Visa Rīga

Though maligned to the point of cliché in art and music over the past few decades, suburban sprawl is still an inescapable part of middle-class life outside of most American cities. Originally built in the 1950s on the territory of former farmland in order to give more “breathing space” to affluent young families looking to escape “blighted” cities, these endless seas of similar-looking single-family houses have become an cultural icon of the United States and are featured in countless films and TV shows.

While this kind sprawl doesn’t quite exist in Latvia in the same form, something a bit similar can be found in towns outside of Rīga and in periphery neighborhoods such as Bieriņi, the area we visited all the way back in early May. Though technically a neighborhood of Rīga, Bieriņi is almost indistinguishable to most residents from the nearby town of Mārupe.

From above it's easy to see that most of the neighborhood is a fairly large and standard grid, full mostly of detached and semi-detached houses. The main geographic feature of the neighborhood is the Mārupīte stream which roughly cuts the neighborhood in half. The northern boundaries of K.  Ulmaņa gatve and Rīga-Tukums railroad and eastern boundary of the Rīga-Jelgava railroad are perfectly logical, but the eastern and southern borders are a bit more interesting. While the map above shows an identical street grid system virtually indistinguishable between the Mārupe and Rīga sides of the border, you can clearly see from the satellite image below that the houses become less dense almost immediately on the Mārupe side.

It was a bit hard to decide where to start, so we decided to try to enter the neighborhood in the “horn” at the very top where the railroads fork off between their respective destinations of Jelgava and Tukums. Although it technically isn't part of Bieriņi, we decided to take the train to Torņakalns station just north of this point and walk a few short minutes along the tracks the get there. When we got off the train, we were met by Konstantin who would be joining us again as he had in Āgenskalns. Luckily, the weather was leaps and bounds an improvement over that day a month earlier.

We tried entering via a path that you can just barely see in the above picture that led from the road to the “horn,” but as soon as we got there, it became clear that it was strictly private property and that the path was only meant for people who lived or worked there. Instead, we walked a bit along the road you can see to the left until we got to Altonavas iela and were able to cross the tracks there. 

At the Altonavas iela crossing we were surprised to find some modern paintings hung on the wooden fencing. There was no information about who or where they came from, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were related to one of the art schools in the area. The tracks we crossed over continue on to Jelgava in the south of the country, and some dandelions were just popping up through the gravel.

We took a left onto Ārlavas iela, which seemed to be the main road through this very northern tip of the neighborhood. There was a wide assortment of brick and wooden houses no taller than two or three stories. While many houses in Latvia have signs warning about a “nikns suns” (ferocious dog), there was one here that warned that theirs was “nenormāls,” which can translate to either “abnormal” or “insane.” This area seemed quite calm without a massive amount of traffic, although cars did pass us by regularly.

At the corner of Robežu iela we found a small grocery store across the street from a cool multi-functional building that looked a bit like a small palace. We grabbed a few novelty ice creams from the store and found a small dog hanging out with the shopkeepers. We then continued on a bit further and came to a bridge that carried K. Ulmaņa gatve, the northwest boundary of the neighborhood. From now on, we would be in the main part of Bieriņi south of the major roadway.

From here we followed Tēriņu iela southeast, passing still mostly residential houses and a few small businesses. We took a small detour right onto Ģimnastikas iela and then left onto Ojāra Vācieša and then back onto Tēriņu iela again, following somewhat of an right triangle. This brought us by a forest that was part of the Mārupīte nature park that we would visit a bit later, where leaves were blooming everywhere. Building houses that looked like castles seems to have been all the rage here at one point in the not-so-distant past.

After a few minutes we came to the intersection with Ceres iela, which to the left of where we were is a fairly major road that goes on to cross the railroad tracks to cross through Atgāzene next to the campus of Biznesa augstskola "Turība." To the right, however, the road is much narrower and full of the small houses which led me to characterize the neighborhood as Rīga's version of suburban sprawl earlier in the article. We followed Ceres iela for a kilometer or so, passing by houses in mostly very good condition.

Although we had already seen a few of these “Man Te Patīk (I like it here) Bieriņi” stickers in some other places during out walk so far, this mailbox was the best example since there were so many of them in different colors. The sticker that says “Kaimiņš kaimiņu sargā” means that “neighbors protect neighbors,” and “droša apkaime” means “safe neighborhood.” There were also two stickers that seem to have been given to participants in the neighborhood's yearly clean-up event that happens throughout the county in spring. This is the kind of suburban patriotism that can be found all throughout America but is more rare in Latvia, especially a neighborhood of Rīga. According to a colleague who has lived in the neighborhood her entire life, this sense of camaraderie really does exist here, and neighbors come together for different events throughout the year such as flea markets, a race down the Mārupīte river, and the clean-up day. She told me that people will sometimes say “es braucu uz Rīgu” (I'm going to Riga) when they need to do shopping in the center, as if it was a faraway place and not the city they were currently in. She also said that, as the stickers suggested, that neighbors really do keep an eye on each other. Although she knew some people who have moved in more recently, many of her neighbors had too lived in the neighborhood their entire lives and knew each other quite well.

We continued down Ceres iela, passing by what we later found out was a massive buddhism and yoga training complex called the “Dipika Yoga School.” The grounds of the facility were absolute gorgeous, with a few small canals and buildings in a vague east asian style. You can find out more about the school here. When we got to Dauguļu iela we took a right and headed north until we came to the Mārupīte river. We didn't go any further north, but we could clearly see one of the towers of Panorama Plaza in Pleskodale off in the distance.

So far, since crossing the train tracks, our path had gone like this:

Along the Mārupīte is a nature trail that extends all the way from the town of Mārupe to the neighborhood of Torņakalns. According to Mārupe's town website, the entire path (meant mostly for cyclists) is 14.2 km long, although a significant portion of this distance is backtracking as can be seen on the map below:

The portion that we walked was very well-maintained and we were unsurprisingly passed by quite a few bikers on this beautiful spring day. The path was mostly either paved with asphalt or well-kept dirt.

According to one sign, the track would be closed on Thursdays from 5:30 PM to 8:00 PM due to a series of bike races. It said that more information could be found at ritenvasara.lv, although most of the information seems to be gone at this point.

When we got to the junction with Codes iela we decided to leave the path for a while and explore the neighborhood's famous “Akmensdārzs” (stone garden). On Ceres iela just across from the garden was a house that had quite a collection of vintage trucks and farming equipment. My colleague who has lived here her entire life told me that this kind of countryside scene is not uncommon here, with some of here neighbors keeping chickens in their backyard even to this day and other neighbors having goats in the backyard in the past.

In the 1970s, sculptor Indulis Ranka got permission from the Soviet government to set up both a stone sculpture exhibition park as well as a workshop to help familiarize people with stone processing. This project ended in the 90s when people began to reclaim the land that had been taken away by the soviet government, but the statues still remain and Indulis Ranka continued working here until his death just a few months ago in April. There is currently a community effort to try to reach out to the different artists who made the statues here to be able to create informational plaques that inform visitors who made each statue and what they meant, but many of them are still a mystery as of now.

We continued along the beautiful Mārupīte trail, coming across a wooden fence with some interesting graffiti and then crossed the Mārupīte via a fairly new-looking metal bridge that was inscribed with lyrics from various mid-2000s alternative rock songs. Here was a portion of the trail that no longer went along the river, so we had to cross through a section of more residential houses to get to the next section of the trail.

Our route along the trail, through the statue park, and to the final section of the nature path looked a bit like this:

The final section of the nature path brought us past a very modern housing unit, under the bridge of Ulmaņa gatve, and the grounds of Rīgas angļu ģimnāzija, a high school that was founded in 1919 and since the early 90s has offered an intensive English language program. It wasn't long before we came to the end of Bieriņi's territory at the train tracks to Tukums and the border of Āgenskalns. On the other side of the tracks was one of the only areas of Āgenskalns that we hadn't explored during our visit there. As we got there, a freight train was just passing by and heading towards the city center.

After backtracking a brief distance to Ulmaņa gatve, we had a decision to make: continue on to explore the northwest third of the neighborhood that bordered Pleskodale, or get some food and call it a day. In the end we doubted that we were going to find much different from what we had already seen, so we elected to walk along Ulmaņa gatve back towards Tēriņu iela and check out a pizzeria called “Ansamblis” that we had passed by earlier. This ended up being a fantastic decision, since at Ansamblis we found by far the tastiest pizza I have yet found in Rīga. Everything was perfect: the dough was just thick enough and not undercooked or crunchy, and the sauce they used wasn't ketchup in disguise as is the overly sweet “tomato sauce” that's used in many other pizza places throughout the city. The pizzeria also seems to be a supporter of local music, with concerts happening inside from time to time and various CDs and merchandise for sale. There's not much I can really say other than if you live in Rīga, like pizza, and aren't too lazy to leave the center of town, you absolutely need to come check this place out. None of us tried the burgers, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were as delicious as well.

And... that was it for us for the day. There was of course more that we hadn't seen, but it was getting a bit late and all of us were tired. We decided to exit the neighborhood across the tracks and walk to Āgenskalns where there were far more public transit options than there were here.

It's easy to understand why residents of Bieriņi seem to be so patriotic about their part of the city away from the city. It's worth taking the train or bus ride out here to check out the pizza at Ansamblis alone, but it'd be well worth your time to walk or bike along the path to Mārupe as well and to stop off at the stone garden too.

A few random observations:

Although we didn't know this all the way back in May, 2017 would turn out to be the coldest Latvian summer of the 21st century so far. We finally had a few days of weather that reached 30° or so by the end of the summer, but by now summer weather is already a distant memory.

I found out later that the Dominican Sisters of Bethany, a Catholic Order that originates in France, operates a convent in the part of Bieriņi that we didn't visit. The order was founded in the 1860s, and they've been working in Latvia since 1995.

According to my acquaintance who has been living in the neighborhood for her entire life, a number of well-known Latvian authors, artists, and playwrights have lived in the neighborhood throughout its history.

We didn't know it at the time (and unfortunately therefore didn't take any photographs), but we passed by the original manor building as we walked along the river. It is a brown wooden house, and has been restored by the original owners in last decade or so. I found a picture here, taken from ambermarks.com:

And that's it for now. Since May, we have also visited Bišumuiža and Katlakalns, which I will try to write about as soon as possible. Until next time, try to enjoy the last few days of relatively warm weather before the dark times set in.

Traditionally, Latvians go out to the countryside, build bonfires to dance around, sing songs, grill food over open fires, jump over campfires, make flower crowns (girls) or oak wreaths (boys), and do a host of other traditions and rituals. Many Latvians still go out to the countryside for this event each year, around 30% according to a recent study published. Līga and I went out with friends in the last two years far away from Rīga, and although we were looking forward to doing the same this year, we decided it was probably best to stick around in Rīga with our wedding coming up in just a few days. Staying in the city to celebrate such a countryside-related holiday is considered sacrilegious by many Latvians, but I also saw this as an opportunity to see how Rīga celebrates this important night.

The day before Līgo, we decided to check out the “Zāļu tirgu” (green market) that had been set up in Doma laukums (Dome Square). These types of markets happen here in the square every few months for different holidays, and feature artisans, craftsmen, artists, farmers, florists, and other merchants from throughout the entire country. As always, there was singing and dancing on a main stage right in the middle of the event.

One of the favorite traditions for Līgo is the making of flower crowns for girls and women and oak wreaths for boys and men. Traditionally, only unmarried girls are supposed to wear the crowns, but that's a technicality that's overlooked by almost everyone.

Uh oh... There was a guy selling reprints of vintage maps. Maps are like an electromagnet to me, so I had absolutely no hope. I left with a very cool reprint of an old map of Rīga showing all of the traditional manor territories we usually write about in our different posts. I justified it by telling myself it would be useful when writing about those places. 

We also found Līga's aunt who was taking part in the market, selling very cool silk scarves.

The next day, festivities began on the road along the Daugava's coast at 7:00 PM. We didn't get there until a bit after that, but we hadn't missed much by the time we arrived. As we walked toward the event area, I took a picture of Līga wearing the flower crown she had just bought in the almost empty central market with the train bridge and national library in the background. As you can see, the normally bustling 11. novembra krastmala between Akmens tilts (stone bridge) and Vanšu tilts (suspension bridge) was completely closed to traffic.

As we walked into the event area, we were impressed by just how expansive the festivities were. The first stage we came across had a folk band playing music designed for dancing to, and the crowd in front of it was being taught how to dance together to each song. This provided a perfect opportunity for people new to Latvian folk culture to dip their toes into singing and dancing for the first time.

There were different food and drink stands set up all throughout the krastmala, as well as picnic tables as far as the eye could see. The biggest shock of the night for me was just how cheap beer was going for. 500 ml of Mežpils (a very good Latvian beer) was just €2.50, virtually unheard of in any of the bars in Vecrīga. Although the event was designed to be affordable for ordinary people, I feel like they easily could have charged at least €4.00.

In the very middle of the event was a massive festival-sized stage where Intars Busulis and Labvēlīgais Tips would be performing later in the evening. A sitting area facing the stage had been set up for people wanting to enjoy the music in a more relaxed setting.

Further on down the krastmala were some different games set up for children, including a large memory flipping game, tic tac toe, and bowling. 

At the far end of the event was another outdoor stage with more folk musicians and space for dancing. This stage shut down a bit earlier in the night, but up until about 22:00 or so quite a few people were enjoying the music and dancing along.

My favorite thing by far about the event was how even though tasty food was for sale all throughout the area (especially traditional shaslik meat cooked on a skewer over hot coals), there were many fire pits which were completely open for people to use by bringing their own meat, vegetables, or whatever they wanted to cook. Many other such events would have discouraged or outright banned people from bringing their own outside food with so many vendors here, so I thought it was very cool that the organizers were promoting the spirit of Līgo and encouraging people to do it themselves as they would in the countryside.

Intars Busulis and his “Abonementa orķestris” (subscription orchestra) started at 21.00 and played an impressive nearly three hours straight, with just two short breaks. The show was a mix of his own songs and a few traditional Līgo songs thrown in here and there. He tried his best to get the audience to sing along with him, but there weren't enough people who knew the words (or willing to sing) for it to be audible. I at least sang along to all the words of “Nākamā pietura Depo” although I'm pretty sure I was the only person who did so.

In one large tent at the very far end of the event near Vanšu tilts and the castle, nearly a thousand people were packed in sitting around tables and standing, singing and dancing along to different Latvian songs with lyrics on projector screens at the front. The screens were too small to be useful for most of the people in the tent, but so many people already knew all the words to most of the songs that it didn't particularly matter.

At 22.30, just as the sun was going down, Intars Busulis paused the show for a few minutes so that the large bonfires could be lit. There were two large stacks of logs, one on each side of the stage. Men had been pouring lighter fluid over the logs for the twenty minutes before they lit them, so I think that most of the crowd were expecting the logs to go up in an impressive blinding flash as soon as they were lit. Thankfully, they had been designed in a more safety-conscious way as you can see in the video. The announcers reminded the crowd over the loudspeaker that the fires would stay lit until the first light of the morning shone over the krastmala, per Latvian tradition.

As Busulis and his orchestra continued, we finally decided to start standing in line for some chicken shashlik. Līga elected to get some fries as a side, while I went for the more traditional sautéed cabbage. All of the picnic tables were full as far as we could see, so we sat on the grass in true Līgo fashion.

After dinner we went back to the dancing area we walked by first, which by now was completely full with a mix of people from all walks of lives and corners of the Earth. We stayed for a few minutes but weren't quite in the mood for folk dancing, so we headed back to the main stage where Labvēlīgais Tips was getting ready to perform at midnight.

Labvēlīgais Tips played a respectable two-hour set that included virtually all of their hits, although I was a bit disappointed that they didn't play my two favorites Desmetais Tramvajs and Koka Klucis Konstantīns. Līga and I were glad though that they ended with their new song Frāzes, which we've been overplaying lately.

We left at 2:00 at the end of LT's set. Although there were still two and a half hours to go until daylight, we were quite tired and still had a lot of wedding planning to do at that point. When we left, the Jāņi fires were still burning strong.

Overall, I was quite impressed by Līgo on the krastmala. Considering that Līgo/Jāņi is a festival that is so heavily associated with the countryside, I had very low expectations for what would be achievable by this kind of event. What the city was able to pull off was a perfect mix of countryside traditions and modern convenience. I find it difficult to imagine that virtually anyone who came down to the event aside from those with horrible attitudes could have had a bad time. Although it wasn't enough to convince me that Līgo/Jāņi shouldn't be celebrated in the countryside away from the loud and busy city, I would highly recommend checking it out next year if you can't make it out of Rīga on the 23rd for whatever reason.

A Few Final Thoughts:

Līgo is also Līga's name day. Daudz laimes vārda dienā, Līga!

According to the city government, there were 100,000 people who attended the event, making it the largest known collective celebration of Līgo/Jāņi ever. According to Līga and my very informal and unscientific observations, a bit less than half of the attendees seemed to be tourists or foreigners who live in the city. Despite this, virtually the entire event and all of the music was in Latvian.

This event could serve as the perfect rorschach test for one's views on globalism. On one hand you could look at this event as a corruption of Latvian tradition being watered down by all of the modern influences and showiness, while on the other hand you could say that it's a successful evolution of tradition for the 21st century. You could argue that the foreigners and tourists had no idea what they were really celebrating and were just there to generically party, or you could argue that Latvian tradition was being successfully dispersed and promoted in a way that no amount of money could buy.

There was a separate event taking place on Dzeguškalns in Dzirciems which was a far more traditional Līgo/Jaņi that Līga and I were planning on checking out at some point, but we were having so much fun on the krastmala that we had no motivation to make it over there.

It's always amazing just how bright it is all night this time of year. Līga took this picture just a few days before at MIDNIGHT from her family's home in Jelgava just 45 km southwest.

The city council's system is similar to Latvia's national proportional voting parliamentary system. Voters throughout the city choose one “party” to vote for, and parties get a number of representatives on the council proportionate to the amount of overall votes they got throughout the city. Unlike in American cities, there are no “wards” or “districts” that vote independently of one another. There is no councillor from Bolderāja, for example; all members are “at large.” The threshold for representation on the council is 5%, so as you can see below only three parties held seats after the 2013 election even though twelve parties competed overall. 

This means that voters do not directly elect their mayor. The position of “mērs” works similar to that of “prime minister” in parliamentary systems, and whichever party or coalition of parties is able to hold a majority of seats and form a government gets to choose the mayor. In practice, this means that the leader of the winning party during the election becomes “mayor.”

Of course, just because mayors are not technically directly elected does not mean that individual personalities don't have an effect on the election. In fact, Latvian politics are quite personality-driven, with party advertisements and promotional materials often prominently featuring their would-be mayors.

Although technically eleven parties took part in the election, only the six that are described here were competitive in any way shape or form. Having only lived here for four years and only now reaching a level of Latvian competence required to watch and understand news programs and articles, I can't and won't claim to be an expert on Latvian politics. Instead, this post will mostly be my casual observations as a semi-outsider.

1. Saskaņa/Gods Kalpot Rīgai! (Harmony/An Honor to Serve Riga!)

We start with the incumbent coalition that has governed Rīga for the past eight years and was the odds-on favorite to win the election. Saskaņa is a continuation of the “Sakaņas centrs” coalition which originally formed in 2005 as an alliance between various “social democracy” parties and regional factions that generally represented the interests of the country's Russophone minority. Going into this election, Saskaņa was the largest single party not just on Rīga city council but also in Saema (the country's parliament).

Saskaņa is routinely accused of being a front for the Kremlin's interests in Latvia, as the party supports closer ties with Russia as well as issues important to the Russian minority such as official second language status and unconditional citizenship for the more than 11% of the country's “non-citizen” residents (most of which are ethnically Russian and migrated during Soviet times). Reports and investigations regarding Saskaņa's connections with Russian government money and influence are a regular occurrence in Latvian media, although like most of the Kremlin's alleged meddling attempts, it's been virtually impossible to prove anything of significance.

The party's national leader and incumbent mayor is the legendary Nils Ušakovs, who first came to office in 2009 at the age of just 32. In the decade before he became mayor, Ušakovs was an active and well-known journalist who worked for a wide range of Latvian media outlets. Having been married three times, his colorful personal life is a constant fixation of Latvian tabloids. You may have already seen him in a viral video that made the international rounds a few months back in which his interview was interrupted by one of his cats jumping onto the table and drinking from his coffee mug.

Ušakovs is one of the few public figures in Latvian politics that inspires the same sort of vitriol or devotion that personalities such as Barack Obama or Donald Trump do in America. While I rarely hear anything but apathy regarding Prime Minister Māris Kučinskis, people generally think that the mayor is either an honest and competent public servant whose done the best for Rīga that the can, or a cynical and insidious mouthpiece of Russian government interests.

For the past two elections, Saskaņa has run on a unified ballot with the small regional party “Gods Kalpot Rīgai!” This party was founded by anti-corruption activist Andris Ameriks after his former “Reform Party” that previously ran city government in coalition with Saskaņa dissolved due to an ironic massive corruption scandal. As is expected by an incumbent party, much of the advertising and promotional materials throughout the city focused on getting out the vote and “not staying home.” It seems like Saskaņa seemed particularly interested in shedding it's image as the “Russian party,” as some of its advertisements featured supporters with clearly “Latvian” names extolling Ušakovs' supposed achievements in improving city life over the last few years.

Although the other major parties didn't particularly coordinate with one another, there was a general effort to paint the election as a referendum on Mayor Ušakovs, who they saw as vulnerable after eight years of incumbency and lower approval ratings than ever before. 

2. Latvijas Reģionu Apvienība/Latvijas Attīstībai (Latvia's Regional Alliance/For Latvia's Development)

After incumbent Sasķana/GKR, the party that seemed to compete the most for Rīga city council was the new Latvijas Reģionu Apvienība, a party formed in 2014 as an alliance of various regional parties just a few months before the national parliamentary elections. The party advertises itself as “centrist” an pro-European, with a focus on developing regions outside of Rīga. Like virtually all major Latvian political parties, “family values” (marriage between only a man and a woman) is one of the “core values” listed on the “program” page of their website.

The party's leader since its founding in 2014 has been Mārtiņš Bondars, a veteran in Latvian politics as well as a former NCAA basketball player and president of the infamous Latvijas Krājbanka during the 2008 financial crisis. Bondars' image featured heavily in LRA campaign advertising, going by the quite optimistic name “Mērs Bondars.” Līga and I joked that he was so confident about winning the election that he legally changed his first name to “Mērs.”

In Rīga the party shared a ballot with Latvijas Attīstībai, Latvia's version of a libertarian party. Despite it's youth, LRA had already had some early success in the 2014 parliamentary elections with 6.66% of the vote and winning eight seats in Saema.

3. Vienotība (Unity)

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. When I first arrived in Latvia, Vienotība was the major player in national politics, and since then has been the largest governing coalition partner (Saskaņa has been the biggest single party in Saema, but has never been able to form a government due to other parties refusing to cooperate with them). Since then, due to a series of mis-steps and PR disasters, their reputation as a technocratic centrist party has been replaced by one of incompetence and inefficiency. Vienotība seems aware of this, and has gone through various attempts at re-branding lately. In case you weren't able to guess, “jaunā” means “the new” in Latvian.

For Rīga's elections, the party put up 36-year-old Vilņis Ķirsis and featured his picture heavily in advertisements throughout the city along with various campaign promises such as “4000 new rentable apartments for young families.” However, the material I got from “Jaunā” Vienotība in the mail a few days before the election painted a very different picture. 

Nasty negative advertising is nothing new in politics anywhere in the world, but this pamphlet had me baffled. The very first comparison between “Mērs” Ķirsis and Mayor Ušakovs is that while Ķirsis supports Latvian as the only state language, Ušakovs supports Russian as a second official state language. These opinions should surprise virtually no one, but it was strange to see this as the very first issue that Vienotība wanted to highlight considering that roughly half of the population of Rīga is either ethnically Russian or Russophone, and around the same proportion supported a proposed constitutional amendment in 2012 that would have changed the language policy. Even more shocking is the very third point that highlighted how Ķirsis celebrates the patriotic holiday of Lāčplēša diena every year (the day that the Latvian army successfully held off an invading force of Germans and Russians in 1919), while Ušakovs celebrates the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany on May 9th each year. The issue of May 9th celebrations is one of the most emotionally raw for ethnic Latvians and Russians who see the day through two radically different perspectives, and drawing attention to it on a pamphlet sent around a city almost evenly divided between both ethnicities is a curious decision for a party whose name means “unity” in English.

This pamphlet seemed to me like somewhat of a white flag for this particular election, and I imagine that the party is looking forward instead to parliamentary elections next year. Even so, it's strange to me that a party that built its reputation on centrism and technocracy would dive so enthusiastically head-first into identity politics and have no problem completely alienating a large swath of the electorate. Is this what's “jaunā” about Vienotība? The lifecycle of the average Latvian political party is notoriously short, and Vienotība seems like it's just about ready to go to seed.

4. Nacionālā apvienība "Visu Latvijai!"—"Tēvzemei un Brīvībai/Latvijas Nacionālās Neatkarības Kustība" (National Alliance “All for Latvia!” — ”For Fatherland and Freedom/Latvian Independence Movement”)

Yes, this is actually the party's name that appears on the official ballot, although it sounds long and convoluted enough to be the title of a Japanese anime OVM (direct-to-video movie). The party's platform is a mix of far-right populism, social conservatism, environmentalism, and patriotism that appeals to a lot of nationalists. As you can tell from the long name, many smaller similar parties have been absorbed into what is most commonly called “Nacionālā Apvienība” (or, when written, “NA”). NA these days has a virtual monopoly on Latvian nationalist politics; an rival upstart party called “No sirds Latvijai” (For Latvia from the Heart) has failed to take off despite an impressive seven seats in Saema won in their first national election (2014), and is likely dead in the water after their candidate in the second largest city of Daugavpils released this infamous “rap” video:

Before the parties that represented the Russian minority successfully consolidated into Saskaņa, NA's component parties controlled Rīga's mayoralty for much of the 90s and 2000s. These days NA seems content being a bit player in Latvian politics, having participated as a minor partner in the last few national coalition governments. Interestingly, mayoral candidate Baiba Broka is good friends with her nemesis Mayor Ušakovs' current wife (as you can see in this trashy tabloid photo of the couple attending her birthday featured in Latvia's version of the National Enquirer, kasjauns.lv).

5. Zaļo un Zemnieku Savienība (Union of Greens and Farmers)

Although ZZS currently controls the prime ministership and presidency of the country as well as many key ministerial positions thanks to an impressive 21 seats in Saema (opposed to Vienotība's 23), the party has never quite taken off in Rīga. This can be evidenced by the fact that although I received a newspaper in the mail printed by the party to introduce their candidates and platform, I didn't see a single poster anywhere in the city during the entire campaign. The party failed to qualify with more than 5% of the vote in the 2013 elections, and it didn't seem like they were expecting to do much better this time around.

While technically a member of the Europe-wide Green Party, ZZS describes itself as “center-right” which is odd for green politics to say the least. Since 2006, the party has been dominated by notorious oligarch and mayor of the 6th largest city of Ventspils Aivars Lembergs, with Lembergs even running for prime minister despite being technically barred from governmental duties in Ventspils due to numerous criminal activities. Aside from Ventspils, ZZS has been quite successful in many other local municipalities in the last decade, including the city of Jelgava where I work every day.

The Dark Horse: Jaunā konservatīvā partija (The New Conservative Party)

Although this upstart party founded in 2014 by anti-corruption advocate Juta Striķe had virtually no visible advertising throughout the city in the past month, there has been a bit of positive buzz about these guys. Their politics remind me a bit of the “liberal” wing of the US Republican party that used to exist prior to the “Tea Party Revolution” in the late 2000s, and they aim to fill the centrist void left by Vienotība's slow and steady implosion and provide an “anti-corruption” alternative to ZZS which is tainted in the eyes of many due to their affiliation with Lembergs.

Nepaliec Mājās!

Thanks to my Irish citizenship and being declared as a resident of Rīga, I was actually allowed to vote. Although I wasn't sure at first if I actually would, I decided that since I always tell my students that they should exercise their right to vote, I decided that I should probably exercise mine. Conveniently, our local precinct was located directly across the street from us at Rīgas 65. vidusskola (high school). I really had no excuse, especially since I was automatically registered to vote and only needed to bring my government-issued ID card.

I wasn't sure if I was allowed to take pictures inside the polling station and decided to play it safe, so unfortunately I don't have any photos to post for you from where the action was. Voting was quick and simple though; I simply handed my ID to the woman sitting at a table near the door, and she wrote down a number on a piece of paper and told me to give it to a man sitting at a different table down the hall. That man took my paper and handed me both an envelope and a stack of eleven different ballots that I could choose from. When I got to my “booth” (a table I sat at surrounded by two walls), there were instructions on the wall that told me to pick only one of the ballots and to add a (+) next to names of candidates that I particularly liked and to cross out any candidate I particularly disliked. This is to ensure that people can choose the party they prefer without having to endorse a specific party member they don't like. Finally, I needed to put that ballot in the envelope and drop the envelope in a large ballot box while throwing the other unused ballots in a trash can (or, I hope, a recycling bin). I waited a few minutes and watched a few other people drop their envelopes in the box before feeling comfortable that I would do it correctly. On the way out of the polling station, I noticed that around a half dozen election observers were standing around to make sure that there were no “irregularities.”

And The Winner Is...

Mayor Ušakovs! While this was the expected result all along, the election turned out to be a lot closer than commonly predicted. Earlier in the night before all of the ballots had been counted, Saskaņa/GKR had only around 42% of the vote and the “Latviskās” parties (as they were being called on TV) were beginning to talk about uniting in what would have been a Frankenstein-ish coalition to block Saskaņa from power. Of course, that talk was a bit premature, as the areas that hadn't been counted were heavily in favor of the incumbency.

A Few Takeaways:

Although the election was indeed a victory for Saskaņa, the 50.82% majority that they scraped by with is hardly a resounding mandate and a far cry from the 58.54% that they received in 2013. I don't want to begin to speculate on why their stock has dropped, but it will be interesting to see how they fare next year.

(Jaunā) Vienotība is officially on life support. While they passed the 5% threshold and haven't been completely locked out of city council representation, they received less than half of their 2013 total of 14.13%. News wasn't much better elsewhere, as they failed to win even a plurality in any of Latvia's nine cities. Things could change, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a mass exodus of top members to parties such as LRA and ZZS before next year's parliamentary election.

How about that Jaunā konservitīvā partija? With virtually no advertising throughout the city, they managed to tie for second place with the far flashier LRA at roughly 13.5% of the vote and 9 seats on city council apiece. The day after the election, one of their top officials boldly proclaimed on Latvian TV that they intend on winning parliamentary elections next year. With how quickly the winds change in Latvian politics, you just never know.

Turnout was higher than in 2013, with 58.72% of registered voters participating. According to various reports, the same was true throughout the country and it will be interesting to see if the trend continues for next year's elections.

So much for the social media campaign to “Gāžam Nilu” (overthrow Nils). When discussing the campaign, one of my friends who is a lifelong resident and lukewarm Ušakovs supporter asked, "are people so dumb that they believe that if they 'gāžam Nilu' that he will be replaced by anything better?” As is the case in so many other elections featuring incumbents, just enough of a majority of Rīdzinieki seem to have felt the same.

Christianity has existed in Latvia since Bishop Albert and his army of crusaders forcibly converted the pagan natives in 1201 (and, according to legend, founded the city of Rīga), but like most of the rest of Western Europe, Latvia is a mostly secular country and religion is not part of the majority of Latvians' day-to-day lives. Bāznicu nakts was founded by an interdenominational group including Latvia's Lutheran, Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, Baptist, Methodist, and other denominations throughout the country to try to get people into the country's churches on one special night each year. Since the event is religious in nature, its funded almost entirely by a special organization set up for the event by the participants as well as various non-government partners, with limited help from city government. This year, around 190 Latvian churches took part in the festivities.

Although churches from all throughout the city participate in the event (including Saint Saviour's Anglican Church in Vecrīga where we are members), we decided to take this opportunity to visit the new Catholic church in our very own neighborhood of Ķengargs that was still in the process of being built when I first came to Rīga in 2013. According to it's website, the land was purchased by the Archdiocese in 2011 and the finished building was officially consecrated in 2015 as Svētā Antona draudze (Saint Anthony's).

For readers in America it might come as a bit of a surprise that a new church has actually been built, as many under-attended church buildings are in the process of being sold off and many new churches in the US meet in unconventional spaces such as movie theaters. While church attendance is generally down throughout Western Europe as well, the Catholic Church is actually doing quite well in Latvia despite not historically being the majority church in the country (aside from the southeast regions which were controlled by Catholic Poland from the 1500s-1700s).

Although the events officially started at 6:00 PM as with everywhere in the city, the first few hours here were mostly discussions about faith and family in Latvian that I wouldn't have been able to participate much in due to my A2-B1ish language skills. We instead decided to head over a bit before 9:00 PM, when all of the participants in all of the churches throughout the entire country were to say the Lord's prayer at once. After, there was supposed to be a one-hour choral and organ concert that sounded like it would be nice.

The outside of the church still looked brand new, with the yellow brick not having yet lost any of its luster. It did feel a bit like the church had been plucked and dropped there; since older churches usually have their neighborhoods built around them as they were meant to be the cornerstones of their areas, this is an issue that virtually all “new churches” have to deal with.

We got there just as a rosary prayer was finishing up, so we politely waited for it to finish before we entered through the glass doors. We sat close to the back, right under the balcony where the choir and organ performed. The songs they did were quite beautiful, and the concert lasted an hour or so. Although I do understand the idea behind having the music come from above and be ambient throughout the room, I can't help but feel that it would have been nice to actually see the performers in front of us. Unlike the more touristy churches in Vecrīga, this one was only about 1/3 full and it seemed that most of the people here attended services on a regular basis.

There were about 10 songs which covered the classical era all the way up to modern times, some of which were sung by a local women's choir and some of which were performed by the church's organist. A few songs featured both, including the final song: Raimond Pauls' “Māte Marija” (Mother Mary), originally sung by Marija Numova as seen below.

After the concert, there was a five minute break before the next one was to begin. We decided to head home instead of staying for the next one, but before we did we walked around the church a bit to get a better look at some of the artwork. Like most all new churches, it still felt a little bit like the shrink wrap had just been taken off and that the building was still in the process of gaining its own identity and character. 

The last time you sped down Kārļa Ulmaņa gatve on your way to Jūrmala, Ventspils, Liepāja, or virtually any point west of Rīga, you briefly passed through Beberbeki just before exiting the city into Babītes novads. You might not have known this neighborhood by name, but you'll remember passing under a cool pedestrian bridge and seeing the “RĪGA” sign on the opposite side of the road. In fact, if you came back the same way and drove by the iconic sign, you passed through this small and sleepy neighborhood a second time. Heres the proof:

Of all the neighborhoods we've visited so far, Beberbeķi's boundaries most logically line up with geographic visual cues (aside from Rītabuļļi which is an island). The southern two thirds of the neighborhood are nearly completely surrounded by forest, while the northern third is bordered by forest to the northeast, the Rīga-Tukums railroad to the northwest, and K. Ulmaņa gatve to the south. I zoomed out a bit on this map to illustrate how close the neighborhood is to Rīga International Airport in nearby Mārupes novads; as you can imagine, planes were nearly constantly taking off or landing. You can also see two clover interchanges; the one on the top right connects the road to Jūrmala and Ventspils (Latvia's 5th and 6th largest cities respectively) with the road to Liepāja (the 3rd largest city), whereas the one in the bottom right corner connects K. Ulmaņa gatve with the road to the airport. It goes without saying that the stretch of road that snakes through the picture below is one of the busiest in all of Latvia.

We took the #32 bus from central station to the neighborhood's lone public transportation stop, “Beberbeķu iela.” The stop is named after the neighborhood's main street which runs along the entire northeast border of the neighborhood along the forest as you can see in the maps above. That cool-looking pedestrian bridge in the picture below was built by the city government after years of complains by residents who previously had to play real-life frogger in order to get across the highway after its completion in 1981. 

Unfortunately, this nice crossing isn't of much use to the wide majority of locals who seem to get around by car. While someone with a stronger arm than me could conceivably throw a baseball from one side of the highway to the other, it takes around five minutes to drive from the end of the northern section of Beberbeķu iela to the beginning of the southern section.

If you think that's bad, the way back is almost twice as long.

I had been excited to visit Beberbeķi for a while because I finally had an excuse to visit the two restaurants on the opposite sides of the bridge across the highway that I had passed by countless times on the way out of Rīga. We decided that we would visit one for lunch at the beginning of our visit and the other for dinner just before we went back. The first was called Grilbārs "Šašliki," named after the traditional style of skewered and grilled meat popular all throughout Eastern Europe and Central Asia similar to what Americans know as shish kebab. According to Google street view from 2014, the restaurant has recently been painted yellow with a mural of a grilling man and cask of ale. On the day we went it was just a touch too cold to take advantage of the outdoor seating, although we were curious to see the inside anyway. 

The interior was designed like a pretty typical North American roadhouse, with wooden benches and wall siding. Although some of the wall decorations weren't quite “authentic,” I think they did a pretty nice job of emulating the feel of the real deal. Our hostess told me that the place has been around for roughly twenty-five years (virtually the entire time since Latvia regained independence), and in that time the place had gained a lot of personality.

I can't say that the food was very cheap, but compared to other destination restaurants located on the sides of major highways, the prices weren't THAT bad. €3.00 is on the higher side of what I would pay for soļanka (the traditional soup that I get when we go to most neighborhood restaurants and use as my baseline for food prices), but I wouldn't call it unreasonable. Līga elected for the soļanka, but I wanted to try their main advertised dish so I went for some chicken šašliks with a side of veggies and fries which cost a bit more than €8.00 if I remember correctly. My concerns about the price vanished the second the friendly waitress brought out the American-sized portions.

It's hard to appreciate from the picture just how much of a mountain of food was on my plate. I'm an absolute pig and will eat more than most when at dinner events, but even with considerable help from Līga I was only barely able to finish everything. The food was quite tasty, and the staff were delightful. Between the decor, massive portions, and warm atmosphere, I rate their recreation of the American roadhouse an “A.” If you want to know what it's like to eat out along the highways of the rural US or Canada without leaving the comfort of Rīga, I'd recommend giving this a place a try sometime. Do it on your next trip west!

Although I could barely move after that feast, we left the restaurant and began our brief walk through the northern section of Beberbeķi. The restaurant shares a building with a pyrotechnics company called “Svētku aģentūra” (Latvian for “festival agency”), and they are responsible for the fireworks at many of the country's major yearly festivals as well as outdoor concerts and other large events. Across the large parking lot was a nursery called “Liepas” (the Latvian word for “lime trees”), which specializes in fruit trees and rose bushes. Although they started out in the small southern city of Dobele, they now have locations all throughout the country.

Now we started down Beberbeķu iela proper. As we were walking down the road, I had the uncanny feeling that I had been here before. Everything looked so familiar: a hilly forest on the left side of the road and various styles of private houses on the right. After a few minutes, I realized that it reminded me of the last road we had walked down during our journey through Imanta... also called Beberbeķu iela. The reason it seemed so similar in terms of terrain and architecture was because it was the same road, although car traffic is cut off from the Imanta portion by the train tracks. 

If you thought it was bad getting driving between the two halves of the road in Beberbeķi itself, enjoy the 7.6 lm required of the fastest route to the Imanta section. The moral of all this is that if you're visiting a friend who lives on Beberbeķu iela, triple check the address number in order to avoid making your life miserable.

The forest on the right side of the road is part of the Beberbeķu dabas parks (nature park) which was established in 1977 a few years before it was sliced up by the highway just like the neighborhood itself. Despite its name, the park is almost entirely located in Babītes novads just outside the city limits, which meant that it was unfortunately off limits for this particular journey.

We continued along the train tracks via Čuguna iela (the Latvian word for cast iron). This road was the “other side” of the Rīga-Jūrmala bike path that we had walked down during our trip to Imanta, but the difference in weather was night and day. There wasn't a second when at least one cyclist wasn't in sight, probably thanks to the good weather and the fact that this was a free day for most people due to the peculiarities of the Latvian national holiday system. The houses here seemed mostly fairly recently built.

Right before the edge of neighborhood, we took a turn down a short road back to K. Ulmaņa gatve. We weren't sure if we were allowed to walk along such a big highway (this would be completely illegal in the states), but luckily no police passed by on either side to answer this question for us the hard way. Regardless of the legality, I wouldn't suggest trying it due to the cars and trucks that speed by and made this a somewhat terrifying experience. From where we started walking along the road you could see the tall Soviet-era buildings of Zolitude peeking above the just recently blossoming tree line. Spring was in full swing with flowers blooming everywhere the eye could see. We also got a good look at some of the houses that we hadn't been able to see earlier since they had been hidden by trees, although technically they have addresses on Beberbeķu or Čugana iela.

And after a few slightly terrifying minutes, we were back right where we had started at the restaurant. Here's the trapezoidal route that we had travelled so far:

Now it was time to cross the pedestrian bridge so that we could explore the southern part of the neighborhood. Although Latvia historically hasn't been a handicap-friendly country by any stretch of the imagination, it's nice to see the situation improving little by little with things like the wheelchair/bike ramp in addition to the stylistic spiral staircase. From halfway up the ramp we could see the border of Rīga and Babīte.

Although the highway passing under this footbridge might not inspire the same kind of romantic feelings that the Daugava or the canal normally do, the guardrails hadn't been spared from the wedding lock craze that's been sweeping the world throughout the last few years. In Latvian tradition the bride and groom are required to cross seven different bridges on the day of the wedding, and what this one lacks in vista is made up for in convenience of location, as driving to nearly all points west of Rīga requires passing under here. Plus, with all of the forest on both sides and the the back of the RĪGA sign visible, the view isn't that bad after all.

The world needs more spiral staircases.

One more view of this beautiful bridge:

We decided walk to the end of Beberbeķu iela and make a loop through the southern part of the neighborhood before getting dinner, although at this point I was still so stuffed from the place across the road that I wasn't sure I'd be able to eat at all for the rest of the day. The road passed right by the back side of the iconic RĪGA sign which can be found at all of the major entrances to the city. At this point the sun wasn't in the best place for taking obligatory cheesy pictures, so we decided to try on the way back instead. Just to the left of the sign was an awesome house on the top a hill overlooking the sign and the highway that seemed to be abandoned despite its fairly fresh coat of paint.

This section of Beberbeķu iela wasn't radically different from the others, with forest to the west and houses to the east. The majority of the houses were quite modern, and there were few traces of the Soviet Union to be found aside from a large fenced-off area that used to be one the city's largest greenhouse complexes and grew a wide variety of flowers. The area is currently for sale.

The forest on the other side of the road was gorgeous, and it was very tempting to continue through and abandon the neighborhood proper altogether. According to the city's forestry service's webpage about the park, there are nearly 2 1/2 km2 of land with a beautiful network of trails leading to an old mill pond at the southern end near the village of Brīvkalni. We couldn't help but cheat just a little bit and cross into the Babīte side and take some pictures of the wooded surroundings.

We continued on down Beberbeķu iela, passing more houses, a sign warning for ticks, and a sign for Beberbeķu 9. linija commissioned by a firm called “Mulkomolka” with an unusual “.ru” web address. We were quite curious to figure out what this firm did, but before we went down that road we decided to follow Beberbeķu iela all the way to its end which was also the city limits.

Just before the border, there was a sign indicating the turnoff towards a village called Dzērves (the Latvian word for “cranes”). I spend lots of time studying maps of greater Rīga, but I had never once heard of a place called Dzērves. I assumed that it was part of Babītes novads, although the border of Mārupes novads wasn't far from here so I wasn't quite sure.

Later on I did a bit of research and found out that Dzērves is indeed part of Babītes novads and has a grand total of 36 residents. At first glance the boundaries of this village seem completely inexplicable; not only is the tiny territory completely indistinguishable from Beberbeķi's, it's impossible to drive from the rest of Babīte to Dzērves without going through Beberbeķi to get there. If any of you know how this geographic situation arose, please let me know. 

In the meantime I have one wild theory; Most of the forests you see here (and many elsewhere in Latvia) were farmland before the Soviet Union forcibly annexed Latvia, and due to the Communist Party's agricultural policies, most of these independent family farms were abandoned and new wild forests grew in this land. Dzērves was at one time almost certainly connected with the rest of Babīte by farmland, as all of the territory down to the lake used to be part of the historic Beberbeķi manor dating all the way back to the 1200s. Although the village should by all conceivable logic now be the outer edge of Beberbeķi, it's possible that Babīte has held on to these 36 residents for their taxes. Again this is pure speculation, so if you have the true answer please let us know.

A few woodland scenes from the edge of the city:

I did say that there were a few traces of the Soviet Union to be found...

The walk down Beberbeķu 9. linija was sublime thanks to the nearly perfect weather. It would have been easy to imagine that we were far out in the countryside if it hadn't been for the steady hum of K. Ulmaņa gatve to the north. We found “Mukomolka” at 7a, and unfortunately the premises seemed to be gated off and not open to visitors despite the friendly and inviting sign. I have absolutely no Russian language ability to speak of, but from what I gather from their website they seem to be an internet-based store for wheat milling and baking supplies.

Spring was everywhere...

As I mentioned earlier, planes were almost incessantly taking off or landing, flying quite low over the neighborhood. Although we couldn't help but notice this every time it happened, I wouldn't be surprised if the people who live here have learned to tune it out the way I learned to tune out the sound of ambulances when I lived in Boston next to three major hospitals.

The reason that most of the houses look modern and newly built is that, as I previously mentioned, this entire area used to be farmland up until the beginning of Soviet times. These houses have been recently built on top of the former farmland just as many American suburbs have been built since the end of WWII on former famland, although I'm not sure why this specific area did not grow into forest like the rest of the former manor's territory as the Soviets did not seem to have a specific use for this area. Again, if you know more please fill us in.

The final traces of Soviet times were found at the end of Beberbeķu 6. linija just as we were turning back onto Beberbeķu iela.

As we were balking back to K. Ulmaņa gatve, I insisted on trying out a rope swing that I had seen some teenagers swing around on earlier (a lot more gracefully than I managed to do). I felt like Tarzan, but I'm sure I looked a lot more like George of the Jungle.

The light still wasn't perfect at the RĪGA sign when we returned to it, but that didn't stop me from forcing Līga to take a cheesy picture of me sitting on the white metal sign.

In 2014, Rīga declared itself “European Wi-Fi Capital” since by its own calculus there were 750 people per free wifi point in the city and three free wifi points per square kilometer, supposedly more than any other European city. Unsurprisingly, there was no free wifi way out where this sign was, since a majority of these wifi points are concentrated in the center and usually in or around major shopping centers. Still, I guess it was worth a mayoral photo-op.

We passed a large bike shop called ZZK and went into Vērdiņš kafe, named after an old fashioned type of money from Latvian folklore. This place was the polar opposite of the roadhouse on the opposite side of the highway: modern, ornate, and quite pricy. Although I was still completely stuffed from earlier, even if I had been hungry €4.90 for soļanka would have been hard to swallow. Instead, Līga and I chose to get some drinks to pass the time before the #43 bus came to take us home. I didn’t feel comfortable asking to take pictures of the interior since we weren’t really ordering much, but you can take a look at some pictures on their website. The food looked quite good and the place is highly rated on Google reviews, but tonight just wasn’t the night for us.

Although at face value Beberbeķi is just another mainly residential neighborhood on the edge of town, I thoroughly enjoyed my time here and the pleasant surprises we encountered such as Grilbars šašliki, the cool house on the hill, and the rope swing. While the neighborhood is full of mostly new houses, it has a certain personality of its own that has developed due to its unique history and location relative to the rest of the city. I would love to return to visit the nature park in earnest, especially since I hear that the lake at the other end is a popular swimming spot in the summer. Next time you're heading west out of the city, it might be worth your while to stop and visit.

Random Observations:

According to what I could find, the name for the neighborhood comes from the word or phrase “Beberbekke“ which apparently in an older form of German means “beavers below” and referred to the ridge of dunes at the bottom of which a river used to flow called the “beaver river.” I can't find much to back this explanation that comes from apkaimes.lv, but that's the nest I've got for you.

This is the last neighborhood in the first column on the “Neighborhoods” page! Although that doesn't mean that we're officially 1/4 done with all the neighborhoods (that will be after Bieriņi), this still feels kind of significant.

May 4th is a national holiday that observes the restoration of Latvian independence in 1990. When holidays such as these fall on a Thursday, the government usually officially declares that a. Friday will count as a holiday as well and b. the following Saturday will count as a “working day” with the same schedule as the lost Friday. While my students are invariably happy to enjoy the long weekend that part a. allows for, many seem to conveniently “forget” about part b.

Because Atgāzene is so small and rectangularly shaped (and because it's easy to visualize), it's become somewhat our unit of measurement to describe other neighborhoods. In case you're wondering, Beberbeķi is a bit less than two Atgāzenes.

Winter briefly returned with a vengeance just five days later. Winter's my second favorite season after fall and I hate hot weather, but that was too much even for me. What you want to see outside when you wake up on May 10th this ain't:

And that's it for now! Our post about Bieriņi is on the way, and we'll have posts about both Baznīcu nakts (Church night) and Rīga's city elections which are taking place at the end of the week. If you've got exams to take or correct this week I wish you the best of luck in hanging in there, and for the rest of you I hope you're enjoying the beginning of summer that seems to have finally come for real this time. 

Last month Līga and I, along with our friend Justine from America, journeyed out to the southern edge of the city to visit Atgāzene, Rīga’s tiniest neighborhood. And when I say tiny, I mean TINY; at just three-fourths of a square kilometer, it’s 25 times smaller than Kleisti (the city’s largest neighborhood), and makes up a puny 0.35% of the city’s area. The neighborhood is shaped like a nearly perfect quadrangle, resembling something like a shard of glass. Vienības gatve (Unity Avenue, the road to Jelgava), Kārļa Ulmaņa gatve (named after Latvia’s pre-WWII president), and the Rīga-Jelgava railroad make for logical boundaries, but the neighborhood is so small and has such few major points of interest that its often included as a part of Ziepniekkalns on websites like ss.lv for simplicity’s sake.

From above, its clear to see that there are two major sections divided from one another by Graudu iela. The slightly larger northern part is almost exclusively residential and made up of smaller houses, whereas the southern part consists mostly of Biznesa Augstskola Turība, a few shopping centers, and the territory of an old sanatorium which now makes up a mixed-use business park.

Justine, Līga and I decided to take advantage of the neighborhood's two train stops, so we boarded a train to Jelgava at Central Station and then got off just two stops later at the “Atgāzene” station less than nine minutes later. I was very excited to finally get off at this stop, as I had passed it by thousands of time on the way to and from work in Jelgava but had never had the opportunity to see this area up close. The original historic wooden station burned down in 2007, and it was replaced by this minimalist “box” station. Thankfully what they rebuilt isn't as gaudy as the shipping container of a station that was put up in Imanta, but it's still a shame that the history was lost. 

We started down the appropriately-named Dzelzceļa iela (Railroad street). Like many of the small roads in this neighborhood, it was unpaved and lined with wooden fences of various colors. The houses here were mostly all two story or shorter, with a few exceptions. The only non-residential building we could see in this part of the neighborhood was a gated kindergarten with a sign that politely asked drivers to close the gate after passing through.

After a short walk we were at Kārļa Ulmaņa gatve, the northern boundary of the neighborhood. Here the four-lane thoroughfare crossed the train tracks via a simple concrete beam bridge. The wide walls underneath had given some local graffiti artists (and simple vandals) the perfect canvas for some artwork, although what we found here wasn't as impressive as that we've seen elsewhere throughout the city.  The three of us walked up the stairs to the bridge and then went out to the middle to get a view of virtually the entire western part of the neighborhood along the train tracks. From here you could also see the towers of Panorama Plaza in nearby Pleskodāle, Rīga's fifth tallest structures.

We now started towards the neighborhood's easternmost edge along Vienības gatve, walking past a historically significant oak tree and a Harley Davidson dealership. All of these thousands of times I had passed by either on the train or bus to or from Jelgava, and I had never known there was a Harley dealership here. The building had some very cool graffiti art on the back, with a “Riders of the Storm” theme in shades of only orange and black. It took only about two minutes to get to Vienības gatve.

Next we took a right and continued down the street a bit until we got to Ģimnastikas iela, where we took a right and walked back towards the station. Before this, we passed an advertisement for Hesburger, Latvia's version of Wendy's, and the headquarters of Tilde, a Latvian translation software company. At the corner of Vienības and Ģimnastikas was one of the country's 126 Fenikss casinos. Although Latvia has very few destination casinos ala Vegas or Atlantic City in the US, there are countless small casinos operated by multi-national chains that can be found in shopping centers, the bottom floors of apartment buildings, and nearly anywhere else imaginable. Although in general I dislike seeing these due to the social problems that I know they aggravate, this one at least had a cool wild west vibe to it compared with the hundreds of soul-crushingly depressing and anonymous ones.

Walking back towards the train tracks down Ģimnastikas iela, we passed what claimed to be the city's best hotel. Knowing nobody who has stayed there I can't confirm nor deny that claim, so if you're looking for a place to stay a night in Rīga you'll have to decide for yourself whether or not to take their word for it. Along the streets were more brick and wooden houses built at various times over the past few hundred years. Although we didn't know until it was too late, we passed by (and unfortunately didn't take a picture of) a house that the legendary Latvian poet couple Rainis and Aspazija lived in for a few years during the 1920s at Dīķa iela 11. We did, however, get a pretty cool shot of one of the new red and silver trains passing by at the end of the street. As we've seen in a few other places, someone took the time to transform an electrical box into a green totem pole using spray paint.

And we were virtually back where we had started. We had now seen the northern third of the neighborhood and had followed roughly this path:

We continued south along the tracks before coming to a small stream that required crossing. It was a bit strange how the stream seemed to intentionally go through this part of Dzelzceļa iela completely uncovered, as I can imagine that after a lot of rain it would be a bit difficult to drive through. As we walked, we got a few more nice train pictures, first an electric passenger one and then a pair of diesel engines hauling freight. 

We now hung left onto Diķa iela, where we passed by Rīgas Igauņu Pamatskola, a primary school opened in 1989 which specializes in Estonian language and culture. At the intersection with Atgāzenes iela there was a traffic mirror to help make the narrow crossroad a bit less dangerous, as well as a small house with a guard dog. I liked his style — unlike a lot of small yippering yappering poodles, he simply just stared at us calmly and silently as if to say, “we both understand that I'm an intimidating rottweiler and that you aren't going to come over here, so let's skip the barking part and keep it at that.” 

We turned down the cobblestone Atgāzenes iela, walking by some more houses before briefly wandering onto the grounds of the Igauņu Pamatskola. We also passed by what seemed to be one of Rīgas Satiksme's (the city's public transit company) offices and another traffic mirror that provided the opportunity for a selfie of sorts. 

Of all the streets in Atgāzene, this was probably the most scenic in terms of the cobblestones and colorful wooden houses. One of the houses had a rare Soviet-era sign with the street name in both Latvian and Russian. It's fitting that the street is named “Atgāzenes iela,” because it really sums up the feel of the entire neighborhood quite well. After a short walk we were back at Vienības gatve.

Back almost exactly where we had turned onto Ģimnastikas iela, we again continued south towards Rīga's city limits. We passed more old brick and wooden houses before coming to a large business park called 87 Vienības gatve, which consists of the old buildings from an 1890s sanatorium. Unfortunately, the gate to the business park was closed since it was a Sunday, otherwise we would have wanted to walk around the park and take some pictures since it looked quite nice. Before the intersection with Graudu iela, we also saw a cool wire frame sculpture of a hand holding a paintbrush outside of a home improvement shop as well as some very colorful bird houses.

On the right side of Graudu iela we passed a discount goods store, a music school, and a floral therapy firm. The left side of the street was dominated by the buildings of Biznesa augstskola Turība, known in English as “Turība University.” This private college is the largest business school in the country, and although it used to have an unfair reputation as a “pay for a degree” type of school, all of my friends who have gone there have told me that they were quite satisfied with their studies. The university even paid for its own infill train station, a great deal for both the school in terms of convenience for students to travel there and for Pasažieru vilciens since aside from the Jelgava, Riga and Olaine stops, its one of the ones the people most consistently use.

Since Ģimnastiskas iela, our route had looked like this:

At this point we were all quite cold and hungry, so we wandered down Bikstu iela to the shopping center anchored by Maxima XX where we found a “Pica Lulu,” one of the city's most popular pizza chains. Of all of the city's pizza options, Lulu is one of my favorites. They do pizza dough very well, but like most places in Latvia, the tomato sauce is far too sweet. In fact, I once got into an argument with my students over whether there was any difference between ketchup and tomato sauce. Sadly, for most of Latvia's tomato sauces there is very little difference (aside from Rundāle, which is the only one I ever buy). I absolutely loved the wallpaper where we were sitting. It's nothing special for pizza places to have stylized urban scenes on the wall, but what I love is that instead of showing Paris or New York or some other cliched global city they have a stylized Soviet block house similar to the ones found all throughout the city (and especially the adjacent neighborhood of Ziepniekkalns). Many people dismiss Soviet block housing as a simple eyesore best to be ignored, so I like how they not only acknowledged it but did something cool and creative with it. Lulu has 24 hour delivery all throughout the city, so if you have a pizza craving at two in the morning you know who to call.

After having eaten and warmed up, we continued down into the final stretch of Atgāzene. Walking back to Vienības gatve, we passed a fireworks shop and a McDonalds before coming to a Rīgas Satiksme client center which seems like also used to be the terminus and turn-around for a trolleybus line. Next to the loop was a large stone marker that used to demarcate the city's border. It was a bit further to Ābolu iela, the current southern border of both Atgāzene and Rīga itself (at least on this side of Vienības gatve).

We turned right onto Ābolu iela (Apple street), the southern boundary of Atgāzene, as well as one of Rīga's borders with the town of Mārupe. Although the left side of the road was technically Mārupe and the right side Rīga, it would be virtually impossible for a casual passer-by to guess that there was a boundary here as both sides look geographically and architecturally identical. At the end of the road, we took a right and started heading back towards the BA Turība train station where we waited just a few minutes before the yellow and blue electric engine rolled up to the platform to take us back home. In that time that we waited, Līga took pictures of some snowdrop flowers that had just barely started to bloom. Despite the grey and cold, there was hope that spring was just around the corner (or at least so we thought).

Our final route had gone like this:

Although it was so small, Atgāzene really did have a different feel to it compared to the surrounding areas with its small houses, dirt roads, and urban feel to it. While nearby Bieriņi and Mārupe also have similarly small houses, they feel much more suburban whereas Atgāzene has this certain sense to it where you really know that you're in the city. That's not to say that it's not a calm and peaceful place by any means, and I imagine that its 1600 or so full-time residents enjoy life there. If you're looking for a low-key and tranquil neighborhood to have a nice walk through, this might be an option: just make sure to take the train.

A few random observations:

Thanks to its minuscule size, I feel that this is the neighborhood that we were able to explore and document in the greatest detail. There were just a few streets that we didn't walk down in entirety, and those that we didn't we were able to see virtually end-to-end from where we were standing. Compared to this, our walk through Kleisti was quite incomplete. It feels a bit presumptuous to say that “I've seen all of Atgāzene” after just one visit, but in this case that might actually be possible. 

For all of the massive neighborhoods in Rīga lacking passenger train service (Purvciems, Bolderāja, Āgenskalns, ect), Atgāzene is almost comically overserved by rail transit. With 2.6 stations per square kilometer (yes, sadly I did the math), I'm going to go out on a limb and say that it's the neighborhood with by far the most train stations compared to its size. Better yet for rail commuters, the Rīga-Jelgava line is one of the busiest routes in the country, with trains in either direction at least once an hour and often more depending on the time of day.

The April that came just a few days after this walk was one of the strangest Latvia has ever seen. We had a lot of false starts to spring, followed by bursts of snow (!) at the end of the month. One one hand I feel bad that my Fulbright colleagues (including Justine) probably got a bad impression of Latvia weather-wise this year with a green Christmas and a white Easter, but on the more selfish other hand I've barely had any seasonal allergies this year.

Special thanks to Justine for exploring with us, who was a very good sport despite the cold and cloudy weather!

And that does it for Atgāzene. The next two neighborhoods that we just visited, Beberbeķi and Bieriņi, were done so on warm and sunny days, so the pictures for those will look far less gloomy than Āgenskalns and Atgāzene did. Till next time, let's hope that spring is finally here to stay, and make sure to wish Latvia good luck in the International Ice Hockey Federation World Championships in France and Germany over the next few weeks!

1. “Mana Dienišķā Dziesma” by Pērkons: 

One of Latvia’s most popular and controversial Soviet-era stadium rock groups, Pērkons (thunder) released “Mana Dienišķā Dziesma” (my everyday song) in 1988 after having already been banned and un-banned by the Soviet government twice. The first half of the song recounts the narrator standing by the trolleybus stop and watching people get on and off. The song was a hit and still gets played on the radio today, and the style is very typical of Latvian rock music from just before the collapse of the USSR.

2. “Desmetais Tramvajs” by Labvēlīgais Tips

Latvia's beloved goofballs Labvēlīgais Tips regularly release songs with subjects as ordinary as a useless piece of wood named Konstantin (their attempt to get to Eurovision) or as absurd as an omnibus that drives through people's gardens and destroys their vegetables. Therefore, it's no surprise that in 1999 they released this classic ode to the #10 tram that drives everyday from Bišumuiža to the center. To give you an idea of the lyrics, here's the chorus:

The tenth tram, two-track splendor Take me away for two weeks The tenth tram, our hearts beat together Come and sit in this wagon of dreams

There's no ironic or sarcastic meaning behind their lyrics, it's meant to more or less be taken at its silly face value as with most of their songs. The style and instrumentation is fairly typical of the modern Latvian pop music commonly found on Radio 2.

3. “Daļa Rīgas” by Astro'n'out

This one is a little bit of a stretch, but Astro'n'out's breakout ode to Maskačka, Rīga's most unfairly maligned neighborhood, features the lyric “piecpadsmitais trolejbuss jau leģendārs” (the fifteenth trolleybus is already legendary). The #15 trolleybus which I take to and from Ķengarags every day is indeed legendary, and something I will be writing about in the near future. I like this song a lot because it's nice to hear something positive about Maskačka which has undergone a lot of positive development lately, and not just the kind of “urban renewal” that's code language for tearing down old buildings and replacing them with unaffordable modern monstrosities like in many other parts of the city. In fact, when this song was released more than ten years ago it was quite ahead of its time, as Maskačka's renewal had only just begun. While the neighborhood's condition and reputation has improved quite a bit since then, unfortunately the same can't quite be said about the #15 trolleybus... 

4. “Tramvajs” by Dziļi Violets

My personal favorite in the list, this short and uber-minimalist post-rock ballad is based around the following simple lyrics:

Everyday the tram  routine is to drive Along the one same path But he dreams that he'll one day have tires And be able to drive away

The words might seem a bit silly out of context, but they go perfectly when paired with the sparse piano and post-rock guitar. The fact that the lead singer is able to nearly flawlessly impersonate a trumpet with his mouth is only the icing on the cake for this song, and the guitarist saying the names of the #6 tram stops as the song fades out completes the effect. At first I wasn’t sure if the lyrics were meant to be tongue-in-cheek like the typical Labvēlīgais Tips track, but after listening to a few more of this relatively new band’s songs it seems that they’re likely serious about using the image of this tram stuck on the same tracks everyday dreaming of tires as a metaphor for how many of us wish that we could break out of our daily grinds and find somewhere better. Most impressive to me is the mood and message that they were able to achieve in just more than two minutes, although I’m pretty sure that now I’ll never be able to take the #6 tram again without feeling at least a bit melancholy.

5. “Nākamā Pieturā — Depo” by Intars Busulis

The most recent on this list and the one that inspired me to make this list in the first place, this melodramatic power ballad sung by Intars Busulis was penned by legendary Latvian poet and lyricist Māra Zālīte, who wrote the Lāčplesis rock opera among her many other works. Busulis has been quite successful in Russia thanks to his dramatic style typical of Russian pop music (as well as his appearances on Russian TV contests), and this lead single and title track off of his 2017 album is no exception. 

The narrator recounts the moment he is sitting on a tram “like a full bottle” where everyone is coughing, and out of the corner of his eye he sees “her.” He instantly falls in love when he looks into her “eyes as warm as home,” and wants to change the entire world just for her. Of course, just as quickly as she bursts into his world, she gets off at the next stop - “Depo.” He rushes off the tram after her, but when he steps onto the boulevard he sees that she's greeted by another man waiting for her with a “kiss that lasted as long as hell.” All alone, he gets back on the tram. Cheesy and cliché-ridden for sure, but any song that can derive so much emotion and drama from a ride on the #7 tram is a rousing success in my book. The album that this song is from will be out soon, so if you enjoy this type of music I would check it out.

While the Rīga-Tukums line makes for a logical southwest border and the rivers clearly cut the neighborhood off from the rest of the city, the other borders seem a bit arbitrary and fuzzy. This is even more apparent when looking from above. Many people refer to a much greater area than just that in the red lines as “Āgenskalns,” while others might consider much of that northern area above Kalnciema iela part of of Zasulauks.

The good news was that we would be exploring Āgenskalns with our friend Konstantin, a life-long resident of Rīga with an encyclopedic knowledge of the history of the city’s buildings thanks to many hours spent researching online and in the city’s archives. Even better, he’s from the neighboring region of Zasulauks just to the northwest, so he was able to provide us with particularly generous wealth of information about Āgenskalns. The bad news was that the only day that him, Līga and I could all go together happened to be the one rainy day in a string of otherwise perfectly sunny and relatively warm days. While Konstantin’s philosophy was that this part of Rīga looks good even in gray and drizzly weather, I feel a bit bad that we weren’t able to do this beautiful neighborhood justice with such dreary backdrop.

Līga was a bit busy earlier in the day, so I met Konstantin by myself first to check out the area by the river before she would join up with us a bit later. I got on a #3 bus from the station and took it just two stops before getting off at the Nacionalā bibliotēka (national library) stop where I met up with Konstantin.

We started on towards the river, walking first by a beautiful pinkish pre-war building that Konstantin told us was used by the Soviet government as a teacher training academy. Apparently during Soviet times teachers were not required to have a university-level education, so it was something more akin to today’s trade schools. To the immediate left was what looked at first like a newly renovated pre-war building until Konstantin told me about the interesting history behind it. Apparently it was a derelict abandoned building before Latvia hosted the EU Council presidency back in early 2015. Since the library across the street was to be used to host dignitaries throughout the six months, the city ordered the owners to give the building a facelift, resulting in a freshly painted skeleton. I couldn’t believe this until we got closer and I was able to see inside for myself.

It’s inconceivable to me that this prime real estate so close to the river and tram lines had not been properly renovated by some savvy developer, but there are many other situations just like this throughout the city. Across the street was a somewhat unusually decorative Hruščovka with an interesting brick pattern. I might not have mentioned it previously, but one interesting thing about at least the brick version of these Soviet projects is that the year is usually inscribed at the top using differently colored bricks.

Continuing down the road, we came to an abandoned old police station across the street from a 90s-era housing construction. As is the problem with nearly any city in the world, it was sad to see such a beautiful structure fall into a state of disrepair which at this point would probably prevent it from being reconstructed in an economically efficient way. Its juxtaposition across from those modern condos were a bit poignant in illustrating how preservation can be lost as an urban priority.

Just a bit further on, we crossed onto the AB Dambis, a large jetty first constructed from wood in the 1880s to regulate the Daugava's flow and for loading and unloading boats. The structure was destroyed by the German army during WWII before being reconstructed in its current form by the Soviet army. If you're interested in learning more about it's history, you can check out this post from Cita Rīga (in Latvian, but can be translated). We walked out to the furthest point and took a few pictures of Vecrīga's skyline and of where we would soon be walking in Āgenskalns.

I got a call from Līga who said that she would meet us soon at the same libary bus stop where I had met Konstantin, so we started heading back in that direction. After waiting about ten minutes at the bus stop, we finally met up with Līga and started down the gray brick road of Valguna iela. To get there we passed under a concrete residential building which like a few others in the neighborhood had been constructed over the road itself. According to Konstantin, this was an “experimental” residential project which was not replicated due to its uncomfortably cramped living conditions and non-intuitive navigation on the inside. Along this road were a row of Stalin-era buildings on the left and some older wooden ones on the right.

To our right there was a building which Konstantin pointed out was built on top of what had previously been part of Staraja Rusas iela, one of the only remaining streets in the city with a Russian name. While it's no longer officially part of that road (at least according to Google maps), it was interesting to see that some history-conscious person had written the name of the street above the driveway to preserve its memory. We also passed a what seemed to be somewhat nightmarish pre-school/kindergarten, along with a fairly scary balcony.

We came to the end of Valgumu iela, and before turning right onto Trijādības iela, we saw what Konstantin said had been a riverboat repair facility before being abandoned. We walked down Trijādības iela towards the river, seeing on our right a typical back yard with trees benches that are very commonly seen next to buildings built in the first half of the 20th century all the way up until the end of Stalin's time. A graffiti ghost on the wall seemed worried or upset about something; maybe we had gotten too close...

Unforunately we couldn't get any closer to the river since the construction area we had seen from AB Dambis was gated off, but Konstantin pointed out one very interesting building before we left. I wouldn't have noticed it on my own, but the two-story house was built in the traditional Latvian style that can be seen throughout the countryside, with the roof slanting on all four sides. Generally these houses are made of wood, so it was a bit unusual to see one here made of brick, further adding to my impression of Āgenskalns as one large architectural gallery. We passed by Latvia's sea administration and a modern apartment complex before coming again to the abandoned riverboat factory as well as a row of very typical brick hruščovkas and another scary-looking kindergarten. 

We took a right onto Raņķa dambis, which quickly turned into Daugavgrīvas iela. Although winter was more or less over, the cove of Zunds canal still had a thin layer of ice covering it. We got a good view of the old riverboat repair factory with some Latvian graffiti on the side and then saw some modern riverboats being repaired right in front of our eyes. Since there is no longer a dedicated facility, a man was standing on top doing some welding right in the open on the deck. We also passed my favorite place in Rīga to drink outisde during warm weather months, Piķis un Zēģele, a relatively cheap pub with a deck overlooking the water. If you're ever here in the summer months and love to sit back and relax outside with good, reasonably priced beer while watching boats go by, definitely check it out.

Just across Daugavgrīvas iela from the road to Ķīpsala, Konstantin pointed out a beautiful pre-war building which used to be a polyclinic for children and teens which unfortunately was now in such a state of disrepair that it had no floors. To the right was another beautiful pre-war building which was derelict aside from the first floor, this one having a commemorative plaque for Latvian composer Pēteris Barisons who had lived in the house before WWII. A brick hruščovka next door ws in much better condition, and had a variety of stores on the first floor including what looked like a tasty vegetarian restaurant.

And now we were finally at the base of the infamous “Z-Towers” which had been visible from many previous neighborhoods. As I mentioned briefly in the article about Dzierciems, these troublesome twins had been under construction since 2006 and were conceived in a different era of urban planning just before the 2008 crisis where this area around Ķīpsala was planned to be a sort of financial district for the city and many other similar large buildings had been planned. As it is, it's almost a small miracle that these ones got finished at all. The buildings began sinking not long after construction since engineers had failed to compensate for the marshy ground beneath, and had to halt progress and improvise a new technique for drying out the foundation. The death of a construction worker whose harness tragically failed stopped progress for even longer, and the buildings went through multiple exterior and interior design revisions as it was being constructed to help make it more more economically feasible. As a result, the final minimalist and utterly generic result is a far-cry from the original gaudy and bombastic structure that was originally planned.

First planned to be an upscale hotel in one tower and offices in the other, now the majority of units in both towers have been marketed as luxury apartments of various sizes. Until 2014, it was possible to receive a five-year Latvian residence permit with full access to the EU and a path to citizenship for a property investment of as little as 70,000 Euros. Although parliament bumped that up to 250,000 Euro due to concerns about Latvia's property market being exploited as a massive money-laundering mechanism by international criminals, I'm sure that foreigners with an interest in accessing the European common market should have no problem finding a unit worth a quarter of a million in these glass behemoths. On one hand these towers further justify Āgenskalns' reputation as an architectural mecca, but at the same time even for this neighborhood they stick out like Siskel and Ebert's thumbs banged with a hammer by a bitter director. While it's easy to dismiss them as yet another tacky monument to the anonymous global 1%, I like to think of them as a relic from a more optimistic time in the city's history when the sky seemed the literal limit for ambitious developers just before it fell in spectacular fashion just a short time later. For more information about the history and future of this ongoing saga, check out this incredible thread on skyscrapercity.com which has been documenting the building's progress over the past ten years. 

When we tried to get up close to the buildings, a security guard at the gate predictably banged on the glass and yelled at us to get lost. We were still able to get a nice look at the impressive structures as we hung left onto Krišjāņa Valdemāra iela and started up the hill towards the northern part of the neighborhood.

While the same can be observed in pretty much all of the city's more central neighborhoods, the clash between “old” and “new” is especially striking here. Aside from the obvious example of Z-Towers, this street was lined by a mix of small pre-war wooden houses, concrete and plaster early 20th century buildings, and glass and steel constructions which look like they had been dropped off by a visiting UFO.

So far, this had been our route since we had met Līga near the library:

We now started down the major thoroughfare of Slokas iela, coming up close to one of Konstantin's and my favorite looking buildings in the city: the national historical archives. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves in terms of how awesome this building looks. The archives are free to browse, but professional photocopies to be brought home cost a fee. Luckily, scores of benevolent history fans have uploaded a lot of material contained there for free to various forums and websites. Much of the information contained there is in Russian due to that being the lingua franca and official language of the Soviet Union, so proficiency is required for serious browsing/research. Documents from 1920-40 though are mostly all in Latvian.

Slokas iela contained a nice mix of older wooden houses and Rīga's famous art nouveau buildings from the early 20th century. On one of the buildings, we found a subtle but interesting historical relic. During Soviet times, all of the street names were written in both Latvian and Russian throughout the city. After regaining independence, the government began replacing them with newer, Latvian-only plaques. On this particular building instead of replacing the entire sign, someone simply painted over the Russian version of the signage which had been found on the bottom of the sign. The result was surprisingly effective, as I never would have noticed if Konstantin hadn't pointed it out to me. We walked left down Mārtiņa iela and then left down the offshoot of Daugavgrīvas iela. No matter how far we walked away from them, Z-Towers loomed behind us.

Jugenstils (art nouveau)

And now we came up to one of my many weird civil planning-related obsessions: a ghost ramp! These “roads to nowhere” are offshoots of other roads that are built to connect with a future transportation project that for one reason or another never quite materializes. This particular one was intended to connect with one of the many aforementioned projects intended for the Ķīpsala area before the bubble burst in 2008. If Z-Towers are a semi-living monument to the pre-crash era of naive optimism and big thinking, then this ramp is something like a poignant and symbolic memorial. I was excited to finally have an excuse to go onto this ramp that I had passed so many times before on my way to work, and from it we had a nice view of the tall buildings as well as the former territory of a factory that built farm machinery just underneath where the ramp is now. We also got a view of the northern edge of Āgenskalns where we were headed next.

We walked towards Mārtiņa Evaņģēliski luteriskā baznīca (St. Martin's Church), passing two older art nouveau buildings: a current police station to the left, and an apartment complex with a classical-style sculpture out front to the right. When we got to the church's back yard, we took the path through crossing back to Slokas iela. The Romanesque church was built in 1851 and 1852, and the red twin steeples are visible from most of the northern part of the neighborhood. Konstantin pointed out the odd fact that the lantern is built in such a way that it can be lowered using a pulley.

lowerable lamp

Coming out of the church yard and turning left onto Slokas iela, we passed a cool purple wooden building and a music school before coming to the nearly-abandoned Mārtiņa kapi (St. Martin's Cemetery). Many of those resting in this graveyard have no living relatives to maintain their graves, although we could see a few modern tombstones that distant descendants had bought for their long-departed ancestors. Following the tram line down the street we also passed the very modern purple courthouse before we turned right down Kuldīgas iela.

Just as we were turning left down Kuldīgas iela, we saw a plot of land adjacent to the botanical garden that seemed like it was part of the garden's territory until Konstantin explained that it was actually a private plot in the process of being sold. That explained why it had the old-fashioned wooden fence while the rest of the garden had a much newer metal one surrounding it. Signs of spring were everywhere as we continued down the street; people were raking up leftover leaves now that the snow had almost all melted, and small flowers were starting to bloom here and there. When we came to busy Vilpa iela, we turned left and came to Rīgas Valsts vācu ģimnāzija (State German Gymnasium), one of the city's oldest high schools founded in 1921. During months when leaves are on the trees, the school is hidden from the road except for the wooden “window” which you can see in the first picture of the school. Unfortunately, at this time of year the effect gets lost.

At the corner of Melnsila and Āgenskalna ielas, we found what Konstantin explained was called “Āgenskalna Priedes” (Agenskalns Pines). This early and experimental “micro-district” that the Soviets constructed in the late 1950s was the first of many often much larger projects in the further-out neighborhoods of the city which were constructed all the way through the 1980s. These concrete-panel buildings are some of the first very early hruščovkas to be built in the city in response to the post-war housing crisis that was only exacerbated by Stalin's obsession with ornate, decorative buildings which took too long to construct to meet the population's needs. Konstantin told us that while these buildings look to be in good condition from the outside, many have problems with electrical wiring beneath the floors that were not properly installed during the original construction. 

This housing project also has one of the last Soviet-era playgrounds to not be torn down to to safety concerns. The metal playground equipment you can see used to be ubiquitous throughout the city's suburban districts, but since independence the city has mostly favored removal over renovation. The building you can see in the background looks new, but is actually a recent renovation of a pre-war building. Seeing the potential of what could be if more of the city's gorgeous old structures received the same love and attention only makes it sadder to think about many of the other buildings' current states.

From the background of the development we could finally get a great view of one of the neighborhood's most famous landmarks: the water tower named “Alise” Yes, believe it or not, some of the city's gorgeous water towers have these kinds of names. After this particular one stopped being used for its original purpose due to introduction of more modern distribution methods, the building was used as an underground record label/studio until the late-2000s. The owner of the Coffee Tower chain and a few other bidders tried to buy it, but the city deemed it a historical monument before it could fall into private ownership. Hopeful the city will maintain and find a good municipal use for this beautiful landmark, as the building really is a stunning piece of architecture.

We turned back onto Melnsila iela and passed a wooden building with a store called “Alus pagrabiņš” (which translates to something like “Little Beer Basement”), a store which sells unusual and hard-to-find beers both on tap and in bottles. People often buy large plastic bottles of the beer straight from the tap so that they can bring it home and drink later, which is usually cheeper than buying glass bottles or cans. 

Now we came to the famous “Kalnviema kvartāls” (Kalnciema Quarter), a group of wooden buildings on the corner of Mensila and Kalnciema ielas. One of the most well-known enclaves of the city's “creative class,” the mini-district features various shops, galleries, offices, and performances spaces, and hosts many cultural events including a weekly Saturday market in the main yard between the buildings. We regretted not being able to come here a day later to check out the market, but I would strongly encourage visiting it if you can make it out here on a Saturday. For any of you who are fans of good wine, there's also a fantastic wine shop and cafe open every day except Sunday from 10-22.

We were pretty hungry at this point, so Konstantin suggested that we try a kebab place called “Fix Box” which he had passed many times before but never actually tried. The interior was modern and colorful, and the prices seemed fairly reasonable so we decided to give it a shot. The wrap was toasted and crispy, which was a bit unusual for Riga's kebab places as they usually wrap them in softer shells. Overall the kebabs were pretty good, but I'm not sure it was mind-blowing enough to recommend coming all the way from the center for considering the wealth of options there to try. If you're in the area and love kebabs though, I doubt you'll be disappointed.

Since the ghost ramp, here is more or less the path that we had taken to the kebab spot:

As we left our lunch place, the weather began to take a turn for the worse that would gradually only worsen. Undeterred, we continued southwest down Kalnciema iela before hanging right onto Sabiles iela. Down this street the mishmash of modern and older architectural styles continued, although in this part of Āgenskalns most all of the buildings didn't reach more than three stories tall. Konstantin pointed out that the dilapidated green building at the end of the road had been “somewhat renovated” on the very right side, which is not uncommon for some of Riga's older buildings in such condition considering that many such buildings have multiple owners. A lot of the older wooden houses throughout the city are split into halves or even quarters depending on the size, and this can be reflected sometimes in the buildings' visual appearance.

At this point, Sabiles iela turned into Talsu iela, and we continued on towards the more urban part of Āgenskalns. Right at the start of Talsu iela I saw one of the coolest yet strangest-looking houses I've ever seen, which seemed as if the architect was torn between three different styles and chose all three. A bit further down the road, we got a glimpse at the old TV tower. Before moving to is current headquarters on Lucavsala in the middle of the Daugava, Latvia's Television used to be headquartered in Āgenskalns, and used this tower to broadcast. According to Konstantin, the city has deemed the tower as a “dangerous object” and has ordered it to be repaired immediately. Regardless of its perilous state of repair, the tower still currently broadcasts Radio Merkurs on 1485 kHz (AM).

We turned now left onto Nometņu iela since Konstantin wanted to show us a few different buildings this way. We found a sad wall that was either bemoaning street litter or had very low self esteem. A bit further down we came to the first of the buildings that Konstantin had mentioned, a “communebar” called “Hāgenskalna Komūna.” He told us that it's the best place this side of the river to hear small acoustic concerts, although various DJs also play sets. Apparently they also offer a good selection of food and drinks, so we plan to check it out sometime soon. 

Just past the corner of Lapu and Nomeņtu ielas we came across the scariest-looking balconies on the planet, which were all missing floors. They were (barely) attached to one of the coolest-looking buildings in the entire neighborhood, a strange castle-shaped one over which there is a dispute as to which architect designed it. Apparently two people claimed to have drawn the original design. Next we found what is a very popular trend in America but something I had so far yet to have seen in Latvia: former cinemas converted into evangelical churches. The first was a brown Art Deco-ish one on the left which now hosts the “Dzīvā Ūdens Avots” (living water source) Pentecostal Church, and the second was a tan-colored one just down the street which is inhabited by the “Jēzus ir Kungs” (Jesus is Lord) evangelical church. The second was offering an “alpha course,” a basic introduction to Christianity that was popularized in the UK but can now be found all over the world.

Continuing down the street, we saw more wooden and brick buildings from various eras. Shops included a fancy-sounding “brick salon” (yes, a salon in which you buy bricks), a door and window ship, a pizza place, an upscale restaurant, an antique shop, and another location of one of Līga and my favorite cafes in the city: Ciemakuklis, which we visited in Dzirciems last year. At the intersection with Slokas iela we took a left.

On Slokas iela, Z-Towers once again reappeared and loomed in the distance. We walked first by a church called Latvijas apvienotā metodistu baznīca (Latvian United Methodist Church), one of the few methodist churches in the country. Next door was an old white building which Konstantin said used to be used as a wedding registry. He told us that his parents had registered their marriage there, and that they were sad to see it become derelict throughout the years. We were just about at the corner of Slokas and Kalnciema iela again where the state archive was, so we took a few pictures and then hung left down Ernestīnes iela back towards the market square.

Ernistines iela cut through yet another district of short, wooden houses, but this part of town contained some of the city's most well-known schools. The first was Rīgas Dabaszinību skola (Riga School of Natural Science), a UNESCO-affiliated youth education center that puts on various workshops and activities related to natural science. The gate looked open and we wanted to take a look through the school's grounds, but we opted against it. Across the street was the well-regarded Āgenskalna Valsts ģimnāzija (Agenskalns State Gymnasium), a high school that is consistently ranked in the country's top five in terms of exam results and student achievement. The third we passed was the newly renovated Rīgas 53. vidusskola right on the corner of Ernestine and Melnsila ielas. 

As we turned left back onto the larger road, we saw a car driving by with some large metal piping tied dubiously onto the roof. This reminded me of how in my home state of Maine it’s not uncommon to see pickup trucks on the highway with large stacks of various items tied precariously onto the bed, and how its occasionally necessary to dodge them when they fall out onto the road in front of you. We followed Melnsila diela back down to Nometņu iela where we took a right and started heading toward the market.

Since leaving the kebab spot, we had walked in this very strange spiral-shaped path:

On our way to the market we passed by one of the city's rare food trucks as well as two cafes situated next to the old tower. It's a bit hard to see from the picture, but one of the tower's supporting guy wires had been decorated with colorful ropes. Konstantin told us that the SEB building (one of Latvia's most popular banks) used to be taller, but that the top floor had been removed during renovation to help make the building more sturdy. 

In the market square there were a bunch of posters for a theater event called “Obama Bananas Go,” which according to one of my friends was some sort of abstract high-concept comedy show that had nothing whatsoever to do with former President Obama. While I was shocked at first and am sure that the poster would have not only been taken down within hours but also sparked outrage if it were posted in the United States, Latvia has so few people of color that conversations about race are nearly non-existent and some of my students even have a hard time understanding why they can't use the n-word even though they hear it often in rap music. That doesn't stop me from trying to educate my students about these issues as much as possible and doing my small part in improving this situation, but I'm not as shocked by this sort of thing as much as I was when I first came here.

This “trash” frowny face was even sadder than the last one.

The interior of the market building was fairly typical for this region of Europe, but Konstantin told me that he much preferred this one to the more famous and impressive central market in Rīga's center due to its more intimate feel. The walls above the market stands were adorned with the coats of arms of Latvia's cities and towns, which was a nice touch. Luckily the upstairs balcony was open and we were able to get a nice view of the whole inside. There were some very nice looking meats, fruits, and vegetables, but we still had a lot to see and decided that carrying around perishables probably was not the best idea.

The stands and benches outside were emptier than usual due to the weather, but there were still a few people selling fresh flowers to passers-by. We continued a tiny bit further down Bāriņu iela to one location I had passed by many times but had never been able to get a closer look at: the Eduarda Smiļģa Teātra muzejs, the city's museum of theater. This former home of famed actor and director Eduards Smiļģis (1886-1966) is now run by the Latvian Academy of Culture as a space for exhibitions and live shows. The grounds of the building were gorgeous, but unfortunately we decided that we would have to save the museum itself for another day considering how wet we now were and how little time we had left to see the rest of the neighborhood.

Līga wanted to see Svētā Alberta (St. Albert's), one of her favorite churches, so we headed towards it via a roundabout route past Māras diķis (Mara's pond). We started past the beautifully painted Rīgas Friča Brīvzemnieka pamatskola, one of the city's most historic elementary schools. The far less attractive concrete box across the street was Rīgas Pārdaugavas izpilddirekcija, home to a variety of government services available to those living on this side of the river. This style of building which looks brutalist to American or British eyes is incredibly common throughout the former Soviet Union for various municipal or education-related institutions. As we got closer to the park, we passed a few more wooden and brick buildings built before WWII as well as a few very modern constructions.

Right near the pond there was a small park with a hill formed from a split between Kokles iela and Mazā Nometņu iela. There wasn't any information that we could find about it, but it seemed like a natural extension of Arkādijas parks in Torņakalns on the other side of the road. The park seemed pretty well-maintained, and at the top of the hill there was a decent view of the surrounding area including the pond.

As you can see from the last picture, Māras diķis is lined on its eastern coast by a walled-off mansions. Thankfully, the entire circumference of the pond is accessible via a paved walking trail. The pond was used for mills all the way back to the 13th century, although the most recent mill was torn down in the 1920s. These days it's only used for recreational purposes, but no swimming is allowed.

Having walked around the pond, we headed straight down Mārupes iela where there was a mix of residential buildings and student housing for Rīgas Stradiņa universitāte, the country’s most famous medical university named after famous Latvian surgeon Pauls Stradiņš. We also passed one of the city’s few Baptist churches, one of the “Coffee Tower” cafes which Konstantin mentioned tried to buy the water tower, and a Rimi.

We turned left onto Leipājas iela, where we saw some graffiti that warned us: “beidz izdomāt melus” (stop making up lies). Within a few minutes we were standing outside of Sv. Alberta baznīca, an important part of Rīga’s Catholic community. Originally intended to be built in French Baroque style, starts and stops to the construction resulted in the somewhat unique final design. Across the street behind the brick wall was the many historic buildings on the campus of Stradiņa klīniskā universitātes slimnīca (the university hospital). Unfortunately we did not have the opportunity to explore the campus, but we were so wet and cold at this point that we were ready to take the bus to our final destination: Uzvaras Parks.

Since turning towards the market, our path had looked like this:

We got off at Slokas iela in front of Zelta Boulings, Rīga’s most popular bowling alley with some of the most surpisringly good pizza found in the city. We backtracked a bit down Uzvaras bulvaris to come to our final stop in the Āgenskalns and one of the city’s most controversial locations: Uzvaras piemineklis (Victory Memorial). 

While the end of WWII and the defeat of the Nazis is celebrated throughout the world, many in Latvia (particularly ethnic Latvians) see the end of WWII as the beginning of the Soviet Union’s occupation of the country which included the forced deportations and murders of tens of thousands of Latvians. The monument was built in the early 1980s and is one of the most physically impressive sites in the entire country, but there have been many calls to demolish it as most other Soviet-era statues were at the re-establishment of Latvian independence. In fact, two ultra-nationalists even tried blowing the monument up in 1997, but ended up dying with the statue mostly unharmed. The site is especially important to the city’s ethnic Russian community which makes up nearly a majority of Rīga’s residents, many of whom had family who fought proudly to defend their country against the Nazi invaders. Many ethnic Russians feel alienated and left behind by the Latvian government's policies since 1991 regarding citizenship and language, and removing the statue would inevitably cause significant tension. For the foreseeable future the statue will remain as a divisive symbol which means many things to many people, and I will write more about the issue for the upcoming May 8th/9th celebration of V-E Day. What is undeniable, however, is that the Soviets knew how to make impressive and awe-inspiring statues.

The final part of Āgenskalns that we skipped over was the rest of Uzvaras parks, but we were so cold and wet by now that we decided to go home. Plus, the rain was so heavy by now that the pictures we would have taken wouldn’t have done justice to the beautiful park. Instead, I will cheat with a few pictures we took of the park from last spring.

I hope that these rainy and dark pictures haven’t discouraged you, because visiting Āgenskalns is an absolute no-brainer regardless of your personal interests. While I usually recommend visiting certain neighborhoods to certain people for various reasons, Āgenskalns is one of the only ones I can suggest without any hesitation or second thoughts. If you’ve been in Rīga for any significant amount of time I’m sure you’ve alresdy spent some time here, but if you somehow haven’t yet wandered across the bridge to Pārdaugava then it’s time to come and visit.

A few random observations:

While most people I know who have lived outside of Rīga’s center have told me that they don’t do much in those neighborhoods aside from living and do most other things in the center, most of the people I know who live in Āgenskalns spend a significant amount of their time there. This is unsurprising considering how much there is to do and see here, but it really almost feels like a separate city with a somewhat different feel to it.

That being said, Līga and I have spent surprisingly little time in Āgenskalns. Although there’s so much to do, I have usually seen it from the windows of busses going to and back from work at the LU Pedagogy Faculty in Imanta. From Ķengarags it takes just a tiny bit too long to get to compared to the center where you can find almost anything that Āgenskalns has, but if I already lived in Pārdaugava I’m sure I’d spend more time here than time across the bridge.

Although we thought that winter had just about completely passed at this point in mid-March, we woke up this morning in mid-April to fairly heavy snowfall. To say that winter/spring 2017 has been a curveball would be quite an understatement.

And that’s it for now. I apologize that this post has been a bit longer than the others, but there is just so much to show and talk about in Āgenskalns that I didn’t want to leave anything out. Also a huge special thanks to Konstantin for contributing so much historical information about the neighborhood and its buildings, another reason why this post is a bit longer than the others. He’s planning on coming with us more regularly on our walks through the neighborhoods, and he might contribute some other posts in the future about urban exploration and other Rīga-related topics. Until next time, let’s hope that spring will soon finally stick around!

Nākamā Pietura: Atgāzene!

White eggs (in Latvia they usually come in cartons of 10, not 12):

An old clean pair of tights:

A large bowl of warm water:

Onion peels:

First, take the onion peels and wet them in the bowl of warm water.

Then, take the wet onion peels and wrap them around an egg.

Take the wrapped egg and place it all the way at the bottom of the tights' leg, where the foot goes. Make sure the onion peels don't slip off too much as you push them into the tights.

Tie the egg and peels off at the bottom.

Repeat this process wrapping the eggs with peels and pushing them down to the bottom, tying each section off separately.

You can try using other materials than just onion peels. For example, this year we tried some dried rose petals and bags of red tea to get other colors on some of the eggs. As always, experimenting with new materials is the most fun part!

Hopefully all ten (or twelve) eggs will fit in one of the tights' legs. If not, you can always use another one.

Place the wrapped eggs in a large pot.

Cover the pot with water, bring to a boil, boil for 10-12 minutes, and then turn the heat off and leave the eggs in the water for about a half hour. As with any method of dying eggs, the longer the eggs stay the deeper the final color. We added a bit of vinegar this year, although I'm not sure if it made any difference (in previous years we haven't).

Once the eggs have been removed from the water, cut the tights apart at each section and remove the egg from the wrapping.

Wow, look at that! A uniquely patterned and colored egg. Like a snowflake, no two will ever be exactly the same.

Each year the city has added to this path and expanded it a bit southeastward. It now goes almost twice the distance it did compared to when I first visited Ķengarags a few years ago, and it barely existed when Līga first moved to the neighborhood in the early 2010s. Now, it's easily the neighborhood's greatest feature, and was being well-used today by walkers, bikers, and rollerbladers from all walks of life. The reason I love it so much compared to any other path in the city is that you can look east down the Daugava and imagine that you're on some kind of lake far away from the city, while looking west you see the majestic skyline in its true glory, with the silhouettes of all of the tall buildings visible. Its off the radar of most tourists and residents of other parts of the city due to its distance from the center and Ķengarags' somewhat unfair reputation as a “rough neighborhood,” so most of the people who enjoy it are the people who live and work here every day.

Līga and I started the path near the Dole shopping center and decided to go as far up the river as the pavement continued. We hadn't been since the spring before, so we were interested to see how far the pavement went now.

A little bit past the turn off to the “Dole” shopping center, there's a short but sturdy observation tower that gives a decent view of the area. It's nothing like the bird's eye from Bumbu kanlniņš in Kleisti, but it's also a lot easier to get up (and less scary for those with a phobia of heights). From the top there was a good view of Ķengarags' southeastern skyline as well as well as both directions of the river.

Further up the river, there's a small hill that kids bike or sled down depending on the season, and from the top I could see a group of people grilling. I was envious.

Right past the border of Ķengarags and Rumbala there's the ruins of two brick houses that I would have loved to have played in when I was a kid. They surround a pond, together making up one of the nicest areas of the entire promenade.

We took a detour down a dirt road to the shopping center “Zoom” to grab some picnic food from the Rimi inside. We felt fairly safe leaving our bikes chained outside as there was a security camera pointed directly at the bike rack.

The area further on through Rumbala is the most recent to have been paved, and this is apparent from the landscaping.

And after a while, the paving ended and turned into a dirt road. We didn't go any further than this since we were pretty hungry and ready to eat, but we look forward to seeing the path get expanded soon. We found a nice place to sit by the river and ate our lunch.

On the way back I tried to get a good shot of my second favorite view of the city's skyline (first being Dzeguškalns in Dzirciems), but unfortunately Līga's Blackberry Q10 wasn't quite up the task in such unfavorable light. I've really got to get my camera fixed...

I took a few more pictures as we biked home, with the sun just beginning to think about setting. While it would have been nearly dark by now in winter, there was still plenty of warmth and light.

This guide assumes that you’re getting there by public transit (bus). If you’re lucky enough to be traveling by car then you can plug these coordinates into your car’s GPS and skip right to the third step.

Step 1:

Take the #3 bus from the center to the “Daugavgrīvas cietoksnis” (Daugavgriva’s fortress) stop.

Step 2:

Walk down Flotes iela, passing Latvijas Jūras akadēmija and a few wood processing factories on the right. Follow the road until the second turn off on the left with graffiti that reads “UZ JŪRU” (”TO THE SEA”). Take that left, and follow the road until you see a small parking area.

Step 3:

Follow the path and walk or bike towards the sea. You will pass some small ponds and a marshy, grassy area.

Step 4:

When you get to the sea, turn right. Keep walking along the beach about two kilometers until you reach the lighthouse. For a while you will need to walk along a fairly steep sea wall, so you will want to use caution during icier months as I have seen someone slip into the sea in front of me before (they were fine). As a general rule, stay as far away from the edge of the wall as possible. This part luckily only lasts a hundred meters or so.

Step 5:

You did it! You’re at the lighthouse! If you’re feeling adventurous, you can continue onto the breakwater to the left of the lighthouse, but you will have to get there by walking on the top of a fairly narrow and steep wall. Also depending on the sea swell and the time of year, it might not be possible to go all the way to the end of the breakwater.

This guide isn't necessarily intended for someone who's staying in Rīga for just a layover or a weekend; in that case, it's probably better to stick to the more well-known attractions in the center. Instead, this is intended for more frequent or long-term visitors looking to see a different side of the city, or maybe even for long-time locals who hadn't ever thought to check these places out. I have divided the locations into a few different categories, with the most essential of each category being listed first. Each place’s name can be clicked on and contains a link to google maps coordinates, and the neighborhood names in parenthesis are links to the articles we have written about each one. The photos were all taken by Līga, myself, or our friends who have joined us on our journeys.

While we’re not pretending to be able to write a “definitive guide” to such a massive and history-rich area after just a few short visits, we hope that these favorite places of ours might provide a few ideas for your next weekend adventure!

Best Views:

Promenade near Saulesakmens (Ķipsala)

Less than a ten minute walk away from Vecrīga, this stunning view of the old city's skyline is visited every day by many tourists and newlyweds alike. If you want a world-class vista of the city easily accessible by foot, bike, car, and public transit, this one is a no-brainer. While you're here, you can also get fantastic views of the city's ports from the beach just a short walk away on the other side of the bridge.

Bumbu Kalniņš (Kleisti)

One of the city's best-kept secrets, many of my friends who have lived in Rīga their entire lives had no idea that there was an observation tower in Kleisti with stunning views of all of Kurzemes rajons as well as almost every tall building in the entire city. This wooden tower is designed only for a few people at once and is not recommended for those afraid of heights, but if you want a unique birds-eye vantage of some of the city's less-known areas then you'll want to check it out. The only downside is that while there is a bus stop just a five minute walk away from the tower, you will need to switch busses at least once if coming from Rīga's center. For those lucky enough to be traveling by car though, there is a parking area right near the tower's base.

Dzeguškalns (Dzirciems)

My personal favorite view of the city's skyline, this location is easily accessible by the #3 bus and will take just about 15 minutes to get to from the central station. I love it so much because nearly every famous tall landmark in Rīga’s center is visible from here but from an angle you never see in promotional material, with some beautiful old factory buildings in the foreground. This is a fairly peaceful and quiet area, although the best time for viewing is from late fall until early spring since at other times leaves on the trees block out the view of the city.

Best Nature Walks:

“Piejūra” Nature Park (Ritabulli)

Hidden away in the city's northwestern-most corner, this emerald gem is an absolutely essential visit for anyone interested in exploring Latvia's gorgeous nature without needing to leave the city. A few kilometers of well-maintained trails zigzag through forest, marshes, and the area's famous sand dunes. The park is surprisingly relatively unknown, so its possible that you might not see another person during your entire walk. You will, however, want to check carefully for ticks afterwards just as you would in any Latvian forest. During summer months, the #3 bus goes directly from the central station to the park’s entrance, but at other times you simply need to switch to a #36 bus to go the rest of the way. When you get to the western end of the park, make sure to enjoy the amazing stone sculptures by local artist Pauls Jaunzems.

Kleisti Meadow (Kleisti)

This large meadow is a nice place for a meditative walk through what feels like the countryside without having to stray too far from a major road served by a few bus lines. Although it’s most beautiful in spring when flowers are in full bloom, it was quite nice even when we visited in late winter. It seems to be a somewhat popular location for fishing and a few people we using a part of it as an ATV course, but nobody bothered us at all as we strolled through the trail.

Spilve (The entire neighborhood)

For the somewhat more adventurous, the areas just to the west and north of Spilves Lidlauks have a variety of forests, meadows, and small rivers that can make for a very pleasant nature walk. The only issue is that this area is not planned or maintained as such, so there are no maps or consistently maintained trails, and it can be easy to get turned around for those without a good sense of direction. Still, the outer edge of the old airfield is a very nice and easy 2.5 kilometer meadow walk that’s fairly similar to what’s found in Kleisti.

Best Picnic Spots:

Daugavgrīvas Baka (Daugavgrīva)

Though a bit inconvenient to get to, this lighthouse right at the mouth of the River Daugava is still perfectly accessible enough for more adventurous picnickers. To get here you must first walk a trail through a bit of forest, marsh, and beach surrounded by some very cool-looking abandoned Soviet-era factories, but you’ll have worked up a perfect appetite for some packed lunches. While there is a breakwater similar to that found in Mangaļsala on the other side of the river, it is in a state of disrepair that makes it harder to traverse especially if there is a sea swell. To get to the lighthouse, first go to this location, follow the path to the sea, and then turn right. After walking about a kilometer, you will be at the mouth of the Daugava. This might sound a bit more complicated than the other places in this list, but I promise there's no secret password.

Kleistu Ezers (Kleisti)

This peaceful location just a short walk away from the bus stop overlooking a pond and a horse track on the other side seems custom-built for picnickers. While the gazebo did not have seats or tables when we visited in late winter, there were a few benches by the pond and might be more in the summer months. There were also a few ice cream stands nearby which I could not tell if were closed permanently or only seasonal. The nearest grocery store is at least a 30-minute walk though, so make sure to bring your lunch with you.

Nordeķu Parks (Iļģuciems)

While heavily overshadowed by other locations in Kurzemes rajons, this former manor territory is easily accessible by a variety of public transit options and includes a playground, some open fields, a duck pond, a few old manor buildings, and some outdoor seating. If you're not feeling so adventurous and would like a pleasant and relatively quiet picnic spot that's fairly easy to get to, you could do a lot worse than Nordeķu parks. As an added bonus, there are a few supermarkets and grocery stores within walking distance if you do not feel like packing a lunch ahead of time.

Best Urban Exploration Spots:

Daugavgrīvas Cietoksnis (Daugavgrīva)

If you’re any kind of fan of urban exploration and you haven’t been here yet, that needs to change. This historic fortress, originally constructed in 1608 during the first Polish-Swedish War and then added to over the course of four more centuries of conflicts, is immaculately preserved despite almost no renovation thanks in part to its inconvenient hours of operation. The gates are locked except between 10:00-16:00 each Saturday and Sunday, but you will find very little graffiti or other vandalism compared to Rīga’s other abandoned locations. Fans of history can learn about the fortress through a few signs posted around the premises, and all but a few of the buildings are open for easy exploration by even the most casual of Sunday strollers.

Buildings around Daugavgrīvas Cietoksnis (Daugavgrīva)

Although these abandoned military buildings are only a short five-minute walk from the fortress proper, they are such a perfect spot for urban explorers that I felt that they deserved a separate post. While the fortress itself is open for just a few hours each week, these buildings (at least when we visited in late 2015) are guarded only by a sign telling you to enter at your own risk. On one hand this means that the buildings are far more dangerous and full of litter, but on the other hand its rare in Rīga for these kind of buildings to not be under lock and key and still be stable enough to safely walk through. Enter of course only at your own risk, but I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

Spilves Lidlauks (Spilve)

Although the beautiful Stalin-era airport is gated and attended by a security guard at most times, there is still plenty to see from the outside. Better yet, to the northwest of the airport building itself are a series of smaller buildings that have been weathered throughout the years and are completely abandoned and unguarded. The airport and its grounds are only about 20 minutes via #3 bus from the central station.

Best Swimming Spots:

Vakarbuļļi Pludmale (Ritabuļļi)

This golden, sandy beach might look almost exactly like the more famous resort of Jūrmala outside of the city, but getting here in the summer is as easy as jumping on a #3 bus and walking less than ten minutes from the “Pludmale” stop. While there aren’t as many touristy attractions such as stores and restaurants like at the more well-known Vecāķi beach in Rīga’s northeast corner, those looking for a more “pure” beach experience will find a clean and well-maintained swimming area complete with a playground, food and ice cream stands, benches, trash cans, toilets, and changing booths. For those interested in nature walking, there is a series of boardwalks and trails through the dunes of the forest that surround the beach.

Ķipsalas Pludmale (Ķipsala)

Though it personally freaks me out to swim so close to the city center, Rīga's city environmental board constantly declares the Daugava safe to swim in. The convenient location also simply can't be beaten. Even if you're not planning on swimming, this sandy spot is just a ten minute walk across Vanšu tilts (suspension bridge) from the city center and is perfect for sunbathing, beach sports, reading, or whatever you prefer to do by the water.

Places to Eat:

Kafējnica Iberija (Zasulauks)

If you're interested in sampling Georgian cuisine, Kafēnica Iberija's offerings are worth traveling to Zasulauks for. The food is fresh, delicious, authentic, and served by a friendly staff at reasonable prices. In warmer months, the outdoor seating will allow you to enjoy your meal in fresh air, although the restaurant is near a fairly busy road and you may elect to sit in the beautifully decorated interior. Come here for a unique and reasonably priced dining experience, just don't forget to order a disk of khachapuri!

Ciemakukulis (Dzirciems)

Perfect for a cup of coffee and pastry after a day at the botanical garden (just a five minute walk away), this gorgeous café offers some of the most unique and delicious sweet treats that we have seen anywhere in Rīga. On other days of the week, they apparently offer light lunch options such as soups and salads. The staff is extremely friendly, and they have apparently opened a location up in Bolderāja as well that we didn't see on our first journey there. 

Other Interesting Locations:

University of Latvia Botanical Garden (Zasulauks)

Best visited in the warmer months, the university's botanical garden contains a wide variety of flowers, trees, cactuses, and all kinds of other plants on the beautiful and well-maintained grounds of a former German manor. Non-students of the university will be required to pay a small fee, but you won't mind as soon as you see the incredible and worthy work that the staff of the garden does to provide the city with such a vibrant and colorful space. Butterfly lovers should also check out the “butterfly house” within the garden which requires a separate small fee to visit.

Žanis Lipke Memorial (Ķīpsala)

Due partially to the country's complicated and uncomfortable history regarding the Holocaust, this fearless dock worker turned protector of Jewish people is not the universally known hero that he should be. After first hiding communists from the pre-WWII Latvian regime, Žanis Lipke selflessly used his connections at the dock to smuggle at least 55 Jewish people out of Latvia. After the war, the Soviet government refused to believe that Lipke saved those he did out of altruism and must have been compensated with diamonds or gold. According to legend, during one of many times he was summoned by the KGB for questioning, he told his interrogators that they were just as bad bandits as the Nazis. Amazingly, he lived until 1987, and ten years before his death he and his wife were able to travel to Israel and receive the hero's welcome that they deserved. This memorial is only open Tuesday-Saturday, but you can find out more about it here.

Balasta Dambis (Ķīpsala)

This gorgeous cobblestone street along the eastern edge of Ķīpsala starts less than fifteen minutes away from the city center by foot and offers spectacular views of Rīga's skyline and ports. The other side of the road is nothing to ignore either: an architectural smorgasbord, the centerpiece of which is a beautifully restored former gypsum factory repurposed as shops, apartments, and restaurants. This is easily one of the city's most underrated walking destinations, make sure to check it out on a sunny day!

Rīga-Jūrmala Bike Trail (Imanta)

I strongly prefer walking to biking, which is why you rarely hear me discussing anything cycling-related in the posts about neighborhoods. If you’re the kind of person who prefers to roam the world on two wheels though, you might have already heard of the famous Rīga-Jūrmala bike path that runs along the southern border of Imanta and goes all the way to Jūrmala’s city center a few kilometers away across the Lielupe river. Though Tukums-bound trains pass from time to time and planes occasionally descend overhead towards the nearby airport, this fairly well-kept trail is a peaceful way for both walkers and bikers to easily travel to Latvia’s most famous seaside town. A full map of the trail can be found here.

Buļļupe (Bolderāja, Kleisti, Daugavgrīva, and Rītabuļļi)

This sleepy river which connects the larger Daugava and Lielupe rivers is a perfect place to paddle around without having the worry about strong winds, sea currents, or major boat traffic. Those feeling adventurous can even paddle all the way around Buļļsala, going along the Lielupe, Baltic Sea, and Daugava at times. If you're lucky enough to own a kayak, canoe, or similar small watercraft, there are endless locations on the Bolderāja/Kleisti side of the river to park your car and easily launch your boat. For the rest of us, there is a rental place on the Rītabuļļi side found here which operates during summer months.

Lāčupes Kapi (Kleisti)

Though it might seem a bit strange to suggest visiting a cemetery, I've known some people who truly enjoy exploring them. Of all the ones I've ever been to, Lāčupes kapi is one of my absolute favorites. It's situated in a beautiful forest on a series of hills that are rare for the area's geography, and is frequently cleaned and maintained by relatives of the deceased. The graveyard is easily accessible via the #39 bus from the center, but if you do visit please make sure to treat this area with the respect that it deserves.

Looking down from a bird's eye view, the neighborhood's boundaries appear even more inscrutable than before. Aside from the obvious railroad in the southwest and thoroughfare of Jūrmalas gatve in the north, it seems a bit like someone drew this manta shape over a random assortment of light industry, apartment blocks, small houses, and parks. This is due in part to Zasulauks' original history as, like many of Rīga's neighborhoods, a german manor. The manor itself was located on what is now the Latvijas Universitāte (University of Latvia) botanical garden, which makes up about one fifth of the neighborhood's area. The rest of the manor's territory was sold off over many decades and developed for a wide variety of purposes. Additionally, during Soviet times many of Zasulauks' traditional small houses were replaced with various types of apartment blocks in a development plan that completely disregarded the neighborhood's history and boundaries. This has led to the somewhat enigmatic borders and geography of the tiny neighborhood, which is apparent from satellite view. According to our friend Kosntantin who lives in Zasulauks, though, they make a bit more sense when considering that the buildings in the eastern part were created as the living quarters for the workers of the western industrial area across the tracks.

Zasulauks is one of Rīga's few neighborhoods accessible by train, which stops less frequently and is therefore much faster than other means of public transportation. Though it would have only taken five or so more minutes to get there by bus, any excuse to take a train is a good excuse in my book. We tried taking pictures of the stunning Daugava on this sunny day, but they didn't quite come out very well. Regardless, you should be able to get an idea of how nice the weather was. In less than ten minutes, we had arrived at Zasulauks Station.

The current Zasulauks Station was built nearly 100 years ago in 1919, although there has been a station here since 1873. Unfortunately, this station was not chosen as part of a massive project to modernize the platforms of stations on the Rīga-Jelgava and Rīga-Tukums lines, unlike the far more frequented Imanta and Zolitude stations a bit further down the line. Although it was already too late in the year, I had seen pictures elsewhere of outdoor seating for the “Mini-Kafejnīca” attached to the building.

Just beyond the train station, the #2 tram and railroad briefly share a right-of-way before the train line veers to the left. Although we weren’t able to see it since we didn’t want to walk too far down the railway in fear of trespassing in broad daylight, a few of the tracks go into a large building abut a half kilometer away from where the tram and train tracks split apart from each other. This building is part of VRC Zasulauks, a company that does maintenance and renovation on many of the Baltic states’ aging passenger and freight trains.

We continued along the cobblestoned Tapešu iela which was still lined by some of Zasuluaks' beautiful historic wooden houses, one of which housed a funeral parlor with morbidly convenient hours on its first floor. According to Konstantin, some of these wooden buildings served as working quarters for factory workers during Soviet times. He also told us that although the factories on the other side of the tracks are technically on Šampeteris' territory, they make up an industrial park called “Zasulauka Manufaktūra” which produced goods as varied as textiles, furniture, and airplane engines.

Once the cobblestone road ended, we continued along the tram tracks. We passed more trees just beginning to change to fall colors, old factories, and Hruščovka buildings.

When we got to the “Kandavas iela” tram stop, we saw that the tram tracks cut the road in half and that only a pedestrian footpath connected the two sides. It was time to explore the small northwestern area of the neighborhood, so we crossed the tracks and began down Kandavas iela. We were only able to go about 150 meters before the road abruptly ended at a walled-off industrial park that included the train renovation center I mentioned earlier, so we had to turn around and continue north down Mazā Kandavas iela. Throughout this walk we saw some beautiful houses hidden by trees, offices for Rīgas Siltums (the city's heating utility), and a garden wagon bursting with apples.

At the intersection with Zārdu iela, we turned left and followed the northwestern border of Zasulauks all the way to the end, most of which was sandwiched between heating piping on the right and semi-abandoned factories on the left. When we reached the end, we doubled back and continued northeast through some blooming trees towards Jūrmalas gatve. Unfortunately, we had no food for the friendly cat who approached us.