I had planned to sleep in a bit this morning but I was woken by an inconsiderate roommate at 6am.

This man from Hong Kong decided that rummaging through a plastic grocery bag at that time in the morning while everyone else slept seemed like the right thing to do.

After making more noises with his locker he finally left the room but by then the damage was done.

I was up and I wasn’t going back to sleep.

I spent most of the morning online trying to figure out a way to squeeze my missing Oslo leg into the back end of the trip.

I couldn’t quite figure it out but I’ll look at it again next week.

At 11:30 Chau and I went over to the Town Hall to join the free walking tour.

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We toured around the old town and also to the little republic of Uzupis which is a self governing little island in the middle of town complete with their own constitution.

Along the way I also picked up (literally, as it was on the ground) the ultimate souvenir – a Lithuanian license plate.

Now, it was on the ground but it still felt like I was doing something criminal by taking it so I quickly shoved it in my backpack and went on my way.

After the tour we went for lunch at a restaurant our guide had recommended.

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We each had bbq ribs cause that’s what we were both craving and, hey, it’s my favorite meal of all time.

After lunch we aimlessly walked for a bit looking for the tiny republic again to get our passports stamped.

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We eventually found it and now I have yet one more stamp in my passport – just room for a few more before it’s time to retire this bad boy.

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We also saw a film set something that I’m used to seeing back home but something I certainly wasn’t expecting to see in the tiny town of Vilnius.

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Outside of the parliament we also saw members of the Lithuanian basketball team coming out and being hounded by locals looking for autographs and selfies.  Naturally I took a photo of them taking photos.  Naturally!

By 4:30 we were back at the hostel where we just kinda lounged around on the verge of falling asleep for a couple of hours before it was time to head out and get the evenings’ festivities under ways.

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At 8:00 Chau, myself and Fahrad headed back to the restaurant we went to last night.

This time the roles were reversed and they each had greasy appys while I chose a nice plate of chicken with potato and salad.

We arrived back at the hostel just before 10pm as the nightly pub crawl was starting.

There were about a dozen of us going out tonight and we started in the common room introducing ourselves and telling everyone an interesting story about ourselves.

Our reward for this mission: a couple shots of vodka.

Not my favorite shot but down it went anyway.

I was immediately intrigued/attracted to this girl from Galway, Ireland named Sinead so I spent most of the night talking with her.

Our first stop was a karaoke bar where I did the unthinkable – I sang.

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Keep in mind this was after person after person went up on stage and sang amazingly like they were professionals.

Time for me to bring the singing caliber down a little…

By the way, I sang Lazy Song by Bruno Mars.

It was actually funny cause my conversation with Sinead was so strained I only picked up maybe half of what she said as we were competed with the singers on stage but also her Irish accent was hard to pick up.

Still cute though.

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At midnight we went to our next location where we were greeted with another vodka shot.

More drinking and more conversation and by 1:30 we were on to our next location – a club near our hostel.

It was here where I decided to pull the cord.

It was late (at least by my travel standards) and I was ready to call it a night.  Tomorrow, after all is going to be a very long day as I pick up a rental car at 9am and spend the day travelling around the Lithuanian countryside.

So, by 2am I was back at hostel ready to call it a night.

I did get one measure of revenge though.  When I went in the room to pickup my laptop to finish off this blog there was only one person in there.

The guy from Hong Kong who woke us all up this morning at 6am.

Naturally I just flicked the light switch on in the room and (loudly) got my netbook out of my locker.

Oh my God, it felt so good to do that!

Anyway, that was the day – a little touring and a little drinking.

Bring on tomorrow…

USSR Trip 2015, Trip Journal

USSR 2015
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