In the instant lottery Veiksme Tavās rokās, a 40-year-old engineer from Riga won 150,000 euros, who admits: he did not have much faith in lotteries. Throughout his life, he has bought no more than a hundred instant lottery tickets, and he does not participate in number lotteries at all.
“But this time I had a gut feeling that I needed to buy tickets, I just didn’t know which ones,” says the winner.
Shortly before Christmas, he passed by a Narvesen point in Riga on Krišjāņa Barona Street, 78, and thought he could buy ten tickets. He chose Veiksme Tavās rokās.
“I didn’t have any deep thoughts or goals to win money. Rather, a boring evening was looming, so I decided to at least scratch the tickets. The belief in winning was microscopic,” he recalls.
That evening he started scratching off the protective layer, but at some point, he got bored and went to bed. The next day he continued. According to him, on one of the tickets, he saw three identical symbols in a row, then noticed the amount below, but he still didn’t realize that the 150,000 euros win was related to his ticket.
So he calmly went back to Narvesen to find out what the winnings were for that ticket and to collect the 30 euros from the three other cards. “I was paid 30 euros, and for the fourth ticket, the seller explained that it couldn’t be paid out on the spot. I thought — how nice! That means it will be more than 150 euros,” he laughs. He returned home, contacted Latvijas Loto — and then learned the actual size of the winnings. “It was very hard to believe. I can’t describe the emotions, but immediately the thought kicked in: what am I going to do now?”
The winner admits that he perceives this money not as a coincidence, but as a sign.
“I rather interpret it as a hint from above that something needs to change in life. I already have a plan for my business — this win will be useful for the start. The money came at the right time,” he says, adding that 150,000 euros is a very significant amount for anyone in Latvia and can serve as a good foundation.
He decided to spend the money thoughtfully: “I kept a tenth for myself, and the rest is placed in a way that over time the money will make money. Fleeting desires do not interest me — I know they pass quickly.”
