Who am I?

No I don't work with two computers. The old iMac is not
used and will find a new role soon as a dvd player. Too
old for much else but I still love its style

It must be the weather. Dull, dreary and not terribly inspiring that has put me in a philosophical mood. As I sit at home thinking about the stuff I have to do during the day, there is a sinking feeling that the reading part of my studies is done and now I have to sit down and collate the thoughts and impressions from various other authors. Who am I to do such a thing? I don't mind bringing people to the table if you like, to draw out the good in their work, but to critique it, I find that distasteful. I would rather ignore it. Again the question rises, "Who am I?" Who am I to tell others they are wrong or what they say does not apply in all the cases they think it might? It is almost like the bars of a prison clink down one by one and shut down the clear thinking process, the process that is needed to put pen to paper - or rather fingers to keypad, but that doesn't sound so poetic. I then go to my desk with a sinking feeling and try to avoid doing what I know needs to be done. Such is the life of many an academic. Many would happily sit reading papers by others, setting up projects to research, but the writing part can be so hard. It is like putting your baby out there, knowing it will be criticised, vulnerable to re-interpretations that you never intended.

Processing lovely soft fleece for felting

Writing a chatty blog with things we have done is the easy part. Sometimes I wonder if people want to really read the stuff, but I know it is not a life many lead and the differences can be entertaining, but writing about hopes and fears is more vulnerable. In the same way distilling the thoughts of a thousand authors (okay not quite that many, it just feels like that at times) can be fine but trying to arrange my own, original thoughts on the way development could be done seems far more scary and again those thoughts creep in, "Who am I?" I can also hold what might seem opposing thoughts in tandem, because I can see there is more than one way to skin a cat, as the saying goes, which basically means there is not always just one right way of doing things. For instance I think that development should be much more about a relationship between the developers and the people and no one way of doing that will appear, because each person within that process is different and the context is different in each place. I see it as a coming together of a myriad of possibilities, clashing, colliding and reshaping what can be to what will be. How do you distill that in a paper and not be mauled by those who think there is only one way forward? No there has to be diversity.

A bucketful of sunflower seeds

Too many of us do get overwhelmed by the choices we have to make, the work we have to do and the work we feel we want to do. I read a good article this week on how not to be overwhelmed. I love the analogy of the ants that move one grain at a time, seemingly doing nothing but bit by bit, little by little they are building a network of tunnels and living quarters. Apparently writing is often like that, sentence by sentence, word by word until a whole is made. I could go on to say this is not about me, but it is. It is not noble to claim "that it is not about me, but it is all about Jesus and the call on my life" - which folks do say. The truth is that we are all important, it is about me, it is about you, it is about Jesus in each of our lives. It is about seeking a better way forward for me, for you and for our communities. Not in some isolated, inflated ego kind of way, but in open, humble (at least as far as we can, for we are all fallible) joyous living. Living as if all people mattered.

A pot of parsnip seeds processed this week

My lovely red rose

Well I haven't been sat at home contemplating my navel all week. In fact it has contained a few things rather different to the usual routine. First was an evening out - that in itself is rather rare. We attended the opening celebration of a new music therapy room in the local school that a friend of ours has set up. The room was a little boomy and so she asked if I had some wall hangings and I had two that were still under wraps, so she took them to decorate the walls. So by way of a thank you she invited Ian and I to her do and got a public thank you and a lovely red rose. We also got to hear a mini concert and an amazing young saxophonist. It was hard to believe she had only been playing since February.

Still working our way through the apples. Our animals are
enjoying them too

The following morning we had to be up nice and early for school, only not our local one but in the big town. It was time to repay our dues to the English translator, who also happens to be an English teacher. We took four classes of English. The kids seemed interested about our life - good job we are not that egotistical, just we don't do normal I guess. One young man was looking all teenagerish and slumped in his chair and it was most amusing to see him perk up and his mouth open as we said that Latvian people are friendly. Not something that he thought obviously. Latvians are not wildly friendly like we find American or Brazilian people can be, but give them time and they are quietly friendly and as long as you are not in their face, they are also very helpful we find.

Garlic salt and pepper

There was an unexpected pause as one class we were meant to be teaching were actually in a meeting with someone who had been at the beginning of the "Awakening" in the late 1980s just before the collapse of communism. We listened for a little while, but it would have been difficult for a translation as it would have disturbed the lecture, so we slipped out for a cup of coffee. We sat down in the cafeteria whilst the teacher went to look for some coffee and next thing we know we are presented with a bowl of soup. We were a bit stunned as the teacher was nowhere in sight and we thought lunch was going to be after the lessons, but since we have faced situations like this before, if food is presented just say "paldies" or thank you and eat. Next appeared a rice dish with pickled cucumbers and finally a jelly dessert. At this point the teacher returned with the coffee and joined us for lunch. Our talk went down well, so well that we have been invited back to talk to the other classes, including the older ones, they might also arrange an excursion to our land to look at the alpacas in May next year. Oooerrr!

Playing! I haven't finished it yet. This is to tidy up a load
of business cards I have. The detail on the side is actually
a piece of crochet that has been cut up and stuck on to
give a textured effect. I think I will go for a coppery look
in the end.

Another change to our routine this week came with a text about 9pm at night. It was from our neighbours to the land. So after a long stint of no towing, we had our first request. The text basically said her dad had had a weird accident and her brother was at the bus station could we help? Ian went out to pick up the brother and found her dad not far away from home but precariously close to a rather deep ditch. Fortunately nothing was damaged and he was easy to pull out. They tried to pay us, but Ian was not going to take anything, in the end he just said "piens" which means milk, so another few weeks of our extra milk.

Baking cakes. Can you tell that we didn't get any photos
taken outside this week? I ran around the house looking
for inspiration and realised there are a lot of things in the
process of being made or have been processed.

Ian also finally got the chance to do some jobs that have to be done. He bought some pipes for the heating system and connected up all the radiators using a heating tool borrowed from a friend. He then slowly filled the radiators. Next he lit a fire and we ran around bleeding air out of the system. So far so good. All the joints he had done were good and all the connections to the radiators appeared to be sealed. Only we had water coming out. As the pressure increased it caused one of the pipes to start leaking through a crack that must have happened when the system froze. We were disappointed and annoyingly it is a a holiday weekend and so no shops will be open until Wednesday. Still at least everything else seemed okay and so he just has to replace that one pipe - pity it is a little awkward to replace and pity it was a thin pipe as he had plenty of the thicker pipe. Yes they should all be the same size, but this is Latvia.

I mentioned that Ian goes on his bike
regularly but inside to someone who
commented on the blog last week. Well
here it is, the bike inside on rollers

Ian also got on with separating Agnese from her mum to give Snowdrop a chance to put on some weight before the winter. Giving milk to Agnese takes a lot out of an alpaca mum, especially when they are also usually pregnant with the next baby. Agnese and Estelle have been given one half of the alpaca house and Snowdrop and Veronica the other half. The paddock also had to be divided. Estelle though disgraced herself and muscled through the wire fence and broke it. Ian thinks she got a bit of a fright and he thought she wasn't going to go in tonight, but eventually she did. Now he just has to make sure there is a hay feeder in that side and everything is set so that Snowdrop can dry up and concentrate on hopefully feeding next years baby as well as herself. Ian was saying it is now easier to feed Agnese and Snowdrop since they are separated. Snowdrop is greedy and she would go to different bowls, which makes it difficult to actually plan which bowl she will eat from, so not much point in putting down extra for her, Veronica though will not allow her to take her food, so she has to stick to her own bowl. Most of them also will try to muscle in on Agnese and so with just her to concentrate on, Ian can make sure she eats in peace.

Leftovers in our toilet. Ian fixed the
hole that was made after the neighbour
complained we were leaking water into
his basement - which we weren't, it was
a leak from the roof, missing us and
leaking into his apartment beneath us. 

One of the problems that we face as we farm our land - I still hesitate to use that word "farm" because I know we are only dabbling compared to others - is the risks from diseases and infestations. This year we have fought a mite problem nearly all year. Fortunately winter times the little wee beasties tend to die off or find warm places to hibernate in. One of the advantages of not cosseting our animals with heating is the wee beasties have nowhere to hide on our animals without risking a freezing and so our animals get a respite from those and as long as we feed our animals well, they cope well enough with the temperatures. Others though face much more serious diseases like the African Swine Fever where neighbours have had to cull their domestic pigs and hunters have to beware of not trampling the disease into farms that have pigs. I was sad though to hear of a duck farmer who is having to cull his whole flock due to Avian Bird Flu. It looks a big farm and probably run as a very commercial enterprise, there is no information on that, but even so, they are still farmers, it is still their livelihood and what do you do when the whole unit is wiped out overnight? How do you build up your stock again? Or do you give up and go get a job in the city? None of that is reported, no comment on how the farmer is coping or anything like that. Just a matter of fact report that glosses over the impact on a livelihood.

Not again!

Oh yes! More snow, just when it had been
melting away nicely. What a way to greet
the new month

Oh yes! I have managed to damage my other arm this week, just as my left arm heals up nicely I went for a slide on the ice outside our apartment block. There was no thought, "this is going to hurt,"this week, it was instant pain. Ian is not often one to give much sympathy, would hate that anyway, but when he worries then it is a tad serious. He had to help me up off the floor and by the time I got to the apartment I was a little pale. It is a bit of a problem considering I'm right handed and it is another study week, but at least it is getting better than when I first hit the floor. Fortunately I can manage quite a few tasks with my left hand, but it's not easy. At least my injury got me a ride right to the door of my accommodation in Tartu, instead of being dropped off at the bottom of the hill and walking up. I also got a lovely bowl of sweet and sour veg and mini meatballs and a little later in the evening, whilst working on this blog in my garrett bedroom, I got an email that said lemon cookies freshly baked in the kitchen if you would like some with another cup of tea, how could I refuse?

We have had some nice weather too. This is a view from
a friend's farm

The studies are going okay, I'm coping with the statistics and getting used to the Estonian version of English, but there is one thing that is guaranteed to make me feel stupid! Plonk me in a foreign country where I don't know the language and try to interact with a machine. Bleh! Last week it was the cupless cocoa until I discovered where the cups were (underneath the machine of course, doesn't everyone know that? Well everyone except me, probably). The next was trying to extract a twix bar from a snack machine. Failed! And somehow there is a 20c coin in a slot that wasn't designed for 20c coins. Oh oh! I think the machine still works though. At least I now know the words for greeting someone, tea, coffee, thank you, please, pasta and beef stroganoff in Estonian. What more do I need? As long as I can politely get myself a drink and some food, that's fine for me.

The snow piling up in the local petrol station. I had to take
this photo from inside the car, because on my side the water
was pouring off the roof and down the door. If I had got out
I would have been soaked

As I said I am coping better with the stats, but guess who was the last to leave by far for the practical! Yup you guessed it, me! Some of the young whippersnappers left after an hour. Now had they finished? Can they whizz through their work faster than me? Had they conflicting timetables? Who knows, but I slogged on until the end, fighting with the computer to get the work done. The software we are using is open sourced, but it doesn't like Macs, as much as PCs and it is acting a bit peculiar on my computer - either that I am doing something wrong, which is equally probable. I will get there in the end though.

A grand looking fella

On the whole I am finding that the Estonians are very polite. People always seem to greet the bus driver as they get on the bus, they all seem to say thank you as they get off and I have never had the door opened for me so often in such a long time. Mind you I think I realised that it was mainly young gentlemen holding the door open for the older lady - so I'm feeling old now! Mind you the manners of one Estonian driver could do with some improvement, or more likely their observational skills! I have to watch the path whilst walking, as it is quite icy and so I don't take much notice of the road, the problem is that there are quite a few puddles too as the temperature has been hovering above zero during the day. Well you can work out what happened! I got absolutely covered by icy water, right over the top of my hat too. It is not good to get covered in muddy water whilst wearing a blue coat and so you can imagine that I blessed the driver mightily, especially as it took two attempts to wash the coat and it still has muddy spots on it. Not a good idea to have a light blue coat I guess.

Taking care of his ladies

Travel is getting better, I feel much more comfortable taking the trains and buses now. I even learnt something about knitting on one train journey. I have tried knitting on the round needles a few times, but not been terribly successful and resorted to the double pointed needles. The problem I had was that the number of stitches was too few to knit on a round needle and I couldn't work out how to knit say a hat using the needles I had. On the train I saw a lady knitting a small round something, not sure what it was, maybe a sleeve, and she had the spare wire from the knitting needles poking out from the knitting. The stitches, therefore were not evenly spread around the wire, as I thought they should be. Not sure if that makes a great deal of sense, to anyone except and expert knitter, but it just goes to show what you can pick up by being observant of others.

We still have snowy roads

I know God provides and he has certainly done that in the past and the money we have had has lasted a ridiculously long time since we've been here, but it is getting to the time where we need to make some choices, as building a house is going to whittle away at our finances. I want to be sure it is in God's plan and not just a wild idea, if it is part of God's plan then he will provide the means. I was asking for some surety on this and I felt him say that we will find the finances, but in some expected ways. Just to make sure I wasn't making it up, I asked for confirmation - always a wise move I find, before moving forward. The first unexpected surprise was to find out that I have overpaid our electric bill - not sure how that happened, but it means we don't have to pay for about 5 months, which is rather nice. A few days later we were treated to a box of chocolates. Not that surprising if it was a friend visiting but it was someone coming to do a job for us of finishing off the wardrobe. We still hadn't had the baskets put in, even though it was a year ago that the wardrobe was put in, just not got around to it, but we hadn't expected him to bring chocolates too. It would be nice if God dumped a whole wad of cash into our laps, but I don't expect that, I do expect him to just keep us going and see where that leads.

"Tell me! When will this white stuff go away?"

Ian's towing ministry has been a little quiet of late, despite all the icy weather. In fact he hadn't been able to serve the community of Latvia in that way for quite a long time. That did change at the weekend. We had rather a large dump of snow, over the weekend, in fact we got caught in blizzard conditions on the way home from a meeting on the Saturday night, not pleasant. The next day one of neighbours who has a little tractor was trying out his new snow plough attachment and helping by clearing the road way at the back of our apartment, unfortunately he went too far into the deep snow whilst trying to move the snow off the road and got his tractor stuck. Ian had gone down anyway as he needed to move the car to allow him to clear the roadway and so was on hand to pull him out.

The path to the right of the picture was
obliterated over the weekend and Ian
had to get the snow blower out once again

It wasn't the only tow of the week though, he had to pull himself out using our own tractor on our land today as he was trying to come home to take me to catch my lift up to Tartu. Our roadway has got quite nicely packed down over the winter, but just to the sides is some soft snow and with the new layer it was more difficult to ensure that he got into the right track and managed to slide off. It hadn't been a great day, as snow clearing was not what he really wanted to do today with the short amount of time he had to work and to cap it all, one of our chickens had a prolapsed vent (google it if you want the full gory details), but basically the poor chicken had difficulty laying an egg and ended up with bits hanging out that shouldn't be hanging out. The chicken has been given a chance to see if she recovers by bathing the area and pushing the bits back into place, if she recovers she can go back to the ark, if she doesn't, it will be soup I'm afraid.

The subject of a facebook enquiry. Amazing
what you can find out by asking a few
friends. This mysterious object is a pickle
container. The white handled bit can be
pulled out and the pickles are ready drained

During my trawl of the internet I came across a surprising discovery. I always thought the secret ballot was crucial to democracy, but now I find that perhaps that is not always the case. The secret ballot was used to stop people being bullied whilst voting in general elections, but a secret ballot is not so good when the voting should be open and transparent. Local councillors, members of Parliament etc. should all be accountable for the decisions they make and so in these cases secret ballots are not the way forward. In the CITES conference (a conference to decide on world trading rules for endangered species) has a secret ballot format, but people are suspected of saying they are going to vote one way but instead vote another. There needs to be more transparency in this case, that would allow people from the countries represented by the voters to call these people to account for their decisions. One intriguing aspect of whether a secret ballot enables or hinders democracy is in the event of cheating. What happens if those who find filling in ballot papers difficult have to rely on someone doing it for them? What happens if the person filling in the ballot paper on their behalf puts down a different candidate to the one stated? Would the results be different if everyone knew who had voted for who? Interesting and depends on the possibility of bullying or vote buying. Getting democratic processes right is more difficult than just getting a secret ballot obviously.

Spring! Yay!

Catkins

Spring has finally arrived here, the snow is now rapidly disappearing and we only have small piles of the stuff lying about now, plus only a dusting of snow since last week, the roads are drying out and bumpy, the storks are here and mating (honestly it's like an x-rated movie outside our kitchen window), and the Latvians are lighting their smoky bonfires. It is so good! Ian can finally get out on the land and get things done as the land begins to dry out, which he loves doing. Just today he made some guttering for our workshop, finished taking apart the remaining bits of greenhouse using his new drill (the batteries on his old one were only lasting about 15 minutes before dying, and it costs nearly as much as the new drill for one battery and he needs two) and he rigged up the wire fence in readiness for taking the winter wraps of the trees later on this week, when the chance of frosts have reduced. Not bad for a days work. The electric fence is to keep the deer away from the new tasty shoots on the trees, since the grass is still a bit scarce, just in case the lynx isn't doing its job properly. Over the weekend we were having a look at the trees to see how they were doing and one of our new trees, the Ginko biloba, seemed to have disappeared completely. Admittedly it was not much more than a stick when we put it in, but we felt sure it should have appeared above the level of the snow by now, and so we started scraping back the layers of snow still on the ground in the general area of where we thought the tree should be. We did finally find it, squashed flat to the ground by the weight of snow. At least it wasn't completely snapped like one of the plum trees so we propped it up and are hoping for the best.

A bit misty this day but here are our two storks behaving
modestly at least for the camera.

This week we took a round trip of 200 miles to see the dentists, the bill for my filling was less than the cost of the petrol. Our dentist who is really lovely and speaks good English had moved from the nearest big town to much further away, to a place called Rēzekne, almost too far for us to bother but we have a friend who lives nearby, who we had meant to see over the winter and hadn't managed to so we decided to take the opportunity of seeing a town we hadn't seen before, and see our friend. I did so well navigating us to the right place until we got to a junction and I suddenly realised that the roadworks we had just crossed over was the road I wanted us to take, and we were in the middle of strange town wondering how to get to where we wanted to get too, fortunately Rēzekne is not Rīga and it wasn't too hard to navigate our way around, well kind of! Where we wanted to park was full and so we had to wander around looking for somewhere. We eventually found a parking place and managed to find the dentists which of course was in a medical centre situated in a hotel - as you would expect, right? When we got back to the car, I was beginning to wonder at the wisdom of our choice, as I hadn't noticed how near a rather swollen river it was.

The stork looking for frogs and toads

Had a really good time talking about faith, life and development. It has been a tough winter for him as he was one of those without electric for two weeks over the winter and that meant no heat either, not much fun when temperatures can dip pretty low. It certainly made me think about what we need to do, to make sure we can still run our boiler even if the pump goes off, there must be a way of keeping it going either with a manual pump or one run from a battery. Anyway, I think he was glad that someone had finally made it out to see him. He gets to see many folks over the summer period but not as many apart from locals over the winter, and many of them have lots of needs which can be wearing to deal with all the time. Also left him with a pile of websites to check out that might be useful, one of the good things about my course is the myriad of useful sites I come across. The place where he lives used to supply the Czars with fish from the lake, nowadays there is not much coming out of the little place where he lives but funnily enough, such an out of the way place ends up supplying Riga with hand me down clothing. Our friend has a lot of humanitarian aid coming in and word gets around resulting in a phone call from someone in Riga wondering if they had any clothing to give away. Must make sure we don't let time run away again and get out and see him sooner rather than later.

Our neighbour has been having their forest cut down as
most of it was alder and birch which don't last so long,
around 40 years. This pile here is the second
load to come out.

I said that the snow has been disappearing rapidly and that means there are areas where it is pretty damp and whereas many of the roads are drying out nicely, some sections are not doing so well and one of those sections is on the road next to our ski hill. Our neighbour lives at the top of the hill and had managed to get out in the morning to pick up their daughter who had been on an exchange visit to Germany, but they got well and truly stuck on the way back. We had only just driven past the road that morning thinking it looked pretty nasty and driven back to our village, done some shopping and then we got the phone call, can we come and pull them out. First Ian tried to pull the car forwards up the hill to dry ground but that didn't work and for a moment looked like he might get stuck himself, he ended up pulling the car out backwards, back onto the dry road and then they took a run at the road together with Ian keeping the neighbour's car going when it started struggling. It was close, it was nearly a get the tractor out job.

Finally grass and our tractor implements are no longer
encased in a wintery blanket

With the arrival of spring has come the arrival of a new baby in our apartments, a little girl too! All the other children who live here are boys, all six of them. It does mean though that any news from our heating company will have to wait as it is our house manager's little girl and she will have more than enough on her hands with two little ones, without having to argue with heating companies. Such is life here in Latvia, things get sorted out in their own time and not necessarily according to a timescale of our own choosing.

Our temporary lake re-appearing

I forgot to mention an amusing incident last week at the hotel. We sat down with the menus at the table and were busy deciding when a few minutes later the waitress turns up at the table with a grin on her face and two cups of tea in her hand. We are just so predictable we don't even have to ask!

Had some good news finally on our sale of our house in England, we are fairly sure we have a buyer but these things are never certainties until people sign on the dotted line in there. We have now had a valuation done for the mortgage for the prospective buyer and so little by little and very slowly it is moving forward.

We have steps again, these bushes
were buried up to their tops in snow not
long ago.

River in full flow, the trees in the background
are not normally in the river

I have been playing around with the video on my new phone and had hoped to post  a video of the local river as there is a lot of water flowing through the weir at the moment but unfortunately the video keeps posting over my writing and it won't work for me anyway, so you will have to put up with a static picture of a very full river. The river is overflowing in a few places and I wouldn't like to be down stream from it as we are at the source pretty much.

We have ponds again!

Strong? Who me?

This is a picture I drew many years ago at a
time when I was not feeling strong at all.
That's like me at the front but I do realise
there is someone looking out for me and
backing me all the way

Twice this week someone has commented that they thought I was a strong person, not true! Really! I know I do bounce quite easily though, as I am an optimist by nature, I do look for the positive signs to tell me that all is not really lost. The ongoing relationship problems of a family member and some other news that can't really be shared in an open forum like this, certainly has knocked me though and I am getting rather tired of our house not selling yet, so happy is not a description I could use this week, nor have I felt particularly strong but I can sense that I am on the up when the fields of snow didn't just seem to sparkle with diamonds today, they looked like 30 carat diamonds not your measly one carat jobs. Snow sparkling like diamonds always reminds me of the richness of a life lived on the edge, a life that money cannot buy and it invigorates me every time and reminds me of the care of my Father in Heaven that created such richness. Also a friend and colleague posted a message which included the phrase "Carpe Diem" - seize the day, which doesn't mean be eternally busy but to seize the opportunities that come your way and I feel that we have done that and I feel that should continue to mark us as a couple - so I am seizing the day and let that drip into my soul to encourage me for the journey ahead.

My interpretation of the tearing of the
temple curtain

My eternal optimism fuels my studies too, if I didn't think that something could be done to turn around this trajectory we are on, one where we show no consideration for the poor and continue to trash the planet expecting our children to clean up, or our grandchildren or even worse not actually expecting anything and giving no thought at all to the future of this planet, then I wouldn't be doing the course I am (Managing Sustainable Rural Development, in case you don't know). I do believe there is a possibility of turning around the fortunes of people out in rural areas, so that they once again feel they can earn a respectable living from the land they love. I also believe that it is possible to turn around the degradation we see of the landscape and so stories like the one from Planet Earth, where organic waste can turn polluted soil into a rich varied habitat and lock up or deal with the poisons, really encourages me. It is incredible that the waste we discard has the potential to create such life all due to the microorganisms it contains. I feel that life can be like that too, some things we think are waste in our lives can actually have the potential for so much growth and redemption. So my prayer this week is that all the dross and waste will indeed by redeemed into something that creates life.

A butterfly in the hand, symbolises holding onto hope for me

This land of Latvia certainly needs a lot of redemption and there are plenty of statistics out this week to prove it for instance there are over 170,000 needy people in Latvia, and that is needy as described by Latvian standards not UK standards. 170,000 doesn't sound like a lot in some ways but it is 7% (1 in 14) of the population and it is 170,000 real people. Last year the Latvian Government spent 89.7m LVLs on a social network for the needy - amazingly, less than the banks earned in profits last year. Doesn't seem right does it, when the minimum subsistence level is greater than the money given to the poor? The figures for the Minimum subistance level released this week came to 171.41LVLs for a months worth of essential shopping, interesting isn't it when the social scheme gives people a basic minimum wage of 100 LVLs a month - makes you wonder what people feed off? Fresh air?

Ian and my favourite embroidery that I have
done. The original photo that inspired this
was taken in our garden in Denmark

The Latvians do not use up as many resources as many of us in Europe, obviously they can't afford it, and so the thought of electricity rises seemed scandalous, until I realised that actually it wasn't going to affect many people at all. In reality it is our electrical usage that seems scandalous in comparison. We had always prided ourselves on our low usage of electricity but I was obviously comparing myself in the wrong direction. The electric tariffs will only increase once 1200KW/hrs of electricity has been consumed and this means that for just under half of Latvian households there will be no change in the costs of electric and for another 30% there will be a one Lat difference or less per month. Our consumption of around 300 KW/hours per month means that we are in the top 24% of customers and therefore we are one of households paying more for our electric. It really shocked me to think I use more electric than about 75% of the population of Latvia and not only that but I was using over 3 times the amount as some do. I think we need to look at our usage once again and make some changes. So what's your electric consumption in one month?

The deer must be getting hungry now as they are beginning
to make their way into the gardens

Okay a bit back to front this week but I have stopped pontificating now, so what has been happening? Well it has been very cold and beautifully sunny all week again and forecast for much the same for the next few days which means temperatures around minus 21C in the mornings and lower. One of the biggest problems at this temperature is getting cars started and ours has been reluctant to get going, and takes ages to defrost but since it has been sunny we start the car and park up around the corner and let the sun do a bit of the work for us. Unfortunately for some of our neighbours coaxing the car into life has been a bit more of a problem and so we have twice had to get the faithful old tow rope out and lend a hand. In one case it meant quite a few of our neighbours could all get to the shops instead of having to walk in the cold, I think they were rather grateful.

I admit it, I am untidy with papers, books and embroidery
scattered all over the sofa

On one day this week we noticed a lot of people milling about and a lot of cars which is unusual for this area, unless something is going on. We managed to work it out when we spotted the local hearse amongst the crowds, aka a bright red minibus; not the sombre black estate car for folks around here. We felt very sorry for the folks gathered as we knew they were in for a long cold day as people were spilling out of the chapel into the open air due to lack of space for the funeral service and at -12C it isn't pleasant to be standing around, mind you from all accounts it is not much warmer inside the chapel at this time of year either. The service is not the end of it, as people will gather at the graveside too and speak some words of how much the person meant to them, and if there is a lot of people that is a long time spent out in the cold, only warmed by the vodka that sometimes flows at these things.

Much tidier with our new acquisition. A rather neat set of
shelves with a cloth basket at the top - perfect for my
embroidery

We have also been progressing ever so well with getting our other flat finished. We laid a laminate floor for the hallway and were really pleased with it and pleased with the fact there was so little waste but we needed something to edge the floor with and tootled out to look for some beading, just regular beading nothing fancy. Well there was some beading in one of the shops but not the right sort, it was too small for the gap. Oh well! Next job! We then progressed to laying the laminate flooring in the living room and it was looking good, we were on a roll but... for some unknown reason we hadn't bought enough boxes we were three pieces short of finishing when we ran out. The problem is that we bought the laminate flooring on a trip into Riga and we didn't really want to go all the way back there. We gambled instead on there being the same flooring at a nearer store, only 45 mins away instead of an hour and half away and fortunately the gamble paid off and they had the right flooring with the same code, so we bought the extra sheets and another 11 boxes so we can do another two rooms with it. Sorted! Well I hope so as long as I have done my sums right this time. Can't believe we ran out, it's not like me, must be losing the plot. As we were carefully loading the car to try and make sure the weight was in the centre of the car, so we didn't destabilise the car in the icy conditions, a guy kept trying to attract our attention and eventually tried to talk to us, unfortunately he couldn't speak English and we had no idea what he was after, or if he was just trying to be friendly which happens sometimes. Only when we finished loading up the car did I suddenly realise that the guy was actually hoping we would give him a tow to start his car, as it was only then that I noticed he kept walking around a car with a tow rope all ready on the front. Doh! Our Latvian does need to improve. Just as I realised though someone else agreed to tow his car, so we thought he could share in the towing ministry and let him get on with it. Well you have to share the blessings don't you!

The temperature in our kitchen on Tuesday morning (11.7C),
 it has got better every day since. Not so sure about the
outside temperature though - that's the bottom reading and
that is minus 23C.

Update on our heating: I didn't need to go and do a sit down protest at the local heating company we have actually had reasonable heat this week - wonder if the boss reads my blog? Somehow doubt it! Our kitchen has gradually warmed up over the last week which has been wonderful and now I can sit in the living room with just the addition of a quilt on my legs.

Cry freedom!

Unfortunately not taken this year, this was November 16th
last year at sunset. I haven't had the chance to take many
photos this week. Sorry!

Sometimes I forget things I should mention and last week was one of those weeks. I forgot to mention how God had been really reassuring to me even though I didn't think I specifically needed the reassurance. I think he knows me better than I do myself and so I guess I was more worried than I thought I was. Three times in one week I heard or read the verses from Matthew 6:25-34 in different places with no connection. 


    ²⁵ “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? ²⁶ Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? ²⁷ Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
   ²⁸ “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. ²⁹Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. ³⁰ If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? ³¹ So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ ³² For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. ³³ But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. ³⁴ Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

Memories of sunnier times but also an expression of
the freedom from worry of what to wear, what to eat,
the freedom to soar high above the cares of this world.

What was concerning me was providing for our future, what steps should we take. What should we set aside and what should we use now? I felt that whatever seems sensible now will not provide for our future and that God would work things out and I should leave it in his hands, but was I being naive? Was I just being silly? In the world's eyes - definitely! I felt reasonably peaceful about it but my thoughts would keep returning to the issue and so I think at the back of my mind I was worried and God's reassurance the other week was comforting for sure and something to hold onto in the years ahead.

No this wasn't the car when I got it back to Ian, it is our
Lada, our workhorse on the land. No frills this car. Looks
fantastic in black and white.

Now back to more recent events. Last week I borrowed the car and went to a meeting at one of the regional Rural consultancy offices, here in Latvia. It is a big event when I use the car as Ian and I have completely different set ups for the seat and he always moans it takes about a week to get comfy again but he graciously let me go on my own, he had things to get on with anyway (this is where sniggering emoticons would come in really handy). It is funny organising my own field trips to do with my course and all feels a bit surreal, on the one hand I am just a student doing a bit of research, on the other hand I am learning to do a professional job and this is my research  for professional development purposes, learning to ask the right questions in the right places. My trip last week was to start to make contacts with professionals in the forestry field, trying to find out how the system works here in Latvia. It was very informative and I got pages of notes and also a glimpse into some of the challenges of working in the forestry field. Forestry is a big issue in Latvia and so it should be with over 50% of the country covered in forest of which roughly 50% is owned by the state and 50% by private forest owners and that is a lot of land, Latvia isn't small, the numbers of Latvians maybe small ie 2.3m but they occupy an area which is only slightly smaller than the Netherlands and Belgium put together ie Latvia 64,589 km2 Belgium 30,528 km2 and the Netherlands 41,848 km2. Latvian private forest owners are fragmented though and not many are motivated to actively manage their forests for a complex number of reasons but fascinating nonetheless. Latvians do not cooperate well on projects it would appear but often that is due to mistrust - trust issues raising its head yet again. It is so sad that the recent and not so recent past holds this nation back and stops it being more progressive. 

Memories of last year too, no less wet and our polytunnel
not finished. This time it is our barn that is not finished.
It is progressing but they are now working in mud too.

It has been rather wet here which means it's towing season once again, it was rather a regular feature of our year last year. This season started with an early morning call from our neighbours to our land - their car was stuck and the guy with a tractor was unreachable, could Ian help? No problem, Ian went to tow the car out of a rather deep hole created by a ditch dug earlier in the year to lay new pipes which hadn't packed down well enough yet and performed a rather good attempt at trying to swallow a car. For his trouble he got a bag of apples but even better was when the neighbour who speaks very very little English shouted across and said "Good friends!" - a precious comment indeed. 

Our certificate

Later on that evening our English class came to our house to eat an English meal, pie, leeks with white sauce, mashed carrots and swede and mashed potatoes followed by apple sponge and custard. They brought the typical gifts that Latvians do when they come to a house for the first time of flowers, honey, a whole rather large box of chocolate marshmallows and also another precious gift of a certificate of appreciation for our English lessons (see picture). So sweet and so thoughtful. I would just like to underline the headline at the top though that we are their first English teachers and they are just on the simpler stuff at the moment and I shall not be sending the certificate back with red lines through it, well not yet anyway (laughing emoticon here!). I do really love the fact that they have gone to a lot of effort to make the certificate and try to write some thoughtful lines in English, it makes us feel thoroughly appreciated, well that and the invitation to a reciprocal meal in about a fortnight. 

An arty photo from earlier this year. I
was reminded of this on a blog
where an artist loves to post pictures
of rusty objects because they are so
interesting. Check out the site here.
This is a photo of a hoe after dredging
out pond weed.

I said it has been wet this last week and our allotment at our other apartment is under water in places and so when someone posted a link facebook on how to build an ark I couldn't resist posting it myself and having a good laugh with another friend planning on how to build an ark - thought we might wait until it stops raining first though before commencing the building project. Just in case you need some directions here's the link to the plans for building your own ark. Our other allotment does look in a sorry state with so much water and we half wondered whether to just leave the plants that are left to rot away as many of the plants were put in a little too late to be ready for picking and we had too many cabbages all ready at once, at least by leaving them it would return the nutrients back to the soil. We changed our mind though after Ian had been working up at the other apartment and looking out over the allotments of ours and our neighbours made him think it actually reflects rather badly on us, planting things that we don't harvest even if the cabbages do look past their best. The Latvians plant their gardens to feed them over the winter and even if I have a freezer full of veg, loads of chutneys, and lots of dried food, it does not look good to let food go to waste - our neighbours probably have enough for themselves and probably would not appreciate soggy cabbages but it still looks wasteful. We decided to go and collect the remaining cabbages and was surprised that once we removed the outer sogginess they actually weren't too bad at all. Now we have the challenge of trying to process them somehow, so some are drying and some will freeze now I have made a bit of space by making some cucumber, apple and orange marmalade (it's not as bad as it sounds, honest! In fact it is quite tasty). Any other suggestions on what to do with a bag full of actually reasonable cabbages gratefully received.

Another memory of summer but also another symbol of
freedom. I like this one as it is in such an incongruous
place, makes for a nice contrast of natural amongst the
industrial rather like the beauty of freedom in the midst of
 brutality

It has been an exciting week this week with the twin announcements of the release of captives, the British couple released by Somali pirates and Suu Kyi in Burma released from house arrest. It really feels like a cry freedom week, a cry coming up that cannot be contained. Even though the situation seemed hopeless there was something that could not resist the cry of freedom. May that cry of freedom echo throughout the world into the very recesses of power, bringing release from bondage of many, whether that bondage be to banks charging excessive interest rates to claw back their profits, or release of slaves sold into prostitution or the burdened people under corrupt regimes. More Lord is what I want to pray! Let the cry of freedom rise!