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Published: June 29th 2006
Roses in Kew Gardens
This group was in full bloom. One of about 20 groups in the garden....in a far off land, two Americans found themselves dizzy on vodka and knee-high in pigs. How could they possibly have arrived in such a magical, new world?
Well, probably on a first-class flight across the Atlantic, by way of a crack town in London, via a green stretch of London earth, through a few stale English pubs, and on a creaky old RyanAir plane that goes bump through the air. That's probably how.
......
Our flight on MaxJet was fabulous. After our pre-flight lounge time, we boarded the plane and were promply offered champagne and hor'deurves, which of course we happily accepted. There was a delay in taking off, but the crew entertained us with a game or two. Talk about service. The drinks flowed like water, and I believe I drank champagne until my head was effervescent. Before our meal, they set our little tray tables with tiny table cloths (yeah...napkins, I guess), and out silverware. The salad was exceptional, on a real life plate and all, but the dinner was pretty much just like any other airplane food.
After eating, we all got our own little TV thingies and we picked from a
bunch of great movies, tv shows, music videos...and much, much more! The seats did indeed recline to a shocking 90 degree angle, and I undoubtedly got at least 3 or 4 hours of sleep. Jason slept as well, and before we knew it we were descending upon the old Blighty!
I always love swooping down into England and seeing the earthy patchwork below. The shades of green vary from a tingly light green almost yellow, to deep, rich green.
As we arrived in London, I think we both felt refreshed and buzzed from excitement, giggling and heartily dragging along our 4,000 pounds of luggage (not to be taken with us the whole trip, don't worry). But, alas, the joyousness fizzled quickly as did our energy. Funny how 5 hours of sleep in 2 days will wear you down.
Our looming defeat was most obvious when we popped up out of the tube station in Brixton, which is where we would stay at Matt (new brother-in-law)and Helen's flat. It took about thirty seconds to realize that we were quite possibly in the seediest spot in London. It wasn't the man begging for money or the other guy offering
Kate and her new friend...
One of the friends we made in Poland. drugs that made us uncomfortable (come on! I worked on Central Avenue for years). It was when the guy with the dreads like Medusa who smelled of sandalwood and who was nawing on a chicken bone eyed me up and down and said "Welcome to Brixton baby," that I felt a little violated. We finally found a cab (matt says cabbies don't come around Brixton a lot....hmmmm...i wonder why?) and collapsed at their lovely little home.
In some ways the neighborhood is quite vibrant and reminiscent of the Caribbean. Lots of dreads, as I mentioned, and brightly colored turbans. When you're not feeling quite so defenseless, and you allow yourself to soften into the rhythm of Brixton, you can pick up on the sweet vibration of reggae music drifting from some unseen place, and the scent of incense and jerk chicken flavoring the air.
You can also notice the barefoot crackhead sleeping in the park.
But enough about Brixton.
On our first real, full day in London, we took the tube to Kew Gardens, which is a 300-acre botanical garden. They have plant species from all over the world, growing in glass houses with a regulated
Pigs on the Polish farm...
I think they were scared for some reason...I'm not sure what they have fear from humans. climate as well as along their expansive walk-ways and paths. Among our favorites is the Waterlilly House (there's a picture of that one), the Palm House (feels like home) and the Rose Garden, which is so fragrant you can smell as you approach it, about 10 or fifteen feet away from any of the flowers.
Kew was built hundreds of years ago by Princess Augusta (mother to George III), while she lied in Kew Palace, which is no longer standing. She created nine acres of this botanical garden, which of course is nothing compared to what it is now. In the 1800's, the gardens were given to England for the public's use.
I visited Kew with my family about five years ago, and remembered it to be a lovely visit. I wasn't sure if I was talking it up too much to Jason, and that we'd be sort of disappointed with the gardens, but it was exactly what we needed after our long day(s) of traveling.
There are spots at Kew where you can stand and see before you nothing but soft green grass and trees lining the way. The view leaves me wondering if I could
just take of my shoes and walk for miles in the green, escaping from the noise for a while. And there are trees that have branches and leaves hanging so low that it creates sort of a leafy dome that you can sneak in and out of. I won't hide it from anybody--I know that if fairies exist, they have a happening life in Kew.
So we rejuvinated our minds and our bodies, and then we had some beer!!
There's an open-air pub right outside the tube in Kew, so we had a few pints and watched the World Cup. I have to say that being over here for all the WC hoopla is pretty neat. There is, at the very least, a constant murmur across all of Europe having to do with the WC. Here at Kingswood Hall, where we have students arriving in bunches from all over, there is so much excitement and patriotism it's just completely catching. A group of about ten German boys arrived with their faces painted in their flag colors, and every day from there on out at least one group of kids is decked out. The night Spain played whoever they
played, they were all exempt from the evening activities so that they could watch the game. They packed into the common room, wearing bright red and waving flags, and walking in there was like stepping into a sauna filled with onions. The heat and the excitment and the energy were palpable, and the B.O. of young Spanish boys and girls was enough to knock you over. (It should be noted, though, in the sake of fairness, that a pre-teen Greek boy wins the award for stinkiest student.)
Anyway, nothing beats a Gator football game in the Swamp, but this is pretty close.
So, after our stop in the Kew Pub, we headed to Covent Garden, which is a section of London that is always swarming with people and activity. Lots of street performers and music, yummy shops, cafes. As evening falls, the young and the fashionable start trickling in. I love the outfits they wear, and really think I need to have a proper night out in London so that I can dress up in some 80's rocker outfit from the thrift store and fit right in.
We found the restaurant and wine bar that we went
to last summer for a special night out. It was cool to be back there, and we wound up talking to the French bartender for a good while. He had a bald head and a tiny little black mustache, and his name was Jacques. Pretty perfect French guy, huh?
The next day we took a sunny train to Stansted and flew RyanAir to Lodz, Poland. I have to say that I was a little bit nervous about Poland. I didn' t know what to expect, and I didn't want to wear Arek and his brother out or ask them for too much. But there is no doubt that we were in the hands of two of the best hosts you could find. Man...we had so much fun.
We get off the plane, and across the tarmac we see people crammed into this area by a chainlink fence, waving to their friends and family. I sort felt like a celebrity, but I also felt like I had just entered a third world country. Arek says that a lot of Polish people go over to England to work because the pound is so strong, and that when they return to
Poland, family members are eager to greet them and receive money.
Our greeters were inside, and they didn't want any money, so I guess we were off to a good start. I hadn't even reached to hug Arek before his brother had my bags-- a lady doesn't carry her own bags you know, and I really love it. Arek said that we sort of already had plans, and that we'd be driving into the country a little bit nearby to meet a family of one of his Polish friends from Florida. He'd never met her family, but she's been gone for four years and we were stopping by as representatives of the happy and healthy life she's leading in Florida.
We pop into the car, which is a compact sort of station wagon, and get onto a busy road. It's drizzling rain outside, and the roads are slippery, and I'm telling you that I have never been so scared in somebody elses car as I was then. The way they drive is to pull up out a half a centimeter from the car in front of them, as fast as they can, and then pull out into oncoming
traffic to pass the car in front of them. I don't know if that makes sense, but I mean it I almost weed the back seat. And the thing is, the only thing I could think of to express my fear was ''I'm sweating like a pig back here!'' I don't think anybody really thought about what I said, but I'm still amused that of all the things I could have said, I chose that. Hmm.
Anyway, by the last day I was humming the Speedracer soundtrack in my head and feeling like Dale Earnhart Jr.'s sexy assistant. (Is it blasphemous that I don't know how to spell Earnhart...or blasphemous?)
So we're bump,bump,bumping though these back roads in the rain, stopping to ask old women with laundry baskets where this family lived. No numbers neccessary, just the family name. We pull down a road, and there they were, standing in the rain with an umbrella, waiting for their guests.
I mean, I expected to cram into some crusty old people's living room, sipping tea and sweating though akward silences. Oh but there's no need for akwardness when there's WODKA!!
They have a gorgeous home, and a
Auschwitz
The feeling of being confined is overwhelming in Auschwitz. I can't imagine what it felt like when the gates weren't open at the end of the day. picnic table was set on the porch with strawberries fresh from their farm (yes, they were the most unbelievable strawberries), and cherries fresh from a neighbors yard. They did offer me tea, which I happily accepted, but then botched up by pouring cream in. Fruit tea and dairy products don't mix. Jason had coffee, and then the mom and the two daughters just kept bringing our more and more stuff. Chocolate cakes, which has a name that translates to ''milk of the bird,'' homemade sausages, homemade soup...and these were just snacks!
The family didn't speak any English except for one of the daughters who spoke a little, so Arek acted as a translator sometimes, and others we just communicated non-verbally or laughed because happiness is contagious.
Enter stage left, the WODKA. half-liter bottles come wrapped in a pack with Orange Fanta...which was funny to us. And then the way it works is everyone has a little shot glass in front of them, someone pours a round, we lift our glasses and say ''Nastrovia!!'' and slug it back. It all happened so fast though that I hardly had time to object. And things moved along and before you knew
it we were on our fifth shot, which is when I realized that I was the only female drinking vodka. I worried for about 1/2 second, probably said something stupid, and then kept on with the rest of the men!
We took a tour of the farm, which of course included the pigs, and chickens, and a huge dog, and a bunch of tiny kittens, and I just felt like all my little girl pretend games were coming to life!
They were calling me Kasia ( I don't think there's a very good translation for Jason), and hugging us a lot, and we managed to get invited to a true Polish wedding, which we're told is pretty much amazing. And I think I told Arek to invite the girls on the rest of our jaunt, but things are pretty blurry.
So we pull away from our new best friends, and the next thing I remember is pulling over on the highway so that Jason and I could throw up. Cute, huh? Way to be a gracious guest. I guess we stopped a few times along the way, and when we arrived in Krakow, Arek and ·Robert found
A sausage a day...
"Welcome in Poland" a hotel, paid for us to stay there, and brought us up wings and pizza. It was great.
The next monring I woke up feeling refreshed and quite self-righteous for feeling that way. Little did I realize that I was still drunk, and that I was on my way to an impressive two day hangover. It wasn't intense, but for two days, I just wasn't right. Jason handled it more manly than I, and seemed to follow his normal hangover pattern of recovering exactly at three o'clock the day after the drinking.
Needless to say, I laced up my boots and acted like a real trooper (you know I'd never actually wear lace-up boots, right?), and we had a beautiful day in Krakow. Arek and Robert wouldn't let us pay for anything, and we saw several beautiful cathedrals, which were in mass, and Wawel castle and the river Wisla. The old town is quaint and lively with a fresh spirit and good energy. We ate lunch at a cafe on the main square, and it had an old western theme with cowboys and indians. The food had really funny, cheesey names, and I am unfortunately not remembering any
right now, but I'll ask Jason for next time.
After Krakow, we drove to an old salt-mine called Wieliczka, and took a two-hour tour of the place. Unfortunately, our tour was in Polish, and Arek only had the chance to translate once in a while. But I do know that we had to walk down about 800 steps, and that there were churches, and a huge hall where everything inside was made of salt. Pretty cool.
Our next stop was Auschwitz in Oswiecim. We got there at about six p.m., with only one hour of visiting time left, and the emptiness of the place and the evening light intensified the aching sadness found there. In my life, I have been places where the feeling of joy is nearly electric, but never have I experienced electric anguish as I did in Auschwitz.
We wandered through the old barracks which all serve as a museum for different aspects of the Holocaust, and it came to a point when I just had to switch off from who I was or else I might have lost it.
In my family, we describe places where the membrane between the living world
and the spiritual seems to be very thin, as ''thin places.'' Normally, that's a lovely, peaceful feeling, but at Auschwitz, the very powerful feeling of who had lived and suffered and died there and the incredible spirit so many of them had is both heartbreaking and also empowering. In all of the sadness, something was pushing my heart forward, reminding me of the inexterminable strength found in people.
Photos of those who were forced to Auschwitz line dark, long hallways, and in their faces you can see the strength I'm talking about. Some of them seem to be smiling at the camera in a way that says ''Nothing you do to me will damage my spirit.''
As I walked out of the last barrack we visited, a little girl in a stroller, who had been crying earlier, looked up at me with magical blue eyes and said someting in Polish, and let out a good giggle. It reinforced that feeling I was having about the spirit and strength found in human beings, and it was just what I needed to slip out of the cloak of mourning I was wearing, while at the same time crystalyzing what I
Backpacker
Walking to the "Eye of the Sea" had experienced in Aushwitz.
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We spiraled through mountain roads, and with each passing minute we ascended further into the picturesque towns of southern Poland, and further away from industry and littered streets.
We ended up in Zakopane, which could be described as Poland's Aspen. We stayed three nights in a beautiful guest house, owned by a dorky young woman named Ella. I found myself staring at her while she spoke, itching to grab my tweezers and thin out her eyebrows, or maybe just dust a little bronzer over her cheekbones. Despite her resemblence to Chewbaca and her complete inability to stand up straight and speak like a human being, after Arek and Robert charmed her socks off (Ella DOES wear lace up boots), Jason and I wound up paying $50 for three nights in her beautiful lodge. And that was half the cost, so...pretty awesome.
Speaking of Robert and Arek...let me tell you what it's like walking around Poland with the two of them. Just imagine two bulldogs with ciggarettes dangling from there mouths trumping down the street, like two body guards with bowling balls for calves. And no one is safe from the charm
Arek and Kate
Standing in one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. Robert is constantly throwing around. I mean babies, grandmas, car park attendants...they will all fall victim. We never knew what he was saying, but he always had strangers laughing and he seemed to be constantly working someone over for a deal, and successfully. I felt so safe in their company, both for the fact thay they were physically sort of intimidating, and also because I knew that if we ever found ourselves in a pickle, the two of them would easily found our way out.
Oh, and how good is life when you have a chef traveling with you? He made some amazing food. MMMmmmm...ribs, potatos, fresh salads, mushroom soup, susumber salad...everything fresh and delicious. The only time it's a downer is when we were so hungry we just wanted something quick and nasty to eat, and Arek just wouldn't have it. I guess in the end it's better that way, and neither of us is exactly wasting way, so we can aford to wait a couple of hours for one of Arek's specialties.
On our first day in Zacopane, we wondered through a cobblestone pedestrian area lined with shops and cafes, and kiosks selling souvenirs. We took
Jason's first snow ball
It's official, this Florida Boy has finally seen snow (slush really, but I'm counting it). a tram up the mountain, and walked around the top where there are more kiosks. One tourist specialty is smoked cheese, and Robert and I went into this tiny wooden hut where someone was making the cheese. They shape the cheese into barrel shapes with designs on them.
We walked down the mountain and felt really healthy for it, and decided we deserved some kind of amazing dessert. So we stopped at an outdoor cafe where Arek and Robert flirted with the girls behind the counter and we had crepes chalk full of yummy stuff.
That night Arek cooked on the grill out our guest house, and everyone who was staying there came out to enjoy the evening. There was, of course, more vodka, but Jason and I only had one shot...kind of a hair of the dog thing.
There was a little Polish girl who was almost two named Iza (as in Izabella) staying in the lodge, and for whatever reason she just loved me. We broke the ice one night while she watched me and Jason try to prepare the grill from her balcony above us. She was a bit shy, and we didn't speak
This is the cup, and it's running over.
We'll never be able to explain to you, or show you in photos how amazing this place was. It's as if God let a little bit of heaven dribble down between the mountains and come to a peaceful sleep at their feet. the same language, so we found common ground...ANIMAL NOISES!! We snorted and mooed and meowed at each other, and even growled, and as silly as it was it was my first lesson on how to communicate with someone who doesn't speak the same language as I do.
Her parents said that she was always asking about American Kasia, and wouldn't go to sleep until she knew that I was sleeping also. And on my last night, her dad took her upstairs to put her to bed, and about five minutes later they came back down because she didn't want to go to sleep without having a picture of me and her together. SHE WAS SO CUTE!!
Anyway, on our second day in Zacopane, we took a horse carriage up a mountain. When we got dropped off by the carriage driver, we walked about a mile further up (drinking beer, by the way) and when we were very near the top, Robert told me to close my eyes, and for Jason to walk backwards, and he guided us up the rest of the way. And then he let go of me and said ''Surprise!'' and I'm telling you my mouth dropped open because we were standing in front of this glassy little lake surrounded my mountains spotted with snow. The mountains reflected in the lake, and I felt like Forest Gump because we just couldn't tell where the water ended and the mountains began.
My words and even Jason's pictures can't capture the beauty of this place, which is called Morskie Oko, or, Eye of the Sea. I had a ''Cup Runneth Over'' moment, and I don' t know how else to explain it but to say that it just felt like too much God pushing from all around me, and their was so much beauty and life and it was all welling up in my heart and the only place all of it had to go was straight out of my eyes. And a lot of times, when I have a moment like that, I feel sort of crazy, but I know that all the guys knew exactly what i was feeling.
We sat on rocks at the edge of the lake, watching the ducks and just etching the vision in our hearts and minds, and Arek said, ''This place makes me miss my country.''
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During our four days in Poland, we talked about communism and what life was like back then. It is very clear that Poland is a country in transition. Old meets new and natural beauty is often blemished with remnants of communism; block buildings, industrialized neighborhoods and peeling billboards. It feels very familiar, and at the same time slightly tilted from reality. It is, in any case, a lovely nook of the world, which I hope gets a chance to thrive and blossom into its full potential.
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When we returned to Poland, we had one wild night out with Matt (brother-in-law), and somehow managed to make it to our BUNAC orientation the next morning. BUNAC is the company who helped us obtain our working visas. After that, we had a picnic in the park with Haike, who is one of the most lovely human beings ever. It was a quick one because she had to go back to work, but we popped our heads into her design office, which was very London-y!
We had a curry dinner with Matt and he showed us the David Hasselhauf costume he was wearing to the England match in Germany, and before long we were on a train to Egham!
When we arrived at the center it was pretty late in the evening, about 10:30, and we were greeted by Rag, who is our British Indian center manager. Rag is 6'6'' (and a half), has the deepest, darkest eyes I've ever seen, and eyebrows like catepillars. He is the best. He plays bad cop with the kids, and our activity leader, Chris, and all the rest of us get to play good cop.
The staff here is great. We all get along, work together, and have a lot of fun. There's a great chemisty now between all of us, but seven more arrive on Saturday so we'll see if things change. I've made a great connection with a girl named Claudia from Sardignia, and Jason is definitely clicking with all the guys as well.
Every night, after dealing with these kids all day long, we gather in the staff room and drink beer and wine, play games and talk for hours. Jason isn't the only one who plays the guitar, so we are sometimes lucky enough to have a soundtrack. The hallway leading up to our little hangout is smelling more and more like booze everyday...and we think it's hilarious.
Life here is good. I had a few days where I felt like a little girl gone to camp myself, and the slow pace around here slowed me down enough to become conscious of missing home. But I feel better now, and I've caught up with Jason's happiness, which was there from the start.
It's time for another cafeteria dinner, and as the English say, I'm completely knackered..so, until next time, thank you for reading and sorry if it was so long you wished you'd never asked me for more.
Love you all, we'll be in touch.
PS-more pictures are on the way!
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Tony Napodano
non-member comment
You're stories are awesome!
Wow, Kate! I can't remember reading a more enjoyable dissertation. I ran the gamut of emotions with you, as you climbed mountains and sank back into our terrible history. The people and places you've colored for us makes it all seem like I'm watching a movie. Stay in touch and keep bringing us along for this incredible ride. Tony