Lithuanian daily and annual routine | True Lithuania
True Lithuania

Lithuanian daily and annual routine

Most Lithuanians live, work or study in cities and therefore their daily routines are quite similar. Time is generally important to Lithuanians so they schedule many of their activities in advance.

The usual day of a Lithuanian: home and work

Most Lithuanians work from 8:00 to 17:00 Monday to Friday, with a break at 12:00-13:00. This schedule is especially strict in most national and municipal institutions but may be more flexible at private companies.

Separate office rooms for 1-4 people each are the most common office arrangement. ©Augustinas Žemaitis.

The commute is short as most people both live and work in the same city/town, so most could wake up at 06:30 or 07:00, eat a quick breakfast and drive to their 8:00 jobs (public transportation is slower and generally limited to the poor and those unable to drive).

The mid-day (~12:00) meal is sometimes translated as "dinner" rather than "lunch" as it is the primary meal of the day. It is enjoyed by taking up special offers at restaurants near the workplace, reheating meal taken from home or (in smaller towns) going back home. Shorter coffee or cigarette breaks may also be taken if there is less work. Office workers also browse social media and news websites between the jobs.

An average Lithuanian can be home after work ~18:00 devoting the evening to his hobbies, household chores or TV. The supper is then prepared and eaten, more commonly by a wife, whereas the husband is expected to do repairs and physical work needed at home. This traditional reliance on do-it-yourself has somewhat withered as post-independence economic boom made eating out and hiring professional help much more affordable. Still, being good at the chores of the respective sex is considered honorable. Full-time servants or nannies are rare even among the rich.

Evening rush hour in Vilnius in January. Short winter days mean that Lithuanians leave homes before sunrise and come back after sunset. ©Augustinas Žemaitis.

If the family has kids and the school is far away they may drive them in the morning. However, usually, kids are enrolled into the nearest one and walk or use public transport to there on their own from a very young age (~8 years old), which is generally safe. The lessons start at 8:00 and may end at 12:00 to 15:30 depending on a day and schoolyear (older kids have more lessons). In any case children usually come back home earlier than parents unless they go out somewhere. In the evenings, kids are expected to do extensive homework.

University student schedule is similar to that of school students although the lecture times are less regular.

The youngest kids usually spend the entire daytime at kindergartens where they are driven in the morning and taken as parents are going home from work (unless there are grandparents or hired nannies to look after them).

The schedules are different for those who work evening shifts or long shifts alternating with prolonged leisure periods (e.g. in supermarkets). Night shifts are less common since most labor-intensive factories have closed down. Peasants also have unique schedules dependent on the annual cycle of seasons.

Weekends (Saturdays and Sundays) are free for most workers and students.

Walking around parks without a particular goal is a popular weekend activity in summer. In winter such strolls are mostly confined to shopping malls, where far from every visitor buys much. ©Augustinas Žemaitis.

Lithuanian vacation and travel habits

The Lithuanian Labor code gives 1 month of annual paid holidays, 2 weeks of which must be consecutive. Lithuanians usually spend these times in the garden, countryside, visiting relatives, on the seaside, traveling abroad, prolonged partying or simply at home.

After independence (and scrapped Soviet travel limitations) an annual or more frequent foreign travels became a norm. Middle-aged and small-town people prefer regularly coming back for holidays in the same Turkish or Egyptian resorts. Young generation increasingly travels independently. Still, Lithuanians love their own beaches and the local resorts get extremely crowded in summer weekends (even if nearly everyone agrees that they have far too little sun). Some now own a house or apartment at the seaside.

Crowded beach in Palanga resort on a hot and sunny summer day. Short coastline and sea-worshipping vacation culture mean many sunbathers per beach kilometer. ©Augustinas Žemaitis.

Alternatively, some city dwellers hold a strip of suburban farmland ("garden") and may spend free summer time at their homes/sheds there. Foraging, fishing, and sports activities are popular seasonal hobbies as well. Some other pastimes, such as alpine skiing or scuba diving, usually require a vacation abroad. Binge drinking is a far less glamorous weekend/vacation activity, its popularity considered a societal problem.

Families with children tend to adapt their out-of-home vacations to the children schoolyear, which starts invariably on September 1st and ends (summer holiday begins) at late May to late June, depending on school and pupil's age. There are also Winter school holidays (December 24th-January 6th) and Spring school holidays (a week before or after Catholic Easter), in some schools also Autumn school holidays (variable). Universities generally follow a similar pattern with the Autumn and Spring semesters ending in January and June respectively (when the exams take place).

Students begin their school year in formal attire and flowers for teachers on September 1st. ©Augustinas Žemaitis.

Traditionally it was not uncommon to have foreign holidays by taking children from school for some time, in general, the family freedom to decide upon child's upbringing is respected in Lithuania more than in some Western societies. However, that changed rapidly in 2020s when the government introduced more authoritarian restrictions on parenting, threatening parents who engage in such practices and essentially limiting family holidays to the times of the official school holidays.

Lithuania is among the world leaders in the number of public holidays. Most of them lack popular celebration traditions and are thus considered as short vacations (especially when joined with a weekend). A few holidays, however, are nearly universally celebrated at hometown with family or a wider circle of relatives. These are Christmas (including Kūčios) and to a lesser extent Easter, Vėlinės. Most also celebrate their birthday though that celebration may be moved by 1-2 weeks for convenience.

Summer is the traditional time for vacations and the only time when local seaside or countryside holidays are feasible. Foreign travels, however, made such vacations possible anytime. In spite of this, climate still frames the Lithuanian yearly routine: cold winter weather brings nearly all activities indoors while massive heating bills strip poor-to-middle-class families of much of their disposable income.

See also: Holidays / Celebrations in Lithuania.

Article written by Augustinas Žemaitis

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