Happy New Spring

31 March 2006

The last time I wrote was sometime late in 2005... and we are already full on into mud season 2006! The sun was shining today in Vilnius and everywhere I went I left a trail of dirty footprints!

Ok, well let's go back to the beginning. I spent Christmas and New Year's in Michigan. I got to visit my grand parents briefly in Florida, see my (still very sexy) ski coach from high school (hey there Turner! :), go shopping at Gap and Victoria's Secret, meet my new cousin Madeline, go to our cottage up north, see Camilla, go wine tasting on Old Mission, buy a new computer, play board games with my brothers and cousins, eat Little Ceasars pizza, ski at Boyne, have a drink in the Snowflake Bar, see a couple movies, go for another wine tasting at the Rowe Inn, and eat a big New Year's Eve steak dinner hot off the grill. Wow, was that only two weeks? It sure was folks! When I got back to Vilnius, I needed a vacation!

Well, our ski club is in full swing. We are officially a non-profit organization, founded by me, Mirka and one of the parents. We had 25 kids this winter! January was a tough month in Lithuanian, Liepkalnis (our home hill in Vilnius) wasn't making snow because it was either too warm or too cold! It was about 9 below 0 F for over a week! We went to Ignalina for a camp, and also to Sigulda, Latvija for races. Finally at the end of the month, we were able to really get training going on the "big" hill at Liepkalnis. Well we were skiing a lot, and I even won a few races here in Lithuania this winter! Of course, the most important thing is to HAVE FUN, and the kids will tell you, we sure had a lot of that! We had a race or training nearly every weekend all winter... in total we made three trips to Sigulda.

On March 16th, we left for almost 2 weeks in Brixen, Italy. Brixen is a nice little down near the Austrian boarder. More people speak German there than Italian! On Saturday and Sunday, March 18-19, 9 of our kids started the FILA Sprint races sponsored by Alberto Tomba and FILA. There were 767 kids on the start list from about 10 countries in Europe, all between the ages of 5-15. There were GS races, a team parallel slalom, a speed race, a jump competition, a team tug-of-war and a parade of athletes. Needless to say, we didn't win, but we also weren't last. Mirka and I are extremely proud of our kids, simply for the courage it took for them to even get in the start gate at this kind of competition. For nearly all of them, this was their first year racing. We are in particular very proud of Emilija Mazuraite, a 10 year old girl who at the beginning of this season could barely turn on the bunny slope. She worked hard this season, and at the FILA races, she was carving turns with the rest of the kids! The most important thing, is that in the finish, ALL of our kids were wearing smiles on their faces!

After the excitement of FILA, we had two days to train for the Lithuanian National Championships being held in the same place. It was extremely sunny, and pretty warm too. Still, there was a ton of snow and we had a great time! Wednesday and Thursday were the races, and the Kalnu Ereliai took top position on ALL of the children's podiums! I also won the women's GS title, and was second in SL, and Mirka was second in GS for the men. Not bad for a guy about to turn 41! It was truly a great week for the Kalnu Ereliai! I really really REALLY wanted to win the GS because I was competing against my arch rival, Anzela. She is former Ukrainian National Team but her husband is Lithuanian so now she races with us. She beat me in l'Alpe d'Huez in 2004, and I had no intention of letting that happen again. My skis were fast, and I knew it. She was leading after the first run, but I didn't know by how much, I thought by a half a second, though it turned out to be only .10... In the start of the second race, I told myself, "the skis are fast, just LET THEM RUN!" And that is what I did! I think it's the most fun GS race I've ever skied... I could really feel the speed. I was in my tuck nearly the entire way, opening up just for a couple tight turns at the finish. I made a mistake 5 gates to the end, and without that, I could have been at least another .10 or .20 faster. I came in with a blazing time to win the second run and the race! Well, ok, officially, Vita, the head coach of Rigas Favorits Ski Club and a new friend of mine actually won, but the Latvijans didn't give the Lithuanians who competed last year in their races medals, so we weren't giving medals this time. Still though, I won the second run outright, and the most important thing is, I beat Anzela!

The exciting thing is that Vita and I have an idea to organize the Baltic Ski Championships... Estonia, Latvija and Lithuanian all competing together with 4 days of races, SG, GS, SL and a team parallel SL. THAT would be a whole lot of fun! Hopefully we'll get it together for the 2008 season.

Now, I'm sure that everyone is wondering if I'm still actually working at the magazines or if I got fired! Well, no, I'm still there... and doing more photography than ever! So it's a lot of fun, but they are happy that ski season is over and I'll be in the office a little! Things are changing though, FHM was sold to the Latvijans, so soon we'll be moving out of our office, which means that I'll be leaving Cosmo. No worries though, we'll be moving to a brand new office space, and starting a new women's magazine which I will be editing, and doing photography for. There is also a rumor of a Landscaping and Gardening magazine that I have the opportunity to also work on. Some of you who get Lithuanian Heritage Magazine may also have noticed that I'm writing a column too! Letter from Lithuania it is called.

The great news is that Malin is coming to visit in May, in July my cousin is getting married in France, and Kostas, my friend from Greece is looking for plane tickets to come in September! So life is full and busy and fun. But that's the way it should be, right???

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