I find myself drawn to visual arts like painting, photography and installations because they give me new ideas for writing. I’ve rarely drawn inspiration from other writers. Music and lyrics have probably provided the greatest source of new ideas for me in the past, and the greatest influence on my work. And in recent years I’ve found a great deal of inspiration for my writing in the visual arts...
Never fear… If thermonuclear destruction rained down on Latvia, your fearless Communist civil leadership would survive. Or at least, that was the intention behind the massive Ligatne bunker, a 2,000 square metre secret facility whose existence was only declassified in 2003. I’m fascinated by Cold War sites, and I’d never pass up the opportunity to explore one. So we drove out there from Riga one...
The countryside of Latvia is filled with manor houses. In fact, there are over 1,000 of these historic homes still surviving today. To understand why, it’s necessary to take a quick snapshot of the region’s history. But don’t worry, I won’t clobber you with details… In the Middle Ages, the Baltic region formerly known as Livonia (today comprising parts of Latvia and Estonia) was made up of a...
Art Nouveau arrived on the scene as a reaction against 19th century Positivism, which saw animals — and humans — as mechanistic actors driven by natural laws, biology and evolution. It also rejected the “standard” conventions that art, at the time, was supposed to convey: notions of patriotism, glory or piety. I don’t know about you, but I’ve had more than my fill of last suppers, JC’s on the...
I’m not very fond of birthdays. I’m uncomfortable being the centre of attention, except for in print. It feels weird to see so many people wishing me well — I guess because I spent most of my younger years getting in trouble. And I see birthdays as a moment of sober reflection on time running out, rather than a celebration of the past. But that being said, I’ll absolutely use birthdays to my...
The Plokštinė base was a Soviet medium-range nuclear missile launch facility built in the early 1960’s. Four launch silos housing 22-metre tall R12 rockets with 3-metre warheads were connected by long underground passageways to a multi-level command centre buried deep beneath reinforced concrete. The base housed 10,000 soldiers, brought in secretly from USSR satellite states. And the 79th Rocket...
The Curonian Spit is a strange piece of geography… A short 5,000 or 6,000 years ago, the waves and winds of the Baltic Sea caused sand to accumulate in thin line in the shallow waters off Lithuania and the territory that would become the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. This thin strip of fragile dunes and pine forest eventually formed a lagoon, with just one narrow outlet to the sea at one end...
My Lithuanian explorations continued with a long walk through the early morning streets of Vilnius, and a bus ride out of town. Our goal was Trakai, probable site of Gediminus’s capital in the 1320’s. You’ll recall from my last blog that Gediminus had based his Grand Duchy of Lithuania in hilltop Kernave. Well, the story goes that he discovered Trakai on a hunting expedition and decided to build...
We had a chance to venture outside of Vilnius and into the Lithuanian countryside for a day, thanks to a local friend and Malta connection. Our target was Kernavė, site of four old castle mounds that were once hilltop forts. UNESCO called the area an “exceptional testimony to 10 millennia of human settlements in this region.” It’s believed to be the place where Mindaugas was crowned in 1253 — he...
I’m spending a few weeks in the Baltic countries, researching a magazine assignment, and just living the global nomad work-from-random-places lifestyle. I thought you might like to join me. Not literally — I hate getting woken up in the morning, and I doubt you’d enjoy my traveling style. But we can hang out virtually throughout the trip. And you’ll only have to see the best stuff without...