Let’s talk better about what we can be proud of here and now, and what, on my word of honor, I would not have thought of in those days, thirty-five years ago, when I was young and together with my generation fought for a free and good Lithuania.

For example, I would not have thought that the passport of the Republic of Lithuania would be one of the most sought-after passports in the world. I remember, for example, how we were planning the first Lithuanian passports, and a very bright and Western person said: our passports will have to have inscriptions in French, because it is the language of diplomats, in English, because it is an international language, and in Russian. why? “Because we will have to travel to Russia and communicate with them.”

I laugh when I remember, just like from those episodes when Algirdas Brazauskas said that Lithuania must be “sovereign USSR successfully”.

I would not have thought that when the news about the increased profits of a Swedish bank in my country will be published, the people of my free Lithuania will often be angry. Because how dare you make a profit? And I remember those times when deposits in state savings banks disappeared, where there were worthless rubles, but they also floated away. I remember when currency transactions were a criminal offence. And how people make money, how they came to freedom with deep pockets. Could I have thought then that there would be a time when a profitable bank would be fu, what a shame. Funny. “What are your problems?” The wallet doesn’t close with hundreds and shoes with diamonds are pressing.”

Let’s tell the people of the third world (or at least the struggling Ukraine) what our problems are. “Horror, just think, our banks are profitable.” What?

“And we also have heart problems, that redundant state vagabonds, who have nothing to do, are rationing the Lithuanian endings of their husbands’ Lithuanian surnames to Lithuanian women.” Of course, it is stupid and pathetic – just like the persecution of “Atsikeli ir varai”, the stupid fight for the banning of three letters ( sorry, it’s still funny – the passions of such medieval witch hunters, or Russia’s modern instructions to depict rainbows correctly, if you don’t want to go to jail).

Yes, there are unfortunate things in Lithuania, for example, the narrowing of the streets and the fight with drivers, the fact that it still operates, protecting unaccompanied minors of unaccompanied minors of books about gays, the fact that it is still September first and Sunday after three o’clock, but, honor word, the people of the central world that anyone would give such problems in exchange for their Lukashenkas, Putins, African dictators or Iranian theocracy of old men. They would say: you don’t know how lucky you are.

And I could think then that the time would come when I would read that “Transparency International.“Declare Lithuania a new high based on how we feel and feel as the 33rd most transparent (least corrupt) country in the world.”

This is a more impressive thing than our higher standard of living compared to Portugal (by the way, Vladimir Putin had a dream to match Portugal, and now he has weapons from North Korea; how ambitions change). Eradicating corruption is one of the revolutionary victories of civilization, which people value less than bike lanes, but which changes society from the inside.

Moreover, dissolving corruption is the most civil act: it starts with and ends with the individual who no longer offers bribes to the police.

Then it happens that people start to trust themselves, they start not to open the door anymore, there are kiosks for sellers, where people pick up goods and put money in, and they stop being afraid to leave their phone on the table in a cafe.

Thirty-five years ago, in hungry and dirty Lithuania carved up by the Soviets (where people used to remove car batteries at night and carry wipers with them when going to the store to avoid theft), I did not think that it would happen that people in Lithuanian stores would buy at self-service checkouts, right only for the civilized world and works only in the civilized world.

Also, only a very mature and civilized society is able to easily and laughingly listen to stories about a nine-year-old boy, his mother’s hand and go on with his life, collect millions for good works and buy weapons to destroy the Satan of the Kremlin.

That’s it, I couldn’t even dream about such things when I was standing, a young man of about eighteen years old, at the Sąjūdis rallies.