Lithuania Has Always Been Like a Rag Doll in the Mouths of a Pack of Wild Dogs

Strategically located ought to be a good thing, but for the smallest of the Baltic States, it meant Nowhere To Hide. Lithuania has been occupied so many times, often by the same countries on their second or third occupations...making & breaking nefarious deals with each other over ownership, that in its current free democracy, it's a very young country. They only got the euro this year. George W. Bush gave a speech in the town square in 2002, two years before they became a member of NATO or the European Union. His words meant so much to the Lithuanians that they engraved them in bronze for all to see:

A few years later, people found out that Bush went to numerous countries saying the exact same sentence. The Lithuanians are a gentle people & did not take down the sign.

Vilnius is not as spit-shined as the capitals of the other Baltic States. The Old Town really is old, not full of cute reproductions for tourists. They haven't even finished demolishing or repairing bomb damage from WWII.

                             Many streets look like this....casual destruction

                                           They do attract graffiti...

                                               ....some very colorful

                                              This is the remains of an old fort

As in so many European cities, the new & the old have an uneasy truce.

                         Arresting sculpture in front of the stage door of a theater

       Lots of big ads of beautiful people (note gold manikins in the background)

               Front window of a tattoo parlor

  Town square, with a splendid new Christmas tree every year

     Statue commemorating the ancient founder of Litnuania, before all the occupations began

      Is this anguish familial? Or religious?

        The entryway of the KBG Headquarters during the several Soviet occupations

     Now there is a museum here. This was the office of the KGB commander

     His phone to every part of the KGB organization

                                      Filing cabinets & gas masks

                           The KGB was nothing if not highly beaurocratic

In the basement, they have preserved the KGB prison

     Minuscule cells, where unspeakable things happened.

Thousands of people were executed right here on this spot. Their bodies were hauled into mass graves, some of which are even now being accidentally dug up. Only recently it was discovered that a power substation in Vilnius, now deep in the woods & covered with graffiti, was built from gravestones stolen (or some would say, repurposed) from Jewish cemeteries, the rationale being that since there were no more Jewish people left, who needed a cemetery?

These photos below are of Lithuanian people who were executed, deported, or both. Their bodies were often pusposedully displayed at farmers' markets, in town squares, & in front of schools.

How do people forgive? If the nations who murdered 90% of your Jewish population, banished thousands of your citizens to live lives of torture & forced labor in Siberia, & robbed you of your cultural identity & heritage time & again happen to be your next door neighbors & all that is within living memory...how are you now a quiet, reserved, sincere people, not a raging hating warlike people who want to kill everyone in sight?

How is that possible??