The only real museum I visited in Vilnius was the KGB museum. Officially the Museum of Occupations and Freedom Fights, it’s in the KGB building where “enemies of the state” were brought for interrogation, imprisonment, and sometimes execution. Talk about heavy. It was worthwhile and it’s not like you see the blood in the execution room (though they did play a docudrama showing a series of executions in that room—interestingly only in Lithuanian, whereas every other room always had English and Lithuanian. Anyway the drama showed the process of the executions and “cleanup” of blood and body). 

Don’t get me wrong. It can be pretty upsetting. In addition to the fact that you’re in the bldg itself — you can see the actual holding rooms, cells, interrogation rooms, prison yards, officers rooms, etc. —  they also had a lot of information and artifacts about and from people of the times. A lot about the people who were deported, the working camps in Siberia, the (unsuccessful) resistance fighters, and general history of the uses of the bldg. First by Russians then Germans and then Russians again. 

There was honestly too much there to be able to absorb it all. I was amused by the original (?) bugged rooms — an office and next door, the cameras to watch what’s going on …

And honestly I went to every room but can’t say I absorbed too much at the end. In fact as I walked out I had to go to this park and take a little breather.

Clearly the Lithuanians hate Putin. Every single bus I saw had, on its front screen, alternating Bus# FinalStop with Vilnius🩷Ukraine. And there were large anti Putin banners on skyscrapers and Ukraine flags on all official bldgs, as well as randomly on people’s balconies or out their windows. Then things like this…

After the museum I went to a former prison — which is where the photo was taken. The prison was massive and was I guess to hold people once the Russians decided to simply incarcerate them. I didn’t take the two hour tour as I had just finished the KGB museum and that was heavy enough. The prison was mostly left in its original state …

But it cracked me up to see how they’ve repurposed some of it. They took a small part to create a bar/food/club scene.

What you’re missing from these photos is the club music being pumped in — pretty loud. I have heard it’s a popular spot! It’s also been used many times in movies or shows, which is understandable. The additions are easily removed, leaving a decrepit looking prison that seems so untouched. 

I’m realizing I forgot a few other things about Vilnius over the days … they have an area called Užupis which was sort of an artist’s colony. They created their own border, money, and constitution (translated to over 50 languages) — with “ambassadors” from places like Montmartre, Tibet (who they recognize), and Brooklyn. It was of course in an originally crappy area but is now being gentrified and the artists being forced out. I actually heard (it was behind me) an accident when I was walking around there. Young woman in an Audi hit a bicyclist— or he her. I didn’t see. No one seemed to be hurt though both vehicles were damaged. They held up the little traffic going through there for a bit!

Melissa was smarter than me — when she went there she got her passport stamped and bought a small printed constitution!

There was also an old southern entrance to the original town, Gates of Dawn, which was beautiful on both sides (though very different) and upstairs has a black Madonna which I did not see (one can go up but it was Saturday evening mass and I didn’t manage it).

There isn’t much of a Jewish quarter left. The synagogue was bombed (it’s now a field) … but they put up memorials in various areas. Unlike in many cities, in its heyday, Jews were not forced to live in a specific area in Vilnius although they started in one area — but they coexisted well until Russia and then worse, Germany, took over. Anyway I took a photo of this one sweet statue in the ‘hood that has the current Jewish center … turns out my Airbnb hostess works now at the Jewish museum but I never figured out where exactly or what she did there. She’s retired but she and her husband had both been professional musicians (violin and cello) — he’s passed away so maybe that’s why she decided to start renting a room through Airbnb.

Believe it or not I’m glossing over another international dinner — Melissa, who is better than I am at chatting up strangers, met another Italian on a tour she attended with Riccardo. Nicola and his partner Rosa, as well as Pavel, Melissa’s colleague at the social work conference, met up for dinner. I didn’t eat with them (it was the huge Trakai lunch day) but I had a glass of wine (not good but I was too cold for beer — and I don’t like their lagers anyway) … we spoke Italianish until Pavel arrived and then tried to stick to English (he’s Czech). Anyway very fun time with new people!

Finally, back to the Russian question. I had thought about journeying to the west beaches of Lithuania. It has a relatively short coastline on the Baltic Sea but what is interesting is that there’s a “spit” (this is actually the technical term?) of sand about 60 miles long that separates the Curonian lagoon from the sea. It’s basically beaches and sand dunes. You can’t drive over from Klaipeda but I think you can take a ferry to a spot on the spit (!) where there are roads. They say because of weather, wind, water, climate change, etc, this spit of sand changes constantly and will likely disappear in my lifetime. (Or Luca’s.) Sounded cool. Though difficult to get around. But then I really looked it up — and the spit is half Lithuanian and half Russian. Kaliningrad, Russia’s disconnected piece of Baltic coast land, has half. And with my terrible sense of direction, I can just see me wandering on a sand dune and ending up in Russia. At one time I might have found that cool but not in today’s environment!

So that’s it for Vilnius! Though I went to another Lithuanian town which I’ll blog about soon…