Lángos!!

My favorite Hungarian treat in the entire world - lángos!!!  I found some at the Great Market Hall, a typically touristy place, but what the heck.  I was appalled when the offerings for your lángos included nutella, pepperoni, peanut butter and other such weird things.  I have only had one sweet lángos in my life, and that was in the United States.  We ordered the traditional one that has sour cream, cheese and SHOULD have garlic sauce on it, but for some reason it didn't.  It was a feeling of home comfort food, and we gobbled it up very quickly.

Traveling with your parents...

Let me start by saying that I am grateful that I have the opportunity to (as my mom says) "make memories" with my family while traveling.  In the close proximity of traveling with family, particularly internationally, there are certain quirks that may not be as appreciated as others.  Like most of the things my dad brings to the table... those are the not as appreciated, but probably should be appreciated because I'll miss them dearly when I no longer have these opportunities.  

Let's start with pre-travel packing "issues."  My lovely, but aging parents could single handedly fund their own gyogszertar (pharmacy) in Hungary.  If you had a clue of the pills they took on a daily basis, you'd think that they were working on making an elixir for life.  In their defense, they are fairly healthy, but really.  My dad has am pills, pm pills, pills for before eating, pills for after eating (dessert pills perhaps?) and drops for his eyes to top everything off.  Don't worry, there are charts to mark down when he puts what drops in which eyes.  Then there is the eye patch... I won't even go there.  All of these things take a calculated amount of time to prepare for when coming up to a trip.  It's basically the only thing my dad is in charge of in terms of packing, other than 42 sudoku books and an occasional three inch anthology of presidents.  God only knows why he needs a book for "easy sudoku" one for "hard sudoku" - there is one thats "complicated sudoku" and best of all, his new "Christmas sudoku."  What the hell makes it Christmas sudoku?  You guessed it, red and green colored paper.  While my mom and I were futzing with our right controller (see post from yesterday) my dad was trying to get to the "games" on his television, and then trying to figure out how the hell to put the numbers in.  Really? You have five inches of sudoku books - why the eff are you bothering with these stupid airplane controllers?  

...I digress....

For those of you who know my parents or have followed my writing before, you know that my dad appreciates the little things.  Whether it be a branch that's caddy-whampous (is that how you spell that?) or a leaf the size of his face.  It could be a man hole cover, or a gutter that seems to flow the wrong direction.  He notices it all.  We are standing looking at the Coliseum in Rome, and he notices that a dog is walking down the street and is fascinating to him because it's an "Italian dog."  Don't get me wrong, he was impressed by the Coliseum, but its the little things that really impress him.  For example, our trip to the great market yesterday.  My dad hates shopping.  With a passion.  He has a sudoku book with him at all times (travel size mind you - which he did NOT pack for the trip) in case the shopping becomes too intense and he needs to find a chair and rest for a bit.  We walked into the great market hall - which is impressive - and he could have spent hours there.  At one point, he told my mom and I that we were walking too fast, and he couldn't stop to see everything.  

 

My dad was so impressed by this cauliflower.  Admittedly, it was freaking huge, but it's cauliflower dad.  Don't you know that there are cheap, crappy souvenirs for us to peruse upstairs?  Let's keep moving.  

Mom and dad in the great market - designed by the Frenchman Eiffel.  Yes, the one you're thinking of. 

My other favorite part of traveling with my dad is the way he takes things in and is easily fascinated by things that are different.  Perhaps it's because he didn't travel extensively until retirement, perhaps it's because he's crazy, I don't know.  My dad is a watcher.  He likes to watch other people.  He likes to watch Fox news.  He likes to watch my mom.  He likes to watch machinery at the European breakfast nook in our hotel. 

Nothing pleases me more than watching my dad watch other people trying to figure out the cappucino machine, or more recently, the orange juice machine.  You have to push certain buttons for what beverage you desire, and my dad just wants coffee.  A large, mediocre, free-refillable cup of mcDonalds coffee.  Well, that's not a choice on the cappucino machine.  You can get "frothy milk" "espresso" "cappuccino" "long milk" etc.  None of these are the type of coffee my dad is used to.  So what the hell does he push?  By this trip, I'm used to just getting his coffee for him so he can stop and watch people as they choose their buffet foods.  I do love the choices on the different machines though, and watching to see if he pushes the right buttons, and puts the cup in the right place so it actually makes it into the cup he put there.  

Who knows what the hell is happening here... but he ended up with some frappy-dappy something or other in his cup.

I'm not even going to get in to the orange juice machine....

The last thing I love about my dad, is how he dutifully follows my mom around.  She wanted to do some shopping while out last night - and hells bells, my dad was not warned of said shopping, therefore ill prepared with no sudoku book in hand- he just had to endure.  As you can see below, he is thoroughly enjoying himself at the H&M.  He just stands inside the doorway, where there is the most direct heaters and waits.  patiently.  as long as he needs to. 

That is family travel love.

Note to the readers: In this picture, my dad has on long underwear - top and bottom - an undershirt, a long sleeved shirt, a columbia vest and a winter jacket - with fleece lined jeans of course.  All of that, and he still looks like he's never braved a MN winter.  Yeesh. 

Well, we're at it again... The Staffa's go (back) to Europe

I'm not sure how we pulled this off exactly, but as a result of my parents' financial savvy and my credit card, we are back in Europe- more importantly, in Hungary.  This is our fourth trip to europe in 13 months- it's a bit of an addiction if you ask me.

I decided months ago that I would return in December for the Szalagavato of my youngest students that I had while teaching in Hungary.   Luckily my parents were interested in coming with, and Mike traveled from Tokyo to meet us as well.

These students we are visiting are the ones I had for the full year and a half I was there, several lessons a week.  One might say I knew these students the best as a group since we had so much time together.  Szalagavato is a sort of 'coming of age' ceremony that is very important in the lives of the 'school leavers' or the graduates.  They receive their ribbons- it's pinned to their winter coat to indicate their status as a school leaver - and then do their class dances.  They have themes that each graduating homeroom chooses, and as far as I can tell, this year's English group is something Godfather like.  After the class dance, they do a waltz in white wedding dresses and tuxedos.  It's a very special night for the graduates and their families, and I'm blessed with the opportunity to attend my third Szalagavato this year.  More about that later though.

The flight over was long, but do-able, as we're basically naturals at this by now.  It would have been a bit smoother, but both my mom and I had faulty television controllers.  I know, first world problems, but when you're looking forward to the free movies as the highlight of the flight, this was a buzz kill.  I was just told on my way to the airport by a friend from school that I should watch "The Campaign" sometime, and sure enough, it was one of the movies offered.  Unfortunately, my controller's arrows would not move to the right, so I was not able to select that movie.  It was super frustrating (as most technology is to anyone who is much older than I) I spent 30 minutes trying various ways of getting around the right directional arrow.  Clicking up, to the left, continuing to the left, trying to go alphabetical, none of it worked.  I eventually settled and watched the latest Bourne movie.  While I am an ardent fan of the Bourne movies, this did not live up to my expectations as it did in fact lack Jason Bourne.  I also watched "Mirror Mirror" with Julia Roberts, who - I'm certain if I were a lesbian I would lust after her.  I also started Pixar's "Brave" but didn't finish.

The thing I hate most about flying on planes is my loss of control.  I am a control freak (as many of you know) and it all goes down the crapper when you're flying.  I can't control when I can eat and drink.  Depending on my seat, I can't control when I pee.  I can't control who I sit next to, and I can't control if my television controller works or not.  This flight was manageable, but not without traits of my OCD and control freakiness bubbling to the surface.  First, I purchased a foot long subway sandwich at the airport before we left.  Never mind that I had eaten before going to the airport, and knew we would be eating on the plane.  There was just something about not being able to eat something if I wanted to while on the plane and when they weren't serving food.  Additionally, there seemed to be something just right about getting a sandwich - with cold cuts - for said flight.  It's as if I was preparing for my arrival to Hungary.  Next, I had two empty water bottles that I filled before take off, a caribou Reindeer Drink and a Diet Coke in my bag.  I need to have beverages.  Lots of choices of beverages.  Lastly, I had an aisle seat.  I've always longed for those super artsy pictures of people taking off and landing in famous cities around the world, and I've certainly done enough traveling to accumulate a great collection.  But that one picture just isn't worth it to miss out on being able to freely pee when necessary.  Bathroom accessibility trumps pictures almost every time.  Well.... that's arguable I suppose.    The last thing I hate about flying is the crapshoot that is seat assignments.  You know you all look around the waiting room wondering, "will I be sitting next to him?  Or him?  Geeze - I hope it's not her that I sit next to..." Yeah - I do that.  Every time.  I ended up okay as the guy I was next to didn't speak to me.  Airplane captive audience small talk is my own personal hell.  This was avoided by immediate application of earphones, to be removed only for aforementioned bathroom trips.  On our flight from Amsterdam to Budapest, I was in the middle (sigh) but again sat next to two equally "shy" passengers.  I did note that the 30something guy next to me was reading in Russian, typing on his computer in English and speaking in Hungarian.  There is something to be said for someone who can just switch like that.  I aspire for such skills.

At any rate, we made it safe and sound.  We are in a nice hotel near the Danube and the pedestrian shopping street, in my favorite part of town.

We will rest easy and prepare for Mike's arrival and more debauchery in Hungary.

at the airport

forralt bor (hot wine) and palacsinta (pancakes)- fresh off the plane :)

Vaci Utca - the pedestrian shopping street

Viszontlatasra!  (there are supposed to be accents somewhere in there, but I forget where)

At camp again

After our swim we had a Polish dance ensemble come to the camp.  They did some folk dancing and were wonderful.  It was interesting to see the outfits and the dance styles as they compared to Hungarian Folk Dance.

After the performance we drove a short distance to a manor house.  It was a couple towns over, but as a result of the roads and our bus, it took us a while to get where we were going :)  On the way, we stopped at an old parish church that was from the 18th century.  It was a beautiful church that would draw people from all over the countryside one per month (or every so often, I don’t remember). 

We continued to the manor house, which was originally inhabited by the nobility of the area.  Their family owned a bunch of land in the township, but then the land became “state farms.”  It was an interesting evening.  When we returned to camp, there was a performance of sorts put on by the Polish students and staff.  They were making skits of Polish legends and such.  The kids did a lot of the script writing themselves and created their costumes on their own as well.  I think the most interesting part for me was the fire that they lit.  Evidently fire is very important in this country, and they elected two students to be the “guards” of the fire.  As long as the fire was still going, there was going to be success for whatever meeting was going on.  

The Warta

Sunday we decided we were going to go swimming in the river.  It was moving really fast (as it is the third largest river in Poland) and it was hot out so there were lots of people out.  I started, once again, with trepidation, but eventually went in.  We decided a good workout would be to try to swim/go/move upstream.  It worked well for Emily, but Melissa and I struggled a bit.  It took us at least 20 minutes to go 50 meters, and we were exhausted (at least I was).  Emily was moving like a trooper- she’s a true athlete.  I think the most awkward part of the whole endeavor, was seeing students out there with their families - some of their family members in speedos.  Not unusual for Europe, but definitely unusual for Americans.  Once we’d floated to our hearts content, Tomek told us he was going to jump in the river using a stick they had swinging from a tree.  I decided it would be in my best interest to join him.  Yes, the non-river swimming girl who is afraid of fish, particularly any that are unbeknownst to swimmers, was going to swing from a tree into the river.  I waited in line and after a long time of waiting, I finally made the leap.  It was ugly at best as my hands slid off the branch early, BUT, I was again in the river.  Melissa and Emily came to find me, and I’ll let you watch the video for the rest of the story. 

The Warta  <------- click there for the video

Talent Show

We had a talent show the first Friday of camp, and it was very different from any talent show I’d seen before.  First of all, there were stringed instruments involved, which, at an arts enriched camp is not that unordinary, but I was surprised.  Coupled with the violins and cellos, we had a kid who danced to “I’m sexy and I know it” and one who balanced spoons on his nose.  It was quite the range of “talent.”  Emily and I had prepared a dance for this talent show, but it got rained out before our chance to perform.  Have no fear, we will give the performance of a lifetime before we leave.  My favorite talent was Jakub, who lived in Chicago for three months and has an excellent command of the language.  He played violin to Britney Spears’ “oops I did it again” with a karaoke background.  Hilarious.

Here is Jakub playing Britney Spears

Janek balancing a spoon

Simon playing the cello - shortly after his performance, he dropped it and it broke :(

4th of July

A few words about the Fourth of July - it was an interesting day here in Poland.  As you saw from the pictures, we decorated the cafeteria in red white and blue, and talked about freedom and liberty in class.  I did a small history thing in class and prepared for the afternoon activities.  After lunch the students engaged in some baseball and put on temporary tattoos.  There were several students with stars and stripes clothing and they really got excited for the day.  There were a half dozen of us who participated in a short play that Tom and Mary Rita wrote about the meaning of the 4th of July and the contributions Poles like Thaddeus Kosciusko (after whom the foundation I am here with is named) made to our country’s liberty.  It was interesting for me to learn the Polish connections and for the kids to learn about this connection to our Independence.  After the play, we engaged in a s’mores fest complete with all the fixins and a cup of strawberries and blueberries for each kid.  It was crazy - They don’t have access to marshmallows like we do in the states, so they loved the idea of the s’mores.  Additionally, it was American chocolate so they were excited about that.  Couple it with fire and camp songs- it was an ideal night for all of these events.  All in all, the 4th was a success.

Trip to the spring

Last night Emily, Melissa, Lauren and I went on a bike ride to find the grotto that is near by.  Tom had mentioned it before, and we had nothing else to do, so we set out with a vague idea of directions which entailed “taking a left then a right and there’s a dirt road and it’s at the end.”  Awesome.  Whatever, we were up for another adventure so off we went.  

We turned left at the appropriate time since it was pointed out to us on the bus.  Incidentally, the infrastructure of roadways was not top priority under the Russians (and they must not have had money to fix them up post communism) so we traveled by bike potentially faster than our bus carries us.  At any rate, we were on our way to the water source and that’s all that really mattered.  We were unsure as to the “right” that we were directed to take, so we tried the first one.  At the top of the hill, there was a dirt pathway off to the right, and we were directed to go on a dirt pathway, but I thought it came in at the very end of the paved road.  SO... we stopped at a woman’s house to ask directions again.  She was outside gardening and came right to the gate as soon as she saw me approach.  I greeted here again with a “good day” in Polish and she returned the greeting.  I went on to say, “I don’t speak Polish... water?”  and I shrugged my shoulders.  We were close to the water source and I figured she’d know what I was referencing.  She began to talk in rapid fire Polish... fail.  I managed to eek out a “1 kilometer” and some gestures in a particular direction, but then she stopped to ask me a question.  What?!  There are NO questions to someone who doesn’t speak the language.  That’s like a given isn’t it?  She became frustrated that I wasn’t understanding me, put up her index finger at me and said, “moment.”  A minute or two later, an elderly lady in a babushka type head covering and a purple duster came out and began to wheel a bicycle our way.  The first woman, who is probably almost 60, shut the front door, took the bicycle from her mother and motioned for use to ride with her to the water source.  Yes, you read that correctly, she mounted up and rode us to the source.  It was a beautiful ride through the woods, with us Americans chattering with each other wondering what she was saying.  Emily joked that she was our new “pilot” for this trip.  Side note: we are not allowed to travel in the bus anywhere without a “pilot.”  Our Polish interpreter is not enough, we need an ADDITIONAL Pole to accompany us on any bus ride to serve as a navigator of sorts I guess.  I personally think it’s a job security thing, BUT the one we have is a wealth of local knowledge so that is nice.  So - Emily was the “pilot” handling the translation and navigation :)

Emily and our friend

the spring

the pond near the spring

holy $%&^!

We rode through the woods and down a bit of a hill to the entrance to the water source area.  I wasn’t too sure about cycling down the hill as it was a sandy path that had washed out a bit with the recent rain.  BUT, if she could do it, so could I.  We parked our bikes and she walked us to the right, where the spring was.  She talked at us there, and then brought us to the left, where there was a newly erected (2008) outdoor chapel.  She said some words about the third of May (when mass is celebrated there) and then she bid us farewell and off she went.  We thanked her as much as possible in our broken Polish.  What a nice lady! I don’t know that I would have taken the time from my day to stop what I was doing to help others like that. 

It was a beautiful sight in the middle of the woods.  The part that really made it seem magical was the presence of some Polish nuns.  They were praying near the water source and sitting in the benches of the chapel.  I suppose it made it seem a bit more real as a sacred Catholic place rather than us just schlepping into some campground or rest area in the woods.  

We sat for a bit and said some prayers, looked at the various rosaries hanging in the altar area, took in the atmosphere of the scene.  At the spring, we filled bottles with the water, it was surprisingly cool water, and delightfully clean in terms of taste.  It has been tested in the past and is okay for human consumption and remains at 6 degrees celsius year round, never freezing.  After about 30 minutes of taking it in and walking around we returned to our bicycles and started walking them back up the small hill.  As we were walking, the sun was setting, and some of the nuns were emerging from the forest.  I had a chance to snap a picture of one among the large trees and I think it’s simply a magical picture - iPhonetography at  its best.  

As we were emerging from the forest on our bicycles, we came across the same woman who led us to the water source.  She was talking with a friend of hers who had just come from blueberry picking in the woods, and it appeared as if she had waited for us.  WOW!  Well, crap.  Now what do we say?  I had exhausted the appropriate Polish I knew already in our first encounter.  I only had the emergency go-to’s left, “where is the bathroom?” and “how much does it cost?”  Neither of those was going to work.  Welp... when in doubt, there’s an app for that right?  Right.  I had a “Polish Phrases” app on my iphone so I whipped it out in the hopes of finding some phrases to be able to communicate.  I started with “it’s nice to meet you” and it was down hill from there.  She started talking about numbers and holding up fingers - turns out that she can hold up five fingers and I can hold up five fingers.  I don’t know why I did, but I was mirroring what she was doing.  Fail.  I think she was asking us to come back, but I still don’t really know.  Melissa was videotaping us in the hope of getting some things we could translate back at the camp, but the whole thing was just a comedy of errors.  I tried to show her the word for “return” and “Tuesday” indicating that we would come back the next day, but that didn’t go over.  SO, she busts out her phone (not a smart phone) and typed out a text message.  Well, it was in Polish, and had no possibility for translation because we had no way of popping these words into google translate in the middle of the Polish woods.  Emily wrote it down on the back of our card from the camp, and we found out later that it asked us how many days we would still be in the area.  Of course at the time we had no answer, but what could we do?  

After some muddling through awkward language barriers we decided we’d better head back because it was getting dark.  We said our goodbyes and returned to the camp with a new Polish friend. 

A day in the life of camp.  In case you’re wondering what we do on a daily basis, let me give you a taste of our lives.  We have breakfast at 8:30 in the morning.  What you do before that is up to you, depending on how late I was up the night before either from campfire singing or loud TA’s talking outside my room, I get up and go for a run.  I’m still adjusting to the sleep schedule as I’m not usually up past 9.  It’s okay on weekends and such, but for real, this late night stuff is killing me.   

At any rate, we all file into breakfast, and occupy our room that is saved for the teachers.  We sit at a long table and there are four or five sets of each of the food types provided.  In the morning, hell, every day, there are tomatoes, cucumbers and some form of ham.  There are always baskets of bread with butter and jam.  We have water and tea, and coffee, and sometimes a warm pink drink that is some sort of compote.  I’ll do a more in depth entry on the food, but these are the staples.  After breakfast, we clear our table and bus our dishes to the kitchen staff who work their TAILS off serving several sessions of food each meal.  We have about 30 minutes before classes start, so preparation is usually in order.  We have four 45 minute class periods with a 5 minute break in between, then a staff meeting afterwards.  We go over any issues we’re having in class and talk about the plan for the day.  When the meeting is done, it’s about lunch time, so we return to the cafeteria, to be greeted by various forms of tomatoes, cucumbers and bread.  Following lunch, we break off into either sports activities or something else that we would want to teach the kids.  I’m doing a one hour photography activity twice.  We’ll see how it goes.  I also went to watch some of the sports stuff, but that’s mostly left to the TA’s to keep the 100 kids busy and active for two hours.  If people want to, they can go for a hike, take a bike ride, have a nap - whatever suits your fancy.  At 6:30 we eat again.  Lunch is the big meal here, so dinner is typically a lighter meal which is nice.  That’s it!  That is how we spend most days here- one week down, two to go!

Chicken rolled with peppers inside of it

the jam plate, tomato cucumber plate, and meat jello shots

tomatoes with cheese horseradish and some other stuff

a delicious pastry we had

meat jello shots

hot dogs? with cheese and catsup

meat kabob

meat spread?

Grocery Shopping

This week in class, we did one of my favorite activities ever.  I brought a number of advertisements from the Sunday newspaper and had the kids make a grocery list for a party they would throw.  We started by talking about what kinds of food they would have at a Polish party, then moved into using the ads to spend $40.00 on a party.  The lists they came up with were wonderful.  My favorite list started AND ended with whiskey, and had Huggies diapers in the middle.  What the heck kind of party includes diapers and whiskey?  It was partly my fault because some places like Byerly’s and Lunds have alcohol advertised, and I didn’t catch that.  Other interesting things students chose were batteries, detergent, and foods that didn’t seem to fit in a party atmosphere, but whatever- they had fun!  At the end of the lesson, Simon stopped and said,  “that was fun.”  Winning.

Whiskey is the top one here... followed by detergent and huggies, jumbo.

Pictures from the 4th

Emily reffing volleyball

baseball during sport time

Janek up to bat!

Melissa and the strawberry/blueberry cups they filled

the smokes

Melissa and Asia working to assemble the s'mores

cooking the delicious smokes!

Fourth of July!!

Yesterday was the 4th of July here at camp - and at home too I suppose - and we went all out here at camp.  We began the night before by decorating the cafeteria with all the schtuff that we brought with us, and things that have been left from years past.  There were boxes and boxes of stuff that we had to sort through, most of it was put to good use.  There were streamers and costume pieces, and random weird things that we had no idea what they were to be used for, but we forged ahead anyway.

Here is the cafeteria waiting for the kids to come in.  We spent probably 40 minutes or so preparing these decorations (I personally put in a good 20 minutes and then let the younger ladies take over) and they did a great job.  The kids loved them, but were distracted by food way too quickly.  For all of you out there who have prepared an entire meal and it's gone in 15 minutes - you know what I'm talking about.

Throughout the day, we did activities with the 4th of July in class- at least in my class anyway.  Emily and I talked about what the 4th meant to us as a country and how we usually spent the 4th of July.  We also utilized the decor I brought for the kids, the lady liberty hats and other patriotic caps.  They wrote word association sheets using the words "Freedom" "America" or "Liberty."

Adam's Freedom activity - please look closely at the words he chose to associate with "freedom"

Janek - working hard as usual

One of the classes

After class the kids had the opportunity to play baseball as their "activity" for the day - it was quite entertaining.  They hadn't been exposed to the rules really, only a few kids were familiar with the game,  so they went after it as much as possible.  The hitting was pretty good - way better than I could have done, that's for sure.  They were a bit confused on the fielding, as they all seemed to flock towards the ball no matter where it went.  The first baseman could cross the entire infield - it was fun to watch.  Having said that, me playing handball would be as entertaining to these folks I'm sure.  Actually, now that I think about it, me playing baseball would as entertaining I imagine.  

Following baseball, we prepared for our "play" and the s'mores activity.  We were all told to bring "things for s'mores" - what that meant was pretty vague.  I got 30 or so bars of chocolate and three large bags of marshmallows.  I didn't indulge in the graham crackers, I was hoping someone else would bring them... and they did.  We ended up with a hodge podge of stuff, but it all worked out!  We had enough for all 100 kids, and then some.  As we were preparing the pieces for the kids, I was counting in my head to see if there would be enough for me.  I never really got the "camping" experience as a kid - which I'm not complaining about, but a REAL s'more?  When was the last time I had a legit s'more on from a fireplace?  I can't recall.  I was thrilled.  However, as we have access to these things on a regular basis, I should really be more concerned with the kids getting them, but I wasn't.  I certainly was a bit bothered when Stanley returned for a second, third, fourth through seventh.  I think by the end of the time out there, I was trying to make Stanley barf up marshmallows or something.  

Our performance highlighting the contributions of the Poles to our nation's Independence-  (which I learned great things from) was stunning to say the least, and the s'mores were a hit.  We did campfire songs and had a wonderful evening.  

Let's Go Ride a Bike

After lunch, Emily, Melissa and I decided to take a bike ride.  Evidently, the camp has purchased a “fleet” of bicycles for the use of those who are here.  Delightful.  I haven’t gone on a bike ride in a long time (despite the $$ I spent on a nice cruiser last year).  We chose three bikes, and after some seat adjusting, brake testing, and general consensus that what we had was just going to have to work, we set off.  Our original target was the store in town.  By ‘store’ I mean general collection of stuff you might use at some point in your life.  Granted, there was some sad produce, and a refrigerated cooler stocked with various types of beer, and some dry goods.  BUT, the real treat came from looking at the “other stuff” that was there.  Emily, bless her heart, brought me mascara from here yesterday, which sat on a shelf with playing cards, shaving cream and other assorted bathroom accoutrements.  Just below, there was bug killer, “American tshirts” and notebooks.  Behind the counter, where all the truly valuable stuff rests, was a wall of vodka and other assorted alcoholic beverages.  Thankfully, we had been advised while in Warsaw to pick up a bottle of vodka because we’re out in the middle of the forest and there isn’t anything else to do.  To my surprise, this piece of advice came from the veteran teachers, both veteran in experience at this camp and in life.  Funny advice to receive, especially since I don’t like vodka at all.  Welp... when in Rome? Anyway, back to the store... it really was a delightful hodgepodge of stuff.

Here is the store

After the store, we decided to roll on to the next town.  We were feeling fierce and ready to rock these bikes.  It was a nice afternoon, peaceful surroundings and great company.  AND, to add some gold to the picture, I was sporting my prized possession from the Grand Marais Ben Franklin store - a fishing hat with bug netting that rolls down from the rim to protect you when needed.  Yup.  Rocked it on the bike.  Melissa had a hat that was almost as cool, it doubles as a fan and folds up when not needed.  A gem she picked up while living in Vietnam.  Emily, she had  Michigan hat on.  Which was worse?  Michigan or a bug-proof hat?  Jury’s sill out.  

We turned toward a village that was listed as a mere two kilometers away.  I know I’m not entirely sure of this whole metric thing, but for reals.  That was way more than two kilometers.  Most of it was uphill too.  Pretty still, but yeesh.  At one point, there was a young man in bright yellow shorts who was riding just behind us, but he disappeared at some point and we lost him.  Where he went, we have no idea.  

Victory was ours when we finally landed in the downtown of the village.  By downtown, I mean bus stop and trio of homes.  At one of these homes, an outbuilding doubled as a store.  We saw a guy come out of said store just as we arrived, and we spotted racks of different beverages and other such goods.  We got off the bikes to look around and take pictures of their super cute mailboxes.  After doing a 360 and seeing the entirety of the town, we decided to stop in what we thought was the store.  I approached the door, and sure enough, there were hours listed, so in I went.  Wait... no I didn’t.  I COULDN’T.... because the owner had locked the door and shut us out.  Evidently three women on bike-back speaking English really makes people nervous.  After I tried the doorknob once more just to make sure I wasn’t making this up, we gave up and returned to the bikes.  As we mounted up, the owner came around the side of the building and asked us something, but we had no idea what it was - as I know less Polish than many of the other languages I’ve studied.  

We decided at this point, instead of curving back down the same hill, that we were going to venture into the trail in the forest.  This is where Emily started questioning our friendship.  Off we went on a dirt/gravel/sand path.  It was well traveled either by field vehicle or automobile, so it had to go somewhere, right?  At first, I thought it could be someone’s driveway back to their farmland.  No homes... we just kept biking.  Fork in the road, we go left.  And keep biking.  We work our way up another hill, and keep biking.  I’m starting at this point, to really regret that I chose the bike that does nothing but 7th gear.  We kept biking.  We came to another fork in the road, chose left again and kept biking.  We were rolling through sandy paths now- Melissa afterwards stated that she didn’t know which was worse, the wet or the dry sand.  They both were bad to try and traverse.  We kept biking.  We wound down and around what seemed to be the forest that we started through, we kept biking.  As a team, we collectively were getting a bit nervous as to the choices we (mostly me) had made - directionally speaking.  We kept biking.  Emily stopped to question if this path was going to lead to any sort of civilization or not - meaning the trio of homes we saw earlier our our “town” with a dozen or so homes in it.  We kept biking.  We ran through some puddles, up and down small hills as we kept biking.  We plowed through sandy trails (and by plowed, I mean the way that a snowplow does on 94 in Stearns County after 10 feet of snow... slowly but steadily) and kept biking.  Finally at one point, Emily took a left (when internally I thought we should have gone right) and it took us to a paved road.  AND, the bus stop not too far down the road said part of the name of our town on it.  Turns out, the part that was different was actually significant.  Emily said we should go right, I wasn’t quite sure, but she looked at a map that appeared on the side of the road across from the bus stop and was convinced that we were to double back towards where we came from.  I decided that I should stop and ask a lady who was out in her garden.  I entered her yard, passed the barking dog, and tried to get the attention of the woman sleeping (or dead) on the porch.  It didn’t work, so I kept going deeper into the yard, around the house towards the garden that I saw originally.  I entered the fenced off garden, paused for a minute as she stood up and she immediately greeted me with a “dzien dobry” and I returned the greeting in Polish.  Followed by “I don’t speak Polish, I’m sorry” and I gave her the card of the camp that had the name and the address on it.  I pointed to the left, and then to the right and shrugged my shoulders.  She gave me much more in response, but essentially pointed the same direction Emily wanted to go and said “trehs kilometres!” I smiled, thanked her and we were on our way.  

We returned home safely- tired, hot and an hour and forty five minutes after we left.  We were done biking.