Nereta

Riekstiņi ( Our – house ) www.ltg.lv/riekstini

“Be greeted forever, you, grey sand, that once has taken my feet with soft hands! Be greeted forever, you, lovely people

  who many times had led my steps and my thoughts to all the
  best! Be greeted you, old huts, which once gave lodging and 
                         warmed me!
                                     ( J.Jaunsudrabiņš “The White Book” )

These familiar words are devoted to the writer’s home. Later calling back in memory the childhood, when the writer spend the most beautiful days at Riekstiņi he said: “Riekstiņi – there had nothing left out of me, there left my child’s heart and my white days.” During the time when Jancis lived there, Riekstiņi was only ordinary farmstead, which in the beginning was sold by the estate as a serf – house. It was about 1874. The owner of the house Bullītis couldn’t pay per cents to the bank and let Riekstiņi away. The house was bought by Jorģis Čakanovskis. He didn’t really know anything about land work and therefore he was looking for a worker and found Miķelis Saknītis. In 1880 Saknīši came into Riekstiņi from Damasāni. Little Jancis saw Riekstiņi for the first time in 1881, but left is six years later, in 1887. But to find out everything about Jaunsudrabiņš’ Our – house one can only by reading “The White Book” which is said to be an anthem to the first real, the most favourite writer’s home – Our - house. The surrounding of the house was dsscribed in the book as. Not only the environment attracted little Jancis eyes attention and his soul. Everything that was at Riekstiņi, day by day remained in the becoming writer’s consciousness and mind. Riekstiņi became an Our – house for Jaunsudrabiņš. Everything remained in his memory very clearly as if it had happened just the day before. The writer remembered all the things from his childhood when in 1961 he started to write “ The white book “. Of course, adults think differently, but there are no doubts that memories are equal. Jaunsudrabiņš remembered everything about Riekstiņi: The living building had two rooms – a servant, room, where the writer’s grandfather Miks, grandmother Līze, mother, uncle Janks and he were living, and a masrer’s chamber for three people – the blacksmith Čakanovskis, his wife and his son. But now the most admired buildings by the tourists are barns, which show them many witnesses of that time working tools and other small useful things. Jancis from “ The White Book” remembered a lot of things about Riekstiņi barns, because since olden times he had walked through them many times. At the Riekstiņi Jancis met his first real childhood friend the Lame Jurks, who was older than he does and also smarter, because only the Lame Jurka taught him in modesty and carelessness. Maybe the Lame Jurka also taught the spite that never left him. Who knows?

 But the most interesting thing for the little jancis seemed to be his grandmother sister Ieva’s old chest, which was in green colour with double cover. When the first one was taken up, then, screwing up some keys, the second cover was raised up. But what covers! There where so many pictures that always attracted Jancis’ eyes. Most of all Jancis liked the pictures of Jesus and and his mother Maria.

In 1967 people from the collective farm “Draudzība” together with some employees from Raini’s Museum of Literature and History made a social museum at Rieksiņi. One of the main arrangers was Milda Buka – the teacher from Nereta Secondary School. She sacrificed a lot of her spare time to reach the aim. And many people from Nereta, who took part in forming the museum, did it only because of one reason – to keep the memory of our writer a longer time.

The Church of Nereta

The church is a 405 years old building. For us, the people from Nereta, the church is also Jānis Jaunsudrabiņš church. The writer’s childhood was connected with temple and still is connected his last way to Nereta.

  	The eyes of writer had seen the same altar, the same stained-glass panel and the same crucial that all of us have. His steps sounded there. The first time the Jancis was brought to the church when he was just three weeks old by his uncle Jānis and the pastor Wagner christened him.

Later he grasped into grandmother’s skirts came to the church not to listen to God’s word, but to admire the golden cock that was standing at the top of the church and also to rejoice at clear bell sounds. When he was working at Liepiņas very hardly, he was blessed by the pastor Wagner to be an adult. The church became fatal to Jānis Jaunsudrabiņš in the summer of 1900, when just like in his novel “Aija” he met his Līziņa. Their eyes found each other and at the same time in the room of bell-tower the note was made ( by the writer ), where he asked for a meeting at the river near the grove of birches. The next yaer in the September 2 they got married. The pastor Wagner married them in the church of Nereta. During his visits at Nereta the writer never forgot to step into the church. In September 13, 1997 the choir “Līga” sang the song “Remember Latvia!” The garden of the church and the street near the church were full of spectators. The writer stooped at the church just for a while, but then slowly moved to the graveyard of Ķišķi.

The Memorial Room of Jānis Jaunsudrabiņš

The room was made in 1977 by the Museum of Literature and Art History and by the help of many people of Nereta. There are seven pictures that testify the writer’s passion for fishing. There are also some pictures of Jānis Jaunsudrabiņš childhood houses. Walking around the room I noticed the list of unknown words and their interpretation. The words ( as I later found out ) were sent by the writer to Mr. Žirgulis, who translated “The White Book” in Latvian. There are also paintings, made by the writer, and his writer works in first print, such as “The Echo” ( 1946 ), “At School” ( 1946 ). But leaving the room everyone is to write something in “The Guest Book”. To my mind, it is the second such book, because the room was opened 1977, but the first sentence in the book I saw was writer in 1981 by Aleksandrs Pelēcis. It was hard to believe that no one had writer any word during 1977-1981. So I wrote my wish and left the room. But I did it with a strange feeling inside, as if there, in the room, was a magnetic field reminding the days of the writer.