Thoughts on the Unfriendly People of Riga

Another leisurely day spent in Riga. During my second Sunday here, it was warming up a bit and sunny outside. After taking my usual tram down to Riga Old Town, I noticed that they were disassembling the basketball courts near Freedom Monument. I wasn't complaining since I wanted the real Old Town back! I decided I didn't feel like spending a lot of money on an overpriced tourist trap restaurant, so I headed for the LIDO inside of Old Town. Hopefully in the near future I will meet a Latvian who can show me some other restaurants in Riga..

The smaller LIDO inside of Old Town is a perfect little spot. It's not too small or too big, and there are usually tables open. I like the dark interior as well. Inside the LIDO I ran into a local man who was complaining about the hard life in Riga. He was waiting for smaller salad bar plates, which have a flat rate of around 1 lat (put as much as you can fit onto the plate). He piled all kinds of food onto this tiny plate.. Smart idea to get a lot of food for a cheap price. I'm sure he was glaring at my .25 liter Coke which cost almost as much as his entire meal.

As for my meal, it came out to 2.50 lats for the food and .70 for my small Coke. A far better deal than so many tourist trap restaurants around the area. I had a chicken filet with cheese and tomato, and fried potatoes. As usual I watched the poor tray collecting girl running all over the place trying to keep up with the customers.

I decided to head to Sefpavars Vilhelms to get a large crepe with raspberry jelly. I also bought a fresh squeezed orange juice which was a little over 1 lat. This is a great little place to hang out with interesting decor. It resembles a polar bear's cave with the white artistic walls.

I'm still trying pretty hard to meet some locals so I can discover more in Riga besides just Old Town. Unfortunately this has been an uphill battle. The locals simply are not polite or helpful here. One trend I've noticed is that the locals never seem to know the answer to any questions. For example, Latvians and Russians working in Old Town never seem to know where another restaurant or hotel is. I find it hard to believe, and think they are just being lazy or don't like tourists. It's simply easier to pretend they don't know the answer instead of helping somebody.

Yesterday while I was spending time with Whitehat, we must have asked three different locals working at bars where his hostel was. None of them even tried to help, and just immediately said, "I don't know" and went about their business. At my hotel it's the same way. I have asked the workers at the convenience shop a few questions and they never have an answer. Best case scenario they say, "I don't know" politely.. Worst case scenario they blow you off like my favorite Russian waitress here. I have simply learned to stop asking any questions, and to figure everything out myself, whether through experience or internet research.

Honestly, when I came over to Riga, Latvia, I had an open mind, and I certainly didn't want the blog to take on a negative vibe. However, that's just reality. The locals are not friendly here, and the only people you will meet easily are beggars and scammers. As an American, it's a different experience for me. Sure back home we have some icy people, but it's far more prevalent here. You know something is wrong when people in public recognize you as foreign, only because you're smiling! I will continue to have an open mind, as I meet new people (if that happens). Hopefully at some point I can meet a local who will explain the Latvian attitudes to me.

I do want to make something clear however.. I'm not a flashy kind of guy. I don't throw money around or dress like a wealthy businessman. I am also not an alpha-male or aggressive in nature. I'm sure if you come to Latvia and you have some of these qualities, you will have better luck meeting locals, especially women. Spend some time in an expensive club throwing money around, and I'm certain you will find some company. That's not my style, and I am not a sex tourist or a wealthy showoff. I'm simply a guy trying to experience life in a different and unique way.. To find something fresh in the world. It does make you a bit sad when you travel so far, only to find more of the same negative qualities in people. But as my friend says, "people are people".

Since it was Sunday, some shops were closed in Old Town, and the crowds were less populated. I also noticed less street performers than usual. I decided to head back to the hotel to see what was going on. I saw a lot of tourist buses arriving and leaving the hotel. They appeared to be from western Europe, from places such as Germany. I wonder what all these buses were about? Tours of eastern Europe? Most of the tourists were older, from 40-60 years of age. In fact most of the tourists in Riga Old Town appear older as well. Well, another day finished in Riga, and I decided to watch the Olympics on TV as usual. Latvia won a gold medal in BMX, good for them!

Riga Old City on Saturday

Drinking a cheap variety of vodka can cause quite a hangover if you're not careful, so let's just say I wasn't very careful last night. After my first week in Riga I wasn't in such a great mood and I decided to drink myself into a stupor before going to sleep. This isn't typical behavior for me, but I also wanted to try the local varieties of vodka. Of course since I still haven't met any locals who are willing to talk to me for more than 5 seconds, who knows if the variety of vodka I selected was popular. It was cheap I can tell you that much! In any case, I felt terrible upon waking up today, and decided to sit around eating chips and drinking water for a few hours. Housekeeping came-a-knocking since I had forgotten to put the privacy sign up. Amazingly the lady from housekeeping was actually polite and nice when I answered half asleep. Wow, I wonder what country she is from? Could she be Latvian or Russian? Is it possible?

After a few hours of watching Olympic reruns on TV, I finally decided to head out to Riga Old City to see what was going on during this fine Saturday afternoon. To my surprise it was even colder out today! Below 60f, and even with my jacket on I was cold. It was cloudy and looked a little like rain. I'm not at all complaining, since back home it's probably 100f. It's still humid here at 80% though, which I'm not a big fan of. Well you can't have everything..

I decided that today I was going to just have a huge meal, and not think about anything else. I wasn't in the mood to try to strike up a conversation with the bitter and icy locals. So I headed to Pizza Malibu, where I ordered a large pizza which comes with a free .5 liter Coke. The waitress didn't speak very good english this time, and she kept jumping ahead of me in the conversation, which was really annoying. I couldn't finish a sentence without her trying to "guess" what I was saying, and it was never close to what I was trying to say. Finally I got my order in and she brought out a .25 liter Coke. Hmmmm, what was this about? I asked why I had not gotten a .5 liter Coke, and she told me they did not have any left. I felt a little ripped off, but her english was so poor I eventually gave up trying to work something out.

The pizza was decent but nothing spectacular, as it had been on previous visits. I was really thirsty but didn't want to get ripped off ordering small .25 liter Cokes or the even more expensive bottled water! I have found that the best way to get a large drink at a decent price is to order tea. They usually make a good amount in a pot, for multiple servings. The price is about the same as a Coke so you get a lot more to drink. The tea is also decent here, especially if you can get a herbal tea. My check came to 9.5 lats with the huge pizza and extra tea, so I left 10 lats. At about $18, this isn't a steal, but it's not a terrible price for a city either.

Riga Old Town is certainly a tourist trap, and the prices are higher than you would expect for a country like Latvia. You can get incredibly cheap airfare and hotel stays, but when it comes to restaurants it seems like you're paying the same amount or more than you would back home! However there are exceptions, such as some of the bistros around Riga Old City. By now I should really know better than to go to the obvious tourist trap restaurants. Sometimes though, you just want what's familiar and I've been to Pizza Malibu several times already.

With the weather being about as chilly as the Latvian people themselves, Old Town was less busy than last Saturday. The basketball event was finally going on, so the area around Freedom Monument was active with a basketball tournament, DJ, and a loud announcer doing play-by-play for all of it. I personally found the event annoying. Old Town has a certain quiet charm, and the event ruined the atmosphere. Opera Singing Man intelligently picked out a location on the other side of Old Town, near the holocaust museum. As usual I gave him my donation for the day.

Since I'd arrived so late in Riga Old Town today, I decided to stay later into the evening, until almost the last tram traveled back to my hotel. While walking up and down the busiest walking street, I saw a tourist who had been tricked into taking one of the annoying "taxi carts". Although this is a legit business, the rates are very high and many unsuspecting tourists are tricked into paying high amounts as they are carted around Old Town. This tourist was speaking fluent english without a foreign accent, so I assumed he was American. He had an eccentric look going on, with a large white safari hat and a diamond earring. Later on I saw him walking by the Double Coffee by St. Peter's Church, where I was enjoying a cappuccino. I asked if he had been ripped off by the taxi cart service. He smiled and sheepishly told me that they'd charged him 6 lats. Yep not exactly a small price for being carted around for 2 minutes.

I will refer to my new friend as "Whitehat", since I cannot recall his name. I  learned that Whitehat was Cantonese, and from Hong Kong! Amazingly he spoke perfect english with an accent that seemed American to me. He was traveling around Europe a bit, and was previously adventuring in Sweden and Finland. Whitehat didn't seem particularly impressed with any of these countries, and agreed with me about the locals being cold and distant. We talked about the various negative experiences we both had with Latvians and Russians. I was starting to feel much better, having met somebody else who felt the same way I did! Whitehat told me that Sweden and Finland were similar, and that the locals there were polite but generally not interesting to talk to. I wasn't happy to hear that, since I had previously heard that Sweden was a great place to talk to people.

Whitehat decided to order a hot chocolate, but in Latvia this is a far different drink! I don't even know if you can call it a drink. They essentially bring you melted chocolate, as if they put a chocolate bar into a microwave! It was hilarious to me watching whitehat attempt to drink his hot chocolate. He needed a spoon to eat it instead. While whitehat and I sat together, multiple beggars approached us. Unlike most beggars, they were very persistent. One man was apparently deaf and gave us a card asking for money. Following my new rules of Riga, I ignored both beggars until they finally went away. The deaf man was very unhappy and cursed at us as he walked away. Beggars are just a reality in Riga, but they become annoying very quickly if you stick around the city. I now choose to donate my money to the street performers instead. There were some very interesting girls today who were swinging around ropes of fire. It looked dangerous!

After our good conversation at the cafe, Whitehat decided to head back to his hotel. He was interested in the nightclubs, but I warned him about all the scams here. I was having a decent evening and didn't want to ruin it by getting scammed for $200 at a nightclub. I would still like to meet a local before attempting to visit any clubs in Riga. Head into the wrong club here, and you'll be mugged by bouncers for hundreds of dollars! They will even force you to take money out of an ATM! The police don't care or pay attention, since the scams are run by the local mafia. In other words, if you get scammed here you're screwed!

Before the night was over, I walked around Old Town for a while and did some people watching. One interesting thing you notice is the bachelor party groups, or stag parties. You will see a bunch of rowdy and drunk men with matching t-shirts looking for trouble. I'm sure the local are not amused by it, but Riga has become a popular destination for such groups. Late at night in general you will notice some shady characters around. Who knows what they're up to, or what scam they might be involved in? With all the tourists around it's just expected I guess. Personally, I feel safer leaving Old Town before it gets too late at night.