The Wandering Chocoholic

Sad news

Extremely sad and shocking news today: My beloved Bapa, my grandfather, died last night of a sudden heart attack.

If you’re reading this blog, you probably already know that, and are very likely a member of my family. This isn’t really the place for me to write about Bapa and how close we were and how much I’m going to miss him. There will be more appropriate places for that. Suffice to say that I’m really beside myself with grief right now. We all are.

Unfortunately, this means I will have to detour back home to Montreal for the funeral and to be there with my family. It’s a long journey, and one I make with a heavy heart.

I’d intended to spend the day exploring Vilnius’s Old Town, going on a free walking tour with my dormmates, and seeing some of the few remaining sites of Jewish history in what was once, prior to World War II, one of the world’s great Jewish cities.

Of course, that was not to be: Instead, I spent a difficult and frustrating day alternately crying and abusing the hostel’s WiFi on a series of Skype calls that kept cutting out, trying to reach family members and book last minute flights and have a futile argument with the bastards at my insurance company who have decided that my trip interruption isn’t covered because a grandparent doesn’t count as “immediate” family. Rotten scoundrels, the lot of them.

Last night in Vilnius

By dinnertime, I’d been on the phones and internet all day, and I was exhausted and drained and feeling numb. I had to eat, though, so I forced myself to go out. I went to a vegetarian restaurant that Lina had recommended, and ordered comfort food: tea, and potato blintzes with mushrooms and cheese. Okay, they call them blynai, but same difference. All the food in Lithuania feels so familiar to those of us who grew up eating Ashkenazi Jewish cooking. Not exactly a surprise; it all comes from this part of the world.

After I got some food in me, I felt a little bit better, so I went walking around the town one last time. I’d managed to book a flight home from Riga leaving early Sunday morning, which meant that I was going to get my bus tomorrow morning as originally planned. So I wanted to see what I could before leaving Lithuania. I exited the Old Town walls and made my way across a little footbridge full of locks: This is a tradition in this part of the world for couples who place a lock on a bridge when they get married, for good luck. Across the bridge was Uzupis, a weird little neighbourhood of Vilnius that has declared “independence” from Lithuania as a sort of hippie artist community, with its own constitution, flag, currency, even president. It’s sort of tongue-in-cheek, of course, with the constitution being set out in a bar. I walked around there a bit, but it was quiet and there weren’t many people around, and it was hard to see much.

After that, I walked up to the Bastion, an old artillery section of Vilnius’s city wall that’s set high up on a hill. From the top, there’s a great view overlooking the entire new city. It was sunset, and there were a number of groups of kids and tourists around. There was also a cafe where a three piece band performed old standards (“Moon River” etc.) but there was a video screen behind them showing scantily-clad female backup dancers at what looked like a Shakira concert. Very, very weird.

I got back to the hostel only to find everyone getting ready to go back out: In the summertime on weekend nights, there are open-air movies played in the square by the Town Hall. I shrugged and tagged along, glad for the distraction. The movie they were showing was Two Faces of January, in English with Lithuanian subtitles. The movie was terrible, by the way, in case you were thinking of seeing it. But it was pretty cool to watch a movie outside with the Old Town as a backdrop. Great venue. Of course, the mosquitoes thought so too; by the end of the movie, I was thoroughly bitten up.

Sleep was a long time coming, as the events of the day caught up with me. Also, there was a wedding being hosted next door, with a live band and a DJ that was going full on until about 2 in the morning. I didn’t actually mind; the band was great, and they played a mix of party music and Lithuanian folk music, and it was nice to listen to people celebrating a happy occasion that was miles away from how I was feeling.