Apparently you have no vision; your President is being knocked for standing up to the USA; and your young people are leaving in droves for better job opportunities and education in foreign lands.

I have been visiting Lietuva since 2003, before you joined the EU. Previous to that I had contacts with Lithuanians who spent their holidays in England. In those eight years I have seen Lietuva changing, going places, advancing, taking its place in the modern world. At the same time, my country (Britain) has been going down the pan.

Clearly corruption in public life is a problem in Lietuva, as it is in Britain. The difference is that Lietuva impeaches its politicians, whereas we literally let ours get away with murder. It is virtually impossible to have corrupt politicians removed from the British Parliament. The new British Government has promised reforms to remedy this situation, but as recent events have shown that corruption is endemic at all levels in both our Houses of Parliament, the chance of a swift adoption of anti-corruption measures is unlikely.

I’m English (of Swedish decent) so cannot speak for America where clearly most emigrants went to escape Nazi and Soviet domination in the 1930s and 40s. I suspect much of the economic migration of recent years is directed towards Britain, which is obviously cheaper to get to, and will let Lithuanians and Poles in without hindrance, unlike the US and other European countries.

We have a saying “The grass is/isn’t greener on the other side”. Be under no illusion; the grass is not greener in Britain. Much of the right-wing press (which is virtually all of it) is very anti Lithuanians and Poles who come here “stealing our jobs, occupying our houses, poncing off the State, stealing, sex trafficking, scrounging etc”. Rarely mentioned is the contribution to our economy by doing jobs that our British scroungers and benefit claimants won’t do. I’ve personally known university educated Lithuanians who have worked in abattoirs and done cleaning jobs in order to earn a living here. Many of the less well educated Lithuanians have been unable to find work and become homeless without receiving any help from Social Services. It is not surprising that many have returned disillusioned to Lietuva and Poland.

Why do you knock your education? From my experience, and that of former Lithuanian student friends, it is much better in your country. Whilst on holiday here, one of them managed to sit in on a week of classes at a local further education college (gymnasium). She was appalled at the attitude of the students who were quite obviously not there to learn. She gave up any idea of continuing her studies in Britain. Her sister, who is now working as an architect (a vocation under threat due to Government economic cutbacks) in London, recently married, and said she would move back to Lietuva when her children are born, so they could get a good education. It is shameful that many young people who have been through the British education system cannot read and write adequately, and have very little knowledge of life outside their small social environment. “Where is Lithuania?” is a question I am often asked, which echoes the inscription on the front of a tee-shirt I bought from Vilnius University in 2003.

Since I started visiting Lietuva, I have seen the rise of supermarkets, a lot of new buildings, motorways, new trains. Not always for the best; supermarkets have decimated the street kiosks and small shops, just as they have done in Britain. How you restrain the power of these organisations I don’t know, but be warned, if you don’t, they will destroy the fabric of your society. I’ve noticed many Coca-Cola machines sprouting on the streets of cities, but what really angers me is that in the supermarkets they have pushed gira out of the fridges onto the shelves – who wants’ to drink warm gira? I refuse to buy Coke both here and in Lietuva. Fortunately there is alus, but there are restrictions on where it can be drunk.

People in the West look at the average multi-storey housing block with disgust. In Britain we have an antipathy towards multi-storey communal living. Everybody wants their own little box to hide away in; and for all except the very rich, those little boxes are shrinking rapidly. I’ve been in many flats in Panevėžys, Vilnius and Kaunas, and been pleasantly surprised how clean and well-furnished they are, even where the outsides are tatty and the roads and pavements are diabolical. Many put the interiors of British homes to shame. Outside, British homes, cities and open spaces are regarded as dumping grounds for all kinds or rubbish. Dog mess on pavements is a recurring subject of letters to local papers. Your old ladies who go round picking up what very little litter there is in Lietuva, would have a field day in London or all other cities in Britain. Except of course, with few exceptions, road sweeping tends to happen only in the early morning by huge mechanised vacuum cleaners.

Obviously with increasing wealth, the desire to own your own house rather than a flat is taking hold in Lietuva. As in Britain, this can be a dangerous trend. I, like many thousands of home owners, lost my house due to repossession when Government-induced financial policies caused the mortgage payments to be unaffordable. I have seen housing estates and a large school in Panevėžys abandoned as a consequence of the financial crash of Russia in the early days of independence. However, as someone interested in architecture, I am impressed by the variety of designs on your new estates, compared to the collection of small identical boxes on the average British housing estate.

Before I leave the subject of housing, I must praise the design of much of the Council built multi-storey housing estates in Lietuva (and Latvija). Not only are the designs interesting, unlike British equivalent developments which were built on the cheap post war, but the greenery around them can be beautiful. There are “garden cities” in Britain, but the norm is concrete rather than grass and trees.

You have lovely countryside with huge areas of gorgeous forest, pretty lakes and rivers with clean water which won’t poison you if you bathe in them.

As for President Grybauskaite opposing the American’s security plans GOOD FOR HER! If only other World leaders had the guts over the years to make a stand against some of the corrupt and monetarist behaviour of the USA, the World might (?) be a better and safer place.

Lietuva, don’t keep knocking yourself.
Aš mieltu Lietuva!

Tony Olsson
North Devon, United Kingdom