Balderdash

Thursday, September 11, 2008

"Although prepared for martyrdom, I preferred that it be postponed." - Sir Winston Churchill

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Baltics trip
Day 8 - 23rd May - Riga, Latvia (Part 1)

Me and Sara, the homestay house dog. She's very old, and had one ear damaged/injured/infected in the past. YC took her for a walk early every morning. We didn't know how he did it. Must be the good ole OCS training.

nw.t and I struck out on our own in the morning, while YC explored the area around the homestay and kindly did our (well, mostly my) laundry. We almost couldn't venture to the city, as a power blackout halted tram service (another reason they suck!)

River

Hotel with flags

Hotel with statues

Animals of Bremen, St Peter's

We ascended the St Peter's tower (with the lift! Woo hoo!)

View

Me. As you can see, the wind was very strong.

Hair flipping. "Flip your goddamned hair". Unfortunately I couldn't do it properly because of the wind.

Nave

Coats of arms

Vault of the Blue Guards. 1743

We had some trouble with the church jaga aunty. We'd bought

Memorial to the Latvian so-called Genocide

Epitaph of Frants Ringenberg

Where the organ should be

[Charlemagne's] Roland. I've no idea how or why he was a symbol of the independence and power of the medieval town.

Mentzendorff house. Unfortunately it was closed, and the previous day we'd arrived too late, so we couldn't learn about the city's Hanseatic past.

The House of the Blackheads was open, but it had very little by way of explanation (even in Latvian) so we didn't get much Hanseatic context.

Most of the exhibits were in the cellar (part of the building was still used for municipal functions).

Weapons and measures

Unlabelled knight, maybe St George and the Dragon

St George and the Dragon (fragment, left over after the Soviets destroyed it)

Justice (?)

Poseidon and Hermes. I'm trying to identify the goddess in the centre. A nude goddess puts one in the mind of Aphrodite (other goddesses expose one breast at most). The helmet at her feet suggests Athena, but then the other weapons and armour are missing. Meanwhile, the cornucopia points to her being Demeter. The fasces-sans-axe is a puzzle.