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Before Christmas| | November began a really busy period for my social calendar. My friends and I decided we should partake in more cultural events (local pubs and clubs not *really* being cultural). First on our agenda was a film festival. It was supposedly for films from Northern Europe, but the two we checked out were Slovenian and Italian. Luckily they both had English subtitles, although my Lithuanian has gotten a lot better. My friend Klemen, who is from Slovenia came with us to the first one. He knew about half the audience, and lucky for him it was a really good movie. Ada and I went on a big ticket-buying binge and got tickets to see Madame Butterfly too. We bought cards that get us 20% off tickets to a lot of these cultural things, so we have to get our money's worth. Sadly, the opera wasn't as good as I've seen elsewhere (like, for instance, St. Petersburg). I'm hoping the ballet is better, but I missed my chance to get tickets to see the Nutcracker before Christmas. (I'm a sucker for all the Tchaikovsky stuff.) Anyways, the opera & ballet theater has THE BEST HOT CHOCOLATE IN THE WORLD. Here, as elsewhere where I've been in Europe, hot chocolate is not the cocoa drink we have with marshmallows, it is what it is: hot chocolate. As in thick, rich, gooey. But drinkable. Yum. With ticket prices so low, it's worth going just for this intermission treat. Especially if you see a 3 act opera with two intermissions :) Our final foray into being cultured involved going to a concert in the jazz festival. Rona got free tickets from the embassy, so Ada and I were easily convinced. However, the tickets did not have seats, which we only realized when we got there, so we had to sit on the stairs. About halfway into the first number, we all realized that we don't necessarily love jazz, even though the group was quite good. So, we ducked out really early, and planted ourselves in a bar instead.
Around this time was Thanksgiving. I'd decided in about August that I was going to make a big dinner. It ended up being 13 people, including me. Yikes. Luckily they sell frozen turkeys here, but I had to order out for stuffing mix and pumpkin pie filling. Ada let me cook and host over at her apartment, since she has the space and the table for the large crowd. Nick came to town, since he'd missed my birthday, and helped me with the shopping and cooking, and the carrying of things back and forth between my apartment and Ada's. (And, most importantly, the cleaning up on the following day.) Everyone had a really lovely time, including two Thanksgiving first-timers: Klemen and a friend from summer school Ben who had come in for the weekend. Despite the large crowd, I had leftovers for a week...mostly mashed potatoes. I can't get used to thinking of food in terms of kilograms instead of pounds. :)
The same weekend was also a big couch surfing party in Vilnius. I hosted two Poles, who got in VERY, VERY late on Thursday (or very, very early on Friday). They were really nice, although one was a bit of a chatty Cathy. Nick and I weren't really into all the partying ourselves, so just let the Poles do their own thing. Luckily for them, most of the events were literally around the corner from my house. Saturday Nick and I had tickets for a concert at the Philharmonic. We ended up being a hurry and grabbed dinner from McDonald's. For the first time since July, for the record. The concert was another cultural disappointment. The conductor was really quite entertaining to watch, but the soloist was out of tune with the orchestra. Maybe we were just too close (3rd row). Also, curiously, one of our seats had been double booked. Oops. I feel bad for making the other guys move, since we ended up leaving after intermission.
The following weekend was a charity holiday bazaar that the ambassador's wife had asked the Fulbrighters to volunteer at. Well, we actually all did volunteer willingly. They needed more Lithuanian speakers, so we were happy to help. I also volunteered to bake some chocolate chip cookies...what a treat! Lots of countries set up booths, selling traditional and holiday items (i.e. gingerbread houses in Scandinavia, candy canes at our booth, jade at China's booth, Irish coffee at the Irish booth), plus some local restaurants and shops have booths also. We set up for a couple hours the night before, stacking boxes of candy canes and making the place look like Macy's. Being in the right place at the right time, the Irish ambassador's wife asked me and Ada to help with the ribbon-cutting ceremony the following morning. We got to hold the ribbon the first lady cut. Ooh. (I checked the media the next day, but we didn't make it into any papers, although we were surrounded by photographers). The bazaar lasted all day, and we sold nearly 7000 litas (about $3000) worth of goods.
Afterwards, I had to meet another couch surfer coming into town. He was from Hungary, and really interesting. He's a cartographer! Who knew that people still have to make maps?! I took him to watch the lighting of the Christmas tree in the cathedral square. I thought it would be a little process of flipping a switch, but it was an hour-long musical extravaganza, involving trapeze moves and fire-breathing dragons. Wow. It's always pleasant to be surprised by Lithuania in these ways. Unfortunately it was really, really cold that night. One of my friends actually put her mittens on her feet (inside her boots) to keep warm. Afterwards, we ended up at an after-party for the bazaar hosted by the Irish ambassador (his wife was the organizer). I managed to get a second wind while there, and headed to Broadway to dance with some of the embassy employees after that party died down. The next day my couch surfer and I got some brunch at my favorite breakfast place. It's really small, so I called to reserve a table...using my Lithuanian skills. It was a proud moment for me. :)
So, this brings us into December, a very dark and cold month in Lithuania. The sun was rising just before 9 and setting just before 4, but the sky was constantly covered by clouds. My language teacher told us that we have to learn to see the sun even when it's not visible, and that the sun is still up, even if we can't see it. But her optimism was lost on all of us. My apartment is especially dark, since most of the windows look out into the courtyard of my building. It became really difficult to do anything aside from go to class, especially on the weekends. To make matters worse, most of the snow had melted and it only rained. At least it was a bit warmer, but the cold, wet rain isn't very pleasant. It was starting to feel a bit like Christmas though. (Helping to make decorations at my friend Catherine's apartment helped too!)
The deputy of the embassy invited the Fulbrighters to a holiday reception, which was really pleasant. His wife is really nice, and has this wonderful Long Island accent. They had all their decorations up, including a little village set like we used to have when I was a kid. I was really getting excited to go home and see my family.
The day before the reception all four of us Fulbrighters met to have tea. I hardly ever see the other two besides Ada, and when I do, they don't always give the warmest of welcomes. So, we met to talk about how things are going, etc. Afterwards, I headed home while talking on the phone, and apparently dropped my purse in the street without realizing it. I only noticed at about 10:30 that night, after the cafe where I'd been had shut. I became really frantic, since my purse had my wallet with my documents and credit cards. Luckily, I had my keys and my phone, and had left my iPod at home. My passport is never in my purse, and so is my emergency credit card. Still, it wouldn't be much fun to get a copy of my residency permit given the wait for the original. I looked around my courtyard, and found a purse, but not mine. There's a little corner in the courtyard where the homeless gather to drink. (I've never seen anyone there, but I do see the empty bottles some mornings). I told my neighbor and the video guy about it, and they hadn't seen anything. My neighbor was really nice and offered to phone around to the other places on the street the next day. Ada came over to help me look on my street, and some guy asked if we were looking for something. We didn't say anything, until he asked if we were looking for a purse. Obviously this caught our attention. He told us someone had taken it to the corner shop. We were so grateful, I gave him some bread, fruit and water, and my empty beer bottles that he can sell. So, the next morning I went to the shop. They didn't have it, but the girl who found the purse left her card. I called her and she told me she'd taken it to the police nearby. I went to where I thought the police building was, but first ended up at the office of a newspaper called "Police" and then at a branch of the police that "only protects the buildings" apparently. I called the girl back, and she clarified where she'd gone. There's a little booth outside the French embassy where a policeman is stationed. Ada and I woke him up and told him the story. He didn't know anything, and wasn't really helpful. We went to the French embassy, and they didn't know anything either. The policeman tried to call the guy who'd been on duty the day before, but no avail. So, we set off on our second mission: turn the other purse into the police. They were a little confused when we told them the story: here's a purse I found, and I lost my purse. We tried calling the branch of the police that protects the embassies to see if the cop had told his superiors about my purse, but no. And his mobile was still off. We were about to give up hope when finally someone got back to us. The cop had taken the purse to Maxima (grocery store) in a different neighborhood and left it at the lost and found. What's nice about the lost & found is that they turn things in to the police if they are unclaimed in 24 hours. The police. So, off we went, and found my purse, with everything in it. Except the cash, which was only 20 litas (not even $10). So, long story short: Vilnius is a safe city, but the homeless are more trustworthy than the police, who are lazy.
| | | Posted 1/14/2008 12:12 PM - 41 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
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