That place you've never heard of

I would venture to guess that most folks in the US might find it difficult to locate little Latvia on a map. After all it is only the size of West Virginia. Having arrived here to the main city of Riga yesterday, I have to say, Latvia seems pretty cool! The apartment we have is right in old town in a great location. Good job, Bill! There is a sign outside that says " Peter was here" in three languages so we have decided that it means Peter the Great probably lived here and indeed, that he had our very apartment as his quarters! We are pretty sure it was his favorite place to stay. We are in the pink building behind the tree second floor.



I made a little video tour for your enjoyment but it is too big to upload so let me work on that and I'll get back to you with it. : )

We went out exploring a bit today. It's basically all reconstructions, since, like the other places we have been, it has been devastated by war.



There are still quite a few crumbling buildings. I think people were living in the yellow buildings in the middle, though.


Amber is everywhere here as it is a very popular commodity in this area of the world.


After World War One there were some dirigible hangers left here. Weird! They turned them into a massive public market. The first one we went in was all meat. It was pretty offal. That is a pun and possibly an oxymoron too! Darn but I am good! The next was cheese, bread and honey with elaborate candles made from beeswax, then fruits, nuts, and vegetables. Lastly was the fish market. I've been to fish markets before in Thailand, Barcelona, and Seattle, but this was intense. Honestly, some of the fish were ugly and scary looking, also they had tanks with live fish and they would just fling them out on the display cases wiggling and gasping, plus sorry, but I just don't think of eels as edible, even big giant ones. Well, there was more but I will spare you. Thankfully, we never found the squid. I was glad to exit and head out to the square for some refreshments.


Turns out there was some action on the square, people with signs, police and fire trucks. I was leery, as I usually make it a practice to steer clear of protests. Bill pointed out that there seemed to be an inordinate number of grandmother aged women in the crowded and they did not seem overly concerned.


So we sat down and asked our waitress what was going on. She told us the local teachers were rallying for a pay raise. That's when I noticed that a number of them seemed to be blowing whistles as part of their "demonstration". I assume from this that the coaches want a raise too. Interesting!