Last year, around this time, Rita and I were returning from our honeymoon in Italy. We spent a quiet Jāņi on June 23 in Vilnius, Lithuania waiting for our bus back to Riga. This year, I was happy to stay in Latvia for a more traditional and joyful celebration. Although with the current Covid situation, …
The Song Festival 2018 This year Latvia held its 26th annual song festival and 16th annual dance festival. These celebrations are held every 5 years, and I feel blessed to be living here in both the Centennial year and the year of this incredible event! I thought that there was no way the performance could …
Midsummer. St. John’s Eve. The holiday is celebrated all over Europe, but it isn’t really a thing in America. In Latvia, the celebration of Jāni (both St. John and a mythical all-father sort of dude who is supposed to show up on the morning of the 24th of June) is probably almost as big as …
16. Marts I just read a pretty good explanation of this holiday here… so I don’t need to completely rehash it. The basic idea is that this is a Veteran’s Day march for the specific group of Latvians who fought in World War II. The problem, of course, is that those men who were drafted …
Kapu Svētki Alūksne, Latvia 5-6 Augusts 2017 After renting a car and dropping off Gita, I went to pick up Rita for our trip across Latvia on the A2 “highway” to our overnight stay in Aumeisteri just east of Smiltene, where my father, Vitauts, is from. The manor was a last minute choice. Every hotel in …
Week in Review 7 August 2017 I have been away from the United States for over a week, and tomorrow will mark my first full week in Latvia. I had been meaning to write a post per day, but time gets away from you when you are traveling the bumpy highways of Latvia! Last week …