Chicago 26 – 28 April:
200 scholars meeting
to examine the Baltics

By Ellen Cassedy

More than 200 scholars from 15 countries are converging on Chicago – home to the largest population of Lithuanians outside of Lithuania itself – to present and respond to papers on Baltic history, literature, linguistics, political science, aesthetics, culture, sociology, psychology, economics, gender, anthropology, musicology, environment, education, and public health.

The 23rd biennial conference of the Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies (AABS) opens April 26 at the University of Illinois. Organizers expect the conference to be the largest ever for the scholarly association, which was founded in 1968.

Members of the public are invited to attend the opening session, where the Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian ambassadors to the U.S. will speak on the conference theme: “The Global Baltics: the Next 20 Years.”

The session will take place at 1:30 p.m. at the Forum at the University of Illinois, 725 West Roosevelt Road, Chicago, IL 60608.  For further information, contact Agnė Vertelkaitė, 312-397-0382, ext. 204, or e-mail: agne@ltconschi.org.

U.S. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, who is of Lithuanian descent, will address the three-day conference on Friday, April 27, on the topic of “The Unbreakable U.S.-Baltic Partnership.”

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This is the story of Vanda and her family. A story similar to what happened to many families that were affected by World War II's terrible events on Lithuanian soil, a story about innocent children who wanted a normal childhood in their beloved homeland, but instead were hit hard by the horrors of war and the terrible atrocities committed by the Hitler and Stalin regimes. Vanda and her parents managed to escape before Stalin's Red Army laid its iron grip over Lithuania in 1944. They came to Germany and later to the United States. Vanda's aunt had no such luck; she was deported to Siberia and starved to death because she shared her food rations with other deportees.

Vanda with her husband, Vytautas Sliupas, in June 2010.
They live in California.
Photo: Aage Myhre

KAUNAS 1938:

Vanda in 1938: “I remember being at the photographer’s and once walking in Kaunas on “Laisves Aleja” and eating the first sausage and a bun (something like a hotdog) on the street – which to me was a big treat.”

CHICAGO 1949:

Chicago became Vanda’s new home in 1949. Here a photo from the Grand
and Harlem intersection, appears to be Christmas Season.
>From NW Chicago history site.

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Cultivating Lithuanian unity world-wide:
What YOU can do!

Boris Vytautas Bakunas

By Dr. Boris Vytautas Bakunas, Ph. D., Chicago

A wave of unity swept the international Lithuanian community on March 11th as Lithuanians celebrated the 22nd anniversary of the Lithuanian Parliament’s declaration of independence from the Soviet Union.  However, the sense of national unity engendered by the celebration could be short-lived.

Human beings have a strong tendency to overgeneralize and succumb to stereotypical us-them distinctions that can shatter even the strongest bonds. We need only search the internet to find examples of divisive thinking at work:

”50 years of Soviet rule has ruined an entire generation of Lithuanian.”

”Those who fled Lithuania during World II were cowards -- and now they come back, flaunt their wealth, and tell us ‘true Lithuanians’ how to live.”

”Lithuanians who work abroad have abandoned their homeland and should be deprived of their Lithuanian citizenship.” 

Could such stereotypical, emotionally-charged accusations be one of the main reasons why relations between Lithuania’s diaspora groups and their countrymen back home have become strained? 

As psychiatrist Dr, Aaron T. Beck and others have noted, accusatory remarks are often perceived as threats by those targeted for verbal attack.  Recriminations follow and escalate into verbal shooting matches that solidify hostilities between individuals and groups that previously enjoyed friendly relations.

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Lithuania’s ambassador to the U.S.:
We will never forget or underestimate the role of Lithuanian Americans in our struggle for independence

Lithuania’s ambassador to the United States, Žygimantas Pavilionis

Ambassador Žygimantas Pavilionis interviewed by Aage Myhre

Ambassador, you represent Lithuania in the United States, a country where around one million Lithuanians and people of Lithuanian descent live, as citizens of the United States. Are you to a certain degree also their ambassador?

As an ambassador of the Republic of Lithuania, I represent, first of all, interests of my country and my fellow citizens. Not all Lithuanian Americans are citizens of Lithuania, but they, nevertheless, kept close ties to their Homeland and helped greatly to keep memories of independent and free Lithuania alive. All the Lithuanians no matter where their live are equally important share of our nation. This is not only the official position of our Government, but also my personal idea I always had and believed in. Therefore, yes, I am to certain degree their ambassador as well.

Lithuanian-Americans played a significant role in the postwar years, until Lithuania's recovered independence in 1990-1991, by constantly exerting pressure on the U.S. President and leaders in other Western countries so that they would pressure the Soviet Union to allow the Baltic countries freedom after the Soviet occupation taking place during World War II. Now, as more than 20 years have passed since the freedom bells rang, the question is whether the Lithuanian-Americans have a role to play also today? See our article https://vilnews.com/?p=8899

We in Lithuania will never forget and never underestimate the role of Lithuanian Americans in our struggle for independence. It will remain an indispensable part of our history. However, it sounds sometimes a bit strange when I hear that the mission of our countrymen abroad might be over. Not at all! Free, democratic and Western minded Lithuania we fought for and we have now is not the fact that will last forever by itself. On the contrary, we must remember that state-building is a continuous process, which requires our personal everyday efforts. So there are a lot of challenges both in our foreign and domestic policy we are facing now where the help and support from the Lithuanian diaspora is of vital importance. Economy, energy, security issues, education, social affairs– those and many other areas where we need our common work on it. To be more concrete and to illustrate what has been said I would like to name at least two significant projects which our Embassy is going to undertake together with the Lithuanian community in US this year - NATO Summit in May and World Lithuanian Economic Forum in September. Both evens will take place in Chicago, but we do expect an active engagement of Lithuanians from all over United States in them.

“The majority, I believe, are disappointed and discouraged with the present president’s seemingly unfriendly view toward Lithuanian-Americans and others abroad.” This said Regina Narusiene, President of the World Lithuanian Community, in a recent interview (see https://vilnews.com/?p=6704), based on a comment referred to in The Baltic Times, where President Grybauskaite should have said that most prominent U.S. Lithuanian emigres, instead of focusing on developing U.S. - Lithuanian business ties, prefer providing political advice to the Lithuanian authorities, which may not be that necessary nowadays. She was supposedly “disappointed by Lithuanian emigres’ inability to attract U.S.-based investments to Lithuania.” Here in VilNews we often hear Lithuanian-Americans say they do not feel welcome to their home country, and that Lithuania's current president seems to antagonize them. What are the ambassador's comments to this?

I would like to comment the words of President which I haven’t heard myself, but as far as I’m familiar with the position of President Grybauskaite towards Lithuanian diaspora I could only presume that these words were taken out of the context and that the President didn’t mean at all anything that could be interpreted as an “unfriendly view toward Lithuanian-Americans and others abroad”…

Having said that I might add that Lithuanians are well known in the U.S. for their persistence, hard and committed work and interesting achievements. We know Lithuanians from every generation who became successful politicians, businessmen, artists, social workers, etc. Just look at our honorary consuls – people like Krista Bard or Daiva Navarette are known in their areas of expertise. We also know a lot of Lithuanians from a younger generation who are well established in universities, research labs, have created their businesses. And some of them very successfully extended their business in Lithuania. Do you know that the company “VPA Logistics”, which operate the block train corridor project from Klaipeda to China, called “Sun”, was created by American-Lithuanians from New Jersey? And this project was developed with a great support of the government and the President itself. And there are much more concrete examples were Lithuanian Americans has invested, developed business in Lithuania or with Lithuania, but they have not yet very much advertised that.

VPA Logistics – excellent example of business venture established by a Lithuanian American Mr. Vytautas ‘Victor’ Paulius is the Lithuanian American who founded the New Jersey company VPA (Vytatuas Paulius Associates) in 1967. UAB VPA was established in Lithuania’s port city Klaipeda in 1996, currently owning & operating over 30,000 sq.m. (320,000 sq.ft.) of state of the art cold storage space located within the Port of Klaipeda and Laistu International Trade Center (LITC), adjacent to Klaipeda State Seaport. VPA Logistics is the company behind the new SUN TRAIN that operates between China and Klaipeda.

VYTAUTAS "VICTOR" PAULIUS

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“Give us this day our
daily harbour seal”

The harbour seal is found along temperate and Arctic marine coastlines of the Northern Hemisphere.

Hans Egede (1686 – 1758) was a Norwegian missionary, known as the Apostle of Greenland.

Many of us remember our Lord’s Prayer, or Pater Noster as many call the most outstanding prayer of Christianity. One phrase goes as follows: “Give us this day our daily bread,..” This became an ever so slight nut to crack for the North Norwegian priest Hans Egede when he came to Greenland to preach in the 1700s. The indigenous people who populated the world's largest island, the Inuits, did not know what bread was!

But the priest found a solution, and in his translation to Inuit language the phrase became therefore logically enough, "Give us this day our daily harbour seal." Because it was these seals that were the most important element of the Inuit food chain at the time...

It was Hans Egede, often called the Apostle of Greenland, who founded the town of Nuuk (Godthåb), capital of today's Greenland. His statue stands solidly on its base in the outskirts of the town.

Nuuk (Godthåb), the capital of Greenland, offers colourful architecture where the winter bites as coldest

I sit at Kastrup Airport near Copenhagen, Denmark, an early February morning. Waiting to border the Scandinavian Airlines flight to Kangerlussuaq Airport in Greenland. Then comes the message: The flight is cancelled. Luckily I get on a plane from Greenland Air, and a couple of hours later I am sitting in a red Boeing 757 heading northwest. I have been awarded a seat between two mildly said overweight Inuits, Eskimoes as we used to call them in the past. It smells of sweat and I am unable to find room for my arms on the armrests. After four and a half hour of torment we land in the icy wilderness. The temperature outsideis -40C, inside the terminal building it is a little warmer. But not much.So I'm very happy when I finally, after several hours waiting time, get on board a red propeller plane, a Dash 7, flying me to Greenland's capital Nuuk further south on the island. The trip takes only an hour.

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The chess game that Pedro’s father made by his own hands.
Photo: Aage Myhre.

My friend, a journalist with the name Pedro, from Chile, gave me this chess game in 1987. At the end of the 1970s he had become victim of the military rule of Dictator Augusto Pinochet in his home country. Pedro had written some slightly critical comments about the General in his newspaper, and was given 24 hours to disappear out of Chile. The chess game was the only thing he brought with him in the backpack, except the bare necessities of clothing and food. It was his father who had carved the beautiful pieces out of wooden blocks, and the game was, therefore, the dearest object Pedro owned. He had over some time come to live in political asylum in Norway and had lived in Oslo for a few years when I met him. After a time of acquaintance he gave the chess game to me. He explained the reason: "You are the first and only Norwegian I have been able to communicate with, the only one who has shown me respect and interest since I came here."

The chess game I got from Pedro is standing here, next to me. Just to look at it makes me think. I think of a father who sat for months and cut out each individual shape very accurately and carefully from pieces of wood he had collected. I know that Pedro had been seeking asylum in Norway because he had told the truth about the abuser Pinochet. I know he spent several years in Norway without being met with genuine interest and love. The fact that my nation’s people, so quick and clever when it comes to aid and support of other peoples, not always is very good at communicating face-to-face with people who desperately need someone to talk to.

I'm glad I could play a role in Pedro's life. I am very grateful for the gift he gave me. The dearest object Pedro owned has become extremely dear to me. For all that it represents and communicates.

Thanksgiving Day is Thursday 24 November

The First Thanksgiving at Plymouth.
By Jennie A. Brownscombe. (1914).

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