Police!

I wanted to get out of the house and explore Poland a little (ha- little!), so we packed up the car with a hoard of snacks, my bike, and of course our face masks for a sheep-dogging adventure. We elected a large green space on Google Maps about 3.5 hours north of Krakow. The drive up was through lovely rolling hills of agricultural fields and wind farms. There were huge patches of bright yellow flowers, which I later learned were rapeseed crop. There were some surprise tolls, but they were easy to navigate and quick to get through. That may have been an artifact of the continuing recommendations to stay-at-home, but the tolling facilities seemed prepared to handle big intakes of drivers.

When we arrived at the park, we parked near a large pond surrounded by long marshy grasses. There were swans in the pond being shooed away by a fisherman and the loud squawk of other smaller birds and bugs. Cameron needed to do a two hour run, which took us down about 20km of trail and road. We were mostly in-and-out of quick-growing pine forests with some vibrant green underbrush. It smelled fresh and when the sun shined it was fairly warm and really pretty. There were a few other people out, but we had the logging roads mostly to ourselves. The park was nice but probably not worth driving multiple hours outside of the city for.

The real excitement was the drive home. There was a lot of construction on the southbound highway which hadn't been as prevalent when driving north. Polish roads already have a lot of fluctuation, but going through construction zones are the worst, so even though the speed limit drops to 60kph, most people keep driving 80-100. The whole drive Cameron had been carefully sticking with the speed of traffic, and even often driving much slower than the other drivers to stay within 10kph of the speed limit. Unfortunately, in a moment of bad timing Cameron was caught driving 87 in a 60 zone.

We could see the police officer standing on the side of the highway up ahead holding out his radar gun. He was not trying to hide: he was clad in neon and the police car's lights were flashing. Cameron slowed down, but not quickly enough and as we got closer the police officer stepped into the road and waved Cameron off to the side with his reflective wand.

The interaction started as expected: the office came up to the driver's side of the car, Cameron rolled down the window, they took Cameron's driver's license and registration, and explained the violation. Of course this is all going on in a weird mix of Polish, English, and gestures. The officer told us it would cost 100PLN, and he told Cameron to grab a jacket. Confused, Cameron thought the officer wanted to check to make sure we had the mandatory reflective vests, but no, he was asking Cameron to get out of the car so he could pay the charges.

I waited in the car, and while Cameron was paying his ticket the second police officer went back to the radar and immediately pulled over another car. I watched as the same string of events unravelled for that driver: he talked to the police officer through his car window, grabbed his wallet and jacket from the trunk, and then walked over to the police car to pay his fine.

 From my distanced position I could hear small snippets of information being shared. Cameron spelled out his father's name, and then said that he worked as a software engineer. I wasn't sure if these were trackable pieces of info or just casual conversation. Cameron later shared that the officer did write down a lot of information across multiple systems, but there was some confusion since most of the conversation was happening with the assistance of Google Translate.

Cameron had been shaking with adrenaline when he first left the car, but he was pretty calm and in surprisingly good spirits when he returned about 10 minutes later. The whole translation was pretty casual compared to any interaction with cops in the United States. Cameron shared that the officers were trying to make him more comfortable and there wasn't any intimidation games going on. Just the fact that they have you, the driver, leave your car is indicative of a very different vibe than the US.

Based on what I've seen, I get the sense that cops are not all that scary. People get fined more often, but they typically aren't that much (100PLN is the equivalent of about 25USD) and I don't think a ticket sticks on your record. For example, people illegally drink in public fairly regularly; if you want to have a picnic, you're going to have a beer, too. Chances are you're going to get fined eventually, but it's just part of the cost of having a nice meal in the park.  It goes back to the overall practicality of people, and most people are willing to pay a little bit to be able to enjoy themselves a little more.

It was not an ideal end of the day, but it also was not as bad as we thought it would be. Hopefully this means that Cameron will start loosening up a little and be a little less anxious for the next road trip.

Not sure what these were, but we passed these hamster-home like buildings on the drive up. 

Not a great picture because it was raining at this point, but you can see the yellow fields of rapeseed among the windmills. 

Pretty spring forest. 

Wetland preserve-like ponds area. 

Cameron peeking out of a lookout. 

More forest views. 

Post-run picnic. 

Stealth-mode photographing. 

More sneak-peaks of the pull-over.

Cameron and the other unfortunate driver both paying their fines. 

Beautiful Spring

Sorry for last week's post–looking back I was experiencing some cabin fever-onset depression. Compared to last week, I feel so happy and and motivated. Starting last Monday, we can now go back outside for exercise and I have been going on daily walks. Parks and forests are open and I'm taking full advantage of our restored freedom.

Whereas I had been going out for weekly trips to the grocery store, Cameron truly hadn't left the apartment in over a month. To celebrate, we wrapped buffs around of faces on Monday morning and set off on a 3,5km stroll around Planty Park. It was so beautiful! Clearly, the city has still been employing their gardeners because the park was full of beautiful manicured lawns and landscaped floral arrangements. The Polish word for April, kwiecień, is aptly derived from the same root word for flower, kwiat, and there were daffodils, tulips, and pansies in abundance. 

There weren't many people out, but it was still a bigger crowed than I had seen in weeks. I wanted to watch other people and try to get a sense of how they were doing; did the first day out feel as monuments to them as it did to me? I felt giddy to be back in the physical world, even though we were all keeping our distance and everyone had their lower faces covered. Cameron kept repeating how surprised to see the changes that had been happening in the outside world. Since he last has seen them, the trees went from barren winter branches to lush billows of greens and pinks. He so badly wanted to wanted to share this, so he ended up video chatting my dad as we walked our loop. 

On subsequent evenings' walks we've walk by the castle and along the river, both of which are quite crowded and hard to keep to the 2 meter distancing in places. A few people, especially those sunning on benches or or grassy hills, are not following the mask regulations fully, but instead have them hanging around their necks ready to be quickly pulled up if a police officer walks by. The police are still out on patrol, and I always have a small hope that those who are disrespecting the rules will be fined. Being by the river is lovely in spring, of course, since the grass is growing more brightly and the cherry blossoms are in bloom. If it's late enough in the evening we see bats flying around catching their dusk bugs. Normally I would be more concerned with getting ready for bed at 20:00 rather than going out for a walk, but the walks are a newfound must-have each day.

Walking around Krakow with a more autonomy has been great, but today was a real treat to take the car and drive an hour south for a short hike in the forested foothills of Małapolska. Some of the early wildflowers were out and the lower trees were budding with their young green leaves. You don't have to wear masks while in the forests, but about half of the people we bypassed had something around their necks that they could pull up when passing fellow hikers. Luckily we had mostly sun on our hike, but springtime weather here is notoriously unpredictable and not long after we reached the car it started to pour. If it weren't for the clouds, we probably would have seen the Tatras Mountains, but even our shorter-range view of the Polish countryside was spectacular.

If you want to visit Poland next year (and are optimistic that we won't have a second wave of Coronavirus) I very much recommend visiting in spring!

Just a few minutes walk from our house.

Some of the landscaping surrounding old town.

Families and dogs were enjoying their evening. 

Young couples sunning under Wawel Castle. 

Paddle boarders along the Wisła river. 

Sunset stroll along the rive. 

Sunset on the Wisła.

Wawel at dusk. 

Twinning on our hike with matching shirts and buffs. 

Budding trees in the forrest. 

A sunny view of the Polish countryside.

Stormy weather starting about an hour later. 

Feeling Down

Every day I check the Coronavirus numbers in Poland and although our numbers continue to grow they grow by smaller percentages each week. The Polish government has clearly been seeing the declining trend, too, and starting on 20 April we will be able to start going out for recreational reasons, so long as we keep our distance and cover our faces. The government has also identified their four-stage plan for lifting restrictions, even though they aren't ready to give dates for each stage going into effect. Fingers crossed that we get to the borders opening up in time for my parents to visit in June!

Although I am very excited to be allowed to go for casual walks again, we'll be in the house most of the time for the continuing foreseeable future. We try to find novel things to fill our time with and to give distinction to each day. Our house has mostly been filled with baking and living room workouts and watching Gourmet Makes. Cameron finds endless joy in his sourdough starter. In the last week we've had sourdough bread, coffee cake, crepes, and crackers. Outside of the sourdough world I've made apple muffins and cowboy cookies and Cameron made his first pavlova.

To work it all off we've been relying on Peloton workouts and running back and forth on the 0.15km utility road behind our apartment. Somehow Cameron managed to run back-and-forth on that thing for an hour; I only lasted about 13 minutes before I got bored (read: winded). Even with our new yoga mats and abundant energy, I have to admit, it's my watch tracking my activity that's keeping me working out every day. For the days that I can't motivate myself to do a formal workout I turn on an episode of Community and do suicides across the living room floor.

This week did have some unique highlights. For one, I started an online Polish class! The Zoom classroom definitely adds some unique challenges and there's something about looking at tiny squares of people for three hours that just fatigues my eyes so badly, but I'm excited to have a place to try my tongue at this language again without the embarrassment of interacting with "real people." The other excitement was getting elected as the new treasurer of my Toastmasters club. The other members got a real laugh when they learned they had elected a CPA into the role.

Even with the little glimpses of excitement, it's been a pretty dull week. Sorry for the correspondingly dull post. I hope everyone else is doing better in your own little residential worlds.

Cowboy cookies and sourdough loaf. 

Easter morning sourdough crepes. 

If you look closely you can see Cameron running down there. 

Daily morning workouts. 

The mall is a ghost town other than the couple of food stores and pharmacies. 

Elected as treasurer :) 

Learning new words like kajak and balon. 

Easter In Poland

It's Easter weekend, but from what I can tell it's not going to be a particularly special weekend for anyone this year. In most years, the long weekend (we get Easter Monday off) means an extended time to spend with family and go to church. Nowadays religious gatherings are limited to five people max and everyone is stuck inside with the same few people they see every day.

In an attempt to make this feel like a holiday, I've instituted some plans for Cameron and I. Last weekend, we painted eggs and now have them hanging on our (long dead) Christmas tree. I also bought an obscene amount of candy which we will divvy up and hide around the house for each other to find. For Easter dinner, we are going to pull out the fondue pot again (another Christmas leftover) and dress up in fancy clothes (read: bridesmaids dress for me and bowtie for Cameron). There's going to be a lot of baking this weekend, and as I write this on Saturday morning the first creation (sourdough biscuits) are in the oven.

These plans are clearly not perfect models of any country's Easter traditions (hidden candy is typically encased in plastic eggs in the United States and I'm pretty sure I picked up the egg painting from German traditions, but Easter fondue is not a thing I've ever heard of), but they were the best I could come up with to make the holiday special. Clearly we won't be having a Polish Easter this year, but nonetheless I wanted to learn about the Polish Easter traditions so that way I have something to look forward to next year.

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I should have suspected that Easter rituals would encompass a full week of activities (referred to as Holy Week or Great Week). According to Culture.pl the preparations start the week leading up to Easter with Palm Sunday and spring cleaning. That explains why I've seen so many of my neighbors washing their windows this week! I just assumed people were getting stir crazy and window washing was a good way to feel productive while still getting to stand in the sun on your porch.

Palm Sunday seems to be as much of a celebration to welcome the onset of spring as it does to be a religious celebration. According to SpotAHome.com, families and school children make their own palms out of "lush branches of boxwood, catkins, dyed herbages, paper flowers, ribbons, dried flowers," and just about anything else that can be found. If it weren't for mandates to stay home, we would presumably find colorful stalls around Krakow's market square selling pre-made palms to the less crafty folks. The colorful creations are then paraded around after mass, similar to the Three Kings Day processions that happen around Christmas time.

On Thursday, priests and bishops at many cathedrals nationwide, including Krakow's Wawel Cathedral, wash the feet of 12 elderly men in a nod to the last supper. Then during Friday mass a Jesus sculpture is placed into a grave where he lays among flowers and candles until his resurrection on Sunday.

Saturday is the fun day, because it's filled with egg dying and food prepping. Although some people do egg painting and egg scratching (dipping eggs into hot wax and then scratching patterns into them), egg dying seems to be most common decorating approach and is done similarly to the US. You hard boil some eggs then drop them into the store-bought dye concoction for a few minutes. I think Cameron had only dyed eggs before, for he was a little bamboozled by the fact that you can use the natural egg color as the base when egg painting. He insisted in fully covering his eggs with a base coat of paint, to which I was of course snippy about because I didn't want him wasting my paints unnecessarily.

When I was last at the store (buying my hoards of candy) there were lots of chintzy Easter decor. The dye packages of course, plus a wall of rabbit and chick statues, decorative eggs and grass, and a stack of small woven baskets. "Pretty much the same as the US," I thought, "just with less basket space for the candy." I didn't realize that the Easter baskets aren't used as candy-collective devices, but rather are filled with Easter foods that are brought to the church to be blessed. The baskets are decorated and filled as you please, but having a piece of sausage, bread, salt, pepper, hard-boiled eggs, and a sugar lamb sculpture are staples. Nick Hodge, another Krakow blogger, notes that sometimes children sneak pet treats into the baskets, too. These baskets are taken to be blessed on Saturday, but cannot be touched until the following morning.

I suppose it goes without saying that food is an important staple of the holiday. From what I can tell, there is a small fuss put into family dinner that night, but it's Easter breakfast that is the main celebratory meal (I suppose you want to eat the blessed basket food as soon as possible!) To start off the meal, everyone takes a small slice of the blessed egg(s) and exchanges well wishes with their family members. After that, you feast! The blessed food is supplemented with a variety of other traditional dishes. It seems like there is nothing more Polish than soup, for there seems to be at least one type of soup found on most families breakfast menus. Various cakes also make regular appearances on the Easter table. I showed Cameron a picture of some of the Easter cakes hoping he would feel inspired to bake one, but he just said "look at those cakes!" Maybe next year.

How about all of those dyed eggs? Those which aren't eaten at breakfast are enlisted for egg fighting! The rules, according to KidsInTheCity.pl, first require that everyone chooses the egg that best meets their secret criteria. You then tap the tips of the eggs against each other until the last unbroken egg is declared the winner. All of the broken eggs must be eaten by the losing competitors.

As I've already mentioned, Monday is a holiday here. I didn't grow up Catholic, but I assumed that Monday had some sort of religious significance. I was surprised to learn that in Poland, there isn't any cultural obligation to go to church, but rather the day is dubbed "Wet Monday," or the humorous sounding Polish name, "Śmigus Dyngus." Once again, according to Culture.pl, "tradition requires that boys throw water over girls and spank them with willow branches." As a kid I'm sure I would have felt some degree of relief not having brothers, but apparently many people treat the following Tuesday as revenge day where the girls get to soak the boys.

Culture Trip advises to wake up early that day if you don't want to be awoken by a bucket of water, and to avoid carrying electronics and important around on Monday since the torment truly can affect anybody (not just boys soaking girls). They also advise leaving important documents at home, wear clothes you don't mind getting wet in, and stay alert for people who may be hiding in the bushes.

The final festivities extend into Tuesday in Krakow, even though most people are back at work. Those lucky enough to have the day off go to Krakus Mound to take place in the medieval fair, Rekawka. Traditionally (per Krakow Info) bonfires burned among fencing and pole climbing contests in this pagan ritual honoring the dead. These days, it's mostly stalls selling sweets and sword fighting between professional medieval knights. Rekawka fairs are apparently becoming more popular around the country and mostly are being treated as a renaissance festival.

What about the Easter Bunny? A few websites noted that the Easter Bunny visits the homes of Polish children and hides small gifts and sweets for them to find around the house, but that doesn't seem to be the focus of Easter. Like most holidays in Poland, the main focus is on family, and of course, food. Happy Easter everyone!

Trying to blow out the egg innards so we can paint and hang the shells. 

Cameron trying to fully coat his egg. 

Me taking a more intricate approach. 

The finished products, hanging from our dead Christmas tree. 

We don't go outside much, but spring is springing! 

I'm taking detours on my way to and from the grocery store to try and see some of the city on occasion. 

The daffodils are everywhere! Apparently, they are the primary symbol of spring in Poland. 

Words and Phrases

Poland's quarantine restrictions have gotten even stricter in the last week. When we go outside, even though we live together, we have to stand 2 meters apart, all parks have been closed down, the number of people inside stores is limited to 3x the number of cash registers, gloves must be worn inside stores, two hours a day have been dedicated as elderly shopping hours, and fines for breaking the rules range from 5,000-30,000PLN. It's not explicitly written that we can't go out to exercise, but it has been verbally requested so Cameron and I are following that rule. I'm writing this on Saturday morning and haven't been outside the house since Tuesday.

Since I haven't had much occasion to get out and experience new things, I will use this week's edition of the blog to go through some of the fun phrases I hear. These have been compiled mostly from my ongoing Toastmaster's meetings and of course my colleague.

Let's start with some Polish words and phrases:

1. Smacznego is the Polish form of Bon Appetite and is said before every meal. Even if you see someone eating a snack you might call out a smacznego in their direction. One time (pre-Coronavirus) Cameron and I were walking along a fairly empty street eating ice cream and a random middle-aged man shouted "smacznego" in our direction. It is derived from the word smak, which means "taste." A Polish coworker asked me what the English equivalent is, and I couldn't think of anything, other than perhaps "enjoy your meal." I think smacznego will be making its way back home with me to the US.
2. Another meal tradition here is to thank everyone before leaving the table. We take lunch as a group at work (or at least when we aren't working remotely) and everyone waits patiently until the last person finishes. Then, someone makes a show of looking around and asking "are we done?" to which everyone agrees and says "thank you" or "dziękuję" as they get up. The same holds true at the close of a meeting (in person or virtual). I was even on a 50+ Hangouts meeting on Thursday and at least half of the participants said "dziękuję" before signing off. 
3.  Over many years, I have developed my response to sneezes. The first sneeze gets a German "Gesundheit," sneeze two is responded to with "bless you," and then if there is a third sneezes the Spanish "salud" comes out. I am trying to very quickly break the Gesundheit habit, because I get the sense that casually speaking German is somewhat frowned upon. The Polish equivalent is "na zdrowie" which literally translates to "for health." It's the same phrase used to cheers people at the bar. 
4. Throughout the day, I hear my coworkers say "czyli." It's typically followed by a long pause or is repeated. It seems to be used as a filler word in the same way I catch myself repeating "so" unnecessarily. I asked what it means, and my coworkers said it works like "therefore" or "or," depending on the situation. It's kind of fun to say, and I've caught myself just quietly repeating "czyli, czyli..."
5. Proszę bardzo literally translates to "you're very welcome" or "please very much." You'll hear it in many casual transactional conversations at the grocery store or a restaurant to refer to both the please and the "here you go" senses of the phrase. Although we might say "you're very welcome" in English, we don't go around casually dropping a "pretty please" at the bank.

There are also a number of unusual English phrasings that I hear people use often that I find quite charming:

1. Do we have villages in the United States or do we always refer to them as towns, regardless of the citizenship count? I feel like I've only heard Americans talk about villages when they are referring to places outside of the US or in Native American lands. Here, if someone want's to tell you about where they are from, and it's not one of the 10 largest cities, they likely will say "I am from a small village." I even heard someone refer to Paris as a village, although I think they were just being funny.
2. Working from home means a lot of Google Hangouts chats. I'm learning that my America ways of just launching right into the meat of something in a new chat is probably pretty jarring for my colleagues. I need to start developing a habit of asking "may I have a question?" before actually launching into the question.
3. All written work communication is much more formal, and I especially enjoy the email salutations and closings. Emails often are addressed to "Dear ____" or "Dears" if it is to multiple recipients. Whereas I'm used to closing my emails with a "thank you" I'm learning that thanks are only given after receiving the requested information; the more appropriate phrase is "thank you in advance." More commonly, the email ends with a "kind regards" or "best regards" instead.
4. "For example" comes up far more often than it does among native English speakers. I think it's because American's are more likely to use "like" instead of the more formal "for example." 
5. I haven't heard this much, but Cameron's coworkers are apt to refer to groups of people as being "tribal." I think that phrases is avoided in the US, or at least in Washington, because tribes are exclusively used in reference to Native Americans. 
6. Colleague is used much more regularly here; I don't think I've heard anyone refer to someone as their coworker. To me it sounds very formal to speak of one's colleagues. 

I'm happy to say that I've notice my Polish language skills improving. When I'm in the shower I try to think of what I would say in fictitious situations, and more often than not I can think of enough Polish words to get my point across. Because all of these conversations take place in my own mind, there's a good chance that I'm using a German or Spanish word as a filler and not even realizing it. I know the opposite is starting to become true, and if I try to think of how I would say something in Spanish or German I can now only think of the Polish words. I'll take that trade off, and I hope to continue to pick up on fun Polish words and phrases to share in the future. 

Working out from home, using wine bottles as weights. 

Working from home every day means more TV time. I was watching Va Banque, the Polish version of Jeopardy, while making dinner the other night.

Parks are now off-limits. You can see the red-and-white caution tape blocking off this space. 

The streets are super empty. I only saw maybe a dozen people in total when I walked 20 minutes to the bigger grocery store this morning. 

Pretty much the only cars you see are the police. Here you can see two police officers patrolling Planty park and a police car patrolling in the other direction. 

The only other person in the market square was a guy in a neon-yellow work vest taking drone footage of Old Town. Drone's aren't allowed in the city so I think he was on official government business. 

Isolation Oddities

I spent a lot of my childhood thinking about what it would be like to live during unfortunate times. I almost always assumed I would be in the most discriminated-against class–a peasant during medieval times, a child taken away from their family and sold into slavery, an Oliver Twist-esque orphan–you know, kid stuff. Whose to say why; I had a great childhood but for some reason I felt the need to pretend that I didn't. My favorite scenario to play-act was the Holocaust. Maybe it was just top of mind living in Germany, having neighbors who had lived during WWII as children, and learning about concentration camps in school. I also was really fascinated with being Jewish, probably thanks to my Mom's friend, Sue, who was tons of fun and didn't try to force me to eat tomatoes after I told her I didn't like them.

During these scenes, there were almost always elements of escaping through the forest. Cara can probably remember hours of me forcing us to climb up a muddy hill over and over again in our escapes from the orphanage or concentration camps. After a few rounds up and down the hill, I would have us sit quietly, trying to not let our breath make any sound, waiting for the Nazis (or an orphanage warden?) to bypass us. We (almost) always survived.

I had forgotten about these bizarre childhood games until I was complaining about the Coronavirus-related isolation to my mom on the phone. This week Poland increased restrictions and have asked people not to leave their house unless it is for a "life need." Mom's response was to "pretend like you're Anne Frank." This made me wonder, why hadn't I ever modeled my make-believes after her life? She was another kid and I knew enough of her story to be able to play the role well. Plus, I thought of myself as quite an accomplished child actress thanks to my role as Alice Wendlekin in the community theater's production of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. But, even if I had thought to model myself after her, I don't think Anne would have appealed to me because she mostly just sat bored in a room. The excitement was about the escape! Being told to pretend I was Anne Frank at age nine probably would have brought forward the same groan as it did to me at age 26.

My living quarters are far nicer than what the Franks and Ottos had, and my situation is (hopefully) way more temporary. It's almost silly to even call it a "situation" in comparison to what they lived through because I'm still allowed to talk to everyone I love, eat anything I care to buy or cook, consume whatever media I want, and even leave my house on occasion. We're dealing with fear and the unknown, but I have no right to compare my petty frustrations to those of Holocaust victims. I know Mom's Anne Frank comment was meant to provide optimistic perspective and to remind me that things could be way way worse. I know that, but I also think we are allowed to be grumpy and complain about the new reality we find ourselves in.

Everyone is making adaptations right now. Someone had called into my favorite podcast, TBTL, and said that during these weeks of quarantining everyone becomes a hunk, a chunk, a drunk, a skunk, or a monk. I think I am becoming a nuisance.

Every day I ask Cameron "do you like my outfit?" despite only changing every three days or so. I have to perpetually fight the urge to crawl under the table and jump-scare him when he is on a conference call. To get "exercise" I hop to get to the bathroom and back, and sometimes I throw in a few jumping jacks. When Cameron gets up, he is always asked to give me a massage (but he obliges me max once a day). I find myself breaking out into songs from Girl Scout camp or Christmas carols. I need a haircut, and since I don't trust Cameron or I with that responsibility, I am instead snipping off individual split ends with scissors, nail clippers, or my teeth, depending on what tool is most accessible when I notice the split. I've also started to haphazardly smear essential oils into my hair because a Facebook ad made me think they would make my hair healthier.

All day long, as I work from the dining room table, I look out at the other apartments in our complex and try to build narratives for everyone I see. One woman, probably in her 60s or 70s, comes out other her porch in the late afternoon and jogs in place for a few minutes to enjoy the sunlight. There's another woman in her 40s who does some heartier exercises on her porch for 30+ minute a day. She and her family sometimes go down to the courtyard to kick around a soccer ball for a while. There's a young woman, probably 20s or 30s, who lives to the right of us who sits on a whicker chair smoking and talking on her cell phone multiple times a day. Next to her is a white-haired lady with black sequined curtains who likes to peer out at others, but quickly backs into her house if she thinks she is being spied on. The next floor up is a young couple who will sit on their patio furniture with their cat on occasion. I heard English being spoken from one of the top-floor apartments one day, but I didn't get a good look at the speakers.

I've already shared that I feel overall safer and better looked-after living in Poland than I think I would if I were in the United States, but I so badly wish I could have casual "this is crazy, huh?" conversations with people. One mother was out in the courtyard letting her kids run around for a bit and she was chatting with an older man peering down at her over his porch railing. I got the impression they didn't know each other, but were both just trying to get some fresh air after being cooped up for two long and getting some solace from having a conversation with someone who they didn't live with. Cameron is overall a great person to be isolated with, but even on a good day he's not much of a conversationalist and I so badly envied the spontaneous conversations that I was watching my neighbors have.

Of the five caricatures we all supposedly become, I'm disappointed that I'm most likely turning into a skunk. For me, there's no urgency. I don't feel obligated to change my outfits because I know exactly who I'll see. I don't need to fold my laundry because I know I'll have time to do it tomorrow, or the next day, or the day after that. I can keep hitting snooze because there isn't anything or anyone to wake up for. I think the hardest thing about staying home so much is the lack of surprise and spontaneity that naturally comes from interacting with the outside world. I should be using my indoor time to study Polish so that I can start to have those spontaneous conversations, but I'm just not able to motivate myself to do so.

I promise, I'm doing well. I'm happy, and healthy, and grateful that I have a routine to follow. I'm glad that I have space in my house to do jumping jacks and practice pirouettes. Cameron and I have made lots of new meals in the past few weeks and every few days we have a new batch of homemade bread. I've had time and reason to talk to family and friends who I hadn't spoken with in a few months. Netflix put out Tiger King and 100 Humans. Overall, my life is really good, but there are moments where I want to feel sorry for myself and cry, and I've decided that it's ok to to feel that way. I hope you, dear reader, are also doing well, and if it is good advice for you, just "pretend like you're Anne Frank."

My cousin sent me some childhood photos and we were playing a game of "what's that expression?" We decided that I'm being super sassy, Cara is begging for coins, and Jake is getting close to being fed up with us. 

Sunday morning Bob Ross attempt. Cameron told me to not be too hard on myself because it looked "quite reasonable good."

Saturday morning Cameron and I woke up at 4:30 to go for a run/bike ride. We're not 100% positive we're allowed to go outside for exercise but we figured if we woke up before everyone else we wouldn't be causing any trouble. 

It was really nice to be out in the woods for a little bit on our morning run/bike ride. 

Polish Names

Working from home and not leaving the house regularly means that I don't have very much excitement to report on this week. Instead, I want to go over a very perplexing topic that I am still trying to figure out–Polish names.

Some things about the Polish naming structure are easy. For example, all women's names end in -a and all male names end in a consonant. Because just about everyone has a Catholic or traditional Slavic name, there aren't that many names overall. Most of them, even if they look or sound foreign at first, are going to have an English equivalent.

For example, if someone told you their name was pronounced like the English words "me how", what would that be? What if I told you it was written like this: Michał? Any guesses? It's the Polish version of Michael!

How about Mikołaj? That is the Polish version of Nickolas. Again, another dull name in English amplified to be much more fun in Polish! Maybe I just have a thing for the letter Ł (called "ow" but has a W sound).

How about this one: Dżesika. This is the modified Polish spelling of Jessica! Apparently, Jessica is though as a very posh name, presumably from people who first heard it abroad. According to a friend, it's a name that poor people will give to their kids to seem more well-off than they are. Maybe similar to calling your kid Diamond or Mercedes in the US?

Name days are important and are more likely to be celebrated than a person's actual birthday. Your name day is the birthday of the saint you were named after. Although people may give you gifts on your name day, it is customary for you to bring cake to share or buy other people drinks to help you celebrate. Aisha is an Arabic name, therefore I don't have a Polish name day, which is just fine with me- I don't want to buy drinks for a bar-full of acquaintances!

Although I red a lot about the formality of introductions before starting work (firm handshakes and titles are important, always address people as Pan/Pani [sir/ma'am], and do not use first names until you are invited to) I have found people to be much more casual in reality. First names, or often their diminutives, are used readily and almost immediately. And that is where my problems lie...

Every name has multiple versions (diminutives) and I don't know when it's appropriate for me to use them! For example, I work with a woman named Anna, but she most commonly is referred to as Ania and sometimes Aniu. Less common, but still valid versions are Anka, Anusia, Aneczka, Andzia, Anula, Anulka, or Anunia. I also work with a Stanisław, who most commonly goes by Staś or Staszek, however Stach, Stan, Stańko, Stasio, or Stasiek are also acceptable.

Clearly the purpose is not always to shorten the name, but I get the sense it's different than having nicknames or pet names since they can be used by acquaintances and coworkers. Some versions of names are reserved for children only, but I don't know which versions those are and I don't know at what age kids grow out of their childhood diminutives. From what I've gathered, the only rule is to not use the full name once you've moved to the diminutive stage with someone. I'm telling you, this is complicated and I don't want to mess it up!

I thought about going by the name Joanna for a while, since one of the diminutives is Asia (pronounced Asha), which sounds pretty similar to my name. Instead, I'm going by my name, but pronounced (I-sha). It's the same way my name was pronounced when I went to German school so it still feels like my real name.

I haven't had as much interaction with surnames (of course they say surname instead of last name) other than the fact that each surname takes up half a line of text! How about these monsters: Trzetrzelewska, Dzieduszycki, Siesztrzewitowski, Brzęczyszczykiewicz...oh my! Luckily I haven't had any obligation to try and pronounce these out loud to anyone.

Every last name derives from either the person's relations, occupation, or place of origin. For example, the common -ski suffix implies affiliation with something. So Warsawski means "of Warsaw". Simple enough, except many surnames will change based on gender so that the female versions end in -a. So if I were married to a Pan Warsawski, I would become Pani Warsawska. Luckily though, last names don't change so I don't have to worry about it beyond the initial introductions with someone.

Well, as far as I know I haven't made any major faux pas but please share any advice if you have it!

I don't have any name-related photos this week,  but Cameron and I attempted homemade pierogis last weekend:

It starts with homemade dough, courtesy of Cameron's kneading skills.

The best dough cutter we could find was a champagne flute. 

We filled them with mashed potatoes and cheddar. 

Since they are so small you need to be fairly dexterous to press them by hand. In a lot of kitchen stores you can find pierogi presses to help with this step

Once folded, you crimp the edges with a fork. 

The pile of uncooked dumplings. 

Boil until they float...

...and then fry them to give them some texture.

While good on their own...

...they are much better when paired with fresh dill, crisped onions, homemade applesauce, and sour cream. Adding toppings is not very Polish but we're not very Polish people yet.