Day 63 Yesterday's Visit to Sculpture Garden + Today

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Today you get to see way too many pictures of the sculpture garden in Klaipeda.  It was named for Manlynas Mazvydas, who wrote the first LIthuanian book in 1547.  The park is located on the site of an 1820 German graveyard which fell into ruin.  Most of the grave stones were removed, but there are a few which have little lanterns and some artificial flowers.  The earliest of the 120 sculptures were dated in the late 1970's and the latest 1988, so they were put up in the Soviet times, as they say here.  There is a large Soviet war memorial and a small memorial dedicated to those killed in an uprising in 1923 to bring Klaipeda into the new Lithuanian Commonwealth.

  We spent a couple of hours there, but I want to go back without the camera so I can really see things.  I remember that Miss Tucker, a crabby old English teacher at Westhampton, used to travel a lot, but she never took a camera.  She said taking pictures kept her from making pictures in her own mind.  She may have been on to something as far as taking as many as we did in the garden.  I didn't dress properly for the wind, and it took several hours, a blanket and a cup of hot cocoa before I was warm agian.  Even then, I slept in my warmest pajamas.  First time I've worn them.

My favorite picture was not taken in the garden.  It is the Chimney Sweep on a roof of a house on the way there.  It is considered good luck to touch the clothing or even the button of a chimney sweep's clothing, so there is an oversized button on the side of the house that people can touch for a whole year of good luck.  We both did.  You probably saw that there are also some ordinatry buttons glued around that big button.  I would like to know the story of that.  I found a button on the ground  and placed it on a ledge.  Hopefully someone will find it and glue it on.

I am so taken with the way sculptures are placed here and there all over Old Town.  We have a map that shows where all 23 of the main ones are located.  We've seen most of them, but still have a few to see and show you.

Today, the internet was on and off, mostly off, but it seems fine now.  Amazing how cut off that makes me feel.  I was pleased that it came back on shortly after we got home from church.

 We met a couple who are visiting Klaipeda from their base in London.  They work in pastoral care for Mennonite families who are on the mission field all around the world.  He had previously been a pastors' pastor for the denomination and she was a mental health worker, so they were snapped right up when they applied.  Of course, they have to provide their own funding.  So far, if I understood correctly, they have been for one to six or more weeks in over 30 countries, some more than once.  I don't imagine they have to pay for the plane tickets, do you?  What interesting, but challenging work.  She said that sometimes it seems that what the people need most is a chance to talk to someone in their first language  What a responsibility.

We went to a pizza place and had pretty good pizza, as pizza goes here.  I did turn down the opportunity to have banana on my pizza.  I love bananas but that's just not right.  We ordered the large pizza, so no cooking tomorrow.  I'll just whip up a salad to go with it.

  The minister for the night had spoken of eating something called kepas duona or fried bread two nights in a row with guests from Germany and having paid for it yesterday.  I asked the dinner group what it was, and after the description, Del ordered some for the table.  We were told that it is always listed in the menu in the snacks with beer section.  There is also a snacks with wine section.  Kepas duona is little french fry like sticks of dark rye bread  fried until crispy and then rolled in cheese and enough garlic that we will not be bothered by vampires for some weeks.  When it gets to the table, the cheese is all gooey around the crispy bread and the garlic is stuck to the cheese.  Yum!  I assumed that we had the extra large order for the table, but apparently that is a standard portion, so we will only be able to order it when we have 6 people.   I believe Del would disagree, however. 

We started Summer Time today.  That's Daylight Savings Time for us.  I googled DST the other day, and it was quite interesting how it all started.  If I didn't already bore you with the story, I won't now.  You might want to look it up, though.