Milwaukee's Best

Lake Michigan at sunset

2012-02-05T23:02:00.000-05:00

It's Winter Time.

2012-01-29T11:37:00.000-05:00

N 34th and Lisbon

2012-01-27T23:24:00.000-05:00

Find a penny pick it up.

2012-01-22T23:00:00.003-05:00

So over the weekend I was little bored and for some reason thought it would be fun to see how old of a penny I could find in our house. 1962 was the winner! Wow, a penny that has been in pockets, in cash drawers, and on the ground for 50 years, cool!

Then I thought, hmm, I wonder if we have pennies from every year since 1962. Turns out we don't but we are pretty close.

I was telling our friend Kyle about my little game and asked if he had any pennies laying around. Out came his change cup and away I went. 1960! Awesome, the oldest penny challenge was on it's way. There were only a few pennies left, mostly shiny but there was one that was really beat up. 1910! I couldn't believe it -both Jeremy and Kyle verified it for me - yup, 1910. I think we have our winner, but now I need to find pennies for all the years in between (smile).

Market Basket

2012-01-20T22:56:00.003-05:00

Dear Milwaukee Drivers

2012-01-20T18:00:00.003-05:00

Dear Milwaukee Drivers,

Right on red is always an option, not a requirement. If cars are coming I am not going to turn infront of them and be killed, and honking at me is not going to make me change my mind. Also, when turning right on red you are still required, by law, to stop before turning - you are still at a red light.

When making any sort of turn, be it left or right, the drivers behind you would appreciate if you used your turn signals as it is the only way we know that you are in fact turning and not just stopped. Furthermore, if your car breaks down in the middle of the road or you feel as though you need to stop or let someone out please put on your four-way flashers - it's all about communication.

Most roads in your city have two lanes for cars (both directions), a lane for bikers (yes, they are supposed to be on the road...), and a lane for curb parking. Why must you constantly pass me using the curb lane? Most of the time there are no other cars in the left lane (the proper passing lane for those of you who don't know) and is getting to the stop sign first really going to get you to your destination any quicker?

Also, riding my ass is not going to make me drive any faster and we would all appreciate if it you would not text while driving. Thank you.

Sincerly,
A Pennsylvania Driver

PS: 3 inches of snow is nothing to freak out about - just take it easy.

Winter Sunrise - Milwaukee, WI

2012-01-18T13:27:00.000-05:00

Winter Hiking

2012-01-15T23:10:00.000-05:00

Pabst Brewery Tour

2012-01-14T23:09:00.000-05:00

Friday the 13th Market Basket (mwaah haa haa)

2012-01-13T23:08:00.000-05:00

Annie in Milwaukee!

2012-01-08T23:07:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year!

2011-12-31T15:31:00.001-05:00

An Ault Christmas in Tennessee

2011-12-25T15:16:00.000-05:00

This Christmas Jeremy and I went down to Tennessee to spend the holiday with his parents, grandma and triplet brothers. I expected to have a good time, however nothing could have prepared me for the giggle-fest which ensued! On Friday, after everyone had arrived, Jeremy's parents decide to give Jeremy and his brothers their main present. With the boys stilling out the couch, out came three identical bags and Jeremy's dad ran to get the video camera. What was so special about these gifts that they did not want to wait two days until Christmas day? All three of them reached into their gift bag at the same time and pulled out a large, black CD case. With confusion on their faces they unzipped their CD cases and instantly a huge grin spread across each triplet's face and a laugh escaped. Inside were DVDs of home videos, not just from their childhood, but also their parents. Needless to say, the entire four days in Tennessee were spent watching these videos, laughing together, and remembering the good times they have had together. Occasionally they would get a call from their younger brother, who was unable to make it but was also watching his own set of home videos. These are the moments that make the holiday season special, and I would like to wish all out family and friends and Merry Christmas, where ever you may be!

Rustic Cabin Weekend

2011-12-18T14:44:00.003-05:00

Nothing says Wisconsin better than renting a rustic cabin for the weekend. This past weekend Jeremy, me and a few friends from Jeremy's graduate program pulled out our long-johns and sleeping bags and loaded up our cars with as much food, games and beverages as possible and headed an hour and a half north for a weekend of rustic cabin fun.

Rustic meaning no running water, no electricity and no heat except a wood burning stove which we kept burning all weekend. We cooked over a fire, sang songs, played games and hiked. The weather was beautiful and we even got a few snow flakes to make the weekend even more Wisconsin-esk.

There was only one thing that put a damper on the atmosphere - the boy scouts. Normally I have nothing against boy scouts: they learn survival skills, build fires and cook outside, and do good things in there communities (I was a girl scout myself when I was younger), however these scouts rented the cabin next to use and the scout leaders brought a gas powered generator with them. Yes, you read correctly, the boy scouts brought a generator on a weekend trip to a rustic cabin. So for 2.5 days we listened to a generator humming away, didn't see any smoke coming from their cabin's chimney and not one boy scout playing outside.

holiday marketbasket

2011-12-16T14:42:00.001-05:00

45 Degrees and Sunny

2011-12-12T22:18:00.003-05:00

It's mid December but you would never know simply by looking outside: No snow,maybe some morning frost and little critters still out and about. Yesterday Jeremy and I decided we would go for a walk since it was so nice outside. Nice meaning 45 degrees and sunny...there weren't many of those days in Western PA, or Policka...two weeks before Christmas that is. Anyway, we're walking down the sidewalk next to campus (but on the other side of campus where there are never many people) and what do we see? Robins. 9 of them. They must have been migrating a little late and happened to fly into Milwaukee just in time for this lovely day. Sadly they flew only the fringe of a college campus and found french fries instead of worms. Needless to say that was a nice little surprise for two bird lovers who went from backyard bird paradise to a busy street and volleyball court.

Yay! Fresh Fruit and Veggies!

2011-12-09T17:05:00.002-05:00

It's been two weeks since my last market basket...

2011-12-02T23:16:00.003-05:00

Roll call:

carrots, broccoli, potatoes, onions, collard greens, zucchini, pears, apples, bananas.

Cranberry Sauce

2011-11-24T12:09:00.000-05:00

Ballet at 26

2011-11-20T12:31:00.004-05:00

I'm not really sure when I decided that I wanted to learn ballet if ever presented with the chance - probably sometime during college. I feel like for most of my life I have had people ask me if I do ballet or gymnastics because I "had the legs for it". I would always reply that I was a runner and swimmer.

I haven't been doing much running or swimming lately, mostly walking, hiking and biking (however I should find a pool....the running I can do without). When we lived in Policka, CZ we had a number of friends who took ballet and other forms of dance, so it was probably there that my goal of taking ballet was solidified. Studios in Erie, PA offered a number of dance classes for children, or adults who already have a background, but none for absolute beginner - which would be me.

After talking a a few people here in Milwaukee I heard rumors of beginner dance classes being offered by the school district and other cultural centers, so the search began. That's when I found Danceworks; a nonprofit that offers a wide range of classes for both children and adults! Perfect!

I'm registered for the full 12 week class, bought a pair of ballet slippers and a pair of tights. I've never taken a dance class and I have a limited sense of rhythm -here goes nothing!

The Market Basket: Health Food Made Afforable

2011-11-18T18:58:00.004-05:00

This week we got a super pimped out market basket for the upcoming holiday. Here's what we got for $9: huge head of cabbage (grown local by GP), carrots (again local by GP), peppers (grown local), apples (local), pears (local), onions (local), sweat potato (local), bananas, tangerine, celery and cranberries. As you can see, not all of the basket it grown locally in Milwaukee, however it is still fresh, healthy food being made affordable to everyone.

Let's go for a Walk!

2011-11-14T22:53:00.001-05:00

Jamie: Do you wanna go for a walk?
Jeremy: Sure, where go you wanna go?
Jamie: I don't know, do you want to walk down by the lake?
Jeremy: We always walk down there.
Jamie: So where should we go?
Jeremy: I don't know.

This is normally what our conversation look like when it comes to going for a walk or bike ride. Normally we end up downtown or along the lake, but this weekend we found our selves on a section of the Hank Aaron trail,tucked away next to the Menomonee river.

What a gem! This section of the trail wasn't very long, only about a mile, however it was just what we were looking for. The path was was bordered by milkweed, golden rod, bergamot and other fall wild flowers and plants, as well as murals painted by children from a local elementary school. So of course Jeremy and I played with the milkweed pods (doing our part to spread the seeds so more would grow next year) and enjoyed the sunny afternoon. When we thought it couldn't get any nicer, we heard this squeaking and looked up. Right above our head a Downy woodpecker was in the tree hoping from branch to branch, squeaking each time it landed. Fascinated by the adorable little bird, we must have stood and watched it for a good 10-12 minutes before it flew off. What a great way to spead a warm November afternoon!

Spinach Salad (brought to you by our market basket!)

2011-11-13T22:51:00.000-05:00

It's Friday! (you know what that means!)

2011-11-11T21:04:00.003-05:00

Spinach, corn on the cob, carrots, apples, pears, lemon, oranges, onion, acorn squash, green beans, potatoes and bananas (yum!).

Kale chips.

2011-11-08T20:41:00.010-05:00

Kale Chips!
- kale (tons, it shrinks!)
- olive oil
- lemon juice
- salt
- oven

Pre heat your oven to 350 degrees. Wash and rip kale into pieces. Put olive oil, lemon juice and salt onto the kale (I used a big bowl with a lid and shook it up). Place seasoned kale onto cookie sheet and bake until crisp(between 10-20 mins). Enjoy!

Ok, enough about food.

2011-11-06T10:22:00.003-05:00

I'm sure that those of you who read our blog are a bit tired of all the market basket posts...sorry about that. I guess I just really enjoy taking a picture of it every week and tel you about the new things I learn how to cook, BUT we need to make sure that there are other things being written about.

It's now November which means we have lived in Milwaukee for just about two and a half months (wow - it feels a lot longer than that). Jeremy is up to his ears in school work and I am learning new things everyday at my job.

Yesterday I worked painting our logo on the side of our building, which made me really happy. I feel that the management staff at Growing Power have a good sense of what people are good at and how they can use those talents to enhance the organization. There are so many unbelievably talented and passionate people working there.

After painting I went to the Urban Ecology Center: Washington Park. Our first week in Milwaukee Jeremy and I rode over there and signed up to be volunteers. Jeremy has been going to the Urban Ecology: Riverside Park every Friday and being a volunteer teacher. This was my first time back to volunteer and I'm really glad I did. It took me back to the root of what I love to do, which is to learn about our natural environment and teach others about it. Every Saturday before the young scientists club starts the staff feeds the animals with the kids (and parents) that come. They have turtles (box, painted, musk, mud), fish (yellow perch, blue gills), an american toad and bull frog, and two different snake (which I can't remember their types). One for the moms next to me verbally expressed her love for turtles, which turned into a conversation about why water and land turtles are shaped different, but also the similarities that all turtles have, and the variety of things different turtles will eat in the wild. Then I answered other questions about snakes. It was so fun!

After watching the animals be fed by the staff, kids and volunteers went into the park and picked up litter. It was so fun watching the them really get into cleaning up the park, but also having teachable moments at the same time. The little girl I was partnered with kept picking up fallen tomatoes when we were cleaning up around the raised beds, but after a few minutes and getting asked where tomatoes come from she figured out that tomatoes on the ground were not trash, but would turn back into soil and we should put them in the compost pile, not our black trash bag.

Then just when I thought the day couldn't get any better the staff took the kids to the rain garden to collect seeds to be planted next spring. After being taught which seeds to collect we split into groups. Never in my life would I have thought that we would collect seeds for 20+ minutes and have kids be so into it that they didn't want to go home! My group collected bergamot, which is a type of mint which is used in making earl grey tea. The stem of the plant is square rather then circular, which is characteristic of mints, and the seeds a found in tiny little tubes which were once the flower. Cool huh?

Another week, another market basket

2011-11-04T20:13:00.006-04:00

Another week another market basket! This week we got (drum roll please) carrots, broccoli, apples, pears, bananas, potatoes, hot peppers, oranges, a lemon, an acron squash and mustard greens!

Wait...mustard greens?! What the crap do you do with them? Actually, that was my second question...the first being, what the heck is this? So can you can see I was told the greens we got were mustard greens and that you can steam or saute them.

So I looked online for a recipe and this is what I found. I kinda liked them, but Jeremy didn't really care for them. They were too strong tasting (like mustard!). But hey, I learned how to cook something new!

Mustard Greens Recipe

1/2 cup thinly sliced onions (I used leak)
2 cloves garlic, minced (I used garlic powder)
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 pound mustard greens, washed and torn into large pieces
2 to 3 Tbsp chicken broth or vegetable broth (didn't have any...)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon dark sesame oil (didn't have this...so I threw on some red wine vinegar)

1 In a large sauté pan, sauté onions in olive oil over medium heat until the onions begin to brown and caramelize, about 5 to 10 minutes. Add the minced garlic and cook a minute more, until fragrant.

2 Add the mustard greens and broth and cook until the mustard greens are just barely wilted. Toss with sesame oil. Season with salt and pepper.

Serves 4.

Nordic Trail (10 mile day hike)

2011-10-30T20:37:00.001-04:00

Yet another market basket.

2011-10-29T10:24:00.003-04:00

This week features butternut squash, broccoli, carrots, onions, potatoes, apples, pears, salad mix and bananas!

You might notice that the carrot are larger than normal. But actually they are rather small compared to the others that got harvested this week! There was one that looked like a zucchini, I kid you not - the power of worm poop :)

Mid-semester

2011-10-28T22:23:00.000-04:00

This week's Market Basket!

2011-10-21T18:49:00.006-04:00

How fun is this week's market basket?!

We've got carrots, apples, acorn squash, pears, bananas, potatoes, purple onions, salad mix, broccoli and brussel spouts (yes, the sprouts are on that long stick thing - learn something new everyday!).

So for dinner I found a recipe for brussel sprouts and added some of the potatoes, carrots and onions that we got as well and grilled up some chicken. I never thought I would say it, but those brussel sprouts were great! Nothing like cooking with fresh, local veggies!

Brussel Sprout recipe

(for those of you who hate boiled brussel sprouts as much as I do!)

Ingredients

1 1/2 pounds Brussels sprouts, ends trimmed and yellow leaves removed
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (205 degrees C).
Place trimmed Brussels sprouts, olive oil, kosher salt, and pepper in a large resealable plastic bag. Seal tightly, and shake to coat. Pour onto a baking sheet, and place on center oven rack.
Roast in the preheated oven for 30 to 45 minutes, shaking pan every 5 to 7 minutes for even browning. Reduce heat when necessary to prevent burning. Brussels sprouts should be darkest brown, almost black, when done. Adjust seasoning with kosher salt, if necessary. Serve immediately.

Spaghetti Squash

2011-10-17T18:05:00.000-04:00

Two weeks ago we got a spaghetti squash in our market basket..... and my first instinct was, "what the crap is a spaghetti squash and how do you cook it?" So I asked asked my co-worker, who looked at me like a was dumb as bricks and made a little joke, then she realized I really had no clue and filled me in on how to cook and prepare this odd squash (smile). So tonight I invited over a few friends to try it out. I hope it's good. Cross your fingers and your toes!

Market Basket update!

2011-10-16T17:44:00.003-04:00

Market Basket!

So...my camera broke, so I sent to back so I sent it back to get new one, which is why I haven't been posting much the last month. However, I just discovered that we can take pictures with our web camera...yeah, I know....so sorry about that, I'll make sure to take more pictures!

Anyway, back to our market basket. The picture is a little hard to see, but we got potatoes, carrots, bananas, acorn squash, apples, pears, leak, dinosaur kale, green cabbage, purples onions and hot peppers - not too shabby.

Wisconsin plate G60-13T is a litter bug

2011-10-04T19:12:00.003-04:00

Why someone would ever throw trash out their window is beyond me. But I saw it happen first hand this afternoon on my ride home from work.

The light was red at W. Fond Du Lac and North Avenue and I couldn't help but look at the car in front of me seeing it was orange and pink (couldn't tell you for the life of me what kind it was). And then, right in front of me, the front passenger drops a pop can out the window. The driver is smoking a cigarette and the passenger in the back seat hands the front seat passenger a big drink cup and he drops that one out the window as well. By this time I'm both shocked and ticked, so I loudly state "Hey, you dropped somethin". The drive looked as me in his rear view mirror, with a look on his face that read, "yeah, and your point?" and drove away. But then why would he care about his buddy dropping a couple of things out his window when there was already trash everywhere. Plus, he wouldn't wanna get his new car all dirty.

Another week, another market basket.

2011-09-24T09:19:00.000-04:00

Bike shop

2011-09-18T10:04:00.001-04:00

Farm Markets and Market baskets

2011-09-16T21:49:00.000-04:00

It's been two weeks since I started working at Growing Power and man, what a cool job. Mind you, the majority of the time I am in a little office with the accountant, on my computer entering things into quickbooks, but every so often there is a little surprise change up. For instance, on Wednesday I was told I would be going to the farmer's market at Marquette University because the person who would normal would go had to do something else. So my co-worker and I loaded into a van with our produce and headed down to Marquette. This farmers market has been in the works for years and is the second annual, however bigger and better. This fall there are three farmers markets planned where students will be able to buy fresh, local produce, dairy, baked goods and more. Ands the best part about it is that the sustainability program at Marquette is sponsoring it, so students are able to use their meal plan and MU cash to pay for they food they purchase. The market lasted from 11am-3pm and what do you know, I get my picture in the newspaper!

One of the perks of working on a farm is access to fresh fruits and veggies. Market baskets are available every Friday, so I thought I would give you a little taste of what is in one. The great thing is they change every week, and you'll never know what you're gonna get!

Sailing

2011-09-11T21:48:00.000-04:00

School and Such

2011-09-10T12:11:00.003-04:00

Well, it's been quite some time since I was last able to post anything of substance on this blog, but I'm glad to see that Jamie has really taken it upon herself to keep the site updated and interesting! My first few weeks in school have been a cloud of honest confusion with fleeting periods of happiness and contentment. To say that I enjoy being back at school would be quite the overstatement, as I find myself more and more drawn to the life outside of the campus boundaries: I yearn to camp with friends, drink beers in bars, explore the state of Wisconsin and read literature as opposed to the ponderous works of historians I don't even know. Yet, having said that, I do thoroughly enjoy the intellectual challenge that history affords me, even if I'm not so keen on the insular politics of academe; the classes that I've been taking this semester have been fascinating and challenging all at once. The student with whom I study with are a great mix of ages and expertise. Many are older than myself, and all of them are passionate about their specific topic of historical inquiry, which always leads to heated and enthralling conversations in the class room. The professors themselves are nurturing and VERY personable; I guess it might be time for me to throw out my old preconceived notion that the large university professor as a man or woman of cold countenance and condescending arrogance.

The social life in Milwaukee is great, and I've been finding it much harder to balance my studies with all the options I have upon the end of work or class. I can go to numerous restaurants, lay on the beach or walk to the art museum. I've enjoyed getting to know many of the students in my Trinity Fellowship, and all of them are wonderful, interesting and open-minded.

Work has also been great, as I've been slowly learning my role within the Adult Learning Center. My relationship with the students has gotten off to a great start, and each day I have more and more visitors. I help them write their resumes, talk about their problems, and even do some basic job searching for them. This job, in all honestly, is a major demotion from what I was doing last year in Erie, but I like the fact that my job now carries less stress and affords me more time to study and read--two activies I'll be doing a lot over the course of these next twenty months.

Due to the fact that I don't work on Friday, I've decided to pick a volunteer teaching job at a local nonprofit known as the "Urban Ecology Center." The center functions almost as a YMCA camp within the city limits and offers classes on biology, ecology, rock climbing, canoeing and botany to inner-city youths and schools. Just yesterday I helped lead a class on bees, which was great fun; I felt like I was back in Ohio working as an Environmental Educator again. The image of children running through a natural prairie, swinging bug nets and chasing Monarch Butterflies amidst the shadows of two skyscrapers was energizing for me. Next week I'll be wading with a group of 5th graders in the Milwaukee River as we look for Macroinvertebrates! Should be fun!

I guess that this all I must update you on. through the semester I hope to write a little bit more about my personal experiences and challenges here at Marquette, as I attempt to learn how to be student again.

Cau!

I work on an urban farm

2011-09-07T20:51:00.004-04:00

Never in a million years did I think that I would be working for a farm - an urban one at that. But here I am, two days into my new job at Growing Power, as an a assistant to the accountant. So you see, I'm not really a farmer...well, or an accountant for that matter, but I heard about Growing Power and their mission from a bunch of different people and they had an opening for a position, and here I am.

Growing Power is a 501c3 nonprofit and land trust that was founded in 1993 by a man named Will Allen. Will's parents were farmers, but he is quoted as saying that he never thought that he would be a farmer as well. But it's a good thing he changed his mind because this man has been an influential piece in the good food movement (or revolution as he calls it)

Simply said, the mission of Will Allen, and of Growing Power, is the make healthy food affordable to everyone (everyone meaning every human being on earth). And his thoughts, as well as the U.N.'s Food and Agricultural Organization, is that the only way to make health food affordable is for it to be produced and distributed at a local level. One of ways that Growing Power does this is through it's market basket program and farmers markets. Cool huh? I could go on forever, but I suggest you check our their website instead! (www.growingpower.org)

Kettle Moraine State Forest - Lampen Peak

2011-09-05T14:21:00.002-04:00

Parking tickets

2011-09-02T19:38:00.004-04:00

All around Milwaukee these little white and blue jeeps can be seen scanning the parked cars. They are the ones making sure that cars are only parked in certain places for no more than two hours and that meters have money in them. And it all is not in order out comes the clipboard and scanning gun to hand out a ticket.

All of the streets that we have seen so far have signs on that stating when and where you can and cannot park. This is normal for any city. However Milwaukee has a little trick up it's sleeve. On "main" roads, such as Wisconsin or Wells there are signs that tell you that there is no over night parking on those roads...what the signs don't tell you is there is no over night parking on any roads within the city (without a permit that is...). How you are supposed to know that is beyond me.

On Wednesday our friend Jake from Pittsburgh stopped for a visit on his way to Tacoma. He got into Milwaukee around 5pm, so we figured he would be okay to park this car on our street until the morning. But we were wrong. At 4:29am Jake was given a ticket because he was parked overnight without a permit. What we learned from this is that you can get a permit to park over night by calling the parking authority and paying a fee, but the question remains, how do you know to call them if you don't know that you need a permit to park overnight?

Dear Milwaukee, Why Do You Smell Like Wet Dog?

2011-08-23T12:19:00.003-04:00

Dear Milwaukee,

My husband and I have enjoyed getting to know you and we like you very much; however we have one question: why do you smell like wet dog? It is a rather odd aroma seeing that we don't live so close of the lake that we would be able to smell the dogs that jump into it, plus I would be expecting to smell fish if that were the case. To my knowledge none of the apartments in our area allow pets, and every pup I have seen since coming to the city has been dry as a bone. So where is this smell coming from?!? Here is my theory, please correct me if I an wrong.

There is a large, wet, uncatchable pooch wandering about. His name is Roger and he likes to fetch things out of the water and return them to their rightful owner. Everyday Roger trots down to the waterfront and searches for something to pull out: a pop can, cigarette butt, flip-flop, etc. Then once he has the item, he runs all over the city until he finds the owner of the discarded item. This of course would explain two things. First, and wet dog smell. And secondly, the clean waterfront.

Milwaukee, I'm not sure if I would like you to catch Roger since he is doing a great service to Lake Michigan; however, if you do see him, please give him a bath.

Thank you and please correct me if I am wrong about the smell.

Sincerely, Jamie

Skyline

2011-08-21T19:35:00.001-04:00

Snow-flaked?

2011-08-21T19:05:00.002-04:00

There is always a learning curve when moving to an new place. You have to relearn where the good places to eat are, what there is to do on the weekends, where all the different stores are, etc. Plus there are always little oddities that catch you off guard.

The first one were the bike lanes. Coming from Erie I didn't expect there to be so many. And I also didn't expect them to appear and disappear like they do. Jeremy and I were biking around our second full day in Milwaukee, getting a little lost mind you, and decided that we wanted to turn right onto some road. Instantly I had an "oh crap" moment as I realized we were about to go over an interstate look bridge, but much to my surprise a bike lane appeared. It's like the city put them in areas where bikers really need them and the rest of the time they assume a biker and hold their own.

The second oddity we encountered happened today while at the grocery store. Nothing new or exciting, just buying food. We went up to the deli to buy some lunch meat and I asked the guy behind the counter for a pound of shaved smoked turkey. He then reached into the case and pulled some out - clearly not shaved. After placing it on the scale I asked if we could get it cut any thinner and he replied, "oh, do you want it snow-flaked?" and put the "shaved" lunch meat back into the case and proceeded to cut us some "snow-flaked smoked turkey". It ended up being exactly what we wanted, but how would we have ever guessed that "snow-flaked" in Milwaukee means "shaved". Weird. I think we might have to ask around to verify that this is an actual term that is used.

Impressions of Milwaukee

2011-08-17T10:14:00.004-04:00

After driving over 550 miles where I traversed through three major cities full of innumerable 'potential hazards', I decided to save my 'accident' for the last five feet of the journey: I backed our moving truck into our neighbor's parked car. Thankfully she wasn't in the automobile (because she was in Georgia) and no one was injured. I was all alone when it happened and initially concluded that I had 'roofed' the truck on a low-lying branch, as the sounds of "CRUUUNCH" and "CRAAACK" were more like that of a stressed out tree than of a car; however, much to my horror, I was not parked under a tree, nor were there any falling leaves to be accounted for. Instead, there was a 2008 black Ford Focus with newly-formed scratches and a gigantic hole in the bumper. My stomach churned and my excitement at finally having arrived at our new destination was as ephemeral as the taste on some cheap gum. I didn't want to move. I didn't want to speak. And I sure as hell didn't want to call a girl--whom I had never met in my life--to tell her that I had just wrecked my 16' moving truck into the front of her sporty, cute college-girl car. I had to, and I did. Thankfully she was in Georgia at the time of the 'disaster' and was unable to slug me in the face upon listening to my wavering, completely embarrassed voice inform her that she will (most likely) need a new bumper upon her arrival back from summer break.

So, there it was. The first impression I made on Milwaukee was indeed a damaged up bumper and an insurance claim. Awesome.

After the initial 'bang' of our arrival in the city, Jamie and I have attempted to get to know the city on a more intimate level by riding around it on our bikes. Half expecting the roads to be as treacherous, if not more treacherous, than in Erie, I was initially a little timid to take my bike out on Wisconsin Ave. (the main thoroughfare) with buses and cars whizzing past my ear. Yet, to my astonishment, no one honked at me; no one verbally accosted me through their window; no one felt the need to rev their engine behind me. In fact, I was even given space on the road on which to ride, which was supplemented by real BIKE LANES that extend all over the downtown area of the city. Numerous times while riding my bike yesterday, I had a slight panic attack, as I turned down a concrete-paved road that looked more like a freeway than a road, and thought to myself, "Uh-oh, THIS road is surely not made for bikes.", only to find that just as I'm about to turn around and go another way, a bike lane appears. It seemed to me that I could ride literally over the ENTIRE city without ever having to be on a road that wasn't meant for bikes. It is such a refreshing change from the danger and complete ignorance of what I had found last year through my travels down Parade St. and State St. in Erie.

Milwaukee is generally cited--if it's mentioned at all--for being the "most segregated" city in America. I took that sentiment as being hyperbole, yet even after just one day of riding my bike around the neighborhoods, I've come to take that perceived 'much exaggerated' statement to be fact. I've never in all my years of living (which, I know, isn't that much) have seen such stark demarcation lines between race groups: In Milwaukee only 35% of the city is of African-American or Latino decent--90% of which live in the same west-side section of the city. I rode through the trendy East End and it's Brady Street; I went along the shoreline and past the beaches; I went to the Urban Ecology Center and back; I found the Adult Learning Center and took a tour of it. I went from 1st St. to 47th St; from East to West, North to South, and I saw almost only WHITE PEOPLE. Then I rode through the part of town that is above 36th street, on the west side, and was thrown into a world of black faces, gangster rap, and refurbished public housing. Everywhere I looked I saw beautiful black faces or the forlorn look of a man out of work. There were broken windows, cracked sidewalks, litter on the streets, and the bike lanes conspicuously ceased to exist. Was this the same city I had ridden in all morning? Did I happen to enter into a lost neighborhood? Was Jim Crow still in effect!?!?

My cell phone has been ringing nonstop since my arrival, and I must admit that it's driving me absolutely insane. I really do believe that I've received more calls this past week than I would in a month in Erie. It wouldn't be so bad if those calls were coming from friends and family, but they aren't, they are the product of numerous confused tennents who live in the apartment building that I manage: "Um, could you let me in (at 12:00am)? I seem to have forgotten my key.", "The Internet man is coming to install cable into my room this morning at 10:30. Could you be there for me?", "Sorry for the inconvenience, however, I'm not going to be moving in today. How about tomorrow? Time!?! Oh, sorry, I don't know exactly when I'll be in." So is the life....

The last thing I'll mention is that I've recently become very aware of my own insecurities about going back to graduate school. I must admit that I'm not so sure I made the right decision, and I'm also not sure that what I'm about to study is REALLY what I'm interested in. I'm reading book after book just to get through them, as I have twenty-four of them total. It's been a hard battle to keep the 'Institution' in perspective, and I'm thankful for the Fellowship and the job at the Adult Learning Center for that reason: I can only read so many books that talk quite arrogantly about the problems of academe that make one believe that actually not getting your paper published in a journal is an ACTUAL problem; I know that what I'll be seeing at the Adult Learning Center will put "academic problems" into a crucible where they are to be ridiculed. I know that my worth doesn't come from being the best student or having an excellent seminar paper. I just have to keep reminding myself this as the year progresses. Ugh, I wish I had some stronger self confidence.....

New Place, New Name

2011-08-16T10:23:00.004-04:00

Yes, we are on the move again. Off on another adventure, so we are closing the chapter of "Life on the 'e'" and opening a new one: "Milwaukee's Best". Enjoy.

Moving

2011-08-12T15:05:00.003-04:00

Boxes are piled high to the ceiling and the dust bunnies that have hidden beneath the bed for the past year, are coming out into the open, only to alight on my skin, making me break out in rashes, hives and unpleasent bouts of sneezing.

For the past few days I've been in a rather reflective mood, as I come to terms with the unknown that is Milwaukee/Marquette University and the realization that I won't be seeing any of my Pittsburgh or Erie friends for quite some time. I wish I could sit back and leave without feeling the slightest hint of remorse or sadness, but I can't. A few years ago I would have relegated my nostalgic and sorrowful tendencies to the realm of "being scared of the unknown"; however, today, I realize it's the fear of being seperated from my established community that has me most at odds with myself.

I received a phone call today from my new 'boss' in Milwaukee and was informed that I must be in the apartment building at exactly 10:00am on Tuesday, August 16th, for the installation of internet into apartment number 11. I informed the woman on the other line that I was still in Pennsylvania and that Tuesday will only be my second day in the apartment, to which she responsded, "Yeah, the manager told me...(silence)...well, I'll expect to see you there on Tuesday for your first job." Looks like work will start RIGHT away.

I spent one of my last nights in Erie riding mountain bikes with my friend Paul. It was quite the fitting way to close my year, as all the way back in September I had met Paul while riding my pervious bike (which was stolen in November) on the trails of Asbury Woods Park. I was quite nervous to pick up mountian biking again, as I myself am more partial to road riding, yet I found the three hours in the woods to be completely enjoyable, challenging and quite dangerous. I was not very confident in regards to my own handling of the bike as I careened down into ravines, attempting to miss the protruding rocks and roots that were in my way, but I decided to hit each hill like it was my last, and I ignored my initial tendancy to be timid and fearful of the obstacle directly in front of me. In a very romantic and cliched way, I viewed my final mountian bike trip like my next life in Milwaukee: I know I'm not confident in my skills, nor am I really ready to proceed head-long into the precipice that is graduate school, but I'm going to do it anyway, and I'm going to hold on tight for the ride. I know that I'll bleed, get scraped up and fall into the mud along the way; however, I know I'll survive the trip to ride home, confident, strong and hungry. Hell, maybe I'll even eat the cream-filled donut I indulged in yesterday upon arriving back from my mountian bike excursion? Who knows.

Reflection

2011-07-28T10:54:00.006-04:00

A year has passed since I first stepped foot into my office here at the Quality of Life Learning Center, and I must admit that I've recently become rather introspective and reflective about my VISTA year and the experiences that I've garnered. And what shocks me the most is not so much my nervousness when thinking of my future plans, or the sense that I've reached a kind of closure with my life and friends in Erie, but it's the yearning and heart-ache that I feel when reflecting on the reality that in a month I once again will pick up and leave for a new destination far away from that which I've known as home for most of my life--Western Pennsylvania.

In thinking back to three years ago when Jamie and I were preparing to leave for our life in the Czech Republic, I didn't seem to think much about my family, friends and colleagues who I wouldn't be seeing for quite some time. I guess in a way, I was content in justifying my 'going away' by acknowledging their 'always being there': If I wasn't around, they'd be; If I didn't miss anyone, they'd miss me; If I came home in a year unchanged, so they would be unchanged as well. It was OK for me to be the entity that was always moving, never setting down roots and being transitory in all my life's dealings. However, what Erie has shown me throughout this past year, is that leaving again--for another two years nonetheless--will not be as easy as the first time. Right now I'm at a place where I realize that friendships, relationships and even kin ties are hard to keep and strengthen when one player--more often than not, myself--is not around. I noticed upon my arrival back to the USA that I did have changed friendships: I lost some friends, felt distant from my immediate and extended family, and had a hard time articulating how I myself was a different person. So, in a way, this whole year for me has been a process of healing in regards to rekindling old friendships and re-appreciating my family; in a way, this year was also one of coming to terms with my own self guilt for not being a part of anyone's life for quite a while.

So now, as I patiently count down the days until my departure date to Milwaukee, I can truly say that I'll miss those that I love, and although it seems a little 'new' to feel this way, I can say with confidence that it isn't an unexpected emotion for me, it's just that I have a hard time showing it.

Last night a group of colleagues from work and friends from Erie had a surprise dinner for me at a great Syrian restaurant. And as I sat amongst the ten of them, I was shocked and overwhelmed with how much they--each one being of a different color and race than myself--had accepted me into their social groups and into their lives. They brought me wine, money, cards and purchased a fantastic Kebab dinner. It was a total surprise, and I left the restaurant a little tipsy from Merlot, but full of TRUE genuine joy at knowing that I once again had made a community and that I had once again found great people. Let's just hope that some day I'll be able to stay longer than a year.

Here's to Milwaukee!

Main Street?

2011-07-13T22:12:00.002-04:00

An evening stroll down Erie's main strip at any part of the season is a practice in overcoming desolation, be it in the frigid winter where piles of snow impede the walkway; in the much-anticipated spring, where rain, wind and puddles chase would-be 'strollers' under awnings and in houses; in fall where the chilly wind hurts the nose and ears; and--as I experienced tonight--in the summer when nights turn into a depressing parade of society's outcast and mentally deranged.

Deciding to embark on such a journey at 8:00 pm down the heart of State Street leaves one with the feeling that the city itself, and a majority of the patrons seen, have passed their prime many years ago. In fact, I'm often left pondering if anything, ANYONE, in this city still lives, breathes and feels. The backdrop of another pastel sunset over the glinting waves of Erie Bay offers up a rather incongruent canvas upon which the night's actors and actresses waddle,wheel, and haphazardly stumble down the sidewalk.

Tonight there was the ancient woman with bowed-legs, rotten teeth and a sad countenance digging through the trash cans finding scraps of food, tin cans and attempting upon all hope to find a little change.

"Do you have a dollar for me to get home, son?"
"No," I replied. "Where do you live?"
"On the East Side," she answered. "What about 50 cents?"
"No. I'm sorry. I have nothing for you."

I left her behind as I attempted not to make eye-contact with her flinching face. Thank God she was hunched over, and her neck protruded in the opposite direction from gaze, so as to protect me from looking and seeing her painful condition more fully. Yet, I was sure she drug her feet continually down that sidewalk at a literal snail's pace stopping at each can to thoroughly inspect its contents. I heard a rather rotund, ugly women yell from a moving car in the old woman's direction: "Stop digging in the trash you dirty hag!" I whipped my head around only quick enough to see the old woman acknowledge the barb, ignore it, and continue on down the street on her bowed knees.

Less than two blocks down the street, I became aware of a middle-aged man with sorrowful eyes and a worn countenance sitting listlessly in a wheelchair still adorned in his tattered military garb. I'm sure he was a left-over from the Vietnam era, utterly crazy and most likely a drunk. He made eye contact with me, and for a split second I wanted to look away, but I kept him in my sight--his eyes locked on mine--until I had walked enough to nearly go around the bend. Neither of us spoke to each other, and I must admit I didn't feel threaten. To the contrary, I saw the man as being already dead. No life. No future. No community.

A little further on, I came across a local hangout for the white, suburban "Erieites"--those that don't actually live in the city center--known as The Plymouth. Many of the patrons were sitting on their iron rod tables and chairs, watching in complete stupor as an anorexic man daintily passed by carrying a minute hand purse, wearing lipstick and skin-tight, bleached jeans. Following this "man" was a mentally unstable brute who was yelling at the top of his lungs these four words: "fuck", "ass", "bitch" and then, again, "fuck." I was terrified, as I came up to this man, and even went so far as to step off of the sidewalk, around a tree and onto the road, just so I wouldn't have to be within arm's distance from his clenched fists.

As we turned to make our way back to our apartment, Jamie and I were witness to wide-open roads, robotic stop lights and blowing plastic bags that were caught up on the telephone poles that lined the cracked sidewalk. We picked two up and dumped them in the trash, thus ending our evening stroll.

Monarch butterfly

2011-07-12T21:35:00.007-04:00

"Attention Whole-Foods customers, the butterfly at the customer service desk is hatching if you would like to come watch". After hearing the announcement it was like I was back in 4th grade, so of course I abandoned what I was doing and hurried over just in time to see a brand new monarch butterfly pushing out of it's chrysalis. Even though I had seen this happen so many times as a child, I couldn't help but be in awe. Jeremy, our friend Seth and I, as well as about 10 other people, stood and watched the butterfly uncrinkle its wings and flex its probiscus. I felt like if I watched carefully I would be able to see its new wings dry infront of my eyes. How cool. This butterfly used to be an egg, which turned into a caterpiller, who after munching on milkweed, encased itself in a chrysalis and today it finished its transformation into a butterfly. But my question is, what is happening inside the chrysalis to make the caterpillar turn into a butterfly? It can't just be sleeping...

VISTA Epic Poem

2011-06-21T22:28:00.006-04:00

I

In the year 2010 A.D., a scare was wrought across that land…
as VISTAs themselves were unsure of their plan…
for the controlling powers that be…
had decided to cut the program, claiming they couldn't pay the fee.

So upon the earth the ground did shake…
with college students lost and leaving only sorrow in their wake…
for no guidance from VISTA workers could be had…
no opportunities to volunteer, no reason to be glad.

The streets were filled with children in despair…
no homework was done, and excuses were brought to bear…
upon desperate teachers who had lost all reason to care…

The flow of money was halted by a dam of inactivity…
as grants and foundations shuttered their doors to
the needs of the community…
as no person was there to write the application…
that would in time cure the affliction.

The nonprofits were burning in fiery torment…
for their lack of capacity building and sustainability…
were considered moot in this unsightly moment…

Executive directors and even bar owners received such a scare...
"Oh! Why? Oh! Why?" they lamented…
were the VISTAs not there?!

II

Yet upon the northern land of Erie, where a frigid wind blows…
were aroused a chosen seven from their oft hung-over repose…
A near impossible task was laid upon their plate…
to ease the suffering of poverty stricken children…
whose lives were controlled by the clocks ticking fate.

So upon foot, cylinder and cycle did the seven go to chosen sites…
Whereupon the grip of poverty would meet its fight…

Two damsels, beautiful of face and full of heart…
were sent to colleges to rouse up a throng…
of student legions youthful and strong.

where with hand and mind did he find line and sail…
in which to build a vessel…
that was sure not to fail.

One was sent to care for the ground…
teaching children of trees and plants that grew all around…
who even spoke to them about birds that abound.

And yet still another was fetched to ease the suffering…
of mothers and children who were told they were nothing.

And to help the newcomers lost and confused…
a chosen VISTA was sent to spread the news…
of hope and a better life…
far away from their countries…
full of suffering a strife.

But Alas! Arose a foreboding cloud in the East…
that held captive the people in gloomy unease…
luckily two other VISTAs were sent with pencil and dodge ball firmly in hand…
with the task of empowering youth all across the land.

III

And so it came to pass in the year 2011…
when the people sang praises of VISTAs up to the heavens.

With trumpet and song and beer and wine…
did all the people have a mighty fine time.

And as the year wore down, the party grew quicker…
when in came Sam Rigotti with a bottle of liquor.

"Hark!" He exclaimed. "To the Villa we will ride…
to dine with the knights of Meadville…
within whom we abide.”
And to celebrate the success of a year done through…
gave one last toast to the VISTA crew.

The End.

New Year, New Hobbies

2011-06-13T20:03:00.003-04:00

Reflecting back on the experiences of this year, I can say with confidence that this has indeed been a year of learning. I seem to have gotten myself into many new hobbies and interests since my arrival back to the United States in July, and I'd like to just spell out a few of them for you here:

1. Backyard Ornithology: Jamie and I have a quaint garden that is full of perennial flowers and oak trees, which makes a nice stage upon which our avian friends can flutter and strut--especially in the early spring mating season. I saw the swooning dances of humble House Sparrows, the nest-building skills of a minute House Wren, the rearing toughness of a mother Blue Jay, and the be speckled breast of fledgling Robins, Sparrows and a few bright Orioles. Each day I am attracted to the chatter and effusive life that permeates through the hedge bushes, our bean garden and the tallest oak. It's a shame that in years previous I myself was quite oblivious to the perpetuation of life that was growing around me, which takes its more endearing form in that of a fledgling. As they leave their nest I have come to appreciate their absolute helplessness in fending for themselves, as they wait for their mother to bring them morsels of seeds or worms to deposit into their gullet. They are horrible flyers and often times end up running head-first into the shed or our wooden fence that surrounds the yard. They are clumsy, physically manifesting the fact that even the creature MADE to fly, still has to learn the art through falling.

2. This year marks the third upon which I have been without a car. I rely almost solely on my commuter bike--and if the weather turns nasty, public transportation. I became accustomed to riding a bike in the Czech Republic; however, at the time, I wasn't aware of the nuances that enable one to truly depend on this wonderfully simple form of locomotion: I was clueless as to how a chain was suppose to be properly oiled and cleaned, I didn't know the difference between a cassette or a chain ring--all of them to me were just "sprockets", I had no true experience in changing out tires, and I was completely clueless about what to look for when a grind or a crunch began to radiate through the steel frame. Deciding that it was time for me to become "more one" with the bike, I called upon the help of a local bike-mechanic friend to give me a crash course in basic maintenance, in which he showed me tools, proper techniques and the names of parts--often times interspersing lessons with a great conversation and beer. The lessons have been a success; I've slowly begun to hear and feel my bike as I ride. I'm more attuned to the way the peddles feel on my feet and the overall working health of the derailleurs, the forks and the all-important bottom bracket. If a problem does arise, which is quite often, due to the fact that my bike is more than 20 years old and has easily over 25,000 miles on it, I am apt to pinpoint the cause and have my hand at an attempt to correct it.

3. Through work I've become what you might call an 'amateur expert' in the ancient science of "Aquaponics"--a hybrid form of agriculture that seeks to fuse both hydro culture--the act of raising plants only through mineral-enriched water--and fishery science. The basic practical application looks like this: A large tank of water is filled with fish. The fish proceed to eat, swim, grow and poop. The 'poop water' is then run through troughs. The troughs are covered by floating rafts that have plants placed on them--the rafts have a series of circular holes cut so that the plants' roots can reach down into the 'poop water' in the trough. The plants in turn suck up the nutrients from the 'poop water', using the nitrogen in the fecal matter to grow. The root systems of the plants filter the water, so that once the water has run the gauntlet of the suspended roots, it is clean enough to be pumped back up into the fish tank as pure, lovely H2o. The fish subsequently eat, grow, swim and poop, repeating the cycle. Aquaponics is a system that was designed in ancient China and is also believed to have been used by the Mayans of Central America (I think). At work we’ve been working tirelessly for the past two years to start up an aquaponics cooperative—which we have named "Hothouse Harvest"—that seeks to unite a worker-owner cooperative business model with that of an aquaponics greenhouse. We have ambitions of selling to local grocers in the Erie region by harvesting vegetables and mixed greens. Once Hothouse Harvest has a fairly robust harvesting cycle and we are pleased with the progress and functionality of our own aquaponics system, we'll begin to expand the cooperative by hiring on employees-- most of whom will come from the refugee/immigrant/low-income population on the East Side of Erie. We're viewing the project as a synthesized land-reclamation-economic-development-food-sustainability model, which we anticipate might be copied and applied in many other post-industrial settings around the United States. Needless to say, I've been reading about, talking about and visiting many aquaponics systems as of late. Dare I say, I think I have enough basic knowledge to set up my own!

just for fun

2011-05-27T16:59:00.000-04:00

Helping and Hurting

2011-05-26T21:07:00.005-04:00

Surrounding my place of work are rows of low-income projects. Many of the clientele and children I deal with on a daily basis eek out a living in the small, four room apartments that make up a 'block'. Most of them never work, so they live a quiet, listless life of porch-reclining and aimless walking--or if they are younger, “child rearing." And even though I can talk at great length (or write a well-articulated grant piece) about the factors and underlying reasons for their plight and poverty, I have spent very little time actually tangibly experiencing it. What at first started out as fear of the poorer, darker populace in close proximity to my workplace, has now turned into a rather accepted line of demarcation between my world and theirs; I rarely walk the 200 yards it takes to reach the main street that bisects the project compound. I am comfortable having them come into MY place of comfort. I can dictate to them what needs to be done, and I can express frustrations to them about their lack of 'drive' or 'focus' in regards to helping themselves out of the dehumanizing circumstance they find themselves in. I ride my bike each morning and evening past their houses, only passing by with a casual acknowledgement that in those dilapidated frames and behind those streaked windows live the children of my afterschool program, or the adults of our GED classes. I see their houses as blurs of gray through the corners of my eyes as I attempt to steer my bicycle around the gaping pot holes and cracks in the pavement. Even when I hear the startled voice of a familiar child scream out my name, do I rarely acknowledge the admonition with more than just a half-hearted wave. Yet, yesterday was a different circumstance.

I had only ridden about twenty-five feet when I looked into one of the many courtyards that make up the 'green space' between the apartment complexes to see a mass of children sprawled out lying on the grass. I knew that many of the children were East Africans by their dress and the daintily-decorated Hijhabs with sparkling rhinestones and golden thread that they were wearing over their heads. The girls , for their part, were running (barefoot, as is customary) around the enclosed yard as the boys of the family--many of them my students--busied themselves attempting to make repairs on some bikes. They all saw me ride past. I heard them yell. I hesitated, and turned around at the end of the corner. In my mind I now knew that I was on the verge of crossing over a boundary that to me had seemed unbreakable for nearly nine months. I slowly pulled my bike up to the curb and saw the kids surround my bike, imploring me to help them fix the back tire and brakes on a well-worn, cheap BMX bike. Getting down from my seat, I had a few of the youngest girls pulling on my shorts and tugging at my shirt as they led me through an iron gate which opened up into the courtyard. I saw immediately the hulking, round body of their mother sitting on the steps. She was adorned in a most beautiful full-length dress of red flowers and bright yellow suns, and also had hear head covered. We both greeted each other through the distant nodding of our heads, yet we both were mutually leery and embarrassed for each other: She ashamed of the life possessions, ownership, cleanliness and respect that she didn't have; me, for my sorry attempt at trying to portray genuine empathy and care--which is not exactly easy to come by from a white child of privilege.

Aden and James, the two oldest boys in the group, were both attempting to generate more tightness in a worn, stretched out, and by all reasonable measure, rusty chain that had a bad habit of slipping off of the smallest cog. The drive train was not only worn out and neglected, the entire bike itself, through its cheap metal and shiny decals, never had much of a chance at lasting anyway--it was a cheap bike, and would most likely have a cheap death on the trash-strewn lawn of four low-income apartments. I looked at the chain and informed the boys that they should attempt to move the back wheel as far down the frame as they could. They began working on that aspect of the job with a screwdriver and a wrench--one of which is only conducive to the job. I laughed on the inside at their lack of knowledge and innocence; reflecting later at my own callousness by not realizing that their mother, who clearly had no interest in helping her children fix the bike, had not the money to buy proper tools. Some how, after twenty minutes of us prying and pulling, we got the wheel to move and adjusted it so as to create a small amount of tension on the chain, just enough so that it wouldn’t pop off. We then moved onto the tires, both of which were dry-rotted and flat. I pulled out my newly-purchased hand pump and began to push some life back into the deflated tubes. All the while I was working, I had a swarm of about five to ten children going through my pants pockets and my book bag attempting to find candy and money; distracting my focus as I attempted to come to terms with the fact that I had light hands constantly pressing and perusing through the more 'sacred' parts, or should I say, "crevices", of my body. Eventually the tires rose up and I felt relieved that eventually I would be able to leave. But, it was not to be, as two more tires and a few more girls appeared in the doorway. They pleaded with me to fix them; I went right to work. The children began attempting to depart tire from tube by using a spoon, which had the unfortunate habit of bending on every attempt. The rim itself was all rust, which did not exactly help the situation, as even with the tools, the tire was reluctant to let go of is grip. Eventually we were able to pry the tire off enough of the oxidized rim enough to pull out the tube, which was surprisingly in fairly good condition. Aden, their brother, instantly took up the tire that looked to be about 21 inches in circumference, and earnestly began shoving it onto the rim of a children’s bike. Looking befuddled, I told Aden that the tire looks way too big for that tire and that maybe he should try a smaller tube." Upon hearing this, Aden responded, "You-- Jeremy--we know how to do more than you. See, I can put this tire on this wheel. I'll just fold it up into sections and it'll work just fine. We do this all the time. I don't have money to buy a new tube like you." (Little did he know that last week I did do just as he said: two flat tires = two newly-purchased tubes). Not saying a word, I let Aden get back to his task at hand, and five minutes later, when the tire had been placed on top of the over-sized tube, I began to pump it up. I let some of the little girls have a chance at actually pumping the air, and many of them seemed genuinely ecstatic at such an opportunity.

Upon getting up to leave, I turned around and saw a few more children bringing their bikes out of their homes. It was a parade of popped tires, broken chains and rusted out drive trains. I felt overwhelmed, and as I debated about what to do, I quickly stood up and decided to leave before I got in over my head. I turned around to say good-bye to the mother sitting on the steps. She sat there, in the same position, with the same expression that she had worn an hour earlier upon my arrival. And I realized that she did not care for my act of good-will for her children; she did not need my help. I then suddenly felt out of place. I could see that all around her laid the broken remnants of tea mugs, and I saw into the home, which was vacant aside for a few pieces of blocky, dirty furniture and a lone, spindly wire running up a wall.

America!?

2011-05-17T11:35:00.010-04:00

In 1991, merely two years after Communism had collapsed in Central and Eastern Europe, Vaclav Havel--The former Czech President, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, dissident, playwright and philosopher--wrote an oft-forgotten book entitled "Letni Premitani" (translated into English as "Summer Meditations") at the conclusion of his first full year as president of the then newly-democratic Czechoslovakia. In the work, Havel spells out his vision for the redevelopment of the country after more than forty years under an oppressive communist regime with an emphasis on the privatization of business, a focus on the rehabilitation of the environment and the reestablishment of regional cultural centers (villages). However, Havel's writing--at least at this point in time-- is more interesting not so much for its optimism and articulation of how to rebuild a nation, but for its diagnosis of the societal diseases and symptoms therein that are a consequence of totalitarian regimes.

The first symptom upon which Havel chooses to comment was the state of the villages, towns and cities, of which, he found to be "uniform in grayness, ugliness, sameness and anonymity." He laments the fact that nowhere was there to be found uniqueness in character and community, as each village itself was just a copy of the previous' drab architectural design, miserable cultural offerings and insular inhabitants. He juxtaposes this with a vision of building two bakeries, two pubs, two sweet shops and an array of private, small businesses in each town and village that would all agglomerate to produce a unique 'face' and 'feel' of a healthy community, thus sacrificing stifling uniformity for vibrancy.

He then proceeds to accuse the communist regime of undermining the relationship between a person and their work by emphasizing the division of society into working classes that congealed to form one giant 'mass' of workers that did nothing but feed the exploitative machine known as "Collectivization." Havel goes so far as to equate the entire nation of Communist Czechoslovakia to a "stable meant to hold robots" that have no control over where and why they work and also over what is done with the fruits or 'products' of their labor. He claims that nothing destroyed the Czechoslovak society as much as separating peoples' professions and work from personal and holistic meaning.

Yet, he saves his most scathing review for the collectivized farm, which he claims turned villages into "Dormitories for factory-farm laborers" and turned farmers themselves into unthinking machines tied to an exploitative, monopolized industry that emphasized quantity of produce over quality; drove cattle into in-human feed lots where they were unable to run through a meadow or feel the glint of sun on their back; poisoned the land through the use of copious amounts of fertilizer; emphasized the complete mechanization of farms with polluting technologies; and threw the ecological balance of the farm--and nature--into a nosedive, leading directly to desiccation and death.

Looks a lot like modern-day America, doesn't it?

Drab box stores and parking lots stretch into the horizon, choking off regional culture uniqueness by putting in their place chain restaurants, gas stations and stoplights, thus creating a uniformity of 'communities' built only for the car and consumerism. Millions of employees and workers in corporate America have lost meaning in jobs meant solely to expand profit margins for international companies and CEOs often times to the detriment of families and to the individuals themselves. And industrial farming with its tenants of monoculture (corn and soybeans), reliance on chemical fertilizers and its complete disregard for the balance of the ecosystem --and the farmer's relationship to the land itself--has laid waste to the family farm, farm communities and former nutritional health of America.

Yet, ironically, most of the modern-day American symptoms do not come from the often-cited 'socialism' of the Democratic Party, but from the short-sighted policies of a Republican Party becoming more rigid, narrow and dogmatic than ever before.

Back Yard Birdies

2011-05-03T20:00:00.005-04:00

What I love most about where we live is our small backyard and it's abundance of birds (and the occasional squirrel or cat). They have been in entertainment through the fall, winter and continue to entertain me even during our dreary spring.

Just the other day a little House Wren was sitting on a branch in the tree near our kitchen window and it had this little stick in its beak. And it must have sat there for 5 minutes (seriously - I watched it an giggled for a few minutes, went and got my camera) and then it dropped the stick and flew over to a little bush were there was another House Wren and it just jabbered away until the other wren flew away.

And the Grackles will pick up acorns and try to swallow them, but they can't, they're too big for their mouths, so they will pick them up try to swallow them, drop them, pick them up, drop them and so on.

Anyway, I thought I should probably write down the birds we have in our back yard, so here's the list. When I see a new bird I'll be sure to update it :)

* Northern Cardinals (2 - a pair)
* Blue Jays (most of the time 1-3, sometime more!)
* House Wrens (at least 2)
* White-throated Sparrows (crap loads)
* Common Grackles (3-5)
* Northern Flickers (2 - I think they are a pair)
* American Robins (3-5 - one is the fattest little thing you've ever seen)

Reflections

2011-05-01T13:46:00.003-04:00

As the summer quickly approaches, I find myself more and more in a fit of uncertainty in regards to what I will be doing next year at Marquette University-- even though I've recently come to a tentative 'peace' in regards to my decision to go back to school. Upon first hearing of the fellowship offer, I was actually hesitant to accept--much to the chagrin of my mother--as I was not too keen about the idea of going back to the university setting, where I would (most likely) be learning highly-specialized skills that could really only be transmitted from one office job to another. I guess, in a way, I am still yearning for a more 'holistic' learning experience where my physical, emotional and biological being are challenged to view their existences as mere pieces in the symbiotic relationship that makes up "contentment": I guess to make it more simple, school tends to focus on a narrowly-chosen realm of being to educate-- be it skills in how to clean teeth, or skills in how to convince more people to buy more things. So, I said to myself that if I was going to be going back to school, then I would chose a major/study that would go against the trend of choosing fields due to their potential "job prospects", and instead immerse myself in a more 'classical' form of education that focuses on reading, writing and giving the student a more comprehensive understanding of historical perspective and international/social standing; therefore, I chose to study History (once again) with an emphasis in Global Studies. I know that this degree might not have a neatly-paved road to success and monetary bliss, but I'm content in knowing that I will enjoy the idea of learning, which I think too many universities and colleges have sacrificed to appease the industrial gods of "Profitability" and "Utility."

It's quite hard to believe that the Trinity Fellowship application is still technically progressing: I applied in December, received an answer that they "couldn't give me an answer" in April, and am now in the process of preparing for my "Confirmation Interview", which is to take place with my prospective nonprofit employer, the Adult Learning Center. I'm typing this blog post about thirty minutes before I'm suppose to call the current Trinity Fellow at the Adult Learning Center to ask her more direct questions about the Fellowship itself and the nature of the work I will be getting myself involved in. I'm a little bit hesitant to call, as I'm not so sure what to ask. I know that I'm probably supposed to have 'a ton of questions', but I can only seem to formulate a few, and most of them consist of such softballs as these: "What do you do on a daily basis?" "What is the most difficult aspect of the job at the Adult Learning Center?" "How do you generally balance your school work and you nonprofit work?" "Do you enjoy the professors and the academic rigor of Marquette?" I guess these questions are legitimate, but I feel as if there is some kind of unforeseen pressure on me to ask something really profound, but I'm just not up to it at this point in time...

Ever since a semblance of "spring" has arrived--which in Erie means it snows only during the morning--my muscles have been screaming to wrest themselves from the listless control of my daily movements--sitting in a chair and typing at a keyboard--to bound for the more atavistic pursuits of riding, running and sleeping under the slowly-blooming canopies of hard-wood trees. I hate the feeling of 'softness' within my body tissues, and each day I find that my legs are aching for the freedom to walk, to move and to have blood pulsate to every single fibre of muscle in my thigh and my calf. Yet, I continue to sit. And to the contrary, the dull pain that resounds in my tissue is not a reminder of a previous day's excursion, it is the consequence of four hours of sitting on my hind and squeezing off blood circulation. I want to get out. I don't want to ruin my youth while I'm still limber and full of energy. Oh, I yearn for a reality that doesn't relegate me to having my retinas accustomed to sterile fluorescent light, or my back atrophy into a position of rounded shoulders and shapelessness.

Reflections

2011-04-20T16:25:00.009-04:00

My birthday is coming up this weekend, and in Erie it still is snowing. I'm usually not really affected by the weather patterns of the Great Lakes region, as I find it to be often 'over-blown' by some of the 'locals', who themselves seem to believe that Erie rests only about five miles from the Arctic Circle, but I must admit that this so-called "spring" has just been down-right terrible to behold. How silly was I to think that in March the weather "would start to improve by April 23rd!?" Ha! Please! To the contrary, each morning I wake up to freezing temperatures, snow and god-awful, windy-blown rain drops that bang off of my bike helmet and make my canvas shoes wet from the inside out. I thought that by April I would be afforded the opportunity to go on a nice cross-city jaunt through the glass-strewn streets with my eyes averted from the city decay by all the blooming, budding bushes, flowers and trees that line the way. I thought that the sun would touch my neck and turn my pastel-white skin a tinge of red. Yet, it is not to be. We here in the northwest corner of Pennsylvania perpetually find ourselves under a thick layer of the heaviest and ugliest clouds one has seen, well, since February. When will spring arrive!? When will I not have to worry about the mucus smell of earthworms crawling across the pavement to flee from the water-logged, muddy 'soil' along the corners of all Erie sidewalks and roads? Soon. I hope.

Last Thursday, exactly one day before my decision deadline, at 8:00 pm at night, I received an email from Marquette University telling me that I had--after nearly three and a half months of waiting--been awarded the Trinity Fellowship. I accepted the Fellowship right away, and since that time have done very little reflection about it, except repeating over and over again in my mind: "I'm a FELLOW." "I'm a FELLOW." "I'm a FELLOW." You know, I would like to admit that I'm not so easily enticed by titles and prestige, but it really does feel GREAT to have been accepted. Now, I guess I just need to get serious about the work I'm about to get myself into: the long nights of studying, the writing, the working, the being stressed, the loneliness.

Last night I found myself at a public discussion about Marcellus Shale Drilling, and was shocked by the general public discourse; we as a nation REALLY do see problems through 'Black and White' paradigms. There were numerous instances last night where I was utterly disgusted and frustrated with the lack of respect that fellow citizens had for each other's opinion--even if the expressed idea was not exactly popular (i.e.- supporting Marcellus drilling). And, I was even more appalled at the manner in which the audience would address the speakers: More often than not, each question started with some kind of one-up-man comment like, "Well, sir, I don't think you quite understand...", or "So, you're REALLY saying that...." The audience really did treat the professors like they were some politicans who were public enemy number one. Yet, my greatest critique goes to the toothless, grunge, know-it-all type in the back of the room who made comment after comment about absolutley EVERY SINGLE POINT that was brought up in opposition to Marcellus Drilling. He spoke in the most obnoxious squack of a tone that is usually only reserved for mentally disturbed uncles who drink lots of beer and speak at length about Agent Orange. I proceeded to chalk the guy up as a wise-crack (and, yes, an "asshole")and attempted to ignore his arrogant morter shells of shallow-thinking that kept falling throughout the auditorium. It didn't work as well as I would have hoped.

I hate getting lectured from some cigarette-smelling fool with thick-rimmed glasses cacked in about two decades worth of black grime and a beer gut to boot.

Small reflection

2011-04-11T12:46:00.007-04:00

This past weekend my wife and I, along with a friend (Lucas), spent the days traversing the rounded hill-tops and 'fording' the rushing, early-spring streams of the Allegheny National Forest. It was a relaxing weekend, spent with pack on back and map in hand. We didn't have a real destination in mind, as all we hoped to do was to get our minds away from the cramped-up offices that have come to be the main environment through which we spend a majority of our waking existence. The peaceful rush of water and the rapid-fire tapping of the Downy Woodpecker was tugging at my soul in the deepest recesses of my being. I had to get out in nature. I had to leave the house. I didn't want to drink any beer this Saturday. The weather would have no affect on my mind; I was going no matter whether it rained, snowed or threw down lightning--which, ironically, was the coming forecast.

But, as is most common in Pennsylvania, the forecast never came into fruition, and we had two beautiful days of hiking weather. Parts of the shadowed valleys still had pockets of snow, but for the most part, we indulged our senses by touching lichen and moss-covered rocks, smelling the fragrance of vast stands of White-Pine and methodically enjoying the calmness that radiated outwards from water rushing over rocks and branches, as it made its quick escape down to the Allegheny River. Juncos, sparrows, hawks and chipmunks were our most-commonly seen fellow creatures, and we were delighted in their seeming disinterest in us, leaving us to our own adventure, as they flout above our heads in canopies, or stole away in hollowed-out trunks.

An escape to nature really does bring one back to reality in regards to our very HUMAN and natural connection to the earth. I've heard many times over again about those who have contemplated the vastness of the universe, and in consequence thereafter, been humbled. But for me, the universe is not tangible. It's large, sure enough, but I need to have my 'place checked' by seeing grandiose things that I can concretely know to be greater than myself. And hiking amongst gigantic igneous boulders is the perfect place. Thankfully, the Alleghenies are strewn-through with these mammoths, and each time I perch myself upon one, I am struck by how old this one, solitary rock must be. It's not part of the soil. It's not part of the earth's crust. It's not part of the hill. It's its own entity, sitting in that one place for over 1,000,000 years. It has seen geographical time, as it itself is a consequence ( and witness) to the near incomprehensible forces that created its being. And we mere humans, with our 72-year life-spans, climb on top of it and feel might. Who are we fooling, right?!

It's amazing the beauty that sits less than a two-hour drive to the east. It's hard for me to imagine that in this country, a nation in which we are blessed to have so many natural and geographic anomalies, that we Americans wouldn't want to preserve our own treasure. It's too bad that this last refuge of Western Pennsylvania wilderness might be on the chopping block for more gas drilling, yet I'm hopeful that the forest will be resilient, after all, it's already been environmentally pillaged once before; it's just unfortunate that 2011 is no different than 1911 in our society's collective thinking about the importance and necessity of nature.

Recurring events

2011-03-28T17:35:00.004-04:00

I Just wanted to write that on my bike ride home from work today I ran into another similar situation to the one yesterday, except the miscreant was driving a large Lincoln Navigator and had a backward baseball cap on. And, yes, he was white. He drove his monstrosity right up behind me and launched into a cuss-ridden tirade as to why I should get my butt off of the road and ride along the sidewalk. However,this day, unlike yesterday, I was a bit more reserved and calm, as I knew that I was in the right, however, this fine young specimen of male bravado was more inclined to fight, as he went so far as to stop his Navigator mid-turn and put it into park. I kept riding away with the contentment that his blood pressure was a whole lot higher than my own---not to mention he looked like a fool in that big, ugly piece of garbage.

But, for real, are people so thick-skulled to realize that a biker is treated a vehicle on the road!? I can't simply just get on the sidewalk! Geez, this is almost making me want to write ten letters to the Erie Times containing a laundry list of all cyclist laws just so some of the more 'low-life' people in Erie would know to stop yelling at me in the street, yet that means they'd actually have to read some written text, which I'm sure they aren't too accustomed to doing.

On an end note, less than thirty seconds after my yell-fest with the "bro" in the navigator, I saw from the sidewalk a group of robust black girls verbally accosting somebody near me. For a split second, I thought they were speaking to me, which nearly made me lament to the Lord above as to why I can't just ride in peace. But, I was happy to see that they were yelling at the two college girls riding in the Honda Civic in the next lane over from me. The black girls went on saying this: "Get your f*** cracker a** c*** off of my f***** street, or I'll whip your white a****." Upon hearing this, one of the college girls riding in the car, stuck out her hand and gave the group of aggressors a sign-language-type symbol for "F*** You."

I then contemplated about the fact that no one here is nice to each other, and about the amazing rate at how often I hear the word Fuck: today in about a two minute span I heard it at least 10 times....WILD! Oh! How I love a jaunt on a bike underneath the sun-streaked skies of an Erie spring!

Bike Muscles

2011-03-27T18:35:00.006-04:00

In general I would consider myself to be quite a mild-mannered person. I don't pick fights with anyone, and when I see a chance to avoid any kind of conflict or violence, I am often the first to back away into my own safe hovel. Yet, when riding my bike around this great City of Erie, I feel within myself a primordial urge for the fight. For blood. For Revenge.

Today I decided to take a nice trip around the more unknown parts of Erie, while Jamie stayed at home to work on a "surprise" birthday gift she was concocting for me and my brothers. After about an hour of having the chilled wind blast against my face and have my toes feel as if they were slowly being morphed into small pebbles of granite, I decided to head back home to East 2nd street. To get myself from point A (Presque Isle) to point B (Home), I had to ride across bike-friendly Sixth Street (the only such road in the city), past Gannon University, turn around the corner at Perry Square, and then make a right onto Fourth Street, from whence it's only about a three block ride across State Street to German Street. Most of the trip was without event, until I made the fated right-hand turn onto Fourth Street, when suddenly, somewhere from behind, I heard the aggressive, emotion-startling tone of a car horn. "HOOOOOOOOOONK." "HOOONK" "HONK!" I quickly turned my head across my shoulder to see if I created some kind of terrible calamity, or had gotten in the way of an ambulance--after all I was only a block away from Hamot Hosptital: I would have felt terrible if I had let my late-afternoon ride for leisure, totally ruin the chances of an elderly woman surviving a stroke. Yet, what did I see blazing through the windshield, waving in my direction? A nice 'fuck you' sign from some Neanderthal wearing a flat-brimmed Arizona Diamondback's hat driving a rusted out Honda with two other knights of ignorance reclined in the back.

Now, this is where I change...

In a fit of adrenaline and rage, I turned around and yelled "WHAT!?!?" so loudly that I felt my voice box rumble in my throat. In an attempt at being as inconsiderate as I could, I immediately turned my bike to the left; placing me directly in the middle of the lane, leaving the curmudgeons behind me without the room to pass or go around me. I stopped at the stop light. At about this time, I heard a 'revving' coming from the engine and again looked back. This time I saw the dumb mug of the ignorant perpetrator smiling in my direction. My blood boiled. I gripped the handlebars a little tighter, and felt the adrenaline pulse into my leg muscles and into even into my eye sockets. The light turned to green. I inched over to the left and began my crossing of State Street at a much slower clip than is normal--which was planned of course. I looked back again and saw that the driver rolled down his side window, which normally would frighten me into humbly pulling over and letting the impatient driver by, but today was different: I felt energized when I saw he wanted to spar. I was sick and tired of having to hear horns blasting in my ears and having young high school dropouts driving past, yelling obscenities. I was tired of being ignored by the local government. And I was envious of the fact that our whole society caters to the oil-loving, car-hungry mob. Oh, did I also mention I was full of ancient, male rage!?

His window came down. They pulled up next to me. My enemy had arrived, and I shot off at the mouth quicker than ever before: "FUCK YOU!" I yelled. "I have just as much right to be on this road as you do." I saw on their faces that they were shocked that such a nerdy-looking white kid on a bike could be so angry. I guess I wore it on my eyes, which would have made sense, because I had actually imagined myself at that moment grabbing up my heavy-duty chain lock, swinging it above my head like some Viking warrior and bashing it into the side of their car window, shattering the glass and leaving all of them to pick out the bloody shards from their faces. Maybe the driver saw that in my face? He read me. I think he thought, "This guy is crazy." and hastily drove off.

I tried to catch them two more times at stop signs, but they always managed to out run me, which eventually made me drop the gallant battle. I quickly came to the realization that fighting about an inconsiderate driver wasn't worth the more-than-likely beat-down I would sustain from the three of them. So, I slunk back home; contemplating what had just transpired and why me--Jeremy Ault--a seemingly passive guy--was thrown into a fit of rage.

The only explanation that I have is that on a bike many mundane situations for the driver are as sharp as a Life-or-Death situation for the cyclist. And in that sense, I'm fighting for what I think is my own perpetuation.

Or, I could just chalk it up to a new phenomenon: Bike Muscles: a little healthier than drunk muscles, but pretty much one in the same.

Life Update

2011-03-21T20:29:00.005-04:00

After three months of pensive waiting for a reply in regards to my application for graduate studies at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, I received the much-anticipated reply this weekend: Accepted with both a Teaching Assistantship worth $ 13,480 yearly, and on top of that, a tuition scholarship worth over $ 17,000 a year; meaning that Marquette has not only decided to accept me as a student, but they've also some how found within the goodness of their own hearts the ability to give me over $ 30,000 next year to study. Now, one would think that upon hearing of such great news, I would have been ecstatic? Yet, it was far from the case. I seem to have talked myself out of studying history before I even got started. I am honored that Marquette has offered me such an unexpected incentive, however, the three months hoping and pondering whether graduate school is the right "next step", seems to have really altered my outlook on this next journey in life. University and academia to me are constantly nudging me to think of myself as not being qualified or smart enough to cut it. It's really--at least what I have been conditioned to perceive--a cut-throat world of papers, deadlines, grants, animosity and charlatan showmanship. Not to mention that getting a Masters Degree of History is generally considered not the most prudent of moves, as the degree is really considered just a rest stop on the way to the real prize, THE PHD. What will I do with a History degree? Who will I meet next year Marquette? How will my mind be transformed, reformed, challenged and set to lofty new heights? What friends will I make? What new interests will I acquire? What hidden talents will be unveiled? I don't have the answers to these quandaries. So I sit here, less than two weeks away from my decision deadline, jaunting back and forth between "to go, or not to go." But, with money on the table, would I be silly to resist?

I am now going to enter into a not-so-often-attempt of stream of conscious writing. I feel I have a lot to say, but not the time nor the chance to write it or say it. So, here I go:

Last night I came across the Danielson Famile again, a band that I have not heard since the year 2005; I found their weirdly-Christian lyrics and tantalizing beats enchanting; I then went on youtube and looked up one of their concerts from the Purple Door Festival of 2003 and found myself and two of my old-time friends (Jake Nelko and Ben Brewer) standing in the frame of the shot at about 1:55 of the video; this got me thinking about the messages and places we leave in our own history, and that probably many years into the future, some nostalgic young man will look through the pictures of a hundred years ago and come across a picture of me with curly hair and shell-laced necklaces, wearing a too-tight t-shirt that I bought at the thrift store because everyone seemed to be doing it: I wonder what that person would think. I wonder if they'd see themselves in me; I'm reading a phenomenal book from the author Cormac McCarthy entitled Blood Meridian, which is a truly haunting novel about the demonic forces that drive human kind, set within the context of American history and the Manifest Destiny doctine; I know that there will be a battle in the book, and I hope so badly for good to win out; at work I often find myself in contact with so much bad, that I can't seem to soften my own heart and care; I've been beaten down by impatience and the recurring problem of me feeling like I do EVERYTHING, that I don't seem to take the time to play, or to nurture or to really FOCUS on improving the situation of the needy immigrants and refugees who come into my office on a daily basis; the shrill of their voice and the laborious way in which they speak makes me want to slam my door in their face, and wish them a good night sleeping on their soggy-rugged floors in the spider-infested adobe that is their Housing Authority apartment; I guess working my ass off for a whole year and getting little in the way of monetary incentive makes me bitter and tired; I'm tired of pinching my pennies; I'm tired of having to fight to make the bill this month; and I'm tired of seeing listless teenagers wearing nicer clothes than myself, and then chastising me for my money and looks just because I'm white; I know that I've been fighting the urge to move abroad again; I'm not so sure that this comes from a weakness of character in regards to the fact that I always need to feel as if I'm on some kind of cerebral--or very real--adventure in life; I'm also not so sure that I can leave my family; oh, the dichotomy of wanting so badly to live so far away, yet realizing the futility of ripping up roots and never laying down my own perennial root system; yet, I'm drawn to the road, to the path, to the steam streaking across the sky to lands often encountered only in books, in thoughts and in periodic spouts of National Geographic marathons: maybe there are those of us who are just made to be wanderers,souls at home on the move, at home and in love with all those places and people they come into contact with; I'm often content in Erie--surprisingly so; I never did expect to find myself enjoying the Great Lake region so much, but I've slowly become fond of the old clapboard houses that look cozy in the night with their glowing windows, or at the bitterly cold winds that shoot off of the bay; I enjoy the accessibility of Erie's bar scene, and of the library that is perched out on the pier near our house; I'll miss these things when we're gone; I love going into the library and seeing a homeless-looking man read Shakespeare; it just throws my whole notion of perception and judgment into a cavalcade of uncertainties; my stream of conscious is ending, as I find myself thinking about what to write next, so I'll just leave with you a quote:

“Their sprit is entombed in the stone. It lies upon the land with the same weight and the same ubiquity. For whoever makes a shelter of reeds and hides had joined his spirit to the common destiny of creatures and he'll subside back into the primal mud with scarcely a cry. But who builds in stone seeks to alter the structure of the universe and so it was with these masons however primitive their works may seem to us."

Who will we be, oh builders of prefabricated homes, wal-marts and indulgent egos? Will we be builders of stone, or of reeds?

I am, in all honesty, attempting at many times in my life to leave stone structures, but I have only hands enough to carry reeds.

Indian Embroidery

2011-03-15T18:16:00.004-04:00

In January I stared taking an Indian Embroidery class at the Erie Art museum. You might be thinking, "wait. WHAT!? The art museum has classes?!" Well, the answer is yes, and you should look into them. Anyway, I was at work, looking over the quarterly reports from the VISTA before me and discovered that the art museum offered classes (and scholarships!) and promptly signed up.

Now, to be honest, Indian Embroidery was not my first choice and my thoughts after the first class were, "what the hell am I doing here? I can't do this. I just wanted to have a painting class." However, after I practiced at home with my tiny hooked needle and successfully made a few rows of chain stich, I started to get into this new style of art. But it still took some time getting used to, since, as an amature painter, my brain needs to have things in picture form and Indian Embroidery is not exactly meant for that: it is used for embellishments.

My teacher, Pooja, was extremely patient with me and the other three women in the class; showing is the different stiches over and over again. Of course, we didn't feel like we were achieving much since Pooja is a professional designer in India, and her work is amazingly beautiful, but her encouragement and praise when we were able to do a stich properly made us feel good about ourselves. And as the class went on, I found myself becoming almost obsessed with doing my practice at home, so that I would be better when the next class came around. So much so that Jeremy would have to actively ask me to do other things (Sorry, Jer. I can be a little one-track minded sometimes).

In the end I ended up loving the class, admiring my teacher and learning a new art form that I truly enjoy. Before the class ended I was able to finish one small project and I entered it into the "First Class" show at the Erie Art Museum, and on Saturday I just finished my large "practice piece" project, which became a mixture of what I learned from Pooja and what my brain wants to form. The art museum will be having their 88th annual spring art show and I am going to try my luck and see if I can get my piece into it. Cross your fingers and hold your thumbs!

Marcellus Shale

2011-03-09T21:01:00.001-05:00

I wanted to post a letter to the editor I wrote for the Erie Times:

Dear Editor,

It has come to my attention that recently there has been quite a rash of “Pro-Marcellus-Shale-Drilling” letters to the editor, which has left me—I must admit—a little bit worried. Worried not only about the fact that I do believe people are being manipulated into thinking that fracture-style drilling will actually bring “JOBS”, “SECURITY” and “WEALTH” to the local region, but also worried that this manipulation will be used to support another money-hungry, boom-and-bust type of industrial pillaging that Western Pennsylvania has been so accustomed to in its long history: first Big Coal and Big Steel; now, Big Gas.
Information abounds as to why “Fracking” is not exactly the most beneficial industry to rear its head in Western Pennsylvania, as it itself has left its own trail of destruction and misinformation wherever its large boot has landed: destroyed watersheds, poor oversight in regards to dumping water, polluted rivers, annihilated forests, corrupt political campaigns, a total EXEMPTION FROM THE SAFE DRINKING WATER ACT (see Energy Policy Act of 2005, section 322), and worst of all, a total disregard for the people that its unregulated, haphazardly-placed wells have affected in the form of asthma-ridden lungs, neurologically-destroyed brains and ruined property.
And, honestly, the problems are not that far off from our safe abode here in Northwestern Pennsylvania. Has anyone been down to Washington or Greene County lately? Has anyone read about the numerous accounts of polluted wells and water shed systems there? Has anyone seen the eye-sores that are the drilling rigs perched atop the once-was-beautiful Southwestern Pennsylvania hills? I have. I went to school there. And, really, not much positive news is coming out of those regions. In fact, all I hear are stories of migrant workers from a laundry list of states—Texas, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Kansas (no Pennsylvanians)—who run into the town, build the drilling rigs and leave. I hear of bubbling faucets, fish kills and the largest amount of pollution in the Monongahela River since Andrew Carnegie’s blast furnaces burned brightly along its banks—30 years ago!
Which is why —as I’m sure you can tell—I am down-right perplexed as to why Marcellus Shale drilling is seriously still being debated as a possible “positive” development for our region: It has a terrible environmental record. The wells themselves are self-maintaining (and polluting), so there is not real need for a job. To actually “frack” the shale enough to release the gas, there needs to be a highly-toxic slurry of chemicals shoved down into the ground, of which, only 20% come back to the surface. And, we are not even so sure as to how profitable this gas will be to the state itself, as most of the companies are from out of state and are completely untaxed under Pennsylvania legislation, and will most likely be selling this gas to foreign buyers.
So, I think it is time to maybe rethink our love affair with Marcellus Shale drilling. After all, are not we—the residents of a state that for so long has given up her resources for the rapacious enrichment of a few tycoons—the ones who should stand up and speak up when a clear pattern of manipulation, extraction and misinformation is being perpetrated?
I do not know about you, but I’m not sold on Big Gas yet, as I do believe it’s got some rotting skeletons in its closet, and they sure do STINK.

Reflection from work

2011-02-22T13:45:00.007-05:00

I saw a Sudanese man at work today trace the outline of a woman wearing a light sundress--beige in color and speckled all over with the pink petals of small embroidered flowers--with the mouse of his computer. She was a far-away woman both in reality and in gaze: her eyes were staring at the camera without much expression except that of the realization that she is nowhere with no future and, to top it all off, without her loved one. Was this man, the one who was in our computer lab, her husband? Her lover? Her best friend? Her brother? He kept tracing her picture with the cursor from his computer mouse; I watched the cursor lightly brush past her braided hair, down over her smooth cheeks and over pink lips that contrasted powerfully with her soft, fudge-brown skin complexion. He knew I was standing behind him, watching this most intimate of acts between himself and this far-off, once-loved woman, but he didn't stop. He just kept tracing, tracing her eyebrows, breasts, and thighs and body--a body that was shrouded in the long, curtain-like raiment of the dress.

A man by the name of Edwin has been loafing through our halls at work, filling the air with that deep African resonance that makes the English language seem almost exotic, even foreign to my ear. I don't know really what his purpose here is, but he seems to be in holding until the time comes when he will be able to move to Houston, Texas to try his hand at trucking in the USA.

Yesterday, Edwin met one of the unruly teens we have coming through the center, Deng. Deng emigrated to the United States when he was merely a two-year-old; his mother was a refugee fleeing the civil war between the South and the North of Sudan, while his father was a "General" in the Sudanese liberation army--by the way, it seems to me that all African women, when asked what their men do back in Africa, unhesitatingly reply that "he is a General." Not knowing his home country, yet not feeling like an American, is a readily apparent hindrance to the development of Deng as a mature young man and a respected individual: he fights, he argues, he has a nearly uncontrollable animosity towards those individuals who have a better life situation than himself, which he barley manages to hide beneath layers of intelligence and an out-going personality. Often times he can be seen berating the racial and family history of other Africans, youth and volunteers for not being 'African' enough, or not "understanding me." His mother is a weaker personality, who is hindered, like most recently-arrived refugees, with a lack of language knowledge and education which will help her improve her life situation.

Anyways, Edwin ran into Deng in the hallway across from my office. He then proceeded for the next twenty minutes to lecture Deng on remembering the importance of an education and the necessity of staying out of trouble and not running amuck with lesser people who have a predisposition to steal, lie and cheat. Edwin, in a seemingly unwarranted and very dangerous statement, told Deng that he should never forget that "He will never be an American," and that he should "Always remember that he is a third-world child, not a first-world child." I could see that Deng began to feel uncomfortable. I, myself, was a little bit taken back by such a brash statement of "You are not who you think you are." This would have been acceptable if Deng had an actual working memory of "HIS country"--as Edwin kept saying in reference to Sudan--but Deng knows only Erie. He knows only snow in winters, boarded up buildings on Parade Street, and the struggles that his mother has in acculturating to the fast-paced, work-heavy American life. His Sudanese Arabic, I'm sure, has a thick American English accent on it. How could Edwin, a Kenyan who has been in the United States for a mere three days, speak to this young man about nationality and history with such authority? And how could Edwin feel confident and knowledgable enough to assuredly give opinons on matters of what makes an American an American, and what it means to be accepted into the American nation?

After the conversation with Deng, Edwin plopped into my seat and sorrowfully exclaimed that "these African kids forget who they really are; that’s sad." This got me thinking: Didn't all of us Americans have to--at least at some point--forget who we were or where our family came from to accept at least a part of our own 'Americaness?' And, when is an American ACTUALLY created? At the moment they make the decision to accept their Green Card? Or, at the time their memory of the 'old country' is nothing but a collection of stories and photographs from family members long deceased?

Yet, the man kept tracing the woman with his cursor, hoping for the past. For love. For sex. For the feeling of finally being 'home' with his Sudanese queen, in the Sudanese desert.

School Day Frustration

2011-02-12T19:17:00.006-05:00

Asking a 14-year old student what "3x10" is usually produces a quick computation and an assured answer of "thirty." Yet, for a majority of the children I work with on a daily basis, that simple question is as esoteric and incomprehensible as astro-physics or the federal tax code. My confident student, young in looks and sure of body, is left stumped. He doesn't respond. His eyes stare off into the sky in supposed contemplation, which does nothing but create a shallow veneer to make it seem as if he is right on the cusp of the answer. It's too late for him, though. I've already judged his intelligence, and I know that the answer will only be forthcoming from my lips, not his.

In the same room, heck, even at the same table, the fifteen-year old student across from me reads a book of poetry that is written on a second-grade level. One of my tutors is sitting beside him, encouraging him to continue on through the pages to the end of the story--a whole ten of them. Sometimes the student completely stops reading, glancing up at the tutor with eyes full of embarrassment and anger, as he struggles to read the word. "Because," the tutor calmly sounds out. "Be-cause."

Did that really just occur? Did I genuinely just witness the failure of a fifteen- year old to recognize and read a 'sight word'? Is it really true that eighth graders are unable to recite the 'threes' times tables, or get through the drudgery of reading a SECOND-GRADE level book!?

Is our afterschool programming a waste of time?

I've recently been contemplating the emphasis that the American school system places on math and science, and have often found myself getting all riled up, as I am seriously nauseated and tired of the 'competitive-advantage' justification that teachers, schools, newspapers, and even the President give: "We must improve math and science education in this country, so that we will always maintain an economic and industrial advantage over those upstart, intelligent, diligent students, THE CHINESE(fear and trembling)!?

Of course, improving science and math education is an admirable goal of the United States and school districts the republic over. And my experience with the times tables debacle is nothing but the strongest emphasis for such a trend. Yet, I am often disgusted at the seeming disregard, or even outright de-emphasis that is placed on the arts, language and history. I am one of the notion that students can't be good scientists without being able to read about those who came before them (speaking on this issue just very briefly, I found myself in the most uncomfortable of situations recently, when I had to explain to two African-American students the importance of George Washington Carver. This isn't inherently a problem for me; however, I became quite perturbed and shocked when both of them informed me that they had never heard of his name before. How sad. But, I'm sure they knew all about Lil' Wayne's recent spat of lock-ups). I am also fairly positive that the worst kind of scientists, business people or engineers that our school system could create, would be those characterized by a highly-specialized knowledge base, incapable of introspection or debate on the more 'cerebral' questions of their work: If we cut out the arts, music, literature and language, we are in my seriously humble opinion, well on our way to 'producing' (why not use industrial language for this most-industrial of educational philosophy) amnesia-ridden, profit-driven, competitive droids, much in the form of Karel Capek's R.U.R. (everyone should read this play; it was from this play that the world became acquainted with the word "Robot").

But, I guess maybe I'm just a bitter young man who constantly feels the need to justify his decision to study the Liberal Arts at school. After all, the question of "Whatcha' 'gonna do with that!?" still continues to stump me, even after five years.

I'll just resign myself to continue to battle on the frontlines, and attempt to help my students learn basic division before they are able to get their driver's permit. Heck, maybe even a chapter book is in the future....

Bus-riding reflection

2011-01-30T18:39:00.007-05:00

Recently I've become acutely aware of a rather incongruent habit of people who ride the public transportation in the City of Erie: they talk to strangers without inhibition.

Often times my days are spent sitting behind a desk tapping away on a keyboard into oblivion with the subconscious realization that my grant-writing skills aren't worth a damn: due to the fact that my comprehension of mathematical concepts encompasses only a cursory knowledge of all elementary arithmetic, my grants are shot down before the review committee due to a very shoddily-written budget report that--by some unaccountable reason--makes money disappear by the hundreds. I don't really interact with anyone besides my fellow coworkers--a whole three of them--whose conversations, although much-appreciated, end in some futile bantering and complaining, and my young, strong body full of pulsating blood not yet slowed by the encroachment of cholesterol is left to rot like a lump of meat with my lumbar pushed up against the back of my desk chair. Is this how I'm spending my youth? Lonely, sedentary, and with no real excitement to break the monotony of my day?

I jump on bus numbers 22 and 25 that traverse Erie city from West to East, as they follow pot-holed filled roads out towards the po-dunk town of Wesleyville, full of its 60's-era shopping malls and fast food joints. I'm usually the only white man on the bus, and am surrounded by a most curious mix of people: those with mental and physical handicaps; obese Latinos who rattle off in unintelligible Spanish; black men who wear jackets with the words 'Will Work' embroidered on the back; young, elegant black women with three babies in toe; white grungy 'crackers' with studded ear lobes and pierced eyebrows, adorned in a marijuana-emblazoned tossel caps; and often not-so-elegant black women who give a new meaning to the phrase, "speaks like a sailor": I'm convinced the majority of their English vocabulary consists of monosyllabic words that begin with 'F' and end with 'uck', or with a 'B' and end with 'itch.' Yet, the most enjoyable of my fellow passengers are the modern-day stoic philosophers who have traded in their marble steps outside the courthouse, for a dirty, plastic chair in the midst of an Erie bus. I lend them my ear when I hear them speak, and I am enthralled at their brashness and their flawless ability to spark up a conversation with nearly just about everyone, even (more often than not) with themselves.

Speaking in tones that fluctuate in crescendo and power like that of Baptist preachers, my philosopher friends of the bus, pose questions for all of us to ponder--often times looking us directly in the face in hopes of an answer. Even when an answer is not forthcoming, they break into a monologue that is at points boundless in scope and accurate in observation; however, usually ending in an abrupt distraction brought on by the sight of a nubile woman, or a beer-lathered belch.

Yet, I'm never uncomfortable with those more verbose fellow riders, as I find their ways more authentic than the public domain of today's social arena, which is often dominated by people continually texting and listening to ipods. Insular. Uninterested. Closed-off.

Upon exiting the bus, I make my way to Erie's local institution of scholarship and higher learning, Gannon University, where I proceed to make my way into their gym facility. And, as I stretch to engage in the upcoming run, I notice that out of all the 15 runners on the track, it is only I who does not carry within my palm an ipod. It is only I who can hear the repetitive click of my bracelets smacking together with the swinging of my arms, or the deep breathing originating in the straining of my lungs. And, with no one to talk to, with no one seemingly interested in communicating, I am lost in a world of my own thoughts--running, in circles, for the next thirty minutes. There is no one there to ask questions. No young scholars brash enough to engage those around them. That kind of experience is only found through daily meetings with the toothless alcoholic carrying a plastic bag and a life-long list of grievances and stories.

Martin Luther King Day Commemorative Service

2011-01-17T20:02:00.005-05:00

Upon walking up the concrete steps and into the pallid, bare catholic cathedral, I came into the situation of seeing a large, rather obese man giving some kind of generic "we-still-have-a-long-way-to-go" type of speech, which then led into a song that I did not want to sing, as I was too concerned with getting my jacket off so I could cool off; hoping to impede the uncomfortable sweat from dripping down my shoulder blades and into the small of back. I sat down at the conclusion of the tune, and again broke into my usual scanning of the people, places situations around me. In front of me about three rows sat five people with mental and physical handicaps. They were brought to the ceremony probably by a local worker at one of the homes. The knew not the significance, nor the importance of the situation; I could tell it from their jerky head movements and roving eyes that seemed to be peering off into the ceiling into a state of serene inattentiveness. Behind me sat a white woman, bouncing a small toddler on her lap. She sang the chorus of the hymn loudly, and wore a perpetual smile upon her face as if she was genuinely happy all of the time. I assumed that she probably came from a well-to-do liberal family, and was educated and well-articulated in speaking of issues of poverty and 'social justice'. She sat like a bird, proud and beautiful and sure of her ability to sing and flutter about above the reality. I liked her, though, I have to admit. Across the aisle, my eyes came upon two elderly men and a group of black Americans, congregated towards the front. They were all trimly and nicely dressed, and the women had sparkling gold glasses frames that looked as if they were polished. They broke out into emotional exultation's along the lines of 'Yeah!' "Bring it home!" "That's RIGHT!" Aside from the fact that I began to notice the milk and oil split in the arrangement of where we sat--black in front, white in back--I was more shocked at the amount of empty seats that took up large swaths of space within the sanctuary. In front of me there was a formidable ocean of chair backs that gave me a great sight-line all the way to the pulpit, even though I had positioned myself in the second row from the back of the room. I found myself feeling ashamed for the speaker when she made reference to the 'turn-out' as if it was an impressive sight, seeing all those chairs, each representing the indifference of a person who probably had something better to do or work on their hands. It's too bad, too, because she spoke about remembering our history and knowing where we want to go as a people, yet the more common collective act of forgetting our own past left the most indelible mark on me. After all, most of us don't even get the morning off on this 'National' holiday; I guess it's not important enough to take time to reflect. After all, time is money and Dr. King is dead.

At the conclusion of our march that spanned about a mile in distance, the crowd of around 200 people began to make their way into the center doors in hopes of snatching a seat, seeing a friend and, most importantly, grabbing a donut while supplies lasted. People were generally in a polite mood, on this day of all days to be civil and non-violent to each other. That was, until of course, they opened a second entrance to alleviate the lines, which perpetuated a shameless stampede of peace marchers who were pushing shoving and cutting to get into the gymnasium. I was quietly behind a woman who was sitting in a wheelchair, who had the great misfortune of not being tall enough to be 'seen' by those impatient miscreants who thought more about glazed sugar than about the fact that the second entrance had been opened to let HER through in the first place. After watching wave after wave of ignorant person go around her, I finally had had enough and thrust my arm into the chest of a young black boy about the age of 14. I informed him that he would NOT take one step further into the gymnasium until the helpless, nearly-forgotten woman in the wheelchair was able to go in. He looked at me with a stupor full of youthful arrogance at the fact that someone had actually told him no to move. Under his breath he mumbled, "Well, just move her out of the way." Ignoring this offensive statement, I implored the usher to let the women take her leave into the gymnasium above the rush and echo of people. And, as I crossed through the two heavy steel doors, I heard the young boy and a women who looked to be about 25 say, "fuck them." I guess justice and the fight for civil rights is only afforded to those who lived forty years ago, and only comes to those who can physically STAND UP and show it up front. I guess we really do have, to quote today's most choicest of phrases, "a long way to go."

Breakfast with Grandma.

2011-01-03T20:53:00.004-05:00

I stood outside in the chilly hallway listening to the static ringing of the telephone through the intercom. Normally, grandma picks up the phone by the third ring, as she anticipates these calls like all lonely, 87-year old women do. I'm used to hearing the spirited pep in her half-paralized voice, full of wrinkles and notches like that of old skin, and of the inevitable fumbling around of the receiver as she attempts to push the number 6 button with fingers too stiff and stubborn to hit exact; initiating a call back. Yet, this time, I heard the phone ring and ring and ring into oblivion. I hung up. I dialed again. I Listened to the answering machine, the one with my aunt's voice on it, because my grandma's is now to weak to record her own message. I dialed again. Futile.

'I hope nothing is wrong with Grandma." I thought. "How will I ever get in to know for sure?"

After about ten minutes of dialing, a delivery man opened the door and held it for me. I squeezed by him and hastily made my way up the elevator and to her room on the fifth floor. I was nervous as I approached the door knob. I knocked, and felt the static shock release from the steel into my fingertips, exacerbating the already cold nervousness that ironcially made my palms sweaty.

I cracked the door open and took a lunge inward, expecting to see her on the couch watching T.V. or reading. Instead, the couch was bare, and her recliner was tipped forward, as if she had recently left the spot. I glanced to the kitchen only to find a dripping tap and a few soft bananas, getting ripe on a plate. I peeked around the corner of the wall and looked into her bedroom. I had a straight-shot to where her bed would be, and I saw an almost ghost-like body laying, with her head tilted to the side. Eyes were closed. Lips were thin. Hands were folded. Cheeks were white. Feet and legs were inperceptiable. She looked as if she was already at the viewing. My heart raced. I dropped my yogurt and made a b-line for her bedside. "Hey! Grandma!" I said trying to mask the fear with a shallow veneer of cheer. "Jamie and I are going to eat breakfast with you." I didn't notice a movement, except for the opening of eyes. "Alive!" I reassured myself.

Grandma's voice sounded strong that day, and I was happy to help her out of bed, even though I was aware that her head hurts in the temple if she walks for too long. She wanted to sit with us out in the light that came in through the sliding doors, as the sun was exceptionally bright on this second day after New Years. My wife and I opened up our yogurt containers and put on a bowl of oatmeal. We recounted to grandma our travels to Tennessee and the party the night previous at Jon's place. She seemed happy to hear it. Jared and Abby showed up, joining the fun. We visited, reminised, heard stories, and did our best to reroute grandma when she would veer into a rut of repitition. She smiled at our friendliness amongst each other, and of course gave some stern advice that was mixed in with her Irish stubborness. A thrity minute visit went to two and half hours-- we all cherished the time.

Upon leaving, I remember standing up and thinking to myself, "Grandma is surprisingly strong today; her speaking isn't labored and her movements are fluid. Her memory leaves a little left to be desired, but her humor is still intact."

Needless to say, I was shocked when I found out she was in the emergency room the next morning. A second heart attack in six months. If I went there today and rang the phone to be let in, she wouldn't be picking up, and I would be left to wonder about the health of a women so fragile, and about the fleeting nature of time coming short, even after 87 years., Thankfully, fate had it wait for one day.

Writing. Who knew!?

2010-12-31T11:14:00.004-05:00

I've entered into the realm of 'published Erieites' this past weekend, when I was informed that my article/reflection of my trip to Slovakia was run on Christmas day as kind of a 'family special'. In keeping up with this trend, I was also recently informed that another one of my op-ed pieces will be published on a Friday in January as a 'Friday Forum', which entails a discussion of the topic (on the newspaper's website) once the article has reached the presses. I'm curious as to the reactions that people in Erie will have to my suggestions on demarcating 'bike zones' on all major city streets. To say that I am ambivalent about the honor of getting two articles published in less than a month would be a lie. In fact, to the contrary, it's made me realize the power of words and the ability to evoke emotion just from writing. Now, I'm not even going to remotely say that I am a 'writer' by any means, but I will say that I've been pleasantly shocked as to the reaction I received from the public who read the article. I received emails and had phone calls--even from strangers! They told me tales of tears and unexpected joy at reading my story; they asked me to write more, and were even quite animate about the fact that it is MY calling to write for people to read. Now, of course, I'm sure some of this has to do with initial reactions to the ONE article I actually wrote for the Erie Times, but it made me feel nice.

When I sit down to write, I often go through about a twenty minute 'prep' period where I think about all the other, better things I could do with my time. I mean, I could peruse through pictures of friends on facebook, or in my yearbooks--after all, I am a very nostalgic person. Or, I could drink a beer and read a book. Maybe I could work on my language and read some Czech? (which I have been doing a lot of since my GRE). Or, I could just listen to some music while drinking some tea. And usually, in the end, the urge to write wins out, as I find the habit to be quite relaxing and important. Writing has a way of making me slow down, and really reflect. Even when I write quickly and I feel as if I'm just skimming through the pages and writing the shallow reflections from my conscience, I still acknowledge the worth in putting SOMETHING down on paper to reflect on later. It's personal therapy for me, and I enjoy the creative/artistic side of it. I've never been one to have a knack for all things cerebral and artistic, but I do realize my own natural grown talent to write my ideas--a talent I would like to nurture. It's so much easier for me to describe a scene through words than it would be to paint one on a canvas: I am the man who recently drew a 'Four-leaf clover' so badly that three people around me guffawed with the honest quiff, "Jesus, Jeremy, it looks like a 6-year old drew that."

I don't know what I'm really writing about now, and to tell you the truth, I'm not so sure I even had an intention when I started, which makes me wonder why I even post on a blog anymore. Do I REALLY believe that people want to read my thoughts!? Do I REALLY think my opinions on issues are anymore informed/observant than my neighbors? HA! I know they're not....so...sorry for dragging you through this post. It sucks. I know.

So, as I sit on the brink of ushering another new year, I'm dumbfounded as to what I'm going to do. I'd really love to take a few drinks, get a little buzz and speak at an octave or two higher than normal, but I'm a twenty-five year old in Erie with no real community. I could go to a pub, but I'd prefer to not have my ear drums ring for the forty minutes thereafter, and I'd like to call some of my friends over, but my house is a grimy mess, and I don't feel like sweeping the dust bunnies out from under the table. Ugh, the conundrum of being lazy on a Friday afternoon...

Yet, what will 2011 mean to me? Will it be another year of adventure, where I put my wanderlust before responsibility and jump to somewhere else on the globe? Will it be a year where I find my life's work? Will it be the year where I return back to school a little more experienced and mature than I was four years ago? Will it be a year of uneventful days and nights, where I live with Jamie, eating dinner, watching hockey and riding bikes? Is that such a bad thought? Oh, 2011, where will you take me? Will you bring me money? Will you bring me friendships? Will you bring me pain, sorrow, anger, joy, BOREDOM? Probably all...

2010-12-08T19:40:00.008-05:00

Many positive happenings have taken place in the last month, and tonight after my quick workout at the gym, I felt compelled to write an update as to what has transpired since November.

For one, I've begun the process of applying to The Trinity Fellowship at Marquette University, which is a fellowship that encourages graduate students to work for Milwaukee-area nonprofits throughout their two years of study for a Masters degree. The night I stumbled upon the offering, I had already been looking in vain for schools that have a relationship with Americorps. I was hoping to come across a few schools that would do more than just match the $5,000 education award that I'm expecting to receive at the termination of my year with Americorps. I also wanted to search for a humanities or a general sciences program that stayed clear of politics and public administration. Yet, after fifty-five schools and nearly two hours of researching programs, I began to feel a sense of resignation in the fact that I probably wouldn't find a school that will give me money to study, and if they did, they sure as hell probably wouldn't be offering a Masters of Linguistics, History or Geography. Thank god I didn't log off the website before I took a gander at school number 60: I found Marquette third from the last

Marquette is the United State's largest Jesuit school and is located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, which is NOT the Upper Peninsula of Michigan--the oft-cited location. It's a well-known school that is respected, and best of all, they give out money to former PeaceCorps of Americorps members--a whole $64,000 worth. Doing the calculations on my fingers, I was pretty sure that two dived by 64 equaled 32, which meant that they would be paying ME, Jeremy Ault, $32,000 to study History and to work in a nonprofit. Not bad, huh? I didn't think so either, so I began the application process by writing my four essays, requesting for my recommendation letters, and--the monster of them all--registering to take the GRE.

The month of November saw my days turn into work/study periods: I would work from 8:30 am to 5:00pm, only to come home and then study esoteric vocabulary that I knew I would never speak in real life; therefore, I began to pick up one of the many history books I had laying around the house. I pilfered the book for "GREesque" words. I seemed to be most successful reading the gargantuan, brick-sized works of British historians; they just use such a robust vocabulary that can't, sadly, be found on facebook. I saw the word lugubrious used not once, but TWICE. Yeah, I was gonna stick the GRE verbal. However, my math skills were a different story.
The night I came across the word 'obtuse' my mind reminded me that obtuse is not only a characteristic of people, but is an angle. Uh oh, maybe I focused a little too much on the verbal aspect of the test. I couldn't remember how to do algebra. I forgot what the Pythagorean theorem actually theorizes. I didn't know how to find the area of a cylinder, nor did I really care. I forgot FOIL and 'Pardon My Dear Aunt Sally." I was pretty much floundering. I answered 20 questions in about 45 minutes and finished in the 7th percentile; meaning, that nearly everyone could and DID better than me on the test. Consequently, for the next two weeks I sat in my recliner and basked in the light of my lamp. I reread two GRE math books, and began going to the library to practice my arithmetic skills.

I tried not to let myself get too nervous about the test, as I find the GRE to be a fairly silly way of gauging the potential of students, as the test really only is an accurate indicator of the prior educational circumstance of students-- a circumstance which is often not chosen by the students themselves--and of how long one has studied for the specific test itself: It has no measure on how to gauge one's drive, talent, passion or inquisitive nature. Anyways, I had resigned myself to a confident "the-test-doesn't-define-me attitude" until, however, the night before the test date came. I couldn't sleep. My mind was a jumbled mess of nerves. I kept on having recurring images of me slamming my head off of the desk in pure anger and despair that my FUTURE, MY DEAR FUTURE, HAD BEEN....lost. I guess I didn't handle the pressure as well as I would have liked to admit...

I slunk out of bed the next morning, ate a 'brain breakfast' of organe juice, cheerios and peanut butter toast and made my way down the snow-covered streets of Erie to the testing building. Upon entering, I was informed that I had to empty out all of my pockets and place my belongings in a locker at the front of the building. I then proceeded to fill out the paperwork that was mandatory for all test takers, which unbeknownst to me, required me to actually write in cursive--something I have not done in ten years. Everyone around me seemed to be on edge. Would they pass? or, would they have to find a new profession? Ugh.

The test got underway at 8:30 am, as I was placed into my minute cubicle and told that I would not be able to leave--even to pee--for the next four hours. If I needed to go, I had to raise my handd and then be given permission from a rather rotund woman sitting behind a glass wall. I felt like an elementary school child in the principles hall.

I began the test by writing two essays, which got my confidence in gear. I then jumped to the verbal section of the test. Once I saw that my questions had become literally impossible to answer, I postulated that I was scoring highly on the verbal, so I left that section feeling encouraged. Then came my dreaded bride, the math. I jumped right into the section and didn't blink. I made motions as if I was jotting down notes and formulas, but it was all a mirage. I had no idea how much time I had, but I knew that I was moving too slowly for the first five questions, which initiated a grave decision on my part: I started to guess. My unwritten rule for the rest of the test was that if I didn't instantly recognize an answer (which was a majority), I would spend no more than one minute guessing. And, I found the most mathematically apt equation for the situation to be of much help many times over: Ini-mini-myni-mo. And, at the end when my scores were revealed, I shook with joy, as I had answered more than half of the math questions correctly. As for my verbal, it was a decent score. I left pleased and happy, yet a little embarrassed that I let the test get to me so badly. I now felt ready to continue on in the graduate school process, which is where I stand right now: I have two weeks until deadline. I will wait patiently as to see what will happen....

In other news, I was informed this past week that my article about my trip to Slovakia will be published in the Erie Times as a two-week Saturday special to be published on Dec. 18th and--of all times--on Christmas. I was pleased, and I hope that the people in Erie will enjoy the story.

Well, that's it for now. I'm off to read and write some letters.

sorry I'm such a bore.

2010-11-24T13:57:00.003-05:00

I haven't posted anything of 'substance' in a long time--aside from a few small 'reflective' posts here and there. I could sit back and claim that my reluctance to post has been due to the fact that I've been struggling with bouts of laziness. However, that would be quite far from the truth. There have been days, even weeks, where I felt as if I WANTED to write, but I've never sat down and picked up the pen to do it. It's like I feel as if I have nothing to say. The past two years of my life played out as if I was in a perpetual forest of new discoveries: dark, mysterious paths weaved in and out of towering trees that would almost inevitably lead me to a meadow of cultural awakening, language acquisition, or lively nights at the pub.

I have to break away from that. The Czech Republic for me--at least the immediate life--is over. Erie, Pennsylvania is my new abode, and the people I see daily on my bike rides to work are my current neighbors. So, where am I to go to now? The enigmatic forest has turned into something of a bore. The cultural meadow has morphed into nothing but a vast, hollow desert: nothing to see, nothing to do.

You see, even my thoughts have been jumbled, and feel as if I'm writing with a pen that doesn't write in black or red ink, but in white or gray, colors like the paper: My writing blends in, offers nothing new, easily disappearing between the blue lines and the red verticle margin.

I wish I had an interesting story to tell....

Election Day Reflection

2010-11-02T21:03:00.005-04:00

Today during the election, my boss, Gary Horton, was a man on a mission to motivate the masses. He organized vans to take those, without the means of transportation, to the polling station, where they would be able to cast a vote. He canvased and recruited teenagers from the local 'projects' to hand out 'Elect Kathy Dahlkemper' placards--our much-aligned congressional representative who has been lambasted in the news--and by 'tea partiers'--for her suggestion that Americans should ride their bikes more often. He entertained guests who meandered into the nonprofit where I work. And chummed up to some volunteers and potential political allies.

Isn't it fun during election time?

At one point during the afternoon, Gary was in the midst of a 'ra-ra' moment, when he turned to a group of about five teenagers that were part of his canvasing crew. A few of them had recently started to lament the uncomfortable cold conditions that they were fored to work in, and were showing a waning enthusiasm for the job. Gary jumped on the issue at hand, and sprang into a lecture of how blacks had gotten the right to vote. "They were lynched and burned," he said in a voice rising to an apex like that of a baptist preacher. "Blood spilled, people were whipped, and white people suppressed." I felt awkward, REALLY awkward. I felt the glances of some of the younger teenagers on my skin, and I dropped my gaze to the ground. Why did I carry this shame? Why did I, at that moment, feel as if I was the only one guilty for the problems of this nation's past? And why, does Gary always have to emphasis the 'white' when speaking about the 'others'? Is it justified on his part? Or, is my shame just another twisted version of the White Man's Burden....

No one likes being judged solely by the physical manifestation of genetics and melatonin.

reflections

2010-10-13T20:13:00.003-04:00

Our house is built in the shape of a rectangle. The living room is a boxy space that stretches out into a cube-like kitchen, complete with four-sided cupboards and an oven made of 95 degree angles. Rooms jut off the side of the living room, at adjacent angles, giving the entire house a very symmetrical feel.

I ride my bike every morning across blocks and intersections. The topography of the Lake Erie Piedmont has convinced the City to expand out into very rational, row-like patterns, where one would be hard-pressed to be confused (except one's first month of life here).

There is a political map on the wall where I work that breaks the city down into sections by painting certain 'blocks' in different shades of red and purple. I find myself amazed at how easy it is to look at the map and pin-point exactly where the 'poor folks' live, where the businesses have maintained a hold, where the most Democrats are likely to reside, where not to ride my bike in the night and where a fun Thursday night could be had: could life be any more simpler and easier
to compartmentalize? Maybe in Erie, we tend to do it too often...

At work I often run into frustrating situations, where in an attempt to 'collaborate' with other non-profits, I am often rebuffed with multifarious excuses as to why it just won't work: "You'll be taking OUR kids." "Well, we don't want to let you play with our toys in the sandbox." "This side of town is our domain." In the end, we as non-profits break ourselves up into 'gangs' of influence who rule over certain turf; making decisions and having the only real right to SERVE the poor.

Race and social class are cleanly sliced into squares as if it was as easy as taking a knife to a freshly-baked tray of corn bread. Once you get passed Parade St., the houses take on a more dilapidated view, and the streets (for some unknown reason) become wide and virtually empty of cars--aside from those cars (generally large, luxury sudans with enormous rims) parked out front and along the sidewalk. It's the 'dark' part of the neighborhood; Parade St. is the second State St. of Erie, as it is the main strip through the immigrant and black section of the city. I've rarely, in all my life in Pennsylvania, seen such a clear boundary line drawn. To most of the middle-class, unassuming, hard-working, privileged, all-knowing whites who I've on the western side of State St., the "East Side' would be the prime kind of physical hell that stirs up haunting images of young, aggressive black men with hoods over their shaved skulls coming at their window with a bat; hoping to smash their window, take their money and shoot them in the stomach. Or, imagery of rows and rows of crack houses form in the consciousness, with young children dressed only in diapers on the front porch playing in an oblivious stupor as to how shitty and hopeless their life already is, while 'moma' stuffs another dirty-needle full of heroin into her thick vein. "Blacks don't know how to work." "Gosh, if only they'd get a job." " I don't want to sound racist, but I'd never let my daughter marry into this...."

Yeah, that's the one side of how Parade Street is portrayed, but on my morning bike rides, I never feel threatened; to the contrary, I'm often amazed at how much livier the place is in comparison to the lily-white, suburban west-side of the city: men and ladies talk and chat on front porches, children ride bicycles along cracked sidewalk, while others play football between old Victorian-style homes that look as though the wood is in thirst for another coat of paint. Women walk to do laundry in a communal 'mat'; carrying clothes and feeding children ice cream all in one motion. I hear the laugh of people, the bass of music and the sound of grills being turned on in the evening. And, as I ride home back to 'my' safe, more 'comfortable' part of the city, I'm struck by how quickly the corner-store bar and restaurant turns into the corner law firm, and how rapidly the chatter of voices on a the front porch, is changed into the flickering reflection of televisions turned on and the technical sound of a broadcasted voice speaking to shut-in people who only come out to take out the trash.

Erie thoughts

2010-08-29T08:48:00.001-04:00

My desk has a sterile and cold feel to it. It’s not made of wood that is of a smooth grain and varnished to a comforting, almost glass-like sheen; it’s steel and hard, thin and sharp around the edges. When I grab a drawer I feel a stinging pressure, as the metal creases into my skin. My work place is nothing but a cheap, imitation top that is “plasticky” and swings between phases of cold restrictedness where papers slide as if they’re on ice, to sticky, full-blooded warmth that makes one feel stuffy and uncomfortable like after a humid rain that makes hands ‘clamy.’

My hands on the first day of work were perpetually cold, which made me conscious around the big, robust black women with large smiles, thick lips and white teeth. They all seemed so full of breast-driven womanliness and human passion, that it seemed their veins were as thick as a concrete tunnels traversing their way though the belly of a stubborn mountain. And here I am with my thin, restricted blue-like veins of seedy, white-man coldness being placed into their fatty palms. “Hi, I’m Jeremy. I’ll be working in the place of Brooke.” I said. “I’m open to talk, so come in and ask me a question when you want.” Ha! Like that will happen; I’m sure the entire time I had their hand gripped, they were wondering about whether my miniscule heart was pumping enough blood to my freezing-cold finger tips. What life could I bring into such a vibrant place with a heart beat (literally) not strong enough to get my phalanges ‘veiny’ and hot.

I don’t know Erie well. The preposterous amount of stop lights pisses me off as I am continually being impeded on my way to work. Drive five feet. Stop. Breathe in exhaust. Trucks are larger than Corollas. Listen to the blast of the combustion of the engine as they speed away. “Aha, five minutes closer to work!” I think to myself. Stop. Red light. A change is now proceeding in cascade-like formation towards the horizons, as freedom-loving greens change to frustrating-as-hell reds. Will I ever make it to work!?

Jamie grew up outside the city, so she doesn’t seem to have a good handle on where 12th street lines up with Buffalo, and where Fairview intersects with the Bayfront. What’s on 6th and 8th, you say? A bar? A Dollar General? A Health Clinic, behind a bus stop, where derelicts and obese people congregate and mix genes? What about Upper Peach? No. I’m on East 19th, but my apartment is on East 2nd. No, not west, EAST! You’re thinking of 6th and where it crosses over with 10th. I went down to the diner today on 24th and 12th, but it was on the WEST side of town. Where are you talking about? Oh, YOU DON’T KNOW THE GOD DAMN NUMBERS!?

When I cross the traffic bridge and drive past the dilapidated Erie Mill Co. and ‘round the bend across from the Orthodox Church, I plunge myself into a world of black men on bikes with rusted chains, and houses with big-wheel strewn front yards. Where are these men going? I’m sure none of them want jobs. Why don’t they clean their gutters, and ‘spray wash’ the grime from the peak of the house, where the siding meets the lip of the roof? Maybe they’re immigrants? Essentially, these people are on the wrong side of the tracks. They’re on the East Side—the bad side—the black side—the side where the ‘Gorillas’ be out. I don’t know Erie aside from the wilds around G.E., and the neatly-trimmed public houses of John Moran. After all, it’s about people sir, not I.

Each morning I hear languages ringing in my ears—some buzz, while others clang and are sharp. Some mumble and are spoken on tones and rhythms. While my own, my own language, has found new ways to amaze me in its ability to confound my ear. How is it that the English language can continually change and encompass the culture of those who speak it? Too many times I hear people claim they are ‘their language’, but the bastardized, beautiful, warped, dirtied, laughed-at and exquisite tool that is ‘English’, is not its people; its people make it: Each utterance, roll of the tongue, slur of an accent, and disregard for grammar is awash in humanity and in personality. ‘Wat’cha want? I been had that done, is jus’ you is like me.”

Sorry I didn't write sooner

2010-08-27T12:29:00.002-04:00

So I haven’t posted since the English Camp…I’m sorry. There are a many changes happening in our lives and I haven’t forgot about all the people who check our blog to see what’s going on in our lives, I just haven’t sat down and written anything.

It a little weird to think that we have only been back in Pennsylvania for thirty-eight days (somehow it seems longer….). Upon returning we were bombarded with paperwork and trainings for a new Americorps VISTA positions, therefore everything else has been squeezed in around our job preparation. However we have done A LOT of stuff. We got to spend a week with Jeremy’s parents in their new home in Tennessee, which was great. We got to see our good friend from camp get married (Bunny looked SO cute!). We went camping with a bunch of our Beaver County friends. We bought our first bed and we have an apartment what we will be moving into on the 6th. For the time being we have been living with my parents, who have been patient with our stuff sitting in the living room and the different habits we have formed (such as only using one glass during the day and leaving it sit next to the sink rather than putting it in the dishwasher and getting a new one every time.), however there are some habits that have been harder, such as making sure the toilet lid is put down after we go to the bathroom. As much as I appreciate all that my parents have done for use since we have moved in with them - feeding us, letting us wash our cloths, giving us a place to store all our stuff – I am really looking forward to moving into our apartment and having our own space and also being much closer to where we both work.

One thing that has been really challenging is balancing the amount of Czech language in our lives. Jeremy is of course tries to speak as much as he can, write in his Czech journal, listen to Czech radio programs online and read a Czech newspaper online, where I am much lazier and only want to speak for an hour a day. I think this also has to do with our level of the language, as Jeremy is at a MUCH higher level than I am (do to my frustrations and laziness with the language while living in Policka), so he can do more with it. But I’m happy that he continues to write to our friends and set up Skype dates, because I get to communicate with them as well.

This weekend we’ll be going down to Waynesburg, PA to see some friends and give a presentation about our last year in Policka at the church we attended in college. I have looked forward to seeing our Waynesburg friends since returning to Pennsylvania and I’m glad that we finally have a chance to see them.

Oh, and I finally got some more paint I can start painting again :)

Updates from America

2010-08-04T21:35:00.003-04:00

I went into my new place of work two days ago and was shocked by the lack of organization that I saw: papers were strewn about the place in stacks as if they were building obelisks; each room seemed to have a purpose that it could be serving, but was currently preoccupied as 'storage'; the computer lab has about 15 'portable' laptops that could be used by the children if they were able to actually take them home, which is greatly inhibited by the fact that almost all of the power cords are missing; and my boss didn't seem to have the time of day to speak with me for more than five minutes. It was, to put it lightly, a very discouraging experience. But, I guess I can't judge it too harshly; people there seemed to be pretty underwhelmed by myself: when I walked in the door the manager's first words were, "Well, I'd expected you to be a bit taller." And when I was introduced to the children who are in the program, all of them took a disinterested/disappointed glance my way and wistfully, almost sad fully, mumbled, 'HE is the one who is going to be here next year?" Yeah, awesome start....

After two weeks of being back in America, I can honestly say that the party has ended: we're both currently living out of Jamie's house and all of our possessions are haphazardly stacked in their living room, pressing into the carpet and spilling onto the couch. I can't find any of my possessions both from the Czech Republic and years previous, and my back is beginning to twitch because the mattress-on-the-floor comfort is just not kicking it anymore. I feel stranded by the fact that I can't walk where I want and when I want, and I'm really sad that I can't leave my peanut butter toast plate on the counter, so I don't have to continually waste water washing it repeatedly when I know that in just another two hours I'm gonna grab for the JIF again. Ugh....the pains of in-law living....

On a brighter note, Jamie and I took a jaunt over to our apartment today (well, our apartment as of August 28th...I hope), and I found it to be really refreshing to know that in less than four weeks I'll be calling that old, clapboard house home. It's wonderfully situated less than a block away from three institutions in my life: the library, the church, and the bar (it's a slight joke ;) ). I plan on regularly making my way to them. We're located about three city blocks up from the bay of Lake Erie, which means we're also in walking distance of a park with benches that over look the steely-gray waters. One night, I'm sure Jamie and I will talk about the future while watching the lights of yachts and sail boats float quietly by. I look forward to that.

This weekend Jamie and I have planned a camping trip in the Allegheny National Forest with about nine of friends coming to partake in the campfires, hiking and fishing that is to be had. I've never really spent anytime near the national forest, so I'm anticipating the hikes through some of the world's richest and densest black-cherry wood forest, and seeing the twisted hulks of contorted oaks left over from the tornadoes of 1985. Pennsylvania, I'm home!

America: first reactions

2010-07-23T10:46:00.005-04:00

I've been back in the United States for about four days now, and I'm fairly quickly adjusting to life (I'm not so sure I'm actually adjusting to life; I think I might just be getting overwhelmed with all the 'new' cultural experiences that it leads me to skimp out on taking the proper amount of time to reflect on what is happening to me; consequently, giving myself the illusion that I've actually readjusted fairly well). Having said that, I know that there have been numerous times this past week where I've been utterly shocked and confused as to how I'm suppose to act in public and as to how I'm to accept a drastic change in lifestyle.

Here are just a few of the things that I've noticed that are different:

1. Language It was really strange getting off the plane in Chicago and instantly hearing everyone around me speaking fluent, rapidly-paced English. My initial shock was at the American accent and how 'nasally' it sounds. On Tuesday I had the chore of driving down to the DMV to pick up my new licence and the women who waited on me spoke so quickly that I was often at a loss as to what she said. She told me three times at one point to "take a seat along the wall", upon which I proceeded to stand in front of her desk waiting for my picture. I didn't understand her rapid intonation and different rhythm; it would have been easier if she had just spoken to me in Czech. I do believe that she thought I was hard of hearing; her blank stares and confusion as to why I was still standing before her after three commands to sit made me feel like a complete idiot. I went to the pub last night with a few friends and had a great time drinking some of Pennsylvania beers. It was so funny being in the pub and knowing that I'm not the foreign person dragging the conversation to a lower speed and jumbling my words with a thick accent; everyone understood me, I understood them. Conversing was SO easy--I was able to say exactly what I wanted and with as much slang as I cared to use.

Nature/Weather I forgot how beautiful Western Pennsylvania really is. The hills in this area are never-ending and they all seem to be covered with a rich layer of deciduous trees. Everything here is green, and the sight-lines that are to be found when crossing over the numerous bridges that dot the area are magnificent. Yesterday while driving in my brothers truck to Beaver Falls, I had the window down and I heard the incredibly loud chirping of the cicadas in the trees. I had forgotten how much I missed that sound, as it has come to signify the season of summer and all the 'good' that is surrounded with it: sandcastle, running in the sun, Kennywood, barbecues and hikes through the woods. Aside from the wonderful foliage that I'm taking in at every turn, the heat has been quite unbearable for me. It is so much more humid here than in the Czech Republic, and when I walk outside I instantly become covered in running lines of sweat. I don't want to sit outside, really.

People Americans by nature are incredibly polite and uphold a level of common courtesy that just isn't seen in the Czech Republic--this has been one of the best little gems of cultural readjustment I have run into. I remember when I was in the airport in Chicago, I was pushing a cart with all of our bags on it. I made a wrong turn into a line and had to turn around. While doing so, the largest and heaviest piece of luggage that I had slid off and crashed onto the ground. I hurriedly rushed to pick it up, as I saw hoards of travelers coming my way--I was worried that they wouldn't have the patience to wait for me while I did battle with the 50-pound bag. To the contrary, all of them stopped and smiled at me and asked if I needed some help; it was utterly shocking. After spending two years in the Czech Republic, where people are impatient and don't want to wait in line, I found the American nicety of offering a lending hand and not 'huffing and puffing' when they have to wait a few extra minutes completely refreshing. The second 'nicety' I discovered was in the grocery store when I was checking out. In the Czech Republic, the common tradition is for the shopper to place their items on the move able belt and then run in the front to bag their own groceries. The cashier generally does not smile, nor do they talk to you; they just read off the price and ask if you want something else. When I first moved to Policka, I found this to be very intimidating and cold behavior. So, when I went to the local Shop 'n' Save and the cashier greeted me with a large smile and very welcoming "How are you doin'?", I knew I was in a different country. She even began talking to me; it seemed as if she wanted to hold an actual conversation!

Lifestyle The most negative aspect of being home is having to deal with the overall wastefulness of American lifestyle and habits. Every single day I'm utterly shocked at the amount of plastic bags that people use when they shop for food, and I've grown completely disgusted with the lack of recycling bins. Just today, I looked in the garbage at my brother's house and saw that about 75 percent of the material that was thrown away could be/should be recycled, yet it will be placed in a land-fill somewhere. There are massive cars everywhere, and when I ride my bike I'm continually on alert, as I feel that many people who drive in gigantic automobiles don't even look out for cyclists. The cars seem to be getting larger than I can remember, which is kind of ironic considering we're suppose to be producing more 'environmentally-friendly' automobiles. I must admit that I've also seen my fair share of obese people, which I had hoped wouldn't be so bad. We Americans have the stereotype of being the fattest nation on earth. For a long time I refused to believe it, but I must admit that many of the people I see driving these gigantic cars are quite large themselves. It's a vicious cycle of static living, poor eating and dependence that lead many Americans down a road of poor health. I just wish for Jamie and I that we will be able to find a balance and try not to live such an environmentally degrading and unhealthy lifestyle.

Architecture Probably the most unexpected joy I've gotten out of being home, has been my fascination with the local architecture around the Pittsburgh area. My time in the Czech Republic was long enough for me to come back home and see the brick buildings and three-story houses built into the hillsides in a whole new light. Generally, I have the perception that American houses are really all just an agglomeration of the 'McMansion' style, and all of our stores are big-boxes surrounded by oceans of parking spots. I've come to realize that this isn't the case. Today I went on a run around the town and saw--I think--at least two very distinct and beautiful architectural styles: Old German style from the Harmonites and the practical, industrial style housing that was built during the steel boom of the early 20th century. I love it how the houses and the buildings all are built upon the sides of hills; their peaked roofs create really beautiful and symmetrical sight lines as they climb their way up to the crest. For many years I found these houses to be just dirty remnants of a 'better' time, but I now see them as having uniqueness and character--we would do well to preserve them.

5th and final day of English Camp

2010-07-16T10:34:00.005-04:00

WOW, what a week! I can't believe the last day of camp has come and gone! I'm positive that everyone involved had a BLAST and it's going to be hard to go back home and to our every day lives outside of English Camp. Jeremy and I would like to personally thank everyone who worked so hard to make this camp a success. Thanks to all the volunteers (Americans and Czechs) and all the families that hosted Americans or had them over for dinner. We know that each camp takes a lot of time and planning, but it would not have been able to happen with out all your help. Thank you.

This post is going to be a little different than the others. We still have pictures, so "czech" those out, but also make sure you keep scrolling down and read the thoughts about English Camp from a few of our Czech volunteers.

2010 English Camp: Friday

Thoughts from some of the Czech volunteers

Pastor Jan: The most exciting thing about the camp is how lively this place is. The campers, the Americans and the volunteers are just full of so much energy. After camp I like to walk around the church and feel all the loose floor boards that weren't there before. I really like the openess of our doors - people coming and going, being relaxed and being themselves.

Jitka: I'm a leader of the teenage girls and they are really hard to impress, but they really like it here. They are having fun and it is because of you.

Petra: For me camp is mainly about relationships. I'm happy my friends from America came so I can see them. And I'm happy I got to make more friends. Your company really means a lot. You always bring so much energy and it really inspires me.

Hanka: This is my first year and I didn't think it would be this great. I can see you like this work and you like to work with children and the children really like you and so do I. This camp is a really specail thing.

Dan: I'm not from here (Policka) so English Camp for me means doing something good and making friends and seeing old friends - both Czechs and Americans

reflections

2010-07-15T04:57:00.003-04:00

I'm normally a studious writer of my experiences; I either find time when the sun is just starting to set to jot down some ideas in my journal, or jump on this blog and type out another post. Yet, this past week has been quite different: I haven't found the time, nor have I had the urge to really put down my experiences to paper. I know that later on--maybe a few years from now--I'll regret this decision, as these past few days in the Czech Republic have been so wonderfully fulfilling, and at the same time, so emotionally exhausting that I can't seem to find an 'even keel' where I find contentment. Much of this feeling is inherent in the fact that I can't seem to make the fact that Jamie and I will be flying away from friends and our lives here in less than three days, a reality. I'll be leaving friends. I'll be leaving habits. I'll be saying good-bye--in a small way-- to myself, or atleast the person I've come to be known whilst living here.

Jamie and I have spent many nights and evenings these past few days sitting with friends who are usually crying; however, I'm never crying. I can't seem to make myself cry. When I see some of my Czech friends break into tears when they discuss the fact that I won't be here, I'm left feeling guilty, because I am not reciprocrating that emotion, and I hope that they understand that just because I'm not crying does not mean that I'm not sad. In my mind, I've come to view all the people and friends that I've met these past two years in the Czech Republic as being true friendships--ones that enrich my life for the better. I also know that some of them will weaken with the passage time, but I honestly am believing (and telling myself) that just because I'll be leaving on Sunday, does not mean that I'll never be able to see them again--and I know that I'm not just saying it to protect myself and my emotions.

This upcoming Sunday is going to be an exhausting day for both Jamie and I, as we will be officially saying good-bye to the church and the congregation who have supported us and who have become our community for these past two years. I've been debating about whether I should say a few words, but I'm content to just tell them thank you and that I've loved both years. And, really, I'm probably not going to cry while leaving. How can I cry? I would be more remorseful and sad if I had never taken the jump and moved to Policka two years ago; I am a better person for knowing them. That, to me, is not sad; in fact, it calls for a time of rejoicing, which we will surely be doing on Friday night during the 'garden party' in the yard of the church. I look forward to the last moment I can take down one last 'na zdravi' and dance with both the Czechs and Americans--of all different ages, sizes and even religions--who have become my root these past few years.

On a personal note, I must tell you that I've been really torn throughout this entire camp, as my family back home in America have been attempting to heal and deal with the fact that my Grandmother is very ill. Each moment I have time to reflect on my own, my mind instantly shoots back to my Grandma and my family; I'm worried for her health; I feel guilty I can't be there with her or them; and I've been struggling to get updated, accurate information about her actual situation. I'm all emotinoally mixed up....it's been the hardest week of my time spent in the Czech Republic.

Day 4 of English Camp

2010-07-15T02:36:00.000-04:00

Today was all about courage. Courage to make new friends, courage to speak another language, courage to try something new (and possibly a little scary), and the courage to do something silly when everyone else is watching.

The skit of the day was David and Goliath, with was good because it was about a younger boy who was being brave. In the stations the campers had to try out their own courage while they did different activities involving mouth traps, tennis balls, and trusting one another.

2010 English Camp: Thursday

Thoughts from the Oklahoma team

Barb Henderson: Thank you Policka. English Camp is awesome! Keep a smile on your face. Give love from your heart.

Jordan Scott: Yesterday was the best day of camp. I liked the family that we ate dinner with.

Coleton Crockett: English Camp has been a ton of fun so far. I think my favorite thing about camp is being able to meet new people.

Kim Shanks: Have you ever seen God in an unexpected way? He's here and you wouldn't recognize Him if you were looking for Him in the usual way. Praise God!

Tim: Schlais: During one dinner hosted by a Czech family in Policka, we began a converstaion about the youth here and their search for something greater in life. A realization hit me that sometimes the search may be important and will create a deeper faith for someone whose belief was come too easily. My greatest hope is that our week here will help someone begin their faith journey.

Day 3 of English Camp

2010-07-14T04:03:00.006-04:00

The middle of camp has come and gone, but not without having an amazing time. It seems like the first two days start off a little slow each year, but once Wednesday comes around the campers are done being shy and the really fun can begin.

The theme of the day was kindness, and was kicked started with a skit about the Good Semeritan. No matter how many times I've heard the story, it still makes me smile when someone "unexpected" does the right thing and helps a person in need. There are too many times in life that we take the easy way out and ingore the people in need around us, so I'm hoping that through the skit it will show the campers that no matter who they are they can always lend a helping hand.

After a morning of shirt making, dodge ball playing, skits and snacks all the camper teams came back to the church to preform their group song/chant before lunch. Every group had made a great sign about their superhero and a song to go along. I can't wait to see what tomorrow brings!

Pokec with the church band:
Cerna Ovce (One black sheep)

Most days that Americans are taken for some sort of trip after lunch, however Wednesdays have been a little different the last three years. During Kati Salmon's last year in Policka she helped to form a church band with the youth. Since then the band has grown and mattured to the point that they are now writing and playing their own songs!

So, today at 4:30pm about 50 people came to the church to watch Cerna Ovce play. Their guest was Kerry, so many of the Czech volunteers from camp, as well as some campers, came to see what Kerry would say. It really made me happy to hear so many people say how much the band had progressed in the last three years, and I hope that the members will take those words as encouragement and continue to grow.

2010 English Camp Wednesday

Thoughts from the Oklahoman team

Jean Crockett: The meals have been delicous! The soccer game last night was lots of fun. Coleton scored two goals :)

Day 2 (hooray!)

2010-07-13T06:51:00.004-04:00

What a day! We started off energizers and then jumped right into the theme of creativity with a skit about Noah and the ark. Super J and Wonder Girl were ready to help protect the animals from the flood waters, but of course our Superheroes were dissapointed that they were not needed, because Noah trusted in God and took care of the problem at hand in a creative way.

In the each station the campers where given taskes where they also had to be creative or solve a problem. For example, in Crafts they made a coin purse out of a juice box, in Power Station they invented their own animal and talked about pollution, and in surprise they decoded and solved riddles.

There is a lot more great things planned for the rest of English Camp, so be sure to czech in and read about what's happening each day and look at some pictures.

2010 English Camp: Tuesday

Thoughts from the Oklahoman team

Kim Shanks: This is SO much fun!

Kerry Ebert: This camp had already been a great blessing to me, especially the honor of serving communion with Pastor Jan on Sunday.

Paula Denson: For me the mission trip has been full of unexpected kindnesses, which I have seen from people caring for other. It makes me think that our goal of finding "everyday superheroes" in both groups - Czechs and Americans - has already been accomplished. I'm looking forward to finding more "superheros" all week long.

Day 1 of English Camp!

2010-07-12T08:39:00.004-04:00

First day of camp! Waahooo!

I'm pretty sure that every camp started off with just as much excitement and energy that this camp did, but it's always quite the feeling to walk into a room full of people and hear the energizer songs and seeing a smile on everyones face.

When Jeremy and I were planning the camp we were nervous that there would not be enought campers interested in attending since there are two other big camps going on at the same time. However, as the applications trickled in, I was surprised to hear that our final count was 90 students!

The theme of this years camp is Superheroes, and each day will have a mini theme that is a characteristic of superheroes (friendship, creativity, kindness, etc...), which the campers will be learning about. However there is a catch. Everyday there is a skit, biblically based, were there are two superheroes that are trying to save the world, however they are always too late - a normal, everyday person does the job for them. Because you see, you don't have to be a superhero to do good things.

Everyday I plan on posting pictures and thoughts from the Oklahoman team, so that you back home will have a taste of what is happening here. Of course you'll have to wait until everyone is back home to hear all the great stories :) So feel free to leave comments for the team and please keep the camp in your thoughts and prayers.

2010 English Camp: Monday

Thoughts from the Oklahoma mission team:

Kelsey Goebel: Today was amazing. The children were so excited. Seeing the smiles on all their faces was so inspiring. I can't wait to continue working in the camp.

Malory Scott: As Monday came around the corner, from all the preparation, I realized that even though it is the first day I already feel the connection between the campers and us. The excitement they has was encouraging even though they were cautious with how they responded to us. I hope that everyone can step away from this week with the feeling that they had made a connection and a difference in the lives of the camper this week.

Tonya Scott: My first day of English Camp made me realise that kids are so very similar - regardless of geography. Today I had students of all ages and I watched them laugh, talk and wrestle. I had expected quieter, more withdrawn children, thinking American kids were more rambuctious, but I quickly realised that they are the same - the smiles, the laughter, the curiosity. Even though it was a hot and tiring day it was full of excitment and reward.

Sunday Worship

2010-07-11T08:56:00.000-04:00

Sunday worship

Rock band and submarines

2010-07-10T13:58:00.006-04:00

"The best way of making friends is by making a fool of yourself" - Jarda

2010 Saturday program

The Saturday before camp is always about meeting all the Czech and Americans volunteers, doing crazy stuff and making new friends. Jarda says it every year that the best way to make new friends is to make a fool our of yourself first, and he is exactully right. During the upcoming week Czechs and Americans will be working together to up on an English camp for about 85 Czech campers, so being able to have fun together before the week is a good way to start.

Our Saturday program started off with a preformance by some of the Czech volunteers. They had a rock band that lip-synced five or six songs ranging from ACDC to Elvis. This broke the ice and from there out the mood of everyone involved was a playful one.

Later on we played game called "submarines". Everyone except the five captains were blind folded and they used the rest of the people in their team as torpedos and tired to sink other "submarines". It took a lot of team work, as well as trust because without the guidance of the captian, and the rest of a submarine, a torpedo would be blind and left to wonder. This week do don't want anyone one who is helping with the camp to feel like that are lost at sea and left of wonder through the camp on their own. We might be two groups - Americans and Czechs - but we are one team, and our goal is to make the camp the best possible experience for the 90 campers that are attending this week.

I would like to ask that you keep our team in your thoughts and prayers throughout the week, as well as the campers. English camp is much more than learning English. It's about making friends, high-fiving kids, and making a difference in someone elses life.

The Oklahoman team is here!

2010-07-09T13:12:00.003-04:00

Early this morning twelve of the Czech volunteers from the Policka English camp loaded onto a bus at 5:30am and headed for Prague. Along the way I started the realise that the English camp is just around the corner, and also, in ten days Jeremy and I would be leaving the "home" we had made during our two years in Policka.

Upon arriving at the airport you could feel the level of excitment rise a little. We looked at the arrival board, which informed us that the Oklahoma team would be arriving at 9:40...we had an hour to wait. What I really like about the Prague airport is that there is a place where you can watch the planes land and take off. So I found that members of our "welcoming crew" would walk from the seating area to the look out point and then to the arrival board.

At 9:35 Jarda told us that the Americans should be arriving right now! We walked onto the lookout platform just in time to see the Luftansa plane pull up to the gate. And then we saw hands in the plane windows waving at us! The Oklahoma team had arrived, and were just as excited as we were. After 5 minutes of waving we went down to the exit to meet them; Jarda came prepared to greet Kerry and the others with a Policka pivo :)

2010 Airport

The seventh English camp is on it's way! And I'll be posting a little something everyday along with pictures, so czech it out!

2010-07-02T10:04:00.002-04:00

“They know everything about my history, except that I’m still alive,” Ladislav Kovac murmured with tears welling up in his eyes. “Please tell them I’m still here—we’re family.” I sat dumbfounded in my chair. I couldn’t look at him in the face. All I felt was pity and the crushing, overbearing weight of loneliness that emitted from his voice.

---
The story and history of places and families always starts with people. Sometimes that history is remembered as a story of moving to a new place and the laying down of new foundations; other times, it is celebrated and remembered through the act of staying connected, rooted in the ancestral land.
In America, more often than not, we gear our minds and society around the “new”: we remember the Civil War for the unheralded nation it forged; we study about the 1960s to trace the developments of fresh cultural phenomenons; and we define our ‘Nation’ as one that is mixed; respecting the difference and finding our strength in our mutual unity and astonishing diversity.
We are always looking to ‘go west’ in search for answers, explanations, and ultimately—if were lucky—the place where our ‘heart is content’.
But, what happens when we begin to set our gaze to what happened before us, so much so before, that our family names weren’t even in this country yet? Through what eyes are we to view that? After all, isn’t there some truth in saying that America’s history is as much about those who came, as it is about those who stayed?
And, where do these two lines—the one of the immigrant cutting ties to the past and the one of the ‘old country’—cross? Do they cross when we find an old black and white picture of a long-dead ancestor tilling a field in the former Holy Roman Empire? Do they cross when we Americans are in the midst of organizing one of our many “Nationality Day” celebrations? Or do they cross when Grandmothers or Aunts (as it always seems to be them) begin to retrace the roots of the family?
Ultimately, I think all of us Americans are caught up in this battle; a battle of trying to preserve a personal/family history often older than our nation itself with little to build upon than vague recollections from aging grandparents and creased pictures hanging on a wall.
So, how can this history come back to life? And, what connections—if any—are waiting to be found?

---

Two years ago my wife and were offered a position to work as pastoral assistants and community organizers in Policka , Czech Republic, a ten thousand-person town located three hours east of Prague in the Czech Highlands.
Our work took on many different forms: we planned English-language summer camps, taught over 100 students, gave cultural presentations, wrote church publications, and planned community activities for both children and adults.
In those two years, we forged relationships, learned the language and adapted to the culture: we became well-versed in understand the confusing public-transportation schedules; became acquainted to $1 drafts at lunch time; enjoyed strolling through squares bursting with baroque architecture; and finally became accustomed to the relative public ‘coldness’ of Czechs to strangers on the street.
And it was in this environment where I finally began to take seriously the past of my family, a family history very typical of many that ended up settling and building a new life in the Pittsburgh area.

---
In 1918, the former Austrian-Hungarian Empire was split in the aftermath of WWI. In the wake of this reality, a new nation was founded in the former territories of both Austria and Hungary: Czechoslovakia.
The early nation of Czechoslovakia, known to both Czechs and Slovaks as “The First Republic”, was powerful and well-advanced. It boasted as having one of the strongest and most robust industrial complexes of post-war Europe; was led by a man of virtue and integrity, in Tomas Garrigue Masaryk; and had numerous theatres, museums and top-class schools.
Yet, not all was so rosy in the eastern part of the country—the region closest to modern-day Ukraine. Jobs were very scarce in the area (situated around the city of Michalovce, Slovakia), as the economy in the east was built largely upon agriculture, and few roads were built.
The eastern Slovakian connection to the cultural life, industrial wealth and political freedom of Prague was merely theoretical at best.
Consequently, the social situation and the lack of opportunity became catalysts for mass waves of emigration from the region.
The early emigrants from the area were generally young men who were hoping to make it to America, where they would work for a few years, save up money, and finally return back home to Slovakia to build homes and acquire land for their families—many of the homes that were built this way can still be seen today. However, this was all ‘theoretical’ planning, as the reality played out much differently: many of the men never returned.

---

It is said that out of the 400,000 Slovak immigrants that came to America, over 200,000 of them settled in Western Pennsylvania alone. They, along with their Polish, Croatian and Hungarian brothers, became the human capital upon which Andrew Carnegie’s steel kingdom turned.
My great-grandfather, Jurej (Jiri, Yurej, George) Hostoviczak was part of the throng. On Janurary 21, 1921, he stepped off the Vedic and onto American soil through way of Ellis Island. He was 29 years old. He left his young wife Anna Kovacova and his new-born daughter, Maria (my grandmother), back in their home village of Kolibabovce.
He found work, initially, at a coke plant in Avella Pa; later moving to West Aliquippa, where he worked his way up into the J & L Steel plant. After about a year and a half of earning steady pay, Jurej sent for his wife and daughter, who together set up a household along the banks of the Ohio River; ignoring their passport visas from the Czechoslovakian government, which informed them that they were to return after one year.

---

At Christmas, I was on a train to Prague when a man sat down beside me. He was very dirty and had the sweet-dingy smell of a drunk. His glasses magnified his eyes to the point that I couldn't make out their color, and his Czech was heavily accented due to the fact that he only retained about five teeth total in his mouth. I tried to make my presence small, as I did not want to give him any reason to spark up a conversation with me. But, it was in vain. He looked over at me and offered me a beer. I had never seen the golden can before in the Czech Republic, so I asked him where the beer was from. "Slovakia," he said. "I was there this past weekend. I work as a forester there." "Where in Slovakia were you, exactly?" I asked. "In Michalovce. It's as far east as you can go. I have a girlfriend who lives in a little village near there." "Oh yeah," I replied. "What's the name of the village?" "Kolibabovce," he said.
Before my grandmother died in 2003, she showed me and my brothers copies of her parents’ passports and immigration papers. I remember reading and looking over the documents to find their place of birth and residence before Aliquippa. I found the name fairly hard to read, but my Grandma was certain of its pronunciation. "Collee-ba-buff-za," she said. "It's the place where I was born." "Yeah right," I thought. "Old people are always so sure of their heritage."
After the train ride, my mind was jarred back towards that memory. The man had said a village in the eastern part of Slovakia that sounded much like the one my grandma had pronounced out seven years ago. Jamie and I pulled out the documents out and scanned them over. Sure enough, it was a match. We resolved to go.
---

The village of Kolibabovce is well-hidden behind a tree-covered hill—one of many in this region, where the Western Carpathian Mountains lead into gentle rolling plains that stretch all the way to Hungary. In fact, it’s so well-hidden, that the village didn’t even have a road connection until 1968. It was, effectively, a forgotten place set dead-center in a genetically mixed border land of Ukrainians, Ruso-Carpathians, Hungarians and Slovakians.
My wife and I started our journey at the crest of the hill, which was crowned by a beautiful baby-blue Greek-Catholic church. We walked around the cemetery in an attempt to find some family names that had become familiar to us through our preliminary research. There were plenty: Hostovicaks, Kovacs, Ihnats, and Pastulaks. We were definitely in the right place.
There are a total of about sixty houses in the village, and all of them are situated along a narrow road that winds its way through a shallow hollow, alongside a rocky creek, The houses in this area distinct in that they are narrow and long: people leave in the front-half of the home, while live stalk and pets reside in the rear. It was architecture I had never seen before.
Many of the villagers came out to take a gander at the two strangers who had suddenly began aimlessly walking down the road—I’m sure we stuck out speaking English and wearing large travelling packs. This area of Europe is not exactly accustomed to seeing hoards of college-aged tourists.
Thankfully, their glances and looks were not negative, nor were they aggressive. They were more curious than anything; it was almost as if the people were inviting us for a conversation. It set us both in a good mood.
House number 33 was our intended goal, as we both knew that my grandmother’s cousin, Ladislav Kovac, was last known to reside there; however, we were unsure of this bit of information, as we had not received a reply from the letter we had sent him about a month and half before.
Upon arriving at the house, we were both shocked to find it in great condition: it had just been remodeled and was surrounded by gardens of flowers and budding grape vines that arched into a canopy over the main entrance of the house.
This is not exactly the type of home that belongs to a man of about 70 years of age (the age at which Jamie and I estimated him to be).
We were both nervous, very nervous.
I wanted to turn back and be content with just seeing the village and the house where my grandmother was born.
We waited and debated about what to do. Were we being too aggressive? Were we forcing a family connection? Will Ladislav have any interest in a long-lost connection to some “Americans” who were supposed to be family?
We didn’t have the answers.
Our fortunes turned when I saw an older man making his way up the road, coming towards us. In an instant, I stopped him and asked him where Ladislav Kovac lived. “Ladislav Kovac!?” he said speaking through a toothless mouth, making his already soft Slovak accent even more unintelligible to me. “His house is here,” he said firmly, pointing to the newly-refurbished, orange façade with the number 33. “Where are you from?” he asked. “We’re from America. We’re family.” At this moment, he turned toward the house and bellowed, “HEY! LADO, YOU HAVE AMERICANS OUT FRONT.” Then he left. We stood dumfounded.
After about five minutes a woman of short-stature and closely-cropped, brown hair came outside and greeted us with a Slovakian, “Dobry Den.” Nervously, I began speaking in rapid, heavily-accented Czech trying to apologize for the inconvenience of just ‘showing up’ and explain our family relation all in the same breath. She just smiled at me and said, “It’s Okay. We’re family. We’ve been expecting you.”
And at that moment, my wife and I took our first steps into the household my grandmother was born in and into the house from which my great-grandfather left nearly 90 years ago. I knew at this moment that the lines between my family’s history in America and my family’s history in Slovakia had finally crossed.
Ladislav came down the steps with a bottle of Czech Liquor and four shot glasses. All of us began speaking to one another, sometimes at the same time. The conversation got louder and more animated.
We all started pulling out pictures, letters, passports and immigrations papers. A mess began to build on the table. Goulash was served and tea was given, but none of us took a breath to eat.
Kamilla, Ladislav’s wife, announced that she had pictures to show. All the while, Ladislav and I gulped down our third shot. This was beginning to feel like a true reunion.
Kamilla came back and placed the bundle of photographs on the table, and immediately began asking me if I recognized any of the people in the pictures—they were all relatives living in America or Canada. I did. Then, almost unbelievably, she pulled from the pile twelve pictures of young children and new-born babies. “Who are these people?” She asked. “That is me.” I answered. Tears welled up in Ladislav’s eyes. “Really!?” Kamilla exclaimed, not believing me. “Yes. That is my dad, my mom, my grandmother and my brothers. You had pictures of me and didn’t even know it,” I said with a laugh. We drank down our fourth shot.
After this, Jamie and I were invited to take a look at Ladislav’s father’s grave. We began to hear the story of my family from the Slovak side, the stories I never heard in America.
We were introduced to Ladislav and Kamilla’s daughter and their grandson, Lukas. We were immediately offered a place to sleep for the night. We took them up on the offer. They really did welcome us in like family.
As the night wore on, and our initial excitement died down a bit, Ladislav and Kamilla began recounting for us the sadder side of our family’s story. Ladislav’s entire family (mine included in this) immigrated to America before WWII. Only his father, Pavol, and an uncle were left. In 1947, his father died in WWII fighting for the Soviet Army, leaving behind Ladislav at the age of one. He had no other family in Slovakia to take care of him. His mother left and found a new family. Consequently, Ladislav was raised by two old women who looked after him and the family house.
Kamilla explained to us that Ladislav felt abandoned not only by his mother, but by the extended family—cousins, aunts, uncles—who had left him and his father for a new life in America.
She said he cried for many years out of sheer loneliness and animosity in the fact that he had been “forgotten.”
Some time during the evening Ladislav brought out the only known picture of his father, a small black and white pocket-sized photo of his dad in military garb. He came down the steps very gingerly as he held the photo in the palm of his hand, as if it was a delicate butterfly. His emotions were overwhelming.
Kamilla looked at him and said, “You’ve cried for over thirty years that you had no family around you, and now that they are here, you’re still crying! What am I going to do to make you happy!?” We all smiled.

---

Our time with Ladislav and Kamilla ended quite abruptly, as the next morning we had to take a bus back into the city. And as I waved to Ladislav out the side window, I saw him wiping his eyes, even though a wide smile creased his rough-strewn face.
When I embarked on this journey to reconnect with the past and search out my family roots, I thought that it in many ways that it would only be me who would come away affected. I was hesitant to make the situation more important than it was. I guess I guarded myself against the fact that maybe for my relatives that live in Slovakia, a relationship is not really needed. I was resolved to believe that it was only we root-starved, history-searching Americans that need to find out about our own past. Yet, I realized, especially with Ladislav, that sometimes it is the ones who stayed that also need a connection, and that they too have family to find and frayed edges to mend.

Off to the land of buried ancestors.

2010-06-22T11:42:00.004-04:00

About three months ago Jamie took a chance and penned a letter to a woman who had a last name as long as the alphabet itself. She lives in the city of Michalovce, which straddles the border between the Slovak Republic and the Ukraine. I've heard they speak a sort of 'funny' Slovak out that way, but I didn't really think much of it. I never really believed I'd go there anyways. Jamie and I were told that this Marta was our relative. Many years ago, a man by the name of Yuraj, Jiri, Jurej, Gyory, George (however you want to spell it), picked up shop and travelled for six months until he finally reached the shores of New York City in January of 1921. His wife and newly-born daughter made the same trip the next year, eventually settling in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, to start the cycle of immigrant labor that came to define and settle this region of North America. Apparently, not everyone in the immediate family thought that the pastures were greener on the other side of the fence (ocean if you will), and decided to stay in the fatherland. Yurej was the only one who took the bait.

As time went by, and the old country split twice and fell under the rule of their Germanic tormentor from the west and their Slavic father from the north, Yurej and his descendents became Americanized. By the time I was birthed onto this earth Yurej had been dead for nearly twenty years and his eldest-born daughter, my grandmother, had been relegated to a hospital bed in a Beaver Falls nursing home for nearly twenty-five years due to a disease that is the property of Lou Gherig. The language went with Yurej and so did the living memory of his life back in Europe. And with that, my family began to trace their history as far back as my grandmother. We had a vague notion of the land that was left behind, but that was about it. We knew not who lived there, what their trade was, or, really, even what country they lived in (for many years my Grandmother believed she had been born in what is today the Czech Republic half of Czechoslovakia. It was found out later that she was born in the eastern-most part of the former CZSK--the Slovak side).

At Christmas, I was on the train to Prague when a man sat down beside me. He was very dirty and had the sweet-dingy smell of a drunk. His glasses magnified his eyes to the point that I couldn't make out their color, and his Czech was heavily accented due to the fact that he only retained about five teeth total in his mouth. I tried to make my presence small, as I did not want to give him any reason to spark up a conversation with me, but it was in vain. He looked over at me and offered me a beer. I had never seen the golden can before in the Czech Republic, so I asked him where the beer was from. "Slovakia," he said. "I was there this past weekend. I work as a forester there." I thought this was pretty intriguing so I engaged further. "Where in Slovakia were you, exactly?" I asked. "In Michalovce. It's as far east as you can go. I have a girlfriend who lives in a little village near there." "Oh yeah," I replied. "What's the name of the village?" "Kolibabovce," he said.

Before my grandmother died in 2003, she showed me the travel documents of both her parents and of herself when they immigrated to America. I remember reading and looking over the documents to find their place of birth and residence before Aliquippa. I found the name fairly hard to read, but my Grandma was certain of its pronunciation. "Collee-ba-buff-za," she said. "It's the place where I was born." "Yeah right," I thought. "Old people are always so sure of their heritage."

After the train ride, my mind was jarred back towards that memory. The man had said a village in the eastern part of Slovakia that sounded much like the one my grandma had pronounced out seven years ago. Jamie and I brought copies of the documents to the Czech Republic with us, so we pulled them out and scanned them over. Sure enough, it was a match. The village was real after all! And to this day, people live there.

It was at this time that we decided to pursue the trail of history more in-depth.

Jamie spear-headed the research and began scouring message boards and ancestry websites for names that would somehow be related to me; narrowing her search to the village of Kolibabovce and its surrounding areas. Immediately, she garnered the help of a Slovak man who was following Jamie's requests vicariously through the internet. He himself is from Kolibabovce and is quite confident that he could give us the 'scoop' on where our relatives, if any of them still live there, are. Initial research was frustrating at best, as this region is a mix of language--mainly Hungarian and Slovakian--thus making it very difficult to pinpoint an exact place name or even family name. It also didn't help that when choosing names, the Slovaks that lived in the region at that time weren't too keen on creativity; it seems that every single man was named Yurej and every woman was named Alzbeta or Maria.

As time went by, Jamie located a woman by the name of Marta (not Maria, but close!). Her maiden name was Kovac, and her father was the brother of my Grandmother's mother. You follow!? Anyways, this makes Maria the direct cousin to my Grandma. They never saw each other. Like I said, Yurej and his wife seem to be the only ones who left.

Jamie took a chance and decided to write this women using very halting Czech. About three weeks later we received an email. It was from Marta, and since that time, we have spoken with her on numerous occasions. She invited us to see her in Michalovce.

Tomorrow we will ride to the far side of Slovakia, and hopefully come into contact with something that might resemble a 'connection'.

Perhaps we will be kindred spirits? After all, history and family documents claim it to be so

stream of thought

2010-06-18T10:09:00.006-04:00

The walls in our apartment are really bare. I haven't seen them look this way since we first moved into the place nearly two years ago. Pictures of friends that have hung on the walls have been placed in plastice bags and laid in the three suticases that lay on the floor, both in our living room and our bed room. Everything seems so empty and transitional. We're running out of food in our pantry, and I really haven't been motivated to take a jaunt over to the store to buy some more boxed milk or cereal; it's pointless really, we're only going to be in this apartment for a total of fourteen more days. To make the fact that we no longer have food in our aparment even more irrelevent, I know that we will have invitations to dinner or to lunch nearly every single day from here on out, from friends who want to celebrate with us one last time before our not-so-long off departure date. We've set up a table in the church entrance-way, where we've placed many of our old clothes and some random items that we won't be taking back with us to the United States. Some of the sweaters that I'm trying to get rid of have been a part of my daily wardrob for about seven years; I don't feel bad about leaving them in the Czech Republic; I view it as a time to start a new era in my life, and I think a change of clothes is an easy, superficial way to manifest this change--maybe I'll actually start to buy some button-downed shirts and ties!? Who knows!?

Last night I went home and started to read some Shakespeare, and it struck me that I haven't read any English-language literature in a very long time. For the past two years, I've been trying to immerse myself in the Czech language, so much so, that I've so often tried to dredge through Czech literature (often met with failure), that I actually forgot how beautiful and easy it is to understand my native language--Shakespeare really is the crown jewel of our language; I've grown to appreciate his writing; his use of rhythm and syntax usually have me literally sitting on the end of my seat reveling in the richness of his vocabulary and the unique way in which he enables the language to express ideas/emotions/physical objects in such creative and beautiful forms. In reality, I guess I've come to the conclusion that I gotta get back into an 'anglo form of mind', if you will.

It'll be difficult to fly away in a month. I'm going to miss the feeling of uniquness that comes from always having another trip to a foreign land at my fingertips. I've grown quite fond of being the foreigner in the group who has the thick accent and the different perspective. I'm sure that the tourist-filled streets of Prague will pull at my heart when, in less than two months, I find myself walking alone at night on the desolate, wide-open roads of back-country Pennsylvania. Life here seems so energetic, and yet, so rooted in history; it's quite a fascinating contrast, but one that I like. I'll miss the continual growth that comes from living in a place that is not the home of childhood memories, and the new perspectives that are dropped upon me on a daily basis. I know that I can find this in the USA, but I'm not so sure what it'll look like...

It's really hard for me to get perpsepective on the fact that in less than a month I won't be in Policka anymore. Many of my friends here have recently been asking me if Jamie and I plan on coming back to visit some time. I usually say yes. But, I don't really know. To tell you the truth, it doesn't seem like I'm really leaving. I get so caught up with living day-to-day, and not knowing REALLY what awaits me next year in Erie, that I've become accustomed to thinking about the USA and 'home' in a very 'theoretical' sense: like it's many years off in the future, and where I can't plan it, I can only imgaine it. I'm curious to see what friends I'll retain in Policka. I already know of some, where, sadly, our relationship will quickly wither as we separate. However, there are others where I know they'll be my friends for life, and while that is comforting, I have yet to know how close we will be...maybe just acquaintences for life?! Even as the language barrier has broken down between me and many of my Czech friends, I sometimes still sit back and reflect on the fact that we really do differ on cultural levels, and sometimes, irregardless of language, those cultural influences can sabotage a friendship, or make it stronger...I don't know yet what the fate will be for me and my relationships.

Today as I'm typing this, I'm going to the bowling alley with the youth group from our church, as it will serve as a kind of farewell for both Jamie and I. After this week, Jamie and I will be taking a trip to Slovakia, where we'll be hounding along the path of some of my ancestors, and camping in a National Park known as 'Slovenksy Raj', or 'Slovakian Paradise'; consequently, this is our offical last week of work in the church---the week that we get back from our vacation will be full of packing and cleaning of our apartment. I look forward to going to the bowling alley tonight, and I realized today that we cleaned out the church for one of the final times. At about three in the afternoon I found myself sitting at my desk staring out the window, because I literally felt like my work was complete. I couldn't think of anything else that I REALLY needed to get done. So instead, I stared out the window and took in one last scene of the trees and of the pond across from the church, where they're setting up a stage for the local musical festival that starts tonight. I was content to just be idle. For the past two years I've been working at making this church and this ministry relevant. Many times I felt like I've failed, or I've drifted from my main purpose, yet today I took solace in the fact that I could finally take a breather. Tomorrow I'll spend time with friends at the concert; tonight I'll be bowling with the youth; next week I'll be traversing the Slovakian Tatras; and next week I'll be eating (probably) my last home-made Svickova. What is there not to like about this ending?

Home

2010-06-16T04:46:00.000-04:00

The Slovak man sitting next to me in the pub was the first one to introduce me to the old Slovak proverb about ‘home”, when he said this, “In Slovak language, we say that ‘Home is where your ancestors are buried.’”

I sat back in my seat and reflected on what I had just heard, and my initial reaction was one of admiration. I was inspired by the proverb’s beauty of rootedness and connectivity to the local community. I found the inherent sense of duty and respect towards elders and family matriarchs, who have passed away long-ago, to be fitting. Yet, I was struck by the heaviness of the phrase and the boundaries that it places around how to define a home, and how it stresses not individuality, but the worth of a human being, being found in his/her relationship to the land, the people, the trees, the animals, the crops and the soil of a concrete, PHYSICAL place. In Slovak language, home is not so much emotional, as it is practical: it only becomes emotional to someone because they’ve been, and more importantly, their family has resided there, for as long as their collective memories can recall.

This Slovak proverb clearly contrasts with the American saying of, “Your home is where your heart is”, which undeniably defines ‘home’ on a strictly individual basis: there is no connection to land, to people, to place and to history. If the American definition does allow for the influence of people, family, history, land and place, it does so only in as much as these ‘elements’ influence the feeling of how much a person’s ‘heart’ is attached to a certain physically-demarcated home location: The American proverb of home puts the individuals feelings and comforts ahead of the individual’s obligations to their ancestors and community.

It might be easy for some of us to claim which one of these proverbs we think holds more truth. Some might feel that the individual’s comfort and peace is more important than some distant sense of obligation to a few dead people laying in a field, while others might find the emphasis on individual, cerebral feelings of ‘place and comfort’ that define the American home to be nothing but a shallow, superficial excuse to support a selfish lifestyle. But, I think for the majority of us, we can find and pick out truths from both.

I think language is a very important aspect of a culture; it’s the way through which the people describe the world around them, and each language, with its different grammatical structures, pronunciations and sayings, influences how people view the world just as much as their physical surroundings can. Language is the vehicle through which the worldviews of a people/nation are told; therefore, when learning another language, one is always coming into contact not only with the actually ‘understanding’ of the words and sounds that the other person is saying, but one comes to see the society and the tendencies of thought that emanate from the people. These two sayings about home are great illustrators of this, as both of them serve a purpose in the society from which they’ve come: the Slovak saying comes from a society that is very small and has had waves of massive immigration in the past; therefore, their saying is practical for them, as it is a form of protection against the disintegration of the Slovak people: think about how hard it would be to completely accept a new land as your home, if your mother language defines home as where your ‘ancestors are buried’. It sustains their culture and language. The American definition, on the other hand, also plays a practical role in our culture: it serves to support the individual pursuit of the ‘American Dream’ with an emphasis on the ‘can-do’ spirit which has defined us for many years. Our home can be found. Our home can be remade. Our home can suit us. Plus, it also helped us populate our great land, as moving was not only justified, but encouraged by the fact that everyone was trying to find their ‘heart-felt’ and rightful place.

I’ve recently struggled with finding my own home. I love the idea that I do have a ‘home’ of some sort back in Slovakia, which is the place where some of my ancestors have been buried, yet, I also found it comforting to know that my home is fluid, which enables me to move. Sometimes, I find that my definition of home can be one of a practical nature: wherever I will be studying, wherever I find a job, wherever I decide to build a house and decide to have family. I think to myself, “well, it’s not a romantic definition of ‘home’; it’s just real.” Other times, I think that home can only be defined by memories; seemingly throwing both the Slovak and the American definitions to the gutter: the most important home is the one where I was born. It is the one where my earliest experiences, smells, animals, trips and friends were found. It’s the home of nostalgia and upbringing; therefore, while my heart might not reside there, my mind always will; and while there aren’t any old ancestors buried there, my mind will be. So, where does this leave me? Is my home ancestral? Is it where I feel most comfortable? Or, is it from where I was born?

I don’t know…

Maybe the reality is, is that home can’t be defined by one main element, because home can be a mixture of many of them. I think that everyone in life has an obligation to find a home that uses all criteria—from ancestors—to memories—to land—to personal happiness—and to love—in a creative way. Thus, maybe a new way that home can be defined (at least for me) is where one’s passion and one’s love find their greatest fulfillment, not in oneself as an individual or as a relative of the deceased, but in how one affects and influences the others around them. I think that it would be much easier to claim a home where your work and your passion can be manifested on a daily basis, and where you work each day for the betterment of the community in which you are a part, even if you weren’t born there, or even if you don’t speak the language natively: if someone becomes a doctor and works in a clinic 5, 000 miles away and gives a service to the people and becomes an integral part of their place and community, then hasn’t that doctor found a home, even though his ancestors aren’t buried there and his memory still harkens back to a childhood and family half a world away? Or, maybe there are people who have regular jobs in a bank, or in a school or at the auto mechanics shop who love their work and engage the people every day; they have a vision for life that isn’t just predicated on finding their place in the world until their ‘heart’s content’, but is founded on the principle that through relationships, memories and community the ‘heart’s home’ will inevitably be found.

I guess to conclude, I think that we should all come to view our places that we now find ourselves in as a form of home. Each one might be a little bit different, and some might be better than others, but if we engage in the people around us and if we care about the physical place we’re in at that moment in time (the nature, the history, the business and the community/society), then we are ourselves making home.

So, as Jamie and I fly back to Pittsburgh (the home of my memories and my family), and as we make our way towards Erie (the home of family and practicality), we’ll always be reminded of the place we left, Policka (the home where we were able to build relationships and find fulfillment). I think we can take solace in the fact that it is our home, even if the place can’t be concretely defined.

This 'aint no rollercoaster.

2010-06-10T02:58:00.006-04:00

The Plexiglas magnified the cockpit to the point that upon sitting, my temples were instantly drenched in running lines and droplets of sweat. I could see that Vilhelm as well was quite warm, as his hair was sparkling from the water that had made its way to the top of each follicle; after all, this was his second time around. He'd been sitting behind the yolk for about forty-five minutes now, and was preparing to take for 'round two'.

I heard the gun of the engine as the low-winged, propeller plane made its way down the length of the cracked runway; pulling us behind it. There was a slight tug on the rope--it wasn’t as jerky or as rough as I had anticipated. We got into the air first because our glider is of a lighter weight than the motored plane. Vilhelm was calmly and smoothly using both feet and hands to control the movement of the glider as we began to lift up into the air. Nothing was hydraulic and it was all mechanical; whenever Vilhelm wanted to open up a flap on a wing to create some more air resistance, I heard a "Thruump, chink, chink" sound. It was almost as if he was locking and unlocking a steel gate by sliding a bolt lock through a series of concentric circles. I could feel the pedals being pushed both the right and the left, helping him control the trajectory of flight. Numerous times it seemed as if the nose of the glider was pointing straight down into the ground, giving me the feeling that at any moment we would surely crash, head first, smashing into pieces. Luckily, none of my worst imaginings took place.

Finally the plane got off the runway and instantly banked towards the right. Our goal was a series of cumulous clouds that had a dark-blue bottom. Vilhelm explained to me that the 'Terminky' under the bottom of those clouds should be good for a flight. A glider is like a large albatross in the air. It sits on air currents and very gracefully cuts through rough opposing headwinds with its long wingspan; however, for this to happen, the glider must be taken up to an altitude of around 1,000 meters, where it is able to get into the upward-moving air flow caused by the development of clouds: when the ground is warm and the sky is quite cold, the warmer air from the ground begins to instantly shoot upward to fill the void in the sky where the temperature is cooler; creating a series of fairly-narrow pillars of quickly-rising wind. If the day is just right, Vilhelm will release the rope and let the glider free-fall for about five seconds, upon which, it should catch a 'Terminka' and begin to steadily gains altitude of about three meters per second. The glider must be steered in a circular pattern as it quickly ascends to the base of the cloud, where the pilot is told to then quickly take the nose done, move to another cloud and start the process again--a glider is not suppose to, in any circumstance, venture into a cloud, as this can be very dangerous; disorienting the pilot and forcing him to fly 'by instruments'. (Vilhelm tells me that sometimes he'll take a jaunt into a cloud, but only for a few minutes and shoot back down--but it's a secret; no one’s supposed to know).

We were attached to the plane for about ten minutes, as we both were making our ascent towards the clouds. Vilhelm was optimistic that the dark-blue bottoms were a sure sign that the location there would be excellent for a flight. At minute intervals, the propeller plane would rise another fifty meters, gunning its engine, and tugging us along behind it. My ears began to feel the pressure as we climbed, and I could hear the wind rustling through the small air holes in our canopy. The whole glider seemed as if it would be ripped apart by the wind. I could feel the fuselage shake and rattle as we went higher and the air streams became stronger. If I told you I wasn't a little nervous, I'd be lying. The countryside below us stretched out into farm fields and villages dotted with beige-red roofs of the the country houses. I could see the hills and the Orlicky Mountians way off in the distance. There was a tractor tilling his field, and another farm machine bailing grass. I could still make out the cars and the major thoroughfares; the Czech Republic spread out into a series of green, brown and yellow rectangles. It was quite breathtaking.

I turned my head up to look straight above us, and was shocked to see how close we had come to the base of a cloud. I was watching Vilhelm, as he was repeatedly looking at the sky trying to figure out which cloud offered us the best chance to find a reliable and quick-moving upstream. It was a bit like surfing I have to admit: constantly waiting for the right time and never being quite sure if you were going to catch the wind or not. When we got to an altitude of 1,000 meters, I heard a large metallic snapping sound, as Vilhelm pulled the large, centrally-located, yellow lever, releasing us from our connection to the plane. In an instant, things got very quiet. It was as if we were in equilibrium. We weren't moving. We were just floating. Suddenly the nose of the glider shot straight down giving us a clear view of the earth below us, and descended...rapidly (Imagine a rollercoaster at the crest of the first hill. The time where it waits for gravity to take it down the remainder of the track is exactly how this felt). My heart rate shot up a few beats as we free-fell, then suddenly, the glider straightened out and we began to cruise at an altitude of about 900 meters. The teriminka was weak; we weren’t going to be able to make it to the top. And, to make matters worse, we didn't count on the fact that we would be flying directly into a strong headwind. Our glider was being pushed around quite a bit, and I could see Vilhelm nervously shooting glances out both sides of the cockpit attempting to locate the airport (later on, I would learn that there was a real sense of danger, as Vilhelm was fairly certain that due to the strong winds we weren't going to be able to ride the weak stream back the airport; he had to, sadly, begin to make his return after only five minutes of unassisted flight).

For me, it was an unbelievable experience. I was watching our speed, how quickly we were losing altitude, what direction we were going, and, of course, I made sure to take in all the wonderful sightlines from the sky. After about seven minutes, Vilhelm asked me if he could try a little trick. Not really understanding what he said, I replied, "JO!". In an instant, I felt the yolk get pulled back and saw the nose of the glider go right up into the heavens. Then, he banked the plane to the left, and then quickly whipped the yolk to the right, forcing the nose downwards into a corkscrew. The G-force was at some instances tugging so hard at my body that I felt I'd be ripped from the seat; at other instances, it came in waves of pressure that made my heart feel as if it would thrust into my gut. Through the canopy, the world twirled in a series of greens, browns and blues. I lost sight of the skyline and only saw the magnificent warping and twirling of the ground. And then, just like that, we pulled out and were even. One corkscrew takes off 100 meters of altitude; we were now cruising about 800 to 700 meters. After about one minute, I heard an extremely loud rush of wind from behind my ears, as the plane again shot straight up into the sky. All I could see were the clouds, and I felt like my back was directly parallel with the ground below us. The manual controls of the wings were adjusted, and I saw Vilhlem's shoulders move forward. In an instant, the glider swung down and dropped the nose of the plane straight down, and we began to fall from our height, like a leaf that has just released it's mooring from a branch. This was terrifying, but OH SO MUCH FUN! Vilhelm once again caught us from our fall, found the horizon and made our descent back to the airport.

The landing was much smoother and quicker than I had expected. Upon seeing the glider in the hanger, I was shocked at its small size and how light and flimsy it looked. There were only two wheels on the entire plane; the front one, which is little bit larger than the size of a bicycle training wheel, and the back one, which is literally the size of one of those small, black plastic rollers on a ‘wheelie chair’. How could a glider, going more than 60 km and hour, land on those weaklings? Well, it did. We touched ground in the grassy meadow beside the runway and quickly came to a stop. The glider tilted to the left as the wing scraped into the ground. Vilhelm opened the canopy and we both jumped out. My flight lasted exactly twenty-five minutes--a little too short for Vihlem's liking, but for me, it was truly an experience of a lifetime.

Pravice nebo levice? Nevím! Zaleží na zemi...Conservative or Liberal? I don't know! It depends on the country...'

2010-06-03T13:28:00.012-04:00

Recently, the Czech paralemtnary elections screwed up the way I think about myself--at least politically speaking. Yet, even after the political campaign signs have been ripped down one last time, and the negative character-bashing has been shot off the airways, to the relief of all of us, I'm still left pondering whether my reflections should come back on ME(!?) or on culture (easier).

Somehwere along the way I garnered the reputation as being the 'communist' of my family. I don't know why, nor will I ever REALLY know why. In fact, all I can assume is that I got the moniker because it was convient and easy: I said some things and acted in certain ways about five years back that made my family worried, especially the older ones, about whether I had lost my 'firm-rootedness' in Reagen and the GOP. I had. It was easy. I guess when looking back on it, I just regurgitated the prehashed arguments that I came into contact with on a daily basis (through my family environment), so it was only natural that when I went to college and got 'brainwashed' in the liberal environment that my seperation from the conservativism of my parents and family was as easy as fourteen year olds changing their personalities in their clique-like cultural world.

But, my shift to 'liberalism' and 'progressivism' wasn't full, nor did I ever myself view it that way. I thought I was just walking the line between what political decision makes sense for our nation, and which ones, well, don't. I fervently and honestly was searching for ways to rationally and faithfully meet societal, economic and social problems from a loving perspective. Sometimes, of course, I was drawn into very theoretical thinking about 'how' we should react...dare I say, naive?! But, all in all, I was really kind of above the conversation of whether I was 'liberal' or 'conservative', 'democrat' or 'republican'. It was easy to do for me, because I was still searching for my place in society, for my societies place in the world, and the practical role of my faith: does it always have to be about abortion? Why is George Bush supported by Christians? Is the GOP really think about justice? Also, what does my grandma know about Mao, and why do some people say I'm a 'Marxist'? Did they read the book?!

Consequently, the past few weeks took me back a few years when everyone here in the Czech Republic was again wrapped up in the converstaion of "where do you lay? To the right, or to the left?' The funny thing about this conversation though, is that here I realized I'm completely 'RIGHT/CONSERVATIVE/PRAVICE/CAPITALIST/WHATEVER YOU WANT TO CALL IT.'

You see, here in the Czech Republic, everything is 'obraceny' (reversed. Their cultural history is so far removed from our own, that the whole conversation must intially start all the way on the left--far more left than our 'American' perspective of it: Czech communists are Stalinists in American thinking. Czech Social Democrats are 'commies' in American thinking. Czech conservatives are moderates in American thinking. And Czech moderates, well, god forbid, they are Democrates. So, does the question even relate to me? How I can I be a conservative, capitalist in the Czech Republic, and a Maoist, Demmie in America?--on the same day nonetheless!

This most recent Czech election pitted the country into two extremes: those who wanted the communists and the social democrates to win (the liberals supported mostly by old people), and those who wanted the conservative, right-wing parties to win (supported mostly by business people and a VAST majority of young people). This was really interesting for me to see, as I was shocked to find that young people were flocking in droves to the conservative-style parties. In the United States, of course, it is completely on the opposite end: if ever I saw young people in the Republican party, it was most likely some bible-thumping evangelical (majority), or it was some economic free-market capitalist whose daddy was a banker (my brothers and I). Why is it this way?

I don't know...

For me, I believe that young people are naturally attracted to breaking the 'status quo' of a society. In the United States, of course, the status quo is that of the Republicans. They are the white, cowboy-hat wearing, country-music loving, Sarah Palin-toting, evangelical-christian hoardes who claim to have a right on 'true' America. Market capitalism has always been the big daddy, so much so, that we can't seem to criticze it, and if you do, you're considered (like me)a brainwashed commie 'youngin'--on a side note: there are some clear societal indicators that free marekt capitalism run amuck in our society has produced some very rotten fruits: the total collapse of small businesses in America, disregard for the envrionment (BP being a great example of that one!),the commercialization of NEARLY everything, and, I will say it, the obesity crisis. So, when we young people hear of anything counter-cultural to that, it intrigues us. Of course, this doesn't always mean that the 'new' way is the smart or right path to take. And, the same thing is true for Czech youth who have grown up in a culture that still has vast remnants of 'Sovietization', which I define as a culture beaten down and passive; they wait for handouts, they complain, they choose sarcasm over engagement, and (in a weird and twisted way) they always choose their own well-being over that of their neighbor or the generation after them. I would say that these characterisitcs are quite typical of older, pension-earning Czechs. This is a very bitter taste for the young.

The weeks leading up to the Czech election looked as the liberal/communist coalition would win in a decisive victory; they were garnering nearly 15 percent more of the votes than the right-leaning parties. Then Greece happened. All the conservative parties began pointing their fingers at the state of the inflated social system of Greece and her friends Spain and Portugal, propehsing that this fate would surely be down the road for Bohemia if she did not awake from her stupor and shake off the chains of the populist lies of the leftists. Videos began spreading around Youtube of young Czechs pleading with other young Czechs to get out and spread the word to 'Babi a Deda' (granny and gramps)that communism had ended and that not everyone is equal in this world. Friend groups popped up all over the place, solely with the intent of smearing the local leader of the social democratic party (which was quite easy to do since he was an arrogant bafoon). My classes talked about the election. People asked me about my opinion. Every night on the news, there were debates and soundbites. The whole Czech nation followed it like they had done the week before when the Czech hockey team beat Russia for the World Championships. It was arresting to be a part of it. I myself got caught up. I bought newspapers and magazines and read about the parties and their programs. I listened to their debates. I found myself being molded into a proper, young conservative in the CZ.

NO! How can that be? I'm liberal, remember!?

In the pub last night my friend Vlada Gracias came up to me and tapped me on the back and the first question that came out of his mouth was, "So how about that election? It was sweet and beautiful!" I responded, "yeah, I'm happy for the Czechs, but I really wish the Green Party would've made it."

The communist and leftists lost the election. It was a shock for everyone. the young people celebrated and danced in the streets of Prague; people toasted to the occasion. "WE WON"T BE LIKE GREECE!" And, I was left pondering the fact that it felt a whole lot like the Obama election of last year: young people made the vote...they pushed the political spectrem of the country into a new region.

But, what does that mean for me, A former-republican-turned-liberal-democratic-communist-turned-back-into-a-capitalist-Czech-conservative-supporter?

In reality, it leaves me in the same spot where I was before: a young, naive twat who doesn't understand the 'adult's' position in the country. I'm still on the wrong side of the fence...except this time, I'm on the 'right'.

Now, I guess I could get into a conversation about how I seem to always be attracted to the 'against-the-status-quo party', but that means I would probably have to admit that it's easier to be that way than to be part of the 'norm'. And, well that doesn't look so good for me, so it'll just have to wait for another conversation.

Oh, culture, how you shape our worlds....and change them too.

How To Say Good-bye

2010-05-27T08:18:00.006-04:00

We had already hiked through about four miles of mud, hunched our backs and pushed our knees up numerous steeply-inclined hills, and stopped to have a quick lunch of apples and peanuts at a picnic bench that had a look-out over the sprawling valleys of rolling hills and pleasantly-nestled villages when Honza yelled, "Jamie! Jamie! Honem! Podivej!" Everyone of us in our line of meandering hikers bolted in a full-on run to where Honza, who was about 30 feet in front us, was standing--book bags swinging from side to side and hands flailing about in an attempt to maintain a sense of balance on the quickly-eroding road. I saw it first, as I was right behind Honza, and couldn't quite make out what it was. It was black, like an oily black, but I saw spots of a very sharp, almost banana-bright yellow. The creature seemed to be in a hurry and was obviously frightened of the giants, one who was standing above it and the others who were running in thunderous fashion towards it. The little body was clumsily making its get-away over the sticks, rocks and leaves that made up the road; attempting to steer clear of Honza's thirteen-sized boot that he incontinently kept placing right in front of its nose, impeding its path. Its head would swing the left and its tail would whip around in the opposite direction, grabbing the back legs and pulling them along with it; it's whole body looked like a contorted 'S' each time it would take a step. I got up closer and from behind the boot, I could make it out: it was a SALAMANDER! And not just any salamander, a tiger salamander, and he (or she) was dressed in beautiful spots of yellow and had grown to a fairly large size. Aside from the fact that I hadn't seen one of these little amphibians in more than two years, I was more pleased to see one here in the Czech Republic, as they are extremely rare. Everyone got in close and stared, each one of us trying to see the smallest detail of its face and eyes. Does it live along this path? Can it see very well? Is it poisonous? Is it true that they look as if they wear a perpetual smile? Many of us wanted to touch it and hold it, or take it back with us and put it in our pocket. For me, personally, I would have been content to have found more--a family perhaps! As it crawled off the side of the road and into the moist leaves that had lain there since the fall, we all said our good-byes to the tiger salamander and returned back onto the path to continue inching up the little blue lines on my map. And, as I reflected on the experience a little later, I was surprised to realize that almost exactly two years ago on this blog I wrote about the fact that there 'will be no more tiger salamanders to hold' once I'm in the Czech Republic--making reference to one of my jobs at Camp Willson--and I was happy to see how wrong I had been.

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The final scene in the movie Big Fish is very powerful me. I don't know if many of you have watched the film, but it is a dying scene. It's sad and beautiful and completely poetic. Yeah, its a happy ending of course, as a son finally connecting with his father who he has been at odds with for nearly ten years, comes back to his father's death bed to listen and tell stories, together, again, one last time--but aside from the fact that it could have easily been warped into a cheesy, feel-good kind of ending, it stays above that fray--at least for me. His son begins to recount and tell a tall-tale of what his father’s funeral will look like. It's awash in adventure, women, a car chase, rebelling, running through the woods and being carried in the arms of his loved ones. And, after the action has ended, his son begins to depict how they both are slowly making their way to the river bank, and as they get closer to the water's edge, people from his father's life begin to reveal themselves from behind the trees to say one last farewell. Hundreds of them. The tale his son tells is a culmination of a life lived well, even though not always truthfully or perfectly, but one that was imaginative.

Recently--in fact, yesterday--I felt this way. Jamie and I planned one final presentation in the church, where we were going to talk about our 'cultural shocks' about the Czech Republic. Yet, we both didn't just want to make this presentation about the comparison of life between the U.S. and the Czech Republic, even though there was a good amount of that too; no, we wanted to say good-bye to many of the Czechs who've come to accept us as their own. We knew that this might be one of the last times we would be able to see them all in one place, as time is running up. However, we were unsure of who would come. I had some people in mind who I knew I wanted to be there, but I really didn't know: it could have been five to forty-six people. So, as the time ticked down to 6 o'clock and only three people had arrived, I was a little bit nervous.

I started to speak first at about 6:00pm. The translator that night was Vlada Hancil, the man who patiently taught me and gave me a foundation in Czech language; laughing at my grammatical mistakes and feeding me wine and whiskey as we went along. The presentation started slow, and soft as both Vlada and I tried to judge each other: how fast would I need to talk? Does Vlada understand everything I'm saying? Should I listen to his Czech to make sure he's translated it correctly? At about five minutes after I started into the introduction, the door opened up, loudly, and two of my students walked in. Petra, who has blond hair and is no older than me and her boyfriend, who lived and studied in England for the past six years. both of them last year, upon meeting me, proclaimed their dislike for Americans, but have since then come to enjoy the class and have recently invited me for beer with them in the pub to 'shoot the breeze' and develop a closer relationship. Being slightly frustrated at the intrusion into my introduction, I carried right along, with Vlada at my side, when, once again, the door was pushed open and another man walked in; this time, it was Vlada Gracias, the local glass artist who has become one of my closest friends in Policka. It doesn’t matter that he is 56 and I am only 24; we talk about life, we run together on Tuesday mornings, I visit him in his studio and look at his work, he talks to me about his marriage and just recently, he personally made Jamie and I our very own glass coffee mug set. He took his seat in the far back corner of the room.
Jamie began to speak after me, and she started off a little bit nervous and slow. I looked around the room, as I sat at the computer and controlled the PowerPoint. Renata Blandova was sitting next to me, and her daughter Martina, who is only 6 years old, was with her. They came with their grandpa and Martina sat on his lap. I know them all very well, and I remember the times I got to spend with Renata's family almost every Saturday when Jiri and I would go 'lifting' for about thirty minutes and then inevitably head down stairs for about two hours of beer drinking and socializing with Renata and Jamie. I remember that Renata always wanted to prepare us dinner, and she would vicariously ask through Jamie what my favorite meals where, so she could try her stab at them. I didn't know she did that for nearly two years, until only three months ago. Now I know why I thought Renata had the best kitchen in all of Policka.
As Jamie began to speak about the sweets of Policka, I shot a glance to right-hand side of the room and saw "Pani Novotna" sitting amongst the crowd. She is a widow who lives all alone except for her seven cats, which she talks about every Sunday. The first time she came up to me in the church, I didn't understand what she was saying, but now, I'd say that were friends from afar. Every Sunday morning I ask her, "Pani Novotna, jak se maji tvoje kocatky?" And she replies, "Jsou dobry, ale pocasi je hnusne. Nemam kitky na zahrade." It's a beautiful exchange. I remember one time when Pani Novotna came into my office carrying the rest of the wine from the communion table. It was just me and her. She wanted to get rid of the wine, however, there was still quite a lot left in the jug. She took out two classes and filled them to the top. We toasted each other and gulped down the sour, red wine, and when she smiled, I could see that her teeth had a purple tint to them.
Jamie continued in her speech and my eyes drifted over to where Kaja, Premek, Martin and Bara were seated. They all graduated this year (except for Bara), and have invited me to numerous parties with their friends. With Kaja, I remember that she was the one who told me that her mother was a dentist and would be able to fix the gaping cavity I had in one of my back molars; she came and translated for my first visit. Now, we are friends and I've been to her house for dinner--her mom makes the best potato salad. Premek is a close friend of mine, and I remember that he is actually our official landlord: Jamie and I live in his deceased grandfather's apartment, so Premek is actually the rightful owner of the place. It doesn't matter thought, he isn't very tough, especially when he is the one bringing the bottle of wine to our house party. Martin and Bara are a couple who've been together almost three years now. They both are quiet people, but love to invite Jamie and I over for barbeques. I remember the first time Jamie and I hung out with Martin and Bara, we ended up taking pictures in their yard holding a bazooka, landmine and a large bomb.
When it was my turn to speak, I abruptly looked down at the front row and saw the Janeceks. I know that Ivo is the local editor of the Policka newspaper, and he teaches people how to properly fire walk. My best memory from the Janeceks was when Jamie and I went over there for dinner and Eva, the mom/wife, prepared the best potato dumplings and roasted duck I've ever had in my life.
I steered the presentation to its final conclusion and I knew that it was going to be good. I wanted to make a final statement on who the Czech people were, and I wanted to tell them what my answer would be if people back in the United States asked me that question. But, as I got to the last side, I could see in the back of the room Vlasta and Mila Plecharcek. They could tell by the tone of my voice that I was wrapping up the presentation. I could see tears begin to form in her eyes, but not of sadness; her face looked extremely content and happy. Mila leaned his head against the wall as I began to tell them all that in the Czech Republic, people are people. Sometimes, you will find those who have 'big' ambitions and dreams, and some who have 'little' ambitions and dreams; sometimes you will meet people who will be friendly, and sometimes people who will be not so friendly; sometimes you will meet people who will open up to you and reveal their inner-most thoughts, and sometimes you will meet people who are closed and reserved. Consequently, it's hard to say who the 'Czech people ARE.' I ended the presentation by saying that whoever asks me who the Czechs are, the best answer would be to show them pictures of the friends we've made here. And with that, the slideshow ended with a barrage of about fifteen photographs. And, as I looked about the room, I saw Lydia, Vlada's wife, crying; I saw Otakar Kleparnik laughing; I saw Honza Stanek leaning on his knees and squinting his eyes; and I saw Honza and Anna Dus smiling. The room was filled that day; over forty people showed up, and they came not to hear about culture, but they also came to say good-bye. Na sheldanou mili pratele. A mozne jeden den uvidime znova.

Art exhibition

2010-05-20T02:56:00.001-04:00

It's May 20th, and a half year ago I thought our life in Policka would be a little less full of activities by now since we would be preparing to return to the states, however this is not the case. Ofcourse isn't a bad thing, because we have friends who want to spend time with us, and activites in the church, however seems like our days are going by even faster than before.

There is one upcoming event that I am both looking forward to and anxious about: an art exhibition in the local theater, Tyluv Dum, which will display my paintings. I have mixed feeling about this because I really don't know what to expect. Will people like my painting? Will I have enought to fill the huge room? Wow, it's cool that my first exhibition will be international! Are my paintings good enough to be up on display? These are just some of the thoughts that cross my mind as I prepare.

The craziest thing is I nevered expected that I would have an exhibition of my work...ever. So it was quite the surprise when Jeremy came home one night after going out with some of the men in the church and told me that Petr, Jiri, Jan and him descided that I was going to have an exhibition in Tyluv dum in June. What exactully do I do at that point? I can't tell them I don't want to, because seceretly I'm excited about the idea. That was in January.

I have two and a half weeks before I will set up the exhibition, and the closer I get the more nervous I am about the quality and quantity of my work...but at the same time I know that the people who are going to come are my friends, and it will be nice to share my paintings with them. Heck, if there is a large space in the room that I can't fill with painting we'll just put a table infront of it and serve wine, no worries.

Life between the cultures

2010-05-18T05:51:00.008-04:00

I've been writing on this blog for over two years now, and I've noticed one large development in my writing since the first posts in May of 2008: the absence of 'God' language. In reflecting upon this a little further, I feel that the fact that I no longer write things like, "I'm so blessed." "I am the vessel through which Jesus proclaims his love for the Czech people." Or, the heavily clichéd, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!” is because it's utterly and completely cultural on so many levels. We Americans have the stereotype of always wanting and needing a 'Happy Ending', so that all stories or avenues of thought, we often glaze over with rosy pictures of fluttering butterflies, peppermint candies and large smiles. And, to tell you the truth, 'God talk' in this sense has become, at least for me, another manifestation of 'Happy Americana': it seems that by putting the 'God' stamp at the end of every single thought or situation that one lives through or wrestles with, is a fairly simple--and righteous--way of saying, "I don't really know what's going on, and, frankly, it could be bad--but, it'll be all good with...JESUS!"

My goal in this post is not to make those of you back home who do write with 'God' on your mind feel guilty about it, because, in reality, if I hadn't been able to come into contact with another cultural expectation of how Christians are suppose to act in real life, I would still, probably, be writing with 'God talk' at the end; the situation is this: if everyone around me is talking about God in a very tangible, up-front way, then I too will speak about God in that way; if everyone around me is quiet in their faith, and does not speak about God openly on the street, then I too will not speak about God so 'openly'. It's a form of cultural adaptation. I need to do it to survive. The only problem is, is where does this leave me in my relation back to my home culture, the culture where it is completely acceptable, and in many cases, necessary--at least if you are a Christian--to speak with "God", "Jesus" or 'God Bless you' on the tongue?

No, this is a question not just about how I will adjust back to American Christianity again, but it is a question of’re-entry', of 'reverse culture shock'.

To tell you the truth, I'll probably never go back to speaking about God in the 'evangelical-I-want-to-change-the-world-and-God-is-my-avenue-through-it-so-I-want-all-of-you-to-know-about-it' way. Personally, I do find it to be on many levels a very immature response to feelings, emotions, reflections and situations that can't just be thrown under the, "I'll be fine, God is with me" talk. What if the situation is not so good? What if I really do dislike that person? What if I really am becoming consumed by envy, jealousy, greed and disregard? What if it does seem that the situation is under no one's control and only looks like it will get worse and worse? What if I really feel alone? What if--ugh, God forbid--I actually can't do it...? Ironically, before I beat myself up about the fact that I'm taking God out of my daily life, I'd like to remind myself of the fact that 'God talk' doesn't actually bring us closer to realizing the relationship between our personal faith and our outward works; to the contrary, its a veneer of relevancy that shields ourselves from true, active engagement of our faith.

But, back to the cultural stuff:

From living over seas, there are two main ways in which people change: first, is contact with the newly-found culture; the second is the putting into context of the home culture. Both of these experiences are challenging in their own right. In the beginning of any one's international travel/residence, one has to adapt and find a comfortable medium between their new culture and their old one: language, life style, habits, social customs, weather, animals and natural surroundings have to become comfortable; one has to find a way to make all that is 'new and disorienting', 'familiar and understandable'. This period, at least for me, lasted about one year, with many ups and Downs in between. Consequently, this second year has been full of instances where I've known that my life in Policka is comfortable--I wouldn't say easy, just comfortable. Subtly, due to the constant bombardment of the foreign culture and the pressure to adapt, mindsets and opinions begin to change--I would say that this phenomenon is always happening under the surface, but goes unnoticed with all the 'practical' adjusting that needs to be done. Subsequently, after about 14 months of residence, one realizes that they are no longer the same both in habit, but more importantly, in thought. The problem with this, however, is when the residence in the foreign culture comes to an end, and one must embark back home. For me, it's coming, and I know it's going to be difficult.

The Czech Republic is a far cry from living for an extended period of time in a place like Malawi, or Cambodia, where both the lifestyle and historical/cultural traditions are completely separated from that of Western Civilization--the standard of living also plays into this. But, for me, there still is a palpable feeling of, "I'm not really that 'American' any more." And, it's true. Many people think that the return home will be much 'easier' than the adaptation that was inherent in learning a new culture's ways and language, but I know that that won't be the case, because my thoughts and opinions, which are firmly rooted in the cultural context of my life in the Czech Republic, will now make me a little more than foreign back in my home culture: the English language will be everywhere, the pace of life and work will change, food options and meal times will not be as regular as in the CZ, socially acceptable practices like having alcohol during lunch break will not be so 'okay', habits of mine will have to change, and attitudes will be hard to get a handle on.

Not to mention the fact that I will be sad that I'm physically separated from my friends back in Policka...

I know that some of you might be thinking, "Well, what concrete things is he talking about?" "What kind of person will he be, and how have his opinions really differed from mine?" And, I don't have answers for you, because we can't have a conversation face-to-face about it. But, I would like to list off for you a few of the life-style habits I've developed while living in the Czech Republic that I hope I would be able to maintain when I'm back in the United States:

1. Recycling: I found it really hard to believe how much waste we actually do create in the United States. Here in Europe, they really do a much better job of being conscious about the environment (maybe it's because their land mass is that much smaller, so when they throw away EVERYTHING, they actually see the trash dump on a more regular occasion). I mean, here is a list of the things that Jamie and I recycle every week: tea bags, paper, yogurt containers, milk cartons, mouthwash bottles, wine bottles, beer bottles, and composting. It was really strange for me when we were back in the United States and I just wadded everything up, plastic and all, and threw it into the can.

2. Public Transportation/bikes: I haven't driven a car in almost two years. I love the feeling. When I need to get somewhere, I either get on my bike and ride (sometimes quite a long distance), or I'm patient and I wait for the bus of the train to take me there. I've found out that this really does save me stress and money. And, I don't use tons of gas. I remember being back home in the US this past summer, and after nearly three weeks of driving, I turned over to Jamie and I told her, "I can't live this lifestyle anymore." And, it's true. Why do we need to drive to work when it is only 5 miles away? Why do we need to drive around town, when we can just as easily all fit into one car? Why do we need to personally take our car to Philly, when there is the seldom-used train connection? Not to mention, it's better for your health to ride your bike or walk, than to sit on your butt.

3. I would like to socialize over beer and wine more often. I think the traditional, American stereotype of people who like beer and wine as being alcoholics is completely ridiculous. For me, there are few more intimate places to get into a good, in depth conversation with someone than in a winery or in a nice, cozy pub.

4. Learn another Language: the reality of life in Europe is that language must be dealt with. Europeans learn them. They talk about them. They love them. I mean, we live fairly close to Quebec, so why not try to learn Quebecois? Or, why not learn Spanish? After all, nearly 15 percent of our population speaks that as a first language.

5. Cook at home: most Czechs have all their meals in the house, and, while it is easier for them to do so, because their work life is not as hectic, I still think that we Americans should get back to our roots and make some genuine American Apple Pie, or steak. It would really cut down on our obesity crisis, and we would know EXACTLY what we're putting into your salad, or our chicken pot pie.

6. Plant my own garden: it's amazing, but every little inch of space the Czechs have, they plant a garden, where they grown their own vegetables. Not only is the food better and fresher, a garden also gets you outside and exercising in the sun. I'd like to take a stab at it.

Future plans

2010-05-12T09:31:00.002-04:00

Two years ago when Jamie and I first agreed to come to Policka, we did so without really thinking about the two years after the CZ. Where would we go? What would we do? Would we go back to school? Would we stay longer in Europe? All of these questions rattled around in our head, unanswered. And, that was good. Yet, as this year came and the months quickly ticked off the calendar, Jamie and I were faced with the decision-making process again, and those same old questions came up. Except, this time, they had to be answered.

The definition of an adventure is quite a funny thing, in that all people have one. Usually, especially if you are young, the adventure that you dream up or concoct in your mind is quite exotic and unique: I want to move to Africa and cure aids; I’m going to hike through Asia; I’m going to ride on a helicopter through the Outback. Everything, every adventure, has to be grand and ‘international’ in flavor. Personally, for me, I had it. I wanted it to be that way. Consequently, the prospect of returning back to the United States was always up in the clouds, above my head, offering me a ‘foreboding’ reminder that the ‘wanderlust’ life will eventually come to a decisive end. I fought it—especially in September.
When Jamie and I both started job hunting, we often started as far away from Western, PA as we could. I know that I personally applied to three positions in Wyoming (of all places), one in Montana and one in Colorado. I though to myself, “well, if I’m going back to American, I might as well go someplace new. I’m still in the mood for exotic nature, which I think I can find…out WEST.” But, all the options fell through.

One day in February, I was perusing the internet on the AmeriCorps website and came across some job openings in Erie, Pennsylvania. I was very hesitant at first, as that was really the LAST place I would want to return to. But, I read the job descriptions of all the positions and each one of them offered something very interesting and worth-while: work with refugees, environmental education, college counseling, etc. I decided to apply. About two weeks later I had an interview. And, during the interview, the woman who was asking the questions, inquired as to whether I had a wife. “Yes” I answered, “She is looking to get into Environmental Education work.” “Really!?” replied the woman. “That’s funny, because we’re looking for a candidate for our open position who would be able to teach and work with an environmental group.” “Do you think your wife would be interested?” And, that’s how it started.

Less than a week later, Jamie had an interview, and then a second. A month later, she was offered a job with the Group “EarthForce.” I, on the other hand, had to wait a little bit longer. Ironically, they seemed more ‘gung-ho’ about Jamie than myself, and I was the original one who had applied!! But, by and by I finally did get my second interview and was offered a position with the group, “Urban Erie Development Corporation.”

To give you a very quick summary of what our lives next year will look like, I would like to tell you what the organizations do. EarthForce is an independent group that is nationally funded and run, however, is broken up into regional chapters: Jamie will be working for the Allegheny-Erie chapter. What EarthForce does (and no, it is not the crazy, eco-terrorist group, ‘EarthFirst!’) is they encourage environmental stewardship and community service among high school and middle school students. Jamie’s responsibility will be teaching and also ‘infrastructure building.’ This means that she will be the direct liaison for the group between the communities; she will have to find volunteers, encourage community involvement with EarthForce, give presentations to Universities and enjoy life on Presquile Isle.

Urban Erie Development Corporation, on the other hand, is a non-profit organization that specializes in community development in poverty-stricken areas. Their program is holistic in that they have programs that address the economic, social, educational and practical problems that come with being poor. My main responsibility will be working with youth through an after-school program, helping start up a community garden project with the large refugee population in Erie, and writing grants.

We both look forward to our new jobs and are confident that we will gain a lot of experience from them. We are working with AmeriCorps, which means that we are also being offered many incentives for our service: money for graduate school, a one year non-competitive status for any government job (National Park Jobs, anyone!?), and training for work and life in an NGO (Non-Government Organization).

The decision-making process was long, and I must admit, sometimes difficult, and we still don’t really have the answers to a concrete future path. Our two years in the Czech Republic have been a blessing in that it has opened our eyes to many different perspectives and experiences. We both feel confident going back to the United States, with the knowledge that we can succeed in difficult situations and that we can always adapt. We’ve grown in our work in the church, and have accepted it as our own. We no longer worry about what was done before, or what kind of opinion the community of Policka will have of us. We know that we’ve had a positive impact on both this church, and the community. We’ve also learned that failing is a part of succeeding, and that you have to have ‘tough skin’ sometimes when working for change (be it the perception of Christians in the Czech Republic, or working for change within the inner city of Erie). It has been a once-in-a-lifetime experience in the fullest of senses.

So, I guess I can go back to the beginning to tie this in. When we first left for the Czech Republic, Jamie and I were searching for an adventure, I guess. We wanted to learn, see and experience ‘something’ new. And, now, as I reflect and ponder on the life that awaits both Jamie and me in Erie, I can rest in the fact that my definition of adventure has been altered: it no longer has to be ‘big’ or ‘glamorous’. Each day we wake up with opportunities to challenge our perspective, or to see a place, or a person, or an experience in new light. Of course, this is much easier to come by if every single day you’re constantly bombarded with a different culture and language; it is a completely different story, when were stuck in the normal town, or in the comfortable life of where we grew up. Yet, like I said, each day you can search for something new—an adventure perhaps.
In this newsletter I also wrote about my joy at being able to plant a tree in Policka, and how the imagery of ‘roots’ grappling into the soil was powerful for me as I prepare for my departure. And, really, it’s the same with my preparation to go back to Pennsylvania; I’ll be happy to water the roots that are firmly planted in my own home, native soil.

Oh, yeah, it’ll also be nice to play baseball and see friends again. But, you already know that, right?

Jamie told me my titles are boring, so here's a not-so-boring title.

2010-05-12T06:04:00.010-04:00

For the past month, my head has been only in the past-- not my own past, but the historical one. For my birthday I received a book from two of my close friends in the church entitled, Neni Spravedlnost na Zemi(There is No Justice on Earth), which is the personal account of a Czech, Jewish man who was taken as a prisoner during WWII and sent to not one, but five concentration camps, all of which he miraculously lived through. The book has been quite a joy to get through for many reasons, one of which is that he covers a topic that I've always thought about, but never had answers to: What did the Holocaust survivors do when they returned home? I've been really taken back by how he humanizes the whole situation. Often times, when thinking about history, I tend to think of it on a grand scale, which paints the people and the events, in relation to me, as greater than they actually were--you could say that I make history inaccessible for myself. Yet, through this book, I've grown to see the holocaust, humanized--as much as it can be--through the experiences that the writer recounts. Here are some of the more interesting and thought-provoking incidences that I've come across: he says that most of the Jews who were sent to the concentration camps, while they hated the Germans, were not revengeful when the war was over; when the Jews who had survived returned home, they often found out that their homes were occupied by other families (sometimes old neighbors) and many of their personal possessions had been stolen or hidden, never to be found again; while walking on the street, a month after he had been liberated from the last concentration camp, Sauchsenhausen, he couldn't remember the names of old acquaintances and many of them , in turn, couldn't recognize him due to this emaciated, near-death state; many holocaust survivors still held out hope that their families would return after the war, as many of them were separated into to completely different camps, so their respective destinies were unknown to each other; in the death camps enemies were everywhere, even the other prisoners; one of the hardest social aspects to adjust to while being back was relations towards the opposite sex (in his case, woman),as he couldn't draw a clear distinction between pity and love and empathy and lies. Also, he speaks about how immediately upon his return back into normal, civilian life, many people around him looked up to him as a man who has 'experiences' in life and carries 'a big stick', which left him always in the awkward position of having to try to explain to those who looked up to him, that in fact he had NO real-life experience, and he was completely out of sync with how to react and live on an acceptable, social and relational level; all he knew was death, burning, robbery, deceit and the tenacity it takes to survive in hell.

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Jan approached me about two months ago with a proposal to help him translate a historical book from the United States, from Czech into English. The book is entitled Pamatnik (Memorial), and is a collection of local histories compiled at the turn of the century by Czech pastors who wanted to write a comprehensive history of every single Czech congregation in America. Aside from the fact that the writing is nauseatingly pretentious (why is it that people need to make themselves LOOK intelligent), and that many of the founding stories are all the same, families move to America--they are poor--they want God--they found a church--have some troubles, get a pastor--find God--Hallelujah, the book itself has been a really fun way for me to get a glimpse into the rough-and-tumble lives of American settlers of the early Midwest. It's hard for us to imagine how much life has changed since then, but here a few of the more interesting tidbits of 'daily-grind' type stuff: The pastors often had to commute more than 60 miles to their congregations, on foot; churches cost less than 500 dollars to build; many original inhabitants of South Dakota lived in houses called 'Soddys', named after the material they were made out of; pastors in Texas had to flee to Mexico during the American Civil War (I'm sure they were glad the Mexicans weren't like Arizonans); the boom and bust cycle of the early plain states is unbelievable--a town could be built within a few days thanks to only a railroad station; and, one pastor got lost on his way to church in Illinois for over six days due in large part because he couldn't see over the tall grass.
Sometimes I find it really quite silly when we Americans claim our ancestry when we effectively know nothing of the language, the culture or the history of the people, yet, this book does remind me that at one point, no too long ago, a majority of the people in places like Wahoo, Nebraska or Silver Lake, South Dakota, were speaking Czech not English, and referred to their neighbors as Germans, Swedish, Dutch and Slovaks, not 'Americans'. I find it quite sad that much of this cultural heterogeneity has been lost only within the last 100 years.

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Having spoken about the history of Czechs on the plains, I feel that it would be interesting for you to know Jamie and I (mainly Jamie) have been delving into some research about Slovaks in Pittsburgh--mainly through my dad's side of the family. She has a great advantage over most people, in that she can understand and read a little Slovak, so she can peruse not just through English-language websites about ancestry, but Slovak-language one's as well. She has done a pretty impressive job, and I won't post too much about it here, because I know that she wants to be the one to tell you more. She has managed to make contact with a relative of mine who is still living in Slovakia--we've been emailing her for the past two months and plan on visiting her in June (we write in Czech, she writes in Slovak)-- she's found information on my great grandfather, the boat he arrived in New York on, the date of his arrival and information about his parents and grandparents. She's contacted some of my 'relatives' who are living in the United States, and she's been partnering in research with a Slovak man who is helping us piece some of this story together. We'll keep you updated on the 'developments'.

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Just this past weekend, Jamie and I went on a camping trip with one of our youth group members, Filip. On Saturday night, we all decided to take a break from the path and find a small pub where we could have a few cokes and a beer (me). We were successful in our endeavoring and found quite a comfortable-looking place about two blocks away from where our tents were located. After about 40 minutes of sitting in the medieval-themed bar, Filip's face turned, as he wore an expression of disgust and worry-- the normal talkative Filip wouldn't let out more than a few words at a time and his eyes were continuously scanning the room. Looking at me, Filip with a very stiff expression said, "These songs their playing in here are racist." "Really!?" I said. "Sing to me the lyrics, slowly." Hesitantly he began to articulate, "Bila Sila!", "Bila Sila!", "Bila Sila!" There was more to the refrain, but I can't really recall it right now, all you need to know is that 'Bila Sila' is directly translated into 'White Power' in English. I couldn't believe it. Here we were, in the 21st century, sitting in a pub in the heart-land of Bohemia, a country that has seen its fair share of violence and war, listening to the same dribble that came from the mouths of the KKK, and the same ideological foundation that the Nazis built their racist-terrorizing machine upon; this whole experience did not coalesce so well with my recent reflections about what I had been reading from Neni Spravedlnost na Zemi. All three of use left the pub in a hurry, and as we exited, the manager came up to us to get our money. He was very kind and he told us to come back again some day, but I couldn't get my mind off of the fact that this business supports violence, racism, killing and blind hate, yet they all looked and were, genuinely kind. And it was then that I realized that I really do have an advantage just by the fact that I have white skin; I can never imagine what it would be like to be a person of color in that place. How terrible and lonely would I feel? How rude, violent and aggressive would the patrons be? Who would be against me? I can't know. I never will know.

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The past few weeks at work in the church have been really odd in the fact that I know I'm practically done; I'm yearning for the day of rest where I can say, "Job well done, Jeremy." "You've accomplished a lot." I know that it is near, and the spring time doesn’t help. With each passing day that leaves on the trees get greener and fuller, I'm reminded of how fleeting my last two months will be, and I'm content in that fact. I don't want to come to work every single day and focus only on my job; I want to spend time with friends; I want to make time to take walks outside; I want to research about apartments in Erie; I want to plan my first two weeks back in America; I want to engage myself in the life that is to come--all of this, of course, is while I'm sitting in the office. When I'm on the street, or out socializing with my friends, the feeling is quite the opposite: It's as if I'm never leaving Policka and I'll be able to cultivate and grown in my relationships for many years to come. However, the sad reality is that I must also prepare myself to leave my social life--the friends, the parties, the concerts, the nights in the pub, the gym--fairly shortly. It's just a bummer that that is much more difficult to do.
Relationships mean so much more than responsibilities at this point.

Foggy post about a difficult subject.

2010-05-01T04:02:00.002-04:00

In the dank, chilly alleyways that dot Policka, the Vietnamese can be found selling their wares: usually, a mixture of cheaply-made clothing, slippers and plastic sunglasses. They work constantly; everyday, they are the first ones on the street in the morning, and quite literally, the last ones to roll up their awnings and make their way home when dusk has arrived. Throughout the day, many of them just stand and speak to one another in Vietnamese, or they are busy in the endeavor of dusting their goods on display. I've never spoken with them before, except for the one time when Jamie wanted to buy a small case for her camera. The Vietnamese women asked me what I was looking for, and when I spoke back to her in heavily-accented Czech, she gave me a curt smile, which was barely noticeable, aside from the quick uptick in the corner of her mouth. And, for a split second, I looked at her and realized we had a connection, and an emotional one at that: the reality of not being a 'native'.

Immigration is all in the news--both in the US and Europe--for numerous reasons. Just this past week, there was a special edition newspaper that came out that had four pages of articles covering the 'immigrant's experience' in the Czech Republic. Many of the young people interviewed, or written about, were of Asian or Russian decent, as these are two of the larges groups of immigrants that are flooding into the Czech Republic, and honestly, these are the two groups of people that no Czechs can trust: they believe that all Russians and Ukrainians are thieves and mobsters, and they are convinced of the fact that if more Asians come, then the Czech republic will lose its traditional cultural identity. (What was interesting for me was the fact that no Americans were interviewed for the piece, even though Americans make up one of the largest immigrant population groups in the Czech Republic, which just goes to show that even though I'm not 'native', I'm much easier to assimilate, or ignore, due to the fact that I actually look like a Czech)Anyways, many of the 'new' Czechs who were interviewed were pretty animate in saying that the Czech Republic, as a whole, is unjustly scared of anybody foreign, and that in the news, most reporting about foreigners comes from a negative perspective; citing the overwhelming instances where crime was the only news worth covering in the immigrant communities: " Foreign-born Vietnamese man, rapes Czech girl."

As a whole, I would say that each country has an emotional limit of how many immigrants they can accept. This comes into play much more often in Europe, than in the United States, due to the fact that European nations seem to constantly be in a battle to preserve their language and 'culture'. For us Americans, this might seem like one never-ending pissing contest in childish proclamations of which country has the best cheese, or what it means to be a 'Frenchman, but here, these battles take on national importance. Consequently, when there is an influx of foreign-born workers in some of these small, culturally-fragile European nations (like the Czech Republic), the first reaction on the part of the 'natives' is not "Hooray, look at all this diversity!"; to the contrary, there is a palpable feeling of distrust and even animosity to the newcomer, especially the ones who threaten to change both the genetic, and the architectural make-up of the nation (Africans and those Muslims with their very Arabic-looking mosques). There are plenty of examples from the public/civic sphere of European life where this societal fear has manifested itself into some pretty crazy laws (from my very politically-correct, American perspective): Switzerland’s law to ban the building of minarets; France's revocation of citizenship if a woman chooses to wear a burka; or, the Czech Republics attempt at 'sending them back home', by offering 500 Euros and a plane ticket to Mongolia. Even in my own personal life, I've come across very dangerous sentiments from Europeans speaking about immigration: like my friends from Holland, who, when asked why they immigrated to the Czech Republic, responded with the very racially-charged answer of, "Because back in the Netherlands, everyone is black now. Here, things are different." I think the 'things are different' phrase, simply means that people are STILL white in Policka.

And, yet, as I read the articles and heard about the stories and experiences from some of the immigrants, I couldn't help but feel a sense of camaraderie with them, which, if I thought about it on a deeper level, is quite silly and a little romantic. I don't speak any Asian language, my skin-tone is that of a northern European, my eyes are blue, my native language is indo-European, and my second language is Czech. I am, in reality, way more Czech than I am Mongolian, Russian, Vietnamese, African or Brazilian. I'm a Christian, not a Buddhist, and I eat more mashed potatoes than curry (sadly). But, I felt as if I could understand them and relate to their struggles of feeling unwanted and never being able to throw-off the label of being 'not Czech'. Why?

I think we as people should never underestimate the power of unity that arises between people that feel they are 'unwanted', or are constantly reminded that they 'don't belong', even though they've lived in a place for 20, sometimes, 70 years. As I go back to America, I do feel that I will be more cognizant of the fact that there are groups of Americans, who, at least at some point in their history, have been unwanted by the mass culture at the time: Afro-Americans, Asians, Muslims, and most importantly for today, Hispanics. We as a nation have great potential in the fact that we are such a mixed place; yet sadly, we will never be able to tap into it if we keep falling into the European trap of 'cultural protection', because all that will do is alienate pockets of our population.

And yes, I'm thinking about Arizona....