On June 11, the book Growing up Different by Eglė Garrick, a first-generation Lithuanian born in Australia, was presented at the National Library of Lithuania.
First-generation Lithuanians born in Australia, such as Eglė Garrick, inherited their parents’ traumas but grew up in a free and friendly Australia. In her book, Garrick humorously recounts what it meant for her and her peers to grow up in two very different cultures in mid-20th-century Australia. The book is based on the memoirs of the author, her family and friends.
Eglė Garrick was born in 1953 in Victoria, southeastern Australia, to a family of WWII refugees. The writer’s parents arrived in Australia in 1949 with two young children: Rasa, aged six, and Arūnas, aged eight. Garrick studied in Melbourne and Sydney, obtaining her BA and MA degrees. After her studies, she worked as a manager of the New South Wales State Public Service, and later served as the CEO of Sydney Ferries and the CEO of the Sydney Harbor Coastal Authority. In 2015, she joined the Board of the World Lithuanian Community, and in 2019, she was appointed Honorary Consul of the Republic of Lithuania in Australia. She now lives in Darwin, Australia.
Garrick has been writing since childhood. In her youth, she published poems in Lithuanian and English in literary magazines and newspapers. Her work has appeared in several collections. Garrick’s articles have been published in Lithuanian American and Lithuanian-Australian newspapers.
Growing up Different is the second writer’s book. In 2022, Garrick wrote a book for friends and family, Around the World in 30,000 Days, Give or Take. The book was warmly received, so the author decided to write a book for the second-generation Lithuanians in Australia, her family and friends.
At the book launch, Garrick has noted that while several books have been written about the first wave of Lithuanian refugees who arrived in Australia, including a book by her mother, Elena Jonaitis, about their family’s journey from Lithuania to Australia, there has been not a single book dedicated to the younger generation of Australian Lithuanians, who, although born in Australia, are proud to be Lithuanians.