Success!

Ahh Sunday once again.

I spent last night and a very lazy today day with Annie while she is house/dog/cousin-sitting in a northern Chicago suburb. While I missed DreamHome, it was nice to be in a real, lived in home. But the real reason I am writing is to post an update on the baking project. Friday night, thanks to the wisdom of Teany, I made vegan petit fours. Yum. And easy. Yesterday, Annie and I took a baking break to eat some of the past project and still some Thanksgiving leftovers. We did bake our own pizzas from scratch, however. That could count, right? This morning, to cap off our anniversary of the Klobouky Mikulašska jarmek, Annie whipped up a batch of pani dough. Fueled by slivovice, naturally, we braided, rolled, and baked some nice little angels, mermaids, devils, birds, and other strange yet vaguely traditional shapes. Happy Saint Nicholas Day!!

So this is going to take discipline, kids

December.
Deemed the month of Baking One Cookie Recipe Per Day.

So far Annie is kicking my butt.

Background: A while ago, anticipating the baking of Czech gingerbread, I came up with the idea that was voiced something like, "Hey, wouldn't it be awesome if every day in December we baked a different cookie recipe??" Annie was all about the idea, but as for me... when push came to shove and the calendar page turned, I rather lost the momentum. Annie is living for a few weeks in the northern suburbs, therefore her enthusiasm for this idea hasn't been translated well through the distance. December 1, she sent me a text message saying "Happy Cookie Month", and when we met the other night, she made me renew my promise. (I should mention, though, that she has the help of a younger and overall impressionable to the whims of her cool older cousin relative. For the record, I too think Annie is the coolest cousin ever. BCEFL, even.)

OK. It's now the 4th, and I have a half-failed batch of Mexican Icebox Cookies half baked and half still in the icebox and some cooling cups of custard in the fridge. "Custard?" you may be asking. Yes, Custard. I was wrested from the reverie of my bank coffee break by a nearly year-old copy of Good Housekeeping. Given my ever-growing reverence for Better Homes & Gardens, I thought I'd find something worthwhile while flipping though the glossy pages. And voilá, custard still counts as a sweet, goshdarnit, and if I am forced to make something sweet, it should at least fit into my evening's dessert plans.

One moment while I try to flip over the cup and give my creation a taste.
(In the meantime, take a look at what I hope to have achieved.)

Loosen the edges with a small spatula - check.
Flip on to plate, and let sit so the caramel can drip onto custard - check.
And now try to soak up soppy mess with a spoon - hmmmm....

I have a jiggly custard and no caramel. Maybe it didn't bake long enough. Maybe the sugar didn't thicken enough. Maybe it was the rum I thought would be a good idea to add to the caramel. Whatever. Maybe December will just be the month of my failed desserts.

Bon apetite.

Roller coaster, wah ooh ooh ooh, roller coaster, of loooooove (a.k.a. My roller coaster of an Indian Summer)

Yet again I am face to face with that seemingly eternal problem of where to begin… Ever since leaving tennis camp in August, I’ve been burning the candle at both ends – and from the middle too. First, there was Vladimir’s visit, which lasted a good three weeks. We went together though Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Washington, D.C., and New York. I came back on a rainy Friday afternoon to my cheery, amazing Technicolor apartment and have happily stayed put since. Relatively speaking. My new task is to find that elusive beast called “job security.” In case I need any more evidence that the old adage “It’s not what you know – it’s WHO you know” holds true, I need to look no further than my dream house teammate, Annie. Annie works at a fitness center for senior citizens, and recently she told me that her supervisor had asked them to recruit possible new employees. And while I am typing this post sitting at Annie’s very own fitness center, I am still only less than part-time. A substitute. I do have a rather busy October, but now come the first time in my life where I really have to consider how to make ends meet (and how to justify my membership to Netflix and a pair of new running shoes…). The holiday season might be interesting since I did agree to work at an outdoor Christmas market for a Polish home goods store. At the very least I can practice my Polish with the shop owner and hopefully earn a tidy sum in an environment that I can only hope resembles the Rynek Krakowski.

Now when I sat down, I thought I would have oh so much to write about: our fabulous apartment and neighborhood, how much I love biking in Chicago, how my bike got stolen, how I found a new bike, adventures in domesticity (how I actually like cleaning and cooking!), being in Obamaland during election season, the orchestra I want to try out for, the books I’m now reading, my upcoming Fulbright deadline, the joys of paying bills, the hassle of banks, my fabulous running finds……. but it’s so hard to take the time out from living my life to write about it. Maybe that’s been my problem with feeling overwhelmed. The other day, when I simply did not want to get out of bed –and, in fact, I spent plenty of the day there­– Annie did say to me that she thought I needed to write. Yes, I do. I have a good WDN article in me. I think I have some other things in me as well. Perhaps with the time and the office-like space we have at home, I’ll finally be able to get something down in the way of writing once again. Aside from the notable downs, there have been a lot of ups in getting to know not only the city but, after traveling around the world, I’m finally getting to know myself.

The Great Czech Republic Adventure

[Note] Blogger would not let me fill in as much as I wanted to in the title space (not enough room), so here is what the official title of this post should be: "The Great Czech Republic Adventure; OR Thank Goodness for Long Underwear; OR I've Never (fill-in-the-blank) in the Czech Republic Before; OR It Is Established Once Again that Annie and Sarah Make A Powerful Team, So Maybe ONE More Person Should Ask If We Are Sisters" There.



The only word that can accurately describe the weekend I spent in Valašské Klobouky –a small town in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains– is "magical". (I don't think it is a coincidence that the the sun came out to shine over the freshly fallen snow once Tomi and I crossed the Czech-Polish border on our way there.) It was truly a change of scenery and a breath of fresh air. The most important thing to me was that I saw Annie in a place where she felt really at home. The entire weekend she had stars in her eyes and love shown out of her heart for everything and everyone. And it was easy to see why. Words are utterly inadequate to convey my feelings towards the hospitality of the kind, worldly souls of Kosenka, Valašské's environmental NGO and organizers of the St. Nicholas jarmek (market). I had to make an effort to hold back my tears as we were saying our goodbyes at their building on Sunday afternoon. And I had known these people for only about 36 hours! I'll do my best to recount the highlights here for better or worse and in more or less in chronological order:

- Tomi and I had to negotiate in Russian for our train ticket to Klobouky and then paid the 22 crown fare with a king size Kit-Kat bar. A good start.
- ANNIE!
- Czech beer
- Bowling at the "Amerikan" bar. Just wait - Cosmic Bowling will take take the country by storm. It's only a matter of time.
- Kosenka
- Attending an art opening with local artists, food, and live folk music at Klobouky's high school. It was the beginning of a lot of hammer dulcimer music.
- A youth choir concert in the town church that included various popular religious songs translated into Czech AND a stirring rendition of "Oh, Happy Day!" in English
- Baking periniki (gingerbread) at Mirek's home with a recipe that has been passed down for at least 4 generations. I use the term "baking" very loosely here since basically my role consisted of sitting at the dining room table to drink and eat while all the women of the house laughed and fell in love with Tomi. (Pretzliki are my new favorite snack.) However, I did give the mortar and pestle a few turns to grind the spices.
- As we were about to leave Mirek's house, we were surprised with the return of Martin, Mirek's son, from Norway and who has another soul full of light and love. I am honored to say that I met the entire family.
- Sleeping on a gym floor. Here are where my long underwear came in handy - it was cold!!
- The next morning, Annie woke Tomi and I, acting like a Dad on vacation at Disney World who wants to see absolutely everything. My breakfast was a glass of hot honey wine. I think I made it until about 2 o'clock before I had something non-alcoholic to drink.
- I spent the rest of Saturday without hardly ever being without food or drink in my hand: kolaczki, frgali, kyselica (oh, spelling...), kielbasa, potato pancakes weighing about 1 kilo each, boiled potatoes and cream from the old people's house, chicken, breads, apple cider, apple and beet juice, kofola cola, and of course, slivovice!!!!

- Dancing devils (that resemble yetis than they red devils we know) with bells on their backs and swatting passers-by with pine branches
- I bought some new red shoes! Actually, they are Vallachian slippers of the same kind that Annie wore all throughout the Powerhouse. My attempts at speaking Polish the Czech actually didn't work to my dismay, so I communicated my size with the shoe vendor in rudimentary German. It turns out that this was the same guy that Annie had bought her slippers from two years ago! And hey, at the end of it all, all three of had a round of slivovice from the shoe vendor.
- Annie's eyes when she met someone from the town whom she knew
- Taking a hike in the White Carpathians and seeing the sky's colors at sunset
- Tons of traditional dancing and people in beautiful traditional outfits
- Getting to try my hand at traditional dancing. ("Take that, Slowianki!")
- Watching Annie tap dance on the table :)
- The late-night jam session of Czech folk songs in Kosenka's horse stable. From this point on, whenever I will want to think about how the Czech language sounds, I will have to think of it in song because that is how I heard it the most.
- Getting too many kisses from old Czech men who thought I could understand them
- Vallachian yogurt
- Conversing with Mirek and feeling his kindness, intelligence, and wisdom
- Attending evening mass for the First Sunday of Advent in Czech, walking by Fredric Smetana's house, and meeting a helpful local who was almost too good to be true in Hranice na Moravia. See? Even good things can happen when you have seven-hour layover at the border because you missed your train...
- Coming back to Krakow at sunrise

I know what I wrote is a lot to take in, but in my own mind I am still trying to put this experience into perspective. Everything was in complete contrast from the style of life that I am living now, and I wish I could incorporate more of that peace here. Even though it was a whirlwind of a trip, (in Annie's words "an act of love"), a revelation came to me: when you live a small life, every single thing you have or experience takes on a grand importance. It wasn't as if when we were grinding the spices for baking, for example, that someone made an announcement that quieted the room and gathered everyone's attention to the ritual that was about to happen. No, it was just life. No ceremony to force the weight of the moment upon us. The festival was about celebrating culture, celebrating who these people are and all of their uncomplicated traditions. Each and every act there was an act of love. The cleanliness and simplicity of the traditions only serve to concentrate their potency. I think each person involved needed this weekend for a different reason. Now the time is ripe for me to think about what is important in my life. Before I leave off, I invite any questions about this post's title that remain unanswered. Finally, I have to include a photo of my new red shoes. :) Ahoj!

SMACZNEGO

This is a post I have been intending to write for the longest time, so this is going to be a lengthy one. Prepare yourself. One of the distinctive experiences of world travel is getting to try all kinds of foods that are new to you but traditional in the way that they represent a place. Yes, I've had pierogis, bigos, obwarszanki, pickled herring in cream and a LOT of kielbasa, but some of my most memorable food moments are not always Polish in origin. Here are some highlights:

"Not What the Pilgrims Had In Mind"

I'll start with Thanksgiving since that was a big event, and in fact it was the first major American holiday that I have spent outside my country. Some of my American friends and I talked about trying to recreate a traditional Thanksgiving meal here at Piast, but that never came to fruition with our midterm exams taking up most of our free time and brain cells. Besides, I haven't really noticed that Poles eat turkey at all. Besides, what kind of student-made feast could top 2006's Powerhouse Turkey Day? I did my own part of celebrating by listening to Sarah Vowell read a story on a "This American Life" episode about Thanksgiving with her family, and thanks to the wonders of the internet I was able to talk with my own family, Peter finally included.

Coincidentally, with our exams finished as of last Thursday (Thanksgiving Day), Isabelle had planned on making a giant pot of miso soup with our Japanese classmates. It was meant to be a celebratory dinner, and it was marvelous. Miso, tofu, shiitake mushrooms, potatoes, onions, some kind of Japanese boullion, and seaweed. Not only did we have miso soup carefully supervised by four Japanese students, Isa also created a rice and tomato dish with all of her Italian-French culinary experience. Wait - there's more! For desert, we had waffles topped with jam. Those were a little more off-the-cuff since none of us had ever made the batter from scratch before, and we had to keep approximating the conversion from the American recipe I got from the internet into the metric equivalent. Nonetheless, I think I will always remember how at one point all of us were standing in a circle in the 6th floor kitchen, passing a bowl every minute or so from one person to the next to beat the egg whites for the waffle batter.

The evening's experience made me consider what this holiday is supposed to represent. Yes, there were all of those messy consequences to deal with once the white men had landed in America, such as, ahem, smallpox, but Thanksgiving was centered around togetherness and food. TO get to Poland, I had to travel across the ocean and disembark in a country where I knew neither the land or the people. Looking around the bed that served as our dinner table at all the people who helped prepare our meal, I took a moment to give silent thanks for the opportunity to be here and to spend that American "święta" (holiday) with some of the people closest to me.

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"Thank you Bloedow's"

It was a foggy, rainy, and chilly day in Krakow. It wasn't at all the beautiful weather that I had gotten used when I first arrived in the city. I had also been put in a bad mood after a full day of classes, and then instead of going home where I really wanted to be, I offered to accompany Isabelle on one of her crazy runs to Carrefour. It was still going to be a long afternoon...

To get from one end of the Stare Miasto to the other, Isa and I walked through the Planty (parks) that ring the old town. But then to get to the shopping center and Carrefour, you have to go through a small underpass beneath a bust street. The shopping center is right next to Krakow's train station, so this underpass sees a lot of pedestrian traffic in a day. Of course, there are small shops and stall that line each side to take advantage of all this high visibility.

It was in this underpass, in the right side, just before the exit into the shopping center plaza, that I had my first and my best pączek. I had been dying to try a pączek since it was one of the few Polish things and words (only known to me by its plural "pączki") that I knew before coming. It is a fried round of dough, filled with a special rosehip jam, and covered in a delicate glaze. Basically it's a doughnut. I bought one of these little balls of fried goodness for 1.10 zloty, and from the first bite it was as if I had only a mouth full of sunshine. The glaze was a perfect layer of sweet and just a tad crispy, the interior was fluffy and golden, and that rosehip jam is still a foreign delicacy to me. What struck me the most about this doughnut was that the taste took me back to a place thousands of miles away. It took me to a place where I knew the rest of the day was going to be okay. The taste and the texture and the feeling all took me back to my favorite corner bakery in Winona, MN, a staple of my childhood, Bloedow's.

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"Lecsó"

Tamás Fözö, my Hungarian, is a cook. Literally. His name, "Fözö" means "cook" in Hungarian. However, irony of ironies, he does anything but. I mean, he basically eats for survival and goes through pounds of instant cappuccino mix. That's my Tomi. But one day, as a super special treat (and in honor of Annie's visit) Tom Cook made the traditional Hungarian dish "lecsó". It was a circus in the kitchen for a while, but the finished product was great. Here is the recipe in Tom's own words as I made him write them down:

Lescó for 4 Persons

1. onion cut, 1-2

2. 1 kg paprika (peppers, in English)

3. 1 kg pomidory (tomatoes)

4. 2-5 eggs

5. 1 very small spoon of salt & sugar

6. some meat, maybe kielbasa

Everything has to be sliced!

Paprika has to collapse! WAIT!

We don't need water because the paprika has her own.

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Finally, I include this bit just be cause it's a little fun. Cookies. I have made three different cookie recipes since I have been here: Peanut Butter Cookies with Annie and Tomi, Thumbprint Cookies with Sabine and Amelie, and last night's Banana Bread-esque Vegan Cookies. I was just in one of those moods to bake. However, I had to get a little creative with my ingredients since I had no eggs and just a little butter. Not to mention that we don't have any measuring cups or spoons. But come on, I am probably one of the few students in this whole dorm that has both baking soda AND baking powder. Here are are the final results. Flour on the bottom, sugar on the top, and egg-less banana goodness in between. I am quite proud of myself.