Aleksejs - 17 August 2012 05:54 AM

People in Latvia still don’t smile as much as in the West, especially if you come here during a winter…

Semochki….........

peter B - 17 August 2012 06:00 AM

Semochki….........

You mean this?

sounds fishy….........

marisr et al.,
“personally I stay a long way away from matters of religion.”

Latvians on Faith, is not just about religion.

Visu labu,

maris wrote:

>>Aleks ... your second youtube link ... are you saying the soviet investment / interference saved Latvia?  that Latvia could not have ‘made it’ by itself?>>

I just watched Aleks’ link and all I could think about was Obama’s recent rabble-rousing speech:

“You think you built Latvia on your own?  You didn’t.  Someone else built Latvia.  Someone else built the substandard roads, the crumbling khrushchovkas…. Someone else built the Internet so Latvians could attack each other—for free!”

ak

Brono.
“Bruno.
personally I stay a long way away from matters of religion.”
I’ve read a pile of that on that thread today ... & I can’t agree with much of it.
There is another avenue that nobody has mentioned .. but if I go down that road
I will be proletising. In short it’s called meditation ... no religion, no faith required; just observance.

Aleks,
BTW (and the rest of the LOL community) I’m surprised I’m not a communist.
All my gut leanings are in that direction.
(I had verbal fights with my father about this (but then he lived / experienced through ((partially)) that era, and I had not .. so what the f^*k did I know))).
But one thing I could not stomach was the compulsion aspect, at the end of a gun.

I still believe in cooperation to meet end objectives.
The’west’ does it to .. but not in the name of communism.

No doubt, as you have listed elsewhere, that Latvia has gained certain infrastructure.
But you have not answered the question ... you pass it off as an “if”.

To back up a bit, the germans stripped whatever they could of machinery in Latvia; the ruSSians did the same in the 1990’s.
Excuse me if it takes time to replace such equipment.

Why don’t you & PC work to advance the place, instead of crying doomsday?

“Not even the Latvian Song Festival? Or were those people forced to the Soviet Latvian song festival?”
Is this a sick russian/soviet joke?

“People in Latvia still don’t smile as much as in the West, especially if you come here during a winter”
Good try, but it doesn’t cut the mustard.

To back up a bit, the germans stripped whatever they could of machinery in Latvia; the ruSSians did the same in the 1990’s.

What is it? Did the Russians destroy the industry in Latvia in the 1990s? Or was it the new government policies and the complete faith in capitalism that did it? I recall reading an old Diena newspaper from the early 1990s where leaders of giant industries like Alfa complained that they cannot compete on the eastern market, i.e. Russia, because the currency evaluation was set too high. After all, lats is one of the highly valued currencies in the world. So if you believe that the “Russians” allegedly dismantled “machinery” in the 1990s, I’d like to see the evidence, please.

aleksejs,
“So if you believe that the “Russians” allegedly dismantled “machinery” in the 1990s, I’d like to see the evidence, please. “

For the moment, I will back down ..‘cos I can’t find where I read that right now.

However, I have never read that the soviets coerced Latvians to the Song Festivals.
My readings are the soviets capitulated, in allowing this event.

And for a couple of nights of searching on the web, I have found close to zero any articles that justifies / promotes any benefits to Latvia, of the occupation.
Maybe I’m not asking google the right questions?
If you have the correct info / direction, please post it.

Don’t make any deals with russians, that’s the lesson that
we should have learned…...................but didn’t.

Two different things:

the Song Festival under the Soviets.

and the destruction of industries in the 1990s.

It’s unclear to me why you responded to my comments about industries with the comments about the Song Festival.

aleksejs
“It’s unclear to me why you responded to my comments about industries with the comments about the Song Festival.”
Simply because you mentioned it first ... as if it was a gift from a benevolent soviets.

“Yep. You think there was nothing good in Latvia during the occupation? Not even the Latvian Song Festival? Or were those people forced to the Soviet Latvian song festival?  .. 17 August

ak,
Your comment below was in as a quote from somewhere.
From where?

”  “You think you built Latvia on your own?  You didn’t.  Someone else built Latvia.  Someone else built the substandard roads, the crumbling khrushchovkas…. Someone else built the Internet so Latvians could attack each other—for free!”  ”

A gift from the Soviets isn’t the same as saying that there were good things taking place in Latvia under the Occupancy™. And as I mentioned earlier, the history is never in the subjunctive. So if I say that, for example, the Soviets developed VEF to the point of the national, read: Soviet, pride, you’d say that Latvia would have developed it on its own. And if I say that, for example, RVR (Riga Train Factory) provided trains for the whole Soviet Union, you’d say Latvia could have done it on its own. It’s a useless, thankless exercise, in my opinion.

marisr - 20 August 2012 04:39 AM

ak,
Your comment below was in as a quote from somewhere.
From where?

”  “You think you built Latvia on your own?  You didn’t.  Someone else built Latvia.  Someone else built the substandard roads, the crumbling khrushchovkas…. Someone else built the Internet so Latvians could attack each other—for free!”  “

The visual for the quote.

” you’d say Latvia could have done it on its own. It’s a useless, thankless exercise, in my opinion. ‘
I never said that at all.
It was a question. Could have Latvia ‘made’ it on it’s own?