Lost in life and in Eastern Europe: Granma dancing ABBA

Riga, 12.6.2012

This day began just fine. It didn’t rain so the tent was dry and we managed to pack it quite easily, we were actually surprised how well we did that :D We decided to head to the showers and then go to the bus station to put our backbags in to safe, so that we wouldn’t have to carry them with us on the tour we were about to participate later. So everything went smoothly, we got rid of our bags and bought some breakfast that we enjoyed in the park near the place that the tour was going to start.

When hunting for breakfast we found this very strange salad from the store. It seemed like something with cheese and carrots, but it apparently was just cheese, cheese, cheese, mayonnaise and something orange. It was awful. It went to the bin. We decided to eat chocolate instead. Very healthy choice indeed.

So we ate our healthy breakfast and then started looking for the guide. We hadn’t read the information carefully enough, so we couldn’t find her at first. We almost started thinking that our good luck was going to turn after all, damn it. Then we saw that some people had gathered around this girl with yellow suitcase. It turned out that the yellow suitcase was the sign for the guide. Well we found her anyway.

The guide took us in the “real Riga”, which meant the other side of this tiny river separating the old town and the Moscow ghetto. So the part she took us was the ghetto. Sounds interesting, she told us that the name had something to do with the history of civilians with different backgrounds and their placement in the city.

It was really interesting to see the other side of Riga, because of we kind of explored the old town by ourselves yesterday already. The guide took us see many places, some of them that had a historical meaning of course. The greatest site (according to our opinion) was however the black market! It was amazing. There was SO much stuff, everything from computers, books, paintings to vintage stuff. Everything old from the last three decades you can think of. A real treasury for someone looking for old childhood things, great undiscovered findings or just something that you happened to lose the day before. Apparently you could find even passports there, if you know where to look.

After two and a half hour walking the tour ended and we decided to go and get our stuff from the station and chill out somewhere. Our buss would leave 6.30 pm, so we had still few hours to spend. We also thought that it would be time to get rid of the Latvian change we still had left, and we had already an idea where to spend it. Yesterday walking the streets we had seen this old granny wearing fancy red clothes and dancing slowly and elegantly to what else than ABBA! It was so great that we thought we’ll have to go and see if she is there again today. And she was! So we gave her some of our last coins. It was worth it. Go granny.

Then we headed to the bus station to get our things. We found out that our backbags weighted actually more than we had thought… No wonder they feel so heavy. We stayed to the station and sat outside, the sun was shining and everything seemed to go according to plans. I might have broken the law by feeding little birds on the platform, but they looked so cute. Now they'll be cute and fat little birds :) Piritta started to study things about Lithuania from Lonely Planet I had with me. Labas! Means Hi! I guess.

And then finally it was time to jump to the bus. Or so we thought. We managed to get in to the bus approximately at 7.00 pm. Then they announced that there is a technical problem, and it would take another half an hour before the bus could leave. Not good. Half hour went and still nothing. It has been two and a half hours now, and we are still at the bus station. I guess our luck turned after all. We will never make it away from Riga.