Lithuania Day 3
From our room you can see in the distance a lovely Russian Orthadox church peeping through the trees with green domes. Looking in the guidebook there was no sign of this particular church but there were a few Byzantine Russian churches scattered through the city. As Simon was still writing his slides for the talk this evening I decided I would hunt for Russian orthodox churches and Jewish Synagogues, partly because I love Russian and Byzantine architecture but also partly in an attempt to learn more about the other religions of the city.
Setting off on a bike hired from the hotel for 50LT (£5) was a great plan as it turned out, I could cover more ground and all the interesting samples were quite spread out. I started out in the vague direction I had seen the green church from the window, getting a bit lost I found instead a silver coloured disheveled church of byzantine style. Getting closer to take photos I soon discovered this was actually Vilnius prison. The guards were looking a little unnerved that I was photographing the area so I quickly cycled on.
Past a construction site on the main road it was evident that health and safety measures have yet to come a long way, none of the workmen were wearing goggles or hardhats despite using drills pickaxes and scafolding above. To get around the site I had to carefully avoid falling down a large dangerous road by going into a busy road, the footpath was in the process of being dug.
Cycling down Vytauto street was fascinating, all the houses were wooden with pointed roofs, peeling paing boarded up windows and a selection of subsiding foundations. If this was England these houses quite likely would not have been classed fit for habitation yet they were all occupied. I learnt from Rita yesterday that there are plans to pull down a lot of these houses in favor of rehousing the occupants in flats, though not enough flats would be available for those who currently live in all the houses. We have not yet seen any homeless people around Vilnius, which makes you wonder is it better for them that they live in houses that are rickety and falling down or on the streets as we have in the UK?
At the bottom of this road I found the other Byzantine style Russian Orthodox Church, much better cared for and preserved than the prison. I stopped in a rustic looking pub for some lunch, ordering in my best broken Lithuanian some soup, or at least it turned out to be soup when I pointed randomly at the menu it was a bit uncertain what I would get. It was very nice soup that came with a main dish of pork burger, potatoes and coleslaw with ketchup and bread.
The sun finally showed up as I traveled up hill to where I was pretty sure the green Russian church was, it had been dry thus far for once but now the sunshine was glorious. looking at the grass verge I saw that the sun had brought out the beetles, the grassy verge was now spotted with a large colony of red leaf bug type beetle, lots an lots of them.
Leaving the Beetles behind and going back on myself a little, I finally made it to the green Russian church which was indeed very beautiful, the amazingly green domes and bright white pillars made it and well worth the effort to get there. Inside was spacious yet very gilded containing a lot of pictures of Mary and other iconography very similar to catholicism.
I traveled home via Vilnius’s only remaining Synagogue, the Gates of Dawn, and numerous other less notable catholic churches. Whilst they were interesting and good to visit I wouldn’t recommend you make a special trip just to see. Pilies street on the other hand is going to be a wonderful place in a few years time (2009 for instance) currently bustling with cafes, bars and amber shops there is still a lot of construction work underway.
gMaps makes that 6.7877 miles, which for me is a good distance and although it took me 5 hrs I did spend a lot of the time in the pub, cafes and taking photos.
Back at the hotel Simon had just finished his preparation and I sneaked in to the conference room downstairs to watch him give his keynote talk, well received as ever. We were both pretty tired from our very different days so instead of joining the Google funded drinks we went out for and Indian meal, a quick drink in the sky bar. An exhausting but fun day.