Friday, May 29, 2009

RIGA, LATVIA



My travelling tango shoe danced its way to Riga!!! FOR THE THIRD TIME ALREADY! Everything is different though...And some things are the same: the statue of Freedom is in its usual place, near the Laima clock.
BUT: 1. we have a new home in Riga. It's our third home and we like it very much! It's a brick house with spacious appartments and high celing. The only thing is... to go upstairs to the fourth, the last floor ( and, as it's double hights, it' s like going up to the 6th floor. No problem- great training after a long milonga night at 3 am or with two suitcases. We accept challanges!) But let me introduce you to the ' content' of our bourgois appartment. We were to share it with 2 beautiful cats. We definitely attract the most feline of the species! Look at Sabine in her favourite place for the intellectuals! Heidrun was other inhabitant of the ' cats' appartment' . This was no 2 change in our third Riga visit: a brand new organiser, a real German Valkyria!
Her ' right hand man', Reinis, had multiple functions during our week in Riga: a chofer, a cook, a Dj, a graphic designer, a leader- follower in one.
Cats loved our room especially when I hanged all the cloths for the tango fashion show.

Heidrun said they would miss it when I am gone!

No 3 change in this visit to Riga was an ecological factor about it. Let me present you our daily breakfast:



Home made butter ( sic!), fresh milk streight from the cow ( bought in the market), home made ham ( from the pork called Valdemar), 3 or 4 different kinds of wholemeal bread ( volkornbrod), free range eggs ( some green, some grey- remains from Easter time, Karlis was joking), fresh berry juice from the market ( a woman from the village is selling it) and herbal tea. On our special request we got coffee. Eco coffe, obviously! Isn' t it obvious that Heidrun changes this country' s environment and habits? If she is a super woman ecologically minded- it was Reinis at their Majesties Aisha & Victor' s service for breakfast time! 5 star hotel service- and no deadlines for breakfast- whenever we got up... Mayor Domo Reinis was there!


Heidrun is a perfect organiser too. We could never find a better one in the whole Eastern Europe! Our 5 days with tango was an intensive programme full of work and fun! Who designed and produced the posters & flyers- Reinis, obviously!



We hardly had time for walking around Riga and visiting it's charming old town. But we could not avoid dancing tango with one of our favourite backgrounds in Riga! The weather was splendid ( arranged by our German organizer :' there will be sun for you' , she promised). And there was sun.
But, but... who should be our cameramen?


Here comes an introduction our another hero, no 4 change to our annual visits to Riga!

Here is Rudi & Brigitte, a couple of our swiss tango students, who expressed their wish to follow us in our tour of Baltic States. But...they came flying their own airoplane! Yes, from their house in the Alps, Switzerland, to Riga! ( From Rudi´s ¨Erstens kommt das anders und zweitens als man denkt¨)

The plane is a kit model that Rudi & Brigitte built themselves! I would have loved to see Latvian yellow fields from above too!But Victor , my ' voice of reason' did not share my enthusiasm although Rudi invited us to fly with them to our next destination, Vilnius....

Another thing I would have loved to see from Rudi' s airoplane was this stalinist building that we see repeated again and again, from Moscow till Warsaw. It' s the most impressive monumental communist arquitecture, we have to give it its justice!
Three days full of workshops and milonga passed by quickely. Jurmala, where Heidrun arranged our workshops on Saturday & Sunday and a milonga with our presentation- showed us its gloomy face- it was cloudy and the sea was dark. Perfect tango weather!
Speaking about fun & entertainment: we loved the last point of the Sunday programme: ASADO at Heirun's made by Heidrun! Is there anything this Valkyria cannot do? Here we see her in action in the kitchen, assisted by two admirers: Rudi ( had to control the quality of food) and Valdemars ( distracting them with an article in Latvian magazine about tango and us)Rudi and Brigitte' s contribution to this latvian asado was a genuine swiss cheese, tete de moine, accompanied by the special cheese machine producing cheese flowers, a girolle. Valdemars was a guinea pig of the quality of cheese... It's difficult to prepare asado for so many people. In Argentina, the master of a ceremony is a man. But as Heidrum is a leader too ( in tango and in her company) , she had no problem providing splendid quality asado with an ideal grilling point . Even her salad was a delight ( any secrets?). Eco Delight!There was obviously wine, we missed so much! And our beloved Riga Balzam as a digestive!
Fantastic evening.... But SOME PEOPLE have to wake up early Monday morning to go to work...Next day, at noon, after breakfast ( thank you, Reinis dear) we were heading to another part of the programme- private classes for Rudi & Brigitte and Karlis & Dace in their lovely residence outside of Riga. They live in one of those enchanting wooden houses ( let's say properly- mansion house with tower, guest house and a garden) and enough proper dance floor to have a good tango session. It was a pleasure to teacher tango there, have a delicious coffee, cakes ( poppy seed cake especially for me) and laima chocolate as an extra energy supply! Next time we want to have a walk by the lake beside the house! Rudi & Brigitte were delighted to have such hosts and their appreciation of Latvian experience was complete! They invited Karlis and Dace to their house in Switzerland when... we are there teaching tango in September! TANGO CONNECTION RIGA- SWITZERLAND-BUENOS AIRES!The days flied so quickly.. we had such good time! And again, according to our 3 year tradition, we had a good bye dinner and a milonga at Dace and Viestrus' restaurant bar LOJA. Our sweet Dace served her best Argentinean wine. And delicous latvian food for us. Then we danced and danced and danced saying good bye till next time!
On the historical photograph above: behind me
Viestrus
Natalia ( our first organiser in Riga!)
Victor
Reinis
Heidrun the Valkyria
Dace

WE WILL MISS YOU ALL! AND WE WILL STRIKE BACK, WE PROMISE!

Accompanied by a bottle of Riga Balzam ( to have for the journey) and a bag of Laima sweets ( thank you tangueros of Riga) we were leaving towards Vilnius, Lithuania.
Brigitte and Rudi would have only 1hour and somehting flight in the same direction. Tango party continues in Vilnius!

"discover a nice new tangofestival in Latvia - Jurmala, directly at the beach of the Baltic Sea. Nice people from Eastern and Western Europe, great dancers, good organisation and and and. See further at www.tangostudio.lv"

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