This year was the first season that the Lithuanian Cup was awarded. The Cup was an end of year tournament that allowed all of the adult teams in Lithuania, from both the first and second divisions, compete for a championship. It was the final weekend of the season. This was also my final weekend in Kaunas. Saturday it was rainy and there were questions whether we would be able to play the game. Draugas pitched in the game and I was playing center field. Not much interesting happened in the game until the second inning. There was a fly ball to [View Full Entry]

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Uh, 2 months from the last post, some things happened during these months, so i decided to write at least two posts today. I am in Coffee Inn, a small coffee bar in one of the most known streets in Vilnius, the office is out of internet and this place makes me feel like writing. I will start with the month of September. First, to remember moment was "Discover 2007" for AIESEC in Vilnius, nice conference with loads of new members and alumni. The conference was about 30 KM away from Vilnius. Lucky me, i was chairing this conference and i [View Full Entry]

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So, in my AIESEC Career i had the opportunity to chair the "Global Village" of Euroco...how could i say no? Euroco 2007 was organized by AIESEC in Vilnius, and because i mentioned AIESEC Vilnius... Congratz guys and Girls you have done a great job... So the External Global Village took part in "Europa shopping Center" a modern MOL in the center of Vilnius, The pictures will tell you a lot about the Location. About 30 countries were there, the general feeling that i had is that GV in AIESEC is loosing it's value, is like the LCPs were out of order [View Full Entry]

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June 2005 The excursions out of Vilnius didn’t get off to the most promising start, due to Miranda’s use of the Lithuanian language. After a difficult conversation with the lady in the ticket office who didn’t speak English about the whereabouts of a bus to Trakai, Miranda repeats one of her two words in Lithuanian - alus. The word she was looking for was actually - aciu - instead of saying “Thank you”, she had been repeating the word “Beer”. The Lithuanians probably have a very dim view of the English, demanding beer at 8 o’clock in the morning! However when [View Full Entry]

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June 2005 Welcome to the most central city in Europe - at least that is what the National Geographical Institute of France published in 1990 - Vilnius. A large city with an almost village like feel to it and another Eastern European melting pot, as a result of the regular transfer of ownership over the centuries. The population today still contains a large proportion of Poles and Russians and has an architectural style somewhere between Italian baroque and Soviet social housing. It also has the largest Old Town in Europe and whilst it is easy to overdose on Old Towns in [View Full Entry]

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So. Lithuania...... after Riga we had finally met up with people that were going our way. Karen from Canada, Ally from Australia, Ken and myself had caught the bus to Vilnius. All these cities had the same sought of attributes, beautiful old city centres and massive developing tourism trade. Vilnius did not let us down. The advantage to this place was the local population also shopped , ate and drank in the old town, not just us tourists! I think overall I much prefered Vilnius to Riga....it had a much more relaxed vibe, cleaner streets, smaller and not quite as busy. [View Full Entry]

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Tijdens onze kotenzoektocht van de afgelopen week had Jasmijn vlakbij dworzec centrałna (centraal station) een pijl richting Vilnius zien staan. Zondag, de dag na onze intrek in de flat, bedacht ze dat het misschien wel een leuke bestemming was voor een trip en ik vond dat nog niet zo'n zot idee en meteen die dag gingen we nog naar het station om tickets te boeken bij Eurolines. Maandagavond 10 september om 23u. De rugzakken gooien we in het laadruim van de bus. Exit pakezel, enter lazy bustoerist. Wij kiezen voor de turkenbank, helemaal achterin de bus, zodat we min of meer [View Full Entry]

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There is a t-shirt that you can by as a souvenir here in kaunas on which is written ‘Kaunas yra Kaunas’. This is the sort of de-facto slogan of the city, though I don’t think it is one you will find in tourbooks or brochures. ‘Kaunas yra Kaunas’ simply means ‘Kaunas is Kaunas.’ As I have come to understand, the city of Kaunas and its people have a certain reputation in Lithuania as being sort of rough-edged, a city where the energy and mannerisms from ‘Old Soviet Times’ are still extremely pervasive in society, moreso than other cities, in particular other [View Full Entry]

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September 1st in Lithuania is a marked day on everyone’s calendars because it is the first day of school. This year the 1st of September was a Saturday, nonetheless they had school (in the US, of course, we would simply begin school the following Monday if the ‘first day’ happened to fall on a weekend.). September 1st for athletic coaches, baseball coaches included, marks the beginning of the scouting season. It signals that it is time to head to the elementary and middle schools in search of players for their upcoming seasons. Last year I spent two days visiting schools with [View Full Entry]

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We had a nice long sleep in again today and neither of us particularly wanted to get up. When we did get up we headed across the city to the bus and train stations to plan our escape route to Poland. Turns out whichever route we take we're spending the full day traveling. We went for dinner back at the veggie restaurant. Rob finally got his falafel, and I had a vegetable crumble, all very satisfying and yummy. During dinner we booked our hostel in Warsaw. We're going back to dorm life, but hopefully it'll be slightly livelier than Vilnius. After [View Full Entry]

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