Tag Archives: Latvia

ideas, memories, musings

Going down the ever treacherous path called Memory Lane…

Fair warning… this is a stream of consciousness post that tackles many seemingly unrelated topics. Proceed with caution.

Bill is away again, so I’m left to my lonesome self. I usually teetotal when he goes away, but I had a beer when Bill made me lunch yesterday. Then I had another one last night while I watched The Boy in the Plastic Bubble on YouTube, starring John Travolta, Robert Reed, Ralph Bellamy, and Diana Hyland. I’ve seen that movie many times, and it’s always entertaining. Last night, it was strange to watch it, because I suddenly realized just how long ago I was born. I was about four years old when that TV movie aired in 1976. Now I’m 51, and all of the trappings of my childhood seem hopelessly antiquated.

It may seem strange that I’d be watching a 70s era TV movie, especially since I’ve seen it so many times. I love old shit like that, though. I’d rather watch campy crap from the 70s and 80s than most of what’s on TV today. I guess that means I’m really getting OLD.

The Boy in the Plastic Bubble actually has some personal meaning to me. I grew up during the era in which there were a couple of boys who lived in “plastic bubbles”. One was Ted DeVita, who had aplastic anemia and died in 1980. The other was David Vetter, who was born without a functioning immune system (he had a condition called SCID–Severe combined immunodeficiency).

David Vetter was less than a year older than I am, so he was one of my peers. He passed away in 1984, when he was just 12 years old. If he’d been born today, he never would have had to spend years in a bubble. Today, we have the technology to treat SCID with bone marrow transplants. Vetter himself had a transplant, but the bone marrow he received from his mother was infected with a dormant Epstein-Barr virus. It activated after it was transplanted and he wound up with a devastating form of lymphoma that killed him very quickly.

When I was in high school, I actually knew a guy who had aplastic anemia, like Ted DeVita did. I didn’t know him very well; he was a popular guy who played football, and football players weren’t interested in me. But everybody pretty much knew who Mike Haury was, back when we were in high school. To this day, he is memorialized at my high school. I believe there is a tree planted in his honor, as well as a weight room that was funded by people who wanted to memorialize him over 30 years ago. I found a new fundraiser online last night in Mike’s honor, by people who wanted to update the weight room at our high school, originally built in Mike Haury’s memory. In our day, the weight room at our high school was located in a boiler room. Mike’s death from aplastic anemia had led to the creation of a proper weight room. Too bad he never got to see it or enjoy it.

I remember Mike Haury went to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, the same place where Ted DeVita spent most of his life. I remember Mike died on December 7, 1988, and I remember how his death was announced to us in school. You could have heard a pin drop. I wonder if Mike had to stay in a “plastic bubble” during the last weeks of his life. Mike’s cousin, Neil, was in my high school class. Neil left us in 2000… a victim of suicide.

Years later, December 7, 1988 would be significant to me for a different reason, when I moved to Armenia to serve as a Peace Corps Volunteer. That was the day a massive earthquake hit Armenia, destroyed buildings and infrastructure in a couple of northwestern cities, and ended 25,000-55,000 lives. About 130,000 people were injured. In 1995, when I arrived in Armenia, there was still a lot of wreckage and debris left from the earthquake. They hadn’t had the money or manpower to fix anything, what with the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, and all. It was still there in 1997, when I left Armenia to go home to the United States. I’m sure by now, things are different. I’ll find out in a few weeks, when I go back to Yerevan for a visit.

Today, Armenia has other problems, to include the struggle over Nagorno-Karabakh– an enclave known as the Republic of Artsakh by Armenian natives. This is a part of the Caucasus region that has historically been populated by ethnic Armenians. Back during Josef Stalin’s reign in the 1920s, as he was forming the Soviet Union, Stalin decided the land should be part of Azerbaijan. Things were, on the surface, peaceful during the Soviet years. But when the Soviet Union fell apart in December 1991, so did the surface peace in Artsakh. Armenians and Azeris have been fighting over the land ever since.

A few days ago, the Azeris seemingly “won” Artsakh, as Armenians agreed to stop fighting, and now hundreds of Armenians are fleeing Artsakh to the mainland. They fear ethnic cleansing, which is understandable, as Armenians have faced genocide in the past. As I was reading about this situation, it made me realize just how profound one man’s legacy can be. Not long ago, I read a book about a woman who fled Latvia, as it was becoming part of the Soviet Union. The woman’s story included a lot about Josef Stalin, and how his disastrous and cruel policies ruined and ended a lot of lives. I couldn’t help but think of that story as I read about how today’s Armenians are still affected by Stalin’s policies. I suspect we Americans will someday see Donald Trump in much the same way.

This situation actually affects me, in a weird way, not just because I used to live in Armenia and served as a Peace Corps Volunteer there, but because of my husband’s work today. He works for the US Army here in Wiesbaden, for a department that does work with countries in Europe and its environs, including Armenia. This situation with Azerbaijan– largely caused by Russia’s distraction with the war in Ukraine, and Vladimir Putin’s affinity for Azerbaijan’s current leader– affects Bill, because the US military is now working with the Armenians.

A few weeks ago, one of Bill’s colleagues actually talked to me for a couple of hours to get some perspective on Armenia and its people. When Bill told her about my experience in Armenia, she was quite excited, as she doesn’t know much about the place, and former Peace Corps Volunteers, especially those who were in Armenia in the 1990s, are in short supply in these parts.

As I sit here thinking about that, I realize how my time in Armenia and my marriage to Bill, both seem to have come about entirely by cosmic chance. I remember how I felt like I was wasting my time in Armenia back when I was there. Now, it seems like I was supposed to be there. And maybe I’m meant to be where I am today, here in Germany, doing exactly what I’m doing now. I’m sure it will fit in the long run. It always does.

Last night, as I was about to fall asleep, I started reading early blog posts on this incarnation of The Overeducated Housewife. The earliest posts on this blog were made when I was using a different blog layout, so some of the posts need to be edited. Some of the posts were also password protected and/or made private, because back in 2019, my privacy was being violated. That’s why I moved the blog in the first place. As I was reading those old posts, I was reminded of how totally mentally fried I was at the time, and how angry I was. In fact, just before I started writing today’s post, I read an old post of mine that inspired today’s…

The old post from 2019 is very profane, and also kind of funny, because I was legitimately VERY ANGRY. Some people might think my reasons for being so angry were petty. Maybe they were, in the grand scheme of things. I look at what Armenians from Artsakh are dealing with right now, and I realize that my issues with our ex landlady were not really that earth shattering. And yet, I remember feeling very frazzled and upset during that time, so much so, that I wrote this very profane, sarcastic, and frankly quite funny post in my blog. And that post led to today’s post, which has left me with some rather profound insights…

The main reason why I was so very angry on August 30, 2019 is because, yet again, I was being unfairly judged by someone who doesn’t even know me. Months after I left her hellhole rental house, ex landlady was in my head, mainly because we had decided to fight her legally, rather than letting her just take our money. Former landlady– fixated on her petty bullshit and hunger for money– determined that I’m some kind of worthless, filthy pig. She treated both Bill and me with extreme contempt over a couple thousand euros. She expected us to be perfect, which no one can be, while she blatantly did things that were illegal. She brazenly tried to steal from us, as she accused US of stealing and personally insulted us (especially me), to boot. I was PISSED, and determined not to let her get away with it.

Making matters worse is that, through her lawyer, she was making defamatory accusations against us the day before we would lose our beloved Zane forever. We spent what turned out to be his last full day alive answering her ridiculous false accusations and threats, when we should have been loving our beloved beagle family member, who meant so much more to us than she ever could. The reality of how we spent Zane’s last day made me even more determined to make sure she was forced to pay.

In the end, we didn’t let ex landlady get away with what she was doing. She did have to pay us. It wasn’t easy or painless, but she did pay. I was glad she paid, and it was definitely worth suing her, but we would have preferred not to have to go the route we did. Because, in spite of her erroneous perceptions, I AM NOT A BAD PERSON. I just want to be treated fairly and live my life in peace!

Quite often, when something like this comes up, Bill and I simply let the other person have their way. Fighting over money often isn’t worth the hassle. We are usually big fans of the “pick your battles” mindset. But, this particular fight was more about our self-respect, and being tired of being bullied, harassed, and abused by someone who feels entitled to act like a complete cunt, with no repercussions whatsoever. Sometimes, the answer to such behavior is a hearty “FUCK YOU!” And that is what ex landlady got. Now that I think about it, it’s probably what people in the future will get when they try to pull that kind of shit with us. Because most people get to a point at which they’re no longer to roll over for obvious bullshit, which is what this was.

Still… that bullshit is NOTHING compared to what a lot of people go through. Just reading this blog post and thinking about some of the folks I wrote about today makes me realize that we’ve been pretty lucky. We mostly have to deal with bullies and narcissists. Not that dealing with narcissists isn’t painful, because it is… But once you realize what and who narcissistic people are, you realize that they’re basically empty shells of pain. And, just like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, you always have the power to go “home” again… All you really have to do is click your heels and walk away. Sometimes it does feel good to give them something to remember you by, though… 😉

As you can see, when I’m alone, I do a lot of thinking. My thoughts often end up on a straight path, where one thing leads seamlessly to another. Before I know it, I have a long string of seemingly unrelated thoughts and memories that somehow fit, that I feel compelled to write about… much like my seemingly worthless and highly unorthodox existence seems to fit in implausible places. Here I am, an “overeducated housewife”, writing these blog posts when I could be doing something “useful”, like working in a cubicle somewhere, driving a teenaged kid to an activity, tending to an elderly parent, nursing an injury of my own, giving someone a baby shower, or attending a fundraiser… normal things all of my old friends seem to be doing.

Things I always thought I would be doing with MY life… But that isn’t how my life has gone.

A lot of people seem to think I’m a silly, amoral, feckless twat. I’m pretty sure that was former tenant’s and ex landlady’s collective impression of me. They didn’t know me. They never took the time to get to know me. They never cared, because they were not interested. That’s fair enough, I guess. I do wish if that was how they felt, they’d at least allowed me to be strange in private.

They didn’t realize there’s someone worth knowing, deep beneath the surface of my loud giggles, weird jokes, copious flab, and profanity… someone strong, who loves fiercely, feels deeply, thinks constantly, and deserves basic respect and simple regard. The people who casually dismiss me, or make a habit of dismissing anyone else, really, ignore those basic truths at their own perils.

Well… today’s post is a rambling toxic creek of different stuff. If you managed to wade through it, I do appreciate the effort. Like everyone else, I hurt sometimes. I have a very long memory, and a long history of people treating me like trash. I don’t have the type of personality that handles that kind of treatment with much grace or patience, hence these weird blog posts that some people think make me seem “unhinged”.

I’m not crazy, y’all. I think I’m just kind of fed up with everything. 😉 Being fed up means I have to empty the bins. Because I’m not an OCD nightmare like ex landlady, I don’t scrub away the shitty residue. When things start to stink, I have to flush. So that’s what today’s post is.

Time to move on with the day. Got to fold laundry, walk Noyzi, play guitar, and buy more beer. So, until the ‘morrow, I bid you all farewell.

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book reviews, history

Reviewing The Rings of My Tree: A Latvian Woman’s Journey, by Jane E. Cunningham…

Some time ago, I downloaded The Rings of My Tree: A Latvian Woman’s Journey, by Jane E. Cunningham. The book, which was published in July 2004, sat in my Kindle queue for a very long time. I just searched my digital orders on Amazon.com and I see that I bought this book in April 2013– over ten years ago! I just now got around to reading it, three months after Bill and I visited Latvia for the first time.

I’m now glad I waited so long to finally read this book, after actually visiting Latvia, and having spent the last nine years living in Germany. My own life experiences gave me more appreciation for The Rings of My Tree, the extraordinary story of a woman named Mirdza, whose fate led her far away from her homeland when she was just a young woman newly out of high school. The title references how Mirdza’s grandmother taught her how to determine a tree’s growth by its number of rings. Mirdza also learned that strong trees weather storm after storm. Like a strong tree, Mirdza weathered many storms in her long life. And if you’ve ever been to Latvia, you know that it’s a country where trees are revered. One of our guides told us that it’s a tradition for new parents to plant a tree when a baby is born– linden trees for girls, and oak trees for boys.

Mirdza’s story is lovingly written by author Jane E. Cunningham, who, as of 2012, lived in Connecticut, and wrote that Mirdza, then aged 92, was then living in a nursing home. I’m sure that by now, Mirdza has passed away. But wow… she really lived an amazing life. At the time she wrote Mirdza’s story, Jane Cunningham had known Mirdza for forty-five years. They were neighbors. Jane was one of the first Americans who became a real friend to Mirdza, who fled Latvia to escape Soviet occupation. She landed in Hitler’s Germany before a series of lucky events led her to an American run displaced persons camp (DP camp) in American occupied Berlin.

While she was in the camp, Mirdza met and, in 1949, married her Latvian husband, Janis, who died in 2000. In 1950, the two had a son, who was born in Germany. When their son was six months old, the family moved to Oklahoma, where they were sponsored by a wealthy American couple. Janis and Mirdza worked for the couple to repay them for their passage to the United States. They had a second son in 1951, who died when he was a month old. Later, they landed in New England, where Mirdza and Janis spent the rest of their lives. In 1961, they had one more son. In May 1962, Mirdza, Janis, and their German born son became naturalized American citizens.

You might think The Rings of My Tree might be mostly about Mirdza’s life in America, but the story is mostly about Mirdza’s upbringing in Latvia, time in Germany, and subsequent journey to America. Mirdza was born in Jaunpils, Latvia in 1920. At the time of Mirdza’s birth, Latvia was a free country. Mirdza’s mother became very sick and died when Mirdza was only four years old; consequently, her earliest years were spent being raised by her grandmother, Gobina. Gobina was her father’s mother, and a very faithful, Christian woman whose father was German. She taught Mirdza how to speak German, how to knit and crochet, and educated her “from the Bible, ‘But the very hairs of your head are all numbered’ (Matthew 10:30). She would one day come to apply that Bible verse to her limited days of freedom in Latvia.

Mirdza’s father had been the postmaster in Jaunpils. Her mother had been a switchboard operator before her death. The couple met while working at the post office, and built a beautiful home for their young daughter. But the beautiful life filled with roses and domestic bliss was not to last, as leaders in other countries were plotting to seize Latvia. Mirdza and her friends, family, and community were blissfully unaware of what would come in 1940, when the Russians took over the country and annexed it into the Soviet Union.

Mirdza was five years old when her father remarried a young woman named Anna, who was not very nice to her. Anna was very jealous and hated anything that reminded her of Mirdza’s mother. She eventually gave birth to Mirdza’s half sister, Rasma. Although Mirdza had known her mother and missed her, she was expected to accept Anna as her mother, even though Anna never treated her lovingly, as if she was her daughter. When Mirdza addressed Anna by her first name, she was chastised and told that Anna was her “new mother”. That was difficult for her. But in spite of the early hardships she endured, Mirdza was happy in high school and excited about her future.

Then came Josef Stalin and the Russian soldiers who would bomb Latvia into submission, as Hitler’s Army also approached. Mirdza, and so many of her countrymen, were now caught in the crossfire of World War II. At first, she thought life under the Germans might be better than life under the Russians. She stayed and worked at the post office for awhile, befriending a German soldier who was decent to her. She helped him send food home to his wife, and he ended up saving her life by giving her his wife’s address in Germany. When the Russians became a direct threat, Mirdza ran for her life, boarding a ship that took her to Poland, and onward to Germany, where she became a refugee, experienced hunger, humiliation, and homelessness, and witnessed hopelessness and despair that would haunt her forever. On her way out of Liepaja– a Latvian port town that Bill and I visited in June– Mirdza fell and injured her hip and her left hand. From then on, and for the rest of her life, she walked with a noticeable limp– a constant reminder of what she’d left in Latvia.

Mirzda’s life was not easy, but she somehow managed to survive a number of near misses that should have killed her or driven her to suicide. Along the way, she met people who taught her new things, helped her, or hindered her. She met one woman who actually talked her into surrendering to the Russians. She and the woman were actually waiting for a truck to take them to a Russian camp when they were picked up by an American who gave them an opportunity to find freedom.

The Rings of My Tree is a fascinating read for me, because I find World War II an especially interesting time in history. I would feel that way even if I hadn’t spent so many years living in Europe. However, what makes this book special– especially in 2023– is that it’s so relatable to today’s times. Mirzda experienced a lot of the same things refugees are experiencing now. Like other people who have fled their homelands for peace and safety, she faced discrimination, ignorance, and hostility. But she also met kindness, decency, and generosity. As I read about how Mirdza was treated in 1950s era America, I couldn’t help but realize that people of 2023 behave in much the same way, forming opinions about subjects about which they know nothing and about which they don’t care to be educated. Below are excerpts of the book that seemed especially insightful to me:

But aside from her experiences as a Latvian refugee turned American citizen, Mirdza also learned some hard personal lessons. When she was living in the DP camp with a bossy fellow Latvian woman named Tanya, she learned how to be assertive. Tanya gave her stockings and said something along the lines of, “Darn these for me.” Mirdza was about to do as Tanya demanded, but then something occurred to her, and she steeled her spine:

I related a lot to this… and I think my husband could, too. He was not afraid to go to Iraq with the US Army, but he was afraid to stand up to people like his ex wife. Thankfully, he’s better now.

I see that The Rings of My Tree is no longer available as a Kindle download. I think that’s a real pity, as physical copies of the book are pretty expensive. I do think the book is well worth reading, and even paying a lot for, if my description of the book is intriguing enough. I’m just happy I downloaded it when I had the chance, and I’m glad I finally got around to reading Mirdza’s story. And I do think it’s a blessing that I waited until now to read this book, after I’d had a chance to see the place Mirdza left behind. Latvia is a very beautiful country, with many trees, beaches, and grand old buildings that predated the Soviet occupation. It’s good to know that Latvians are free to be Latvian now, and their homeland is free again.

When we visited Latvia in June of this year, I heard firsthand from Latvians that they never wanted their homeland to be occupied by Russians… and I read in Mirdza’s story how terrible communism is. I had also seen that in Armenia when I lived there, as well in other countries that used to be ruled under communism. But, toward the end of the book, it becomes clear that capitalism isn’t necessarily better. I don’t know if Mirdza realized it herself, but when her half sister, Rasma, visited her in America, after the fall of the Soviet Union, she was left flabbergasted by American supermarkets. She was bewildered by the huge array of choices Americans have, and the terrible waste… as well as the ignorance so many people in America have about the rest of the world. Sadly, as I see every day on Facebook, not that much has changed since Mirzda’s young life as a refugee. And she had the benefit of having white skin, which helped her fit in with the ruling class in the United States.

Anyway… I really enjoyed The Rings of My Tree. I’m grateful that I had a chance to read Mirdza’s inspiring story through Jane Cunningham’s capable writing. I hope those of you who will read this review will get something from it, and perhaps, try to read this book yourselves. It really offers perspective that I think is lacking from so many Americans… especially those who never venture beyond the United States’ borders. Yes, Americans are very fortunate, but our luck may be running out before too long. I implore you to open your eyes and your minds to what could happen to you or yours someday. You could learn a lot from Mirdza’s story, if you’re open to the lesson. I sure did.

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communication, history, musings, racism, Virginia

An offline discussion reminds me of why I prefer hanging out with my dog…

Sometimes, I truly miss having discussions with people offline. And sometimes, I’m reminded that certain people can be frustrating to deal with in person. As I wrote in my travel blog this morning, Bill and I went to the Wiesbaden wine week festival last night. We met up with some of his co-workers, most of whom were very nice and good conversationalists. This isn’t to say that talking was an easy task, given how loud it was at the fest. There were a lot of people there; most of them were drinking wine and probably getting drunk. There was also loud music.

Before things got too loud, I met one of Bill’s colleagues. He attended Virginia Military Institute, which is the same college my father, uncle, and several cousins attended. I also have several relatives who worked there for many years. Bill and I got married there in 2002.

It’s actually funny this topic is coming up today, since almost exactly a year ago, I got into a contentious online discussion with some Washington Post readers about that school, which spawned a pretty good blog post (in my opinion, anyway). I’m mostly a VMI booster, although I understand why some people don’t like the school and think it should be shut down. There are big problems with racism and sexism there, at least historically. It probably continues today, although the school does put out some pretty excellent military officers. My dad was one of them.

If you know anything about VMI, you know that it’s a very southern school, and people there are very proud of the fact that VMI cadets were involved with the Civil War. The VMI Corps of Cadets fought as a unit at the Battle of New Market in Virginia. General Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson is a hero at the school, and for most of the college’s existence, cadets were obligated to salute a statue of the man. The statue, which was one of several commemorations of Jackson, was removed and relocated in 2021.

If you know anything about Virginia, you might know that until just a couple of years ago, there were many public Confederate monuments and memorials there, especially in the state capital city of Richmond. A lot of people were very upset that the statues were removed, although probably just as many were either indifferent or ecstatic to see them go. They were a reminder of dark times of the past, when Virginia allowed White people to enslave Black people.

Bill’s co-worker happened to mention, casually, that he didn’t think it was right for the statues, monuments, and memorials to come down. He said they were part of history, and removing the statues was akin to “erasing history.” I was probably visibly shocked when I heard him say that, but somehow, I managed to keep my mouth closed.

The guy continued that his family comes from Cuba, and to them, when the government starts renaming streets and taking down statues and such, it means communism is coming. I guess I can understand that reasoning. I’ve heard it from other descendants of people who have escaped communism.

On the other hand, a couple of months ago, when we visited Estonia and Latvia, I heard two different guides talk about how glad the Estonians and Latvians were to get rid of communism. When I lived in Armenia, I didn’t hear as many people praising the fall of communism, probably because life for them was so difficult in the early to mid 1990s. I’m sure many Armenians at that time would have preferred that the Soviet Union stayed intact, because the Soviet style of government was what most of them were used to, and life was easier when they were more closely aligned with Moscow.

In any case… even back in the mid to late 1990s, Armenia started divorcing itself from Russia. That meant that the street signs, most of which were in Russian and Armenian when I arrived in 1995, were changed to just Armenian. City names that celebrated Lenin and Stalin were changed back to Armenian names. The Russian rouble stopped being the official currency; Armenian drams were used, complete with pictures of Armenian leaders. Armenians started to sing the Armenian national anthem instead of the Soviet one. There used to be schools that specialized in Russian, and there may still be some now, but there are just as many schools that specialize in English. I taught at an English specialty school. There were many changes made, all of which were essential for the country to move forward.

When I was in Latvia and Estonia in June of this year, I heard about the same things happening in those countries. When the Soviet Union fell apart, and communism was no longer the style of government in those countries, things changed. Statues celebrating Soviet history and heroes were taken down, and people stopped learning and speaking so much Russian… and guess what? Street names also changed! In those cases, the name changes and removal of statues and monuments were due to communism going away!

I suppose I was a little flabbergasted that this guy– a retired high ranking military officer who now works with Bill– thinks that removing Confederate monuments and memorials is akin to promoting communism and “erasing history”. Talk about unskilled thinking. I wasn’t impressed at all.

Bill said that when the guy started talking about how awful it was that the monuments were taken down, I visibly stiffened. He said it was subtle, but noticeable to him. Bill knows me very well and pays attention to my body language. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, a lot of communication is done non-verbally. I didn’t say a word to the guy about his thoughts on the Confederate monuments, but apparently my body was saying a lot. I don’t know if he noticed my unspoken comments. I’m kind of gratified that Bill noticed.

Count me among those who think taking down the monuments is a positive thing. It marks progress in promoting equality, mutual respect, and racial sensitivity. The monuments don’t really mean much to me, personally. I never would have thought to launch a campaign to have them taken down. I always had them in my community when I lived in parts of Virginia, so they’ve always been part of the environment I’m used to seeing. But I’m caucasian, and have never had a reason to feel offended by the monuments, other than having empathy for those who do find them offensive. I’m sure the descendants of slaves have a very different opinion than those who think the monuments are part of history that should be publicly preserved.

Given that in the United States, we are all supposed to be equal members of society, Black people’s opinions and preferences certainly matter. And if removing the monuments promotes peace, mutual respect, and racial harmony, I’m all for it. We sure could use more solidarity, especially in today’s polarized society. It hurts no one to remove the monuments, as the people who have been memorialized are long gone, and the cause they were promoting and defending failed after just four years.

Why publicly celebrate people who were ultimately traitors? It surprises me that this high ranking retired officer, a man who obviously has basic intelligence, doesn’t ask himself that question… but then, maybe I shouldn’t be surprised. I know from knowing my dad, and the many other VMI grads in my family, that going to VMI is kind of like joining a cult and becoming indoctrinated into the school’s ways. And when you’re in a cult, your mind isn’t 100 percent your own.

I still appreciate VMI. It’s part of my own history, even though I didn’t go to college there. But after talking to that guy last night, I realized that an education there has its shortcomings. And given that until very recently, cadets were obliged to salute a statue of Stonewall Jackson every time they passed it, I’m pretty sure that graduating from VMI is, at least in part, behind this guy’s opinion that removing Confederate monuments– that were erected during the Jim Crow era to keep Black people in their places– is akin to “erasing history”.

How disappointing. Guess I should go back to conversing online. Well… at least Noyzi is a good listener.

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first world problems, travel

The big decision has now been made…

Again, cross-posted on the travel blog… The featured photo was taken on the car ferry from Denmark to Germany, back in 2019.

Yesterday, I wrote about my apprehension about booking a cruise. I termed it a “true first world problem.” Aye– as my Scottish ancestors would say– that it is. Twenty-four hours ago, as I was pondering whether or not I wanted to spend big bucks on a luxury cruise in the Baltic region, I started looking for alternatives.

A friend of mine had suggested touring the Norwegian fjords on Hurtigruten, which is, of course, a perfectly good suggestion. However, if I had decided to go for the fjords, that would have completely negated using the champagne bucket to choose where to go. The Norwegian fjords are a place I’d love to see the right way, and a cruise is probably the right way to go. But it wasn’t one of the choices for this particular trip. Moreover, I never asked for alternative suggestions.

I still decided to look into the Norwegian fjords experience and found that besides Hurtigruten, there’s another line that does cruises along the fjords. Maybe at some point we’ll pull the trigger on that. I did look into short cruises in Norway for the days we’ll be there, but they aren’t very convenient to our plans.

After a short while, I stopped researching travel possibilities, and turned my attention to my guitar, which badly needed new strings. I don’t play it so often that I routinely change the strings. But, it had gotten to the point at which I had forgotten when I had last changed them. The old ones were starting to get discolored, and weren’t staying tuned well. So, as much as I hate changing the strings, but love the results of changing them, once they stretch, I knew it was a job that urgently needed doing. I had just put one string on when my phone rang.

It was someone from Regent Seven Seas Cruises calling. I felt confident in answering, since I knew Bill was already agreeable to my booking the cruise, once we confirmed the correct price. The cruise specialist, whose name is Andrea, is from Germany. She thought I was German too, and was speaking German to me, even though I had made contact in English. I didn’t realize it, but the voicemail on my phone is in German… No one ever calls me, so I didn’t know. I thought the call was coming from Germany, but actually, it was a U.S. based call that somehow looked like it came from Germany.

Andrea and I got to talking, and it turns out she lives in Florida, which is where Regent is based. She’s been there since 1991. I always find myself bonding with Germans in the U.S., since I’m an American in Germany. As we discussed the cruise, we talked about how we ended up in each other’s countries. In many ways, Germany is kind of like the U.S., but I find that the U.K. feels more like home to me than Germany does, even though people drive on the other side of the road and kids wear uniforms to school.

Andrea said that my request went to her, because I am in Germany. She handles all clients from Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, and Germany, even though she’s based in Florida. It was still very early in the morning where she lives when we were talking– maybe 5:30AM! Nevertheless, she was wide awake and friendly. I guess she’s a morning person like Bill is. All of our documents are in German. Andrea says there’s nothing she can do about that, since I’m in Germany. Google Chrome will save us, I’m sure…

It didn’t take long for Andrea to sell me on Regent. I put a deposit on the cruise. I would have just paid for the whole thing, since the cruise is coming up in June, but I used my credit card with a lower limit, and the whole cruise costs more than the limit is. I used that card rather than the other one, because I knew it was less likely to get declined for “suspicious activity”. Both of my cards usually have zero balances. I rarely use them because it took me forever to pay them off when we were less affluent. The deposit didn’t raise any red flags, which made me feel confident.

Bill got home later and I proposed booking the flights. I was thinking of flying into Stavanger or Bergen, since we had never been to either of those beautiful towns, and we have been to Oslo. But it turned out there weren’t any flights that worked with boarding Noyzi and didn’t cost an arm and a leg. Like… there was an attractive flight that would have worked, except it left at 10:30AM, and that wasn’t enough time to get Noyzi to the Hundepension and get ourselves checked in at the airport. So, Oslo it is…

I had no idea that Norway’s cities were so far apart. Stavanger looks like it’s not that far from Oslo, but it’s a seven or eight hour car ride or train trip. Bergen, likewise, is hours away by car or train. There are cheap flights available, and we may decide to avail ourselves of one, just so we can get a feel for a city other than Oslo. But, we did also enjoy visiting Oslo when we were there in 2009, and that was at a time when we had a lot less money.

Oslo is also closer to Stockholm, which is where we will be meeting the ship. We haven’t seen anything in Stockholm except the cruise port, which is where our first Baltic cruise in 2009 ended. It was a four night “short break” on Royal Caribbean, and we started in Oslo and stopped in Tallin and Copenhagen, then ended in Stockholm. We couldn’t enjoy the city, because Bill had a conference in Garmisch-Partenkirchen the next day. So, we hopped a plane to Munich. I spent the next week taking tours out of the Edelweiss MWR Lodge while Bill tended to his Army duties. We had flown to Oslo from Munich, and when we got back to the parking garage, the car battery was dead, necessitating a call to ADAC. Plus, our bags didn’t make the flight, and had to be brought to us in Garmisch.

This time, we will end in Copenhagen, a city we’ve been to twice, but haven’t had much of a chance to really enjoy. The first time, it was on that short cruise, that only allowed a few hours in town. The second time was in 2019, when we were passing through on our way home with our new car and stopped for a night of rest as we continued onward to Rostock, Germany. This trip will at least give us a full day to enjoy Denmark. We’ll spend a couple of nights there before coming home on July 2.

So, off I went to Lufthansa to book our flights, after confirming with Bill which ones we wanted. I input all of the information, then tried to use my trusty credit card to pay. Sure enough, it was declined. I called up PenFed and explained that I was trying to book my vacation. I should have probably asked them to raise the limit on that card, too. Maybe next time I call…

The tickets are now booked. All I have to do now is decide on hotels in Norway and Denmark and maybe book transportation to Stockholm. A flight from Oslo takes an hour, but a train is much more scenic and is about five hours of fun. 😉 Oh… and I also need to choose excursions and restaurant reservations for the cruise, since they are included in the fare.

It’s hard to believe, just a few days ago, I was agonizing over all of this. It’s all coming together now, like magic. I wasn’t planning to do a cruise, but this may turn out to be a bit of a Godsend. If it turns out we really love any of the places we see, we can come back and do a land based tour, as I originally planned. They are now building a railway in the Baltics that will make it a lot easier to travel there. And I do want to go and spend more than a few hours. We already know we like Tallinn from our 2009 trip, and Bill enjoyed Riga when he went.

I know… first world problem, and maybe I should be ashamed of myself for writing about it. But, at least this isn’t a cranky complaint post about politics or similarly unpleasant topics.

For those who are curious, here’s a video highlighting the ship we’re going to be on. Yes, it’s expensive, but it’s not like you don’t get a lot for the money. This is also not our usual style. We normally prefer much smaller ships, and that generally means the ships we’re on are usually much older. Splendor was built in 2020. Hebridean Princess, by contrast, was built in 1964 as a car ferry and later became a cruise ship in 1989. SeaDream I was built in 1984. I think Vision of the Seas is 1998 vintage, and I’m not even sure if it’s still in service.

A new experience for us… revisiting the region where we had our very first cruise. This time, we’re taking more time and spending way more money!
We booked a Concierge Suite.

Again, I chose this entirely for the itinerary, and the fact that it’s an all inclusive cruise. I’m not a Regent cheerleader, and I’m not sure we’ll give up small ships for this. But then again, maybe we will. We won’t know until we actually have the experience. At least now, I’ll have something new to write about on the travel blog!

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first world problems, travel

A true first world issue…

Because this post involves travel, I’m going to cross post it on my travel blog. The featured photo was taken in 2019, when Bill and I went to Sweden to pick up our car and drove it on a Nordic adventure.

I’m in the midst of trying to plan a summer vacation/birthday trip for Bill and myself. Because of the whole COVID-19 odyssey, and the seemingly endless lockdowns that followed, we’ve decided that this year, we’d like to fly somewhere. And because there are a lot of places in Europe we still want to see, we decided to choose our destination using the “champagne bucket” method.

I’ve written about the champagne bucket method on my travel blog. Basically, I got the idea for it from “blind bookings” on Germanwings (now known as Eurowings). I’m not sure if Eurowings still does blind bookings, but Lufthansa does, and Lufthansa owns Eurowings. It basically involves booking a surprise flight, and usually paying a lower fare. You don’t know where you’re going until after you pay for the ticket(s). Bill and I have done it four times to great success. We visited Barcelona, London, Berlin, and Munich that way.

When we moved back to the States, I decided that it wouldn’t be hard to plan more of our vacations that way. Instead of relying on the airline, we just put our choices on slips of paper and put them in the champagne bucket. Then, Bill picks one of the slips out of the bucket.

I was really rooting for a trip to Armenia and possibly Georgia this summer. That was one of the choices, too. Bill was a bit reluctant, because of political and military issues going on in Armenia right now. We may still go there this year, but for a short trip to Yerevan, instead of an all out country tour. Then, I can show Bill where I lived, when I was a Peace Corps Volunteer, and sign him up for a more extensive trip. 😉

Anyway, when we did our champagne bucket challenge, Bill ended up choosing Finland. Neither of us has ever been there before. We have been to Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Estonia together. Bill has also been to Latvia a couple of times on business. Neither of us has seen Lithuania, but we’ve met people from there and Latvia on cruises.

Originally, I was planning for us to go to Helsinki and do a land based trip, then go by ferry to Tallinn, Estonia, stay a few days, and work our way south to Latvia and Lithuania, before flying back. Then I started researching and discovered, there’s no easy way to travel to Latvia and Lithuania that doesn’t involve riding a bus. We considered renting a car, but that seemed potentially risky.

So then I thought, maybe instead of trying to hit the Baltic capitals, I could go west. Visit Finland, do a day trip in Tallinn, then head west toward Norway, which we know we love. Then I thought, maybe it would be better to start in Norway, and head east to Finland, then go to Tallinn and spend a night or two…

Then I realized how expensive flights would be… plus the stress and inconvenience involving finding transportation, hauling bags, and booking hotels… and although I’d already looked for cruises and initially didn’t see any I liked, I kept getting ads for Regent Seven Seas on Facebook. And Regent is– or was– considered a luxury line, although it’s a much bigger ship than we usually go for when we cruise.

I noticed they had a cruise available during the time we plan to travel. It starts June 23 and ends June 30, and hits ports in Sweden, Helsinki, Estonia, Latvia, and Denmark. We could still go to Norway and do a land based trip, working our way to Stockholm, a city we’ve been to, but didn’t really get to explore at all in 2009. Best of all, the cruise in question is on sale. It’s still expensive, but doable for us. We wouldn’t even have to stay in the cheapest stateroom. I pitched the idea to Bill, who liked it.

I started making a booking request. It took about a half dozen times to finally get registered. I mismatched my email address, or added one too many dots in the address, or the passwords didn’t match. Finally, I had my account, and started to make the request.

But the stateroom I wanted was listed as twice as expensive than was advertised. While we technically could do it, I’d rather spend that much money on a new car or a down payment on a house. So I stopped making the request, and sent an inquiry to Regent, asking them to confirm that the cruise is on sale.

About an hour later, I got a phone call through my iPad, which I wasn’t prepared to answer, as I was reading something to Bill. I also got a message, written in German, indicating that the cruise is on sale, and inviting me to call between 11am and 8pm today. I sent a message back in English, asking if I have to call to get that rate, and clarifying that I’m American and can’t speak German worth a damn. 😉

Then I went on Cruise Critic and started reading reviews and comments on the messageboards. The consensus is, the ship I’m looking at booking is beautiful, although Regent has “gone downhill” in recent years. Bill and I have done cruises on Royal Caribbean, SeaDream, and Hebridean Island Cruises. SeaDream and Hebridean, like Regent, are considered luxury and are all inclusive. However, they are much smaller ships. So Regent would be a different cruise experience for us, and it would offer some convenience, as we’d be hitting places we want to visit– albeit for a shorter time than we would personally plan for ourselves.

I truly am attracted to the cruise because of the itinerary and the time the cruise is going. I don’t have particularly high expectations of great service or being treated like royalty. A cruise just offers a convenient way to cross some items off our bucket list.

On the other hand, I was kind of looking forward to a deeper dive into the areas, and exploring more on our own. Also, there’s less chance of running into people with whom we don’t mesh when we do land based trips, or getting sick from any number of viruses on ships. I like to plan trips and look for interesting places to stay. I guess the pre cruise travel to Norway would offer that, but I was kind of wanting to get more of a feel for Finland.

Either way, this trip is going to be expensive. Good thing Bill got a generous raise this year. We do have the money, too… at least for the cruise. I’m just not used to having that, either… being somewhat well-heeled is kind of a new experience for us.

Sigh… a trip to Armenia would be a lot more economical. On the other hand, if I develop a bleeding stomach ulcer, I’d feel better about seeking treatment in a nordic country. 😉

This is truly a first world problem. I’m sure I should just go for it and see what happens. We’ve had some great times on cruises and made some friends. And a bonus is, since Regent ships are a lot bigger, there’s less chance I’ll get seasick this time.

We’ll see what happens. I may scrap the idea of the cruise. It is tempting, though… Regent is probably more comfortable than the Stockholm to Helsinki ferry.

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