A situation I got into two days ago sounds like a funny adventure, but in fact there could have been a real danger involved. It tells a lot about the attitudes towards safety of staff and clients even in such a prestigious place like I was in.

I started attending a course at a known language school, Kalba.lt, which is based in the Vilnius Business Harbour (Vilniaus verslo uostas) - a relatively newly-built, hyper-modern steel-and-glass building, which hosts many successful companies (perhaps some not so successful ones too). After the class on the 4th floor, where the language school is, I went into an elevator together with five more people. As we got on, the elevator unexpectedly started ascending. We laughed - there must have been a mistake. The elevator stopped at the 6th floor, then went down to the 2nd, and up again... Now it started feeling like a bad horror movie.

Better late than never. On the 9th of September I attended a street art event, co-organised by Julijus G., whom I know. There is a group of people who promote graffiti in Lithuania as a legal form of urban art, which engages the people who hang out in the spaces decorated. The even coincided with other phenomena related to graffiti - I will write about those later. As expected, it provoked all kinds of reactions.

Last month the European Union was shook up by expulsions of the Roma from France, shedding light on equally or even more criminal actions in Italy (at a local level though) and invoking such concepts as 'crime', 'stigmatisation', 'security', 'rights' - as always. Before we notice, 'big politics' is facing realignments and populations in Europe are fed with daily portions of fear and distrust. Sarkozy, a former minister of interior, is doing his best to perform his brutal acts wearing white gloves: the way he and his followers present the issue is almost flawlessly politically correct and taps into the fears that lurk in many Europeans, while other powers than the extreme right fail to address those. But as we discuss, people are being sent away, and the European dream, embodied in the fundamental treaties of the EU, is convulsing in its agony, abandoned.

"What's this? What's this?" curiously repeat an elderly French-speaking couple to each other as they pass by a colourful crowd of all kinds of characters, some holding swords about the size of themselves, some with blue hair or painted faces. It is the fourth time Cosplay enthusiasts get together in Vilnius and show how they can imitate their favourite characters, but lately (at least since 2009) the Japanese embassy happily supports their show(-off) in the framework of a festival called "Now Japan". In addition to crafts workshops and a movie night, Cosplay was one of the parts of the festival. However, the city, waking up from the summer vacation, felt it more than anything else.

Just read this. I have not found the words to comment it. I visited an unrecognised (I won't spell 'illegal') village in Ramleh. The families that live there were expelled from their original villages after the Independence of Israel was announced and in a period of rather lawless situation many Arab residents were forced to leave their homes. Many of them did not stay in Israel at all. Those ones did. They, along with Israeli activists helping them, have estimated that demolition of a house costs about 20,000 NIS - for this you could upgrade sewage and water supply to the village. Now the village lacks basic amenities and feels increasingly hopeless: as many times as they tried to apply for recognition, the municipality was deaf and blind. Meanwhile, a new Jewish moshav nearby got all the rights and all the amenities immediately. The villagers went to negotiate with the new members, but those reported they just got what they wanted from the government, and perhaps would not want to compromise their situation. The only positive thing is that Israel has a very progressive law: all children are entitled to school education, regardless of the status of their parents. The children of Dahmash (the unrecognised village) go to schools in towns and villages nearby, potentially enabling them to (a) claim their rights better, as they will be literate and educated to communicate with the authorities in the future, (b) access the labour market outside the village (although I cannot imagine how is one supposed to send a CV to a respectable company with the address in this unrecognised village on it). In this respect these children are better off than Roma children in unrecognised settlements in/near European cities - many of them are not in school.

Well, I guess I won't describe the  situation any better than my dear friend, Yuval Ben-Ami, already has.

There is never one side to a story. State authorities are under multiple pressures. At least in Lithuania, illegal housing is a big issue. The Roma settlement in Kirtimai, Vilnius, is in heavy debt to the municipality, for which some basic amenities are periodically disconnected. Many children do not go to school, and crime is thriving (this is the biggest drug hub). Not all inhabitants are willing to move to social housing offered to them, as they prefer to live in the community they feel comfortable with rather than have their family dispersed. When they try to move in together with all their family members they are used to have around, non-Roma neighbours complain. 49% ethnic Lithuanians surveyed (as of 2009) reported they would not like to have Roma neighbours, and 38% would not like to work together with Roma. For those who read Lithuanian, this is an article I wrote after visiting Dahmash, drawing a parallel with the Roma settlement in Vilnius (to which, I must admit, I have not been).

However, a parallel problem with illegal housing in Lithuania is local mafiozi, nouveau-riche and politicians building or expanding their houses illegally in protected heritage areas, blocking roads so that only themselves and their guests can use those, stealing land from parks and forests to make their property more attractive, and so on. The media reports such cases regularly, but it is very difficult to do something against those in power. You may not see anything in common between impoverished Roma, who have lived in that neighbourhood historically (and some rich Roma living there, too, as they have attractive business options there) and rich individuals building houses on national parks and other protected areas, such as the Curonian Spit. However, predictably, as soon as the state makes a legal exemption in its laws, the powerful will be the ones to capitalise on that. I think both states, together with the respective communities, should look for some other grounds to legalise the settlements on ad-hoc basis. And I say 'legalise', not evict these people and patronisingly move them into social housing.

Come to Lithuania if you doubt climate change. When I went there for winter vacations, I was greeted with a very polite "Ladies and gentlemen, the plane is landing above Vilnius. The temperature in Vilnius is -22 degrees Celsius. Have a nice stay..." In spring I heard of horrible floods, although not so destructive as in Poland or Hungary. Right before I came here in summer, my friends were complaining about unprecedented mosquito attack and more annoying then ever pollen in Vilnius. Eventually, summer came with rains, thunderstorms and barely survivable heat above 30 degrees, which is very unusual. How do people cope with it?

I miss the predictability of Tel Aviv weather as the skies of my native country vomit a chilly rainfall onto my head. Because of this, I'm about to skip the only festival which makes me shout, "Yeah, I do love being in Vilnius!" I mean, the Let It Be Night festival, when many cultural venues are open at night and many events are free. Many of them are inside, but you can't feel the greatness of this event without moving around the space, so alive with people, lights and joy. You can't have it all if you walk around cursing the ugliness of the weather, which is tropical except that it's cold. As you may predict, if your mood is already bad enough, or if you think you have much better things to do than read a bitter blog post, you can close it now.

So, just as you know, I continue to move around. Greetings from Budapest this time! One week in advance I was already worried: I'll be travelling with lots of things, including books, notes in a rare language, and so on. I had heard legends of Israeli border controls, and experienced some of the hell they often give to tourists myself as I was going to Lithuania for holiday.

The ancient town of Hebron (West Bank) once looked very promising. Its ancient Jewish community, more or less continuously living in the city, which claims to host the tomb of Abraham (considered both the first Jew and the first Muslim in history), had many things to share with its Arab neighbors. For example, this prayer house, built by Herod, used to serve both.

However, when conflict arrives to previously tightly connected communities, it has more painful consequences. The consequences of the conflict are visible with a naked eye.

"The Economist" had this funky mental exercise: imagine that countries could be relocated on the map. Don't read the article yet, first look at the map. I'll repost it for you in case the article becomes subscribers-only in the future:

Source: Economist