Sonnyš Latvian Adventure

Thanks!!!

2010-08-02T03:03:00.000-07:00

So for those that know me fairly well...will know these things...I wear odd socks as i cant usually find any pairs, I am not very good at apeeling and I have anwful grammer skills ( see what i did there) and I am a fan of a little known band in Liverpool named after a bug ( actually they were named after the rival motorcycle gang in the Marlon Brando movie the wild one) ...and I like to compare little things in life with the achievements that this band have done...and If I had to compare this latest blog to one of the Beatles albums...well it has to be Abbey Road.

Now this is offically the last post of the Latvian adventure blogs....however some of you out there who have a keen eye and a good memory will know that my last blog..party time part 1 was not concluded with part 2: 'Charlie dont surf"
now it will come out ...but after the offical last blog
Just like Abbey road fact fans....Abbey road is the last studio album that all four members or the beatle were heavily involved with...and Let it be was realeased afterwards..though the prinicpla recordings were done before the Abbey road session as it was planned to be the soundtrack to the movie and was going to be called get back.
Now i will put out part two......and other bootlegs but the fans ( all three of you) should consider this as the last part of the story....and in a way you are very much involved.

I remember as a kid going away to a place called Nevercott farm for a week...the longest I have ever been away from home, it felt like a lifetime, it was also a surreal expeirience full with farm yard animals and early mornings. I missed my family very much.
As I got older I didnt go away too much, we never really went on holiday abroad ( well never until Im was 18). But when I finally did, well my perception changed, I had that feeling that I wanted to see it all, I want to see everything I can before its too late.
Things got in the way, life mainly, getting a job, having a flat, having an amazing laugh with my mates and then going to Uni.
Then my Little sister gave me a leaflet from an organisation called Platform 2 and I got the chance to go to India for 10 weeks, and from the places that I saw and the people that I met there I knew that sometimes you have to just go with those crazy thoughts in your head, just let go of the things that are holding you back of doing what you want and love. There is a quote by Albert Einstein that I Love very much

“If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it'

So the seeds were sewn and I knew that I was going to search for a long term placement....but I have to admitt I never thought That I would end up In Latvia.
I mean I didnt even know where it was.....what it was like....what could I do
but sometimes in life you get that feeling, that feeling that there is no other choice you can make, no matter how much you think about something or you try to debate it in your head...you always have the same concluison...your just going to do it, what will be will be, for good or bad.
I knew it would be hard and at times it was, despite what people may think there were difficult times here...being away from the ones you love for ten months has its problems, missing your mothers birthday twice in a row, not being able to meet a couple of your close friends baby, not seeing your other friends kids grow up, not able to go to a friends wedding, just not being able to go to your mates and play ping pong, ava bong and play some pool ( the bong part was a joke gran)...you get the point

And this is where I get positive ...It was hard but I was lucky enough to be in a place that treated me so fucking good, always looking out for me, supporting me and the things that I wanted to do.
Making stupid little movies, learning how to use an old camera, teaching English to the community, everything that I did in Gulbeene I loved...I mean really loved this place has become very special to me and its going to be really hard to go back home.

My perception was wrong, I had worries...and yes in the winter time it was fucking freezing (-30) but I never thought that the people would be so nice and welcoming..Once I was in the town looking to buy some film for my old camera and I didnt know where to go so this lady just took my arm and walked me to the shop haha.

Once I got stuck in a nerarby village...no one there to pick me up for this talk I was going to give in a school...and i had no phone credit..so I was walking on my own down this long and dusty road with only my backpack and harmonica to keep mr company but when I found people they were more than happy to point me in the right direction..to help me get home to Gulbene.
My Dad doesnt like me calling Gulbene home..for him Plymouth is my home...and yes it is, but now so Is gulbene.

There are many things I can say about this place and the people but the most Important thing I can say is "thank you" ( paldies) this trip has meant so much to me...and has really made me realise whats the most important thing to me, those that care, who worry, who laugh at my misfortunes haha...I can not wait to get back home and have a pint...eat a curry...go and watch a movie...a drink at the millbridge..see my mates new place, see my mates old place. There is a book that I read about 5 years ago, its a famous book called the Alchemist..and there have been a few defining books in my life..that one..alonng with Cloud Atlas and watership down...that I can really undertsand now truly..( Spoiler) the main character goes on a journey to see what Is most important in his life its not what he thinks at first...but it makes sense for him ( END OF SPOILER)
There is something that Is more Important than traveling to me...and no this isnt a cheesy sentence where I say you, or anybody, but something that I am bound with and thats a love of music...so the time is for me to say fuck it and do what I have always wanted...dedciate my life...my money and own the best Record store that Britain has ever seen. May be impossible..but as einstein said

“If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it"

Stay Classy Latvia

Party Time: Part 1- the best thing about other peoples parties is that you can leave if its shit.

2010-07-21T02:13:00.000-07:00

So if anyone who keeps up with these blogs or even a friend of mine will know that I only have two weeks left of my little Latvian adventure and so therefore, I dont have much time to document these last weeks with you....the fans.

So im think to do at least three more blogs, parts 1 and 2 of Party Time and then the last blog ....ever.

Now these blogs will mostly be about ....well partying in Latvia...drinking and how they like to party.
Now Im a fan of going out .....sometimes ....well now and again...but i like to start around eight and leave around two in the morning. I have found out here that like to start drinking a little later. In the winter time when the temperature was around -20 a friend rang at 11 in the evening and asked me to go out to a friends flat...I had two options stay in my flat on my own watching Apocalypse Now...waiting for my French friend...so I said no....and then after another phone call..I thought fuck it go out...see the Latvian party lifestyle, Fuck it even more, dress up put on some shoes...a bit of a mistake with you know the roads full of ice...minus 20 outside and having to have a 20 minute walk. So after 5 minutes my shoes with their lack of grip allowed me to fall into a puddle ...nice...but I carried on trying to find some grip in the road.
Weirdly enough I was in the same sort of position about 4 years ago walking to work in the rain up a hill wearing bowling shoes.

So on my walk to the party I bumped into my French flatfriend...asking me where I was going at 11 at night so i replied facetiously "going for a walk" and amazingly he turned around taking me very seriously and replied "ill join you"which was bizzare in itself....I told him where I was off to and he proceeded home
Got the flat and had a great time and fell over twice on the way home around half three in the morning.

This is what i have learned they like to party late and stop until they cant carry on. And in Latvia there are many festivals especially when the winter subsides and the spring breaks through the coldness and the grey.
By the spring I even started to have people come to the flat....Thibault was never really into parties, well to tell the truth he didnt even like groups bigger than three people, so it has seemed after may more people were allowed in the apartment. However the thing is I dont like hosting parties too much, its not that Im unsociable, Im very sociable, I like meeting people because I know that I have the ability to leave if I start to feel uncomfortable or bored, and so when you have your own party where do you go....nowhere just deeper in to your own subconscious of weirdness.
Luckily I have enjoyed the few get togethers Ive had, mainly involves alcohol and one night picking up pieces of glass from outside my neighbors apartment because a bottle of vodka fell from my window ( next to helping a mate put up a giant billboard on the motorway for his job this is one of the most rock n roll things to happen in Gulbene)
Ive started to get used to the party life style here...slowly, even went to riga for a party Got to Riga at 6 in the evening went to a party, then we decided to hit the pubs and found myself back on a bus going back home to Gulbene at 6 in the morning.
Now the worst thing about this was that I had no sleep, and my good friends could tell you.....car travel makes me very sleepy and If it was'nt for a friends mum who recognized me on the coach...I would of ended up somewhere near Russia.

I found myself getting deeper and deeper involved in Latvian culture and celebrating some of their greatest festivals...which will be mentioned in
Part 2: Charlie Dont Surf
Peace out my Bitches

the 20th

2010-06-04T02:52:00.000-07:00

Well here it is my 20th blog and I have a great story to tell you all today.
Now this blog is sort of like the third and final installment of a loose trilogy concerning people visiting me or me visiting them. Now in Feb Rob came down to visit and we had a great time we did the things that we would of done if we were in the UK, we drank lots of tea, played Pro evo on the X box, went to the cinema and generally had a laugh.
I met up with my friend Grace in Germany, and again the trip sort of emulated the basis of our friendship, we went to museums, independent cinemas and mostly talked about music and films.
Now in Early May Thom and Stiff (Matt) visited and we had a long weekend in Riga. This trip also highlighted what I know about these guys.... funny,intelligent and heroic drinkers.
Now their trip to Latvia went full circle. I am pleased to say that they entered Latvia the same way they left...still pissed from a sleepless night of excessive drinking.
When they both got of the plane I found out they left from Bristol without any sleep and got incredibly drunk on a boat. Both men were a little bleary eyed but they pulled through, we spent the day mostly walking around riga, with me trying to show them the cultural sites and both of them trying their very best to seem interested.
We got to the hostel and the real fun began...only a pound a pint..and free taster shots of some Latvian Balsams got us on the way..and for our first night we went to a Latvian Hockey match.
The game was quite surreal, Latvia was playing Belarus in a friendly, the stadium was packed and the crowed were eager...the best thing about this sporting event was how easy it was to get a beer..with several people dispensing larger to members of the crowd, no one was going thirsty.
After the game we hit the bars with a couple of friends showing us the best places to drink.
The first night was great, it went very smoothly...and by 3 in the morning we were feeling a little peckish so we were taken to this restaurant that was still open and what you do is you take a bowl and then fill it up with anything you desire from the counter...there was these cheese potato dumplings and various kinds of ravioli and sald..some good eaten.
And then destined to break the calmness of the evening we find that Thom was kicked out of the restaurant because the security guy caught pissing him in the sink...the security guard obviously did not understand traditional customs.
After that we tried one more night club...the 48 hours of drinking finally caught up with stiff and he left for the hostel...but even then he didn't go straight to bed but had another beer at the hostel bar.
me and Thom stayed...Thomas was on his A game and unfortunately for him he had to settle for me to take up wingman duties..I tried my best dance moves and by one puzzled lady I was described as a young Jim Carey( not too sure if this was a complement or not)...they also called Thom something which I will have to ask next time I speak to him.

So one evening down two more left...after a days rest for the lads...we were on it once more..this time we had no guides to show us around we were relying on our own senses, wits and experience....and mostly just went to the bars we were in the night before.
In the morning I heard this story from the owner that this guy in one of the rooms was sleeping with a young lady in the room..now these rooms are shared dormitories and the bed they were using was a bunk bed and that they were "rumping in the hay" on the bottom bunk... they created a sense of privacy by using his bed sheet and hanged it around the bed so one can see...but privacy was something that was not going to happen especially when the guy who was on the top bunk pissing himself with laughter at the noises he could here,had his part of the bunk bed collapse on the unsuspecting couple...it was a good job that no one got hurt...later on stiff wanted to know more about the story and so asked this Australian guy we were speaking to "do you know anything about this guy falling through his bed, when his mate was shafting this bird ( sorry stiff this may not of been exactly what you said) the guy replied "yeah it was me" he then told us that that night they got lucky with some local ladies and instead of following the unspeaking rule of shagging in the toilet not the bedroom..his mate gave it beans and subsequently had a 6ft Australian bloke fall on him.

Now Im not a big drinker...Im not sure I have ever been..I can last all night..but usually Im not drunk and that I actually stopped drinking considerably earlier than everyone else.
This does not mean i dont get hammered...there have been very few occasions but they do happen, and on this night it could of happened but I tried to fight it...In one club and im not proud to say this but I knew that I had to sober up..so i forced my self to be sick..its not pleasant I know and even reading this back im deeply ashamed but come on im sure most of you have done worse...... I know I have but family members read this blog.
So I went back upstairs feeling slightly better and told stiff...now Thom at this point is totally unaware and is being hassled by some crazy Latvian lady...but this happens regularly to Thom..or being hassled by some mentalist as he gets away form this trouble he proceeds in buying me and and stiff a pint of lager and a shot called apple pie....so what could I do... the sensible thing, say no, drink a coke....no thats right I maned the fuck up...I drank that shot....i drank that pint....I went home early.

Now the next day....I was rough...the guys looked ok...but felt half dead, I tried for most of the time to catch up, we went to an English bar to watch Chelsea beat Liverpool....drank cider..walked in the sunshine..took it a little easier.
We went to a bar called Cuba..which had all these great postcards covering the wall and then if you look carefully you see that someone has drawn hundreds of cocks everywhere... picture of Bob marley..smoking a cock...two guys playing chess...with cocks.
Now in this bar we had the great game of flipping coasters....even in my state I was on Fire....I flipped 28...so Stiff being the competitive dick he is ...he flipped 30...so i flipped 30 and that bastard flipped 31..alas i couldn't flip 31...but hey im still proud of my achievements.
Now we got back to the hostel...watched the last of anchorman which was on in the the main room...the guys powered on and I went to bed knowing that they had to leave around 9 in the morning.
I woke up around 8 and I see that the guys arnt in bed..so maybe there ready, organised, all packed, showered....in actuality they were still up...still drinking..and I have to say I was slightly impressed.

The guys made it back well and I know that Ive missed a few things out and I might even give this a redux in a couple of weeks...maybe put in some deleted scenes.
But for now Ive wrote enough..im still recovering...and ill have too as in July Thom is coming back and were going to hit the Latvian music festival...and i need to get pub fit..as I said to Thom if this was the premiership id be John Hartson...or maybe Andy Ried.

why so serious

2010-06-01T05:38:00.000-07:00

so here is my 19 th blog, one more to go and then Ive hit the big 2 0 which will be also be available to read this week.
Now there are two themes for this blog the first being pranks and the second being birthdays.
To start of with I consider my self to be a serious man....i don't take my self seriously or anything around me seriously but in some sort or strange way i am still quite serious, however others do not and I can understand that...I'm happy, i enjoy a joke and I'm laid back...yet I'm still serious about those things..I take being laid ....back very seriously...its not easy you know it takes years of practice and a lot of hard work.
I like jokes ....like most people do...I try to make a joke of most things to look at life with humor, i enjoy the odd occasion of mischief and I have even been know to get up to the odd bit of hi-jinx but one thing I have never really understood is the Prank.
I ve seen some pranks in my day and I have even been a subject of some...but I have never really understood how to pull one of...or even why.
There is a fine art to pull of a good prank...its not easy..the fall out of a prank cant be swept aside as easily as a sarcastic comment or a a crude remark about someones Gran...the Prank needs to be well timed, well judged and very well executed..there is the balance of making the subject of your pranks look like a dick and then make it so good that they are laughing along...if you don't get them laughing ...then it was probably very very funny for everyone else.....except for that person and sure they may have been smiling at the time...but four glasses of sambuca later and they just wont let it lie...and forever that person will remind you of the time that you fucked them over for a joke.

Now where I work we pulled a "Birthday" prank on the security guy that works here..its his job to make sure that everything is in place, in order and nothing is missing..so in the morning me and some others got to work early stole some computers...hid the photocopier crushed some pills on the table....lefts open condoms all over the place...porn magazines ..booze..ashtrays fill with fags..and left the video camera in the corner of the room in a high place to film what will happen next.
The security guy got a call from two guys from the local government saying that they will be doing a check with him in the morning now these were actors..friends of my boss ieva..so when he got to the office saw the mess he was shocked, surprised and found it very funny..that was a good prank..in the video you could see that he fell for it and not only that proceeded to blame thibault for the mess.
It was good...a little mean i guess because the two actors took there role a bit too serious but everyone found it funny and we joked about it all day with some lovely cake....now in the back of my mind i couldn't stop thinking...fuck its my birthday soon...i hope they don't realise.

Now my birthday came up and I was starting to worry that i may have to suffer a prank..which i was worried about because I'm not very good at them...i get suspicious but i don't want to stop trusting people, i get confused and then I don't know how to react afterwards...i knew it was going to be a long day.
So i got up in the morning because i was helping in the nursery that day, made some cheese and pickle sandwiches for a birthday treat, had my Mojo magazine sent from England in my bag..and all the ingredients for a awesome veggie fry up were waiting for me when i got back to the flat...its the little things in life that really matter.
Now i got to work...nothing...someone wished me birthday so the rest of work then said why didn't I say anything so I went to my computer and started my work for the day knowing that soon it will be cheese and pickle time.
however....this was not to be the case and within half hour I got a call.."sonny" "come here" so it turns out work didn't forget and there was a surprise...a prank if you will.
So i was blindfolded and put into a car and to be taken to a secret location.
Then when we stopped I was allowed to get out of the car take of my blindfold and see that i was standing in front of a church and standing where the priest would be situated my boss was holding a pillow with two rings announcing that today was going to be a very special day for me...today will be the day that i marry a Latvian.
So im given a choice of three women...a big boned lady with no money but she does come with a lottery ticket....an elderly Indian woman who comes with a big family but also a sachet of pumpkin seeds and a beautiful blond who comes with a plaster for the bruise i will surly get after being punched in the face from her hockey playing husband.
So at this point staring at the three marriage certificates all looking very real and all waiting for my signature..i started to get confused, i understood it was a joke but i was not sure where this joke was going...so i was blindfolded once more and i was told that i was going to a place where men go to think about such difficult decisions before their wedding day....then i was really confused because i looked every where for a strip club and never found one..however when my boss saw what i was thinking she said not the kind of place English guys go to before a wedding.
Si we pulled up to this building, took my blindfold of and i see that its a massage parlor and that the guys from work have treated me to a massage ( which i needed badly having been forced to sleep on a hard ish sofa bed for the last 8 months) so after 30 mins of an awesome massage, i started to understand that Latvians love a story and that even there presents and gifts are wrapped up in stories and jokes and pranks and my boss was right it was a very memorable day for me...luckily i was not forced to marry anyone in the end but i was given a huge bag of soil to take home.

It was pretty strange to have my birthday away from the loved ones at home, no drinking in the milly, no dancing at 2 in the morning in Ride 2, no Jakes or goodbodys to finish the whole event off...but I still had a great time...just very very surreal

Planes, Trains and Karaoke

2010-05-23T03:01:00.000-07:00

So folks I hope you are ready for another exciting installment of my Great Latvian adventure. Today I will tell the tale of my trip to Bremen...now some of you out there might ask why on earth go to Bremen, and the answer is easy...Ryan Air. Its cheaper to visit Bremen then If was back at home and I wanted to visit London...or Alton Towers...or Even Crealy adventure Park.And at that point of my Latvian adventure I was still hungry to see new places..exciting places and most importantly warmer places.
So when I was thinking about going I was talking to an old friend from Plymouth if she also wanted a random trip to Germany...she agreed..if only we knew what to expect..we could of prepared ourselves.

Now Bremen was fantastic...some beautiful buildings..lovely scenery..and lots of shops in the main center and places to eat, but for some reason after eight, walking around in Bremen became a little strange for the fact being it was a Saturday night and the center was empty...i mean literally empty there was no one around, the restaurants were closing and worst of all there were no bars....this was a little disappointing along with the rain..the first day was a bit meh.
We did have some fun..for example I bought a tiny Gnome and we found a cool record shop but the night life was not what we expected.
Now the second day we hit the museums...hard....and also saw more of the town..we even went to a modern art museum..this was hilarious..in the middle of the room was an anchor and on the walls was old pictures of little children dressed in naval clothes from the 1900's with the eyes cut out in the other room was this installation outside the window with things hanging down ( a book, sausages, a bone and some other shit) and all this was being filmed by this camera with a television in an opposite room showing the images on a screen....haha.....I don't no art but I know what I like....comic books and star wars....much easier to understand.

So the evening was upon us..and after an awesome Mexican we started to worry about the night life once more..I mean if it was dead on a Saturday night what was going to be like on a fucking Sunday.
So we were a little reluctant to leave the hostel....and then when we saw that they were showing Lord of the rings the return of the king on the television in German. Well leaving was no longer an option..we watched the whole thing...when the credits came up I think we both knew it was time to find a bar and get drunk and that we had to leave this sanctuary of geekdom.
We tried different tactics..rather than go in the city...try the seedy bars by the train station.
Once again the streets were empty but we found an Irish bar and luckily the place was heaving..and not only that but shots were one euro and there was fucking karaoke..at this point I knew...that this shit was going to get raw.
After a couple of blow jobs ( don't be alarmed Gran it was the the name of the shot) a pint and a pack of Worcester sauce crisps..I was ready to party and more importantly ready to make a twat out of myself..which usually go hand in hand...and I requested my song....these People were in for a treat a faithful adaptation of Wild thing by the troggs..it was awful but we did get clapped by two people at the front which made the whole experience worth it.
However we were not the worst that evening this one guy from Baltimore (now I ve watched plenty of The Wire and if I had to guess he was west side Baltimore maybe working for stringer bell..not sure) and his friend was celebrating his birthday...the bar sang happy birthday and then he made a speech...the longest speech I have ever heard...the guy thanked everyone told us his life story and then tried to get his rapping friend to come up on stage take a mic and to spit out some rhymes and in his words this "is for all the ladies out in Bremen tonight"....now they were telling us that they were in Bremen to record some music and that the guy was the best rapper in Germany...now I did come up with a nickname for him but unfortunately the crisps and the blow jobs affected my wit and I didn't call him Breminem until the next morning...however it was still funny...just a little late.

Now our last day was upon us and we decided to walk outside the main city center to find more interesting place and we found it.....and we found much much more...record shops restaurants, independent cinemas, book shops, cool cafes, open markets, we found what we were looking for....cool places to hang out interesting shops..cool paintings on the wall...we found the students my friends...lots and lots of students....as soon as i saw a tofu restaurant I felt that this trip was now complete.

so after buying the best book i have seen...a Bob Dylan graphic novel..12 songs with his lyrics and then an artists interpretation of this...along with a new record ( Jackson Brown- to late for the sky) we were ready to go to an independent cinema and watch a french film..in Germany...in English subtitles..it was amazing your allowed to drink beer while your watching the movie and before they show the film they have a game of movie pictionary with a guy at the front drawing the pictures and the crowd shouting out to win a prize..free tickets to see another film.

Now after a great night I didn't have long to sleep before my flight...I went to bed at 1 and had to wake up at 4:20 to get to my tram and to my plane which boarded at 6 and left at 6:30..so my alarm woke me up at 4:20 and now with my ability for profound stupidity I thought that I still had time ...close my eyes for a few minutes before getting up and getting ready...and relax and take it easy, no need to stress...and then I opened my eyes and my clock read 5:20...I had 40 minutes to get to the airport with a tram that took twenty minutes to get there, so I ran.....and ran..i dint brush my hair...clean my teeth...or even have an annual morning pee...I got to the airport with about ten minutes to spare..saw a huge line..joined the back of the line and then I saw a toilet opposite me...tempting me, teasing me..even laughing at me...so i went for a pee..to then try and sneak back in the line with out being seen..which is pretty tricky when your carrying a 9 kg rucksack, and smell like shit.

Well as you all know I made it on the Plane....had a great time with Grace in Bremen..had more stories to tell, but its finding the time and energy...luckily we were able to laugh at the the strange and stupid situations that Bremen put us in ..I didn't even tell you all about the odd maybe homeless or travelling lady that wanted her picture taken with a half woman half lion statue with massive boobs and that she wanted me to take the picture on my camera and then send it to her...maybe that can be saved for another day...so long everyone...and hope your all well.
Get ready for I have another installment ready to be posted on Wednesday.

Robs and Sanj: Bojus Journey Part Two

2010-04-25T10:39:00.000-07:00

Well Its been a while...and the last blog im sure left many of my readers hungry for more..what became of our two plucky heroes..did they have a good time in Estonia...Did they get harassed by more drunk eastern Europeans...did Bono the dog keep them awake at night....the answer my friends is yes.

Now the problem with writing a blog is that you have to find the time to write it, now lately as the most Facebook stalker-ish of you will know is that I have been very busy working...well not really working but more like traveling around Europe (which these adventures will also be mentioned in the Blog) so unfortunately for you hardcore Latvian adventure fans I dont always find the time...and when i do some of the stories that I wanted to share...I kind of forget..However I came up with an Ingenious Idea and I cant believe that I never thought of it before, from this point on..if I cant remember how the story ended Im just going to make this shit up.

So when me and Rob left the bus, found Jaanika and Bono the sausage dog, we were taken to the flat to meet Dimitri (Jaanikas boyfriend/ Plus an EVS volunteer from Greece) relaxed at the flat had some good food, some wine, and rested in the night...the sleeping arrangements were a little snug..but I wont get into details..however I was alarmed to wake up with the sound of panting and the feel of hot breath on my neck, but completely relived to see it was bono the dog...after waking me he then put all his concentration into waking rob and the rest of the flat.
He was a cool fucking dog..however...the best dog in the world is my own..for those who don't know I have a dog, his name is Billy (know in the family as billy ballbags)..hes a mongrel and hes now 17-18 years old and I even miss him stumbling around the house, bumping into walls and pissing and shitting everywhere....because what he lacks in cleanliness he makes up in character...and character goes a long way.

Next morning had some pancakes and we were on our way to see old Tallinn, one of the first things I wanted to see was the coast (miss the sea) so we went to the ferry port, walked to the reception asked which way to the coast and the beach the ladies reply ...."get a taxi" haha very helpful indeed.
Old Tallinn is a beautiful place with plenty to see and so many places to eat, Mexican, Indian, African...just what you want in Estonia.
To be honest I cant believe that we walked for so long and not get bored...even went into one of their malls went to the electrical entertainment section I was looking at CDs..if I dont get asked to leave by someone my CD searching can go on for quite a while. After around twenty minutes of looking at all this music I couldn't afford I started to wonder where my English friend had wandered off to..then with a gaze around I see that hes in the corner sat on a sofa watching the end of Gone in 60 seconds on blue ray....very nice, really rounded of a good fucking day..back to the flat for some soup a quick spray of deodorant and I was then ready to hit the Estonian night life.

It was really cool..lots of people that work with Jaanika and Dimitri and other volunteers..we even found a stray Englishmen that was in Tallinn on his own so he joined the rest of the very multi-national group and got the drinking under way.
Now Ive been living in Latvia now for nearly 7 months and my continental English has gone from strength to strength so I dont have as many people now asking what the fuck did I just say and I can communicate pretty clearly unfortunately and entertain a room however for the other English gents with me they had problems..its ok if you speak English but if you want to talk to people in Europe then you need to be fluent in Continental English.
The evening was getting later and by 2 in the morning most of the group was pretty drunk...especially this French woman who was determined to piss people off..she went up to a couple of Estonian guys with long hair..and started shouting in their faces "GUNS AND ROSES WHOOOO" .
Also in the this club this Guy came up to me and asked for something in Estonian so i replied "sorry mate I speak English" so the Estonian replied none too friendly "give me some of your FUCKING BEER" so I was at a crossroads ...should I give into into this angry, rude, obnoxious youth...or should I stand my Ground and look him dead in the eys and say "fuck you....C*&T Chops"...well the reality was I actually replied "Que"...thats right I took option C pretend that I was Spanish...make up some words, walk away and let Rob and the other Guy deal with it.

Once back to Riga...we had to make the most of it..as rob only had two days left to go..so we decided to get an early night..and see more of Riga in the morning however sleep was difficult..we were back into the hostel and the place was busy..very busy..as it was the holidays for a lot of European students they seemed to have all come to this one hostel..so getting beds was a difficulty luckily I booked in advance..met our neighbors..one Columbian guy and two girls from Korea.after a couple of drinks ( well two cups of tea) and a DVD of wedding crashers we went to bed..only to be woken in the morning...apparently the room was overbooked and that the Korean girls were not supposed to be in those beds..when a group of people came arrived at 3 in the morning those two poor girls had to wake up and move all their stuff into another room..where these groups of multi-national students had the audacity to complain...it was hardly the girls fault they were told to go in that room and there was nothing on the bed or any luggage..and why couldn't a couple of them just grow the fuck up and decide to sleep in the two beds which were supposed to be for the Korean girls..so in that way no one got disturbed until the morning...pricks.
I made a joke that the next night I was going to be in their beds just to keep the continuity of them finding strangers in where they sleep...they didn't find that very funny....however Rob laughed.

So the week went very fast and I have to say it was great seeing one of my closest friends again, and Im lucky to report that I will be seeing two more at the end of next week..and I also met up with another friend last month In April (which will also be blogged), I wish I had the ability to communicate more easily with everyone..but it wont be too long .....and I still have many more adventures to get into.
Next week I will tale you the tale of being blindfolded, forced to marry a Latvian woman and given a bag of soil.

Its up to you as the reader if you believe everything that you have read today
"reality leaves a lot to the imagination"
John Lennon
however in this case it was all true

Rob and sanj's Excellent adventure Part 1

2010-03-14T04:27:00.000-07:00

Well last week I had a friend from sunny Plymouth come to visit me here in Latvia. AS I wanted to show Rob around I had to think of things to do...so he comes to Latvia and the first Idea I have is to go to Estonia and visit their capital city Tallinn.
The best thing had to be the fact that he brought
English Tea Bags
Brannigans: beef and Mustard (veggie friendly of Course)
Mojo magazine, Q Magazine and Nuts *ahem
and Last but no means least a jar of Branston pickle...which believe me friends nearly brought a tear to these old eyes.
The first night was fun, the Hostel was fantastic and the beer was a pound...two beers later and huge shot, we found ourselves conversing with latvians, Canadians, Australians and Chile...ans ???(well people from Chile).
The drinking was fun...but the 3 and half hour journey back to Gulbene wasnt, I was ok, But Rob suffered a little more than me, but soon as we got back to the flat...time for Pro EVO ( for those not familiar with Pro EVO, well its the best football game in the world and if you prefer FIFA then stop reading my Blog and Fuck off).

Now since Ive been here I haven't had any problems with anyone, none of the locals or any of the rivals but for some reason Rob attracted the crazies.
The first time was on the way to Riga, I had to leave for a minute (to go toilet around the corner of the bus station) as I came back a strange old man is trying to converse with my English friend who at the time was looking quite bemused by the whole situation, luckily I know enough Latvian to tell people I can't speak Latvian.
When we were in Riga we went to the cinema to watch a film "From Paris with Love" I read one review that i had to agree with which described the movie as Rubilliant...something which is rubbish and brilliant at the same time...any film with John Travolta as a fat and bald special agent with a black dyed beard is worth watching. Now when you buy the tickets here you have to choose the row and the seat number so we picked the ones in the middle...but it didn't really matter as the place was practically empty so what were the odds we would be in someones seat...........well Im glad Im not a betting man...5 minutes into the film a Latvian gentlemen walks over says to me in Latvian that I'm in his seat..there were seats all around us but he wanted that one, luckily I didn't have to move he just sat one seat away from me...very odd.

When we were in Riga we didn't have long until we had to get the bus to Estonia. So we had a bit of lunch with some traditional food (pizza followed by Ice cream.
As I was in the bookshop picking something up for the journey (Frankenstein and selected poems by Edgar Allen Poe- I was in the mood for something dark).
As i left the shop I see that Rob was having another strange encounter with one of Latvia's finest drunks...this guy was a little harder to talk to as and a little more aggressive his face was right in robs asking for money...but luckily I knew how to diffuse this situation I just used the old short charm..distract and run.

However our meetings with European drunks didn't end here..no..unfortunately it got worse. The Bus to Tallinn (Estonia) was a 4 hour and a bit journey and on this bus was one Estonian gent who was going to get through this journey the only way he knew how...drunk...very very drunk.
Now he was sat in front of rob and I was sat behind rob,,so for most of the journey I didn't notice him..sometimes I can hear some shouting over the noise coming from my I pod but in general I didn't care. Rob however started to get annoyed, he couldn't sleep because the guy kept hiccuping (we timed him and he went on for half an hour). I tried to help Rob by telling him not to be so up tight, relax, don't let him bother you and even suggested that he should just move. Half an hour later Rob got to sleep and when he woke he found that the man was gone...moved...thats right he moved...moved right behind me.
I tried to talk to the man to befriend him so in that way he may choose to be quiet and to stop disturbing me from reading but unfortunately nothing... he would say some nonsensical things in English and then carried on drinking and spilling beer on the floor....which flowed on to the bottom of my bag..then he would put his face in between the my chair and the chair next to me...say something in Estonian and then would proceed in reading Frankenstein with me.....well enough was enough I turned around looked him straight in the eye "excuse me, Im trying to read my book if you don't mind" well that showed him he went back to his seat...at the next stop the driver saw that this guy was so wasted that he forced him to sit at the front of the bus.

When the bus arrived we were greeted by our Estonian hosts Jaanika and Bono the Dog.

Please stay tuned for next week for Part 2 Rob and Sanj's Bogus Journey

I was looking for a job.....I found a job....heaven knows Im adequte now

2010-02-27T01:53:00.000-08:00

Last week me and Thibault were accompanied with a visitor. One of the ex EVS volunteers came back to visit Latvia and stayed at the flat. It was really nice having someone else at the apartment. For me it was nice to hear people talking and having a conversation without being one of the people involved (Thibaut doesn't really like a lot of company at the flat and if I do hear talking then its usually Thibaut talking to himself.....which he does an awful lot). It was nice to talk to someone who has experienced the things which I'm experiencing right now and I was even able to get a few tips...One of the biggest ones was how to improve my Latvian and the answer was.......volunteer at the local nursery. As I have done nursery work in England and a little in India I felt that it was brilliant idea....as I have never found that type of work as work. This may be because I still have a lot of growing up to do...but come on why decide to work in an office all day, go to a job from nine to five, having to wear a tie or worse, when you could be helping kids paint or play with plasticine or reading stories.....you do need to be creative and at times patient but other than that its one of the best jobs Ive ever had (though I haven't been a paid musician or director or blog writer.....yet).
Plus its one of of the jobs Ive ever been good at
* Waiter - only kept on as it was my grandparents restaurant...however was demoted to dishwasher
* working at a bakery's- sacked because I couldn't make a sandwich to their standards after 5 weeks..a thing that my closest friend still wont forget or remind me often
* Telephone salesmen- sacked on my first day and also the day that the aforementioned friend got promoted
* shop assistant- got the job as my friends already worked there and convinced the manger at the time....lasted a while, god knows that they had enough excuses, but I was good for morale...fact
* barman- fantastic laugh yet not enough hours in the summer...somehow tricked my way to supervisor position.
I believe that for me the future is in volunteering which im reasonably adequate at.

back to the story.....now I went to the nursery with Margaretha and she talked to the headteacher for me to start and go every Thursday working with four year olds.
Now she wasnt wrong about learning Latvian because if i don't learn some stuff soon then the kids will run riot....sentences I need to learn
stop hitting
speak slowly
don't fight
stop laughing at me
put the gun down

The kids were a little frightened at first but it was ok as were all going to a puppet show in the main hall. All I can say is thank fuck I was well rested because that was the most trippy thing I have ever seen...erie looking puppets of animals hanging about in the woods....a dog playing the harpsichord and a lady fox dressing up as mrs Santa cluas...at the end the puppeteers completely broke the fourth wall by coming out of their hiding positions to say goodbye......rubbish, I saw their lips move...but the children seemed to love it.
Later on we all went outside to play in the snow...I heard a few of the kids talking and conspiring and then one shouting hey English, I turned around and .....THUMP ...snowball in the face (well it was more like a shard of Ice)
however even though their was slight trouble with the language I had a great time and Im looking forward to going back in a couple of weeks......because next week Im off to Estonia with a friend from England...and I going to drink and become happy in a haze of a drunken hour ...see you around readers.

snow, snow everywhere... yet not a tree to pee.

2010-02-21T03:35:00.000-08:00

we all have things we want to do before we leave the world behind us....I have many dreams...I want to have a drink and share pringles with David Bowie at my local pub...I want to learn how to fix pocket watches......and I would like to insert adamantium claws into each hand....but now one thing I can tick of my list and that is watching Latvian motor racing in the freezing cold.
There was cause for celebration as there was one British team taking part (they didnt do very well) but I did show them support with my pillow which incidently has a union jack on the front.
But the racing wasn't the best thing about that day...no the best thing was that i finally got to go in a tractor....well more precisely on a tractor as I was sitting in the big bit in the front that scoops all the mud.
Standing in the cold for two and half hours did have its challenges. For example my snickers bar which I was saving became very hard to eat and that goes double for my ornage...plus my body became cold and also I needed to wee quite badly. Drinking tea did not help....drinking tea with Balzams ( Very strong Latvian Liquor) made me warmer yet I was always hoping that the warm sensation running through my body was the liquor and not piss.
After watching a couple of laps and having a ride on the tractor we dcided to go back as I was not the only one who was having trouble with their bladder.
However we did have a problem....the car wouldnt start...we tried pushing but nothing helped...luckily I had my pillow just in case we had to stay their for a while....help was on the way yet I could not hold it any more...I left the car to wee.
Now the first thing I had to do was get out of the road as we were on the track of the actual rally.....they only get timed at certain parts..luckily this wasnt one of the parts but they were still pretty fast...so looking around me to find the best place to go...I saw....I saw a vastness of nothing....just fields and fields all covered in deep snow.
Their was a tree close to the car but surrounded by a blanket of whitness and as I walked to the snow..I realised why their were no other footprints...becasue it was a stupid idea.
After getting waist deep in snow...i had to walk ten minutes from the car to find an isolated place and ....im not proud but I had to wee in the middle of the road no shelter...it was out and luckily I was alone....sorry gran.

After that pleasent story I can tell you all now readers...Ive been so busy lately....always dreamed when I was younger that by the time I was 26 id be living some sort of rock n roll lifestyle.
Well how about this for rock n roll...last week I went to a textile museum and then a few days after that I took a ride on the oldest train in Latvia and ive been making videos for presentations for youth centers and schools..Ive also been to the biggest art academy in Latvia....I know its not very rock and roll but I like it....like it yes I do.

"you want fame.......well fame costs"

2010-01-28T03:56:00.000-08:00

So, ive been back now for just over two weeks, trying to get in the same momentum that I had last year. One big change is that I now have the bedroom which is fantastic, Ive already bought the insence,candles and a new plant. Ive also put all my stuff from India in there along with my Beatles poster and R2D2, and it looks like a hippie paradise....just how I like it. Thibualt is struggling with the sofa bed though...so we have come to an agreement Ill keep the room but he can have the bed, and we will move the sofa bed in my room, so in that case were both happy I have a place to hide from the world and he can sleep comfortably in the front room....I hope guests wont find it too strange as they would have to sit on Thibault's bed ...having a cup of tea and some biscuits.

In this issue Ill will be talking about fame and the price you have to pay when you finally get it.
There have been many great songs about fame, there is "Fame"from David Bowie....um..."fame"from the movie fame .....and "when will I, will I be Famous"from the fantastic wordsmith Luke Goss and his band Bros. Well Luke you should of come to Latvia.

Now Gulbene is a small district in Latvia and and to say Ive had an impact.... would be a slight exaggeration. But I have been in two movie since my time here, and you have to admit I have some credible acting range(un-named, and waiter).
I feel I have perfected the presence of a very uncomfortable man wanting to be somewhere else....years of practice I suppose.
Ive also been in the local paper to promote my presence here in Gulbene and certain projects that I do like English lessons and my media group.
What is also quite funny that Im now on tour....in a way, im going to different schools promoting volunteering and the youth center ( Ive even been asked to give a shout out in my blog to the high school in Juan-gulbene)
Also my very controversial in your face band, the Milk tits wrote a Christmas album last year called "spray your milky egg nogg" which got some great recognition in the underground scene.
There has been a few perks, getting recognized in the street, groupies and the drugs, but you know its a very hollow lifestyle.

One of my favourite achievements here in Latvia though, and one of the funniest is that last week I filmed the local awards ceremony. Its one of the first times I have had to film anything and a fucking awful job I did too, but as it happens I was the only one filming and the local news wanted to do a piece about it the next day, so they used my footage, unfortunately I don't have a TV that shows any channels, but apparently the next day they used an edited version of the footage and afterwards, the screen showed "footage filmed by Sonny Short" fuck you Luck goss...look at me now.
However like Icarus who flew too close to the sun, I seemed to of rouse the suspicion of an important person here in Latvia and that man is The "immigration officer".
So it looks like my debauched lifestyle has come to an end and my new arch nemesis seems to have heard a little too much about the English guy who insists of hanging around his town. As I didn't have my passport on me, the gentlemen will be back to get my details this week, I would try and challenge him but he has the second best mustache I have seen in Latvia ( the winner being a Lady I saw at the shops) so as soon as I can grow hair around my face.....its on.
So I hope this is a lesson for any young people out there looking for fame, don't try so hard, get by on your own wit and charm and always look out for the immigration officer who is ready to take you down.

long time "snow" see

2010-01-14T04:32:00.000-08:00

well the blog is back and I am going to continue telling you all about my adventures here in Latvia.
I hope that you all had a great Christmas and enjoyed your nut roasts ( i have decided that if everyone presumes that I eat meat and everyone eats meat, then I will counteract this by presuming that everyone is a vegetarian)however apologies to those allergic to nuts.
I had a fantastic time back home with my friends and family and it did make my final days of my visit very difficult to say goodbye.
As I was preparing to get back to Latvia i had one worry and that was how much will my luggage weigh and how much will Ryan air fuck me over if my bags were too heavy.
The worry was that I was taking more things then i left with, I now had more luxurious items on board with me.
As I now had experience and knew what to expect in Gulbene, i knew that I had to take my X box, around 30 films and twenty of my favourite CDs for those lonesome evenings. Not only that I also now have the pleasure of announcing once again, that I sonny Short am an owner of a onesy.
My family are awesome as they helped to prepared me for the remaining journey, they tooled me up with

An army green itchy as hell onesy
a 1930's style bomber hat
Custard creams
spices
cous-cous (the food so nice they named it twice)
chocolates
A Union Jack pillow
new books
veggie dumplings
a sign for my door that says "what would Elvis do"
A candle and of course, my R2D2 clock that projects the time on the wall

I was worried that all these things would add up and weigh me down. I was also worried about the weather and the journey up to London but it actually turned out quite good.
On the road i was accompanied with my Dad and Grandad short, thats right the shorts went on a road trip to London, we had flasks of tea, coffee an assortment of crisps and sweets and cheese and pickle sandwiches. It was awesome I do like the little things in life and when you have lots of little things adding together well then its bliss, and how can you beat a coffee with a pack of McCoys a cheese and pickle sandwich, reading a music magazine, traveling in a back of a car listening to some of the finest soul music produced in the 60's. I do like traveling and whenever i get into a backseat of car, wherever its a friends or family members the first thing I want to do is have a little sleepy.

As the weather was so unpredictable and the journey was five hours long, we left at 8 in the evening to get there for 5 in the morning as plane left at 6, we shouldnt of worried so much as they was no problems at all and the roads were so clear we were making perfect time, we were going to be so early that we stopped regularly (even ten minutes before the airport) and as we got there it had the feel of some sort of refugee camp with various people sleeping on the floor waiting for their flights, we went for a coffee around the corner of the counter and hour later the lines were unbelievable.
As I was waiting in the line the inevitable happened my rucksack strap snapped, the x box was too heavy for the strap........however I still had one more, all it needed to do was hold the weight till i got home, the problem was that it nearly broke before and i used a staple to keep it attached to the bag and now I had to rely on this small staple to last until i got back to the flat which would insist of a 40 minute walk from the bus station to my place.........did it fuck.
As i got to the bag dropping zone the lady informed me that my luggage was to heavy and I had to get rid of half a kilo....half a fucking kilo..I had to wear a tshirt, a shirt, a hoodie and a huge jacket with a bulging bag with one workable strap held on by a staple carrying my old style camera, unwashed and under-nourished and the worst thing is not everything was saved....no custard creams, no veggie dumplings...not even my cous-cous was able to come along.

As I got in to Latvia I had to wait for a bus to drive to gulbene, luckily that wait gave me enough time to watch a film in the nearby cinema (sherlock Holmes, at least 7 out of 10) 3 and half hours later I made it to gulbene and then the staple gave way (fuck you staples Ive always preferred glue and binders), I had to make some straps out of the surviving bits of the bag, which was extremely uncomfortable walking in freezing weather and a lot of snow (photos will be up shortly)I had to also get food for shopping and I fell over on the road twice, the journey felt like a life time but luckily I didnt crack my eggs.

However you have to make the best of a bad situation, I got home unpacked, had some spaghetti, a cup of tea, biscuits and watched a DVD of the Old Grey Whistle test, Put up new decorations for the flat, played some pro evo listened to some music lit some candles, and rang my parents. My dad was so tired he crashed out when he got home, only to be woken my mum who made him breakfast in bed with a hot steaming bath, he was so confused he thought that he might of crashed the car......good work mum.
I ended my first night back all snug in my onesy wearing my bomber hat mentally preparing my self for whats to come.

Just another clip blog

2009-12-08T02:03:00.000-08:00

Now if you know your TV history you know that whenever you have a long running show you will always get a shitty clip show, a sort of recap of all the "best"bits from that particular series. Well I don't know if its been done before but i am going to write a "clip blog" this is going to be a way of just recapping certain adventures Ive had in My Latvian adventure.

Now Im creative but unfortunately Im not as creative as I would like. I wish I could be some sort of artistic poet, or maybe a painter or a hobo musician from 50s America traveling across the open country on fright trains. One of the first jobs I ever wanted was to be a cartoonist and even today I have fantasies about being In a band, not selling any records and then in twenty years time some artist wants to make a documentary about the Impact that my small band had on the music industry. However with all this passion for art, music and to certain extent performing there was one thing always in the way.........my lack of talent.

Now in the last two months Ive been here I have had the opportunity to show my creative side and even practice certain skills and talents.

Drawing.
Now Man loti patik Gloznot. This in Latvian means , i really enjoy drawing ( I know your Impressed) and I do enjoy it but when it comes to art I've had a wall in front of me, I can get to certain point then everything turns to shit.....my peak is cartoons. I think its the child in me but Ive always been able to draw cartoons or doodles but when it comes to actual reality, i struggle my brain and my hands just stop co operating with each other. At the beginning I had spare time to practice my gloznot, and I even tried to draw something real....the picture of the parrots. The usual happened and it turned into some surreal childish doodle and then I started drawing Uncle Ben eating jars of KoK, maybe My art teacher was right that my approach to art was always too childish.......actually fuck him...being childish is my artistic style and for me well sometimes reality needs to be altered.

Music
For those who know me well, know that I have been practicing harmonica now for around five years, and its probably the only musical Instrument i have ever been average at.
A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to perform with the amazing new band "the Milk Tits". Ive played in front of my friends and small groups of people but never to a big hall, and I wasnt always on the harmonica I had to play guitar and the drums too (not at the same time, though that would be hilarious) which took me out of my comfort zone a little. The best thing was that we playing music for the theater workshop, so we didn't have to play a song just make some atmospheric sounds and If it was out of key or if it didnt have any rhythm well thats ok because it was art and improvisational and we could just say it was meant to be like that. However after we finished the next band was running late so a few of us went back on stage to do a performance of creep.....now I watched it the other day and all I could think was fuck, im really bad at the drums. Though every band has one bad performance and we have to start somewhere I think that im just going to stick with my harmonica. Undeterred I have plans to write the "milk tits" Christmas album.

Acting
Well some of you may know that about six weeks ago I went to watch some improvisational theater, and I was thoroughly confused by the whole thing, Partly due to it all being in Latvian and partly due to the double whiskey I was drinking.
Now for the last three years of my life ive been a student..and one of the quintessential elements of being a student is day time TV. Now yove got to be smart,too much is bad, if you wake up too early then you may get enticed with the E4 morning schedule.Smallville, One tree Hill , now this is bad enough but its ok at 12 45 scrubs is on but what to do before then well unfortunately on E4 its the fucking Gilmore girls so dont get stuck in a rut, shop around try different channels and for me Dave can help at these vital moments even though youve seen that episode of Top gear far too many times before...what else are you going to do get out of bed and study. Now one of my favorite day time television shows has to be Who's line is it any way USA (which can be found on channel Five USA) now I used to watch it thinking to my self If I ever got in a position where I could have a go at doing what there doing then Id do it, however I never thought that I would be doing it in Latvia.
Well last weekend thats exactly what I did, I took part in Improvisational theater, and I have to admit i was quite nervous, I mean we had a practice before people arrived but I never though that there would be so many people, and it was mostly In Latvian. We had to work in teams and luckily for me my team had good English skills and we had a plan for the first game kill me off, kill me off early. So the first thing I had to do was pretend to get shot in the head...another great role for my CV.
As a child I starred as a cabbage In Jack and the Beanstalk, Ive been in two short movies in Latvia, my roles being Random guy and waiter and now Im pretending to get shot in the head....im moving up the ladder of success me thinks.

All in all, I still haven't found that special artistic skill that i have but I do try.....maybe thats my special skill, some people are good at football, some are good at maths ...Im good at trying haha

The Big One O

2009-11-29T04:17:00.000-08:00

Well here it is, the tenth blog of my great Latvian adventure and it´s put me in a somewhat reflective mood. I never thought that I would make it to ten. Firstly I thought that I would get bored of writing all the time (which sometimes I do) and secondly, I thought that things would start getting more, you know.....normal, and that I would run out of stories to tell. But writing these blogs have been great for me to tell you all about the strange, the mad and the weird. What´s funny is that the blogs themselves have now become internationally known, they are read in parts of Europe, Asia, South America................................ and they all agree that my spelling is awful. Though I have had some really nice comments from others. I have even spoke to the first EVS volunteer that stayed here in Gulbene and she told me the origin of all the pictures of animals in the flat and the reason why there is a huge plant in the corner of the front room.
However for all you critics I now have an editor to help keep the spelling and grammar in check, this is just the start of bigger things, although when I say editor it´s probably fairer to say a lovely friend who is willing to help me.

Last weekend I hosted a party for all the people that I met on my on-arrival-training in Riga about a month ago. The party was organised by my new mentor Justinē, which was good as she did all of the organising, as I´ve been so busy lately with work and joining various projects. At the time I probably wasn´t in the party mood for several reasons. One being the fact that I was starting to get a bit tired of all the partying I´ve been doing, I love to party but I also need time to rest and be on my own. The second reason was that on that weekend, thousands of miles back home In Plymouth my ex-classmates from Uni were all celebrating their graduation. This put me in a bit of a sombre mood. It´s quite hard to give yourself a goal, work really hard for three years and achive that goal, especially at times when I didn´t think it was possible. I´m really pleased with how I did but I haven´t been able to celebrate with the people who helped me along the way. I couldn´t celebrate on the day we got our results because I was In India, but that ended ok with a sneaky beer on the rocks next to the river by the house.
But graduation is a chance to celebrate together, but as always Pa short had some great advice, "the awards are great but at the end of the day they are just trinkets and baubles". I know he´s right. You give your self personal goals and that´s what they are personal and you may forget the rewards that you have over time but the things you learned and the experiences you gain will last forever.

Well thats a bit too deep for this story. Let´s get back to the reasons I don´t like hosting parties. Here´s the big one: If it´s shit you can´t leave.
But thankfully it was a great and I think everyone had a great time. It was interesting to get their perspective on the flat, some were shocked with the smell of the water and the sleeping arangements and the pictures of random animals every where. One guy was saying that if im not happy I should do something about it, but I suppose I am happy, very happy, its not perfect by any means, but I have two choices - whine and complain, or just get on with it. There are times when it can be difficult here but the work is perfect for me and the opportunities are amazing, I’ve met so many people and already seen a lot and its still very early in my journey. Next year I´m going to travel across the Baltic countries and then see how far I can get after that.

I had a great time meeting the guys once again and I will meet them again soon somewhere else in December. But for the week it was back to work, I have created a couple of new interest groups at the centre and recently bought a really old manual camera, which I can´t wait to learn how to use because then I can develop my own pictures in the bathroom, which would be great as the red light will distract people´s attention from the orange stains and mould on the wall.

Plus I joined another project at the end of the week with people from Lithuania, Poland and Latvia. The centre was hosting a project that focused on the importance of young people being polictically active and there were workshops on how to make videos. So I even starred in my second short film in Latvia and my roles are getting higher, first I was just a random guy but in my second role my character had a name which was .................................waiter. Hopefully that film will also be on YouTube.
At the end of the week the group went to the capital, and in Riga we went to the Latvian parliament and even met the ex-Minister of Finance. This was fun, as Latvia is in a current economic crisis and also spent two million Lats (which is close to two million pounds) on a bridge that hasn´t even been completed yet. I donned my serious face, and gave him some hard-hitting journalistic questions about these issues.....worryingly he sort of just laughed the issue away and said this, I quote,
"when I was starting out in Politics a superior said to me you can make two types of decisions when you´re a politician a bad one........or an even worse one".............Knob.

Riga is a great place and the hostel I stayed in was awesome. Any place where they greet you with a free beer is going to be a good place especially when they have the Beatles, Rolling stones and Dylan on the video juke box. The nightlife is active in Riga, but they don´t start until quite late and as I was in English party mode, I started drinking at eight but it´s ok, people caught up, and me and the Lithuanian guys even managed to sneak into a night club full of cheesy euro trance music and Russians.
I learned a lot from these guys: They are currently squatting in England and have made getting stuff for free into an art form.

Once again I had another great week in Latvia and drinks with some new international friends.
But next week I think I´m going to take it easy with a new book, a cup of tea and some biscuits. It´s coming up to two months of being here now and the time has gone fairly fast, I´m going home for Christmas in December but after that I might have to do a full seven-month stretch away from home and whether it will be easy or not, who knows, but I´m sure I will have some stories to tell.

Danger Danger, High Voltage

2009-11-22T05:56:00.000-08:00

Me and electrical goods have been having slight disagreements lately. About three weeks ago my apartment had a blackout and now and again the electricity would just cut off. I think it was because one of the sockets is a little dodgy, Usually this would nt be a problem but always seems to be when Im cooking and using the oven, I had to wait till 11 in the evening one night just to have an egg sandwich. The flat wasn't just struggling with electricity but the heating was on blink too, It was OK for me because Ive been going away and staying at other places which is lucky because for about five days we had no hot water neither.

But the worst was about to come.....since Ive been here evenings can be a little queit sometimes, without a laptop to keep me occupied I have to rely on the Four books that I brought, ( three down one more left) and the DVDS that i brought with me. Some classics (blade runner, The good, the Bad and the Ugly and some more of my favourite films. I was lucky enough to get a TV from the youth Center and I was given permission to borrow the centers DVD player in the evenings. It was a good time, Films a cup of Tea and some of the finest Oatmeal biscuits that Latvia can offer.......but that has come to pass, as the other day my Latvian TV.......died.
I was in the middle of watching a film in the morning and then i could hear this strange ticking and then I heard a soft boom the screen went blank and then smoke began to rise from the doomed Television set. I am still able to watch films in the evening at the center but that means that Ill have to remember to take the biscuits.

On the 18th of November It was the celebration of 91 years of Latvia's Independence. To celebrate there was a party being organized across the street from the center, we had to all dress smart and bring food. I got my party on with some potato salad mother fuckers.
During the afternoon the center was open and the boss thought that it would be a good idea to use the light installations which were made last week at the seminar. The light installations use multi coulured bulbs and look really good in the evening. The only problem was that for some reason they were not working, they were in a chain so, I tried other bulbs to see if it was any better, the new bulbs worked but the coloured bulbs were being stubborn bastards. So I thought maybe I should see if a coloured bulb would work inside, I took the bulb and put it in to one of the rooms, as I put turned the light on I could see that shining glow of yellow, the image of success for about a second then the bulb blew, and there was only darkness, not just in the room but I fucked the electricity in the whole building. It was bad timing as the center was full of young people listening to decks, going on the computer and even the boss was in the middle of having her nails done. Its another thing to add to the list of fuck ups and mistakes Ive done at a job (not this one, but just in general) Most fuck ups and mistakes were probably in the bar that i worked in for two years, but they never got mad if anything I think they encouraged that type of behaviour, and I have to respect any job that wouldn't mind employees flashing their pants at other employees in the wine cellar, Mouthing off to policemen, uncomfortable encounters with Frank Bruno and being on the whole a bit of a lazy twat but thats whole different blog altogether.
The fuse box was the tricky part located in a separate building next door, completely pitch black in a warehouse type building with obstacles all over the floor and even a spiral stairway which has no banister and a drop that can be easily mistaken for a black hole. It was so eerie walking down the stair case with a candle as our only light to reach the fuse box looked like a scene from a 30's horror movie.

In the end everything worked out fine, the electric came back on, and I got to share my Potato salad with the good people of Latvia, Ill just be staying away from any electric goods for a while., and stick with books............................I just hope I dont get any paper cuts catastrophes.

I would like to Dedicate this Blog to My Latvian television

Latvian TV
08/10/09- 17-11-09

Away I go

2009-11-17T08:53:00.000-08:00

well I have changed my mind I was going to write a blog titled "game over" which was going tell the account of how I got my ass kicked my six people aged 13-20 at ping pong (Latvians love ping pong who knew) but as I didn't have any similar stories Ive decided to write about my recent travels and the people Ive met along the way.

In the last three weekends i have met, had dinner with and consumed alcohol with people from-
Morroco, Spain, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, France, Italy, Hungary, Palestine, Algeria, Estonia, Tunisia, Molidivia, Bulgarian, Greek,......not all at the same time.
A couple of weeks ago i went to France to attend a training seminar, the seminar was about sustainable development, actually a lot more interesting than it sounds.
To get to France I had to go to Riga first, I was little worried and tired. I had to leave for Riga at six in the morning and then i found out that we wernt taking off until 3.30 then we land in Prague and have to stay in Prague for 4 hours and we wont land until 11.00 which worried me a little as everyone else was meeting at 7, and when we did land we had to get on this bus for 35 mins and then when we were on the bus ring a number that we were given, but because of the international block on the Latvian sim I have I couldn't make any outgoing calls and nor could my traveling companion.
So at this point she had the idea of going to get some food at her Aunts, so were on are way getting further and further away from the airport, and im starting to worry about time, walking through a strange town and then we got to a really old building and then at the apartment i can hear her dog bark,.....................as we went in , I saw that the place looked nothing like the outside it was like the Tardis , and there was a sweet old lady who could not speak a word of English sat me down, and then created a mini feast, massive cups of coffee, three boiled eggs, cheeses, breads and waffles. Its been said by someone before that I can be a bit of a hobbit but all my worries were gone with a nice full belly.
I had to use the communal toilet at the apartment and as i walked into the small old fashioned toilet trying to be funny and clever thinking oh i could write how this toilet looks like the one from trainspotting in my blog............i broke the pull handle.......fuck...when i thought the day was going to get better. I fixed it in the end, after three boiled eggs I was at the top of my game and only panicked a little.

Got to France quite late and found out I was sharing my room with a elderly gentleman from Morocco that looked just like Barrack Obamma's dad, who was nice enough guy but kept asking me if I was asleep when I had my eyes closed.
The week in France was great, and even got the chance to walk around the streets of Aix en Provence, which was full of rich yellows and browns and has a strong Mediterranean vibe to the place. Also got to go to Marseilles for the evening, went to the Notre Dame le garde at the top of this hill and you can see the whole of Marseilles, and it was very impressive.
Most of the guys went shopping but a few of us decided to have a look around the smaller areas and I even found a small independent cinema. It was funny because I was talking to this Italian girl about how much i miss watching films and going to the cinema than we find this one, and it was showing the Sam Mendes Movie 'away we go'. Absolutely brilliant one of the best films Ive see this year........and one of the best sound tracks ever, you cant argue with a film that has Bob Dylan and the Velvet Underground.
It was nice to meet these people and will hopefully get to work with some of them soon for new projects i was even given a nick name from one of the Palestinian girls.....'Mr Smileyface. I'm not sure why Im getting these types of nick names I thought i give of the impression of a serious mysterious poetic young man ......................................................................................... but its probably closer to a permanently grinning rodent.

When I came back from France I had another seminar to go to, this one though was being held in Gulbene the place I'm living in which makes traveling a lot easier. This seminar was called 'Ā million reasons light is better than dark' and I already missed some very creative work shops and making some light installations because I joined the group of Estonians, Austrians, Latvians and Slovenians about five days after the rest of them arrived so i didn't have much time left to get to know everyone but I was lucky because they were all very friendly and sociable and on the first night i was with them I even learnt about Slovenian poetry.
On the last two days their were four workshops Fire juggling, Music, Theater and Synography. I decided to join the music work shop and the four of us decided to play the music for the theater guys. It was great jamming with them, we had around two days to practice and we all swapped instruments and I learned some new tricks on the guitar.
One of the funniest things was when i asked one of the Slovenian girls what the band should be called......and she came up with the 'Milk Tits'....even stranger was the dance that she made for the band which simply put just looked like she was milking her tits.?

Before the night of the big performance we had a party at a sauna house, which is as cool as it sounds, got very drunk and had some great Estonian Quiche and various fruits, as the party went on I got into a very philosophical chat about time, with an other Slovenian girl who is currently studying philosophy and then astronomy...... you cant beat drunken philosophical chats whilst at a party.
The sauna was hot, really hot at times I could hardly open my eyes. I shared it with some of the Estonian gang and they were telling how they like their saunas hot and how they also like to hit each other with branches....hard,................ so What else could I do I got smacked with a twig and maybe it was the heat or maybe it was the alcohol but I really enjoyed it....but they were taking it a little easier on me the next day one of the guys still had marks where they hit him so hard, Its also custom to roll in the snow after but as they wasn't any there Id just hang outside in my pants drinking a nice cold beer watching all of this steam just roll of my body, but then a few minutes later it got very, very cold.

Back at the party, people were drinking and dancing to Nick Cave.....so it was very good night. I forgot how much fun it is to dance to good music when your pissed, I havnt really drunk much since ive been here in Latvia, so it was nice to get my dance on....and oh believe me I can dance with the best of them, it was like I was back in the dance room in mielleinium ( a refrence to all my Plymouthian friends).
Through the night people were being picked up at various times, I was in the last group to leave. One thing Ive noticed about young Latvians is their dry sense of humour and when something goes wrong a lot of them just say 'fail',
when i was getting in to my seat in the car, the door got closed on my hand...it didnt hurt and my hand is fine but what was funniest is the fact that the guy who was driving us just said in a really dead pan way "ultimate fail"......it was funny at the time.

The next day we had the performance, I played the drums, guitar and the harmonica and I really enjoyed my self, it was only the third time Ive ever played in front of an audience and one the most sober times. I was once played in a Bar but I was pissed out of my face dressed up as "the dude"from the Big Lebowski....as i recall a very good night indeed. The performance was being held at the cultural center, and the group of us did a lot of rallying people and informing people the night before, at times it looked like the circus has come to town with a group of foreigners roaming the streets of Latvia holding posters, waving flame torches around and having a quick exhibition of the fire jugglers doing their stuff, all the while the band was making as much noise they could with the drums and shakers. Quite a number of people turned up at the cultural center and it was great night of music and entertainment and the place looked fantastic with all the light installations put up and the lanterns that everyone made.
The theater was great as it starts out with using shadows only, inside a huge white cube then the guys come out of the cube and you notice the fantastic face paint their wearing and then the music and the dancing start to work together. Hopefully Ill be able to show you all a video of it soon.

Its been a very busy couple of weeks and Im probably forgetting lots of stories. Its also been very culturally diverse and I have learnt lots of things from lots of different people in such a short amount of time ....but if i take one thing learn from it, well ive learnt this. THE MILK TITS ARE THE BEST BAND EVER!

What line is being said any way

2009-11-02T08:54:00.000-08:00

well I start this blog with a big congratulations to My mentor Maris and his wife Ilena as two days ago they had a baby girl named Nora, I did originally spell it wrong but thanks to edit mode its all perfect now.

So I have to let you all know that I can not understand the Latvian Language what so ever, I'm trying but its just not happening, its just too difficult and Im slipping in to bad habits.
I have two Latvian lessons each week, but Ive only been to about five, (the teacher was poorly, or Ive been busy with work and training programmes) and it really is like a lesson. I was never a bad student at school academically, but I was a bit of a day dreamer and the truth is I still am, and its something that wont change. I remember as soon as i walked into French class in school my mind would already begin to drift and then i would cover at least half a page of my work book in nonsensical nonsense and doodles. It wasn't just French but History and Art too, At parents evening My history teacher said "Sonny has the unique ability to look like hes working but not do any thing productive"and my Art teacher "If sonny worked at his very best and only concentrated at Art .......well the mos the will get is a D"which I thought was particularly harsh, as he always was. He once shouted at me because I wanted to use cotton wool on one of my paintings as a cloud he looked furious and shouted "what do you think this is Nursery" well I showed him three years later and I was working in a nursery for a living.......all the cotton wool for clouds a young man could hope for.
Even in Later eduction My mind would drift and I would do doodles, I tried at the start of every year to keep my books clean and to resist the urge to draw but these attempts would always be a waste of time as I have the attention span of a baby chimp.
However Ive also learned during my time here that if I don't learn the language then Latvia will just become stranger and more surreal, and its strange and surreal enough.

Its my second Saturday night and I haven't got any plans to drive around in the evening and drink alco pops but instead I'm off to the theater to watch some Latvian Improv.
The show was being held at the local pub and the actors were an Improv group from Riga, there was about 4 guys and 4 girls and then the audience (mostly young people around 18, some from the center and some were colleagues of mine). The premise was pretty much Who's line is it any way, the host would ask the audience for situations and different styles and the actors would then continue with "hilarious"results.
Well I could tell one thing even though I didn't understand the language, and this was the fact that the actors were rubbish, every person held something in their hand and Ive never seen so many people pretend to sweep in my life. The weirdness probably wasn't helped by the double whiskey i was drinking ( with no coke may I add), This went on for two hours and By the end I was extremely confused. But not as confused when for no reason in particular the actors started gyrating on their pretend brooms and started to lick the walls.

So I carried on with my lessons on the Monday after the weekend, and as usual I continued with my doodles. I have a stock of doodles that I usually do, these are
Trees
The Aliens from Futurama and the Simpsons
Lines
Shapes
Water
Clouds with far away Birds
Cartoon Rabbits
The Rolling Stones Mouth Logo
and Cartoon eyes, none of them of any high Quality. I was once drawing at the flat and my room mates mentor commented on my pictures and said that I had a soul of an artist ( She may of been using the famous Latvian sarcasm I ve learnt about) and as I looked at the pictures she didnt see, one of me and Uncle Ben sharing a jar of KoK, Im sure I have more the soul of a Man/Child than artist.

But My attitude has to change and on the Thursday coming I knew that I would have an opportunity to see how other volunteers from other countries were doing with the Language at On arrival Training.
This was being held for four days just outside Riga in the Latvian Country Side. There were Seven/Eight Volunteers there and about 5 Latvian Mentors and Two Latvian Trainers.
The volunteers were a mixed bunch, we had for the boys Two Spanish, 1 Austrian, 1 Turkish1 British (yours Truly) for the Ladies there were 1 French, 1 German and 1 Italian don't think I forgot any one I shouldn't of as it was two days ago I came back and most of them are now friends on Facebook so they will be able to see this.
The training was focused on the EVS programme and the reason I'm here, it was interesting at times but it was more interesting to get to know the other volunteers and it was worth it because all the food was free with as much tea as an Englishman can drink. In the evenings we got to know one another, without any alcohol we still had a laugh. I wasn't alone with problems of mastering the Latvian Language as most of the people here have been in Latvia for around a month everyone was at the same level. But for some the problem was English, the Italian girl struggled at times but could still communicate, sometimes through purrs or during a game outside you could hear her shout one English Phrase she knew"Ī Kill You". I learned in these four days that not only could I speak Latvian but I also need to master Continental English as it would be easier for people from other countries need to understand me too.

The Turkish guy knew the least amount of English and found it hard to communicate with the rest of us. He would sometimes say something completely out of context which could be funny at times or beweildering. The next day his mentor turned up and was able to communicate for him and these translations showed me that you really cant get a grasp of somebody if you cant speak their language, and that here is an intelligent and thoughtful young man with valued ideas,...........or maybe his mentor just did a very good job of translating his thoughts. Later on that evening me and the Turkish guy were talking in continental English and I mentioned that young people in Latvia looked older than they were and his reply with a straight face and extend hand over his head and said "17 18...... big bitches" ...you can make up your own minds.

the food at the retreat was good but they were a few problems 1, no biscuits for the tea. One day we had tea and cake and next to the cake was some sort of diced meat sausage roll ( these Latvians love the meat), and 2 the veg they had would be next to slabs of meat and the veggies
in the group would have to make sure we got the veg on the edge of the tray. The concept of veggie is really not known here and one Latvian girl even gave me the nick name "British Bunny". Now I don't know why but Ive never had very Impressive nick names, and they mostly end up being animal related and always close to the rodent family. This girl was also took back my doodles who didn't think I was drawing eyes but actually nipples.

On the last day we were all sharing our experiences and thanking each other for a great time. Then when it was my turn I satrted with a little bit about how I usually dislike these sorts of things and that i can be quite cynical about these training methods but i was going to carry on and mention what a great time I had but I didn't have that opportunity as I could see opposite me the Latvian girl was doing something with her hands so I stopped my speech and finished off with "I'm sorry but I cant carry on that girl seems to be Playing with my nipples"
Even though it wasn't profound, or maybe not even true (it could of been my imagination) i thought it was funny, which Ive learned most of all, no matter what language you speak, Funny is funny, you can still have a good time not knowing the language you just neet to find other methods whether that is Purring, Making jokes or lot of noise because the language will come in time.
Later on the bus home I was contemplating my time away and then the nipple playing Latvian girl said "British Bunny I have a Present for you"and pulled out of her bag three carrots!
Latvia may be strange and surreal at times but its also very, very funny!

Next week I will be tackling the concept of competition in "Game Over man, Game Over"

Every One Knows Chuck Norris

2009-10-25T02:50:00.000-07:00

So, im cooking in my apartment, as usual the only one cooking as my room mate does not cook and hardly eats. Im trying to boil some rice, one of the more difficult carbohydrates in my opinion. Im never sure on how much waters your supposed to put in and it always ends up with a thick film of starch on each grain (and for someone who has supposed IBS thats not too good, but its only supposed becasue I dont trust my doctor). As im cooking the fire alarm of the whole building starts to go off, the only thing I can think to my self is FUCK not again, as this would be the third alarm now thats been set ofwhilst ive been in the building. The first was the security alarm mentioned in the third blog, the second time was only a couple of days before this incident, something to do with the security at the apartment which incidently gave the whole building a balck out right in the middle of me boiling some eggs, and then this incident making it the third. I ask my roomate whats going on and he said "don't worry , it happens all the time" īt has nothing to do with us"
Now ive learnt one important thing about my room mate is that for about 90 per cent of the time he is completley wrong or quite ignorant of the enviroment around him. For example he didnt notice that the bath was orange because of dirt but because of its oldness??, the doorway light was broken and needed repairing??, but in truth the lightbulb was gone (which I changed) He does not cook because does not know how too ?? now I do like my roommate but sometimes its wise to question what he says but on this occasion I believed him, I just carried on cooking with the alarm ringing, not doing the usual waving of a towel at the alarm or opening the windows to let the smoke/steam out. So the alram kept ringing and ringing for around twenty mins and then there was another massive Latvian authority in my doorway, speaking to me in Latvian then stopped talking completly when he learned I was just a stupid Englishman he just pointed at my rice and then the alrm, explaining two things to me, One it was my fault and Two dont trust Thibaut.
Even the moring after there was strange goings on, as I leave for work a bit later than Thibaut I was surprised to hear someone in kitchen when I was in bed, I was going to stay in the front room becasue there was nothing in the kitchen that I cared about and if someone was going to steal then they could help themselves to as many shitty national geographic pictures on the wall, and spoons as they liked, but as the noises were getting louder I became more curious I open the door and instead of the usual huge latvian there to meet me there was a sweet old lady..........which was good becasue if I got a good punch in I m sure I could of floored her, serves her right coming into my yard. The truth is she had a key and was checking some numbers on some metres or something plus she wasn't that small so it would of been a much more even fight then I would of liked.

Now as the weekend was coming up I knew one thing I could not stay in that apartment it was getting too strange, spontanious and unpredictable , what I needed was a night out, I needed a drink.
This weekend was going to mark my first saturday night out in Latvia, as i finish work around 8 in the evening i get call from one the guys from the centre around 9, asking if i fancied going out. This was good timing as I wanted to see what young Latvians do on a night out................as it turns out its the same as being 17 in England....not a lot.
The thing is with most young people in Latvia they all look older than they actually are, so i meet my friend from the centre i meet his friends and sister. The thing is they are 18 but they look older and Im 25 but i dont feel 25 and i certainly didnt that night.
It turns out that there not many clubs in Gulbene, well there are actually no clubs at all so we go for a drive and before we drive off, we go the shops and buy a little alcohol. I actually end up buying some sort of alco pop which was coke flavour and tasted like shit, and two others bought some brandy and a bottle of coke. A swig of brandy than a swig of coke, it was great it was like being 17 again, driving around in my mates car finding a place to hang around, and plus driving in the night in Latvia is awesome, the speed limit here is 90 miles per hour in the country roads and its completley black as there hardly anylights, plus it was snowing too which for me (as i was sitting in the middle in the back) looked like scenes from star wars ( when the millienium Falcon hits hyper space) unfortunatley I have such confidence Issues I didnt imagine my self as Han solo or luke, the most i could muster was fucking R2 D2.......but it still felt like Star Wars and that was good enough for me.

The night was good fun, I got to meet new people but we didnt find a place to go to, as many places were shut after 11, so we drove around for a while and then we had probably the best conversation Ive had with anyone here in Latvia.................... we talked about Chuck Norris.
Chuck Norris is an American matrial artist who has starred in some very cheesy and rubbish action movies over the years, plus a really awful T.V show "Texas Walker Ranger", but most of the time there so utterly shit, that there genius. For a few years now Chuck has become something of a cult legend and an interent pheneomenon happened...called Chuck facts here are some of the best
1 when Chuck Norris is Late, Time better Slow Down
2 When Chuck Norris does pushups, he doesn't lift himself up. He pushes the world down
3 There is no theory of evolution. Just a list of creatures Chuck Norris has allowed to live
4 Chuck Norris can Kill two Stones with One Bird
5 Chuck Norris Does not sleep. He waits
6 Chuck Norris does not wear a watch, HE decides what time it is.
7 Chuck Norris is the reason why Wally is hiding

I think you understand and there are loads of facts on the internet, so when i said in the car "I cant believe you guys know Chuck Norris" ont of the best qoutes I have ever heard back was simply "Ēveryone Knows Chuck Norris"

Meeting new people in Latvia is great and one thing that ive noticed that the humor here is very black which suits me as I love funny sereal things. One day i had to go to a new youth centre which was getting small finishing touches done, but on the way we had to pick the centres camera from one of the young people. On the way i made a joke that we should take his money for being late and then my boss replied "yeh then we should kill his cat"........which I found funny any way.
It turned out to be one of my favourite days here, it was good to ge tout doors and do some hardwork. I had to cut bark of a log which was great fun, as I said before i hate confronation with people but give me an axe and im going to fuck your tree up.
The new centre is the great building which used to be a school and its located in quite a rurual area, and out side the building is this great stretch of land, near the back of the building is this lake and in the lake is a little island, it was are job to make a bridge then a path in the middle of this small island and then to help make a bonfire.
It was great that a team of people from Riga came to help ( this team actually turn out to be some of Latvias most famous musicians) at the time I had no idea, so I kept talking to them about youth work and what centre there from which In reply I got some very strange looks.
After the bonfire we go to a bread factory and we see how latvian black bread is made at the end of the tour we are offered some bread, to take back to the building with us, where we will all share the Bread with some Honey and Cheese, It was quite funny as all these people were taking the bread to be shared but my roomate Thibaut had other plans he was taking the bread and was putting it in his pockets. I asked him why and he replied that "I antcipate that there will be laods of bread left on the table so i can take home" which he did.
It was a great and very bohemian evening, we ate the food and then listened to some acoustic music from the musicians and even though I didnt understand it there were still some moments that were fantastic. After the music we watched a film on youtube made by the kids of the youth centre to show the musicians what kind of activities they do there, they even used on of the muisicans songs, I was stood next to him to see if if he was pleased or embarresed by this but the song choice seemed to not effect him, then the second song comes on and its only fucking David Hasselhof asking us all to jump in his car, if I was the musician I may have been deeply offeded by following my art and passion with the Hoff......or maybe its a great honour.

After the music finished we were all getting ready to go home, a woman who was one of the musicians asked what I was doing there, I said "im volunteering in Latvia" she said 'Interesting choice"and I suppose at the begening it was, bit now i feel more confidnet that it was the right choice.............................. even though yesterday (at the time of writing this) I'd set of the fire alarm again, Im now four and counting.

Tune in next week folks as we see our plucky hero tackle the language barrier at an Improvisational theatre show, called "what lines being said Anyway".

Oooh it takes a Montage

2009-10-22T08:33:00.000-07:00

Well Rocky had a montage and the way I see, i want one too, this will be one of the shorter blogs as for those familiar with montages will know they don't take long at all.

Now the plan is the blog to be popular with friends and family, then I get home and send it to a publisher and then it turns into a book. The blog gets changed by the editor to make a beginning, a middle and an end to make sure that the protagonist goes through some sort of journey. Then the book gets taken by an up and coming screen writer all the names and events that happen in the book will be changed and the location will move into America and they will add new people into the story, there will be a love interest also a hapless to bring in a best friend to bring in some light relief and then the end product will be nothing like the original blogs.............but I promise you this there will always be time for a montage.
Now all this is a reference to the film Team America, and if you have not seen it well shame on you, because its fucking hilarious. In the film there is a scene where they take the piss out of montages in movies particularly the Rocky movies where there is a Montage in each one (everyone has their favourite, mine is Rocky 4 where hes training in the Russian wilderness carrying a cart on his back) and in this part of the journey I have to face certain challenges and at the moment im doing Ok but I need a montage to speed the whole process up.
The first and biggest challenge is the bath, my oragnge bath. When I first saw it my flatmate told me that it was supposed to be that colour as a result of it being so old, on closer insepction (and scrub) I saw a gleam of hope, a white streak in the middle of a world of orange. So I bought some cleaner stuff and wnet to it. Unfortunately for me, years of being a lazy bastard when it comes to claening has taken its toll and it doesnt help that im buying cleaning products in Latvian as i don't have a clue what im buying or what the directions of use are, so i gave it go....................It took me a whole fucking WEEK to clean that bath. And to be honest its not perfect by any means, I mean i look at my dads cleaning credentials and they are good, the man knows how to clean, he cleans everything. He even used to go his friends house (James) along with my mum and give his house the Short treatment, and everytime i look inside that bath and see my murky reflection looking back at me I dont see triumph but only my fathers bitter disappointment.
But I wont give up, I wont give in i will clean that bath tub if it kills me, it will be whiter than white, this will be my 16th chapel, my Mona Lisa, my Sgt Peppers, my bathtub masterpiece. All I need to do is find a mentor every good montage has a mentor, I need my own Micky, Mr Myagi or best of all I need a yoda...............................Actually even the two blokes that dress up as women in the bounty adverts would be a blessing,
The challenges keep coming here in Latvia and I suppose all you can do is take them head on. I cant speak the language, there is no good veggie food, its freezing now its time for the montage, clips of my Latvian lessons, Clips of me chopping onionš, at first its shit but im gradually getting better, I burn the rice when i cook but after getting some advice from a friend (thanks Nat) It starts to turn into edible food, there will be a scene like in Rocky where hes in a meat locker punching raw meat but instead ill be in a field punching raw turnip. There be short clips of me trying to clean the bath, swearing nearly being defeated by this cold metallic batsard, Mr Muscle will put his head around the door and shout get up you BUM...............and clean it I will .

As i said this was a quick blog this time around because I have many tales to tell but with all different types of themes, the next blog will be the Epic "Ēvery one knows Chuck Noris' this will deal with my first Saturday night out in Latvia plus my Interaction with people and even meeting some of Latvia's most famous musicians and not having a clue who they were.

Would you be Concerned if you urinated bright orange wee

2009-10-17T06:53:00.000-07:00

Well before I start I have to tell you that I am fine and that there is nothing wrong with me physically. I spoke to my Dad yesterday and he told me that along with my Mum, he was a little concerned about the title of my next Blog and wanted to make sure if I was Ok and If I was eating healthy food. Well dont worry Dad because ironically it was me trying to be haelthy that made my wee bright orange in the first place. It only happened twice and it was on the same day. I dont exactly know why, but I have an idea...............
Once upon a time my Auntie Tam insited that I took vitamin tablets, I tried to tell her that Im sure there would be food in Latvia, but she was having none of it. What could I do, she outranks me, not only is she my Auntie which makes her some type of authority figure I suppose(which in a matriarchal family like mines doubles in position) She is also a Paramedic in training. I would try to challenge her medical knowledge but Im only an EX-first Aider, and the only reason I got the certifiate in the first place is because the Lady that was marking and testing us, found out that I was related to Tammy and the rest of the Duckett clan( Ma, Claire and Bernie and of course my wonderful Gran). Plus if I argue too much she would litterally crush me like a grape.
So i have decided to take them, the best vitamin tablets Morrisions has to offer. First of, their huge, as big as.................................................i dont know my ear lobe and for people that are familiar with my ears they will understand my problem. secondly they are a horrible rust colour and they taste like shit and Im pretty sure that they were the reason that my piss looked like lucozade, thankfully this has stopped but Unfortunatley I am finding obstacles on my hunt for a healthy diet.

Now for those who do not know, I am a vegetarian and i have been a veggie for about three years. I have been asked why many times and I have given many explanations, "because i felt like it" "I dont want to eat something which has been killed" "one time under the influnce I watched Watership Down and it had a great effect on me to change my perception on life itself".
Well their all true (even the watership down one to a certain extent). I dont miss meat but I do miss one thing, My Grans Lasange, It is the best meal that for some of you have never had, so it was sad for me to say goodbye to it but now my Cousin Alf has taken the mantle of number 1 fan, its better of really......................................... its a young mans game.

Now to find veggie food here has been difficult, mainly because the concept of being a vegetarian itself is completely mad to your avarage Latvanian, they love the meat.
At the beggening of my trip to find food at all was difficult as my flat mate Thibault doesnt eat in the flat and if he does its a peice of bread with a slice of ham (he doesnt even put butter ont bread). Thnakfully the next day he showed me where the stores were, there are three similarly priced stores in Gulbene there is Maxima, Alviva and my favourite store Super Netto (its my favourite only becasue it sounds like Super-nintendo).
The first one we go to is Alviva, this was my first chance to look around to see what I will be cooking for the next 10 months of my life, and I tell you what there are a hell of lot of pickels!
Luckily there are your basics Pasta, rice bread, cereal and eggs and then it gets a little difficult theres veg but some of it I dont recognize and havnt got the first clue where to start cutting or even what top do with it, Thank fuck for the onion.
Next of is the brands, now there food items here that I recognize but not the manufacturers,Things like cereal is ok i mean Tony and the rest of the kellog gang are all here but savoury items are tricky. We have Butter made from the company Valdo, there is Vici Pizza, Spilva bread and my favourite Kok sauce. Kok (pronounced cock) makes pasta suaces (tomato, Oninon and garlic ect) and i cant wait to go to someones house and see it there, I have already planned what to say "I see you have some Kok on your shelf" ī perasonally like to keep my Kok in the fridge" and of course "whats your favourite falvour of Kok"
I may not be eating a wide range of food but at least it makes me laugh.

The thing is even the restaurants here are against vegetarians. There is a restaurant over the road from the centre, one day i skipped breakfast and lunch and decided to get some food there but unfortunatley its shut cos it doesnt open till 12, so I go in to work and I have a job to do which makes me busy untill 3 by this time Im getting really hungry and tired as the cold just saps your energy levels. I walk in ask for the english menu and go to the veggie section which said at the top "Vegetarian/kids speciality men". Us veggies dont even get our own section of the menu to ourselves. On offer was-
Carrot and PeaStew
Grilled Aubergine w/sauce
Potato Rosti with parmazan cheese
Dumplings with Sour cream
Pancakes with jam
Oats and ceral

There was no section marking off where the kids special menu started so i guesed it was the pancakes and oats. I ordered the dumplings as I like sour cream and I was even planning what to have for pudding, I had a coke (my first in about a week) and i was feeling quite happy about the whole situation.........then my meal came, these little dumpling things looked good on the outside so i popped one in my mouth and im sure i dont need to explain but i spat it back out again in about 3 seconds, Latvia is trying to fuck around with my food. I look inside and all i see is meat and not good meat but the kind of meat that makes turkey twizzlers look like a fucking T bone steak with peppercorn sauce in comparrison. I was angry, well as I angry i can get (which is not that angry). I stormed or realistically walked gently to the waiter. Now he was only a young red haired fellow, which by knowing many red haired gentlemen knew that they are quick to anger when startled, so I politely told him that there was no way at all that I was paying for this meal and that how on earth could they have a meat dish in the vegetarian section, that showed him....................I payed for my coke and left.
Later I told this story to one of my Latvian colleagues who said that they probably didnt have much meat inside which in Latvia is the closest you could get to a good vegtarian meal.

Now I went to a new store (maxima) and had a look and all the similar things were there, plus lots of things looking at me through hundreds and hundreds of glass jars, each thing as indescribable as the last. I walk to the pasta sauce section and there it was looking at me...it felt like a heavenly vision, at my lowest there was one person that was by my side, one person to look to, we all know him, weve known that hes been around us for years, we all know his name we call him BEN..............Uncle Ben.
There that sweet old man was looking at me on a jar of sweet and sour sauce, a brand that I knew, a brand that i could tolerate, I dont even like sweet and sour sauce that much, but thats not the point, Wheres the homepride cheff, wheres the annoying Dolmio puppets wheres the man from Del Monte......fucking no where to be seen.
And whenever i feel down about food again I will always smile and know that in My fridge Uncle ben is placed right next to a jar of Kok.

Next week join me on an me my next adventure "Oooh it Takes a Montage". This will see how i deal with the challenges that Latvia is making me face
and anything that we want to know from just a beginner to a pro, you want a montage (montage)
Even rocky had a montage (montage)

Raise the Alarm

2009-10-13T02:38:00.000-07:00

Well, here is part three of my latvian adventure, now at this point I feel I have to tell you that as crazy as some of this may sound, all thoughts, feelings and events actually happened at the time.

Its saturday night and I am at my mentors house, we have just had dinner and finished watching a movie (yes man) and i know at this point that soon I will be walking home. Latvia is still very new to me and I dont really know if its safe or freindly and the walk home is at least 20-30 mins, so im beggeining to worry. Only a little of course.
Unfortuantley physical confrontation is another thing that I dont excell at. If i am involved in a conflict I have three methods to deal with the problem. The first is to run. The second is to act mad and slightly insane, I saw this work in the cartoon Hey Arnold. Arnold was getting bullied so he decided to baffle and scare his foe by acting completley insane, he used the dancing to James Brown technique. My technique would be something basic yet effective....maybe I'd start to eat my shoe or something. The third and most effective method is to offer food and try to tame your foe, this actually worked once back home and has made me believe since that anyone looking for a fight has really only got the grumps because they havnt eaten today.
As im leaving the apartment I asked Maris if it was safe and he assured me that it was, he said "šure, sure its safe, i mean it is for me". That didnt feel me with total confidence but i have to get used to my surroundings and it wasņ't that late anyway. Option 1 was out because i could run, but whereto I dont know where I am, option 3 was out because i had no food on me, so it looks like the acting slighlty mad option it was going to be.
The thing is Maris was right I had nothing to worry about at all, because there was no one in the streets,because no elese was dumb enough to be walking outside because it was fucking freezing.

Gulbene has a strange beauty in the evening, with the lack of street lights and the cold crisp air it can make the place very atmospheric. As im walking to my apartment, i have to walk through country lanes and on each side of the road are lots of trees and on the left is a wide river, with old style wooden houses and there is even a well in one of the gardens. I look up and I see the most fantastic evening sky Ive seen since I saw shooting stars in India. The stars were so clear and it gave me a great comofrting feeling, I got the same feeling in India and even Blockhouse park, a park which is around the corner of my house and is the highest natural point in Plymouth dont you know.
As Ive turned the corner there is a street light right by my place but it sort of put too much light on everything and I could see this really eerie mist coming from around the corner and everything started to look like the eastern european viallge from the game Resident Evil 4, where the hero has to face against a group of zombie peasents and farmers and this massive bloke with a chainsaw and a brown bag over his head, my walk turned in to a fast pace. Then I started to hear a noise i turned off my I pod and it was the dogs barking and then my fast pace turned into a lazy mans run and i was home in two mins.

As i got home i still had nothing to do, though I am starting to get a routine, My flatmate was in his room watching movies, I decided to put the radio on and read a book. The radio here is fascinating, there is one station called Star FM which plays a lot of recognisable music but its always the same songs, it starts with Beyonce and then Rightsaid Fred, Green Day, the Jai Ho song and then as Im feeling a little vulnearble comes on everybody Hurts by REM, the Irony was not lost on me.
I was feeling vulnrable because of the book I am currently reading which is called Slaughterhouse five, this deals with issues surrounding life and death, and when faced with these issues you cant help but be a little reflective about the decisions you have made and along with the REM song, it occured to me that Im far away from my loved ones, Im cold and Im not sure what kind of project Ill be doing...maybe i rushed things slighlty (i didnt though). Then in around an hours time and Im being completley honest with you here, it was like the light at the end of the tunnel , a sound through the fog, as I was reading I subconciously started to listen to the song and what i heard was -
Here is a little song I wrote
You might want to sing it note for note
Don't worry be happy
In every life we have some trouble
When you worry you make it double
Don't worry, be happy......

all I could do was laugh, turn off the raido and i knew that tommorow was going to be a good day.

Now the next day was sunday and on sunday the centre in which I work at BAZE , is closed but me and Thibault are allowed to go in there and use the facilities like the internet and the DVD player
All we have to do is lock up and put in the alram code. Now before I carry on with this tale you have to know that the language barrier can be a litle difficult some times, all the workers at the centre and my flatmate speak English but they cant understand a word im saying because of my accent. It seems like the Aviva adverts have not made it to this part of the world yet and the concept of Janner is wasted on them. For those who dont know, I am from the south west which may give me a slight accent when i speak certain words, and over here it seems to have baffled my Latvian friends. Especially my French room mate, who seems to ask me to repeat my self an awful lot, I too have difficulty sometimes understanding people sometimes but I tend to act very English and poilite and rather than ask people to repeat themselves i just nod my head and smile which I thought would be fine and not get me in any trouble.

Back to the tale there are two alarm codes one as you first come in and one on the third floor where the office is and the Computer room. As there was no one there apart from Thibault who goes to the centre very early at 8 every day (working times are usually 12-8 in the evening) i thought that it would be ok to go in as the codes would of already be put in (as i didnt want to do it as Ive never used an alarm before) I got a phone call from Thibault saying that the door was open and the 1st floor alarm was deactivated but the office on the 3rd floor was armed, i thought to myslef thats fine because im not going in the office im going to the computer room, so i go upstairs not a problem and then im on the 3rd floor there are three rooms the TV room, the Computer Room and the Office the alarm is right next to the office so thought ill be safe and go no where near it. I go into the computer room to find it empty but evidence showing that Thibault has just left, cos his laptop was still there, so i guess hes over the road having lunch, great i can use the internet to write my 2nd blog in peace and then all i could hear was _PEEP_PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP .Ive set the alrm off, I started to panic I and I try to remember the code, I did have them on a slip of paper but I lost it, none of the codes im putting in are working PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP PEEP, fuck fuck fuck fuck, but its ok ill Ring Thibault and he can tell me the code....................... my phone is out of battery, so I do what anyone else would do, ill put on my boots and Iļl get the fuck out of there and as Im leaving I notice that the front door is open. My Initial thoughts were great Thibault is back or one of the other Workers heard the noise ..................but no, it was a 6ft2 Latvian policeman that looked like Ivan Dragoš (from Rocky 4 people) skinnier brother, Luckly he wasņt holding an AK47 but a massive walkie talkie that still could of done damage if it was busted over my head. I started to talk to him hoping that he could speak English......he didn't. Ok I thought what can I do...........................well I could always eat my shoe.

The Policeman seemed to be ok and did not look at me as an intruder, we went to the alarm and randomly pressed buttons, i said "Ill be back to him" (which made me laugh to myslef of course) and I went to find Thibault, which was quite easy as he was on his way back, he said that he told me about the alarm, he may well of done, I dont what Ive been agreeing to in the last five days. He also found this terribly funny and at the time I wasnt to ammused with the whole situation.
So just another day in Latvia, the rest of the day was long after that excitement and I had to make jobs to do to fight the boredom, I drew cartoons of the parrots that stare at me...whos mocking who now eh.
I cooked a meal and then when it was late i once again put on the raidio. Star FM was putting on the usual, Beyonce and then Rightsaid Fred, Green Day, the Jai Ho song and then as Im feeling a little vulnearble comes on everybody Hurts by REM... Do you know what.................FUCK the radio i have Tetris on my phone.
And I knew that tomorrow was going to be a good day.

Well Latvian fans Tune in next week to find our reluctant hero battle the huge viatamin tablets that aunty Tam gave him and the difficulties of being a veggie in Latvia, in the next exciting tale titled "Would you be concerned if you Urinated Bright Orange Wee"

Thank God for the Brian Jones Town Massacre

2009-10-11T02:45:00.000-07:00

Well it turns out that on the weekends I have nothing to do, and as I still don't know many people and I have lots of things to get of my chest the only thing i can do is write, but please don't worry i will not be writing one every day its just that i felt i left the last one half finished, i need to tell the tale of my first night in the flat.

I got to the apartment around 11 at night, the first thing i noticed was the darkness, there are few street lights in Gulbene which can make it a little unnerving at times. When we arrive at the flat Ieva the co-ordinator who was dropping me off took my 22kg bag with such ease it made re-evaluate my own masculinity.......it didn't take too long. I know being strong is not an asset that i particularly have, who needs strength when you have ..............matching socks, i dont know im sure i have a few more........who am i kidding my socks don't match.
My new flatmate Thibault was waiting outside. What can i say, well not a lot as he will be reading this and is behind me as I write this down, but he certainly is a fascinating character. We go into the flat, i wasnt expecting a penthouse suite but it took me by surprise.
The first thing was that there was only one room, and i was lucky enough to have the couch! it wasnt till the next day that i found out not by my flatmate but by one of the volunteers that the couch was a pull out bed and that there was a second heavy blanket in the bedroom.
But on the first night the couch it was with a thin blanket, my sleeping bag and two pairs of socks on my feet.

So back to the flat, there was no food in the fridge as Thibault does not know how to cook and does not want to learn, so he eats out regularly, also there was no Television at the time, only a radio and a massive plant bigger than me in the corner of the room. One of the strangest quirks of the flat is the random A4 national Geographic pictures of animals randomly placed around the rooms and corridors, I literaly wake up looking at two parrots and i turn to the left and there are a group of penguins on an Iceburg.
The most irritating quirk is probably the fact that, and i dont want to sound crude here but its the only way of describing it, the water smells of fart...........................on closer inspection its probably copper which explains why the bath tub is orange.
So the first night was hard, i was cold, hungry, alone and had two parrots staring at me when i was trying to sleep. Thank god for the band the Brain Jones Town Massacre, a band that ive just put on my I pod, a fantastic band that sound like the early stuff from the rolling stones, which just put me in a better place.

Next morning i spoke to Ma and Pa short, they seemed concerned, fantastically i got a text of mum later saying 'were not happy with the sleeping arrangement do you want Dad to ring up Bruce ( he is the guy in charge of the organisation that sent me to Latvia) I rang them back up said thanks but no thanks iļl sort this out and as a matter of fact i had a great first day, sorted out the bed, got a heater for my room went shopping for food, asked for a TV and im allowed to borrow the DVD player, i have a quilt and im going to put up my massive Indian Om sign that i got from well.....India and a Beatles poster that my gran gave to me years ago.
I also met my Mentor Maris, a good guy who is here to help with things like getting a sim card for my phone , setting up a bank acount ect ect. He intoduced me to some of his friends asking me to pretend that im Latvian by just saying Ja (yes) alot and nodding my head when i felt it was neccesary, lets just say i got some funny looks, consequently Maris inivited me to his and his wifes (who is expecting a baby in November) home the next day, we had dinner and then watched a movie.............the movie was YES man with Jim Carey.
Its going well so far but i have a lot comfort in the fact that my dad is at home waiting for the sign to ring up Bruce and to give him shit on the phone, who knows maybe he could get me a penthouse suite but at the moment I love the quirks too much.........even the parots that stare at me when i sleep.

Tune in to the next instalment "raise the alarm"this will deal with me being stuck at the centre not knowing the code and the police showing up.
PS feel free comment on facebook i would love to know what you all think

Feel free to Laugh

2009-10-10T04:42:00.001-07:00

Well, welcome to my Pictureless blog. I would like to put a picture on there but because everything is in Latvian im not too sure what im doing and i only got this far with lots of help.
I was'nt going to write a blog at all, one of the main reasons for this as people who know me well can agree to is the fact that I can't spell. I like to think this is because I dont feel I have to adhere to the rules of spelling that at I'm an individual and that don't have to follow the crowd with correct spelling and proper grammer an all that. The truth is I'm just not that bright.

I've decided to write a blog because........well because I'm in Latvia and itš all very surreal and funny and i have to share this experience with my friends and family so that they can laugh at my misfortunes.
If you don't know I am currently in Latvia for ten months doing volunteer youth work, after i came back from India I was restless and I needed one more adventure, I applied for a placement on the EVS scheme and three weeks later I'm in Latvia changing my opinion about how blogs are a waste of time.
My tale starts at the airport, where the first surreal moment of the adventure happened. I met Tom Waits. Now if your not sure who he is, thats fine but for those who do I hope you can understand my excitment. For those who dont know who he is, he is an American singer/āctor who has made some seminal albums in his time and stars in one of my favourite films of all time "Wristcutters: A love story"
Now by living in Plymouth, you don't really get the chance to meet many famous people, before Mr Waits or for his friends Tom, the most famous person i have seen was Bobby Zamora the footballer for Fulham and even then I was awestruck and blurted out a nonsensical remark about football. So meeting Tom was strange the first thing I said was "hey i dont want to desturb you......but i love your work" i got a nod and a thank you and that pretty much made the trip worthwhile.....welll until the palne landed.

What do you picture in your head when I mention Latvia, is it cold, grey, dull, well your mostly right, its peacefull too and with some nice sights so far and soon it will be snowing which will make everything look less grey and more.......white i suppose.
The first thing i noticed about the language was that they all sounded like the characters from the computer game "the Sims". They are direct in how they speak but they are also friendly with a dry sense of humour. I was picked up from the airport in Riga and then had to walk to one of the volunteers apartment. This was made a little more difficult as i was wearing a heavy back pack and dragging a suitcase that weighed 22 kg and then i found out that the appartment was on the fith floor of her building.
The houses in Riga are small and quaint, you can tell that these are hard times for Latvia and they are also sufferring from the world wide recession at the moment. There are rough areas with many direlect houses but you can find an area like that in any city ( especially in Plymouth). I tried latvian tea, im still not sure what was in it but it tasted good i think it was peppermint and had pasta for supper than off i travelled to meet one of the project co-ordinators who was driving us to Gulbene where the project is which took three hours in the car. Before hand i had to ask her to use the toilet which she replied "you go toilet Latvia style"which meant pissing next to a tree, even thousands of miles apart english people and Latvians are not too different after all.

I have written far too much for the first part, the second blog will be about my tiny apartment with a shower that smells and my flatmate and the other oddballs and freindly people i have met so far, plus the raido staion that palys cover versions of old classic songs yesterday i heard "hit the road jack"in Latvian very odd.
I hope all is well England and look of out for Blog 2 titled "thank god for the Brian Jones Town Massacre"
From Sonny Short