Latvia

When I worked for a multistate healthcare system, a team of my colleagues and some consultants divided the work between us to visit each of the hospitals. For one of these trips, I traveled across Nebraska with two consultants, one who had sailed to every country in the Caribbean and the other who had played basketball on the national team of Denmark. Wait! What? They play basketball in Europe? I was taught in elementary school PE that basketball is an American sport. This was one of those moments when I realized that my ideas are limited by my experience.

I was reminded of that learning when I found the Latvian movie Dream Team 1935 on Kanopy. What a great sports movie and a reminder that Latvians are so much more than I had known before. If you haven’t signed up for Kanopy through your local library yet, you can rent the subtitled Dream Team 1935 in several places including Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Dream-Team-1935-JanisAmanis/dp/B00UJ8F5VC If you want to see some great plays by Kristaps Porzingas, a current Latvian player in the NBA, check here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-OlHvyi6k0

What other special activities do they have in Latvia?

· A quirky and fun Latvian folk dance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXMSZ10cWh4

· A Latvian Song and Dance Festival, with 40,000 performers and almost 150 years of history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkp0H6QmfHs

· More Latvian music – I watched part of this full day of festivities with my mom when I was with her last weekend: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IFFEO4UD4o

My mom, dad, and I also went exploring deep in San Francisco last weekend, below the Castro District, behind Noe Valley, to find a little tiny Latvian Lutheran church. I had to find something – I couldn’t find a restaurant. There are two more churches – one each in Sacramento and Los Angeles, and some community centers. Since there don’t seem to be any events right now except for online, it looks like I will also be going online for Latvian art, literature, food, and shopping.

Mark Rothko might be the most famous of Latvian artists, but his paintings are out of my price range! Other Latvian artists can be found online at the Latvian National Museum of Art http://www.lnmm.lv/en/dmdm/info/explore/exhibition/2013/the-museum-chooses-acquisitions-of-the-latvian-national-museum-of-art-in-2012

Latvian literature varies from the classic Bearslayer, through the horror of Soviet occupation and the need for recovery, to recent short stories found in the following online resources:

· Bearslayer by Andrejs Pumpurs: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17445

· A Google preview of A Woman in Amber by Agate Nesaule includes the first five chapters with beautifully written stories of her childhood interrupted by the Soviet invasion. The rest, including her road to recovery, is available through your local bookstore or for purchase: https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_Woman_in_Amber/YZNiDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&printsec=frontcover

· A survey of recent Latvian literature with links to selected works can be found here: https://www.wordswithoutborders.org/article/february-2018-latvia-a-small-country-with-a-big-literature

Besides Latvian recipes https://www.saveur.com/gallery/Latvian-Recipes/ I also found Latvian shopping online here http://www.balticshop.com/ and here https://studijapienene.lv/ I ordered two kinds of Latvian honey, one from forest flowers and one from meadow flowers from BalticShop to do a taste test with Heidi and Linda when we have dinner next month.

At dinner, I will be wearing jeans and a t-shirt (as I usually do) and I will thank Latvian born tailor Jacob Davis who approached his cloth supplier Levi Strauss for financial backing to mass produce his durable working pants. I appreciate Latvia's relationship with the comfortable clothes I love to wear!

Some of the best places to visit in Latvia are noted on their tourism page https://www.latvia.travel/ and at The Crazy Tourist https://www.thecrazytourist.com/15-best-places-visit-latvia/ Yes, it would be so much fun to go! I am looking forward to a time when we can travel again and hoping we all survive, thrive, recognize our mutual humanity, learn to deal with our conflicts, and allow peace and health to flourish in Latvia and throughout the world.

Photo credit: Kristaps Ungurs https://unsplash.com/photos/rWBJBGLzJAw