Soooooooo… Hello again! 🙂
Hope you are all doing fine!
The fact that my EVS is nearly over now, makes me really really sad. I learned a lot and spend maybe the best time of my life here! I am very thankful for everything and thought about the next topic for my blog. So, I decided to make a list of 20 things I will totally miss from Latvia when I arrived home in Germany.
TWENTY THINGS I WILL MISS FROM LATVIA
1. Nature – I will for sure miss these huge forests, the magical atmosphere and the lakes, where you can go swimming in the summer. For me it’s very special and I appreciate the connection of people and the nature a lot! Aswell, here the people respect the nature and are very environmentally friendly! This is awesome!
2. Culture and Traditions – Jāņi, Name Days, traditional dances! Whatever, I am enjoying these celebrations so much and I will for sure miss it in Germany!
3. Speaking latvian – I learned so fast and my biggest fear is to forget everything when I will be back, so I give my best to go on with this language. Even if I cannot speak in my daily life with other people.
4. Garlic bread – So yah, garlic bread is everywhere! But it is amazing and super tasty!
5. The beautiful sky – I am so impressed by the amazing sky and its stars at night. Sometimes I just sit outside and stare at them. Latvia’s population is very small, so there is not that much light at night and you can see impressing things at night when you watch the sky! I will miss it so much!
6. All of the people I met here – My mentor, my flatmates, my bosses, local people, other volunteers! Just everybody who crossed my way during my time here! There is nothing more important than meeting new people and connect with them!
7. My work with the children – I have worked with the children from the Centre for half a year now and built up a very good connection. I will miss them for sure, because they are part of my daily life here and make me happy everyday!
8. Riga – For me Riga is a very special capital city. I love the atmosphere and how it’s built up with the Old and New Town. You can discover every day something new and right now it’s some kind of meeting point for everybody, because it’s totally in the centre of the country. I love Riga!
9. Easy possibilities to travel – Even if you just have a small budget, you can travel very cheap and fast around Latvia and the neighbour countries. It opened my mind about travels a lot and I am very happy about it! I will miss it a lot, but I got a huge motivation for my future and that’s why I am very very thankful for coming here!
10. Empty streets – Sounds crazy, but yah! In Germany I normally don’t like driving the car because it takes too much time. There is soooo much traffic and just simply too many cars. But here, even if I didn’t drive that often on my own, it’s fantastic!
11. The weather – To be honest: I sometimes turned crazy with this weather here in Latvia! When I arrvied there were tons of snow everywhere, then it was hot, then it was raining all the time, then summer arrived and it was even hotter than in Germany. (32 degrees here, 16 degrees in Germany). I never knew what to wear, but in the end I will miss it because it’s just so special and unique! 😀
12. From tourist to local – This is one of the most important things for me! I turned within those 5 months to a person that is involved in the society, speaks (more or less) the language and can take care of myself in a foreign country. This feeling is amazing!
13. Travelling – As I already told before, travelling is easy here. I love to travel alone, but also with friends and I did it a lot! I saw so many places, where I would never go in my life, if I wasn’t here. I discovered amazing cities and I will miss this feeling to be alive and free a lot!
14. Living in an international flat – Germany, France, Italy and Hungary together in one flat. Amazingggg! Even if I needed to challenge myself a couple of times and try to stay by myself, it is a unique feeling and I will miss it for sure, because for me it’s very very special.
15. Hitch hiking – When we talk about easy ways to travel, this is one of the biggest options you can have. This kind of transport is nearly impossible in Germany! If you are standing on the street, putting your thumb up and waiting for a person picking you up, you can wait for days. Here I tried it many times and everytime was so fast and easy. ONE OF MY BEST EXPERIENCES!
16. Everything is cheap – As I was talking before about cheap transport, I can connect this topic with nearly everything here. For me, it’s a huge difference from what I know from Germany. You can get good and fresh food for a cheap price!
17. Latvian hospitality – The ones who read my post about stereotypes will know that I was amazed by this from my first day here in Latvia. I already noticed when I went back for a visit to my home country, that this is completely different here and I appreciate it a lot! Latvians are an amazing folk and I will miss this kind of cultural heritage a loooot!
18. Flowers everywhere – I never received so many flowers in all my life, as I did here in just 5 months so far. Even if it’s just a small gesture, it makes a person happy and shows that someone thinks of you! I really love this kind of small things!
19. Rimi – Rimi is everywhere! And it makes you happy everytime you go out of it! 😀 When you have a Rimi in your city, you can call your city a big city! 😀 I will miss it!
20. Balzams – Even if there is pretty good beer here in Latvia, German beer is better! 😉 But I discovered this black currant drink and it’s pretty cool too! Something very new and special! To fulfill my list now, I will put it here! 😀
So, I really love Latvia much much more than expected! We have a really deep connection, how you can see on the following picture! 😀
Paula in Latvia 