Mano senelio senelio senilio senelis?

Here are some random pictures of the last week, including the tragedy that occurred on Thursday, the snowfall.

The snow started to stick....

There was only one thing that would cheer me up after the snow, kugelis in a pot. Thank goodness for my cousin and her cooking.

I never used to use sour cream, but now it seems I do every day. Crazy!

Here is the lookout from my 8th story classroom from the university where I am giving speaking lessons to some professors. The buildings are mainly just apartment buildings. It certainly is not what I think of when I think of Europe. Of course this is not the center of town, but an important fact to remember is that only 12% of the town was left standing after WWII. That is a lot of buildings that needed to be built very quickly.

For the first time in my life, I bowled a clean game, meaning I got either spares or strikes in every frame and did not leave one pin standing. I think I was having a lucky streak because I was actually bowling a second game at the same time with the group of men I went bowling with. (We were bowling 2 games each on 2 different lanes) In that game I bowled an even higher score of 209 and nearly bowled another clean game but had one split which I nearly picked up. (On a side note, I don't want to just toot my horn, but the only other time that I played in Lithuania, I bowled a 201 one of the games and picked up my first split of my life.) So I was having a lot of fun. Unluckily for the group that I was with, they wanted to have a competition in which the person who won the game would win a big beer, 2nd place would get a small beer, 3rd nothing, and 4th and 5th would have to pay for the small and big beers respectively. Well, let's just say I made out quite well. Out of 6 games, I won 4 large beers and 2 small beers. Since it was such a landslide, everyone just paid my bowling games and that was it. I still may have to lose some games, though, if I will be invited again. Oh, also in this picture is a 100 Litų bill (100 Litai), worth about $40.

What is the most logical thing that you will find next to the Lithuanian liquor? Female hygiene products of course, including pregnancy tests. Catching this woman bending over was not intentional.

The picture above and below is are old relatives of the Jonaitis's, former rulers of Lithuaniam, I believe. Of course I already knew our family was like royalty so really there is no surprise. I could not look anything up on him, though, online so I will have to ask my cousin who is the museum curator in Lithuania to give me some history on him and maybe find out where my nearest castle is.

This is one of the bikes in the bike museum where I live. Notice it does not have any peddles... it is like a Flintstones' car in which you go by running on your feet. Šiauliai did and still does produce many bikes.

Sniegas

Today it is snowing and it makes me want to cry. I see tree buds ready to burst open feeling fooled. It's not almost May is it?

Of course the snow is not sticking to the ground and truthfully, I love the snow. This weather, however, is a rainy snow when everyone including me is ready for warmer weather. The last few days have been sunny and somewhat warm, which makes everything feel worse. I am willing to make a trade. Increase the temperature by at least 30 degrees Fahrenheit and let it precipitate all it wants.

Pataisa

OK, there's a correction that I wanted to point out. I wrote incorrectly about the city where I live, Šiauliai. In the March issue called Ukyje, I mistakenly said that the golder archer, or golden boy was said to have shot an arrow during the battle of the sun that took place near Šiauliai. This archer is more just a symbol for the city. I was told that, but find any backing to the myth. I did just a little reading on the battle which took place in 1236. It was fought between Catholic orders trying to "convert" the pagans of the land to Christianity (and of course to do more like get land and the such) and the pagans they were trying to convert, including the Lithuanians. This battle ended in a large defeat for the Livonian Brothers of the Sword (the Catholic order) and helped spur revolts throughout the Baltic lands for years that followed.

Also, I said that this was the 1000th year for Lithuania...which is coming to an end this year. Some time in 1009 Lithuania was first mentioned in a German manuscript. One person has told me that the reason Lithuania was in the manuscript was because the people, pagans, had killed a pope. I have not found anything to backup the story, but it certainly is interesting in the least.

Atsakymai

OK, so now for the long awaited answers!

#1 shows where the bathrooms are, including handicap accessible bathrooms. When I saw the sign and was searching for the restroom, I thought for sure it was for an elevator. The arrow pointing up is for women and the one pointing down is for men.

#2 is an exit sign, something you will see all over of course. Most people say it is a better sign than in the US because green means go and you can see a door in the picture. You also do not need to know a language while with the US exit sign, you need to be able to read and understand EXIT.

#3 has 3 signs, as I said. From left to right they are for a movie theater, bowling alley, and bathrooms.

#4 shows a child's play area and bathrooms

#5 warns no ice cream, no shopping carts, and that you are being watched under surveilance.

#6 directs your attention to where the fire extinguisher is.

#7 directs your attention to where the fire hose is.

and finally, #8 lets you know that it is good to hang on to the escalator when riding it up or down.

Thanks for all your guesses. Be sure to go back by scrolling down to the post with the pictures of these signs so that you can match the images with their descriptions.

Naujausios Žinios

Well, I just thought I would let everyone know that my university job ended up coming through. I was a bit skeptical at first, especially when they did not get back right away, but I should have trusted the fact that my cousin said they were very interested. They called today to give me the working hours, which are more than I expected. I have 3 classes for 3 hours each with professors of the university and have 1 class with students. I start tomorrow and will also work on Tuesday and Wednesday! I really have no idea what level the people are at so this coming week will be when I try to figure that out so that I know what I can teach and what they want to learn. If you have any suggestions about things I should do, feel free to post a comment. Hopefully the classes will go as well as the classes in the high school.

Also, this past week, I mananged to get my library card and a postage stamp without knowing necessary vocabulary ahead of time. It was certainly a struggle, and I made lots of mistake and many gestures, but I was successful in the end. They are the little things that I need to find since learning this language is so hard.

Kokie yra šia zenklai?

Can you name all these signs? These are just some normal signs that I found when walking around the mall. Some are easy, and some are just darn right not obvious to me. Post the picture number with your guesses in the comment box below. (You may have to click comments to open up the comment box.)


1. 2 triangle shapes.... I wonder what it could be.


2. This is not the direction to go to a running track.

3. So in this one, there are 3 separate signs. There are 2 that are fairly simple, but there is one, the first one, which is not obvious at all.


4. This has 2 signs.


5. Again, here are 3 signs to decipher.

6.
7. This is not where you wind your spools of thread.


8. And a tough one to end it. Does this mean you can carry your oversized pencils? I think not.

Linksmu Velykų

So far, here's how the jobs/volunteer positions are panning out. 3 days of the week have been set aside for 3 separate high schools, most of which will be volunteer except for 2 hours one week when I will do an after-school activity in English for the students of one high school. I went to talk with the faculty of the university with my cousin and both the faculty and the students are interested in receiving English classes. If they say yes, they would be paying me. I have not heard back from them though as it has been Holy week and vacations.

On Good Friday, I went to church at noon, but found no service. I later found out that it is normally held at 3pm, unlike in the US.

Easter started out early with a packed 7AM mass and a procession outside. I was just happy we could squeeze in because it was cold outside-0 C. Of course I was told otherwise that it really was not cold. Mass was so packed that they had communion service afterwards in which only half the people stayed. We then walked over to my cousin's husband's mother to what would begin a day with tons of eating and drinking. The breakfast was mostly cold, which would be the theme for the entire day. It included cured fish with onions, meat blended with nuts with plum sauce in the center, jellied chicken, hot cooked chicken legs, horse radish, bread, tea, sweets, and homemade liquor. We also did a competition of boiled eggs in which each person picks one egg and then faces another person by smacking his egg with the other person's egg. The winner is the one whose egg does not break. We competed using both sides of the egg and I won both times! Then we returned home to some homemade ice cream and Russian Orthodox Easter cake (this was a special date because this year the Catholic Easter and Orthodox Easter were the same day), which was very heavy and gritty and had candied fruit in it. Then we went down to the same neighbor who made the cake and of course we had to eat more. The menu included cold duck cooked with apples, cold chicken, a specialty Russian cold meat, a type of sea fish prepared only with sugar and salt, a dish of shredded beets with pistachios and plums, oven-baked milk, cold cooked fish, fruits, and more homemade liquor. I was only noon when we got done and had had so much, which is why I took a nice nap before going to the farm (I am sure the shots of homemade liquor helped).
At the farm, there was more excellent food. There were bandukes, more cured fish with onions, cake, homemade candies, breaded fish, fish in a type of slaw, onion rings, a type of radish, horse radish sauce, potatoes, breaded mushrooms from the farm which they grow to export to other countries, and brandy and vodka. I ate just about as much as I could until we started our next egg competition in which we rolled boiled eggs down a ramp onto the ground. The object was to try to roll your egg into someone else so to capture his egg. After an hour, we stopped. I started with 3 eggs and ended with 8. I guess I have been having a lot of beginner's luck. With that, Easter was finished and we went home to rest the next day and prepare for the coming work in the high schools.

Oh, I forgot to mention. I also got to decorate some eggs for Easter with a neighbor. Here, she's showing me how to make intricate designs on the eggs using the hot wax you see in the lid on the stove and a tiny nail stuck into an eraser of a pencil.


The beginning of the procession at Easter morning massThe end of the procession with the Holy Eucharist.





My first of 3 mealsI chose the egg with the heart stain and won with both ends of the egg.I forgot to mention the cured string beans were also apart of the cuisine which you can see in this picture.Russian Orthodox Easter cake.Homemade ice cream with chocolate and pistachios
The 2nd egg competition. This one had a lot more strategy than the first.


My 3rd and thankfully last meal for the day. I know it does not look like that much, but really, it was a lot.
Ignas!

These movies below are not meant to be watched as they only show my feet, except for 10 seconds in the second video in which they show a glimpse of the cathedral in town. I wanted to record some of the Easter music while in mass but did not really have a good opportunity nor think it was right to record something properly. So, just click it and then go to your emails or something. The first song is something I recognized from my home parish, something that they sing also during communion.