Off to the land of buried ancestors.

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

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

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.

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...'

Recently, the Czech parlamentary 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 us all), 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 the G.O.P. 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 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 debates. 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 society's 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 G.O.P 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. 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 ripped 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 and 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 market 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 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 swallow.

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, prophesising 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 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 spectrum 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

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

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.