crooked apology

I have been in Oz for the last four weeks now. Three of those weeks were spent in Melbourne at the Australian Open. I did not have regular access to the internet whilst working, and now I seem to be drinking too much beer and hanging with too many friends and cousins to have time to write posts. Besides my camera got lost/or stolen on Australia Day in the pub, so my two weeks of tennis banter in picture format went down the shithole. I did, however, get an earful today from Michal about neglecting the blog. And now I feel bad. I promise to update sufficiently one of these upcoming days, as soon as I grasp these MacBooks that everyone seems to have here. Edd and Tim have been very generous and have lent me their snap-shot camera number, so I now have no excuse.

Being back is good, weird, fun, lonely, better, comfortable, easy, familiar, with that little bit of something missing. Sydney is green, clean, organised, with plenty of weirdos, with horrible traffic and distances that shit me. Apartments are more spacious, nicer, with good views, clean air and better furniture and pretty landscaping. Bike riding is still a relatively new trend that needs to be discussed by most, including morning radio stations. Wog food is delicious and I have eaten little outside of the Asian/Indian/seafood or steak variety. Beer is bad and gives you mad hangovers.

My mates and family are for life. It appears that it matters little if I disappear for a long while. We all fall back on track immediately. I am very happy to see that all my closest friends are content.

I miss Michal.

from my carp to your carp

Have been away all of this week. I am over-fed and tired from all the eating, sitting, family relationing, and eating. But it has indeed been a good festive season. I even ate carp. It has to be the most disgusting fish in the whole wide world, but for some reason the Poles love it AND it is THE MAIN Christmas dish on the Christmas Eve supper table. Bleh. My dad scored these two beauties from my uncle who happens to have a carpy type of pond. These were young and not for mass-sale in supermarkets, but kept for the sheer joy of simply having carp in one’s back yard. Why? The fish bloody stinks, has massive bones, is ugly and tastes like shit. I know that they do not cause environmental damage here in Poland like they do in the rivers of Oz, since here they are a native fish, but somehow I cannot get over the fact that they are indeed a swimming rat with fins. And here’s something more bizarre – you’re meant to keep a few dry carp scales and put them in your wallet for good luck. No thank you. Anyway, all good Poles buy their Christmas carp live, stick it in their bathtubs for a day, and then well – slaughter them in the laundry. Michal had the honours (mainly because my dad is a whimp). Supermarkets have massive plastic pools set up in the fish section with a lady who has a net and who fishes out a carp of your choosing for you! Imagine that! I’ll have one swimming fish and a mooing piece of beef please.

As much as I hate the slimy carp buggers, I felt sorry for their miserable fate – and crumbled some milk biscuits into the bathtub for their pleasure. Little did I know that carp do not eat in winter. Like bears they sort of hibernate and wait for the ice to crack before they dig their dirty slimy fishy lips out of the muddy river floor and start feeding again.

note the floating bits of biscuit - their last meal on death row –

convicted for being the most horrible fish on the planet

a slice of rude head please!

I should have turned on the spa vents for their amusement.

And since we're all getting over Christmas...Polish door-knocking carol singers anyone? If you are expecting a little choir with angelic voices and the one daggy baritone in a woollen hat holding a candle, you would indeed be mistaken. Carol door-knockers in Poland don’t actually sing (or do very rarely). They come in teams usually made up of the local village kids, get dressed up in costume and perform mini plays, involving the grim reaper, a king being sleighed and some general material out of old peasant or bible stories. They come into your home, entertain the guests (usually on Christmas Day – since the Poles celebrate Christmas Eve), wish you good tidings for the New Year, then collect money and goodies from each home they visit. These carol boys came to my uncle’s place. Their costumes were pretty good, but the acting was a little wooden.

And so, in the spirit of the carol non-singing boys, may your New Year be a Happy one!

one wooden pencil holder and a grass rabbit please

Can’t get my arse into gear these couple of days and write proper posts. Maybe that’s because our little digital camera collapsed and I can’t be bothered lugging the SLR around with me every time I step outside. Or maybe because it has been freezing cold and stepping outside in itself is a bother. Although I do like my beanie. Or beanies. I have a whole collection.

Fave headwear, courtesy of Nat.

Christmas is next week and Krakow is lit with fairy lights. I won’t show you the pictures because I do not have any. There is a Christmas market out in the Square as well and it drives me bonkers, mainly because it is very shit. What’s with the Square’s necessity to constantly exhibit wooden folk crap to sell on every occasion possible? What about introducing genuine arty/graphic style stalls or handmade items that are not mass produced in a wooden mountain shack in the Tatras by a horde of arthritis-ridden goat herders? It’s all very quaint when you fly here for the weekend and you want a whiff of the cows, but when you’re dealing with this kitschy hey-Poland-is-so-villagie-vibe all year round, it gets on your nerves. Krakow, despite its large quantities of sheeps' cheese, is not an agricultural heritage park. Can we start showing its urban side, which, unbeknownst to most, is actually pretty bloody good. There are people out there who are producing great photography, design work, prints and crafty art, but who have not been business-mindedly kicked in the pants. Do you know which annual festival gets the largest amount of cash from the City Council? The Pierogi Festival (dumpling). No comment. Tourists please stop buying wooden crap. Locals start selling good shit that I can buy and give to my friends and family with my head held high.

The plus side of it all is, is that the Russians have arrived!!! They are swarming in through the streets of Krakow in alarming numbers and I love it. I think Russian is the greatest language on earth, and the Ruskies one of the more interesting societies, so I take great pleasure in following them around and eavesdropping on their conversations (just for the pure sound of their language, since I can only understand an eighth of what they are saying), being amazed at all the glitz, pink and trash they like to wear.

They are coming in large numbers to get their shopping done before the Schengen Agreement kicks in on the 21^st of December. This means that Poland will no longer have border control with any of its neighbouring EU countries (Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Lithuania) and no check points (you will be able to drive from country to country like in Western Europe without even having to put the brakes on or flashing your passport). But what it does mean for the Russians, the Ukrainians and the Byelorussians is tighter border control, EU implemented border regulations, harder to get visas and tighter security. So no more popping in for shopping or skiing weekends in Zakopane. The highlanders are already wincing in pain. They will lose a whole heap of dosh over the Christmas break due to the lack of the very generous rich Ruskies who usually come in massive amounts and spend big. Decline in the hotel and hospitality sector will mean an increase in wooden shit production.

Our home does not look at all Christmasie, but it smells it. Michal decided to bake ‘paszteciki’ on Sunday, and poor Tukan just happened to arrive at the wrong moment and was forced to help. The filling is wild mushrooms stewed with sauerkraut (what else). The pastry is some sort of yeast variety. Very fluffy but filling. You eat them with a hot cup of borsch (which Michal also cooked and added a bit too much chilli). Good effort from Bake Boy.

I stole the table for craftiness.
Michal was forced to fight the slanted walls of the kicthen.

Marcin proved a very good pastry technician.


I like the turd looking one on the far left.

birthday weekend

Justyna: Where are we going?

Michal: I’m not telling you.

J: C’mon give us a clue.

M: It’s in Poland.

J: And?

M: And that’s it.

J: Will I like it?

M: Not sure. I know your mum would love it.

J: Do I take my backpack?

M: Nope, your wheely suitcase.

J: What do I need to take?

M: Your Blunnies. But also a dress and some heels.

J: Is it posh?

M: Nah.

the castle poshness in paszkowka - some 30ks south of krakow

castle blunnie poshness

castle bannister poshness

back of castle poshness

castle departure poshness

chamber poshness

I have never stayed in a castle before. It is rad staying in a castle. Thank you Michu for taking me to a castle.

Also wanted to say a huge and wonderful thank you to all who thought of me on the day, sending me excellent wishes, emails, smses, cards, phone calls and gifts! It was a truly tops birthday!

volleyball

Knee deep in snow and no chance in hell of being ‘outdoor active’. Yes there is skiing, but that’s hardly an option at 6pm on a Tuesday night. In fear of having my arse permanently stuck to the desk chair during the dreary dark evenings, endlessly surfing through YouTube and checking out the latest clips Wong sends me the links to (although I highly recommend this Russian gem), I decided to join a volleyball team. It’s mixed, it’s free, and it’s at the local primary school. The team is run by the teachers who work there. Got in through connections (Michal’s mate Szymon teaches maths there). Now when you think primary school, you usually think cozy one-to-two storey type building, with classes of 25 and lots of paper cut-out flowers stuck in windows. This school is a bit different. It is four levels if you count the underground gym bit and caters for 1200 primary school kids. There are over 35 teachers and classes are divided from year 3 along high-school mechanics, i.e. different teacher for PE, different teacher for maths, different teacher for chemistry, Polish etc. The school is equipped with two gymnasiums (basketball court, volley ball net, indoor soccer goals, handball, and bits and pieces needed for gymnastics), an atrium, showers, changing rooms AND this leave-your-winter-boots storage solution thingy so that children don’t slosh around in their wet footwear round the corridors. They even have special bags for their slippers or ‘dry shoes’ that they bring with them and hang up in the morning. There is also a portiere who sits in the school’s lobby and the floors smell of lemon scented cleaning detergent.

The teachers have a shit common room though, with one photocopier and only 15 or so chairs for the whole lot of them. They have to bring in their own mugs, coffee and have no regular access to their own computers or the internet. There are nice curtains though and plenty of pot plants. They also get paid next to nothing. When I say next-to-nothing, I don’t mean the usual teacher whinge. I mean next to nothing. Szymon, in order to make a standard living wage, has to tutor privately about an additional 25 hours per week. Lucky he is a maths teacher. They’re in big demand. Imagine if he taught home-ec. He’d be rooted.

As for volleyball? I am officially the midget retard. Amongst burly men who are over 1.90m tall, who whack the ball like jackhammers, and who block volleys in a way that make me look away with fear, I have come to accept I may be there because everyone is too polite to tell me to rack off. Stuff it. My ego is intact and I am having fun. Only once did I feel like vomiting out of sheer horror and embarrassment for being so completely shit. With every week I get a little better. For example yesterday I even managed to score 4 points. In two hours (for those who know anything about volleyball – that’s a really bloody awful average).

foot locker with shoe bags


some of the jackhammers

volleyball does not have to be poncey

midget retard

more winter tales

This one is from last week, before the snow really fell in Krakow. I needed to get to Nowy Sacz which is some 100km south of town. I didn’t feel like waiting for the tram to take me to the bus stop that would take me to Nowy Sacz. So I decided to ride by bike to the bus stop and chain it to a fence. Now, the temperature wasn’t all that inviting. In fact it was about +2 degrees. My bike thought it was finished for the season. I thought differently. With a million layers of clothes and a scarf covering half my head, I managed to get to my destination which was some 3ks away. I hopped on the bus and was glad to be warm.

Having finished my business in Nowy Sacz and nine hours later the town was knee deep in snow. I was on a bus that was snailing its way back to Krakow at a pace of about 50ks an hour. With a two hour delay I reached Krakow which by this stage had turned into a massive white doona. I scratched my head and wondered what to do with my bike, which I barely found hidden amidst a tonne of white fluff. I started to wheel it and rang Michal to maybe come pick me up. As I hung up I felt disappointed at my lack of trying to rely on myself in a winter blizzard. The disappointment did not last long. Quickly the conviction was formed that I could indeed fight the elements. I got on the sucker and started peddling home.

On a bike with slim line city tires, no gears and only a back peddle brake, I started to think I was going to crack my head on the edge of a footpath (zero helmet, warm winter beanie instead). But the Ukrainian machine rolled on, trenching through the snow like the plough it was not. Michal found me a kilometre away from home, tapped his head with his forefinger exclaiming I really was retarded, took my heavy bag off my back, got back into the car and drove off yelling “I wouldn’t want to spoil your fun!!” Right he was, because I was grinning like a mad idiot happy that I was RIDING MY BIKE IN THE SNOW!!

I only slipped about 10 times and fully stacked it twice. A week has gone by and I do not have pneumonia. Success.

drawing made on an envelope - excuse its shitness

drawing on some more scrap - you get the idea

about 11:30pm, after the ride and before a hot bath - pretty!



desnowing - an activity done by all who have no garage

thick socks required

I enjoy a hike in the mountains. A heavy pack, fresh air, sore quads, beautiful semi-alpine scenery, utter exhaustion at the end. Hiking in winter is even more pleasurable for the abovementioned reasons plus many more: frozen snot, constantly slipping in the waist deep snow, sliding on your arse, drinking cold water in minus 5 temperatures, reading the ‘warning avalanches’ signs, sweating inside your wet weather gear, wondering if there is a hungry bear still not in hibernation. And the mind blowing landscape. Nothing beats it. I had an excellent weekend.

Krakow is also covered in snow. If this is early to mid November we will all be so rooted by December.

We went hiking with Konrad and Aga who came down from Wroclaw on Friday night to our place. They returned home on the Sunday after the hike. The trip usually takes 2.5 hours from Krakow to Wroclaw on the freeway. It took them 7. The ploughs hadn’t cleared the freeway from the snow and all the heavy semi-trailers couldn't make it up the small inclines. Plus they were still on their summer tires. For those not in the know – you have to switch your tires to winter ones for the snow (deeper grooves), for better traction. Because the snow has come early, tire change places are booked up with massive queues and there are plenty of spazzos slipping and sliding all over Krakow’s streets.

this is the mountain shelter we stayed at on Sat night - at about 1000m

first icicles - they can be lethal in the city and pierce skulls


ascend begins

sigh


in the end there was no need for cramp-ons because the snow was still very fluffy -
good thing too beause we didn't have any