Getting back to roots

OLD AND NEW: The author imagines what it would be like to be with her relatives from bygone days. RIGA - I must have heard the story a hundred times. In 1944, my grandparents and their son (my father) ran from the communists invading Latvia. After five years in post-war Germany, they went to the United States. They built a new life in America, but their dreams and stories came from faraway. It was a place that lingered in my imagination growing up; it has always been close to my heart. But it was only in 2006 that I finally stepped onto Latvian soil. Thousands of people share similar stories of exile, after fleeing or being sent to Displaced Peoples (DP) camps in Europe during World War II. Many have since come back. Maybe it is not strange that the children of exiles came back, most notably Toomas Hendrik Ilves the president... [read full story]