Lithuanians in the News
6th December 2009
Lithuanian Diaspora is the Subject of a Travelling Exhibition
At the opening of the exhibition - Past President Valdas Adamkus
and Speaker of Parliament Irena Degutienė. Photo courtesy lrs.lt
The Lithuanian World Community Congress (Pasaulio Lietuvių Bendruomenė (PLB)) has produced an exhibition about the lives and activities of Lithuanians dispersed throughout the world in the time period 1945-1990. The exhibition was opened on November 16, 2009 in Vilnius and it will later travel throughout Lithuania, to acquaint younger Lithuanians about the one million Lithuanians outside Lithuania’s borders, formally organised in communities in 41 countries.
The exhibition is called “Lietuviais esame mes gimę” (“We are born Lithuanians”), after the opening words of a famous song, which is known as the Anthem of Lithuania Minor (the Klaipėda
The Columbarium at the Tuskulėnai Peace Park.
Photo courtesy Wikipedia
region). The lyrics were written in 1879 by the German linguist Georg Sauerwein, who had a great love for the Lithuanian language and Lithuanians, and the music was composed by Stasys Šimkus in 1908. It has always been very popular, not just in Lithuania Minor, and it is played every night at midnight by Lithuania’s national broadcaster.
The opening of the exhibition was at the recently opened Tuskulėnai Peace Park complex. In 1944-47 within the grounds of the present day Peace Park almost 900 victims of the KGB were buried, mostly Lithuanian partisans. Most of them were reburied in 2006 in a specially constructed memorial columbarium within the Peace Park grounds. During the exhibition’s opening Past President Valdas Adamkus stated that the location of the exhibition within the confines of the Tuskulėnai Peace Park was no coincidence, for the Peace Park also witnesses Lithuania’s sufferings and determination.

Further information: www.lrytas.lt 16/11/09 www.tmid.lt