Walking tours, hot cocoa, and...Frank Zappa?!?

Today was our walking tour of Vilnius' Old Town. Our guide, Jurate (which, fun fact, means mermaid in Lithuanian), had some really interesting perspectives on what it was like to be in Lithuania when it was still under Soviet control. We saw a number of churches and heard about the pagan roots of many Lithuanian symbols including the ornamentation on their crosses

Sun rays/Garden snakes

 Even their Jesus's had pagan origins

The crown of thorns was added later, the bored/pensive bearded guy was originally a pagan symbol!

After the walking tour, we were set loose on the city for the afternoon. After spending at least an hour getting lost and looking at street art on Literatu Street (A small, winding street that is COVERED in small weatherproof artworks dedicated to writers, translators, and other folks who are important to Lithuanian literature in some way)

This picture *hardly* does it justice

I grabbed myself a hot chocolate from a glorious little place called Pink Milk Shake

It was Gingerbread hot chocolate and it was MAGICAL

And went on a quest to find the bronze bust of Frank Zappa I had read about in our guidebook. Why Zappa, you may ask? He's not Lithuanian... Well, I didn't know why he was in Vilnius, but I wanted answers and figured the best way to start was to make a pilgrimage to the statue. After much wandering (apparently a theme in my life...) I finally found him. He was a little far off the beaten path, but there he was, all bronze and Zappa-y, on a tall steel pole, surrounded by brightly colored graffiti of other pop-culture icons. I tried to ask other Zappa-pilgrims what his likeness was doing in Vilnius, but everyone either didn't know or didn't know in English, so the hunt continued.

Me and the lovely Mr. Zappa

After failing to find out the reason for the bust, I decided to drown my sorrows in more gingerbread hot chocolate before returning to the hotel. There I overheard a man who was asking (in English) for directions to the Zappa bust, I chimed in with directions and decided it was worth a shot to ask him if he knew its story and......HE DID!!!

Apparently, Zappa had been idolized during soviet times for his anti-establishment stances and, after Lithuania declared independence, a number of Zappa fans decided to test the water of this freedom by basically saying to the government "Prove it! If we're really free let us erect a monument to this non-soviet icon of sticking it to the man!" and free Lithuania said, "Yeah, sure, sounds good to us!" and thus, the Zappa statue was erected.

Pretty friggin cool.

And then there was dinner, and a discussion about Lithuanian basketball culture, and then we decided that we were going to sample a few different night-life locales throughout the city, starting with the Portobello Pub (the one we were at the night before) and moving on from there...But when we got to the pub it was crowded to the rafters (literally) with screaming basketball fans who were glued to a huge projection screen that was broadcasting a game. 

Lithuanian basketball culture is not a myth.

Needless to say, we chose to stick around Portobello and watch culture in action rather than go bar-hopping. I'd call it a good choice.