School:
Since the last time I posted, I have started to get heavily involved in my newest class, Product and Brand Management. Now that I have seen the workload of two classes here, the way that the major specific classes work at Aalto is a little more clear for me. For the most part, school work is very much a self motivated thing. Almost none of the classes have attendance requirements, but it is a very good idea to show up, because not showing can mean that you miss out on a lot of information. Another element to school work here is doing cases. Both of my business classes have had a heavy focus on cases, and after talking to other exchange students, it is clear that Aalto tries to focus on both the theory and practical applications of the course. In my first class, it focused mostly on cases that had already happened, but this Brand Management class also includes what is known as a "live" case, where the issue that you are trying to solve in the case is a current issue for the company. My group and I just finished a case today covering corporate level branding for a Swedish steel company known as SSAB.
Outside class, you also have a ton of reading that has to be done before you get to class. For my Purchasing class, we usually had to read about 20-30 pages of material before class, but for the Brand Management class, we have approximately 30-50 that has to be completed before class every Tuesday and Thursday. The cases also apply to outside work, since you will have to meet with your group to manage the workload, but it is manageable.
Aalto also has these classes that they call "book exams" and it is where you are responsible for learning all of the material needed for the exam. you do not meet for lectures and you don't really get any information from anyone about the exam. With these types of classes, making sure that you keep on top of your reading is very, very important.
That's enough about classes for now, lets talk about Riga, Latvia.
Riga, Latvia: Background Information
Riga is the capital city of the country known as Latvia. While Latvia has only had independence for about 20 years, the city of Riga dates back to about the year 1207. The city was originally founded by a bishop from Europe to help extend Christianity to the east. It was then inhabited by German merchants and crusaders participating in the Northern Crusades. The city soon became divided by the three factions, with the merchants eventually gaining the biggest amount of control. Since that time, Riga became one of the most important trade cities in the Hanseatic League. The city was eventually taken by the Swedish empire and at one point, Riga was larger than the capital of Stockholm. Later on, Riga became a part of the Russian Empire and was the third biggest city, behind Moscow and St. Petersburg. Riga, and Latvia, remained part of Russia until after World War I. The Latvian people declared independence in the 1930's and erected the Freedom Monument to commemorate the occasion. The freedom was not long lived, and during World War II, the country and city were occupied by both the Nazis and Soviet armies, with the Soviets maintaining control until the fall of the Soviet Union. Today, Latvia is a proud member of the European Union and the city of Riga served as the culture capital of the EU last year, and is serving as the Presidency of the EU until this July. If you talk to any Latvians around Riga, most of them feel very optimistic about their country's future and are proud of the strides that the country has been making to improve.Riga: The Trip Day One
I arrived in Riga on a Friday, and I was very surprised by how modern that the main airport of Riga (RIX) looked and it looks better than some American airports I have visited. Like most European cities, public transportation is a easy method for moving within the city and compared to Finland and Sweden, the buses in Riga are very cheap, with a ticket costing about 2 euros. It took about 30 minutes to get to the city, and while the outside fringes of the city don't look the best, most of the buildings just appear to need a fresh coat of paint and some gardening.
Once I arrived in the city center, my companion Alyssa and I made our way to our hostel in the Old Town. We left our belongings in the hostel and decided to explore some of the city. We started by paying a visit to the central market, where you can find everything from fresh fruit and flowers, to electronics and even Soviet memorabilia. The outdoor portion of the market is mostly just open air stalls with the vendors showing off their merchandise. The indoor portion however, is housed within these old Soviet era hangars (the four round roof buildings in the right side of the photo). This area was one of my favorites in the city, just because of everything you can see and the different kinds of people selling their wares at the market.
After seeing the market and buying a few souvenirs, we decided to head into the heart of the Old Town to see the sights. Riga has a style that is pretty unique compared to the other cities I have visited. We made our way down the winding cobblestone roads to the main square containing the famous House of the Blackheads. While the original building was made in the 15th century, it was destroyed and the building you see has only been around for a few decades. The building was originally built for the single merchants that came to the town, with the smaller red building on the left being meant for the married merchants. We continued to look around the Old Town, and eventually found our way to the Freedom Monument and saw some of the churches in the area. Following our exploration of the Old Town, we followed the recommendation of the hostel and had dinner at this Irish pub called Paddy Whelan's. Riga: Trip Day Two
As it turned out, there are free walking tours of the Old Town offered every day in English at 11 or 12. We met the tour guide in front of St. Peters Church (there's a lot of photos for this so they will be included at the end) and began our one hour tour. Our guide explained all about the different art-nuveau sculptures that Riga is known for and we also got to see the infamous "Black-Cat House". Since the German merchants would not allow the Latvian people to join the merchants, one well known family set up a Latvian merchant house, using a black cat as the symbol. At first there was only one cat, and the Latvian merchants had the cat facing away from the German merchants. After seeing that, the Germans allowed the Latvians to join their ranks and the Latvians added a second black cat to the house, this time facing the German merchants. Riga used to have a massive wall, with many gates surrounding the city, but today only one section of the wall remains, and only a few of the original gates exist. We followed our guide to a few other sights, and ended the tour in an alley way behind the St. Peter's Church. After the tour, we decided to go to the top of the tower and see the city. It cost about 7 euros to go up the tower and see the church, but the city is massive and seeing it from that perspective was amazing. We tried to check out a few of the museums and the castle, but unfortunately most of them were closed for renovations while we were there.
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| St. Peters Church |
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| Portion of the tour at the narrowest street in the city. |
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| The Black Cat House |
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| Example of Art Neveau in Riga |
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| View of one part of the city from the tower. |
Riga: Trip Day Three
We had a bit of an earlier flight on Sunday, so we didn't have as much time to see a lot, and since most places in Riga don't open until about 12 on Sundays, there wasn't much we could see. Out of all of the places that I have visited so far, Riga has been the favorite so far. Despite being so close to Sweden, Finland and Estonia, the city feels so different from all of those places and creates a wonderful atmosphere.
Next Trip Hint:
I didn't do this last time, but I am so excited for my next trip, so I want to give you guys a hint as to where it will be. I have mentioned the city/country in this post and here is a photo of the location (hint it may not be the first place you think of):
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| courtesy of google image search |
Thank you all for reading, and congratualtions to Dawn Staley and the Lady Gamecocks for capturing the SEC regular season and SEC Women's Basketball championships. No matter where you go, its always great to be a Gamecock! Until next time!
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