Day 13 - The streets behind the post office

In the morning we continued our exploring. We found a bookstore that sold large books in English - mostly photo, art, travel, and cooking. It is on Traku and is called Humanatas or something. There were lots of people inside.

On the way we looked inside the courtyard on Ogminiu gatve. There was a little airplane hanging in the air. We walked inside to see more, but it was the usual courtyard with crumbing walls, some decaying sheds, and patches of peony bushes. Maybe the plane belongs to the gallery that is located there.

We ended up covering the streets behind the post office and up to the opera therater. Buildings are less well repaired and less nicer looking than in the old city. There was noticeable quantity of the private objyn/urology offices compared to the other places.

We did find an interesting restaurant for lunch on Syrvido. Don't know about the food quality but it is set on the first floor in a really beautiful building. We saw the chalkboard menu but no other signs. We walked through the two sets of very heavy doors at the entrance and then hit a building receptioninst booth. The setting inside was heavy duty luxury of the before the war type - guilded wall decorations, opera house quality chandeliers, and a massive wrought iron staircase. Pretending to look like the belong we went behind the staircase, and, at the end of the corridor, having passed some offices with buzzing computers and copymachines found another heavy door. There was a sign of in "Kavine ... Clubas" and some other word in the middle. We walked inside and saw a pretty comfortable eatery with few remaining signs of luxury including the large mirrors and large windows with excellent views of the back of the post office. I asked the bartentender lady whether the Kavine was only for the club members and she said no, anyone can come. Hurray, we will be back.

We noticed people walking around with produce bags from the little valley on the Vienuolio Gatve. Turns out that in addition to the regular flower market they also had some farmer mini-buses come in and sell their wares. There was one of each - raw meat, cheeses, sausages, fruit, and vegetables. City folk were responding gloriously to it. There were long lines to each bus. What a good idea. I wonder if they do it every day. We never ventured this far on Gediminas during lunch, would be nice to check it out.

We made our orders at the Wok to Walk - Georgia wanted rice for lunch. Dan joined us in a few minutes and we had a nice lunch there. They had another guy from Asia and the same girl operate the woks. They still had not resolved the speed issue but we got lucky. When we came in, there was a bunch of girls studying the food ordering plan in front of us and several people waiting for their food. As we stood there contemplating leaving because the wait would translate into at least a half an hour, the girls decided against Wok and walked out. Within minutes the waiting crowd got their orders and so it was just us :) As we ate, we watched another marvel of efficiency - a Coca Cola truck came and their delivery guy must have made 15 trips back, and forth each time carrying one case of Coke products.

The number of tourists seems higher than last year. There are especially many tourist groups from Poland.

At the Cathedral square they had set up a small stage and chairs getting ready to make the presentation of something related to the lower castle. Possibly a dedication. There was a sign in Lithuanian on the wall. That might explain why they had tried to finish at least the front of the building so frantically in the 2 weeks prior.

In the afternoon we walked up to Subaciaus gatve to take a look at the contruction progress. Last year they were rebuilding the Subaciaus gate at it was beginning to look very beautiful. However, unfortunately no further progress had been made, at least on the outside. It is very sad - this is the year of the Vilnius Culture and crisis had interfered with the conclusion of these projects that would make the city even better looking.

It was raining and we were hoping to walk to Carskoje Selo on Savanoriu. But we did not get very far - Georgia was starting to get cold. So we looked for the pizza place on Gedimino. Cilli Pica and Cancan Pizza were full so that left Pizza Jazz, the place where we last were on the girls night out. This time the place had plenty of men and children too. Right away Georgia got hot chocolate to warm up. It was more like a hot dark chocolate mousse, similar to the one they have in the tiny place on the Harvard square, and totally awesome when we were allowed a quick supervised tasting. Dan and I got our pizza, and Georgia got hers - with a smilie face done in ketchup. It sounds a bit like a sin, but we seem OK here eating pizza with ketchup and salsa.

There was not a lot to do in the rain so we returned home. Our apartment owners were still there finishing their cleaning. They've brought two brand new garbage cans for the bathrooms when they had noticed that we were using adopted water bottles there. Very attentive. Nona said that they are strugging to find enough people to stay in the apartment. 2-3 year rentals to the embassy employees is a thing of the past. She is advertising in the "In Your Pocket" and it seems to be bringing back some short term summer leads, but nothing solid for the fall and winter months.

Day 12 - Vilnoja sculpture park, some parts of it

In the morning we went to the youth park. Georgia enjoyed hanging out with other kids. There were also some school kids on the day trip so it was a full playground.

Almost forgot, on the way there we stopped by St.Anne's church and got up on the lawn to take pictures. Georgia sat down on the grass. And then we got attacked by the Taiwanese tourists again. About 50 of them. They were snapping like crazy. Georgia got up and ran to me and as they turned on us both I got a taste of what it feels like to have your picture taken by the crowds. I now totally empathize with famous people chased by paparazzi. We wanted to be nice and there was no way out. They were blocking the back of the lawn and I was not sure I would be able to jump with from the tall ledge Georgia at the front. So Georgia did a heroic thing and stood still posing for a few minutes so they could take their shots. Then we started inching our way out. A few were still not done as they wanted some pictures in motion as well. They chanted "Achu, achu" and offered Georgia candies, gum, and even sunflower seeds on our way out. Ah, she is getting used to fame from the early childhood.

Georgia resisted a lunch walk and we settled for the copycat soup and bun place located in the basement of conservatory. It had the air of the orphan home and we felt like we were intruding of the starved students lined up for their sour pickle soup and kibinai. We grabbed some kibinai and sausage buns and left. Georgia refused to walk the final portion of the way and Dan carried her as she started working on her sausage bun.

At home I made the first unsuccessful attempt to prepare the Lithuanian Cold Beet Soup (http://www.soupsong.com/rbeet5.html). Apparently if the beets are too sweet it is bad. How do you find the less-sweets beets? Ours were the size of small apples. Maybe they should be more like the size of the plum? Anyway, I neutralized mine with some bologna and lots of salt, which is OK for the one not born here. Dan would not do such sacrelige. So I will be finishing his tomorrow.

In the afternoon we went to Vilnoja Sculpture park (http://www.stoneart.lt/en/). It is on route 171, on the way to Kernave, about 20km short. After a really wonderful day it started to rain in Vilnius but we thought we might get lucky outside the city and dropped in to pick up Alicia and went.

And for the moment it seemed like it worked - the sky got clearer as we approached the park. But as soon as we got out it started to rain. The weather had caught up with us. We walked to the lake and got to see some for the sculptures before it was clear that we had turn around. The park and the lake are beautiful. There are lots of T&A and lots of statues that are without either and are still very nice. There was a small bathhouse near the lake with acovered patio and a grill. It was rented at the moment by the group of Polish tourists who got stuck in the park because their unionized driver had hit an 8 hour driving mark (This place is about 15km short of Vilnius). Based on the amount of booze every person we met carried in their hands they were going to use the down time well. A few though had opted in for the water bikes. Either they started early or they were at the point that the rain did not matter anymore or both but they kept going.

We spoke to the really friendly and courteous man who was probably the hotel owner at the lake and he told us about the tourists and also said to call anytime to reserve the bathhouse, umbrellas, grills, tables or anything else we would like. They had dinner prepared for the Polish tourists at the hotel that they offered to us but we did not want the selection so got on our way. We are totally coming back!!!

We stopped in about 1km at what looked like a roadside restaurant. They had a few cars parked outside. There was a large playground like it usually is around the places like that. And there was a sign of a fisherman getting a fish. Dan sent me in to investigate. The restaurant is very cozy inside - all wood with an old tiled fireplace. The way they work is either you catch your fish at the lake behind the restaurant or they catch it for you within 20-30 minutes with the help of the dynamite (kidding about that last part). And then they prepare the fish for you in the way you choose. It sounded exciting too but we weren't ready to fish in the rain and did not want them to either.

So we kept going and very shortly reached the watering hole of Vilnius - Acropolis mill restaurant. It was not anything thrilling, nor did they pretend it would be. At least we had investigated a great way to spend another afternoon or the whole day.

Day 11 - Refining Palanga plans and a day trip for tomorrow

In the morning we walked to the playground next to the building where we used to live. Georgia recognized it and our building too. The playground had suffered some damage in the past year. One of the swings is done, the little merry-go-around sounds like a dental drill, and the sand is all kitty litter. But Georgia enjoyed hanging out with other kinds. That's one thing she seems to be really missing. None of them seem to understand each other but they don't seem to mind.

After that we went to the market and got greedy from all the smells. We got strawberries, sour cherries, grapes, and thin little sausages - thinner than a pinky. And we also got 3 bouquets of daisies. Georgia was very happy about that. She carried the whole bunch and was very pround. Tourists made comments. As we walked we identified three more potential eateries for lunch in the days ahead. And disqualified a few too.

At home Georgia set out to systematically consume the fruit. It was worth it to be consumed this fast. Next time I will put plastic bags all around her though, and keep her away from the wall paper.

On the way out to lunch we saw an incredible thing. There is a theater large poster stand on Pilies. They decided to advertise the upcoming performance of the Romanov ballet and put a live ballerina into the glass stand. She was dancing with the music and everything. It was like watching a human sized ballerina toy in a musical box. This was incredibly creative.

Then we walked out to Tomazz'Inn - a new eatery on Pilies that promised 9LT pasta in 3 minutes. First we panicked because the waitress said there are no menus in Russian and she seemed unwilling to translate the list from the blackboard. But then she suggested an English menu (oh, the savior). The food did not come in 3 minutes but came in faster than we had expected. We went back and forth with the waitress because they did not have the advertised dumplings in Bolognese sauce, so I ended up getting sweet cheese ravioli in spinach sauce. With some extra salt it is not a bad combination. Dan had a pasta dish that was OK.

During the afternoon we exchanged a few chats with Dina and finalized our Palanga hotel. Really looking forward to it. We will be staying right next to the main street in 2 little apartments next to each other.

Alicia came a little later and we went out together to Cilli Kaima's for dinner. The food was great and the service was excellent - the waitress perfectly emulated the English lady brought up in the best bordering schools. We walked around and saw resident snake and a chicken and a rooster. The only thing, the little brown crawly friend who shall not be named appeared towards the end of the dinner on my table, and ruined the fun. Yak. Never again. I did not want to tell anyone but Dan noticed my change in mood and suggested to move to a cake place next door to finish off our dinner. There, again everything started great, but I got a rotten green hazelnut in my hazelnut cake. It is definitely not my day when it comes to eating. But at least the nut was not crawling.. yet.

We dropped off Alicia at home and Georgia got to see her friends from last year on the playground. Everyone has grown. It is really neat. Not to say that the parties expressed tremedous interest in each other. They looked at each other and went their separate ways. You just don't know with kids..

Georgia said something really funny today. I asked if she wants to grow a really long hair, all the way to the floor like those princesses in the Russian fairytales. She said "No" because she would constantly get it dirty by pooping on it - because it is goes right past her butt. Makes sense.

BTW, "In your pocket" review of Zoe's is downright trippy. Should have given us some clues.

Day 10 - Going up the Gediminas tower

This morning we had a light workout in the morning. Only about an hour of walking around street followed by a short visit to Svejais Bandeles to get some lunch to go and preparatory fortifying pastry for Georgia.

We stayed at bit near the San Francisco church. It it one of the most charming churches and is a really sad state of disrepair. There were several groups of kindergarten kids hanging out in the closed church courtyard overgrown with grass.

We dropped in a few other places on the way. One was the Lutheran church across the building we lived at last summer. Georgia liked the red roof of its bellfry. It makes the building look like an overgrown gnome. We also stopped by yet another bookstore. Still no luck. And a few home design shops in one of which Georgia picked out a pink jump rope so that we could do a proper role playing for the Sleeping Beauty re-enactment. I am unvariably the evil witch who ties up the prince.

Good weather brought out drunks like fresh poop the flies. But I guess they need fresh air too and their quantity is only proportional to the number of other people on the streets.

For lunch we walked up the Gediminas hill and the tower. Georgia walked up the entire way. She was really proud. Granted it was not as much as we thought it would be. The road wraps halfway around the hill and there are just over 70 steps in the tower. About half of the stairs of our building that we climb 3-4 times a day at least.

The view was wonderful. There was surprisingly many locals - schoolgirls going up to have their lunch on the hill, mom's with little kids and such. On the way we stopped at the tower museum. Georgia got screamed at by the museum worker for walking around the exhibit table. We spoke to the evil witch and she apologized. But you really can't do anything about the reflexes that were burned in for years. At least we told Georgia that it is never OK to scream at kids and she saw up telling the same to the person who did it.

The whole trip was less than an hour. We ate our many goodies from Bandeles at home - kibinai, croissant with ham and cheese, and cheese danish. We certainly would not starve here.

In the afternoon we went to the railway station to see the Russian book store. The selection of books is staggering, particularly in the weird categories like "Magic Sciences." We wanted to get some coloring and easy to read books for Georgia but they are way too expensive. It is much cheaper to find and print interesting coloring pages from the Internet. And easy to read books can be found in any Lithuanian bookstore. They are much cheaper there.

Georgia wanted to get on the train to go to the zoo. It is amazing that she remembered our trip from last year.

After a long walk we finished the day at Zoe's bar and grill. It is recommended as one of the highlights of the city in the "In Your Pocket Guide". The location is great - right next to the Indian and facing the Cathedral square. Service is good too - fast and responsive. Ambience is there as well - they have a wall with lamps that change colors covered by another wall with holes, comfy seats with pillows, and there is even a children's potty in the bathroom. The bartender, possibly Irish or Brit goes around his business with the air of high priest.

But the food was so so and very overpriced. I don't know.. somehow the recommendations and the place really build up your expectations and then, when you get a burger that is clearly inferior to the one you could get next door at McDonalds it is kind of disapointing. On the positive side, the portions are big :)

With Dina's help we made plans for a quick getaway in Palanga in early July. Hopefully the weather will comply this weekend - we have big plans for the South of the country.

Another little city mystery. Whoever designed this building must be turning in their grave from this abomination.

Day 9 - All over the town

Today we had ambitious goals for the morning: find the book Dan was looking for, burn calories for the past week of overeating and underwalking, draw the Gediminas statue that stands on the Catherdal square, and find new eateries.

Georgia figured that I will be walking her to death this morning and tried to stay in with any excuse. Once we did go outside she tried to sit her butt down on any sittable surface on the way. But I prevailed in the end.

We visited 4 book stores looking for the book and had the most luck in the University book store. They had a related book and we got it for completeness sake. The cashier/information lady at the door was pretty unhelpful and said they don't have anything like it. We said thank you and went inside. Inside there was another information booth and the guy who was working there was much better. He walked us to the history shelf and showed the related book. And tried to help with suggestions on where we can find what we are looking for.

Next we slipped in unnoticed into the courtyard of the Italian department of the university. A connecting courtyard offers a nice view of the courtyard (yet another one) inside the President's Palace. This was pretty neat. Georgia really liked the mystery and forgot for the time to sit down.

We walked down some of the backpaths of the old town where we haven't walked before keeping in mind our final goal. On the way we also went inside the Japanese garden in the first courtyard on Pilies (the one that has Rioja sign outside). I wrote about it in our blog last year. This year we wanted to see if we could go inside the store. But it was the same story again. Inside there was a bunch of middle aged ladies getting high off the smell of paint as they were practicing drawing with Japanese brushes and leafing through the Asian art albums. Seriously. They had the door closed and everything. We did not want to break their reverie and left.

On the way we stopped by the store in the same courtyard that sold gifts in "non-traditional" style. A lady who could easily be my mom not for piecings and tattoos on her face and alternating shaved and colored head sections met us at the door and said that the store is closed today, to open tomorrow. Closed on Monday, just like a museum. With so many people sporting piercings all over their face here, if that's what they offer, they may as well switch to "traditional" here. Unless there is something really untraditional inside.

After that we sat down on the monument in the Cathedral square and Georgia made a painting. She was supposed to color the picture I was asked to do for her - King Gediminas and the Princess. But I stupidly drew him with a sword so that was rejected. Next we walked around Ogminiu and Totoriu gatves trying to complete our plan. Zoe's grill review coming up soon. We finished at Vaga and waited for Dan to join us for lunch.

Somehow several paragraphs got eaten when I saved this post last. I was saying that we had lunch at Pilies Kepyklele, the wonderful pastry place on Pilies. Georgia and I opted in straight for the cake. Though she did help herself to Dan's omelette. In the afternoon we walked around the backstreets surrounding our building. And in the evening we walked along the river and enjoyed the nice weather. As did many other people as well.

On the subject of the "tough economic times" here, to use DanR's favorite quote. It is noticeable. There are more drunks in old town, service is way nicer in the restarants, and homeless guy from last year who wandered the streets with a Maxima bag is still around only now he talks to himself. Some of the construction projects that were in progress when we were here last are still at the same stage. Vitalik and Dina painted a pretty bleak picture too. But, at least, the country is not at war. I bet things were worse even as recently as in early 90s. And none of us certainly had lived during the war times.

We have a big walk coming up tomorrow so will drop off early - it is only midnight.

Here are 2 mystery objects along the river. Any guesses welcome.

Day 8 - Taking on Acropolis and having a party

Dan and I figured out what precipitation percentages stand for on weather.com as they apply to Lithuania. If they say 20% - it will rain 20% of the time, 60% means more than a half a day. Today was 90%.

We decided to head somewhere indoors from the start and went to Acropolis mall after breakfast. Looked like majority of Vilnius residents were there too. They Indian market in the covered alley outside the mall. It was pretty big and sold many different wares. From shawls, to carpets, to neck scarves, to decotive ware. Most booths had Indian working together with a Lithuanian. There was Indian flag outside the market too. It was very crowded and everyone seemed to be excitedly picking themselves something.

Inside the mall was pretty busy too. We walked around and finished at the Hyper Maxima. Somehow, even with so many stores and interesting restaurants, skating rink, movie theater and bowling alley it is somehow missing something to make it a worthwhile place to hang out at for extended periods of time. I think it may be subjective feeling though. There is a huge bookstore, but we can only look at the pictures. We could have had more fun walking around the old town in the rain. We resolved to try the covered water park next time.


At home we tried out 5 kinds of salami we got at the mall. The best were the bite size sausages with chillie peppers. Now we are waiting for our dinner guests. Dan and Georgia dropped off but I don't feel like sleeping.

I need to find some proxy to change my IP. Pandora would not play outside the US, and the only decent replacement I found - last.fm only plays 30 tracks for free and I am almost up. Hidemyass.com/proxy seems to be connecting but now Pandora seems to be down.

Vitalik, Dina and Ilyusha came at around 6. The little guy is certainly grown since last year - at 2 he is the same size as Georgia down to shoe size. He is also more comfortable than Georgia at climbing up on the things and jumping down. He also gave Dina quite a workout going up and down the stairs going to the master bedroom. We had a great time and even got to enjoy the 10% of dry weather by going out after the dinner.

Day 7 - Medieval show in Trakai

Today Dan brought us some fresh pastries from Svejais Bandeles for breakfast! Hurray!

Then we headed out to Trakai. Georgia was very excited. We told her some stories about the kings who used to live there and she fully believed they would still be living there. We planned to do our usual walk around but she begged us to go inside. It was a good idea. The exhibits and descriptions inside were updated and now the museum looks pretty impressive. They have some nice light and sound exhibits on the third floor of the big tower. Unfortunately some rooms are still closed and it is not possible to go around everywhere. Dan said it may be because they don't have enough exhibits to go in those rooms. It could also be because they could not afford enough attendants to man all those rooms. This sucks. These special areas are some of the key perks of the castles.

Georgia was pretty disappointed. I think she expected to see princesses. She dragged us from room to room without finding what she wanted.

Just like in our last visit here, we got lucky and came on the day of the Medieval fair. Arond the fair there was enormous amount of booths selling different handicrafts, cheeses, sausages, honey. There was also Chinese alley that was selling junkets that had no relevance to the show or to the country. But they completed the picture.

There was a guy who on his RV traveled around entire Europe and much of Asia. He travels with a bunch of pets and they do a show together. There was a stage for performances of folk music/dances by the different groups of locals.

Inside the fair grouds they have a couple of scenic eateries like last time, a witch booth selling various herbal medicines, blacksmith, book binder and others. There was also a joust between the knights from different European countries. It was pretty awesome. The event would take two days and in the end, president Adamkus would present the winner with a suit of armor made by the best armorer in the country. This is pretty neat. They had army boys without any weapons apparently stand around guard and help to move heavy pieces around.

There were lots of long time enthousiasts of this kind of show - they walked around in really authentic costumes and footwear. This stuff was not the type they sell at Renaissance fairs. The clothing was handspun and colored and was probably extremely close in historial detail to the real things. Women looked particularly beautiful in these dresses.

The knights were fighting with swords on foot. Even though the swords were probably dull and we did not see paramedics anywhere (unless guys with crosses on their shirts doubled as such) they looked like the swords were very heavy. The goal was to hit the opponent on the head as much as possible. That's probably the best you could do with the thing being this heavy. Some had squires who carried their helmet. Some knights kneeled and prayed before the battle - it was very realistic. There also was a guy with 2 huge mastifs. They were pretty friendly but during the joust barked and pulled like crazy and that added to the atmosphere. Anyway. We got lucky with today's event and the weather :) Beats Kazukas!!!

On the way back we picked up Alicia and drove to Vandens Malunas for dinner. It is an actual watermill that was converted to the European restaurant. There were 2 weddings going on so we got the cellar. It was done in a really interesting way. The cellar is 3 stories. The bottom where we went so that Alicia did not have to do any climbing has ceiling so low that you have to crouch as you get to your table. The second sellar floor is a bit higher. There was a door to the kitchen on the third. This setup brought to mind the description of the eatery Ijon Tichy ate at in the final pages of the Futurological Congress. Free translation now "The reality drug kicked in. The palm leaves turned out to be the rope of the underpants of the guy sitting on the level above". Sort of the same thing. But really very scenic and cozy. There was a little table for kids, with coloring paper and pencils.

The food was great. They had what Dan defines as a higher cousine quality quotent - excellent sauces. Every dish was excellent, very well prepared and, again, the sauces! We may need to come back for desert. There was simply no room to stick it in.

What was equally impressive (note, this is a third paragraph covering the same restaurant!! feel free to drop off if you are nauxeous) was that the waitress split her time between hanging out outside directing the non-wedding clients to the cellar, running around between the two stories of the cellar and the kitchen. And she was fast and responsive. Amazing.

The weather got completely perfect towards the evening. The sky was blue and there was not a single cloud. But Georgia was totally beat. And we only looked ready and willing. So we headed home and had an early evening. Dan ran out to Rimi and got us some desert to have with our evening movie.

Day 6 - Getting a few blocks further

Today we walked out fully prepared - rain boots, rain jackets, sweaters and it is was good thing too. Even though it rained less it was pretty cold - possibly mid 40s.

The first order of business was to check whether it was possible to walk up to the Gedimino tower on foot. Last year the walkway was closed and only funicular access was available killing half the fun. We failed in that task. In addition to re-starting the work on the front of the lower castle (actually very cool - they have 3 cranes up there with people during the day), they are also expanding the cathedral square into the park so there was much construction going on around the walkway. I extrapolated that the walkway would be closed. But turns out during our afternoon walk that it is open and it may be possible to get up by walking.

We walked leisurely stopping here and there. There is a no stroller rule for the morning walk.

The second order of business was to go to the toy store on Vilnius gatve and get Georgia some more paints and play dough. By the time we got to the post office to do some research for Dan, Georgia decisively claimed that the bathroom was needed and now. We ran into a Double Coffee. Our first foray here this summer. She instantly forgot what we came here to do and sat down to study the menu. We got a stuffed croissant (not recommended) and hot cocoa for her, cappuccino for me.

While we were sitting there, there was a serious business discussion going on at the next table. There was a young couple and a young real estate agent discussing a possible deal in LithuRussian. It was funny to hear "blah-blah-blah" + "a separate master bathroom." I wonder if the agent spoke like that because the couple was Russian Lithuanians. We do hear people mixing up these two languages though younger people usually speak purer Lithuanian and use Russian for the expressions where certain emotional impact is necessary.

It started raining outside again. We watched a family across the street without the raingear deal. They had a double stroller and a bigger kid Mom took over the stroller and dad launched the kid on his shoulders. They ran out of view. We forgot about them but in about 3 minutes they ran inside the Double Coffee and started chaning the kids into some dry clothing. Georgia and I felt like a veteran hikers properly prepared for the hardships ahead.

By the time we were done it stopped raining and we got as far as Gedimino 9 before there was another bathroom call. I am beginning to suspect that it is a trick. We walked around the mall afterwards. There is really little to see. The last floor is still unoccupied. There are few open spaces on the other floors as well. The only thing that was really interesting was the bookstore. It was all Lithuanian and we only got as far as the children's section but it was really awesome. They must have such enormous supply of local illustrators that each book was a treasure trove of pictures in many different styles.

We walked over to the square next to McDonalds and called Dan to join us to lunch. We went to the soup and bun place on Gedimino. It was nice. On the way we saw some policemen on police Segways. This looks really cool. Incidentally Segway renting place on Vilnius gatve is really popular and we see people on these things practically every day.

In the afternoon the apartment owner came over with her husband to do the cleaning. They are great: brought new toys for Georgia, extra soap, towels, table liners. It is weird to figure out what it is we are responsible for since there was toilet paper, paper towels, and other similar things already there when we came. They also tried to bring over a couch for Georgia's room but she did not allow it and asked for it to be taken away. Poor things. They dragged it all the way up here. The owners were really talkative - I guess they are working their garden all day long and don't get much of a chance to speak with anybody. Or maybe they are like that with everyone.

Georgia and I went out while Dan still had to finish a few things. We fed the doves and went to the temporary textile exhibition in the building on Stikliu gatve. It was one of those weird incogruous things we saw on our last visits here. Several rooms of strange textile artifacts of questionable artistic value. Like semi-circular wood frames with threads pulled through to make it look like it is a human figure in threads. Yeah, I can see a deep meaning and be impressed for about 10 seconds. Georgia wanted to climb on top and use the thing like a seesaw. Zero other customers and bored to death attendant who has to keep an eye on this goodness for 8 hours a day.

We walked a bit more on Stikliu gatve visiting different stores. One of them,"Silvero Salonas 925" on the corner sucked. The stuff looks nice enough from the outside but inside there were eagle eyed women who last took shower in the time of the Soviet Union. They followed us around drowning the view of the goods inside with their aroma.

There is a brand new little nook that used to be a broken down backyard last time but is now a place with three vintage clothing stores. Don't know if the venue is a long term proposition on this street but it looks good now.

We met up with Dan and went up to check out Usupis. On the way we passed the Church of the Holy Mother of God. It was freshly plastered and they uncovered sections of the original walls. The view is awesome. Of course we left our camera at home. Next, there was a chanting crowd in Usupis Cavine and one customer was taking off his pants. We stopped to see the end of the show but that was the end. After that we walked around the Cathedral square and went home to get our car. Initially we planned to just get some drinking water but we ended up getting some stuff for dinner. So, sorry, no culinary updates today.

Day 5 - Rain games

Today started out very nice - perfectly blue skies, bright sunlight. No sooner than we fed the morning fix to the pigeons than it started pouring. It is a good thing we live about a block away. A short trip up to the third floor (ceiling height in the apartment is at least 3 meters) and the sky was perfectly blue again, the sun was shining, and the birds were singing. We went back out.

This time, first we stopped at St. Nickolas church where our windows go out to. It is tiny but very pretty. Very typically Orthodox with rich spattering of gold icons. The colored glass windows looked awesome with the sun shining right through.

Less than a block later it started to pour again. We ran into the new souvenir shop near the Vokieciu pharmacy. They have really awesome scuptures by a new artist. Totally fantastic, like something you would see in a painting - horse with the cage inside pulling another cage, a man sitting on a fantastic bird. Some sculptures had secret drawers inside. After we finished with the sculptures it got sunny again outside.

We leisurely walked over to Dailes art store. On account of Vilnius being the culture capital, they moved away most of the art and were having an exhibition of Austrian inventions (?). There were some pretty and not so much armchairs, pictures of some industrial excavators, a model of train, a real bike, headphones, and such. It started raining again so I gave the collection a very thorough overview while Georgia was testing out the furniture.

The rain slowed down and we managed as far as the city hall. They had some boring exhibition downstairs and then there was a sign that there will be an exhibition related to the Lithuanian kings starting on Friday. Several people were walking upstairs the city hall so we followed them dripping but looking like we belong. Upstairs the workers were nailing some of the large paintings for the exhibition to the walls. The guy who looked like a painter came over and said something friendly in Lithuanian to Georgia. We are getting good at smiling and nodding. We walked around and looked at the paintings. I could not make out any of the history on them but they were really beautiful and dramatic. Lots of violent bloody scenes, flying gilded angels and saints, and exceptional attention to detail despite the very large size of the painting. Georgia liked them too.

Then we made a quick run to the supermarket across the street, and, after that, another 3 blocks home to get Dan and our raincoats. For lunch we walked over to Wok to Walk right off of Gedimino and Vilnius gatves.

It was supposed to be a fast food Chinese and they got everything together except the fast part. They had a Chinese girl and Indonenian guy working furiously. There was a 3 step easy ordering process - get you carb (white/brown rice/different types of noodles), get your meat (pork, chicken, etc), and get your sauce (sweet and sour/oyster/etc). Sitting inside and outside was nice and implied fastness. The only thing we had to wait for almost 15 minutes for our food. Compared to the other eateries here it is pretty fast but still not fast enough. There was a huge lunch crowd waiting at the door. But the two wok operators, who were the bottleneck, could only handle 2 dishes at the time having only 2 woks. Almost everything was cooked from ground up. We were craving to offer operational efficiency suggestions. The food was branderized for the local flavor and there was cabbage with every dish but it was OK. Georgia really liked her dish.

During the entire lunch the sun shone and not a drop fell.

In the afternoon Alicia came over and we hanged out at home while it was raining again. For dinner we went to Forto Dvaras. The food was great just like in the last summer. Alcohol-free beer is almost as good as the real thing. The restaurant also extended their cellar. Now it is a massive maze of the rooms, some done in different styles. There was also a children's corner where kids could build towers from the wildly colored wooden blocks in many different shapes.

The only downer was that we got a lousy waitress. She walked about with a stone face and only came over when she wanted to, despite our hand raising and "exsuse mes." Absolutely no peripheral vision whatsoever. But when she came over she was actually sweet. The dishes came in with a 10 minute interval between each person. The final drop was when she added another dish to our bill that amounted to about 10% of the total. We had to argue with her over that too. In the end she did not get any tip. Dan wanted to leave her some but I was against it. Waiting the tables implies certain degree of courtesy and accuracy. She failed on both counts.

In the evening we drove to the local equivalent of Target and Home Depot combined, forgot the name. We had to get a microwave. There was incredible selection, far more than in any of the stores we were at. It was like a hypermarket of the home improvement stuff. We hunted down a store assistant, they are as rare here as they are plentiful in a real Home Depot. Scared the one we got into obedience by speaking English with them. Incidentally, just as he was about to dash out to the warehouse to pick up the model we wanted Alicia blew our cover by speaking Russian to him. Darn. He was not nearly as eager when as he dragged off to get our microwave. But we got it in the end.

Dan spent about 30 minutes, all our alcohol pads, some Windex, and some of our dishes detergent trying to remove the sticker "Microwave" from the microwave. Eventually he succeeded by rubbing it with his sleeve really fast, getting the plastic to warm up and release the glue. Amazingly good quality sticker.

Just reread this post and it sounds pretty negative. In reality we had a great time and it was a really successful day. Covered one more eatery, saw a new church, a few new exhibitions, and got warm milk with honey for Georgia to have with her evening cartoons. The weather is funny. It does not rain long enough for it to get depressing. And when the sun comes out, everyting dries out in minutes. The view of the wet roofs and shining green leaves from our balcony is awesome. And tomorrow we will come armed with our raincoats on the very first trip out.

Day 4 - Taiwanese paparazzi and diving into the culinary delights

Today at 9am I was the first one up. I guess with time we can become completely nocturnal. It is a good thing that it gets light out at 5am and dusk comes after 10pm. We woke up Georgia around 10 and went to walk around the town.

Last renters left some ungodly quantities of unroasted sunflower seeds and salt. So we wanted to check out whether the doves would respond to the former. Did they ever! Georgia dropped the first seed and a whole avalanche of the flying city rats descended in her vicinity. She panicked and dropped the whole bag. They destroyed it in under a minute. Will have to repeat the experiment later today.

As we walked towards the market outside the Gates of Dawn, Georgia got tired and sat down on the stairs outside the store. I snapped a picture of her. Then I heard snapping sounds behind me. It was a crowd of the Taiwanese tourists who stopped to take a picture of her too. They gave Georgia some candies.

We smelled the market as soon as we walked out of the Gates. It smelled like strawberries and cucumbers. We got some of each and tomatoes too. Everything looked so fresh and enticing. Women outside were selling lillies of the valley and peonies. I wanted to get some but our apartment owner left us a huge bouquet of Daisies and wild grasses. Will have to wait till it rots.

As we walked back a gypsy woman with a kid a bit older than Georgia appeared and followed us around for a bit begging for money. She and her daughter did some praying outside the shrine and then resumed following us. Gypsies had been living in the city for a long time. I wonder if they all practice the same religion or the bunch that lives here became Catholic or Orthodox. From what I could tell the shrine does not belong to either one of these faiths in particular. It is designed like an Orthodox icon but Pope John II did some praying here. So I am not sure. Back to the gypsies. Supposedly they are living in the area called Taboras which coincidentally respresents the largest drug market in the Lithuania. A few years ago authorities tried to fix that problem and also return the gypsies to back to the nomadic lifestyle by offering them some trailer homes located elsewhere in the country, but that did not go anywhere.

For lunch we went to the Royal Thai Bangkok in the old center on Šv.Mikalojaus str.15. Pretty austere setting offers a few hints that it is actually a Thai restaurant. It did not smell like anything either. But the food and service was very good. The spices were subtly different. We ordered chicken fried rice for Georgia. It was bright yellow from some spice (not just turmeric) and came served in the body of a pineapple. Dan had yellow curry and I had chili chicken. We switched because mine was very good but suited better the fire-eater league. Georgia had some fun with the napkin. Gold bags with chicken appetizer was great too.

At home we spent some time working while Georgia was taking her nap. It started to rain pretty intensely during that time. Later in the day the rain seemed to have stopped and we went out. The plan was first to feed some more sunflower seeds to the doves. It is a lot of fun to watch them. Next we wanted to walk around before our planned dinner at Graf Zeppelin, on Savičiaus 9. Supposedly the home of the largest ceppelin in the country. After dove feeding it started to rain so we had to run to our eating hole and finish the day there.

It is an awesome place and we see ourselves returning again and again. For one thing it has a perfect decor - with gnomes, writings in German fonts, and the pictures of Kaiser adorning the walls and cabinets here and there. Add to it a really friendly Aryan bartender/waiter who spoke fluent Russian, Lithuanian, and English (and I don't know what else). He brought colored pencils and a coloring book for Georgia. There was a pleasant sound ambience provided by the German 30s waltz style music. I was surprised to hear the rendition of Prince's Kiss in that style. Much more interesting this way than the original. Now, either Prince ripped that off or whoever was performing the waltz was making very good fun of it. I could not recognize any of the other songs, so it was probably the Prince doing the ripping.

Now we would probably be OK with the place even if the food was so so but the food was great, and they did not lie about the size of their zeppelin. Georgia had the "German children's favorite" Hoppelpoppel which was the fried potatoes and eggs. Dan and I are no German children but we remember this very same thing from our childhoods. Only it was usually accompanied by cutlet. Ah, the culinary memories.

We ran back home through the rain - it was only about a block away.

Now it is past midnight again and it is time to drop off.