No taxi stories this week!

This week has been interesting for me with several business opportunities presenting themselves. All have been in partnership with Latvians and it showed me that the crisis has not dampened the energy or enthusiasm of everyone for doing new things. I just hope we can make some of them work. Sadly another friend has lost his job.

Yesterday was a good visit to the Latvian Chamber of Commerce. With a thousand members they are hopefully part of the solution to a revitalised Latvia. But a look at their handbook shows the huge gulf between the very few large successful companies and the huge number of smaller enterprises with fewer than 30 members. The chief Zanete Jaunzeme-Grende was full of positive ideas and thinking. She has trips arranged to China and Scotland soon, so hopefully they will both bring something.

I have had discussions with four good consultancy companies from UK who want to bring their reform experience and expertise to Latvia. I hope that soon someone will realise their value and use them.

The number of beggars and bag people is increasing daily. Luckily the weather is mild.

Will the last taxpayer to leave Latvia, please turn out the light!

The rumour today is that the government tends to close the Latvian borders in 3 months time and not let anyone else leave. It is so wonderfully Orwellian it may just be true. But there is no reason to do it then unless there are other plans afoot so that probably places Devaluation firmly into the first week of February. You heard it here first.

Of course I may just have given away another secret government misery plan so I apologise to Ventspils Police in advance. It is now nearly a year since they arrested Dmitrijs Smirnov the University lecturer (remember him readers?) for the heinous crime of daring to speak his mind freely about the economy. I always thought that was what we paid academics for in the first place!

LEAVES

5 years ago I went to Minsk. One of the abiding memories of that wonderful trip was the sight of 40 or so workers walking in a straight line in the park clearing leaves. A sure sign of Soviet control I felt. This week I saw the same leaf clearing in a park in Riga. I fear we have progressed backwards. I think it is a great idea that those unemployed should do something positive with their time but when we have literally hundreds of unemployed executives and teachers, why cannot we run lessons for them all and do something positive - back to school!

WASTE

My friend Lars who runs Swedish owned Ragn Sells waste company in Riga says that after steady drops in volume all year, waste (rubbish to the rest of us!) has now bottomed out. This says something important but I am not sure yet what.

My building supplier client Maris from Buvejam LV says that his customers have simply stopped phoning. Luckily he has Plan B in place and intends to be there for the recovery. We are about to start an advertising campaign. He says his friends who have shops are all saying the same. The slow decline is still going on and the next marker point will be February when the money stops for the last group made unemployed and the big 500 million cuts start to take effect. I fear that despite the good news of waste, we have the worst still to come.

FLAGS

I passed the Europa Hotel yesterday on Barona Iela. All the flags hanging outside were wrapped around the posts and looking very sorry. Self respect and attention to detail has gone. I think it probably sums up the sad way the country sees itself.

ANOTHER TAXI STORY

Friday evening I was invited to the Riga Fashion Week party in Hotel Latvia by my American film director friend Ryan. It was the first time I had been in the new night club since renovation. The half we were in looked good. The other half had about as much soul as a fridge. needless to say the other side was empty. I wonder sometimes who designs these places. I hope they got their money back.

The fashion crowd were as you would expect, beautiful people and very well dressed. There were lots of them too. The language was heavy on the Russian side but if they are bringing business to Riga then well done them. Judging by the queues at the bar there is no serious shortage of money in this profession either. Ryan was networking hard to get some new people for his next film, and being one of the oldest in the room, I just enjoyed the beautiful girls, the music and the beer.

There was a fashion show of Jeans. Some were good but some of them were the belt round the knees baggy type. I know its showing my age, but they do look really weird. And how do you run away from the police when you are wearing them for goodness sakes?

At a sensible time (sadly, 2 minutes after the last tram had left) I hailed a taxi. Off we went, or to be precise, off we didn't go. The engine kept dying. The driver was on his first evening with the firm and being watched by an assessor so he was not a happy boy. We finally got going and the driver apologised and told me that they had just filled up with illegal Russian petrol and the fuel was dirty.

We had several unplanned stops on way to home and a couple of kilometres at a good 3km per hour. The trip took a little longer than usual. I found the whole thing really funny and it made a great end to the evening. It was just another cameo of the way the country is going. On one hand an assessor to make sure that everything is being done properly and on the other, illegal petrol. I am sure that neither man saw the irony.

As they left, I wished them luck on the trip back into town. I hope they made it.