Hunger

Dear Friends,

Hunger is one of my closest traveling companions. I'm often hungry. It's not that food is hard to come by or funds run too quickly dry. Nor is my hunger Riga specific by any means, as my appetite was alive and active even in Illinois, the heart of America's bread basket. I like to eat and so I do. I'm fortunate that I can. At age 28, I wonder how much longer I can fall back on the exhausted excuse, "I'm a growing boy" or respond politely to the observation that I must have a hollow leg to fill. Maybe I do.

This past week I've been honored to welcome three friends to my Rigan table: Joy, from Illinois, and her friends, Preeta and Anna, from London. The trio taught together last year in Madrid. Showing them around the city has woken this sleepy man from his slumber. Nothing like seeing a place through the willing, expectant eyes of guests. We covered the highlights and a few hidden gems of Riga, mostly on foot, but the real jubilation of their visit manifested itself when we sat down to eat. For me, a pork chop and mashed potatoes usually qualify as suitable dinnertime company but breaking bread in the presence of friends makes the food that much tastier.

That's why I was doubly excited to dine at Vincents, arguably Riga's finest and best-known restaurant, named after Van Gogh. My thoughtful brother and sister-in-law presented me with a gift certificate to Vincents as a token of their thanks for serving as best man in their wedding. It was an arduous job but someone had to do it. Since receiving their gift the end of July, I'd been anticipating using it. Going, then, to Vincents on Friday night with Joy, who had been my date to the wedding, seemed like the perfect time to celebrate the close of her stay in Riga while remembering Andrew and Alicia's kindness and generosity.

Prior to our 7:00 reservation, Joy and I prepared for our evening with formidable intentionality. After bathing, grooming, and dressing, Joy emerged an ethereal sight in her new black and white dress. I can't claim to have come close to matching her radiance -- a careless bout with the razor left my neck slightly sliced and a precarious pimple remained conspicuous even after being touched up with a tiny drop of Mary Kay foundation (make-up is a sign of virility, gentlemen) -- but, exterior primping aside, my enthusiasm came to a head as we walked in the unpretentious lower-level entrance of Vincents off of Elizabetes iela in the famed Art Nouveau section of Riga.

"You must be Timothy Chipman," one of the hosts said as we walked in. Cool, they were actually waiting for us!

"That's Mister Timothy Chipman to you," I thought, with a smug cackle.

The place was posh. White walls and beige carpets were augmented by minimalist artwork (yes, we concluded, the sketched horses were indeed mating in the framed piece behind us) and natural decor -- dark, wintry flowers strategically dangling from the ceiling, a shelf full of zen rocks and small votives, orange fruit and simple floating red candles on each table. Ella Fitzgerald crooned Christmas songs through the small speakers. The place oozed charm and Fung shui. It smelled of money.

After pushing in Joy's chair, our conciliatory server asked us about aperitifs.

Joy and I glanced at each other. A pair of what?

Whatever we said must have been right because a couple minutes later, the cart of pre-dinner wines and champagnes had been pulled up next to our table. Feigning certainty, we tentatively made our selections and were pleased with the results.

After agreeing that this was the fanciest restaurant either of us had ever been to, I had an epiphany. "Joy," I said, "This is an experience to be remembered. We need to own this place... embrace it!"

Which was all well and good until the menu came. It read like a fairy tale but was anything but embraceable. The server shared with us the specials and proceeded to give us his recommendations. I felt like I had been given the charge of selecting a new car. For 70 Lats per person, Joy and I could have partaken in the "Christmas Tasting Menu," a full-blown five-course extravaganza fit for King Ahaz, but we declined. In the words of Steve Martin as father of the bride, we opted, let's say, for the "chepper chicken." We were not disappointed. My grilled wild boar with chestnuts, a traditional Latvian dish, was a colorful parade on a plate, and Joy claimed satisfaction with her Irish dish of grilled noisettes of lamb with pearl-barley and mushrooms. I'm still looking into what "noisettes" are precisely.

An empty dish with the slightest remaining traces of crème brûlée, my melting bowl of ice cream (yes, the bowl itself was made of raspberry ice), and two and a half hours later, Joy and I toddled our way past Elton John, George W. Bush, Madeline Albright, B. B. King and other dignitaries framed posing with the chef on the wall to fetch our coats. The meal -- the entire experience -- was sensational.

I was hardly hungry for breakfast Saturday morning. Somehow my Special K didn't seem so special. With Joy already in the air, I rolled out of bed for the second time that morning, picked up yesterday's jeans and sweatshirt off my make-shift dresser, put on my glasses and stocking cap and made my way through Old Riga to St. Saviours. I've been helping with the church's Saturday soup kitchen off and on since my arrival four months ago. I was told the soup kitchen was originally conceived by two teenage girls who organized the weekly event. Eventually, a troupe of boy scouts provided the tables and chairs in the church's undercroft calling to mind the unforgettable words, And a child shall lead them. These days the soup kitchen feeds approximately fifty homeless or near-homeless people a week, but yesterday's numbers were in the seventies.

The soup kitchen is primarily run now by Rihards, a well-intentioned young man who works for the church and actually stays in a small room off of the balcony, and Alita, a temperamental older gal with hair fire-engine red. While the church facilities are adequate, neither Rihards nor Alita seem to stand by the old adage of cleanliness being next to Godliness. I always struggle to decipher the clean towels from the used ones among the pastiche of items in the small kitchen.

Unlike those who patronize Vincents, which prides itself on being a trademarked "Slow Food" establishment, the men and women who come to St. Saviours for soup and sardines and brown bread, when it's available, on Saturday mornings have little time to spare and little tolerance for slow food. Collectively, they are a mangy crew, wearing over-sized coats, carrying a variety of bags, mostly plastic. Bedraggled and forlorn, they aren't much to look at, and Lord knows they aren't pleasing to the nostrils. "Be sure the fans are on," I was advised early in my days of volunteering.

Occasionally I play the old piano while the people eat and Saturday seemed like a good day for Christmas carols. I always play quietly, as if I'm afraid to wake the neighbors, and I am never certain if the diners like my music or not. Some of them exchange smiles with me. Mostly, I'm an obstacle to surpass on the way to the station of seconds. I am always surprised when I make it through my playing without noodles or warm broth on the back of my neck. With so many people in a space too small, the odor was particularly loathsome this week. Even the heavy aroma of the soup on the stove in the kitchenette across the hall couldn't disguise the inextricable blend of unwashed, unfiltered humanity. For the first time in my piano-playing life, I concentrated on "smelling the music" to keep my gag-reflex under control.

After about twenty minutes or so, most of the people have gone and I move into the kitchen to wash dishes. There are always a few men who stay behind to help clean-up. This is where notions of the stinky greater mass of a puzzle fall apart into tiny pieces of unique personalities. I don't know his name, but one man, for instance, is quite the raconteur. A hardy laugh follows all of his stories, and though it would be very plausible, I've never detected a drop of alcohol on his breath. He's just happy.

Another old fellow offers a courteous, nearly inaudible "excuse me" each time he has to come past me to fill up his bucket with water... a gift to the English speaker standing at the sink.

I'd like to say that my time at the soup kitchen was more fulfilling or more rewarding than the evening before at Vincents. In spite of the fact that both food venues provided this writer with multi-sensory experiences, I can't say it's so. Just like you, I guess, when given the choice, I'd rather be seated on the receiving end of the table.

Into this world of contrasts, as vast as the discrepancies and complexities of one human mind, a world of fine china and plastic bags, of reservations for some and starvation for others, comes Immanuel whose humble entrance among us, a rather deplorable, hopeless dramatis personae, still ought to stir up something sacred within. I think it starts with an invitation: come, the table has been prepared.

This Christmas, bring your appetite.

Yours,

Tim