Windsurfing coach Jānis Preiss on why the Baltic Sea is dangerous in a storm
The nra.lv portal has published economist Gundars Bojārs's conversation with windsurfing coach and farmer Jānis Preiss about the dangers of the Baltic Sea for sailors and about starting farming without experience.
The Latvian portal nra.lv has published a conversation between economist Gundars Bojārs and Jānis Preiss, a windsurfing coach (windsurfing is sailing on a board with a sail) and farmer. It looks at how dangerous and how favourable the Baltic Sea is for sailors, and what it means to start farming with no prior knowledge of rural work.
The sea, the wind and the sport
The discussion covers how to fall in love with the sea and the wind in childhood, how Daiņis Caune's windsurfing photo in the magazine "Liesma" inspired young people to take up sailing sport, and whether the Baltija match factory in Liepāja produced the best windsurfing boards in the USSR. It also asks whether Pāvilosta is now a mecca for sailors, whether it is hard around Riga and elsewhere in Latvia to drive up to the sea or other waters to launch a boat, and whether the Gulf of Riga can generate whirlwinds during strong winds and storms.
The talk also touches on the Soviet occupation period, when carrying eight people in a passenger car without seat belts was not counted as a violation, while not having your passport with you was considered a serious one.
Farming and the Olympics
The second part is devoted to the countryside: how weather affects agriculture, how to start loving the land and farm work, and why cooperation in Latvian agriculture is going very poorly.
Sport comes up as well: whether Latvian windsurfers have a chance of competing at the Los Angeles Olympic Games, and whether riding a windsurf board today also means mastering acrobatics. The conversation closes on why one cannot joke with the sea and why the Baltic Sea is very dangerous in a storm.
