Let's Talk About it - The Awkward Silence

Somehow a recent chat with a friend brought up the feel about awkward silences. She said that a guy-friend of hers had told her that it's nice to talk to her as there are no awkward silences.

And so I remembered the years when I was in Canada. If you do not know, here's a fact about Canadians: They simply hate the so called awkward silences. They have this constant urge to fill in every second with words. It is like a plague. And if they fail to produce a sound, they, of course, have to apologize for it! It's quite ridiculous. As for me, I'm Latvian, we are very different from Canadians. We like to be quite, and we like to keep to ourselves, some more than others, but in comparison, most Latvians will not like if you talk non-stop.

So very often when I would be in a room with one or more Canadians, they would feel pressured to talk. And, naturally, they expected everyone else to pitch into the conversation. When I did not speak as much as they would like, I could see that they begun to feel uncomfortable. It was like someone was pinching them, or as if someone was saying something extremely controversial, or as if they really needed to use the toilet, but couldn't... like something was seriously bothering them. I have to admit that I made fun of this in my head. They have this urge to produce a useless conversation, it's like an addiction. And if it does not go as planned, they went ahead and kept talking.
What do they talk about, one might wonder.

Weather, that's a no briner. It's always changing, and so is a good chat material. You can talk about it at any given time, as the weather is a continuous thing. Winter is cold and filled with snow, summer is hot, fall is rainy....and so on.

Hockey! They either talk about their favourite teams, or if they don't like hockey, they will talk about how much they dislike hockey! They will also go as far as talking about equipment and different leagues and levels of hockey. All this talk will lead in talking about other kinds of sports (or the dislike of all other kinds of sports). I must add, though, that most Canadians do like sports! Now that, in my opinion, is a good and healthy thing!

They will also talk about what ever is happening around. If it's a chat at work or school they'll talk about tasks, meeting, classes, bosses, teachers, ....etc.

They also will compliment each other. Then the small talk goes into talking about where the certain thing was gotten and they will talk about that thing. For example, if I would have a scarf from a friend, the other person would say: "what a lovely scarf you have, looks good with that jacket! Where did you get it?" To this I will reply that I borrowed it from a friend. The other person would then say: "Oh, really? I do that too sometimes. Me and one of my friends, we swap and borrow things all the time." ... Well you get the point, don't you?

What is my say? I think people should not fill every moment with some pointless conversation. It is highly annoying, and brings no good. I like silences, I love them, and I feel perfectly comfortable when no one is saying anything. I think this should be practiced more often.

Maybe people fear their own thoughts and that's why if there is a silence, they have to call it awkward. ..

Es negribu visā uzreiz atzīties.

Bet man regulāri sāp galva un domās plosās nemierīgs vējš. Man bieži ir bail un gribas paslēpties, tā, lai neviens mani neredz un nekad neatrod. Es raugos cauri netīriem stikliem kā uz manas mātes zemes netiklās miesas sniegpārslas krīt. Tas ir tik maigas kā maza bērna pieskāriens. Man acīs uzplaukst asaras, te skumjas mīt. Bet kaut kur dziļi, dziļi sirdī ir tāds prieks, tāds prieks, ka nesaprotu, kā dienas nepaiet vienos priekos.
Jā, tas tiesa, ka sevi izprast - neizprotu. Ir reizes, kad pati slīgstu savās izplūdušajās domās. Tad es kā maza, vāja buru laiva triecos pret tālā okeāna viļņiem. Manī mīt spēks, bet to pārskalo tās asaras, kas klīst pār maniem vaigiem.
Es pārāk bieži jūtos bezspēcīga. Parasti spēks man palīdz to noslēpt no citiem mirstīgajiem.

Je Suis Charlie

Why?

Je suis Charlie because I care.

Je suis Charlie because I have friend who are Muslim, who would never think of killing another human being.

Je suis Charlie because I have friends of many different backgrounds who would never think of killing another human being.

Je suis Charlie because I do not want to see people choosing sides because of what happened in Paris on 7th of January.

Je suis Charlie because I am human and I would not choose to kill innocent people because they have different views as me.

Je suis Charlie because there are better ways to show who you are and what you're made of.

Je suis Charlie we have one planet Earth and we are all responsible for each other.



Je suis Charlie because humans are the kind of species that have the intellect to control their own actions.

Where Did Viola Go?

As of January 7, 2015 I am no longer Viola, now I am Marta.
Why Marta, obviously because that is my real name. I have been living in some places online as Violeta Viola. But it's time I face the world as real me.


ALSO, of course, Happy New Year! :)

You Want to See More

So now I have created a new blog where you will see some things from our trip.

Cycling in South East Asia

From Here to There

November finally arrived. But before that end of October happened. On the last Wednesday of October I went to "trim" my hair. It is now half the length it was. (It is still long though!)

On Thursday it was a tough day at uni. But after that I had a nice lunch with a couple of my friends. Then later, in the evening, I was visiting my brother for his birthday dinner. It was great to see my niece again. She is growing rapidly. We stayed there till late and were home a bit after midnight. It ended up being a long night with packing, shower, doing laundry, and tiding up the mess I had produced in the last few months. I got to bed at six in the morning. My alarm was set for 7:30. I woke up 5 minutes before it went off.

Now it was Friday, the very day that I was patiently waiting for. That's the day when, what should be the greatest trip if my life so far, was about to begin. I flew to Lisbon to see my boyfriend. He was waiting for me at the arrivals, with a flower! :) We seized the last bit of the day we had by going a bit out in the city. Again, arriving after midnight home, we started packing, this time Pedro's things. It went a bit hectic, but by four in the morning we were fast asleep.

With most things packed we let ourselves sleep so we would be somewhat rested for our first flight together. With everything ready to go, bags and bikes packed, Pedro went to get his father and then we drove to the airport. At the check in we had a bit of a scare, the lady at the Emirates desk said that I could only get a 15 day visa for our final destination, so she could not. Check us in because we had our return flights only in 5 weeks. But luckily we had purchased another flight for us for while on the trip, so we had theoretical proof that we'll be leaving Thailand before the 15 days expire. With all that settled we now had to pass our bikes through the oversized luggage scanner, and help the woman working there bring the bike boxes to the other side. :D  We then bought some wine and headed for our gate. The flight was long, more than seven hours. And at Dubai we were not able to land because the airport was busy, so we took an extra minutes just circulating above Dubai. We landed passed two at night local time. Luckily our CS host Jihad was still waiting for us at the airport to take us to his place. With him was another surfer, Vaidas. This guy is from Lithuania, but has also lived in Norway, and in Canada for several years. Now he was on his journey to see every country in the world!! At our host's place we had a quick chat but soon went to sleep. It had been a long day!

We all slept in even though that was not the plan. We planned to leave the apartment by 10, but Jihad had to be in work. He had called work that he would be late, but because he sounded ill, his colleague said to stay home for the day. So now he was our awesome "sick" driver and tour guide. He really turned out to be one of the best hosts ever! Impressive!
We got to see some of Dubai. Before our flight we met an old colleague of Pedro's, had a nice quick dinner. And then our host drove us to the airport. We found our terminal, our boarding gate, and we were ready to take off for Bangkok!

And that is where we are right now. :)

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The End!