Daytrips around Druskininkai - Alytus
Tuesday we sailed up the Nemous river; not much to report there. Gail was a real trooper on the trip; we all climbed a huge hill to visit an old church/monestary and she volunteered to carry Daniel all the way down when got antsy. Sitting around in a grassy courtyard listening to someone speak in Lithuanian about the history of a 400 year old building isn't his cup of tea - can't say I blame him.
Wednesday Eileen stayed in the hotel watching Daniel while my father Gail and I drove northwards to the country seat, Alytus. Alytus was a good 90 minutes by car, and we drove through at least 6 small villages along the way. The highway doubles as main street for many of these towns; at 90 km / hour we usually spent 15-30 seconds in the village before departing.
Many of the villages had the local cemetaries off the highway. A number of times we looked for the corresponding Jewish cemetary but couldn't find one. Almost all the villages of pre-war Lithuania had a Jewish component to it, but virtually all trace of our people had been uprooted from these small towns. There was one time that my father spied a sign pointing off the road to a holocaust memorial (probably marking the spot outside town that a group of Jews were killed, as so many of these monuments do. We read that the post-independence Lithaunian government has erected close to 200 such markers.) and we ambled along some dirt roads for 15 minutes but couldn't find it. All throughout the trip the lack of signs was always present. Without a very detailed map, compass, and a good sense of direction you were often dead in the water in the outlying areas.
Alytus once housed a sizable Jewish population. All that remains nowadays is the brick frame of the old synagogue and a memorial outside of town. We visited the synagogue first. It once had a huge upper level / women's section, and the men's area could have easily sat 400 people. The local government did a good job boarding up the entrances so that children couldn't wander inside, but we were able to make out the layout from the cracks in the windows. The outside was also very well maintained, with no graffiti or other damage that you might expect to occur to a derelict building. To the local's credit, it is located in a central area that would be suited for development but they've left it intact as is.I think my Dad was moved by the sight; we spent a while there, davening mincha and taking photographs.
More moving to my father, however, was the memorial at the southern edge of town in the forest. It was not in any guidebook we had; however I spotted it on a local map we bought just of the town. We needed to walk a good quarter mile into the forest from the parking lot, so I gathered that it didn't get many visitors. Instead of a shrine, or an imposing statue, what the government erected were large white cement pyramids, standing in the forest at irregular intervals. It was clear after walking around the site that they were erected wherever they could find evidence of mass graves having been dug. The sight was very moving; imagine walking through a cornucopia of green, animals chirping and flies buzzing. And there, all around you are a dozen or so large white pyramids. The only writing of any kind was a sign in Lithuanian near where we parked which read, "Recognise that the ground you are walking on is soaked with the blood of innocent people." My father later remarked to me that he found the Alytus memorial, for people he never met nor knew, more moving to him that the 9th fort where his sister was murdered outside of Kaunas.
Wednesday Eileen stayed in the hotel watching Daniel while my father Gail and I drove northwards to the country seat, Alytus. Alytus was a good 90 minutes by car, and we drove through at least 6 small villages along the way. The highway doubles as main street for many of these towns; at 90 km / hour we usually spent 15-30 seconds in the village before departing.
Many of the villages had the local cemetaries off the highway. A number of times we looked for the corresponding Jewish cemetary but couldn't find one. Almost all the villages of pre-war Lithuania had a Jewish component to it, but virtually all trace of our people had been uprooted from these small towns. There was one time that my father spied a sign pointing off the road to a holocaust memorial (probably marking the spot outside town that a group of Jews were killed, as so many of these monuments do. We read that the post-independence Lithaunian government has erected close to 200 such markers.) and we ambled along some dirt roads for 15 minutes but couldn't find it. All throughout the trip the lack of signs was always present. Without a very detailed map, compass, and a good sense of direction you were often dead in the water in the outlying areas.
Alytus once housed a sizable Jewish population. All that remains nowadays is the brick frame of the old synagogue and a memorial outside of town. We visited the synagogue first. It once had a huge upper level / women's section, and the men's area could have easily sat 400 people. The local government did a good job boarding up the entrances so that children couldn't wander inside, but we were able to make out the layout from the cracks in the windows. The outside was also very well maintained, with no graffiti or other damage that you might expect to occur to a derelict building. To the local's credit, it is located in a central area that would be suited for development but they've left it intact as is.I think my Dad was moved by the sight; we spent a while there, davening mincha and taking photographs.
More moving to my father, however, was the memorial at the southern edge of town in the forest. It was not in any guidebook we had; however I spotted it on a local map we bought just of the town. We needed to walk a good quarter mile into the forest from the parking lot, so I gathered that it didn't get many visitors. Instead of a shrine, or an imposing statue, what the government erected were large white cement pyramids, standing in the forest at irregular intervals. It was clear after walking around the site that they were erected wherever they could find evidence of mass graves having been dug. The sight was very moving; imagine walking through a cornucopia of green, animals chirping and flies buzzing. And there, all around you are a dozen or so large white pyramids. The only writing of any kind was a sign in Lithuanian near where we parked which read, "Recognise that the ground you are walking on is soaked with the blood of innocent people." My father later remarked to me that he found the Alytus memorial, for people he never met nor knew, more moving to him that the 9th fort where his sister was murdered outside of Kaunas.
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