Albert Calles is a 31 years old Catalan from Barcelona who since January 2016 lives in Vilnius, Lithuania, where he works as a Spanish and Catalan teacher. I thought it would be interesting to know the experiences of a Catalan living in Lithuania, which is such a different country from Spain.
Here is where Albert teaches, at the Ñ VIVA Vilnius languages academy
I asked him for an interview and we met on Thursday 14 September in a nice, quiet café in Vilnius.
Noemí: Albert, tell me what you exactly do in Vilnius. Where do you teach?
Albert: I am a teacher of Spanish at languages school in Vilnius. I teach Spanish to adolescents and adult people. I also teach Catalan.
Noemí: Why did you choose to become a Spanish teacher?
Albert: Well, after finishing my studies at the University (he has a degree in Philology at University of Barcelona), I decided to obtain a University Master degree specialized in Spanish teaching for foreigners. I love traveling, I always loved traveling, and teaching abroad was a way to go out of Spain and knowing other countries. I am a teacher since 2011. Since then I have been teaching in Saint Petersburg, in Israel, in Helsinki and now here, in Vilnius. In addition to that, I must say that my mother is also a teacher.
I obtained my current work in Vilnius after an interview. I sent my curriculum to the school and I was interviewed through Skype. This is the reason of me being here now.
Noemí: How was your adaptation to the country (Lithuania)?
Albert: It was very easy. Here people are very warm and friendly. I had absolutely no problem and I felt good since the first moment. Here people are more introvert than in Spain, but that is just the first moment when they don’t know you, that they don’t talk so much. Afterwards, they are very friendly and it is really not difficult to make friends here.
Noemí: Do you think Catalan and Lithuanian people are similar? What are the main differences and the main similarities between Catalan and Lithuanian people?
Albert: I think that both, Catalans and Lithuanians, are very open, friendly people. They both like to talk, meeting new people… In fact, it is said that Lithuanians are the “Latinos” of the Baltic region. But I think that in Barcelona we are much more open-minded than they are here in Lithuania. I mean, Barcelona is a multicultural city where new and different people have been always settled and mixed with the native population. In Barcelona does not matter if you come from Argentina or Spain or somewhere else, and people do not care where you come from, what your origins are. Here they have a Russian and a Polish minority, and this difference is important. They all are Lithuanians but often happens that somebody says to you, “I am Polish” or “I am Russian”. They give a lot of importance to the nationality or to ethnic group they belong to.
Noemí: Are here in Vilnius many foreigners like you? I arrived in Vilnius just 4 days ago and one of my first impression is that there is no immigration to this country. Am I right?
Albert: About 5 years ago foreign people began to come to set up here. Most of them work in multinational companies who have a branch in Lithuania, but the number of foreigners here is insignificant compared to Barcelona.
There is very low immigration to the country, and they usually come from Latvia, Belarus or Ukraine, countries which are very close to Lithuania. There are not many Italian or Spanish immigrants here.
Noemí: Why do you think there is so low immigration to Lithuania?
Albert: Basically because it is a very small country and its economy is still not very powerful. All foreign people who I know here are working in foreign companies established in Lithuania. None of them is working in Lithuanian company.
Noemí: As I know there are different linguistic communities in Lithuania. Lithuanian, Russian and Polish languages are spoken here, aren’t they? How is the relationship between these cultural and linguistic communities?
Albert: I think that in general there is no conflict between these different communities. Maybe some old Lithuanian-speaking people who were born or passed their childhood here during the de Soviet period have some reticence to use Russian language despite being capable to use it.
On the other hand, about 7% of the population here are Russian and about 6% Polish speaking people. The majority of them are concentrated in Vilnius and surrounds of Vilnius. Some of them were born here during the Soviet period and their knowledge of Lithuanian language is very limited. But there are not a lot of cases like this. All young people speak properly Lithuanian, which is the schooling language today. Compared to Latvia or to Estonia, where the number of Russian speakers is very high, here in Lithuania there is not really any kind of language conflict.
Noemí: And what about The Yiddish language? Is it still Yiddish language to hear in Lithuania?
Albert: I have never heart a Yiddish word in Lithuania, but I know that there is a Yiddish Institute at Vilnius University which every year organizes summer courses for those who intend to learn this language. There is a Yiddish academic tradition in Vilnius, and there are even people from Israel who come to here just to study the language. But as I said before I have never heart anybody talking Yiddish in Vilnius.
Noemí: Tell me about your experience of the Lithuanian language. Do you speak it?
Albert: No, unfortunately, I do not speak Lithuanian, just a few words. I use to speak in English here. If they don’t understand (that could happen with older people), I try in Russian. I have a good level of Russian language and that helps a lot. Lithuanian is a very difficult language!
Noemí: Before coming to Lithuania I found that a lot of people in Spain think that Lithuanian is Slavic language, but it is absolutely not. Are there many differences between Lithuanian and Slavic languages?
Albert: They belong to different Indo-European families, but that’s all. They are different languages and are not related. But the fact is that they have being coexisting during a lot of time and maybe they having a few words in common. In Lithuania, they have some words that come from the Russian language.
Noemí: Tell me some essential words in Lithuanian to survive in Vilnius.
Albert: Wow, I don’t know! “ačiū“ means „thank you“; „kava su pienu“ means „coffee with milk“, „alus“ means „beer“, „labas“ means „hello“, „sąskaita“… you use it when you want to pay.
Noemi: Let‘s talk about the winter in Lithuania. How hard is for a South European like you the Lithuanian winter?
Albert: I love cold and snow and I cannot suffer heat! So, I love winter in Lithuania and being at minus 20 degrees is not a big problem for me. What is really hard is the lack of light during the winter days. Here winter means darkness. Days are dark and short and it is certainly difficult to live with that.
Noemí: Which places in Vilnius and all over Lithuania do you recommend to visit?
Albert: Vilnius is a beautiful and interesting city. I recommend very much to visit the Old Town and the Užupis Republic. Out of Vilnius, I suggest you visit Nida, which is a small village in the Courtland Region where beaches are formed by very big dunes.
Noemí: Lithuanian literature is completely unknown in Spain and I guess all over the world. Please, let us know something about it. Do you have some favorite Lithuanian author?
Albert: I have read Vincas Kudirka, who is very famous because he wrote the text of the Lithuanian Hymn. In the center of the city, there is a square in which you can find a monument dedicated to him. There is another very well-known author, a poet named Antanas Baranauskas who talks about the woods of Lithuania.
Noemí: Albert, tell me about your students. What is their profile and why do they study Spanish? Is it difficult for them to learn Spanish?
Albert: There are a lot of people who learn Spanish in Vilnius. Most of them are adolescents and adult people who love Spanish and Latin American culture. Some of them just want to travel to these countries or they have friends there. There are also students who want to learn Spanish just because they like Latin music. There are a couple of pubs here where you can listen to this kind of music. Young people love reggaeton and songs like “Despacito”, which is very fashionable here at the moment.
It is not difficult to them to learn Spanish. I think here in Lithuania people have good skills to learn foreign languages, they learn quickly.
Noemí: Do you think that learning the Spanish language will improve the opportunities of young Lithuanian people to enter the labor market?
Albert: I don’t think so. Here there is not really a Spanish market and Spanish presence is not important. Anyway, if there would be some Spanish market influence here, learning the Spanish language would not be essential. Spanish is only useful if you want to travel there. Lithuanian young people would better study English, German or Russian if they want to improve their labor market opportunities.
Noemí: Are you thinking about to coming back to Barcelona someday?
Albert: Not, absolutely not, and you can write it in bold fonts. Barcelona is an uninteresting city to me, I have been living there all my life and I don’t want to come back.
Noemí: Which method do you use to teach Spanish?
Albert: I use the communicative method of the Instituto Cervantes, which has the 6 languages official levels recognized in Europe. I don’t speak Lithuanian, so since the first moment, I talk Spanish to my students.
Noemí: Thank you very much, Albert, for this interview!
Albert: You are welcome. It has been a pleasure!
I said goodbye to Albert thinking that I must taste a Lithuanian beer. During our conversation, Albert has told me that Lithuanians are very proud of two things: their beer, which is really good, and their basketball team!
Very interesting interview.
It’s always good to have information from an insider.
Really good informations!