A Glimpse

From the rise near the old Town Hall, I look back over the Old Town and spy several gleaming glass towers. The 21st c. exists across the river from this sleepy sunwashed antiquity. I quickly head past the market back to Zydu.

Yiddish storms in and out of my brain. When I’m on a roll, the letters fly out of my pen and phrases and sayings rush in to mind, complete with faces and voices of family.

Ode to Joy and the Brahms German Requiem are the soundtrack in class. More German than I thought, Yiddish even uses only certain letters for Hebraic words – to keep them holy? The rest of the alphabet (aleph-bays) is free to form the nearly vowelless words of Slavic and Teutonic origin.

Oh yes. When I am not on a roll Ich fargessen gantze – I forget it all, can’t read my writing or my work book with its eye destroying tiny print.

Between our two 1 ½ hour classes we have a lovely coffee break under huge umbrellas in a pretty courtyard. The courtyards of the University and the residential area nearby contain a labyrinth of courtyards, porticos and new courtyards. Entering from the street, the environment is MC Escher meets babushka doll.

I have become buddies with a few women my age, American and French and we sit in a cafe and study together, which helps to mitigate the intensity of this immersion program. Yesterday’s lunch was with a few of them in the artists’ colony nearby. We sat outside and ate herring on the banks of a noisily babbling brook.

The French women are lovely, tres gentille and quite fluent. They are ready to help.

Michael the Schnorer- a local panhandler - appears every other day. His line is “do you speak …English, Deutche, Francais, etc. and he then proceeds to ask for bus fare in your language. He’s persistent and will show scars and bruises to try to convince his prey. We are convinced he’s a junkie.

And then there are classmates. In addition to my teachers Ber Ber and Anna, and my friends and the lovely Martina from Venice, are several Austrians, including the young carrot top, Bertie (Adalbert), several young German women, and two lesbian women. One a self described “hairy lesbian” whose close cropped hair belies her handle. Daniel Aleph seems to have landed one of the 2 young Parisiennes. Daniel Ein (1) is quite friendly with Martina since his Swedish girlfriend left. He’s a tall super thin Jew from London, about 25 and a self-described Anarchist. We may go to Kaunus with them. He reminds us that is the birthplace of Emma Goldman. Alan is a middle aged Jew for Jesus from Berkley. Joshua is a silent Yiddish Jedi Master who in real life is a Yale Law School Student. Sharon is right. This is the Island of the Misfit Toys.

Indeed, I have the great escape.

Continuing Education

I forgot how life is without the incessant drone of the weather report. I have a pictogram on my computer, I otherwise consult my skylight. It is cold, sunny and humid here, so one can get cold or warm depending on shade, indoor/outdoor, and the ever threatening drizzle. I'm enjoying the intensity of the work, and the very interesting people. These three days have seemed very long -- my only life, and very distant from "real life." Hard to know what will result from this extended visit.

I try, mostly in vain, to find English language TV that is not dubbed over by the sole voice of TV, a loud guy who drowns out men and women with his voice over. Interesting are the American series dubbed in Russian and voiced over in Lithuanian. How mangled!

I have two teachers, one is Dov-Ber, who, thanks to Meredith I think of as Bear-Bear. He's a burly, grizzly fifty-something Russian Jew who looks like the man who is always in Jewish/Israeli tourist art. He's a little full of himself. He's written a text with a number of errors, which, ever the editor - even when I don't understand - I correct publicly. I think he feels the book was his heavy lifting and that he can coast. He spends too much time telling jokes and speaking Yiddish in an Italian accent so as to flirt with 20-something Martina from Italy. Our other teacher is Anna, an Estonian Jew, stick thin, 30-40, almost Abigail - like in her waifishness. Her intensity and didactic forward march are tremendous motivation.

School Days

Classes started on Monday. 3 hours of immersion, speaking, reading and writing. I haven’t written using the Hebrew alphabet in over 40 years. At one point I actually think I know something. Many light bulbs flash. Then I can’t even read my writing! To the French, Germans and Austrians, add Lithuanians, a Finn, a lovely young woman from Venice. One professor is from Estonia, the other from Russia.

Out of Thin Air

At our confab last night people were addressing the audience in Yiddish and talking among themselves in Yiddish. It seemed a little like a Star Trek convention. It is genuinely great to revive the language. But there is no context, no street to talk in, no marketplace. A young Austrian man is doing his alternate military service here. It seems that the Holocaust is in a separate service category. I can only imagine how that came about. His fresh face is welcome, regardless.

Sun Rise... Sunset

Today's tour of Vilnius was lovely. It is a beautifully restored Renaissance city. Cobblestones, churches and cafes. all bright in the northern summer sunlight. The tour guide, predictably, perpetuated the charming central European myth of a prewar harmonious multicultural society. It reminded me of hearing songs from Fiddler on the Roof in a Warsaw piano bar.

Surprise! I'm not the only boomer in the group, although most students are from US and European colleges, looking for summer abroad credit. I had lunch with three Frenchwomen. Tres charmant!

Dinner!

Tree House

I'm at the top of a four story building. Surprise! It is next to the statue of the Gaon of Vilna. It is on Jew Street! There are no curtains, and I'm afraid of a fairly white night, I've bought some water and yogurt and found an English language movie. Settling in.

Turning off my Blackberry, the finality sinks in. I will turn it on again in a GSM world many time zones away. Half my luggage is electronics! Welcome to 2009! As Vilnius is not Milan, clothes have lost their passage.

I get a pass to the Red Carpet Club. I succumb to the fake-yet-sincere patter of fellow travelers, kayaks passing in the perpetual afternoon.

Talking to Myself, Backward

Well, I leave for Vilnius today. I guess this handful of posts were just stretches before the exertion. I will start to ask for participants. Fresh air. I welcome all of you to share.

Channelling my Inner Borat

My Hebrew School brat humor leaked out yesterday in a telephone job interview. A brief lapse into shout out quipping which may have cost me a shot. Insignificant other, Dr. Lee is repentant. It's the sex, stupid.

Running Into The Past

Oddly, Blogs move from present to past as well. The opposite of a story. In the Beginning is at the end. With my daughter's recent visit, I realize how small my universe has become relative to what it was when she was growing up. Hers is a life of promise. Mine seems like a life of closed doors. Singing is now dubious, my audition with the maestro I have given thousands of dollars to has been rejected. The non relationship with my insignificant other, Dr. Lee, has gone south and is dying a belated death. With too little in my brain, I find my self both repetitive and forgetful. Obsessed with worry.

Running Away From Home

I guess the trip to Vilnius is a major escape. Hopefully an escapade as well. I need to change that nasty mental ruckus. I need to leave the environment of the USA Network. So I am running into the past. The land my grandmother was born in over a century ago, to study a languishing language. Not quite my fantasy of an airy flat in Rome and a job singing in the local church. But, different enough from the everyday to change the conversation. I guess I'd like to change my life as well, but I think that's too difficult. We'll see.

Eating My House

Having sold in a downturn, my profits from my house were low. Without a job, I am using that money to live. I am literally eating my house. I have wanted more all my life. More house, more love, more children, more job. Now I know that I must deal with less. My upcoming trip to Vilnius will eat my house as well. I need the break from a future that looks dissapeared.

Too Much Television

I watch way too much TV. My books are in storage. I feel like the opening of Royal Pains. Dr. Hank is VERY CUTE. If I had a Bible I would more likely feel like Job. But I doubt he has blue eyes. House does.

In the beginning

The conversations in my head are so ugly and hurtful. All of a sudden everyone is younger than me, or comfortably retired. I am somehow stuck in the middle. Memories of the quick reorganization that left me jobless in this horrible economy and the rapid decline of fortune - sale of my beloved house, fears of permanent unemployment, poverty, loneliness and worse. I am below flat lined. I want to sleep, but manage only sweat drenched nightmare-filled fits. They are followed by zombie days, unrelieved by exercise.