YUPPIE LOVE
THE SAGA OF THE FLOWERS On a street in Riga, a woman pressed a bouquet of flowers into Ibid's hands. "How much?" Ibid asked, as (in Britain and Estonia at any rate) this is a typical gypsy (or whatever the politically correct term is) means of making money. "No, they're free," the woman said. "Is this your first visit to Riga?" Ibid said yes, although it wasn't. "Then they're yours," she said. We went into a photography shop so Ibid could develop some photos. Films were stacked like pyramids. When we returned later, we found the flowers sitting on a counter in a container of water. She picked them up and having resisted the "Medieval Restaurant" (with barrels and a bloke dressed as a friar sitting outside and early music emantating from within - "Dysentry guaranteed," Ibid remarked), we went to a another. The waitress brought us a glass of water for the flowers.
Ibid collected them, but some time later, I noticed she'd lost them again. We concluded she'd had left them in the music shop, where a metalhead shop assistant plied me with his e-mail address and recommended local band Neglected Fields, which was strange, considering she didn't buy anything there.
Ibid and I have taken to saying, "Ahhh, traditional Latvian (whatever)" on sighting or hearing something incongruous. Walking around Liepaja, we hear Spanish music drifting from a bar. "Ah, traditional Latvian music," I say, but we fall into step with it. A man walks past, raising his hand and shouting a greeting. There’s no one else around. I feel like I’m in a romantic comedy, what with the cheery music and feeling that every chance encounter might change my life. We pass a bunch of teenagers, emerging from what’s probably a community centre. One steers a pushchair. This gives a whole knew meaning to the phrase "youth group", I think cynically, but there’s something wholesome about the grouping: the chavvy girl, her kid, her chavvy mates and a black-clad couple, lost in each other. We find ourselves following a couple in their twenties, the man in a suit, the woman in a smart black jacket and a white knee-length skirt. I coin a phrase. "Yuppie love": where you go out with the person you want to be seen with. Ibid mishears this as "guppy love". "That’s when you fall in love with someone and forget three second later," I say. Man, I’m on form tonight, and Ibid laughs in appreciation. But really, I just want my own trenchcoat wearing boy; my version of yuppie love.
Fortunately, such soppy thoughts only hit me occasionally.
"Do you want to go in?" Ibid asked me outside Kaunas Castle. "Wouldn't mind," I said. It was thirty degrees and its cool was tempting.
So we paid our three litas (60p) and headed down the steps to the first room, where we found . . . a cyber club! All the lighting was black and the only things visible were neon paintings and decorations. Our white tickets acted as torches. The second room was just the same and the third and final room contained nothing. We have no idea why.
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