Writing. Who knew!?

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...

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.

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

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

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

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." 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

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

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

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 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

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

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

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

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!)

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!

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

Sunday worship

Rock band and submarines

"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!

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!

Kolibabovce, Slovakia

“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.

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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?

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.
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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.

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.