What images come to mind when you hear democracy, or tyranny? Would they not be polar opposites? Lithuania and Belarus are now situated on opposing ends of the scale measuring the nature of political regimes in Europe. Still, their national histories had been crossing paths since the 13th century. In 2012, I went to two towns lying on either side of the Belarusian-Lithuanian border to show what hides at the junction of the European Union and ‘the last dictatorship in Europe’.