Wu Wei

Update

As everyone will have noticed, I haven't been updating for quite a bit. Largely because I didn't have much to say, or perhaps there was not enough going on, though there was certainly plenty going on in my head. 

I also just noticed that with the demise of one of my widgets, the site was blocked by a domain-name site so nobody could read it. 

Anyway, that is now fixed.

The LibraryThing widget for "currently reading" was stuck on the reading I did for my master's dissertation.  It had the pretentious title "Popular genealogy: living with the ancestors or render-vous with the self".  Still it got me a distinction.   Now it seems to have updated. But Goodreads has what I am currently reading, for those who care. 

There are plans for a new blog in the autumn.  Watch this space. 

 

Putin's New Year Speech

In Britain we are very conscious that an essential part of Christmas is the Queen's Speech to the Commonwealth.  When I say essential, I mean it is essential to decide whether the family will watch it or not.  As a child we always listened to it on the radio with my mother.  I am sure my father did not hold with such royalist notions.

These days, extracts are relayed on the BBC News in any case, so you get the gist of it whether you like it or not.

At lunch today we were discussing the invasion of Russians to Vilnius over the New Year.  It seems that all the hotels and restaurants were full.  They came in civilised family groups and their main requirement was a plasma TV to watch Putin's New Year Speech and champagne to drink with it. 

My informant could not say whether the speech was favourably received, which left me with some unanswered questions:

• Was it prerecorded so without any reference to the demonstrations?
• Is it too early to predict an "Annus Horribilis"* for next year's speech?
• Was it acceptable to boo in front of the children, and in a foreign country?

And what did he say anyway?  I seem to have slept through an important message.

*One year, the Queen complained about her Annus Horribilis (horrible year) in her Christmas message.  True there had been a fire in the Castle (someone smoking in bed, the rumours were) and her children all got divorced rather publicly and crossly.  Since most people were taking Diana's side, the discussion afterwards was all about how families had coped with their own Anni Horribili, and theirs had definitely been worse, without the money at her disposal. 

Shakespeare Hotel, Vilnius

Yet again, the best service no matter what the request.

I was home for the weekend and on Sunday needed to print a 30 page report for editing, but suddenly no ink left in the cartridge. What to do?

I consulted the oracle, Vilnius in Your Pocket, (now available on the iPhone) and found the nearest internet cafe.  In fact practically the only internet cafe in the centre, since Vilnius is maybe 10 years past the stage where teenage boys have nowhere to go and nothing to do but sit in internet cafes all day (unlike Pristina and Lefkosia).  Lack of business custom meant it was closed on Sunday even in the tourist season.

Again what to do?

Needing lunch (it was 3 pm), I decided to try my luck at the Shakespeare, since I could guarantee a good lunch at least and maybe they would help.  Aurimas the receptionist instantly offered to print, and when we had difficulty printing from my USB, lent me a laptop to get at the file another way.  After 15 minutes, the problem was solved, I had ordered lunch and was busy proof reading over a glass of wine. 

I did feel a bit cheeky, using a smart hotel as an internet cafe,  when I wasn't even staying there. But it wasn't a problem for them, as usual they were happy to help. Their computer even listed which rooms I had stayed in, in the past, which we found, when they made me an invoice. 

After all that help, I was amazed to be offered a big discount for lunch because it was Sunday.

Better value I doubt if you can find anywhere.  Highly recommended as always.

Still Hitler supporters in Lithuania

From the title "Triumph of the Third Reich" and the photos, this book seems to be promoting Hitler.

Depressing to see a book like this on full display in what I always thought of as a respectable book shop  in Vilnius along PIlies, the main tourist street.

It carefully stops at 1942.   It does say Part I but with a title like that, one wouldn't expect Part II.

 

 

 

Just another load of reasons for hating Citibank

It's bad enough to lose your debit card and have to cancel it.

But Citibank then makes it impossible for you to log onto your bank account and see if anyone has stolen money from your account.  It also makes it impossible for you to pay any bills.  What's more they do not tell you this, merely putting up some error message which makes you believe that Citibank somehow has decided to prevent access to its website over Christmas for everybody.  Of course this is unlikely but by now I fail to be surprised by anything related to Citibank and bad service.

Not only is this bad enough news, but Citibank will not send you your card by airmail or courier, no matter how dire the emergency. They also will not help you get emergency cash, but think it is helpful to repeat ad infinitum that you should go to a Citibank branch in your country, even when they do not know where you are, and imagine that Citibank branches are scattered all over the world.

Of course with service like this, it is not surprising that there are few branches of Citibank in other countries. 

Recommendations for a better bank please, so I can implement a long standing New Year's Resolution?

 

 

 

KGB Museum, Vilnius

Going round the KGB museum with 30 other people was not really a good idea.  I never wanted to go before (having heard about it from Bee and Sloph's school trips).  But part of my Lithuanian course includes local cultural lectures and excursions so I thought it was time to catch up.

The museum is located in the local court dating from Tsarist times but while the court was redundant for the Nazi and Soviet regimes, the prison cells were well used.  Some of the museum relates how the partisans were rounded up and passed through the prison in the late 40s and 50s.  You can see the cells, including the water torture cell and the execution cell. 

My thoughts ranged from a) thinking I didn't know much about prisons generally and what their conditions were like in the post war period, but thinking the British ones were probably  pretty much still in the Victorian conditions in which they were built and on the face of it, apart from the torture part, the cells looked pretty much like cells anywhere, not intended to be comfortable especially when crowded  b) thinking that probably these days  the political prisoners in the North Caucasus get pretty similar treatment or worse by the local Russian military or modern day FSB as the KGB meted out here.  

The museum itself was informative and the guide sufficiently practical herding groups and giving just enough information without the previous Soviet resort always to statistics.

But going round in groups just trivialises it all, for me.

Culture vulture in Vilnius

I overdosed on culture last night: two Bach Passions in one night.

I went to the first, the Passion according to St John, not expecting anything different for the usual serious stuff.  Edward Lucas* may complain that Vilnius is boring these days, but he obviously doesn't go to the opera. I found myself sitting down with a curtain depicting a vulture in a tree looking out over a plain.  That should have told me something was up.

The curtain rose and it was clear we were getting a lot more than the usual soloists and choir facing the audience.  I should have realised this from the programme but somehow it didn't sink in, though I did wonder a bit where the part "solo dancer" came from.

It started with the Evangelist in black and the solo dancer in white walking very slowly across the stage and when they met they turned and continued walking backwards slowly away from each other. This was quite a feat for the dancer as she was pulling a train (attached to her dress) which in length was half the width of the stage.  Eventually the soloists appeared in minimalist costumes and sang their stuff.  At the same time, the stage was mainly lit from the back curtain, where what looked like 3 railway sleepers at curious angles moved diagonally across the backdrop, in a very distracting way.

Everyone was very slow in their movements which were designed to look either like shadow puppets moving against the light background or Egyptian sideview stereotypes.  The dancer spent rather a lot of time walking very slowly back and forward at the back in profile. Everybody except Jesus spent a lot of making rather threatening gestures in profile.

The chorus were dressed in cream tents and caps which made them all flat-chested and fairly indistinguishable except by height and width.  They moved as a group like Daleks.  I did find it rather disturbing that the chorus was one minute praising God and sounding God-fearing and the next minute baying for blood, but that's the way with choruses.

The soldiers were rather impressive, all in black with spears and huge black helmets.  As they marched in profile they looked very much like Balinese shadow puppets.

Finally at the moment when Christ died on the cross, a silver blue fluorescent light appeared (diagonally opposed to the railway sleepers) and pointed the way to heaven.  Unfortunately the wires hanging the light were rather more visible than those hanging the railway sleepers, so some of the effect was spoiled.

I'm sure you can tell that I was rather distracted from the music.  There were subtitles in Lithuanian, but my 3 years of lessons never needed me to read the bible, so my Christian vocabulary was a bit lacking.  However  several years of church-going in my youth did mean I was familiar with the plot, though I doubt if my kids are.  I realised also that the music was more unfamiliar than I expected.

So a rather strange performance altogether, from the direction of Robert Wilson (USA), with a mostly German cast, who came only for the first performance and we got mainly substitutes on the second night.

After that I got home and found that there was still time to watch Passion according to St Matthew on Mezzo TV, which was the classical performance standing on a stage with no acting.  That was much more familiar and I enjoyed it more.  

It's been rather a cultural two weeks.  Sloph and I went to more opera to see how they managed Anna Karenina falling under a train, to a Kazakh film in the Vilnius Film Festival, and to hear Edward Lucas.

*Edward Lucas (Eastern European correspondent of the Economist) was in town to address the British Chamber of Commerce on the occasion of the 20 year anniversary of Lithuania's independence.  His talk included telling the Lithuanians they had now become boring, but this was not a secret weapon they could use against the Russians, so true to his New Cold War book, he told them to hurry up and buy more tanks.  The Cabinet of Ministers turned out in force to hear this, and the Defence Minister must have been very pleased, though quite what they will pay for them with, is not clear.  Also just at the moment there are a few more priorities than defence.

In a ceremony at Vilnius Airport Lucas handed over the first Lithuanian visa numbered 0001, to be preserved for posterity.  It seems that Lithuanians didn't expect many other visitors if only 4 digits were required.

Old Soviet Postcards of Vilnius

You know, those ones that were all you could buy: terrible blurry colour printing, and supplied in a komplekt (little folder of 10 or so).

Here's a few from Facebook here.

  

No prizes for guessing this is Lenin Square, now Lukiskiu Square.

And this one of the Rotuse Square complete with statue:

  

The inevitable bleak blocks of new housing (though to be fair, there are plenty of places built like this in Britain in the 60s and 70s, with the same effect)

  

Some of the comments on the photos are quite funny, if you read Lithuanian.

Gassy water machines

Someone is kindly posting old photos of Lithuanian cities on Facebook. There is now a "modern" series from the late 70s early 80s here.

It's a bit strange. It's almost the same as now, but the Soviet statues are still there. I arrived in Vilnius long after they had gone, and I only ever met one person who talked about Lenin Prospect as opposed to Gedimino prospect.

Here's a photo of the old "gassy water" machines about which I have had many nostalgic conversations with people who remember them, while Bee and Sloph were amazed: gassy water instead of coca cola?

 

It seems that I am not the only nostalgic one, as 103 people like them on Facebook.

Old photos

How do I know my flat is in the right place?  Because it is right next to the offices of Lietuvos Energija and the Energy Museum.

And on the old photographs now being collected on Facebook here, you can see a rather smart power station and some trees where my flat will appear later.

Apologies for the lack of posting.  Just not much happening these days, plus it's too cold. Tbilisi may not be so cold, but it makes up for that by the bitterly cold howling wind.  Unusual in a town to have such strong winds.