The Great Daminski Days in Orneta

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October 16 through October 19, 2008

After my drive from the Baltic Sea I arrived at the small village of Orneta, Poland for the first of my Couchsurfing adventures. Fot those who don't know, Couchsurfing is the coolest website ever, where you can host or find hosts to stay with pretty much anywhere in the world. Although I had a little experience with this I was still mighty nervous about meeting the Kaminskis, my Couchsurfing hosts for the next couple of days.

So there I was, at a bus stop in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere, waiting for Danka, my host. A few minutes after I got to the bus stop, Danka comes zooming up in her car. We went back to the shop where I had asked directions for some food and then I followed her home. As you might expect I had been mighty nervous about staying with a family way out in the country and so far from home. It took maybe ten minutes to realize that all my fears had been unfounded. Danka and her family were the kindest and friendliest people you could ever meet. I think they were as excited to have a visitor from America as I was to be there. The household consisted of Danka, her husband Marek, her twelve year old daughter Olla, and Danka's mom whose name I never could remember or pronounce. Danka and Marek's niece, Ewa and her husband of one week, Marcin, were spending their honeymoon there. The house was larger than I expected and I had my own bedroom upstairs. About the first thing they did was to make coffee for me and we sat down in their family room to drink it and visit. There was a small coffee table there with a nice table cloth on it and right away I bumped it and spilled my coffee all over the tablecloth. A bit of an embarrassment there. After awhile everyone went to bed except for Danka and I, we stayed up and drank some moonshine that was left over from Ewa and Marcin's wedding the previous weekend. I don't remember what we talked about but I know we never were short of things to discuss. Danka did mention how funny they thought it was that I would be carrying a yellow book at the bus stop when they picked me up, since it was such a small bus stop that this was obviously totally unnecessary.

October 17

By the time I awoke on Friday everyone was gone except Grandma. I decided to take the ten minute walk into town. I tried my best to ask Grandma if there was anything she needed from town but she didn't have a clue what I was asking, I am not sure if she ever even knew what I was doing there. But she was always smiling and never seemed to mind that I was there. She cooked most of the meals. Among the dishes I got to try were potato pancakes, beet soup and my favorite, pickled pumpkin. One of my favorite stories that Danka told me happened when Danka was in high school and Poland was still under communist rule. Danka's PE clothes were dirty so Danka's mom waited in line for a long time for laundry soap. When she got to the front of the line there was only one package of soap left and she had to wrestle someone for it, but she won and Danka had clean PE clothes the next day.

I think the town was typical for the area. There were many, many beautiful old churches and other really old buildings. These would be historic landmarks in the US. But in Poland there are so many of them and the country is so poor that many are abandoned and in ruins. And Orneta, like many towns, has these ugly big Soviet era apartment buildings that are in such contrast with all the beautiful old houses in the area. I went up to a couple of these buildings and they are not very nice.

I walked around the town for awhile and stopped at a coffee shop for a snack. Orneta has no supermarket so to shop for food you must go to the butcher, the produce store, etc., just like I imagine the US was before I was born. It seems so quaint and interesting but I think if I lived there the novelty of it would wear off and I would miss the convenience of the supermarket. While walking, I ran into Ewa and Marcin. Ewa had grown up in Orneta and she was showing her new husband some of the town. Although I think they would have preferred to be alone, they were very gracious and invited me to go with them as they walked around the town.

Danka teaches English at the local school. She invited some of her class over to her house for an afternoon barbeque so I could talk to them a little in English. I think six girls and one boy showed up. They were about twelve or thirteen years old and were very respectful and all full of shy smiles. One thing that surprised me was that each child brought their own food and drink. They each had little packages of sausage or meat, and a little juice box in their pockets. It was great to listen to the kids talk and try their English. One little girl spends the summers in Scotland with relatives, it was fun to hear her speak English with a Scottish/Polish accent. Although they were very attentive I couldn't think of much to say so I did my favorite card trick and they were suitably impressed.

The only boy there met a friend of his in the alley. He had this old '50s vintage motorcycle. The two boys would try and try to get this bike started. They would fiddle with it for a few minutes. Then they would kick start it and it would start and run just long enough for the two boys to get on and then it would die. Then they would fiddle with it for a few more minutes and the same thing would happen. This went on three or four times until they finally gave up. I think they were disappointed because they wanted to impress the young ladies.

After a dinner by grandma, we went to the only restaurant in the town for dessert. Here it was, about 8:00 on a Friday night at the only restaurant for probably twenty miles and the restaurant was almost empty. Another culture shock for me. Then back to the house and a little more moonshine and conversation, another great day.

October 18

A trip to the city of Olsztyn, about thirty-five miles away was the big thing on the agenda. We went there to do some shopping at a big American style mall and so that I can see the town where Danka went to college. She graduated there as a microbiologist. Five of us piled into my little rental car (it was a tight squeeze) and started off only to find that we had a flat tire. After a little discussion, we ended up hobbling along on the flat for about a mile to a tire store in what looked like a 100 year old barn. A young guy took off the tire, aired it up and could not find a leak. I was watching as he put soap and water on the tire, then submerged it in water and....no bubbles at all. They probably spent 20 minutes on the project and I think the whole deal cost about six dollars. So the five of us got back in for our journey to Olsztyn. It was another beautiful town and after some shopping we went to a nice restaurant for tea and desserts. On the way back to Orneta, we were talking about Poland and World War II. Danka started getting more and more animated about how America had promised to come to their assistance if they were attacked but we never did. I said I didn't think so, that America was not involved with any part of the war until more than two years later. But Danka was insistent and I was starting to feel really bad about our abandonment. Then Ewa said something to Danka in Polish and Danka said "Ah, neffer mindt. Zat vas ze English zat abandoned us" and the topic never came up again. In the middle of nowhere we went by a very upscale looking restaurant in an old mill and Ewa said that they had had drinks there for the wedding party the previous week but that they could never have afforded to have a whole dinner there. I felt so indebted to this kind family that after a few minutes of thought, I suggested that we go there for dinner that night.

But first we went back to their home. As soon as we go there people started showing up to visit. Over the course of a couple of hours maybe twenty people showed up, mostly relatives but I think a few friends and neighbors too. Once there was a knock on the back door and it was loud enough that I was the only one who heard it. So I opened the door and let someone else in. Neither the guy who knocked nor anyone else saw it as odd that I let him in, I felt like I was right at home. Everyone was talking a hundred miles per hour and laughing, kids and dogs were running around, I couldn't understand a single word and it was great. Occasionally Ewa or Danka would take pity on me and translate a story or two but it didn't matter, it was truly enjoyable whether I understood or not. One of the clan there was Uncle John. He was about 70 years old and he came to town to take his wife to a yoga lesson, of all things. His English was poor but his smile was wide and we had a great time. He wanted to know if I knew Bill W., as he was a proud member of Alcoholics Anonymous for the last twenty years or so.

Then it was six of us (in two cars this time) back to the restaurant at the mill. It was a small restaurant but very nice. I was kind of nervous about what I had committed, how would I explain this to my wife if the meal came to three or four hundred bucks, a kind of expense I would not likely lavish on her at home. But we went whole hog with meals, coffee (no free refills) and desserts. And the whole deal was only about $120.

I had said all along that I would be leaving on Sunday but Danka was a little upset when I reminded her, as she wanted me to stay the whole week. At about 10:00 on Sunday morning I had put my stuff in the car and I was ready to roll. So there I was waving goodbye to six people all standing in the light rain on the front porch and I admit, I was a little teary eyed myself. The only problem was that I had had two or three cups of coffee and I really needed to pee. But I couldn't imagine going back into the house after a sendoff like that so I ended up driving down the road until I was definitely out of sight, then I pulled into a field for a much needed...er...break.

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