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crosses
the hill of crosses, lithuania The hill of Crosses
It is said that this saddle bag hill 12 km outside Siauliai was once a pagan alter. How this remote location, far from anything, came to be a holy place is unknown, but the legend describe it as such. Many centuries later it became the home to a cross or two, this is estimated to be around the 1830's, and today the saddle bag hill hosts hundreds of thousands of mainly wooden crosses placed there by pilgrims and a large part by especially Polish and German tourists.
The crosses are mostly wooden and unfortunately many of them are identical and have their origin in the souvenir boxes at the entrance. But others are of a more personal caracter, and it is interesting to find in the forest these few trees which truely light up and show that they were planted tere for a reason and by someone who really cared and believed.
And the Lithuanians care and believe. This is a center for Lithuanian national feeling and for their spite against Soviet rule. Here they fought a battle against oppression. Here they defeated the atheistic rule of the Soviet Union. Three times did the
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hill of crosses, lithuania Soviets bulldoze the crosses of the saddle bag hill. Three times did Lithuanians, in the darkness of night, raise new crosses. The will of the Lithuanian people is shown in this place and in their pride in it.
And for that reason, if for none other, a visit to the saddle bag hill with the thousands of crosses is worth the trouble to get there.
Leaving, however, one does have a destinct feeling that one has seen quite enough crosses to last a life time.
For pathetic Danes
Pathetic Danes, who have been away from home for too long, might find joy in the street scene of Titzes gatve in Siauliai. As a busy mainstreet and a part of the A12 highway from Riga to Kaliningrad this street also hosts a lot of buslines. The buses of Siauliai are, in difference to the busses of most other cities that I have ever visited, not painted in a specific color or branded with the name of the local bus company. They are second hand busses and a large part of them are bought in Denmark. For this reason, Danes might find themselves entering a yellow HT bus
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hill of crosses, lithuania on which is written in Danish things such as "kort og billetter" or perhaps Abus.
As a pathetic Dane with a camera one might find, therefore, that most of ones pictures from Siauliai are of yellow busses. The citizens of Siauliai do tend to sake their heads at these pathetic Danes as they take a stand next to any given bus stop in order to get a picture of their beloved busses.
This particular and pathetic Dane can only be happy that the busses that she used as a child have seen a new and exciting chapter of their life in this northwestern corner of Lithuania.
Pathetic Norweigians going to Lithuania might be interested in knowing that some of the Vilnius city busses are originally from Norway, which is evident when the busses sometimes display "Ej i trafik" (not in traffic), even though they are on route.
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