Day in Riga, Latvia

The next day in Riga, I make friends with two French girls from Toulouse who are staying in my dorm room and we're off to explore the town. We start off with the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia. After WWI Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania all declared independence from the Russian Empire, taking advantage of the chaos surrounding the Communist Revolution. The Baltic states enjoy independence until 1940 when the Soviets invade during WWII at the “request” of puppet Baltic governments. Latvians endure a “Year of Horror” until they are “liberated” by the Nazis, who turn out to be no better than the Soviets. Out of the over 100,000 Latvian Jews, only 1000 survived the Nazi occupation of Latvia. My grandfather Shalom left Latvia in the 1930's, which is why I'm alive today. After the Nazis are defeated by the Soviet Union, the Western World talks big and does nothing as the Soviet Union permanently annexes Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. After decades of Soviet oppression, the three Baltic states finally declare independence in 1991 as the Soviet Union dissolved.




We then head off to the Market to get some food. Turns out its strictly a fish market. The French girls are loving it and pick up heaps of smoked fish while I do my best of retain consciousness among the fish stench. We sit down to eat and after some peer pressure I try some fish and find that it's actually pretty good. They were a little embarrassed about their stereotypical French fish-eating but I confessed to them that I had eaten McDonalds the night before (it was the only thing open late at night dammit!)





We do some more sightseeing until we take a break for some really good Latvian beer. A few drinks turns into a night out at the discotheque with a bunch of people from the hostel.