Adventures of NaDave: Dave Germany: 81-84 (Lith-Thurs) 1/5

All my bookings had been made (flight, car rental, hostels, tours) and I was cautiously ready to embark on an amazing trip into Eastern Europe. I was excited that I was going to be make a family pilgrimage back to Lithuania. I would be the first one in the Urbon/Krzeminski blood line to make it back to Lithuania, where my Great Grandma (Benedicta Rudys) had left for the USA around 1905 (at age 13!). While we couldn't find out exactly where Benedicta was from, Lithuania isn't too big of country, and so her life growing up on a farm would be easily realized in a country mostly covered by farmland.

I also want to point out that I feel a strong connection to Lithuania. Within our family, I think my looks and personality is most similar to my GPa Urbon (Benedicta's son) and so I was extra excited to walk around and find people that looked like me!

I was also extra nervous, because I was headed into a country that was still behind the Iron Curtain in the early 1990s. They haven't even been independent for very long. Heck, I had just turned 6 years old when Russian soldiers were stillterrorizing Lithuania. So I would need to be extra careful

Once again, I packed all my things into my backpack, and on Thursday afternoon I left work around 4pm. I biked 5 miles to the Erlangen Train Station, and got to the Nuremberg airport in time for my 7pm flight.

From Nuremberg, there was only one afternoon/evening connecting flight into Vilnius (the capital), which arrived at 11:45pm. I was a little nervous about arriving so late into a city I had never been, but I read where there were plenty of taxis to take visitors to their destination.

As I waited at the Frankfurt Airport for the flight to Vilnius to board, I realized that I was sitting amongst fellow Lithuanians and started to get excited. The pilgrimage experience was already beginning! While on the flight, I sat next to two people flying from Dallas, and the chatting with them helped to calm my nervous energy.

When we finally landed, it was after midnight. I walked off the plane, and there were signs with all new letters! (Luckily signs also had English below). Since I was coming from Europe, there was no customs stop, and so I walked out and was in Vilnius! I walked over to a taxi, and showed him my hostel booking address, and off we went.

The taxi driver was a very polite man in his late 20s and could speak English were well. I told him that I was visiting because my family roots go back to Lithuania, and the neat thing, was that he asked if I was from Chicago before I could say anything. It was neat that locals knew where lots of Lithuanians had headed, and I felt a little more at home because of it.

He dropped me off at Come to Vilnius Hostel, and since I was arriving so late, the owner had given me the PIN code & said my keys would be on the welcome desk. The PIN code worked, I grabbed my room keys, quietly found a lower bunk, and finally exhaled.

I had made i safely to Lithuania! I could finally relax and begin to prepare for a Friday was that packed.