Blogs from Lesser Poland, Poland, Europe - page 63

Today, we really wanted to get the walls of the house completed, so that the "official" construction workers could begin to pour the concrete floor. Unfortunately, even though we worked until sunset, we were not quite able to get it done. We have Thursday off, so Friday, we will have to work that much harder to get it done! We are SO close though, so it shouldn't be a problem. Because we worked so late today, we actually got a nice break in the middle of the day. We went in two shifts to downtown Miechow to visit the adult day care center that Czarek and Konrad attend. It was such a moving experience for our entire group to see the brothers in such great care. They were doing arts and crafts when we arrived, and ... read more

While the US celebrated Labor Day today (and most of our Thrivent friends celebrated the holiday with a day off), we labored intently throughout the day working on mulitiple projects throughout Tomasz' home. Teams were assembled to complete insulation, begin dry-walling, taping and mudding the walls, continue to dig trenches, etc. An abrupt rainstorm halted the trenching team for a brief period, but the skies later cleared and work resumed. Everyone felt enormously satisifed with the amount of work accomplished during the course of the day. Returning to Krakow in late afternoon, we gathered as a group for reflections before departing to the Market Square for dinner. We ended up dining in the cavern-like basement of an American-themed restaurant where we sat in a covered wagon and enjoyed fun and frivolity. During dinner we enjoyed sharing ... read more

Today we are anxiously awaiting new sights and experiences as we embark on a walking tour of Krakow with Magda and Agnes serving as our guides. We head first to the colorful Market Square with historic buildings, including St. Mary's Church where we hear the legendary story of the bugle player. From there we head to the church and area where Pope John Paul II always stayed while he was in the city. Pope John Paul is quite revered in Krakow, not only because he was the Pope, but because he grew up in the Krakow area and served local parishes before he became the Pope. Next we visited 14th century medieval Wawel Castle just inside old town Krakow. The royal family lived here; we saw the largest collection of amazing tapestries in Europe which fortunately ... read more

Most of us were up by 7:30 this morning for breakfast which was catered in. The smorgasboard (spelling?) included breads, croissants, sandwich meats, cheeses, juices, and coffee. It was a very typical European style breakfast, but quite good and plentiful. Nobody left the hostel hungry; however, when we got to the build site after about a 45 minute bus ride, there was another breakfast waiting for us. Some friends of Tomasz (who is one of the brothers we are building the house for) baked an apple coffee cake and a chocolate cake!!! Some people from the local Habitat office also brought tea and coffee! This "second breakfast" was definitely not needed, but was very good as well, and quite a nice gesture. We spent a good hour learning about the brothers for whom we are building ... read more

Greetings from the Tatras! We are in Zakopane, which is on the Polish side of the Poland/Slovakia border. The Tatras are the biggest mountain range in these parts, and the Tatras are spoken of highly by Poles and Slovaks alike. So we had to check it out. A word of warning for those thinking of coming here - all such sightseeing (at this time of year) must be done before 11am when the clouds roll in, and remain for the rest of the day. Zakopane is a favourite holiday haunt for Poles, with various local traditions. One of them is Oscypek. When we arrived, we were extremely curious as to what the little things that street vendors were selling were. They looked like pork-pies and the locals seemed to be buying and eating them very qucikly. ... read more