fair, neither did I until Saturday.

I will come clean. After Poland and Alicante last year I did think that I would not be making another trip until Copenhagen this July. Well, there was no chance of going in the February half term what with Jenn’s wedding. I did think about the possibility of raiding my picture/holiday fund and seeing if Jenn could find me something cheap and cheerful this Easter break, but knowing me I wouldn’t have actually done it. Then out of the blue, Mary passed a comment along the lines of – we haven’t got you anywhere to go set up for this holiday, have we? Next thing I know Jenn is ringing me up and offering me Belfast or Riga. Now, don’t get me wrong, I have no doubt that Belfast is well worth a visit too, but it had to be Riga. Which is a pretty bold decision considering that I know so little about Latvia that I’m still not 100% convinced that it isn’t the place ruled by Doctor Doom in the Marvel comics. So to cut a long story short Jenn got cracking and so it was that yesterday morning I found myself waiting at the bus station for the first leg of the journey, Port Talbot to Cardiff, Cardiff to Bristol, Bristol to Riga Airport, Riga Airport to Riga Central Railway Station, Riga Central Railway Station to . . . well, thereby hangs a tale. We’ll get there. Mind you, so did I, although I did my level best to get hopelessly lost. I’ll come to that.

The journey was pretty uneventful, although we were a little late getting to Bristol airport because the police had closed off the M49. But as it was the bus was due to get to the airport 3 hours before my check in, so no real panic there. Now, mine was a budget airline flight. A budget airline flight late in the afternoon. Well, if you’ve ever used a budget airline before – and no names, no pack drill. I don’t want them cancelling my flight home out of spite – you’ll know that they have such a short turn around time that it’s hard for them not to lose time as the day goes on. So I wasn’t surprised when we didn’t start boarding until the time we were due to take off. I was surprised it took us half an hour before we actually did take off. To be honest, they were a bit of a rum lot, this particular flight crew. I do not think I have ever in my life heard anyone speak English as quickly as the captain did on what I can only guess was his welcoming speech. It could not have been more obvious how much he wanted to get it over with even if they’d had little signs proclaiming it next to the no smoking and do your seatbelt up signs.

We got there. It was about 10:30pm local time. All that was left was passport control. Oh boy. Now, you know the way that when you’re in the supermarket, the line next to yours always moves faster? And when you’re held up on the motorway it doesn’t matter which lane you pick because you will be in the slowest? Well, this was what genuinely happened to me in passport control. The line next to mine was practically whizzing through – Next – stamp stamp – on yer way, son. Not my line. Oh no. I had the officious passport officer. The one who kept picking up the phone and making serious faces. The one who sent two people away into an office. The one who looked at every passport three or four times. When I finally got to the window she looked at me and said,

“Why are you here?” I considered giving the old Spike Milligan Goon Show answer to the same question, (queue silly voice)

“Well, everybody’s gotta be somewhere.” If I’d have given that answer I’d probably have still been there now. So I answered seriously, “Sightseeing . . . holiday. . . drawing, your honour. (Alright, I probably didn’t say Your Honour, although I was that flustered and knackered I can’t swear that I didn’t.)

“When are you leaving?” – Again, I felt like answering “I’ll get me coat” in a Mark Williams voice. Again, it’s probably a good thing that I didn’t.

Okay, so things started looking up. A bit. I found where the bus to the railway station left from. And there was already a bus there waiting! All I had to do was buy a ticket. Which was another cause for celebration when I found out that a five day travelcard is ridiculously cheap. Yippee. Nothing like that to gladden an international cheapskate’s heart. Now, I think that the driver of the bus must have been a fan of Bob Newhart, because he expertly closed the doors and drove off just as I was about to get on.

At this point can I heartily commend to you the benefits of having a travel agent daughter? If you don’t possess such and article, can I suggest that you get one? It was as I was getting onto the bus – by now it was gone half past eleven – that Jenn range me, because the hotel/guest house wanted to know where the hell I was and why I hadn’t checked in yet. Apparently their 24 hour reception closes at midnight! They agreed to keep checkout open for me, for a price. So all that remained was to get off at the station and find the guesthouse. Okay. Now the unfortunate thing was that the station was two stops before the end of the route. But it wasn’t actually called anything like the word Station – the Latvian word does actually start with Sta. So I had the mortifying experience of being kicked off the bus at the end of the route. Which led to the even more mortifying experience of having to ask someone for directions. My nearest and dearest will confirm that being a bloke I would rather almost anything than speak to a complete stranger. I blame my Mum – she was the one who taught me not to speak to strangers. Mind you, I was only tiny at the time.

Well, this stranger couldn’t have been nicer or more helpful. He walked to within what I found out was about 10 feet from where I needed to be. So what did your intrepid hero do next? Seeing no sign that resembled anything like the name of the place I was looking for I went marching off down the street in the wrong direction. Eventually, after asking for directions from the Hotel Ibis down the road, and ringing Jenn, she used google street view to direct me to the place. Now, on the booking it says the City Flower Guest Rooms. NOWHERE either outside or inside the building (and I’ve searched on 3 floors since ) have I found that name on any sign at all. There you go.

To be fair, though, I have had a cracking day out and about in Riga. Last night when the guy was walking me from the bus stop he made a point of saying, “It isn’t always as cold as this in Riga.” It was snowing and below zero, you see. I was tempted to give him both barrels in my best 4 Yorkshiremen voice “Cold? Cold! Oh we dreamed of having only a tiny bit of sleet and 1 degree below zero when I was in Reykjavik. Luxury!” But he did have a point. It was cold and snowing as I went for my McDonalds healthy and nutritious breakfast. Look, 1) the McDonalds is right next door to the guest rooms. 2) I arrived far too late to do any shopping last night and I was bloody starving. 3) They didn’t tell me the wifi code yesterday when I arrived and McDonalds has free wifi.

So, what have I achieved during the day? Well, firstly, not only have I ridden on a tram, but I’ve also ridden on a trolleybus. What do you mean so what? Now, I’ll be honest, if there were trams close to home – (the nearest ones to Port Talbot are West Midlands trams) and I used them all the time then maybe I wouldn’t get so excited about them. But who knows? You can see that I’ve drawn one of them, an older style tram a bit reminiscent of some of the trams in Prague. This is my ideal kind of tram, the type where you can stand at the back, grinning from ear to ear with every squeal it makes trundling around a corner. AS for the trolleybus, that was fun, if still not quite a tram. It took me to see Milda.

Milda is the local nickname for the Freedom Monument. Basically, it’s a large, off white monument topped by the statue of the woman, Milda to the locals, Mother Latvia to the rest of us. If you didn’t know she was erected in the 1930s you’d have been able to have a pretty good guess looking at the rather Expressionist style. So I’ve read the Monument stands where a statue of Peter the Great once stood, which ‘went missing’ during World War I. During the Soviet occupation quite a number of Latvians ‘went missing’ too, just for laying flowers at the base of the statue. I didn’t visit the Museum dedicated to the Occupation today, but it’s definitely on my list.

Once I left Milda to her own devices it was a short walk into the historic old town. Now, you know me, I like an old town. It reminded me a quite a bit of Warsaw’s old town which I visited last year, except that this seemed bigger, and frankly, a lot more confusing. I say confusing because whichever direction I thought that I was going in, I kept coming back to the Museum of Art. Now, don’t get me wrong, this is a very nice museum. It’s housed in the former Riga Stock Exchange building, completed in 1855. I’d like to think that the museum has brought more pleasure to more people than the former stock exchange ever did. I spent a couple of hours in there. The exhibition occupying the main exhibition space was a funny old thing on the Art and Culture of India. That in itself is not funny. The funny thing was that most of the exhibits were, erm, how should I put it? Younger than me. Much younger. Quite a few being early 21st century. Sorry to be pedantic but strictly speaking we ain’t even reached mid 21st century yet. Well, I did make a sketch of a Greek or Roman bust in the permanent collection upstairs. I don’t know that it comes out in the sketch, but she just seemed to have this expression on her face which seems to be saying “Ooh, would you look at the muck in here?”

I enjoyed the Museum, even if I knew very few of the artists whose work was on display. I did not enjoy it quite so much when I ended up passing the said museum 4 or 5 times while trying to find my way out of the old town. Mind you, it was on one such fruitless meander that I came upon the statue of the Musicians of Bremen.

In all honesty the only way I know anything about this particular folk tales is through the excellent Muppet Musicians of Bremen which I watched many years ago. This statue was actually gifted to Riga by the city of Bremen. It was the home city of the Bishop who actually founded Riga. There’s a number of interpretations of it, but basically it can be said to stand for the people of Riga standing up to defend themselves and what’s theirs, as did the animals, and also of them looking out onto a new world of new opportunities, inspired by the excitement of the times engendered by perestroika.

I did eventually get out of the old town, by retracing my steps to Milda and from just round the corner I was able to take a tram to the market.

The Latvian word for market is not exactly the same as the Lithuanian word for the same, but it’s close enough, so when I saw this was a few stops away I was definitely up for it. It’s a very large indoor market and the food section of it is fantastic. I had a terrific savoury pancake for about the price of a packet of crisps at home, so McDonalds next door are going to have to be bucking their ideas up if they want to get any more of my business, especially since I’ve been given the wifi password now. As if that wasn’t enough, there was also a Maxima supermarket next door to the market. Back home supermarkets are a permanent fixture in my ‘necessary nuisance’ category, but whenever I’m abroad I love going in a supermarket. When I heard Peter Kay’s routine about his Dad’s delight in finding a Spanish supermarket selling Cadbury’s chocolate fingers I laughed, but only because I was recognising myself in that.

I’ll be honest, I’m starting to run out of a little bit of steam now. It was about 1am when I finally got to bed last night, and it’s not that often nowadays that I go to bed much later than 10pm. So that’s your lot for today. Tune in tomorrow for episode 2 (Riga, this time it’s personal.)