Part I – Relatives

Before my trip I interviewed all my relatives (three generations) about their memories, ideas and projections of/onto Lithuania.

Audio:

Conversation with relatives who were born in Lithuania. I tell them that I’m going to Lithuania and that my grandfather (their brother-in-law or cousin, respectively) would never tell me about the war or the resettlement period, always telling me stories about moose instead. But these relatives too avoid my questions about their war experiences and tell me another moose story.
When I leave the room for a short break one of them says “… von mir kricht se nichts raus” (“she won’t get anything out of me”).

Video:

Using my father’s old Super 8 camera, I filmed all the places in Poland and Lithuania that were significant sites in my grandfather’s life. When I viewed the material for the first time after developing it, there was nothing but unexposed film. Only one segment of one reel had been exposed: the river Nemunas at Gelgaudiskis (my grandfather’s birthplace) and the only moose I saw in Lithuania – stuffed and exhibited in a showcase at the Natural History Museum in Kaunas.