Global True Lithuania Encyclopedia of Lithuanian heritage worldwide

Japan

Japan may be worlds apart from Lithuania culturally and geographically, yet, unexpectedly, it has a vast array of Lithuanian locations.

Unlike anywhere else in the world, these Lithuanian sites of Japan were almost universally created or funded not by Lithuanians but rather by Japanese people who became interested in Lithuanian culture or history.

Commemorative plaque for the visit of Lithuanian president in Yaotsu

Lithuanian sculptures in Inami

The town of Inami in Toyama Prefecture has two Lithuanian sculptures – one dedicated to the Lithuanian pagan (pre-Christian) goddess of fire Gabija, and another one dedicated to the Lithuanian patron saint Casimir.

Gabija statue in Inami

The sculptures are located in a sculpture park on the opposite side of the intersection from the Inami Sculpture General Hall (note: there is another sculpture park right next to the hall, that one lacks Lithuanian sculptures).

Inami town is famous for its woodworking. The Japanese here, however, decided to go beyond the local woodworking tradition and regularly invite sculptors from all over the world to build their traditional sculptures. Two sculptors were invited from Lithuania.

Sculpture of St. Casimir

While some sculptures in the Inami’s two sculpture parks are “international” in nature (with only plaques next to them reminding of the nationality of the author), the Lithuanian sculptures are arguably the ones the most rooted in tradition and culture. Not only their topics are entirely traditional, but they are also inscribed in Lithuanian language.

Inscription on the sculpture of St. Casimir in Inami

Gabija was built in 1999 by Algimantas Sakalauskas. The inscription on the sculpture says “Gabija Ugnies Deivė” (Gabija Fire Goddess); the non-Lithuanian inscriptions on the plaque says “Fire Goddess”.

Gabija sculpture plaque

Saint Casimir was built in 2007 by Raimundas Puškorius. The sculpture is reminiscent of a traditional Lithuanian chapel-post, a small “chapel” with a sculpture of a saint (St. Casimir) on top of a pole. Above the “chapel”, there is a sun, a Pagan symbol that also found its way into Lithuanian Christian iconography. On the basis of the post a Lithuanian inscription says that St. Casimir is a patron saint of Lithuania (“Šv. Kazimieras Lietuvos globėjas”).

Close-up of St. Casimir

Close-up of Gabija

Together, the two sculptures in this far away Japanese garden represent both religious epochs of Lithuania. Gabija shows the traditional Baltic faith, which survived longer than nearly all the other pagan European religions (Lithuania, the Europe’s last pagan great power, converted to Christianity only in 1387). St. Casimir depicts the current Lithuanian Catholic tradition, which, while rooted in international Christianity, acquired its own popular symbols, among them St. Casimir and chapel-posts.

Plaque next to the sculpture of St. Casimir

Lithuanian House in Kuji

Kuji town of Iwate prefecture has a Lithuanian House. This town is twinned with Klaipėda, Lithuania since 1989, and that cooperation has been called among the best examples of intercity partnership, as, when Lithuania was attacked by the Soviet Union in 1991, the people and mayor of Kuji petitioned the Soviet government against this while, when Kuji was hit by the great Tohoku tsunami in 2011, people of Klaipėda collected donations for the city.

Lithuanian House in Kuji

Lithuanian House of Kuji is the most tangible example of the partnership. It is open almost every day during the spring-to-autumn season. From the outside, the building has many Lithuanian details, including a Lithuanian flag perpetually waving. Inside, one can find a shop for Lithuanian goods, something usually non-existent outside countries with large Lithuanian communities. Among the goods sold there is Lithuanian wine and spirits, Lithuanian crafts, amber artworks depicting Lithuania. The building is actually more of a shop than a museum, however, through its arts and crafts and some Japanese descriptions, one may also learn about Lithuanian culture.

Interior of the shop

Exhibits and goods inside the Lithuanian House of Kuji

The Lithuanian House is located in a forest near the city, it is part of a larger complex dedicated to amber which includes two Amber museums, both of which also have Lithuania-related exhibits. The main amber museum is also colored in the colors of the Lithuanian flag.

Amber Museum of Kuji

Amber was, in fact, a reason why Kuji and Klaipėda felt close enough to begin cooperation, as Kuji is the heart of Japan’s amber region while Klaipėda is the heart of seaside Lithuania, which is famous for its own amber. In the late 1980s Lithuania was still occupied by the Soviet Union but the movement towards democracy and capitalism (so-called Perestroika and Glasnost) were happening there, which made it possible for the Japanese amber companies to also search for possibilities to import Baltic amber, which led to Klaipėda.

The Amber museums of Kuji describes both the Baltic and Japanese amber and includes Lithuanian amber-related legends such as that of Jūratė, and a large amber artwork depicting Jūratė made by Japanese authors.

Japanese-created amber artwork depicting Jūratė in Kuji Amber museum

Stasys Eidrigevičius Museum in Otaru, Hokkaido

Incredibly, Stasys Eidrigevičius, one of the most famous 20-21st century Lithuanian painters, had a museum opened for him in Otaru, Hokkaido (1993) more than two decades before his museum was built in his native region of Lithuania (Panevėžys, 2024). The museum is dedicated to two artists, its main floor showing Stasys’s works on one wall and the works of Hiroko Mori, museum’s founder, on the opposite wall. Thus, the museum is known as Hiroko Mori Stasys Museum. There is also a second floor with works of other Central and Eastern European artists liked by Hiroko Mori, a library of art-related books, and a cafeteria.

Hiroko Mori Stasys Museum

Inside the museum with Stasys's works on the wall

Stasys Eidrigevičius, known for his unique personal “cute but somewhat scary” style, had his works exhibited in Hokkaido in 1978 for the first time, something uncommon for a person who lived behind the iron curtain (born and educated in Soviet-occupied Lithuania, Stasys married a Polish woman and moved to Poland in 1980).

Stasys's works in the museum

Stasys’s unique style then impressed many Japanese, among them Hiroko Mori, who established the museum in an old family home in 1993. The home was demolished and replaced by the current museum-specific building in 1998.

The museum is located at Yubinbango 047-0034, Otaru city.

Japanese information about Stasys in the museum

Chiyune Sugihara related sites in Tsuruga and Yaotsu

Chiyune Sugihara is the most famous person whose life story connects Japan and Lithuania, and the stories about him are retold in several museums. Ch. Sugihara was a Japanese consul in Kaunas, Lithuania, who irregularly issued Japanese visas to thousands of people, allowing them to flee the war-and-genocide-torn Europe.

One such museum in Sugihara's native town of Yaotsu (Gifu Prefecture) is dedicated specifically to his achievements, while another one – the Port of Humanity in Tsuruga, Fukui Prefecture (located in the Japanese port where saved-by-Sugihara refugees finally reached safety) has about half of its exhibits related to Sugihara's story.

Tsuruga museum tells in detail about the Sugihara’s achievements, which are far more complex than the well-known yet simplified claim that “Sugihara saved thousands of Lithuanian Jews from the Nazis”.

Port of Humanity in Tsuruga

In 1939, Sugihara was stationed as a vice-consul of the newly opened Japanese consulate in Kaunas, the provisional capital of Lithuania. In June 1940, Lithuania was occupied by the Soviet Union – however, before Soviets annexed Lithuania de jure on August 3rd, 1940, Japanese consulate could continue its work. Potential refugees flooded the consulate asking for visas so they could leave the Soviet-occupied Lithuania - and Sugihara, contrary to the wishes of his superiors, agreed to offer the Japanese transit visas.

As evident on the refugee list in Tsuruga museum, most of the refugees were not Lithuanian citizens but rather citizens of Poland. Poland had been partitioned by the Soviets and Nazi Germans in September 1939 and these people then fled to “safety” in Lithuania, only for that safety to be shattered less than a year later. Arguably, while citizens of Lithuania may have still expected “the best” (so, fewer of them sought visas to flee), those who had already seen war and occupation knew they need to run away further on and, with many countries closed by war, Japan was one of the few options among the countries directly reachable from the Soviet-ruled lands.

Sugihara's voice recorded in the Tsuruga Museum

Tsuruga museum has recorded stories of these survivors, where they tell about how they initially fled from Poland to Lithuania, how they feared the Soviet regime due to them being either religious Jews or rich people before the war, or being men who could be drafted into the Soviet army. There are stories about the tough and expensive travel across the Soviet-ruled Siberia to Vladivostok, where Soviet servicemen would rob the refugees. And then there are stories about the final part of that journey – the ferry from Vladivostok to Tsuruga, which is the reason why the Port of Humanity museum was opened in Tsuruga. This is where these refugees finally entered a free and then peaceful country. Their lives after that are also described, with some of them moving on to USA or Australia, and others relocated to Shanghai after Japan joined the World War 2 in 1941.

Mapped memoir of a survivor in Tsuruga Museum

(While ultimately Lithuania was occupied by the Nazi Germany in June 1941 and that occupation was even more deadly to Jews than the Soviet one, this happened almost a year after Sugihara left Lithuania and thus, while often dominating “hindsight” historical analysis, is not something recorded in the memories of the refugees themselves which one could hear in the Tsuruga museum).

Not far away from the Tsuruga Museum, a commemorative plaque marks two trees planted to represent both Lithuania and Japan – a Lithuanian oak tree and a Japanese cherry blossom (sakura).

Commemorative plaque for Sugihara in Tsuruga

Meanwhile, the apex of the museum at Chiyune Sugihara’s birth town of Yaotsu is a recreated room of the 1940 Japanese consulate in Kaunas where Chiyune Sugihara stamped the visas.

Recreated office of the Japanese consulate in Kaunas in the Yaotsu Museum

Outside the museum, a commemorative plaque marks the visit of Lithuanian president Gitanas Nausėda on 2019 10 24. It is inscribed with a quote by Nausėda in Lithuanian, English, and Japanese – “Wishing everyone peace and harmony” (“Linkiu visiems žmonėms taikos ir hamonijos”), as well as Lithuanian and Japanese flags. The plaque is attached to a Hill of Humanity memorial that consists of a musical fountain and 160 pipes which represent the UN countries during the time it was built (1990) – sadly, Lithuania, which became independent from the Soviet Union only that year, was not yet one of them.

Commemorative plaque for the visit of Lithuanian president to Yaotsu town

The exhibits of the Yaotsu museum itself are more generic than those at Tsuruga, talking more about the history of World War 2 Europe than the story of Sugihara himself.

Some of the exhibits are similar in both museums, such as the long lists of people saved by Sugihara (and their citizenships – note that some Polish citizens were also seen as Lithuanian citizens by Lithuania, as they hailed from the disputed Vilnius region).

Yaotsu Sugihara Museum

There are more places and plaques dedicated to Sugihara in Japan, such as plaques for him in various places of Nagoya where he lived and Sugihara Space there.

A part of list of people who were issued Sugihara visas in mid-1940

Lithuanian Museum in Fukuyama

A Lithuania Museum has been opened in the HQ of Fukuyama Transporting in 2024, one of the largest logistics companies in Japan, having 27000 employees. The Executive Chairman of this company Shigehiro Komaru is also a honorary consul general of Lithuania and he had the idea of this museum in his company HQ.

The Lithuanian flag permanently waves on the company HQ building. Inside, on the first floor, a several room Lithuanian museum presents the key unique elements of Lithuanian history and culture.

Fukuyama Transporting HQ

Here, one may see Lithuanian folk costumes, Užgavėnės carnival masks, sodai straw ornaments, margučiai painted Easter eggs, amber jewelry, Verbos (traditional Lithuanian dry plant contraptions that replace palms on Palm Sunday). Each of these item types is described in Japanese for the local visitors.

Some of the exhibits inside the museum

Additionally, a wall is dedicated to the key unique historical and cultural facts about Lithuania, with Japanese descriptions and illustrations. There are stories about the post-WW2 anti-Soviet partisan war, Lithuanian basketball achievements, the Baltic Way, Lithuanian language, Lithuanian faith, Lithuanian nature and other topics. The descriptions are brief but on the mark.

Museum wall with descriptions about Lithuanian history and culture in Fukuyama Lithuanian Museum

Moreover, there are sections about the relations between Lithuania and Japan. One of these cover Chiyune Sugihara, the 1939-1940 Japanese consul in Lithuania who gave visas to thousands of refugees in 1940. There is an example of a visa he issued.

A film about the company and its relation to Lithuania is shown with English and Lithuanian subtitles.

Founder of the museum Shigehiro Komaru in the film

The museum exhibits were created in cooperation with the embassy of Lithuania in Tokyo.

Unlike the other Lithuanian sites mentioned in this article which have official opening times, the museum is only open by appointment.

Zemaitis Museum and the closed Lithuanian sites of Japan

Due to Lithuanian sites of Japan being closely related to their enthusiastic creators or owners rather than larger Lithuanian communities (unlike elsewhere in the world), some of these sites close down or change.

Among the closed Lithuania-related sites of Japan is Zemaitis Museum in Tokyo, dedicated to a Lithuanian-British guitar-maker Anthony (Antanas) Zemaitis, whose works became so popular in Japan that his surname-trademark is now held by Japanese company.

„Zemaitis Guitars“ – each of them made unique in design – continue to be made and there are Zemaitis shops selling them in Japan (a large one located in Osaka) but the museum was closed in 2012.

Zemaitis Guitars store in Osaka

Similarly, a linen shop of Lithuanian goods named after Lithuania and once open in Hiroshima has closed down.

There are still, however, a couple of stores selling Lithuanian goods in Tokyo; in general, however, businesses are beyond the scope of this encyclopedia of Lithuanian heritage sites.

Albinas Margevičius grave in Tokyo and the modern Lithuanian community

For centuries, Japan never had a Lithuanian community. Albinas Margevičus (1913-1988) is considered the first Lithuanian who naturalized as a citizen in Japan. He was a missionary priest of the Salesian order. Originally dispatched to Japan in 1933, he learned the local culture and helped spread the word about Japan in Lithuania of the 1930s.

Albinas Margevičius is buried together with other Salesian priests in the Fuchu Catholic Cemetery and his name is only written in Japanese script. When he became a Japanese citizen, he became known as Rubino Hiroshi.

Margevičius grave (Salesian priests buried here are listed)

Due to its location in Japanese capital Tokyo that otherwise lacks Lithuanian heritage sites, the grave of Albinas Margevičius receives significant attention from the Lithuanian community and diplomats alike.

The Lithuanian community of Japan is small and completely modern, having been established after Margevičius‘s death and after the independence of Lithuania (1990) meant the renewed possibility to emigrate (the official founding date is 2005). Still, the Lithuanian migration to Japan was limited as there were many other developed countries that were easier to emigrate to (especially the Western Europe). However, Japan attracted Lithuanians interested in Japanese culture and traditions; that said, their numbers were too few to build their own Lithuanian heritage sites, yet they help draw attention to the Lithuanian-related heritage sites that already exist in Japan.