White Riga - Latvia

I first came here, not with the intention of coming but just to avoid flying from Helsinki to the Finnish north. Not because I dislike the capital of Finland but just because I spend a lot of time in summer there and winter called for something different.

Riga is different, it’s a mix of St Petersburg, Prague and any west European city. The feel is medieval, the touch is modern, the people are friendly and even though it doesn’t always matter, they all speak English.

In the first year itself, the ‘Riga plan’ was appreciated by my people who had almost all been to Helsinki. For them, Riga offered a different take on the winter and white Christmas. It just proved to be the ideal stay, before flying off to the North of Finland where Santa has his abode, Rovaniemi.

Latvia is one of the three Baltic countries that were formed when the USSR went out of work. Estonia and Lithuania are the other two. The LATS, local currency here is stronger than the EU, perhaps the only country in the EU to have such a status. Economics has never been my strong point, so when I came to know that the financial crisis has not affected this country so much, I thought that the stronger Lats has something to do with this. However my guide made it very clear,  “we know how much to spend”. “ We earn one third of what they give in Greece and look where it is today”

Its true, even in the priciest of streets here, the people display modesty. The women too, can you believe it! Even the Burberry store on the corner looked simple. 

The food has distinct traces of Russia, and why not when half of its population still speaks Russian. Vodka, however is not a strong seller. The Balsam is, which happens to be a concussion of herbs and fine tuned to the fermentation process. I however stick to beer when I am here.

I always stay for a night and somehow don’t feel incomplete when I leave.  I just feel happy to have come here again. Riga doesn’t shout, it doesn’t need to do that. It just keeps quiet and lets you look at it, till you feel it under your skin.

As I said bye to my guide today, she just said, “See you next winter”.

I don’t know how I will feel if I ever come here in summer. There is an image this city holds, a feeling. For me Riga will always be cold with a warm inside.