{"id":2877,"date":"2018-08-21T18:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-21T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2020-09-12T14:14:14","modified_gmt":"2020-09-12T18:14:14","slug":"so-your-character-is-from-latvia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victoriagracehowell.com\/staging\/6258\/so-your-character-is-from-latvia\/","title":{"rendered":"So Your Character is From Latvia … Featuring Anna @ Anna’s Little Thing"},"content":{"rendered":"


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<\/span> It’s time for this week’s So Your Character is … Post! This is a weekly segment where I interview lovely volunteers from around the world to give you a firsthand account of being a citizen of their respective country or having a disability. I’m hoping to encourage international diversity, break stereotypes, and give writers a crash course on how to write a character from these different places on our planet. If you haven’t checked out last time’s So Your Character is from Bosnia & Herzegovina … be sure to hop on over there and give it a read!<\/span>
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<\/span> Disclaimer: The content below may be culturally shocking to some. Each of these posts is as uncensored as possible to preserve the authenticity of the cultures of each of the interviewees.<\/span>
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<\/span> (None of the Images are Mine)<\/span>
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Hello, my name is Anna.I\u2019m 22.I\u2019m from Latvia. I live 20 km from the capital Riga, in a small town called Jaunolaine. Right now I work in an NGO youth organization and my main hobby is blogging.<\/span>
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<\/span> What do you feel is unique to your country? Landmarks? Celebrations?<\/b><\/span>
\nLatvia is one of the greenest places on earth. Over half its territory is covered by forest. Everywhere where you look or go you will find a forest or at least lots of trees (even in the center of our capital Riga). And we are really proud of it! One of the things that I feel is unique is how \u201cobsessed\u201d we are with healthy living (as in eating right, fresh and organic). So many people in Latvia have gardens where they grow vegetables and fruits, or even if you don\u2019t have time for a garden the local supermarkets have a wide selection of local and organic foods. <\/span>
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\nThe biggest celebration in Latvia (even bigger than Christmas and New Year combined) is J\u0101\u0146i ([j\u0251\u02d0\u0272i]).J\u0101\u0146i is an annual Latvian festival celebrating the summer solstice. Although the solstice usually falls on 21 or 22 June, the public holidays\u2014L\u012bgo Day and J\u0101\u0146i Day\u2014are on 23 and 24 June. The day before J\u0101\u0146i is known as L\u012bgo Day (formerly known as Z\u0101\u013cu Day). On J\u0101\u0146i all people travel from the city into the countryside to gather and eat, drink, <\/span>sing, and celebrate the solstice by observing the ancient folk traditions relating to renewal and fertility. And on the 23\/24 June the city, Riga is almost empty because people celebrate in the countryside. Here is one of the folk songs of <\/span>J\u0101\u0146i , called “In the J\u0101\u0146u Night.”<\/span><\/p>\n

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