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Photo Time
Top: From left: Edita Mildazyte, Sister Inge Marijosius, Saulius Pilinkus. Above: The show's cameraman, Mindaugas Bagdonas. Linda Lemmon photos.


Lithuanian TV crew films in East Putnam

By Linda Lemmon
Town Crier Editor
EAST PUTNAM — Following Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda’s historic visit to the Immaculate Conception center last week, Lithuanian TV hosts crossed the ocean, filming shows in Chicago, Boston and finally — East Putnam.
Edita Mildazyte, journalist and host, was filming segments for her Lithuania Columbus show. She strives to “collect” the stories of famous Lithuanians all around the world. She wants to make a record of them and make people aware of just how much influence Lithuanians had/have on the world.
She began her TV career 37 years ago, when the Soviets occupied Lithuania. She won an audition against 200 to 300 others but said she was “not interested in being a doll in the window” news reader. And Soviet censorship was a challenge. Becoming a reporter was much more interesting. She took a break and when the Soviets left, her show “Indian Summer” centered on how interesting and different life was. “We were hungry, angry and very poor but we were very happy” after the Soviets left. She changed again with “Market of Problems,” where someone might need an operation, for example, and “we would find people who can help you.”
The current show, Lithuania Columbus, keys in on Lithuanians, living or dead, who have made a difference. “It’s important to our heritage,” she said. Many were famous in America, Israel, India and beyond.
Her husband, Saulius Pilinkus, was also filming his own show, “History of Things.”
They both said Putnam was a very important place to Lithuanians. For those who were leaving their Soviet-oppressed country after WWI and WWII, Putnam was a destination. “A Lithuanian system was already here” thanks to the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  
They’ve found 70 year olds who remember the names of the nuns here. “We’re saying to the viewer – ‘you belong to this story. You are a part of this experience’,” Mildazyte said.
Pilinkus said the Lithuanian-American experience is a special one. The Americans never recognized the Soviets and “we remember this.”
Sister Inge Marijosius said there is a “whole sense of value and identity shown in the Lithuania-America experience.”
The pair filmed in the center and in the cultural center and —a car ride away — the Lithuanian cemetery and the King Mindaugas Castle.

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