For Latvians, the “2009/2010 Blizzard of the Century” has coincided with the “Economic Crisis of the Millennium.” It is the “Big Winter” we will always remember. But what about our grandchildren?
My 3-year-old grandson will definitely remember the snow. It’s a lot bigger than he is and it covers everything. For him and a lot of other kids his size, the spring thaw will reveal a new world, a little wet and muddy, and somehow different from the one they ran around in last year.
For us adults, the departure of the snow will mean an altered world as well. Change has been intense, sudden and sometimes overwhelming, and the prospects we all face in the spring of 2010 are very different from those we were confronted with a year ago.
Some would say those prospects are better. Latvia’s prime minister is convinced of it and said so at a press conference last week marking the one-year anniversary of his government. Other politicians disagree and want voters to believe that they can do a better job.
Our grandchildren don’t have an opinion. They can’t vote in the October parliamentary election, so they aren’t following the public political debates with quite the same intensity that they may devote to, say, snowboarding down a slope of Milzkalns in Kurzeme. Milzkalns, by the way, means “giant mountain,” and while Alpinists may snicker, to the kids, it probably seems that way. I’m sure that everything that the adults are doing today seems larger than life to our grandkids, but I suspect that 20 years from now when they remember something massive, it will be the blizzard and not the budget cuts.
The sun is setting this recordbreaking winter and crisis.
The thaw will come and so will floods and puddles and mud. Although Riga is located on the banks of the Daugava River, not all the water in the streets can find its way down there, and will prefer to settle as little lakes in major intersections. While their parents curse the inefficiency of the sewer system, the kids will celebrate this proliferation of small Baltic Seas throughout the city and jump into every one that they can. For kids, spring always comes with a big splash.
Some kids may remember that during this overwhelmingly white winter, Latvia won two silver medals at the Olympics. Even if they don’t fully understand what “Olympics” means yet, they know what happened was big and exciting. And it was one time when they saw their parents really happy.
For kids, the winter of 2009/2010 meant foxes in the city, sledding in the country, and a pretty girl named Aisha singing to “Mr. God.” Preschoolers may be too young to fully appreciate the cultural diversity and artistic nuances of the Eurovision Song Contest, but they know that Aisha will be singing there for Latvia this spring in a place called Oslo. The kids probably don’t know that a girl with two names, Elīna Garanča, is knocking them dead with her “Carmen” at the Met but that’s largely because Elīna’s arias don’t make the play list of European Hit Radio.
The kids may also remember that the Riga Dinamo ice hockey team is doing better than the Latvian Olympic team, although they may not know that those are pretty much the same guys on the ice, just in different uniforms. In any case, this too makes their parents happy.
Much happier than when they watch those talk shows where politicians argue about taxes and other incomprehensible adult issues.
For a lot of Latvian kids this will also be the winter of blue people in three dimensions, because while “Avatar” didn’t win an Oscar, it won the hearts and imaginations of kids everywhere. Although for Latvian kids, worshiping trees isn’t really all that odd and their own parents will be behaving a lot like the Na’vi in June when Jāņi and the summer solstice rolls around.
And while I can’t predict what will happen in Latvia’s economy, politics or society in the coming months, I have no qualms about assuring my grandson that the sun will rise again over Latvia on the morning of June 24th. Hope we can watch it together.
Ojārs Kalniņš is the director of the Latvian Institute. The Latvian Institute (Latvijas institūts) was established by the Latvian state to provide a wide range of information about Latvia, its society, culture and history. For more information visit www.li.lv.
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Views expressed in the opinion section are never those of the Baltic Reports company or the website’s editorial team as a whole, but merely those of the individual writer.
