Greetings Everyone,

Today is a major holiday in Latvia: the anniversary of the proclamation of the Latvian Republic in 1918.  Flags are flying from all the buildings, and there will be a big fireworks display in Riga tonight. Here in Mazsalaca, there are more cars in town than usual, visitors who have come to spend the holiday with family or friends.  There was a concert at the culture hall today, and tomorrow there will be a special service at the church.  The weather is overcast, so the day feels a bit gloomy, with temperatures hovering around 45 degrees (F).  What a contrast to American Independence Day celebrations in hot, sunny July!

We are definitely in the dark part of the year.  Today the sun rose at 8:11 a.m. and will set at 4:05 p.m., for a daylength of 7 hours and 54 minutes.  That's not much longer than the shortest days, December 23 and 24, when the sun will rise at about 9:00 a.m. and set at 3:45 p.m., for a daylength of 6 hours and 44 minutes.   The change from summer isn't just in the length of the day, though.  The sun only makes a fairly small arc in the southern sky now, barely making it over the tops of the trees by the school--that is, when you can see it!  For the past month or so the days have been heavily overcast and it has rained frequently. The sun has been visible a few times as a bright spot behind the clouds, and once or twice it even shone clearly for a few minutes.  But blue sky seems like a figment of imagination at this point.  This weather isn't unusual:  Mazsalaca's relative closeness to the sea (about 30 miles) means we don't have a lot of sunny days, especially in the winter.  But the effect of the overcast is to make the short days seem even shorter. (See Daylight in Latvia on my website for a chart of daylengths throughout the year: http://members.tripod.com/brehm.sarah/latvia/daylight.html.)

Because I grew up in Wisconsin, I am no stranger to the increased amount of darkness in the winter time.  But the dark part of the year in Mazsalaca is quite different from that of a place where bright electric lights everywhere keep the darkness at bay.   Electricity is expensive here, so even the lights that do work are often turned off by people who are accustomed to working in the half-dark.  It is the season for flashlights.

At school, the classrooms have buzzing, flickering old fluorescent lights.  If the day is bright, the students often prefer to have these left off.  The hallways are lit by incandescent globe lights hung from the ceiling, most of which have bulbs in them.  There are also a few windows at the ends of some of the halls, so some light comes in from outdoors.  (The stairwells all have windows, so there is always some natural light there.)  The switches for the lights are in the halls, accessible to all, so people turn them on and off at will.  While classes are in session they are usually turned off.  But if no one bothers to turn them on when classes change, the halls will remain dark.   The office I share with Agita and Gunta is at the end of a hallway where there are no windows, so I often have to put the key in the lock by touch rather than by sight since it is too dark to see.  Why don't I just turn on the lights?  Partly laziness, I suppose.  And I guess some of the Latvian conservation mentality has sunk in.  I know that once I go in the office, those hall lights will still be on, yet no one will be out there so the electricity will be wasted.  I always carry my flashlight to school now, since it is usually dark when I leave.  I often use the flashlight in the stairwells, and if I am working on the computer in Valda's office, I need the flashlight to get through the big hall.

Outside, there are a few big lights behind the school, which are usually on.  And there is a light on the boiler house between my house and the school.  But once past the boiler house, I need my flashlight to navigate the path through the bushes that leads to the driveway of the apartment building.  In front of the building there are four or five globe lamps on poles, but only one works.  It is enough to see my way to the door, though, so I don't need the flashlight again until I enter the stairwell.  There are sockets for light bulbs on all three landings, but the third floor, where I live, is the only one that has a bulb.  The switch for all the lights is on the first landing.  So I still need the flashlight to get to the first landing, so I can turn on the light.  And if I am coming out of my apartment and the light is not on, I need my flashlight to get down the stairs.

Mazsalaca has street lights on the main streets, and most of them work. But the school and my apartment building are actually outside town, so once you get past the lights of the school, heading toward my place, the road is dark.  Since I know the road, I don't usually use a flashlight, especially if there is a moon or it is clear with lots of stars.  It's amazing how well you can see once your eyes adjust.  If it has been raining, though, I need the flashlight so I can avoid puddles.

I'm not the only one using a flashlight; I often see the flicker of lights being carried in the distance.  One thing amazes me, though: people ride their bicycles in the dark with no lights, even where there are no streetlights, like on my road.  I suppose if you have been riding on the same road for twenty years you know where all the potholes are, but it still seems incredible.  The unusually mild weather we have been having means that it is still possible to get about by bicycle. Normally by this time we have icy roads, if not snow, and the bicycles have been put away for the year.  The extended season is a boon to people whose primary mode of transportation is a bicycle.  Once winter comes, they will be on foot.

Although the mild weather doesn't show it, the year is moving toward its close.  According to Latvia's ancient Lunar calendar, we are now in the time of ice, which will last until the solstice, when we'll move into the time of winter.  From September 22 (right around the equinox) until November 10, was the time of souls.  This is a time when the souls of the dead are said to walk the countryside.  One old custom, no longer practiced, was to put a meal out in the barn for the visiting souls. The misty ground fog common during that time lends an air of unearthliness and makes it easy to believe that spirits could be abroad.

The time of souls ends on Martin's Day, a holiday much like Halloween. Children dress up in costumes and go out to neighboring houses.  Similar to trick-or-treating in Britain, they come into the house and recite a poem or sing a song in order to get their treat.  Traditional costumes include a very tall woman (on stilts), a short fat man (the head is a stuffed bed sheet that goes from the head to the waist of the wearer), a black rooster, and a horse.  Witches and ghosts can also be seen. Although there may have been some in the larger cities, I didn't see any costumes in the stores in Mazsalaca or Valmiera--people still make them at home.  There are Martin's Day songs, and traditional foods, especially rooster.  And Martin's Day is a time for weather predictions.  Here are a few:

* If it is sunny on Martin's Day, the winter will be very cold.
* If Martin's Day is cold, it will be warm around the Solstice.
* If the geese are fat at this time, next year will be a good year for eggs.
* Snow on the roofs on Martin's Day means a long winter.
* If the nights are clear during this time, the nights will be clear during the hot time next summer.
* If there is a snow crust on the trees on Martin's Day morning, next year there will be a good harvest of tree fruits.

This year it wasn't sunny or cold, we didn't have any snow, and I don't know about the geese!  As I mentioned before, the weather has been unusually mild.  For weeks the temperature has been between 40 and 50 degrees, night and day.  From a heating standpoint this is great, since it means that the woodpiles will last that much longer.  We have a new boiler in the boiler house that provides heat for the school and my apartment building.  It is much more efficient than the old boilers, and so both the school and my apartment have been quite warm.  Happily, it is cool enough outside to have the heat going all the time, which means we now have hot water 'round the clock every day.  It's amazing how quickly one can become accustomed to that luxury!  Now I don't have to plan major cooking projects for the days when there is hot water to make the cleanup easier.

As far as cooking goes, I haven't quite made the transition to winter foods yet.  It was so great having fresh greens from the garden all summer.  And I actually had some arugula and lettuce this month.  We had some early frosts, and the hens ate the first part of the crop, but the greens I planted in August finally did yield some meals.  I think my neighbors thought I was crazy to be gardening in the fall.  Under cover, the greens were alive but not really growing, so I finally pulled everything and had a big salad of baby lettuce last week.  This was prompted in part by hearing that it is the tradition that if you work in the garden after Martin's Day, you won't have a good harvest next year. Also, I was finding it increasingly difficult to find time to get into the garden, since it's always dark by the time I get home.

My school work has settled into a busy routine.  This year feels busier but also more enjoyable than last year.  I have a nice mix of teaching students, teaching adults, working with the English teachers, and working on the resource center Agita and I are creating.  I'm also doing outreach work once a month at a Waldorf school in a neighboring town. The school has existed for several years, and now has kindergarten through fifth grade.   Tomorrow is the official opening of their new building, a beautiful straw-bale structure that is the first of its kind in the Baltic states.

Time always seems to speed up before the winter holidays, but this year for me the effect is intensified by the knowledge that my time here is dwindling.  Even though I still have 9 months to go, there is a definite sense of being near the end rather than the beginning.  People have been asking me what I plan to do next, and at this point I don't know.  I am exploring a graduate program in human ecology in Edinburgh, but I don't know if I can afford it.  I'm trying to learn more about working in the area of corporate social responsibility, but not having much luck finding information.  Mostly I'm trying to be patient and follow my intuition, knowing that the path will present itself eventually.  In the meantime, I am trying to focus on the present, on appreciating the moments I have here, on seeing the things around me, on really being engaged with people, and giving as much as I can.

In two weeks we will have our yearly all-volunteer conference in Jurmala.  They schedule it around Thanksgiving so that homesick volunteers can have some English-speaking company, and part of the event is a big Thanksgiving dinner.  As the holiday season approaches, I do find myself feeling a bit homesick at times.  Not for any specific place, but for friends and family, and the comfort of sitting around a table and enjoying their company.  Luckily, I'll be heading to Scotland on December 23rd, to spend two weeks with my dad and step-mom at their home in Dundee.  It will be great to have time to linger over tea after meals and talk, watch some movies and episodes of Star Trek, relax, and be in a place where I understand everything people are saying, and they understand me too!

I wish you all a holiday season full of love and laughter, sharing and joy.

Visu labu,

Sarah

p.s.  I hope to have some fall pictures up on my website in the next week or two.  Also, it has come to my attention that I have not received some letters that were sent from the U.S.  If you wrote to me and haven't heard from me, that may be why.  I do respond to all the letters I receive.  And I love hearing from you!