shakshuka

i'm starting another series -- because, thursday, i went to the best restaurant i've been to in vilnius

first, though, about the weather -- when i looked at the weather app on my phone, thursday night, it said that it was going to dip to 46 degrees, at six o'clock, yesterday morning

i asked maria -- she said her colleagues said it got down to three degrees -- celsius -- equals...38.4 fahrenheit

back to food

i first met this restaurant in march -- i was walking around, and saw these antique instruments in the window

it's between town hall and the gates of dawn (ausros vartu (that's awsh'rus), the only remaining gate to the city), a place of good luck

then, i passed the restaurant again, a month ago, when i was on my way to see hales turgus for the first time -- a popular market, on the other side of ausros vartu

reminded me of the women who sit on the ground outside the gates of jerusalem, selling their produce

the woman was wagging her finger at me,...about taking pictures -- i then walked by her, and we smiled at each other

i haven't talked about the rye bread -- unbelievable -- maybe the best thing here -- certainly,...the greatest discovery...from my first trip

a week before, i went to another turgus -- kalvariju -- i'll get back to that one

when i passed the restaurant, i took two more pictures of the instruments -- thought i might get a better result than the first time

 then i looked at the menu

WHOA -- SHAKSHUKA (the bottom-left item) -- WHAT THE HECK!

on mother's day, we went for a brunch at table 45, in the intercontinental hotel, on the cleveland clinic grounds -- hani, the egyptian man at the omelette station, made me an omelette -- very good -- then my ex-brother-in-law went -- hani offered to make him an omelette, arab-style -- shakshuka

we loved it -- lots of tomatoes,...well cooked -- stewed,...i guess...is the word -- with onions -- i think khalid said that cooking the tomatoes well, takes care of the acidity -- the eggs are cracked onto the cooked ingredients -- the egg whites get mixed in, but the egg yolk is left intact, until the end -- then,...a little cut in each,...to let the yoke leak out

so i made it a goal to have a shakshuka here

after spending more time walking around hales turgus than i should have, i finally headed back (towards the library), and i stopped at felicie, to check it out

we finally made it there, thursday -- a holiday here -- mindigas day -- the founder of lithuania -- brought the country together -- its only king -- but the founder of a dynasty,...i think -- one of his descendants, gediminas, founded vilnius,...responding to a vision of a wolf

the shakshuka was great

only difference,...the egg yokes weren't cut -- were cooked just slightly more than...to make them ooze-able -- i told the waiter...about everything -- he was going to tell the cook

actually,...looking at the picture now, i see that the egg whites weren't mixed in with the rest of the ingredients -- a la hani's shakshuka

oh -- something important -- when i first told the waiter why we were there, he said that they were no longer making shakshuka -- that it wasn't a popular item, so they took it off the menu -- i asked him, please -- he checked with the chef -- bob's your uncle

and we were the only ones in the restaurant -- inside or out -- they have a nice seating area outside -- great location

before the shakshuka, though, we had their baba ghanouj -- very different than what i'm used to (levantine arab style) -- excellent -- i loved it -- jewish style, the waiter said -- with mayonnaise -- funnily enough, the plain crackers worked better with the baba ghanouj than the soft bread did

and the mushroom soup was outstanding too -- a special local mushroom -- i don't remember the name -- something like buletas or bulentas -- i'll get it -- mushrooms are so amazing

maria wanted the baked goat cheese -- with caramelized beet roots -- she loved it -- i thought it was just all right

the gira was very good too

and look at the couch there

we sat on a similar couch -- looking at that one -- the outdoor seating area is to our left

i told the...replacement waiter -- our first waiter was great -- very friendly -- he left, though -- well, i told her that i've been to 20 or 30 restaurants in vilnius, and this one was the best

i'm going back -- for everything

it's pronounced felitsia

brrrrr

before i get back to drinks or bibliotekas,...or anything else,...a little weather report

people have been wearing overcoats here,...today and yesterday -- raincoats,...jackets,.... -- maybe the days before too -- i don't remember -- it's 57 or 58 degrees, at four o'clock -- the high hasn't gone much over 60, the last two days,...if it has even reached 60 -- it's to get to 50, overnight -- might have dipped into the forties, the last couple of nights -- my summer costume is always,...t-shirt and shorts (polo shirt, half-sleeve shirt, whatever) -- not today or yesterday -- long-sleeve shirt,...for sure -- and long pants -- socks, too -- although i've been formal here -- want to look presentable,...when i go into these libraries -- haven't worn shorts yet,...i don't think -- maybe once,...for a very short foray -- reminds me of being in baghdad

actually, i just looked at the weather channel's web-site -- even though it reaches 66, 65 and 67 degrees, the next three days, it goes to 46, 45 and 47, overnight

funny

it's supposed to warm up, saturday -- crack the 70-degree mark

i finally was able to find the temperatures for past days, on the weather channel's web-site -- the high was 62, yesterday; 59, sunday; 70, saturday

now,...back to drinks or bibliotekas -- i like saying "biblioteka"

vilniaus bibliotekos

that's libraries of vilnius -- not too hard -- i just had to learn the ending -- endings -- of both...vilnius and biblioteka

* * *
before we get back to drinking,...a little work

when i was in cleveland, and decided, three months ago, that i would spend the summer in vilnius, i thought i'd teach english during my stay here -- i corresponded with a few schools here, and they told me that to teach english here, one needed a certificate -- after arriving, i learned that a program to get the certificate lasts four or six weeks, and costs a thousand or so euros -- in the meantime, i thought i'd put up a shingle, offering writing and editing services -- i told aneta, at my old hotel, and my landlord that i was looking for work -- zita sent me links to three translation agencies here (vertimu biuras) -- the place is littered with them -- one of them, which provides translation services for businesses and the e.u., responded -- that they were actually looking for someone to write for their blog -- they liked some of my ideas,...so that meant i needed a library -- i've been to seven or eight

the first one was the closest to my apartment of the ones recommended -- lietuvos technikos biblioteka, on sventasis ignoto gatvé -- saint ignatius street -- sventasis starts with a "sh," and is always abbreviated "sv," with a little wide v accent mark over the "s," to make the "s" a "sh" -- somebody tell me what that accent mark is called -- most of the streets in old town, especially the pre-war streets, are narrow alleys -- cobblestoned streets,...or brick streets -- alleys, really -- the way they've been, for hundreds of years -- now with elevated pavements on the sides -- probably added, early in the twentieth century

the library is on the right side of the brick wall,...down the road a bit

that's the other end of ignoto -- the library is behind us, on the left

entering, from another gate 

before you enter the reading room -- which is around the glass case to the right

i don't know if this library is attached to any university or college -- its web-site says it was founded by the ministry of defense, last year, and that it's funded by the state -- i've seen a few men in military uniform here -- one, with his little girl, in the cafeteria -- its books are divided into design, architecture, landscape, aviation and other technical fields -- a good percentage of them are in english -- maybe 10 to 20 percent

it's quiet -- the cubicles are wide -- not too many people have been there -- friendly staff

this library quickly became my favorite -- then, what i discovered, a week or two ago, made it...soar...into the stratosphere -- into...something,...supernatural

next day, i went to the national library, on gedimino prospektas -- the main boulevard of the new city -- gedimino starts, directly across the street from the great cathedral

that's the library building -- to the left is the parliament building, one of the main sites of anti-soviet demonstrations -- which began in 1987

the building was constructed in soviet times -- i think, begun, in 1963 -- but they've been redoing the inside, for 10 years -- just opened up

i like their system of numbering the days of the week -- you see that, everywhere -- shops, restaurants, etc.

busy place -- it was hard to find desk-space

i couldn't understand what those were -- right across from the main desk

lot of lockers

it looks like i've got myself another series -- and i'm not even done with the second item in the series

same bat channel

our infielders

watching saturday's game, from vilnius,...i saw four of our five infielders mess up on defense in the first inning, to put us in a two-run hole, right off the bat -- two guys misplayed the first pitch of the game

as for the other infielder,...i couldn't believe what i saw him do -- in the bottom half of the inning, he actually ran out an infield grounder -- and to the pitcher, at that -- i wondered if something had happened to him -- or maybe it's me, for noticing too much, when he doesn't

lithuanian drinks

i'm taking "anna moffo" on the road -- first time

i've been in vilnius, for more than a month -- will be here, another two months

i've enjoyed my time here, and i've shared a few things with people back home -- especially about food -- one person (you know who you are -- j-a-s-o-n) encouraged me to put my observations in a blog -- so, here goes

* * *
i've met a few drinks in lithuania

the first new drink to me was honey beer, which the man behind the bar at snekutis pub recommended to me -- this was when i was here for a week in march -- the name of the place is pronounced shne'koo'tis -- i don't like beer, so i'm always on the lookout for something sweet or fruity -- i didn't like it

more important than the beer were the beans -- when i saw the picture on the menu, i thought, tashreeb baa'gilleh, the iraqi dish of fava beans -- i had to order it -- the dish here is called pupas, which i think just means beans -- in tashreeb baa'gilleh, the beans are islands...in a sea of bread, soaked in the juice of the cooked beans -- i guess the beans and the bread are both islands -- well, the color and taste of the beans was the same -- even the taste of the herb/spice that it's topped with -- these beans, though, weren't peelable -- just ate the whole bean

when i went back to my hotel, i told rapoles (raphael) about it, and he said that they also eat it with bread soaked in the cooked juice -- unbelievable -- i'll have to find that -- at least confirm it

the next time i went back to snekutis (for the pupas), I got a cherry soda -- excellent -- refreshing -- not too sweet -- looking on-line for the drink, three months later, it looks like it might be a gira, the national low-alcohol drink made from rye bread (i think) -- more on giras,...anon

snekutis is across the street from the 13 and the sign for zemaitijos (pronounced zhé'my'tee'yos)-- its street, though, changes name, to st. nicholas, for the church that's across the street from snekutis -- pictured, on the left -- the church has a significant place in lithuanian history -- it's one of the oldest in the country (the last country in europe to become christian, by the way -- some parts of the country stayed pagan until the 19th century), and from 1901 to 1939, when russians and poles suppressed the lithuanian language, the services here were an exception -- and after antanas kmieliauskas made a sculpture in 1959 for the church's, of st. christopher carrying the baby jesus, it buoyed people's spirits -- the association of artists expelled him for it -- lithuanians seem to have a funny way of resisting,...and bouncing back -- last night, i was reading about the hill of crosses, outside siauliai, in north-central lithuania -- the communists kept tearing down the crosses -- thousands of them -- in '61, '73 and '75 -- and people kept putting crosses back up (dk eyewitness travel guide: estonia, latvia & lithuania) -- the rising of the baltic states against soviet rule from 1987 to 1990 is called 'the singing revolution' -- in my picture of the beans and cherry-drink, you can see the main entrance to st. nicholas

zemaitijos is a street of one of the two jewish ghettos -- pronounced jha'my'ti'yos

towards the left on siauliu (i think that's pronounced show(as in shower)-loo), is my hotel -- hey,...that's a shower and a loo -- here's the outer door to my room

and a look across the street from my room

more drinking,...to come

great tosca, with daniela dessi, armiliato & raimondi

i think it was last summer, that she passed away -- and left fabio

'69 pavarotti 'a te, o cara'