Blind Man Walking

Today is a good day; I didn't have to walk over any dead guys to get into school. Last Monday I was coming to school early to teach my zero hour yoga class. It was shortly after 7:00 AM, so when I saw the police talking to our custodian, I figured someone had tripped the security system. We exchanged "Dobre Rano's", and I entered the building. What I failed to notice, however, was the dead person lying behind the police car, definitely all done walking.

Made me think of the cop shows on TV where they always decribe the "perp", you know, caucasian, male, six feet tall, with dirty blond pony tail, etc. As the witness, I'd be like, "Perp? There was a perp?" I think of myself as pretty observant, but I was definitely off my game that morning. Too early I guess.

I am a tornado of activity today, with all the presents swirling around inside the vortex, sorted, but mostly unwrapped, all unpacked. Yes, I am very stressed, but meanwhile here at school, the students are crazy as they traditionally seem to be anywhere before holiday. As I feel it is bad form for a teacher to be just as crazy as the students, I am trying hard to keep it together.

I have two large suitcases I had planned to pack, first for taking gifts home to Chicago and then for hauling equipment back to Slovakia. Fulbright has given me money to purchase equipment for my school, and I have determined that what we really need is anything that is a modification of the official type of equipment, particularly balls. Over here we can purchase volleyballs, for example, but any kind of oversized, light or soft ball is unavailable. Slovakia doesn't "do nerf". So I have placed two orders and will load up this equipment when I return home on New Year's Eve, the second important use of the suitcases.

Everything looked good for packing until it came time to include a purchase I had made for a certain anonymous brother-in-law whose initials are JMG. It was one of those fun gifts to buy because when I saw it I knew I had found the PERFECT PRESENT. But what happens when the perfect gift not only doesn't fit in your bag but is considered weapon-like and therefore unable to be a carry-on? I called the airlines, asked advice from everyone, and finally scored with a duffle on loan by Chuck. While the length is adequate, I sacrifice space and compromise on substantial suitcase structure.

This concerns me for two reasons: fragile gifts and P.E. equipment. Recently I made a Xmas shopping trip to Modra, a nearby town famous for its vineyards and well-known for its ceramics. The small factory uses a 400 year old process where the pottery is hand-thrown, then painted with an opaque glaze, then hand-painted by about 6 women in any number of traditional combination of colors. Each piece is different, and if you don't break it (I already broke TWO) the glaze will last forever. So I am challenged to safely pack the ceramics.

The other issue is that I will hopefully still have adequate room for all that equipment on the way home. So what started out as the perfect gift, has somehow disintegrated into, "Geez, he just better appreciate this..." I've gone from energetic elf to grumpy Grinch in the blink of an eye...

Last week I traveled to Gyor (say j-YOUR) with my friend, Erika, to buy not just any fabric, but SPECIAL fabric. Actually Erika had helped me bus to Modra for ceramics the day before, and then we trained down to Hungary the next day to get the material. This field trip turned into a three country, three currency expediton, although no trip was longer than 1 and 1/2 hours.

Last fall I had mentioned that I really loved the blue fabric I kept seeing in the folk art stores. The material is hand dyed with indigo, and then hand-stamped using 100 year old wooden blocks that are about 5" x 10". Erika said we must go to "The Blue Lady" (Although not the store's name, a good one, right?) There are as many patterns as stamps and an infinite number of shades of blue. The store was small and contained yard goods as well as made up clothing and accessories. I soon realized some blues looked purple, while others were green. Some samples were navy but I preferred the brighter shades. After the initial shock of just standing there, gaping in visual overload (much like at Modra the day before), I chose three contrasting prints, not perfectly matched but then that's just the point.

We cruised the farmer's market: Erika bought shelled walnuts from a granny and ever the Xmas shopper, I purchased pastry brushes made of chicken (I think) feathers. Spent an inordinate amout of time doing laps around the small village trying to locate the magyar hat I'd seen but didn't buy for Marisa. I swear the vendor pulled up stakes because we never did locate it. Instead we hopped the train to Bruck on de Leithe (sounds like brook on delight) for dinner in Austria. And although dinner was "de Leithe-ful" bed looked even better. Dobru noc!

Who put the Krak in Krakow?

Well, Prince Krak, of course, but I'll get to that later. Last November, the week before Thanksgiving, I had a long week-end, unusual for my schedule. Four of us cooked up a plan to visit Krakow so this entry is out of sequence but really, do you care? Thought so.

Kathy, Jon, myself and another newly-arrived and recently-departed Fulbrighter, Al Magid (NY - political scientist) decided to take the night train to Krakow (say CROCK-oof), arriving early (6:00) on Friday, giving us the most possible time to tour the city. (No, Al's not dead, just in Prague with wife Sally before heading back to the States, his Fulbright stint having been completed.) I arranged the train travel, and was very nervous because there are no direct trains, we had to switch trains both ways, AND we had booked sleeper cars on the way there. But I had "my peeps" at school look at the reservations, things looked good and in fact were fine. (I say this NOW of course.)

We all met at the Hlavne Stanica where we would leave on Thursday evening, traveling through Czech Republic, going north through the Tatras and across the border to Poland. Jon had met Al the previous week where he heard him speak (and speak and speak) at the University about the elections held just the day before in the States. Al's a talker. Kathy had also met him, and although I met Al that evening we would ALL get to know each other well on this trip.

The first train was incredible! And why not? We were accidently traveling in First Class for the first 40 minutes until the conductor pointed out the giant number one posted in the compartment that no one had noticed. Oops - pretty good scam actually. The first connection was made with little complication - there's always a little - and we settled into our teeny tiny 3-layer beds for about five hours of sort-of-sleep. It was Al, Kathy and then me in order of acendancy, with Jon next door. We were somewhat concerned that the conductor kept our tickets, but later realized that's so we would get off where we were supposed to. Sure enough, 5:00 came, yet another passport check, we had our complimentary chocolate croissant and sparkling water, and it was Krakow here we come!

Kathy had booked us at the Hotel Chopin, walking distance from the station, and a major score in the good fortune category. We checked in at 6:30 and not only were our rooms ready, we ate an enormous buffet breakfast before heading out to the old town, feeling refreshed and able to take on the world or at least Krakow.

Krakow is Poland's third largest city, and at 800,000, bigger than Bratislava. It's history goes back over 1,000 years, and although it was destroyed by the Tatars in the 13th century, it was subsequently rebuilt. In 1945, the Russian Army encircled the town, forcing the Germans to evacuate thus saving Krakow from destruction. Today Stare Mesto, the old town, survives intact with its churches and museums, and Kazimierz, the Jewish Quarter, tells of a sadder recent history.

Krakow was a medieval students' town. Jagiellonian University, established in 1364, is Poland's oldest and where Copernicus studied. Today, it is Poland's second largest school and Krakow what we'd call a college town, with about 10% of the population being students. TO-GA, TO-GA! Well, maybe not so much.

As we walked into Stare Mesto, we crossed the Platy, the green space surrounding the town created by filling in the former moat that protected the castle. We zeroed in on the Market Square, Rynek Glowny, the largest medieval town square in Europe. We shopped at 16th century Cloth Hall, where I picked up some amber jewelry. Amber is symbolic of Poland and said to have health benefits, the stone warming to one's body temperature as well as being light and comfortable to wear. And there's more: soak amber in vodka and rub it on your aching joints! Does the AMA know about this?

Interested in churches? Walk a block and you'll find one there. There on the square we visited the 14th century Basilica of the Virgin Mary, an amazingly decorated structure that was so unlike anything I'd seen around here. The interior is painted with a rainbow of colors, seemingly over every possible surface, to me creating a very lively but peaceful space. As is typical in large cathedrals, we paid an entrance fee. However, there was also a distasteful photography fee which was optional. I paid and received a little sticker to put on my jacket to ward off the camera Nazi who patrolled the premises. Really. It certainly diminished any religious feeling I may have mustered, but we did luck out with the timing of our visit as we were there at noon for the opening of the altar. The main altarpiece, three stories high, dominates the sanctuary. Carved by a German, it depicts 200 scenes treated with color and gold foil, and is considerd to be Poland's finest sculptural work. There are five sections when it is closed, but when the nun comes out with her pole (hah!) at noon, you are able to see the basswood tryptych, viewed only when the sides are slid open.

During the viewing we also heard the bugler's sound played from the watch tower. Every hour this call is played from the west church tower, then repeated from the east, south and north. It recalls the medieval alarm the bugler would play to announce opening and closing of gates, fires and approaching enemies. The simple melody (Heynal Maricki) based on 5 notes, is known to all Poles and broadcast on Polish radio each day at noon. It ends abruptly as if unfinished to symoblize the bugler's call cut short by a Tatar arrow in 1241.

We also saw St. Florian's, home of Archbishop Karol Wojtyla who became Cardinal, and later Pope John Paul II. Poland is a very catholic country (80%) and they adore their own Pope John Paul.

From there it was a short walk to Wawel Castle and Cathedral, passing by a band, who for a few coins would play "The Star Spangled Banner" and pose for pictures. Very strange sight. Polish royalty lived in the castle and for four hundred years they were crowned in the cathedral, even after the capitol moved to Warsaw. The crypt holds one hundred kings and queens interred there, which unfortunately we didn't have time to see.

Another must-see didn't work out because it was after OCT 31. Remember the afore-mentioned Prince Krak? It seems the good prince secured Krakow's commanding location, but only after fighting off the annoying dragon who was making off with all the fair maidens. Clever Krak filled a sheep's carcass with pitch, the dragon had lunch and didn't stick around for dessert. There is a tunnel that leads down to the Vistula River, where a bronze statue of said dragon stands. During the cold months the tunnel accumulates dampness and/or water, so we couldn't go through it. Krakow, therefore, is filled with dragons-for-sale but most of them are Barney-like. No one bought, or if they did, they didn't admit to it.

After almost a full day of churches, a very patient Al led us to Kazimierz Town, the Jewish quarter founded by King Kazimierz the Great. About 100 years after King K the G lived, Krakow's Jews moved to this part of the city, where they thrived and at one time there were seven synogogues. It was in this neighborhood that Oscar Schindler had his home and factory, and some of the filming for "Schindler's List" was done here as well. We saw a Jewish cemetary and Al was able to get inside one synogogue for a few minutes during service, but we were not.

We had agreed to devote the next day to taking a bus out to Auschwitz to view the museum at the concentration camps. The name of the town was (and still is) Oswiecim, but the Germans re-named it Auschwitz, the death camp responsible for killing one million men, women and children over a four year period of time. Many years ago I had visited Dachau in Germany and almost took a pass on this, but decided to go, and realize it was a good choice. We saw a brief film that showed the Russians releasing the prisoners; a woman behind us was sobbing. We followed this with an English-speaking tour guide, who lived in town and was excellent.

After first visiting the site at Auschwitz, you take a shuttle a short distance to Birkenau, the camp that covers about 425 acres. While Auschwitz has the iron gate that says, "Arbeit Macht Frei", Birkenau has the oft-seen train tracks which came right into the camp to the platform. To stand on that very spot was overwhelming; many of us couldn't even talk during much of the visit, and we were amazed when we realized that we had spent about five hours there. Near the crematoriums and gas chambers there is an International Monument to the Victims of Auschwitz, and you walk on pavers, each one representing a lost life. I have decided to say little about this day because it would take a book; instead I recommend it to anyone. Even if you have substantial knowledge of the Holocaust, there is much to learn by experiencing this first-hand.

As you can imagine that was an exhausting day and we still had a bus trip back to town and a eight hour train trip the next day back to BA. Even Al didn't talk as much, or maybe he did and I was just too tired to know it. In addition to our Euros and Slovak crowns, we have accumulated Polish zloty and Hungarian forint. Most of us"went without" in the Czech Republic during brief stops because we didn't have Czech crowns. Bring on the Euro!