On the road to Lietuva
Look out the window, Leni, and welcome to Lithuania.
Two years later, I look back at life in Lithuania.
The back story
In 2017, my French residence permit was valid until September. I was due to come back to my home country by July but I was officially out of my dorm by June. Earlier that year, I was trying to make plans on whether or not to come home earlier or to make the most out of my valid permit. I was on the search for other language immersions in Europe. If they had scholarships to offer, the better. I listed all my options and it all boiled down to two: one in Estonia and another in Lithuania.
I missed the deadline for Lithuania by a day. My relentless spirit refused to back down so I sent an email to ask whether they can still accept a late application.
They weren’t.
I had to wait a year later to get my chance. I did try six months later for the winter course but complications with my work schedule did not permit me to do so. In retrospect, despite the bitterness during those times, I now understand why things didn’t go as I wished they would. Everything fell into the right place and time.
One fine day in spring 2018, a notification was sent in my email. I was accepted for the summer Lithuanian language and culture summer program with a scholarship! The catch? I had to pay for my own plane ticket. I eventually figured out how to finance my ticket. It’s officially a go! I sent my confirmation and off I went to my preparations.
Where is Lithuania?
Situated in central Europe, Lithuania is around 10,000 km from the Philippines. It borders other European countries Poland, Belarus and Latvia. On its coast is the Baltic sea. Lithuania is known and referred as one of the “Baltic Countries” together with Latvia and Estonia.
On my search for more information about Lithuania, I came across this awesome YouTube channel.
Other facts I gathered about Lithuania in the course of my research:
Pink has Lithuanian origins
It’s a predominantly Catholic, although historically pagan, country
Basketball is a religion there (speaking figuratively)
Forests everywhere, their highest elevation is not a mountain but a hill
Why Lithuanian?
I get asked about this a lot. My only answer is: EXACTLY. Why not? I honestly don’t have any other answer than pure curiosity.
So, where in Lithuania?
The first choice was Klaipeda, a city along the Baltic coast. The second choice was the capital city, Vilnius.
Getting to Klaipeda from Manila
MNL - SIN - WAW - PLQ
This goes without saying that there are no direct flights from Manila to Klaipeda. Out of the varied choices from different search websites, I chose to fly Polish Lot via Singapore. From Manila, I got into a JetStar flight. For this trip, I decided to try “self check-in” since I had the luxury of time to do so. I also got the opportunity to visit my friend who has been living in Singapore for a while now. I had eight hours to wait so that was enough time to get off the plane, pass immigration (got a candy from the immigration desk), gather my luggage from the conveyor belt, put it in a locker, wait for a few hours and meet A.
After a full 8 hours and a good chat with A, I collected my luggage from the locker and checked in my Polish Lot flight… to Warsaw. From there, I had a few more hours to get to my connecting flight to Klaipeda.
3 planes, 3 cities, 3 time zones, 40 hours in transit, 9, 058 km… Don’t feel too sorry for me! I won an award for this. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
