The Estonian Song Festival

I am so excited!  When we visited Tallinn, I found out that the Estonian Song Festival is going to be held there this year on July 5th and 6th, and I get to go!  I don't know about the Estonian festival, but the Latvian Song Festival happens every five years. Their most recent one was last year, so it won't happen again until 2018.  I was really bummed when I heard that.

Now, a song festival may not sound too exciting, but a song festival here is unlike anything you have probably ever experienced.  For one thing, they have been going on for decades, so it holds a lot of tradition.  It's also a very unifying event, which helped a lot when Latvia was under the rule of other countries. The most amazing thing about it, though, is the number of singers that participate.  In Riga, it is typical to have over 20,000 people participate in the choir.  That doesn't include the number of people who are there to watch and listen, which can number around 100,000.  Here is a picture of a recent song festival in Riga.

I don't know about Estonia's song festival, but I imagine that it is similar to Latvia's.  While we were in Tallinn, we visited the song festival grounds.  Here is what we found.

This is what you see as you walk up to it.

This is the area where the singers sit.  I wouldn't be surprised if they add chairs along the front of it.

Here is a picture of the grounds.  It's really big, and I imagine that my ticket will put me about as far away as possible.  That's okay, though.  I just want to be able to experience 20,000 people in a choir all singing together.  I imagine there will be songs where the audience sings along.  When that happens, I know I will get goose bumps!

Here we are sitting on the stage area.  I didn't count how many rows or seats there were, but I know that there were a lot of them!

We will take the bus to Tallinn on Saturday, July 5th, in the morning.  We will get there around 1:30. There is a concert that night at 8:00 and one the next day at 2:00.  Then we will head back home again. It will be a quick trip, but I'm sure it will be worth every penny we spent on it.

I just wanted to share with you this amazing opportunity.  I am so excited!

Happy Jāni!

Jāni is a national holiday in Latvia celebrating the summer solstice.  It is held on two days -- the day before the shortest night and the day after.  Although the actual summer solstice happens on June 21st and 22nd, Latvia has shifted the celebration to June 23rd and 24th to coincide with John the Baptist's feast day, which falls on June 24th.  Jāni is an ancient fertility festival originally celebrated in honor of the Latvian pagan deity Jānis, who is mentioned in ancient Latvian folk songs. It is celebrated everywhere, but people usually spend the days in the countryside.

During Jāni, you will see tree branches and flowers everywhere.  Originally, tree branches were put on homes and fences to ward off evil spirits.  That tradition continues, and tree branches are put on everything.  Wreaths are made of flowers and leaves and are worn on the head.  A well-known part of this celebration is the search for the mythical fern flower, though some suggest that at one time the fern flower was a symbol of secret knowledge; today is it almost always synonymous with having sexual relations.  Young couples traditionally wander away from the main bonfire in search of the flower, and there is a subsequent increase in births nine months later.  (Some of that info came from Wikipedia, in case you are wondering.)

While a lot of people go to the countryside, we had nowhere in the country to go, so we stayed in town. One of the major roads that runs by the river was closed to traffic, and everyone gathered there for the celebration.  There had to be thousands of people there.  Two big stages were set up, and large screens were set up in various spots.  Lots of folk dancing and folk singing took place on the stage.  It was fun to see the people in the crowd sing along on the folk songs.  I guess they are taught these songs all the way from early childhood, so everyone knows them.  While we have a lot of celebrations in the US, I don't think we have anything that compares to this.

Because the celebration goes all night long, everything is shut down on the 24th so that people can catch up on their sleep.  Don and I stayed at the festival until around 10:00, but then we decided to head for our apartment.  It was strange, but last night was the first night that I felt as though I didn't belong.  I hadn't felt that way at all before, but seeing all of these people having fun celebrating this holiday together with all of these old traditions made me feel out of place.

Here are some pictures of the event.  They really don't do a good job of showing how big the crowd is, but you can get an idea, anyway.

    Here is the sign advertising the festival.  We've seen them all over town.  The word on the sign can                                                   be pronounced as Lee-go or as Lee-gwah.

Here are some examples of the flowers at the event.  They were all over the place.  Latvians love their flowers.  You can see people carrying bunches of them all the time.

Whenever you see a Latvian woman or girl in an authentic folk costume, you will more than likely see a flower wreath on her head.  There was a booth at the festival that was selling the floral wreaths, and, of course, I had to get one.  You know, when in Rome, do as the Romans do.  Anyway, here is a picture of my flower wreath.

Here are some pictures of people performing on stage.  Notice that there are tree branches 

covering everything.

Here are some pictures of the crowd.  They really can't begin to show how crowded it was.

There were several of these on the boulevard.  Bonfires are a big part of the Jāni festival.  They light them at sundown and have to keep them lit until sunrise.

Here's a picture of Don holding one of the favorite snacks of the area.  It's a potato that has been sliced on a spiral slicer, put on a skewer, stretched out, and then deep fried.  It is very popular around town.  We had to stand in line for quite some time to get one.  I may try and fix them and see how popular they are in our area.

These pictures can't begin to tell you what a big event this is around Latvia.  There isn't a holiday in the US that can even compare.  As I mentioned, everything shuts down for those two days, and the people party hearty!  It was so much fun to watch the people enjoy themselves while singing, and it was great to see some of the awesome folk dancing groups perform.  While I am looking forward to coming home, there are many things about Latvia that I will miss, and the people's love of folk music and dance is one of them.

Until next time...

Our Visit to Tallinn, Estonia

Boy, have we been busy!  Deb and Dan are here, and we decided that we would take an overnight trip to Tallinn, Estonia.  Several of the Americans we have talked to here in Riga had visited Tallinn, and some of them liked the old part of Tallinn better than Riga's Old Town, so we decided to check it out ourselves.  We purchased round-trip bus tickets, which only cost us 43 Euros each, and off we went. Thank goodness the bus ride was comfortable, because it lasted 4 1/2 hours.  On the way home, we had individual screens on which we could watch movies or TV shows, play games, read books, etc.  That helped the time go a bit faster.

Tallinn is known as the most well-preserved historical old town in the world.  It consists of two sections, which at one time were two feuding medieval towns separated by a wall.  The upper town, called Toompea, is on a hill and was the seat of the government ruling Estonia.  The lower town was a trading center filled with German, Daniwh, and Swedish merchants who hired Estonians to do their menial labor.  When you go from the lower town to Toompea, you certainly can tell you are walking uphill.  It's a rather steep walk.

We stayed in a very nice hotel in lower town called the Meriton Old Town Hotel.  It was yellow, which happens to be my favorite color.  (We didn't know that when we rented the room online.)  Here's a picture of it.

 Here is a Russian Orthodox Church.  It was built by the Russians over the grave of an Estonian hero.  It was their way of "flexing their muscles" during a period of Estonian national revival.  While the Estonians made plans in 1920 to remove it, they later changed their minds, and the building has been renovated to its present glory.

 Below are panoramic scenes of the old town from a couple of viewpoints in Toompea.

Below are just some examples of the streets in Old Tallinn.

As I mentioned earlier, several people we talked to like Tallinn better than Riga.  While its Old Town is larger than that of Riga, I still like Riga better.  The streets are narrower, and the buildings are more interesting.  I'm sure that part of that has to do with the art nouveau architecture in Riga.  Riga's Old Town just seems to have more of a personal feel to it.  In addition, it's not as far north as Tallinn is, so it's quite a bit warmer.  I like warmer.

Well, I'll go for now.  I think we're heading for the shore.

The City of Riga, Latvia

I want to show you some pictures that I have taken since we have gotten here.  I hope they give you an idea of what the city is like.

Riga is split into two parts -- Old Town and New Town.  "New" Town really isn't an appropriate word, because the buildings in that part of the city are still very old -- they are just not as old as the ones in Old Town.  Some of the buildings in Old Town have been there since the 15th century.

Here is the view of the street from the window of the hotel where we stayed the first night.  We were on the 5th floor, so we got a really good view.

Here is a view of one of the narrow streets.  Cars actually drive down these streets, and you'd better get out of their way!

Here is a view of another street.  Notice the cobblestones.  They make walking difficult, though a lot of Latvian women do it in spike heels.

Riga is known as the "City of 1,000 Faces" because of all of their Art Nouveau architecture.  Here are some examples of the faces that you see.  Some of them are okay, but some of them are downright scary.

Here is what is called the "Cat House."  The story is that the man who originally built the house was angry about not getting into some type of organization, so he put the cats on the top of the house and turned their tails toward the organization's building.  However, city authorities eventually made him turn the cats the other direction so they'd be less offensive.

You see these type of openings everywhere.  They are called "gates."  At one time, there was a wall around the city to protect it from invaders.  The wall is still there, but buildings have been built onto the front and the back of the wall.  This opening was one way that people could cross through the wall.  Now they add a picturesque effect to the city.

This is the Riga Dome Church.  It is one of the largest churches in the city.  Its structure is once again very old.  It is a Lutheran Church, and I want to attend it this Sunday.  It is right in the center of the town.  There are organ concerts held here all the time.  I hope to get to one of them.

Notice how there are lots of people in the picture above?  Most of the restaurants have outdoor seating areas, and people definitely take advantage of them.  Here are two more pictures that illustrate the popularity of the restaurants and their outdoor seating.

The Freedom Monument is a special monument in the city.  It was opened in 1935 and honors the soldiers killed during the Latvian War of Independence. It is considered an important symbol of the freedom, independence, and sovereignty.  It is truly a sight to see.  You can't tell it from the picture, but it is a very tall structure that really reaches into the sky.

Although it's not the same as being here, I hope these pictures give you a feel for what the city is like.  It's a beautiful place.

I'll add more pictures later!

We made it!

It's May 22, we've been here three days -- and what an eventful three days it's been.  It started even before we came:

We got a call on Saturday morning from Mike, our landlord in Riga.  He started out the conversation with, "Hi, Chris.  Do you know Murphy's Law?"  I knew right then and there that something was up. The water heater in our soon-to-be apartment had caught fire that morning, so the apartment was not going to be available for a week.  Fine, no problem -- we'll just go to a hotel for the first week.  I made the reservations without a hitch.  We got to the airport, Mike met us and took us to the hotel.  After checking things out, Mike discovered that the fire was caused by a problem in the chimney, not in the water heater.  Consequently, his apartment wasn't going to be available for two to three months -- a real problem for us.  He was able to find us another apartment (a lot cheaper than his!), and we moved in yesterday.

It's a nice, roomy apartment that is located in "Old Town,"which is the oldest part of Riga. it is a lot different from American apartments.  It's not "cozy" -- there are wood floors, three bedrooms (although one has a love seat in it), and no true sitting room -- but it's big and roomy.  I'd like to take the bed out of the biggest bedroom (it would make a great sitting room!) that has a TV in it to the room with the loveseat and take the loveseat into the other room.   I'm hoping it will fit and that the landlord won't mind.  Now we just need to find a way to come up with some chairs so that we can have seats for everyone.

Our adventure continued this morning when I decided to take a shower.  When I stepped out, there was water all over the floor.  I had some clothes laying out to put on, and they were dripping wet.  We threw some towels down and got the water dried up.  Don contacted the landlord, and she got a plumber over here right away.  Nothing major was wrong -- just a hose that had come unhooked. Hopefully, my shower tomorrow morning will be rather uneventful.

Then, to top things off, we did not have wireless internet in the apartment.  We can't function without it, because we need to be able to get to our email and contact our kids.  I also can't do this blog!  I finally ended up calling Deanna on the mobile phone that was provided by our contact and given to us when we first got here.  I'm sure it was expensive, but, at that point, I didn't care.  I needed to contact them and let them know that our living situation had changed.  Our contact came over last night and installed the wireless internet for us, so we are going strong at this point.

I visited a secondary school today.  It covers grades 6-12.  I observed a couple of choirs, a music history class, and a couple of other classes.  I don't know what I expected -- things looked about the same as they do in any American school.  They sure didn't sound the same, though.  The 5th through 9th grade girls' choir I heard was wonderful!  They had full, mature voices and sang 3- to 4-part literature.  I was really impressed.  When the Soviets were in control of Latvia, they instituted an excellent music education program in the schools.  The high quality of music education today is largely due to that fact.  The students all know how to sight-sing, which helps immensely when it comes to learning new music.  That's something that I want to really work on next year -- teaching sight-singing techniques to my choir students.  I'm not sure how to go about it, because I have beginning students up to advanced students, but I need to come up with a plan of some kind.

I like adventure, but I really hope that tomorrow is a boring, uneventful day.  I am visiting a music publishing house tomorrow morning, and then Don and I are going on a tour of the area with a great guide tomorrow afternoon.  We are truly enjoying ourselves.  Don is itching to get some fishing done -- our landlord absolutely loves fishing, so he may end up going with her sometime.  There is nowhere in Riga to fish, but there are a lot of places throughout the rest of the country.  I'm sure he'll find them before we leave.

I have some pictures, but I haven't figured out how to add them here yet.  I will try and do that before long so that you can see what we see every day.   Well, I'll sign off for now.  I think we'll go out and take a walk and try and find some ice cream.  It won't be Graeter's, but at least it will be ice cream!