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"Narrow cobblestone streets and an orgy of Baroque: almost like a Jesuit city somewhere in the middle of Latin America," wrote the author Czeslcaw Milosz of prewar VILNIUS . Soviet-era satellite suburbs aside, it's a description which still rings true today, though the city Milosz knew was, in many ways, a different one to modern Vilnius. Between the wars Vilnius, known as Wilno , belonged to Poland and was inhabited mainly by Poles and Jews, who played such a prominent role in the city's life that it was known as the "Northern Jerusalem". Though now firmly part of Lithuania, Vilnius is still a cosmopolitan place - around twenty percent of its population is Polish and another twenty percent is Russian - though with just 578,600 inhabitants it has an almost village-like atmosphere, making it an easy place to get to know.
VilniusJankauskas says "Inhabited for centuries, Vilnius today is a multinational city with significant Polish and Russian minorities, about 20% each of them. It used to have a strong Jewish minority before World War II, but most of the Jews from Vilnius got exterminated. After the war the Soviet government expelled most of the remaining Polish population of the city and replaced them with Lithuanian and Russian citizens."
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