- Title: LITHUANIA: Back to USSR at Lithuanian adventure park
- Date: 22nd January 2008
- Summary: BUST OF SOVIET STATE FOUNDER VLADIMIR LENIN (SOUNDBITE) (Lithuanian) PRODUCER, RUTA VANAGAITE, SAYING: "There are still many in Lithuania, who are sick with Soviet nostalgia, so we have started this show to help them to recover. We also wanted to show the foreigners how we used to live for 50 years in the Soviet Union."
- Embargoed: 6th February 2008 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Lithuania
- Country: Lithuania
- Topics: Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky
- Reuters ID: LVA315JSKH5AG4E742PURDG5MLNH
- Story Text: You can be beaten, shouted at and interrogated at Lithuania's latest tourist attraction -- a journey back to the Soviet Union.
The "1984" adventure park aims to give people the feeling of what it was like to live under Soviet rule, though some in the Baltic state see the old days as better than the economically turbulent times of recent history.
"There are still many in Lithuania, who are sick with Soviet nostalgia, so we have started this show to help them to recover," said producer Ruta Vanagaite.
"We also wanted to show foreigners how we lived for 50 years in the Soviet Union," she added.
At this village about 25 km (16 miles) from the Lithuanian capital Vilnius, the trip back to the Soviet Union takes place at a two-storey underground bunker in the middle of the woods.
The bunker, built in 1985 and abandoned in 1991 when Lithuania regained its independence, was a secret location during the Soviet period. It was built to house a TV station that could go on air in the event of a nuclear war.
Visitors pay 120 Lithuanian litas (aaprox 35 euros) and first enter an administration building to be met by a uniformed guard and a German shepherd dog.
Typical padded workers coats are then donned and visitors are offered coffee made from roasted barley, a popular substitute for real coffee in the Soviet Union.
"I grew up in a free Lithuania, and hardly remember Soviet times, though I was born then. It will be interesting to see how it was, to see how true the stories of my parents and grandparents are," said Tomas Budelis, before embarking on the "tour".
Chatting among the around 30 visitors is soon stopped by a guard telling everyone to speak only Russian or be quiet.
Soon the group is lined up in the yard and starts learning to march under the red flag and anthem of the Soviet Union.
A "captain" tells people "to stop thinking, because the party will do that for you" and smiling is declared an offence.
Visitors then go down to the bunker, some 5 metres (16 ft) below ground, and are forced to run through a labyrinth of corridors. A big bust of Lenin watches as the captain exhorts visitors to shout Soviet slogans.
Those who disobey are put in a dark room or taken to meet an interrogator from the KGB, the Soviet secret police.
A man dressed all in black accuses you of illegally travelling abroad and bringing back hard currency, threatening to send you to Siberia.
A few people are ordered to write "sincere admissions" of the crimes they committed against the Soviet state. Those who disobey or smile are "beaten" with leather belts.
Though it does not hurt much, the idea is to humiliate.
In the next room, a lady doctor says you should behave well, otherwise they may use drugs to force you. She points out that the Soviet Union is not a signatory of the Geneva Human Rights Convention Lithuania and its fellow Baltic states were forcibly incorporated into the Soviet Union in 1940. Though many people remember repression and the thousands who were sent to exile or death in Siberia, the 1970s and 1980s were also considered a time of stability.
That stability is what those nostalgic for the Soviet era remember, particularly older people, who have seen their incomes shrink and prices rocket.
"I would not want to live in those times, because there were no freedom and individuality," said Visita Ivashkeviciute, after taking part.
"It was scary indeed the way they treated people and people did not know what to. They could do whatever they want with people, and that was very frightening," said student Santa Survilaite.
69-year old Romualdas Bartaska, an associate professor from Vilnius University, said the adventure gave him a terrible reminder.
"When you are confronted with those interrogators, military, guards, who are so realistic, you better realise the taste and the price of that freedom," he said.
The adventure is not for children, people with heart problems or claustrophobia. To make it more stressful, all the instructions are in Russian.
At the end of the tour, you are served a shot of vodka, tea and canned buckwheat kasha porridge with meat.
A captain gives you a certificate stating you have been a Soviet citizen for 2 hours.
People will be able to take these "trips" back to the Soviet Union until at least 2009 as the park is part of Vilnius' events that year as European culture capital. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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