And thinking of that, I’d recall my grandfather. Now he was from a whole different time that most of us could barely imagine. In his specific case, it was a time of countless, endless hardships – huge wars, violent, brutal occupations, utter poverty, all that stuff. I heard a story about him that when he was a young man, and the second World War broke out, he really wanted to serve, to fight. But he was so sickly, nobody would enlist him, neither the Germans nor the Russians. He’d even joke about that himself. This was the only story about the war from him though, him or anyone from his time. Nobody talked about those days one bit and shunned any mention of it so categorically that you could see darkness in their eyes. It made you think that what me and my dad go through is just pale moonlight.
My grandfather’s joke made sense though, about him being too sick to go to war. I vividly recall him being a pretty small, gaunt old man, but always with that fighter’s spirit. He’d always spend his days outdoors in any season, any weather, do his farming chores no matter what, never complained. He’d walk around a lot. I recall, when I was a little kid, I tried following him from a distance so he wouldn’t notice me. Followed him right into this swamp and dropped neck deep in some pond, just neck deep enough not to drown. I was four or five years old. Grandma wasn’t happy, though I was fortunate to have those good, kind grandparents who never yelled at you no matter what. Lucky me. My grandfather though, despite his strong, silent reliability, died when I was about seven. Seemed like a thousand people showed up at his funeral, and a lot of tears were shed, never seen anything like it at a funeral since. Someone so poor and meek, but so highly regarded.
And speaking of war, we’ve got one going on not too far east of us right now. But I don‘t mind. I’m too old and too sickly to fight. I got money in safe places and I know where I’ll go if I have to. What do I need to worry about? Innocent people die all the time, who can count how many people suffer in the world? Start feeling sorry for everyone, you’ll never feel anything else for the rest of your time. Yet to me it’s a little fascinating to think of the war coming here. Something real, something true, even if horrible. But who am I kidding, I’m no romantic, especially not about war. Everyone in their right mind knows that war is hell, no matter how one goes about it.
Here at “Hugo’s” we have a regular who tells us all about war first-hand. Vladik came to our corner of the world after having his arm and leg blown off in a mine field. He’s seen war for about a year and a half. I believe that is a long time for any war vet. He’s not much older than me. He was sent over through some international aid program, got free housing in a nice neighborhood and a small pension. Massive drinker, though, even by our cultural standards. He has this crazy stare and he talks in borderline gibberish that is hard to make out, but his stories are worth the trouble. Recently Vladik got married to some widow from his homeland. Yet they got into a drunken fight, and the police took him away. Then his wife took away his home, so now Vladik has to spend his small pension on a garage room, but he doesn’t mind one bit. Vladik has seen hell already. Every time I get to meet him at “Hugo’s,” I always talk to him and pay for his meals and drinks.
In a way, Vladik reminds me of my uncle, my dad’s brother, the hero. I don’t remember my uncle myself. He died young and way before my time, executed by the occupiers for being a partisan. But everyone who has ever talked about him has called him a hero. Brave, tough, smart, a true inspiration dedicated to freedom and all that good stuff. I believe it. Never knew exactly what he did or where, just a few old pictures of him in uniform, a few notes from his barely legible letters and a diary. Been thinking a lot about him and the whole history surrounding his myth, if you can call it that. In part due to societal programming, as the media has been pushing a lot of old history about that recently. Though the real history hasn’t always been as glamorous as they sometimes portray it, most of the heroic stuff is legit. Your typical rebel, overwhelmingly very young men, would join their local offshoot military force and get sent to some smaller guerilla unit with a base in the forest. They’d move their base a lot in warm seasons, doing raids against occupiers, patrols, robbing their supplies and killing people. They’d have their contact networks in cities, operate underground media campaigns through newspapers, even read theater plays in basements to preserve our language. They’d collect donations and supplies from locals. And although the documentaries shy away from saying it sometimes, it wasn’t all given willingly. Those brave young men were hopelessly outnumbered though. The occupiers had their own networks, a comparatively infinite supply of both men and equipment. Lots of partisans died fighting. Many were captured and executed by gun or rope, or tortured. And as their ranks kept dwindling over time, their presence ebbed at a slow, steady pace. My uncle is somewhere among the bodies out there too. We never found him.
(…to be continued…)
by Paulius Limantas
Transadaptation Volume 7 – Via Ellipsis – Continuation of Uncertainty, Instability and Extremes Transadapted
January: An Unexpected Trip Down Memory Lane – Sarah-Leah Pimentel (South Africa)
February: Blow-up – Veronika Groke (Austria)
March: Futuros Murguistas – Alejandra Baccino Uberti (Uruguay)
April: The Nomenclature Man – Paulius Limantas (Lithuania)
May: Amanecerá y veremos – Adriana Uribe (Columbia)
June: Finding Light in Yerevan – Armine Asryan (Armenia)
July: The Last Judgement – Nadia Silva Castro (Brazil)
August: Who’s Afraid of the Big, Bad Worm? – Narantsogt (Natso) Baatarkhuu (Mongolia)
September: Second Steps – Jonay Quintero Hernandez (Spain)
October: New Normality – Svetlana Molchanova (Russia)
November: Pandemic Love – Li Xiakun (China)
December: Beyond Comprehension – Rahaf Konbaz (Syria)
Background – Context
Transadaptation Volume 6: Meaning? – Uncertainty, Instability and Extremes Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2025)
Transadaptation Volume 5: Of Flowing Vicissitudes – Life Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2024)
Transadaptation Volume 4: Material Dissent – Adulthood Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2023)
Transadaptation Volume 3: Evanescent – Young Adulthood Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2022)
Transadaptation Volume 2: Conceived – Childhood Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2021)
Transadaptation Volume 1: In the Middle – Prelude to a Contemporary Transadaptation, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2020)
Peripatetic Alterity: A Philosophical Treatise on the Spectrum of Being – Romantics and Pragmatists by Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
La Syncrétion of Polarization and Extremes Transposée, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2018)
L’anthologie of Global Instability Transpuesta, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2017)
From Wahnsinnig to the Loony Bin: German and Russian Stories Transposed to Modern-day America, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2013)
Emblems and stories on the international community
Perception by country – Transposing emblems, articles, short stories and reports from around the world
Credits
Center photo: Palanga, Lithuania – Shadows – Kotryna Juskaite (Unsplash)
Photos from top left corner clockwise: 1. Lithuania – Old and new – Kotryna Juskaite (Unsplash); 2. Lithuania – Going home – Kotryna Juskaite (Unsplash); 3. Vilnius, Lithuania – The street – Alex Vinogradov (Unsplash); 4. Kaunas, Lithuania – A summer evening – Egidijus Bielskis (Unsplash); 5. Lithuania – From above – Gantas Vaičiulėnas (Unsplash); 6. Panevėžys, Lithuania – The shack – Kotryna Juskaite (Unsplash); 7. Lithuania – The residential blocks – Kotryna Juskaite (Unsplash); 8. Lithuania – In the woods – Ugne Vasyliute (Unsplash)