Steve Jobs gave an interview as part of a Smithsonian oral history project that’s one of the greatest things I’ve ever read, full stop. If you read this (along with the Playboy interview I’m about to mention), and you read between the lines, too, you’ll know what Steve Jobs knew.

One of the things Steve Jobs knew was that motive matters. Your motive is what’s in your heart and your mind when you’re making or doing whatever it is you make or do that people pay you for.

Walter Isaacson, in his Jobs bio, quotes from another equally lengthy and superb interview with Jobs, from 1985, for Playboy. Jobs’ recalls what his dad told him about one of the hallmarks of a real craftsman.

When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through.

That’s a long run-up to my point: I had Steve Jobs on my mind when I visited the Huntington Library in Pasadena, California, to see an exhibition on furniture maker Sam Maloof. In The Wall Street Journal article that resulted from my visit, I couldn’t help but reference good ol’ Steve.

On the surface my article is about Maloof, an American midcentury woodworker-modernist who became a legend in his own time. Beyond that however, it’s about integrity and motives and bringing soulfulness to your work. Since it lives outside The Wall Street Journal‘s pay wall, you can read it for free here.

A generous client treated me to a suite at the Fasano Las Piedras in Uruguay. I loved almost everything about this uber-posh resort in the hills above Punta del Este. The modernist bungalows, paired with a converted hacienda main building, were a revelation, and I savoured the impressive ensemble from the moment of arrival. I padded barefoot around my flagstone-floored room like it was my fourth home and rode the golf cart to the lodge like I was Hemingway on safari.

But it weirded me out that the help acted like I could have them killed if they displeased me. I found awkward their stiffness and their practiced posturing of pedestalizing my every whim. (Call it false modesty, but I don’t feel a request for a little more pepper on my gnocchi requires a ceremony rivalling the changing of the guard.)

So, to my next waiter or bell hop: please, just act like you’re a nice, confident person, my equal in every basic way, who happens, at this moment in time and under these circumstances, to be paid to look after me. We’ll get along just fine, and if you make me feel like a million bucks, I’ll endeavour — as Michael J. Fox’s concierge character put it in “For Love or Money” — to leave a tip so big it feels like passing a kidney stone.

Deal?

[Click to enlarge above panoramic photo -- my first effort with the wow-inducing and oddly named Dermandar app for iPhone]

I’m loving Mongolia. Yesterday I stood in a stockroom containing US$2 million worth of de-haired cashmere, combed, carded, teased and fluffy. It was taupe, and cream, and bursting the drawstring tops of stagecoach-ready sacks piled ceiling-high. I’d like to think it was destined to be knit into sweaters for gods and demigods. But I know it’ll end up, ill-fitting and pilled, on the backs of dolts like you and me who haven’t got even 10% of the requisite appreciation for this exceptional fibre, and who (to boot) are morally unworthy to possess such a precious, rare and laboriously-had commodity.

Okay, maybe I’m taking my job too seriously. But they’re paying me to make a big deal out of cashmere. That’s my reason for being here. So I’m practicing.

San Salvador, Bahamas, a sandy coral cay that would meet the specs for Desert Island Discs, was the first land Chris Columbus sighted in the New World, on October 12, 1492. “I believe Japan is only a short distance to the west,” he wrote in his logbook. (Really.)

Some 189,000 days later, I awoke at San Salvador myself, 200 yards off the beach in the anchored 55-foot sloop Far Niente, which belongs to my best friend from university, Chris Robbins. It was the Fourth of July, and for two reasons, I greeted the day with a feeling of disorientation not unlike Columbus’s.

Firstly, it was a strange place to be on American Independence Day. The Bahamas are Commonwealth islands first settled by loyalists who fled the American colonies at the time of the 1776 revolution. Secondly — and far more significantly — at 36 years old, this was the first time I’d celebrated the annual Yankee victory party as anything other than a full-fledged, red-blooded American.

Though I am a California dude by birth, six months ago I voluntarily became a British subject (I still hold US citizenship, too, as dual nationality is allowed by both countries). I’ve lived in England almost eight years, going from work permit to work permit, so taking UK citizenship was practical. It also felt natural; it was something I wanted. (That I got it done in time to vote Tory in May’s general election was a bonus.) But still it felt weird to be a Brit on this hallowed American holiday.

At midday on the Fourth of July, in a rubber dinghy floating above San Sal’s barrier reef, I set aside my national identity issues and cinched up my scuba gear. Chris was taking me on a wall dive. We sank our wet-suited selves — gurgle, glub, glub — 30 feet till we were standing atop the dead coral in our fins. Then we swam a few strokes seaward and the bottom dropped out: we were suspended, like cartoon characters who’d run off a cliff, over an unfathomable expanse. Although I’m a certified diver, I’m definitely not a regular denizen of the deep, and by the time we got to 70 feet under I began to feel drunk and dizzy — the symptoms of nitrogen narcosis — and I made slowly for the surface, holding eye contact with a barracuda during part of the ascent.

Back on board Chris’ Far Niente, we hoisted the Stars the Stripes and set a course for Rum Cay, making the 25 nautical-mile crossing in four hours. And here, dear reader, please grant me a conventional British whinge with an American tinge. Because the major thing a West Coast native leaves behind when he’s transplanted to Blighty isn’t great Mexican food or the right to turn right on red. It’s cultural references. About Rum Cay (pop. 60, maybe 90 if you include visitors), I could just tell you “Man, it’s straight out of a Jimmy Buffet song!” Buffett is a Gulf Coastal balladeer who sings about boats, beaches and bars and reportedly earns $100 million a year; according to Rolling Stone he’s the 7th richest rock musician in the world. In America he’s a legend, but in Britain, he’s nobody from nowhere.

Being unable to make reference to Buffett in a British context is, I admit, irksome, even alienating, but since I had never heard of Beckham until 2003, I’ll forgive you — just go to YouTube next time you’re feeling gloomy and listen to “[Wastin’ Away in] Margaritaville” or “The Weather is Here, Wish You Were Beautiful.” Then you’ll catch my drift.

For Independence Day revels, the colourful cast of Rum Cay locals set ablaze a dried coconut “burning man” on the beach that night and launched a thundering sortie of  fireworks over the assembled crowd of yachties and fishermen. And as the bombs burst in the air, for the first time all day, I felt damn truly, and damn proudly, American.

Right then, my old buddy Chris (I still cannot bring myself to say “mate”; it just sounds bizarre coming out of my mouth) asked me whose side I’d take if, hypothetically, Britain and America went to war. I replied that it might depend on the reason for the war, and whatever personal principles or possessions of mine were at stake. My response astonished me. A lifetime habit of reflexive Americanness, cultivated from grammar school (“I pledge allegiance to the flag…” we’d recite every morning, just as you’ve seen it in films), had apparently lapsed.

Introspectively, I realised: I now have two national loyalties and there is more than enough room in my heart to feel profound attachment and gratitude to both great nations. Like the treble and bass of the tape deck on the Ford Tempo I got when I turned 16 in Los Angeles, or the CD player of the Nissan Figaro I drive in London, there’s no conflict: these two national timbres sound good together.

Anyhow, I thought to myself as the firework smoke dispersed into the balmy Bahamian night, with a bit of luck, that shared God (the one so often mentioned in my two countries’ patriotic songs) won’t ever be forced to choose between blessing America and saving the Queen — and neither will I.

Havana, Cuba: where a Yankee imperialist *is* a Yankee imperialist.

There’s a great expression in American English: “Where you stand depends on where you sit.”

It means: your point of view is probably highly correlated with what you think your place in the world is.

It’s a simple idea, but I have found it extremely powerful to keep it in mind when working on place branding jobs, or doing any kind of corporate identity work that involves getting to know the culture of an organization or a nation. And I’ve been grateful — and amused — whenever I’ve stumbled across something that makes me realize my perspective is just that: a perspective, not [necessarily] the gospel truth.

Example 1:

Once I wrote an article for The Wall Street Journal about the British Empire and Commonwealth Museum in Bristol, England. When I visited the museum, I found one placard on the wall which put the American Revolution somewhat differently than did my childhood history texts in Southern California:

Colonial rebels: The American War of Independence

By 1765 thirteen very different English-speaking colonies stretched along America’s east coast. But, from Georgia in the south to Massachusetts in the north, one thing united them. They disliked Britain imposing taxes on them.

The colonists kept spreading westwards, seizing land and starting wars with the local people. They expected British troops to defend them. But they objected when parliament tried to recover its defence costs by taxing them.

And so on. Not inaccurate — but certainly framed from an angle alien to the one I grew up accepting as reality.

Example 2:

In Havana, Cuba, the one-time presidential palace now houses the Museum of the Revolution. Outside the museum is the tank which supposedly (but why shouldn’t it be so?) Fidel Castro himself drove at the Bay of Pigs invasion. The text is all about Yankee imperialist invaders and heroic rebuffs. So, too, is the placard beside the pieces of Maj. Rudolph Anderson’s U-2 plane, which the Cubans managed to shoot down in 1962 just prior to the Cuban missile crisis. To an American it’s entertaining to read. Sure, it’s propagandistic, but it makes you realize there’s another side to the coin.

But my point is simple: I always try to remember that mine isn’t the only way of looking at things, and — possibly even more vitally — that people’s perspectives are always as real and truthful to them as mine is to me.

There *is* something about old spa towns. Maybe it’s just the exaggerated power of suggestion induced by knowing that generations and legions of people have been drawn from far and wide to a particular place to have a particular experience.

Druskininkai is in southeastern Lithuania, near the borders with Poland and Belarus, and people get here in cars and buses from all three countries.

In Soviet times, there was a full-service aqua health park in Druskininkai. I’m standing in front of the mosaic mural at the entrance to it in the nearby photograph. Now the park is dilapidated but I like walking its grounds. I imagine buying it and bringing it back to life — which would be a very health-spa thing to do, really.

I picture Druskininkai in its mid-20th century prime, filled with workers on holiday “trying to cram lost years into five or six days,” in Jimmy Buffett terms — a Commie ROAD TO WELLVILLE, as it were, animated by a Soviet pseudoscience every bit as hopeful and hopeless as Kellogg’s Michegonian variety.

I get it, though. Whatever side of the Iron Curtain you’re on, we all want to live forever.

Warsaw, Poland — I’m just capping off a 5-day solo ramble (more accelerated than an amble, you see) to Ukraine and Poland. I travelled with only a daypack and an iPhone 4, and it was the freest I’ve felt on the road in years. This is in spite of a tight schedule and a lot of ground to cover. Here are my lessons, plus a few key app recommendations.

But first, a paragraph of background. My ancestors on my mother’s side are from somewhere near Lviv, in present-day Ukraine. I’ve been curious about the place for years, especially since visiting Kyiv last December to speak at a conference where the director of tourism for Lviv presented some beautiful slides of his city. I decided to use Lviv as destination one of a mini-Eastern European odyssey.

I started the trip in Vilnius, Lithuania, where I’m based for the summer. I booked the trip largely through Kayak.co.uk, a site which in conjunction with its app, continues to impress me and become a go-to service for flight reservations, and Booking.com, which also has a superb app for finding and booking hotels.

Vilnius is still a backwater, bless it, as is Lviv, so getting from A to B took two hops, and this is where travelling with only a daypack as carry-on came into its own. I had a 30-minute connection time in Riga (simple, as Air Baltic dominates this airport) and a 60-minute connection in Kyiv in which I had to clear customs and change terminals. A cakewalk, in the end.

(Aside: Ukrainian International Airlines has one of the most terrific web services I’ve used, including a button I clicked which put me straight through, at 10 o’clock at night, to an English-speaking agent; I called beforehand to get a better sense of the terminal change I was faced with. The UIA site does have an irritating animated stewardess Toast overlay pop-up thing, but at least she’s hot.)

You must understand that one reason I travel is to break with routine, so I value interesting hotels over conventionally nice ones. A comfortable bed, a window that opens and Wi-Fi are the primary amenities I need; most everything else is optional — though hot water is nice.

The Hotel George smack dab in the heart of Lviv, had hot water and local character in spades. I liked the place. Its highlight were the young women staffing the front desk. They were charming and helpful and, interestingly, worked 24-hour shifts, from 9am to 9am, which means service doesn’t flag due to handovers. The women liked this work pattern, too. Aligned to a natural cycle, they were more attuned to the flows of things, and then they had whole days off after each shift, so they could plan their own lives better. It will be nice when labour laws of advanced countries allow for this, which I’m guessing they don’t now.

After Lviv came a 10-hour train ride to Krakow, Poland, with a 7am departrue. I had a lower berth and the compartment to myself, and had stocked up on noshes like nuts and raisins and smoked sausage (and two litres of water) the night before. The only discomfort I had, in fact, was mental, as nobody spoke English and I was afraid I’d miss Krakow and end up somewhere else. Then I remembered I’d installed the free Europe Offline map, and so I used that to check the train journey’s progress. When the GPS showed we were drawing near Krakow, I packed up my stuff.

Krakow, once the imperial capital of Poland, impressed me with its grandeur — I did not expect the Wawel fortress, for instance — and comparisons with Prague strike me as very, very fair, including the throngs of tourists and the touts who love them. The rynok square at dusk was almost too vast and vibrant.

By the time I got to the Jewish quarter, it was dark and I my iPhone battery was dead. Feeling young, and not caring whether I slept that night, I checked into Nathan’s Villas, the first hostel I happened upon. Sitting in the lobby with the phone plugged in and typing on my Bluetooth keyboard (which tethers to the phone, I discovered only a day before the trip — now THIS changes everything) proved to be a talking point, and within 15 minutes, I’d made  three instafriends. The night, hot, then rainy, then fresh, was underway. Backpacker banter ensured. Good times, as the young people say.

In the morning there was a stoic, silent, tanned Japanese man about 50 years old in the breakfast room. Decked out in brightly coloured North Face-type garb, he prepared toast and jam like it was a tea ceremony, and then stared straight ahead as he ate while sipping from an insulated camping mug. He should have looked out of place but he didn’t, and noticing this cheered me greatly, and I thought to myself, fine, maybe I can keep doing this a few more years, too, at least now and then.

This trip reminded me how damned exciting the “people you meet” aspect of travel can be, and it made me sad to think how many years of it I’d foregone for one reason or another. If I could do my twenties over again, there’s no doubt I’d have more stamps in my passports and even more stories for my [posthumously published!] memoirs.

Bidding adieu this morning to my fellow travellers at Nathan’s, I flew LOT to Warsaw. There was no printer at Nathan’s so when I’d checked in online I opted for the “send boarding pass to mobile device” option. The QR-code on the iPhone screen couldn’t be read by the red laser scanner at the gate, as happens about half the time in my experience, so the one lady read the details off to the other lady and I got through just fine. The flight was swift but buzzy from the turboprop; the vibrations actually were strong enough to make The Killers’ Brandon Flowers’ voice stutter on my headphones. (BTW, has anyone else noticed that flight attendants are letting you listen to music during takeoff and landing nowadays, and going easy on the admonishments to switch your phone off before takeoff? I’m loving this apparent trend.)

Well…I’m going out now. Nighttime Warsaw. Dinner. And what else? Which brings me to my last and most important app recommendation for travellers: City Maps 2Go.

City Maps 2Go costs a buck or two and once you’ve installed it lets you download offline maps of a goodly number of the world’s cities. (A screen grab of the Lviv map, with my dropped pins, might be nearby if I’ve uploaded it correctly; I’m experimenting with WordPress mobile, since if I wait to write posts they usually never get written.)

Users of the built-in Google maps for mobile might at first be disappointed with City Maps 2Go, but stick with it. The “headlights” on the blue ball show you which direction you are facing (why doesn’t Google do this, or have I failed to toggle that feature?). Getting the lay of the land on the flight in (and what joy and advantage there is in preparing yourself for a place by engaging with the map before you visit), you can find points of interest already in the database or drop your own pins — as many as you’d wish, unlike the built-in map app — and label them; for instance, I put pins in for certain sights mentioned by the outstanding InYourPocket.com guides to Lviv and Krakow, the free PDF versions of which I’d downloaded to Drop Box and leafed through using PDF Expert.

The fact that you cannot query for directions or a route from point to point struck me at first as a bug and only later as a feature. In fact, this is brilliant, because it forces you to wander while at the same time making the wandering more efficient and thus more pleasurable. With City Maps 2Go, the only thing you know for sure is where you are, and even if you have a mind about where you’re going, you will need to make your own way there. Thus the emphasis shifts to the journey, to the exploration, which you can pursue as directly or circuitously as you wish. Since you’ve dropped your pins in advance to pre-map your territory, you’re still being purposeful. And yet you can’t get lost. You can only lose yourself.

That’s what I call travelling.

The Tube as it really is. "Wow," right?

The London Tube “Map” (which is really a diagram, because of its gross geographic inaccuracies) is beloved. Even the normally hyper-rational Edward Tufte seems to approve of it.

But I’ve always hated the damned thing, and seethed with resentment at the distorted view of London that’s been forced on me (and others) by its ubiquity. I understand that it’s elegant–using only horizontal, vertical and 45-degree lines–but it so obscures the true street-level layout of Europe’s largest city (as well as the transit time between lines at certain stations) that, according to one NYU researcher, the famous map (read: loathsome diagram) can cause 30% of all travellers to take a longer route than necessary.

Having lived in London for eight years, how many hundreds of times have I been one of these travellers? How many hours have I lost thanks to this lovely piece of iconic design (read: overhyped purveyor of misinformation)?

Fresh off the boat to London, I lived in Earl’s Court, on the Piccadilly Line. The Piccadilly Line opened in 1906, so I was able to use the 1924 edition of the London Underground map, which I printed in colour and carried with me. However, too much of the rail system was built after 1924 to make this eccentricity of mine sustainable. Reluctantly, I went back to the ubiquitous diagram.

Now, someone named Mark Noad has created an accurate Tube map. The Economist has written about it. I hope it catches on. I have downloaded the PDF to my phone and I’ll see if using it, instead of Mr. Beck’s fatally flawed legend, improves my public transport experience of London whenever I deign to take the Tube (like most Londoners, I prefer travelling by bus or foot).

Dispatch from Mangshi, China; Tue 4/2/02 9:16 AM; from the Heat Treatment ’02 series.

Dear Friends,

I never thought I’d say “Ahh, freedom,” upon crossing into Red China, but that’s exactly what I breathed to myself yesterday as we left Burma-slash-Myanmar after a whirlwind week in that repressed, impoverished, tarnished jewel of a country.

Burma, wrote Kipling, is unlike any place you’ve ever seen before.

Boy, and how.

In Rangoon, we dined at the home of a dentist turned antique dealer (more money in old ivory than new, I suppose). Pickled squid and spring rolls stuffed with glass noodles were my favorite dishes that night. We sat in cane-bottom chairs on the veranda drinking local beer, and were attended to by the two household servants. We felt like members of the British raj a century ago, except that rather than flout the native customs as they did, we embraced them, particularly with respect to dress.

Literally, dress, for that evening, and for the better part of the week, we wore the longyi wrap-around “skirts” favored by 97% of Burmese men and 99% of Burmese women. It felt awkward at first, I admit, but the longyi is purpose-built for the brutally hot climate and exceedingly comfortable. Also, I soon realized that we looked about as out of place wearing a skirt in Burma as one does wearing a Brooks Brothers suit in lower Manhattan. In other words, not a bit. Besides, the Burmese people seemed really to appreciate the overture, and so I felt much less like every other Western tourist traipsing through the Orient with a camera ’round his neck.

At Nyuang U jetty in Bagan, on the sandy south bank of the Irrawaddy River with the afternoon sun low in the sky, we watched men carry bags of cargo, one by one, down the gangplanks of moored ships. They tossed the sacks onto the beds of waiting ox carts who then pulled them sluggishly up the berm to drop off the load and return for more. Meanwhile, children bathed, fishermen fished, and women carried water in buckets balanced on their heads. Were it not for the sound of the diesel engines of the two ships, there would have been no way to tell we weren’t in the 19th century. No earthly way. Most of Burma is like that. It is quaint, and also sad.

In Old Bagan, we chewed betel nuts and took in the sunset while perched atop a 900-year old temple — one of hundreds of such temples located within a few square miles. (You haven’t lived, I tell you, until you’ve spit deep-red betel juice over the side of an ancient monument as the sun goes down over the dusty plains of Burma.)

Bagan is virtually unknown internationally (except to archeologists and such), but I predict it will become a top tourist attraction once Burma (which now calls itself Myanmar) opens up. If foreigners were allowed to own property in Burma, I’d buy a hotel in Bagan.

In Mandalay, we drank tea with Par Par Lay, a comedian who spent more than six years in jail for telling a joke that the government didn’t like. He was released a few months ago, and performs nightly (and indeed, discreetly) at his house, along with his brother, his cousin, and their wives. As a troupe they are known as the Moustache Brothers and are renowned in Burma. They told us that they are under regular surveillance by the secret police and live in constant fear of retribution to themselves and their family. Yet courageously, they go about their activities as if they lived in a free country.

From Mandalay, we wound our way up the infamous Burma Road, built at great human cost by Allied soldiers and Chinese and other local coolies during WWII, and rebuilt by drug lords in the last few years (all the swifter to carry opium by, you see).

Halfway through this leg, we relaxed in the British hill station of Pyin U Lwin at the Candacraig Hotel, built in 1907 as a lodging for the bachelor employees of the Bombay Burmah Teak Company. The seven-room inn is constructed more or less entirely of teak, and is, without a doubt, the most elegant hotel I have ever stayed in for $30 a night. The elegance and archaism of the place was enhanced by the fact that we arrived (I kid you not!) by horsedrawn carriage.

Our passage on the Burma Road was impeded only slightly by the five checkpoints we had to clear along the way. Going into it, we were greatly worried (having been warned by people who might know) that our cameras and film and notebooks might be confiscated at any of these checkpoints, and with them the many stories we will later tell in great detail, not all of them flattering to the Myanmar government.

But we emerged with all of our possessions unsullied and crossed the border from Muse, Burma to Ruili, PRC, yesterday evening, losing 1.5 hours on the time difference (why Burma is half a timezone off I’ll have to research; it certainly is novel, not to mention inconvenient). For some reason our car wasn’t permitted to cross, so we parked about a block away from the border and crossed on foot, bags in hand. Interesting sensation, to walk into another country.

Well, my dispatches should resume now. The Internet is illegal in Burma — even the American consulate, we learned when we reported our itinerary, is without access. Of course the twice- or thrice-nightly nationwide power outtages aren’t very good for computing anyway (we never went anywhere at night without flashlights), but at least you can buy Windows 2000 professional edition for 700 kyats (less than a U.S. dollar) in many stores. (I might have to devote a later dispatch or two to more of Burma and our adventures there; there’s just so much to tell).

We’ll be in China, working our way back to Kunming, until Friday, April 5, when we fly to Phnom Penh, Cambodia. There may not be email access there either, but other than that, I should be able to stay in touch through the end of April.

All the best,

Jeremy

Lithuania used to be the largest country in Europe, stretching, under the rule of Grand Duke Vytautas in 1430, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea (a feat achieved, incidentally, not by conquest but by inclusiveness and diplomacy).  Lithuania was also a Soviet Republic for half a century, and Vilnius, its capital, wears on its sleeve the evidence of just how far the country’s come since independence in 1991 (and joining the EU in 2004).

After much restoration, Vilnius is back to being its ridiculously beautiful self. Home to about half a million, it’s one of the most pleasing cities in northeastern Europe: distinctive and familiar, exalted and accessible, storied and gloried, ambitious, confident, tragic, romantic and, these days, very, very lively.

Where to stay

The Narutis (Pilies str 24; + 370 5 2122894; www.narutis.com) is sometimes said to be the best hotel in Vilnius, and is well-appointed if stuffy. The Reval Hotel Lietuva (Konstitucijos pr. 20; +371 6 777 2345; www.revalhotels.com) is gigantic and well-run by a Finn, but is a good walk across the river from old town. If you want to play it safe and be confident of a perfect location, try the Radisson (Didzioji 35/2; +370 5 2120 110;www.radissonblu.com/hotel-vilnius). If you don’t mind staying 10 minutes by foot from the action, the moderately priced Algirdas (Algirdo str. 24; +370 5 2326650; www.algirdashotel.lt), is one of the newest hotels in Vilnius. Or if you want to be fully self-sufficient and rent a flat, contact Darius at VIP Apartments (+370 6984 7355; www.vipapartments.lt/?en).

Where to eat

Vilnius doesn’t have many fine dining options, but if you need a special restaurant, try Saint Germain (Literatu 9; +370 5 2621 210; www.vynine.lt) or DOMM (Didzioji 31; +370 686 77707;www.domm.lt) in the Town Hall, which is reputedly the best in town.

The atmospheric Uzupis Café (Uzupio 2; +370 5 2122 138;www.uzupiokavine.lt) is famed as the bar, restaurant and parliament house of the Uzupis Republic. Here you can try saltibarsciai (cold borscht with potatoes – good stuff) or cepelinai (potato dumplings stuffed with minced meat; a real Lithuanian classic – the classic, actually, but not to everybody’s taste) or kepta duona (fried rye bread with garlic and cheese) and wash it down with the ubiquitous Lithuanian brewsky, Svyturys Extra.

In the district of Gedimino, Neringa (Gedimino Avenue 23;+370 5 2614 058; www.restoranasneringa.lt) is a great place for lunch and a glimpse of classic Soviet interior design; the specialty of the house is deep-fried chicken Kiev. Slightly further out but worth the walk (over the bridge, past the Seimas parliament building) is the quirky, classy, hip Jalta (Vykinto 17a) which is good for drinks or food, day or night.

Elsewhere, the Contemporary Art Centre café (Vokieciu 2; + 370 5 2121945; www.cac.lt) is a stylish place to grab a bite to eat for lunch or dinner while Manonering Guru (Vilniaus 22; +370 5 2120 126; lunch only) has a vast selection of fresh salads.

Where to party

Many locals feel Pabo Latino (Traku 3/2; +370 5 2621 045;www.pabolatino.lt) is a bit of a meat market, but it’s also the snazziest club in Vilnius. Woo (Vilniaus 22; +370 5 2127 740;www.woo.lt) draws a good crowd, but can get stiflingly hot. They have a lot of live acts, including the jazz that Lithuanians are famous for. The salon-ish Mano Alibi (Totoriu 18; + 370 5 212 5051; www.manoalibi.lt), with its flecked wallpaper, has a wall-to-wall crowd even on a Tuesday night. Paparazzi (Totoriu 3; +370 5 2120 135; www.paparazzi.lt) a block away, is a wryly themed institution with an extensive cocktail menu.

For a mellower scene, or to kick off the evening, head for In Vino (Ausros Vartu 7; +370 5 2121 210; www.invino.lt), not far from the Gates of Dawn, or Tappo D’oro (Stuokos-Guceviciaus 7; +370 686 168 66; www.tempolibero.lt) between the cathedral and the president’s palace. Both wine bars are done nicely (the latter exceptionally so), but with a local twist, and get packed at peak times so make a reservation beforehand if possible.

What to see

Vilnius is best understood as a place for ambling about. The entire downtown – the largest working old town in Europe – is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a feast for the senses, especially in summertime. There are three key areas to check out: Pilies Street (and surrounds), Gedimino Avenue (and surrounds) and the district of Uzupis.

The Gates of Dawn and Pilies (Castle) Street

The Gates of Dawn is the last of the original entrances through the mostly long-gone city wall. A few blocks down from here is the restored Town Hall square. Off the square is Vokeciu [German] Street, a wide boulevard at the corner of which is the Contemporary Arts Centre. Incidentally, Vilnius was one of the most important Jewish cities in Europe – the Jerusalem of the north – and this whole neighbourhood was the heart of Jewish Vilnius prior to WWII; Vokeciu Street divided two of the ghettos.

Further down Pilies Street you’ll pass Vilnius University (Universteto 3; +370 5 2687 0001; www.vu.lt), Lithuania’s Harvard and one of the oldest universities in Eastern Europe. Close to the bottom of Pilies, turn right down Mykolo Street and stop at the Amber Gallery (Myklo Str 8; +370 5 2625 241;www.ambergallery.lt). There’s a tiny, free “museum” downstairs, and if you want to buy amber, some of the best is sold here. Amber has deep cultural and mythological significance in Lithuania’s pagan heritage, making it an appropriate souvenir.

Castle Hill and Gedimino Avenue

There is only one thing in Vilnius you really must see, and that’s the KGB museum (Auku str. 2a; +370 5 249 7427;www.genocid.lt/muziejus/en/). It’s actually called the Genocide Victims’ Museum, but since it manages to gloss completely over the awful period of Nazi occupation from 1941 to 1944, its common name is more accurate and more deserved. If you have only ten minutes between meetings, then just go downstairs and walk the length of the prison. It won’t be pleasant, but you’ll be doing your job as a human. The museum is free and keeps reasonable hours. Don’t miss it.

Climb the Castle Hill (or take the funicular) up to what’s left of the castle. The view, plus the wooden scale models of the city at various stages on display inside, will give you the lay of the land of Vilnius. At the base of the hill is the cathedral. The separate tower is the bell tower, and it’s the chief visual icon of the city. Put the cathedral at your back and walk straight up Gedimino Avenue. This was Lenin’s Prospekt during Soviet Times, and remains Vilnius’s main drag. Make a right opposite the Novotel, and walk down Vilniaus Street to the river and the Green Bridge, which exhibits probably the only four ideologically Soviet statues still standing in the country (if you’re curious about Soviet architecture, seek out the Lietuva cinema and the Soviet wedding palace, both of which are truly impressive examples). From here you’ll also glimpse a few of the city’s modern skyscrapers across the river.

The Uzupis Republic

My favourite Vilnius neighbourhood and the first settlement built outside the protective city walls. It fell into disrepair after it was cleared of its Jewish inhabitants in the Holocaust and was subsequently taken over by artists, thieves, prostitutes and suchlike, before declaring itself a faux-independent republic in 2000. Its current incarnation is a welcoming admixture of truly Bohemian and genuinely gentrified.

On your way there, make sure you notice St Anne’s church, a red brick gothic building which Napoleon wanted to take home in his pocket for Josephine. Walk along the river behind the Uzupis Café and find the Bridge to Nowhere, the Galera (Uzupio2;www.umi.lt) art gallery (typical artsy Uzupis), and the sculptures in the river. If you go back and carry on up the main street you came in on, up to the square, you’ll see the Uzupis Angel on a pillar in the centre.

If you’ve got any time (or energy) left, follow the road up the hill, take the right fork and pop into the hideaway known as Snekutis (Polocko 7a; +370 6504 7058)  for a bottle of beer or gira (refreshing fermented bread drink) and a side of garlicky smoked pig’s ears. If it’s a warm, sunny day, though, take the left fork instead and visit Tores (Uzupio 40; +370 603 90524;www.tores.lt) which has a memorable view of the city’s spires, tiled roofs and forested hillsides from its terrace.

Out of town

About 40 minutes from Vilnius is the country’s ancient capital, Trakai, with a restored Teutonic castle situated on an island in a lake. Go anytime of year (by train, car or organized tour). There’s a formal restaurant close to the bridge, or the casual standby Kybynlar (Karaim? g.29; +370 698 06320; www.kybynlar.lt), serving the food (and teaching you something of the culture) of the local Karaite people, a wandering Turkic tribe that settled here ages ago.

Best read

Vilnius: City of Strangers is the best single volume on the city. Says one rave review, it contains “diary entries, letters, jottings and other personal prose written about Vilnius over the past 700 years or so by visitors to the city including Dostoyevsky, G. K. Chesterton, Napoleon, Stendahl and others….Brimming with tales and observations of Germans, Jews, Poles, Russians, Tartars, Belarussions and of course Lithuanians to name but a few who’ve helped shape the city.”

What you should know

Lithuanian’s the language here (standard Roman alphabet; it helps if you happen to know Sanskrit, to which it’s closely related), but you can gingerly assume English is understood (and spoken with a considerable range of proficiency) by professionals, shopkeepers and everyone under the age of 30. It’s even easier to get by in Russian, the speaking of which will cause no offence; the ethnic Russians here are well integrated, so unlike in the other two Baltic countries Estonia and Latvia, speaking Russian in Lithuania won’t provoke any sensitivities.

The weekly podcasts of the Mondayjazz musical group (www.mondayjazz.com) have reputedly gained a worldwide following and may just put you in a Vilnius mood before – and after – your visit.

Words and photos by Jeremy Hildreth (www.jeremyhildreth.com) Originally published on Globalista as Globalista’s Mini-Guide to Vilnius.