Linas Didvalis will introduce the film evening on Lithuanian-Japanese relations

On Monday, May 23 at 16:00, a public screening of the documentary “Kaunas. Signs of Sugihara and Japan” takes place at Jakobi 2 (room 107). Linas Didvalis will introduce the film. The event is free of charge, and everyone is welcome.

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Linas Didvalis is the head of the Centre for Asian Studies and a lecturer at Vytautas Magnus University in Lithuania. The Centre’s main objective is Asia, from the perspectives of humanities and social sciences, focusing mainly on the modern trends of Asian politics, economy, society and culture. Didvalis teaches Asian politics to undergraduate and graduate students. Didvalis teaches East Asia and development-related courses to students majoring in political science or area studies. His research mainly focuses on Japan’s environmental policies and sustainability issues in the East Asia region. 

Twenty scholars and politicians both from Lithuania and Japan participated in the shooting of the documentary “Kaunas. Signs of Sugihara and Japan”, among others Linas Didvalis.

The film talks about the bilateral relations between Kaunas and Japan through the eyes of four people. One of them is Yukichi Fukuzawa, the first Japanese who mentioned and wrote about Kaunas in his diary. In 1862, together with 36 Japanese, he travelled by train through Lithuania and went for a stroll in Kaunas. In 1905, Steponas Kairys, the author of the first Lithuanian book on Japan, was amazed by a small distant country that defeated Russia, which was ten times bigger, and inspired Lithuanians to strive for independence. Matas Šalčius, who decided to ride a bicycle from Lithuania to Japan, and Chiune Sugihara, a diplomat who showed extraordinary heroism in Lithuania in 1940 as a deputy consul of the Empire of Japan, also played an important role.