The past weeks...

were rather boring. I spent my days reading chapter after chapter and writing several essays. I did not really have the time to go out and enjoy myself. Besides, I also had an exam coming up. This exam turned out to be very difficult. The questions were mainly aimed at little details, which I should have read in one of the 800 pages I had for this course… of course. When I handed in my exam the professor said: ‘you did good… it’s all over now’. That day was one of the happiest days in my life! I could finally start enjoying my Erasmus. No more short module, no more intensive reading and writing… I chose to do an extra language instead. This module I will therefore only have Latvian, German, English and International Political Economy, which only requires another 3 small essays of 500 words and 1 big essay of 3500 words. And because I have no short module, I will have an entire week at the end of the module to prepare for my exam of International Political Economy, which then implies that I can merely relax during the duration of the module. Heavenly!

After I handed in my exam, I went to the airport to pick up Zuzana. For you who don’t know who Zuzana is: She is one of my colleagues at COST (European Cooperation for Science and Technology) in Brussels, where I work as a job student during the year. After her arrival we went to my apartment to drop off her luggage. Then we headed off to Old Riga, were we had lunch in Double Coffee. After our delicious lunch, we did a quick tour through Old Riga. Because of the cold and the darkness, we went back to my apartment for a relaxing evening in front of the television (Thursday night still is Popstars night :)). I will not mention the piano debacle, I will not mention the piano debacle…

On Friday morning I had to go to my Latvian language course. Zuzana was left on her own for a few hours, but she enjoyed herself by walking around Old Riga and taking pictures of the pretty buildings. After my Latvian course we met in town and headed off to the Central Markets. After strolling around, we took the tram to the big Lido. I enjoyed my crumbed pangasius filet with cooked vegetables. The evening was filled with going to the opera and to the Skyline bar. Together with Nadia and Julija we went to see a modern version of the Magic Flute, once composed by Mozart of course. It was great! Our evening in the Skyline bar was also amazing. Although I drank the same amount as the previous time, I managed to keep my hands safe from getting stuck between the door. I think it was around 2AM when I finally got Zuzana and Julija off the dance floor! Ha!

Getting up on Saturday morning was rather painful, but it was for a good cause. Zuzana and I would go to Sigulda, which is also known as the Switzerland of Latvia. We took the train to Sigulda, which was also a good experience. Getting in the train is not so easy, compare it to climbing a steep mountain. I don’t understand how all those old people get on the train… Taking the train in Latvia is really cheap; we paid maybe 3LVL each for a return ticket. After an hour or so we finally arrived in Sigulda. My first impression: Sigulda is empty, empty, empty. Without going to the tourist info first (which we better should have done :)), we started walking in the direction of a castle.

Our day in Sigulda can be described as a day in which we mainly took the wrong decisions! It all went wrong when we took ‘some thing I cannot name in English’ down the hill. We should have taken the cable lift instead, but we kind of didn’t see it immediately. So, we took ‘the thing I cannot name in English’ and we asked a guy working there where to find the castle we were looking for. He gave us some directions, but he didn’t really have the same castle in mind. So, we followed his directions. We crossed the Gauja river and ended up in some kind of forest. We nicely followed the arrow which said something about a caste. On the way up to the castle, we had to take a lot of stairs, which was amazingly tiring. When we finally reached the top of the mountain, we thought ‘what a **** hole’. The **** hole even had a name: Krimulda. There was nothing, except for one shop/bar and a building that once was a castle, although it didn’t even look like a castle. We decided to have a drink chez Milly. Zuzana’s coffee was all right, but my coke came out of bottle which probably stood there for a very long time…

Anyhow, we wanted to go to the pink castle, which we saw in the distance during our walk up to Krimulda. But how? Luckily there were 3 Krimuldian men chez Milly, standing around a freezer containing ice-cream (it is definitely something different than standing around a bar). Zuzana asked them kindly how to get to this pink castle. Surprisingly one of the guys spoke English and explained to us, well he mainly explained to Zuzana, how to get there: you go down and you go back upstairs, it’s a long walk, about 5 kilometres. The guy really invaded the personal space of Zuzana, at one point he came really close. But it was for a good cause :)

We left Krimulda and left for Turaida, where the pink castle is situated. It was a long walk :) We went down the serpentine way and walked in the right direction this time. On the way we even saw a cave, which is told to have healing water. There was also a lady selling gingerbread cookies and cones with caramel inside. The lady was really friendly and surprisingly also spoke English. We continued our way to Turaida, but this time with something nice to eat in our hands. The way up to Turaida was rather steep and we discovered that the pink castle is actually made of red bricks :) We were glad to have reached the top. In Turaida is some sort of open-air museum which contains old houses, an old church and an old castle. After having paid an enormous entrance fee, like 1.5LVL, we visited the open-air museum. The main thing we wanted to see was the castle and we even ended up climbing the tower. At the top of the tower we had a great view over the area, so it was definitely worth the hassle.

After that, we were hungry. There was only one funny shop/bar in the neighbourhood and we had to wait too long for the bus, so Zuzana bought something small to eat and we decided to walk back to Sigulda. Gosh, that was a long trip :) Instead of taking the cable lift back to Sigulda, which was one of the decisions we could have taken on the way back, we walked back into the direction of the ‘thing I cannot name in English’. But Zuzana had the amazing idea of taking some staircase which was built ages ago on a hill. The way up was extremely long and painful (I might be over-exaggerating a little :)). We eventually ended up where we had started in the morning. If the end is good, all is good! We headed back in the direction of the train station and took the train back to Riga. We were still hungry, so we went to the Lido in town. The food there is always great... To celebrate her final evening in Riga, we went back to the Skyline bar and enjoyed another cocktail. We were very tired, so we didn’t stay too long this time. I was glad to be in bed, because I was freezing during the day… it getting really cold in Latvia.

The next morning we set our alarm clocks at 6.45AM, which is very painful on a Sunday morning. We wanted to go to Jurmala, the Ostend of Latvia. We took the train and ended up once again in a **** hole. Jurmala was empty, empty, empty. Luckily, it was worth the trip. The beach was really calm and it just looked great. We had a little stroll along the beach and then we had to hide for the rain. I warmed myself by drinking a nice hot chocolate. We took the train back to Jurmala because the weather was too bad. Once back in Riga, we visited the National Museum of Art and surprisingly we went back to the Lido in town :) Then it was time for Zuzana to pack her bags and go to the airport. At the airport we had a final drink and then it was time to say goodbye. We had a great time together! So Zuzana, if you read this, thanks once more ;) Unfortunately in the evening I still had to write an essay for the next day. At 11PM I finally turned off the lights and went to sleep… and I still need sleep :) The weekend was great but very tiring.

So yeah, that was my adventure of the past weeks. On Friday my dad, my brother and his girlfriend are coming to Riga. That will be another adventure! I’m already looking forward to it, especially since I now have the time to enjoy their visit.

Some other thingies:

• Handshoes are really useful when it is cold :p:p:p
• Ticket controllers in the train are scary people; you wouldn’t want to mess with them.
• It is cold, cold, cold, cold!!!
• I found a studio in Lanaken for next year! Hooray!
• Did I already mention that it is really cold here?
• I’m glad that my exchange is nearly over. Riga is a nice city, the university is difficult but okay. However, I’m extremely annoyed by something... and this I can't name in any language.
• I should become a cleaning lady. I always seem to be ending up cleaning up after everyone else. Cleaning ladies at least get paid for their work.

That’s it for now! Hope you didn’t fall asleep whilst reading this huge blog entry :)