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March 17, 2005
Jen and Lisa's Baltic Adventure – Day Three
Today we explored more of Vilnius, beginning at the leisurely hour of 9 a.m. when our breakfast was delivered to our door. Unfortunately, overnight the snow had turned to rain and it was a mess outside. We decided to give it a go, however, and were delighted to find that the hostel managers had two umbrellas that we could borrow for our stay. Duly equipped, we set off to the internet café, where I confirmed my phone interview for tomorrow evening at 5 p.m. That settled, we headed off in a new direction and made our way to the Cathedral Square. The most obvious attraction is the Cathedral, which was described by the German Expressionist writer Alfred Döblin as a "cross between a Greek Temple and a Polish civic theatre". Quite so, Alfred.
As our guidebook succinctly puts it:
The site was originally a shrine to Perkunas, the Lithuanian god of thunder, and Mindaugas the Great chose to build a simple brick church here in the thirteenth century—this did not go over well though with the resolutely pagan Lithuanian nobles who had him murdered in 1263, and the spot wasn't associated with Christianity again until the conversion of Lithuania to Catholicism under Grand Duke Jogaila after 1387.
The Cathedral was then remodeled, added on to, modified, seized by the Soviets and turned into a museum, and then reclaimed by the Catholics in 1998. Also interesting:
As the symbolic heart of Lithuanian Christianity, the cathedral was the natural focus of mass rallies in the run-up to independence. The most moving of these took place in January 1991, when the coffins of those killed by Soviet troops at the TV Tower were laid on the flagstones of the square, draped in Lithuanian tricolors, for an outdoor memorial service that united tens of thousands in grief and defiance.
Also in the square is a three-tiered, freestanding belfry, which (as the guidebook so accurately notes) "looks like a stranded Baroque lighthouse".
After perusing the extremely devout and Catholic interior of the cathedral, including the hideously ornate St. Casimir Chapel, we continued down the slick and slushy Gedimino Prospektas street, where we admired the architecture and navigated piles of ice and puddles of water. Eventually, we made our way to the Opera Theatre, were we were able to purchase tickets for that night's showing of Aida. For 3rd row seats on the first balcony, we were willing to pay $10 for tickets without caring too much about the show.
With tickets in hand (well, in Lisa's purse), we found Double Coffee, which might just serve the best coffee in town. We had a delightful lunch, and then headed off to see St. Anne's Church (which was closed, but very impressive from the outside. Around the corner was the Bernadine Monastery, which was totally creepy. We were the only ones in a huge room full of relics and old paintings, except for a tiny babushka-ed woman who scolded me when I tried to climb up to the second floor…even though the chain that could have barred the way was clearly unfastened.
Well into the afternoon by now, Lisa and I ventured across the street to a fancy hotel we had noticed earlier. Following the signs to "beauty salon" we located the spa, where we tried to get on-the-spot appointments. Lisa was able to sign up for a massage, but there wasn't room for me to have a facial. And when the woman pointed out that I "needed a lot of work", I decided to skip it altogether. I don't need that crap—I can feel bad about my flaky skin alone in front of the mirror, thank you very much.
So Lisa and I parted ways, and I went back to the hostel for a nice little read-and-nap. When Lisa got back, we dressed in our finest clothes (ok, I put on my nice sweater, but put the nice pants in my bag—there was no way I was slogging through three inches of water in my dry-clean only slacks!) and left for the opera.
According to our pre-arranged plan, we stopped back at Double Coffee and had a drink, while I surreptitiously changed into my nice pants and dress shoes. Thus suitably attired, we made our way to the Opera House (noticing, with much chagrin that lots of other people were in jeans). The performance of Aida was comical, complete with a little modern dance, an actor representing Verdi who watched his masterpiece from the corners of the stage, and a full choir of mummies. That's right, the high priest was accompanied by a mummy choir. Lisa and I had never seen Aida before, so it was hard to tell how much of this foolishness was written into the opera and how much was from the crazed mind of the Lithuanian director.
We were thrilled with Aida and Radames—or is it Radamesas? It's spelled several different ways in the English synopsis section of the program—were finally walled into the crypt, singing their last duo as the air ran out. Full of good cheer, we wandered around town looking for dinner options, and finally settled on a restaurant serving only traditional Lithuanian food. More specifically, they only serve dishes from a special "registry" that details the regional food, and make all the food with "traditional technologies". I can sum up the meal with one word: potato. Apparently, the Lithuanian people were huge fans of the potato, with a little herring, crackling, and curd thrown in for good measure. We did not linger for dessert.
It's now almost midnight and we're back in the room. Lisa's diligently working on her thesis. Now that I'm done chronicling the events of the day, I will read a little Margaret Atwood and go to sleep—assuming, of course, that my stomach eventually stops making those alarming groaning noises. No more traditional Lithuanian food for me.
