On July 20, 2018 the academic director of the International Yiddish Center at the World Jewish Congress, Dr. Mordechay Yushkovsky, in collaboration with the Vilnius Jewish Public Library hosted an exceptionally exciting intellectual event. The scientist from Jerusalem provided a lecture under the topic "Vilnius through laughter and tears" for general public, devoted to diverse aspects of exclusively Vilnius' Jewish culture.

Many visitors of Mr. Yushkovsky's event were already familiar with the lecturer due to previous his lectures in the past. This time M. Yushkovsky touched the allegedly extinct, but recently revealed, layer of Vilnius' Yiddish culture, comprising literature, theatre, music and daily routine of ordinary Jews. Litvaks' songs, stories, jokes and anecdotes are enhanced with pictures from the life of folk.

Dr. Yushkovsky's presentations are exceptional because of rich, knowledgeable content blended with good sense of humor. Listeners admire them first of all due to their profound, often unexpected insights and feelings, which makes his lectures not only interesting and captivating, but inspiring, too.