Vilnius - a Perfect Target for my Camera

I didn’t realise that I haven’t posted anything on my blog for such a long time… It’s really been ages! But there are some reasons for that:

1. I’ve been very busy with my studies – at the moment my aim is to pass my sailing theory exam in the end of April. Trust me it’s much more complicated than I ever anticipated. There’s so much stuff you need to remember… I keep reading and reading and reading till I feel as if my head is becoming square – I haven’t looked in the mirror to see if it really is so, as when I reach that stage I can’t do anything, just sit on the sofa and wait till I feel better… And I’m convinced that the more I relax, the quicker it starts reaching its old shape :)

2. A friend of ours visited us last week, so we had a chance to go to Vilnius and once again to wonder in the old town and climb the castle hill. But as the capital is 300 km away from where we live it wasn’t worth going just for a day. In the end I managed to spend 3 days without internet connection! But I could engage in one of my hobbies – photography.

For your judgment a few photos of Vilnius:

Russia

(Virtual Tour 2009 - Around Europe without Leaving Your House)Russian literature is so vast, but this time my choice was made simply because of visual stimulation (by the way doing IQ tests I get the highest scores for visual abilities). Quite small green, red, blue, brown and yellow books stashed on my grandma’s shelves attracted my attention. These happened to be compediums of short stories written by Anton Chekhov.

I’ve heard that name before, I knew he was a writer, I knew one of his plays (“The Cherry Orchard”) nether the less there wasn’t anything else I could have told you about him. But now my knowledge has increased. So hopefully I won’t ever forget that Anton Chekhov is considered to be one of the greatest short-story writers in world literature.

He was a doctor (I could have guessed it after reading his story “Ward Number 6”), who used to say “medicine is my lawful wife and literature is my mistress”. It is thought that he started writing his stories for money, but later on Chekhov’s artistic ambition grew and he developed his original style - used something that is called “stream-of-consciousness” – portrayed inner monologues of his characters.

From the stories that I read the one that made the biggest impact on me is called “Rothschild’s Fiddle” (later on I found out that Russian composer Veniamin Fleishman even composed a one-act opera that was called “Rothschild’s Violin” – must be a very sad one).

The main character of the story Yakov Ivanov - a poor old coffin-maker is so engrossed in counting his losses that he never notices anything that’s around him: scolds his wife and tries to save on everything. He can’t work on a Sunday – it’s a loss, someone from his village is sent to a hospital in town and later on dies there – it’s a loss. When Yakov’s wife gets ill he makes a coffin for her and after she dies he writes out an invoice: Marfa Ivanova – 2r. 40kp. And of course it’s a loss… Yakov managed to realize what his mistakes were, but I guess it’s really sad that he did so just before his death. (I’m not going to mention the fiddle and who Rothschild is – I need to leave some secrets.)

Reading this story I thought of myself and how I like to count my time... Sometimes I believe that I haven’t got time even for a hug or a few friendly phrases – that would be a loss of precious minutes! But then am I not just like Yakov? Am I not robbing my loved ones of something that could make them happier?

The 1st of March - 3 Steps for the Future

It’s the first day of spring and the sun is shining brightly as if supporting the illusion that it’s really warm outside! Trust me winter in Lithuania doesn’t want to retreat without a fight. When I took the dog out in the morning the grass was crisp and the ground beneath it – frozen. I’m sure we will still have dark days with grey skies that will make us feel that summer is not yet close – maybe it is somewhere like the Mediterranean coast… Nether the less I’m in a hurry to bring more colour into my dull life.

The first step was to get some blossoming flowers. I don’t think I will manage to keep them alive for long (maybe my fingers are not green enough?), but at the moment they are helping us to sustain good mood!



The second step was to start making a jumper for colder summer’s days. I couldn’t resist buying that colourful pure cotton yarn!


And of course I started knitting something new without finishing my old half made jumpers… Not good at all. Hopefully I will manage to force myself to finish them sometime soon… Please keep your fingers crossed!


After flicking through some old German knitting magazines I decided that the finished product should look something like this:


(This image can be found in a 2003 January issue of “Verena”; You can find this magazine online, please click on the link: http://www.verena-knitting.com/)

And the last and probably most interesting third step was to get involved in a new photography project. I still haven’t finished my old one (how very me!) – a brief summary with all of the images from the February diptychs will appear on this blog next week.

Anyway, this time I’m not the one who decides what the rules are… it’s down to Kel, a kiwi guy who lives in Klaipeda (I find this miraculous) with his wife Sharon (even more unbelievable – why did she agree to come here and suffer our cold winters without having hot water or heating in their bathroom?), who were “found” by me accidentally while browsing the web and “adopted” by Andrew as his closest link to English speaking population here, in Lithuania (but that’s another and even more unbelievable story…).

Anyway, I just got a message that today’s word is “soviet” and if I remember correctly the photo has to be taken inside…