Latvia warms my heart

1/5/10
I am enjoying the people here in Latvia! Granted, we have been living with a pastor and his familia and working with a kids camp put on by the church - so most of the people we have had contact with so far are probably Christians.

There are 2 older, well "rounded" Latvian women who make soup for lunch for everyone doing the camp. They make my heart smile!! When I saw them coming in this morning, I said "ciao! Lab briet!" (hi! Good morning! - pronounced "lawb-breet") and they repeated "lab briet" for me a couple times and I copied them - they are so cute! They help us pronounce the words correctly (err...more correctly, at least - haha).

They don't seem to know a lick of English (at least, they don't let on that they do). But they get a kick out of confusing us and seeing us fumble around in the kitchen. :) I went in this morning to make tea and I smiled and waved hello and timidly said, "Ciao", (side note: it's so intimidating at first to attempt speaking another language in the native country!! Even easy words like ciao!). The women started smiling and one of them starts going on and on in Latvian and waving her hands and getting all animated while talking to me (as if she was saying, "come on, English girl, don't you speak Latvian yet??). The other sat there, smiling sweetly and giggling every so often. I threw up my hands as if to say "I have no clue what you're saying!!" and the woman laughed and kept going on and on as if she was telling me, "look American girl, you're going to learn Latvian one way or the other because I'm not gonna try to learn English at my old age!!" (it was a very hilarious situation, she wasn't being mean - just to clarify). Finally I managed to say "tea!!" and pointed at my empty mug and she goes, "Ahh! Tea! Yes!!" as if to applaud me for saying a word correctly! Hahaha :) so then I got my tea and decided to try and impress them so I point to it and go, "paldies!!" (pronounced "pal-dee-es" - "thank you" in Latvian). You should've seen their faces light up!!! So I said it a few more times as I walked out of the kitchen, then said ciao and left. They are great!!! Later they told me (my friend translated to me) that the kitchen was my home too and to feel welcome to get whatever I wanted. Something like, "always feel at home, but never forget you're a guest". I'm not entirely sure what that means here yet - in America I could assume what it meant but you never know in other cultures since they have their own phrases and ways of saying things. I need to ask our translator. :)


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