Adventures in Latvia
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When I brainstormed all the countries I'd go to this year, I wasn't expecting I'd end up in Latvia. France, Spain, Germany yes. Who would have known I'd fall hard for Eastern Europe?
I arrived in Riga, the capital, late Thursday evening. A young, friendly, very enterprising young Latvian man (along with a close friend) picked me up from the airport and drove us deep into the Latvian countryside. Highways turned to gravel roads turned to muddy trails as we arrived at Vaglani to a group of people, visible only by flashlight, gazing up at the stars.
I soon met Paula, Natasha, Virgil, Laura, Martins, Linda, Jacob and Kitty who would be my housemates for the next few days. We stayed in a two story countryside home kept warm by a woodburning stove, set on hundreds of acres of beautiful Latvian countryside. Over the next few days/nights we slept together, ate together, laughed together, sauna-ed together. We went from complete strangers to close friends.
Each meal was carefully prepared by Laura, often with ingredients selected from one of the many gardens. On Friday morning the ten of us went for a long walk into the Latvian forest to gather Chantarelles. At first they were tough to find, but before long we had gathered hundreds of small almost neon orange shroomies. These would become a staple of our meals to come, creatively sauteed with honey, or puréed into soup, or mixed into salads with herbs from the garden.
Another unlikely staple of our meals was a baby deer, affectionately referred to as Bambi. As a fair-weather vegetarian I felt it was my duty to appreciate this gift. (I am also chest-deep in Yuval Noah Harari's "Sapiens" and relished the opportunity to connect with my hunter-gatherer ancestors of yore.) Bambi was killed by a local hunter only a few days prior, and over the course of the weekend Martins and Laura would strip him/her down to her bones to create delicious soups, steaks, and tartare.
By now you've all read about Saturday evenings sauna ritual, where I and several formerly strangers got completely naked and were slapped/massages/scrubbed by older Latvian women in 150 degree heat, for five hours. While at first I was a bit bashful, by the end I couldn't get enough. No surprise here.
All of the above was unexpected icing on a truly phenomenal cake... the reason we ventured to Latvia was for Ezera Skanas, the annual Lake Event. At midnight on Friday night/Saturday morning, we piled into the van and drove an hour and a half to Mezare. When we arrived it was windy and cold and raining. I was grateful to have packed my Iceland gear - long underwear, thermals, ponchos, hats - not to mention the bottle of rum we consumed en route. We inflated our boat and set off for the shore. Then, Martins and Christ - who clearly established themseleves as our knights in shining armour- rowed us 2.5 kilometers through sideways rain as we huddled together in the back of the boat. Just as I was starting to really wonder wtf I was doing here, the rain stopped and I heard sounds of music off in the distance...
Slowly the sun crept up through dawn and we could see hundreds of boats around us, wading in the water enjoying the music and natural beauty around us. There are no words to adequately explain what a magical experience this was, so I leave you with these images....
