Three Meals

It was a lazy morning. I woke up around 9, got out of bed at 10, and was finished with breakfast by 11. Meal 1: Lithuania.

When I got downstairs I met Aled (Ah-led), a Welshman who just arrived this morning in Vilnius. We got into a heated discussion over the merits of socialist programs, among other things, interrupted only by my packing up everything for our trip today to Belarus.

I paid 80 Litu of my 84 Litu bill, as it was all I had on me at the time. The

At 12:30 or so Jonas, Aled, and I left the hostel to explore a tad. We first went to the train station, where we got two tickets to Minsk, leaving at 6:05pm. It cost 59.84 Lita. Translation: less than a round trip ticket from Westport to NYC.

We stopped at a coffee shop, where we got three mediocre coffees for 7L or so. Jonas treated.

We meandered quite a bit, so at

We went back to the hostel, around 2:30, to get our passports, as I wanted to take the two of them to Užupis, and we wanted to have our passported stamped at the border - i.e. bridge. Jonas and I also wrote a message on the wall of the stairwell, where so many travelers have before us. We left Jimmy Jumps again at around 3:00, and headed towards the old city wall.

Next to the wall we found a music shop called Tamsta that Jonas was looking for. It was a mini musical emporium. The prices were good I think, but not great. It cost about 320L (a little over $100) for a decently good guitar. Jonas was looking for an accordion and a pedal for his keyboard but couldn't find one cheap enough.

We went back down the hill along the wall. I practiced my running slides in the snow, Aled thought I was "mental" for attempting it, insisting he could do the same, but it was never on purpose.

We found an art gallery of local artists on a side road and I ducked in. Nothing interesting.

In Užupis, no one checked our passports. It was a shame. We walked around and I showed them the micronation based on all I learned yesterday in my tour.

We stopped in a little Pizzaria in Užupis for lunch, making it our second meal of the day, in our second country of the day. The pizza wasn't bad, and neither was the price. A 30cm (~12in) pizza for 21L (~$7).

After eating, it was getting dark, and was approaching 5pm. Jonas headed back to the hostel and Aled and I went to the Cathedral and Belltower in the old town. I've been trying to get here for days, but just couldn't do it until today.

We were in a rush, having hit the 1 hour mark before train departure, so we just got to run past the cathedral and tower. As we approached, the tower began a little bell ringing performance that lasted for minutes.

The square is a little winter oasis. People's have packed down the commonly trod-upon places, but most of the snow remains pristine. The Cathedral boasts 6 massive columns in front in a building built in the Greek style.

The tower is more distinctly Lithuanian, a solidly built tower about the size of the leaning tower of Pisa (I believe this tower, too, leans just a tad). Tiny windows appear on each of the 6 sides to the tower, on each floor, ascending to larger windows on higher floors, then to the roof.

We couldn't stay long, and left quickly, heading back a new way. Past the presidential palace and across a park, and we were back at Jimmy Jumps.

It was 5:20. I finished packing and paid the final sum that I owed them, paying the last ounce of money I had. We had to borrow money for the taxi ride to the station.

Aled gave us 5L, I found 1L in my pocket, and Jonas found 1.5L on the floor. Pete was kind enough to make up the difference from the till.

We got the cab around 5:40. The ride cost just under 7L, and we gave him the whole 8. We would've walked, but when it's snowing, slush covers the streets, you have a 50lb back pack, and it's just so cheap, we didn't want to.

We got to the train and took our seats in Wagon 2, seats 33 and 34. It was 5:55. At 6:05 sharp, we left.

We had no issues leaving Lithuania. Belarus stared at my passport for a bit, talked about my American-dom, and let me in. Perhaps the most memorable thing about it was the very Russian fur hats they all wore. I want one. We didn't stay long on the border. At Belarus line 7:00. Trough at 7:17.

We pulled into Mink at 9. Or what we thought was 9. It turns out that Minsk, for whatever reason, is an hour ahead of Vilnius, though every world clock says otherwise. I think they don't do daylight savings, but it's just a guess. Jonas and I had been asleep, and woke up to everyone moving around us as we approached the station.

The station is beautiful. It's enormous, cavernous, and filled with people. Very impressive. Across the street are two squat towers, identical and adjacent. It's quite an impressive sight, perfect for a former Soviet state to show off their might.

We took a little money out of the bank. About $12. You know, 100,000 рублё? It's about 8,300руб to the dollar.

With our 100k руб in hand we got to the metro, another Soviet era construction (though late, 1984 the metro opened). I got directions to it in my impeccable 4 words of Russian.

I misread our hostel directions, and we ended up at the end of the blue line. But after some getting turned around (and losing one of my warm reindeer gloves from Finland in the cracks between the metro train and the platform!) we found our way to the red line (second line of 2 in Minsk) and took it to the end of the line.

In the train we sat across from a girl who kept glancing at us. When we left the train, she approached us. She offered to help us find our hostel. She took out her iPhone and mapped the route. Then she took us to the surface and pointed us to the building.

She gave us her number and name, Katя, and asked us to text her if we needed more help. We didn't tonight, but we're considering treating her to dinner or something in the next day or two.

Our building is an enormous Soviet block building, and the entrance is in the back on the ground floor. We had to circle the building fully before finding it. We walked through the door at Postoyalets Hostel about 10 minutes before midnight.

We checked in with the woman at the desk, who speaks no English, and checked into room 5, an 8-bed dorm that's totally empty tonight.

We were starving, so we found a supermarket open late, got directions to the place, and called a taxi to bring us.

The trip was 60,000руб, $7.25. That got us from the outskirts of the city to the center, maybe 20 minutes drive.

We found ourselves at a supermarket that is larger than any Walmart I've ever been to. It was 1am and there were so many people there, too. We dove into the aisles and shopped for dinner.

We got a loaf of bread, two types of cheese, a package of turkey slices, a carton of milk, three 2-liter bottles of water, a toothbrush for Jonas, toothpaste, a Lion bar (rawr!) and two beers for 125,100руб, $15. It wasn't the cheapest in the world, but certainly not expensive in the slightest.

The taxi ride back was the same price as before, though he tried to charge us 75,000. We argued it down to 60,000, like before.

In the hostel we feasted, our third meal in our third country today, and watched some Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Already it is abundantly clear: we so often talk about countries like Belarus, and internally think they're desolate and wanting. But Katя has a nicer iPhone than I, the subways are cleaner and stations more beautiful than in NYC, I saw more tablet devices in the metro at one time at 11:30 pm than ever I've seen in the States, and the supermarkets just as modern. I'm already loving Minsk, and I just got here!

Sleep around 4:30 local, 3:30 Vilnius time.