Walk Through Riga

I cross under the bridge, and something is sucked out of the air around me, in me. I look around, dazed, trying to identify the source of the emptiness but all I see is market stalls packed with cheap items of every kind in every direction.

There is a greyness that pervades every building, every person. They walk, packed up in muted tones, looking down at the ground, each second passing leaving them closer to their death. Of course, we are all dying, but these people seem to know it. As I continue to walk, wisps of conversations flow through me, reminding me of a sense of life that seems to be sparse in this part of the city. But the further I walk away from the bridge, the greater the sense of heaviness is.

Here, the buildings speak of times that have passed and of times to come, leaving what is in a sort of limbo which pushes in on my chest, in which my heart searches frantically for the life-energy that is lost. There are some hints of it: one young woman stepping out of a taxi with a beaming smile, off to some place or person of joy; another cycling past with shocks of colour adorning her body, but these are isolated incidents of a strange nature in this part. I feel the pull of what I know behind me; the comfort of the hotel sheets and shops I know and faces I have seen but the greater draw is that of what could be, of what is in front of me but that I cannot see.

A church, perhaps, in the distance, between the grand skyscraper of old that captivates me, and the crumbling walls, is my target. Whilst on my journey there, I see strange groups of men of all ages and old women standing and talking in clumps. Some smile, but I don’t believe them. Once I reach the targeted church, my eye wanders to a strange sort of paradise amongst all this grey. As if possessed, I draw closer to it, all the while desperate to turn away from this wretched place. It is an embassy of course, with pastel pink walls and designer gardens but I can’t help but feel that all this cannot mask that this beauty is surrounded by abandoned and unidentifiable disintegrating structures, ever closing in on this gated paradise.

Even the most beautiful flower amongst a multitude of weeds will be eventually be forgotten. I continue to walk past, never stopping for a moment for fear that I will freeze and never be able to leave. As such, my feet quicken, hindered only by the traffic lights where a green man does not mean safe crossing. Walking past the grand skyscraper, my eyes are not able to leave it alone once more until I must turn away to round the corner.

Now I am close to home—well not really home, but safety. Like a magnet, the pull is stronger the closer you get and as my pace quickens once more, my vision seems to focus only on the end point, protecting me from the pervading grey that is darkening with every minute, closing in around me, so that I feel like I have awoken from a dream when I eventually cross under the bridge once again. Back into safety, back into my reality.