Another interesting Lithuanian oddity

I was getting my manicure with Natalie... she does amazing work by the way - the most thorough and painstaking manicure I have ever had! She speaks some English, so I always look forward to our time as I try to get her to explain various things that I don't understand.

I asked her about when school was starting and she said September 1st. I was a bit surprised as this was a Saturday. She explained that school always started on September 1st regardless. The kids would really only attend for a couple of hours, getting their class materials and meeting teachers etc. But because this was a Saturday this year, this meant that there would be NO ALCOHOL of any kind sold anywhere in Lithuania that day!! I was naturally confused, thinking I was misunderstanding her. Remember this is a country where alcohol can be purchased everywhere and drinking is a national past time. When asked to elaborate she reiterated, no alcohol would be sold anywhere....not in the supermarkets, kiosks, restaurants or bars. If someone had a private function, such as a wedding booked, they had to have all the alcohol purchased in advance as there would be none available for purchase on September 1!!!!!

Why were they doing this, I ask. Apparently, some of the students make this day into a celebration and take it too far! Therefore they wanted to ensure that none of them get that drunk this year.

Not sure how to take all this as it seems like a taking a fly swatter to an elephant, but what the heck...
I told Tom and he didn't believe it either until he found a front page article about it in the Baltic Times. It will be funny to watch the reactions of the some of the expats on Saturday when they can't order a beer with dinner!!!!!
In the meantime, I am off to the local Maxima store to stock up....................IKI.