An American Household in Poland

The End of This Story

2010-07-04T23:25:00.001+02:00

I started this blog/journal/diary in April 2009. I wanted to document this adventure for my kids. My first entry was titled "Are We Really Going?" At that point we were not entirely sure that we were even going to Poland. Back then I had never even heard of Gdansk. We thought that if we did go, we would be living in Krakow or Warsaw. Details unfolded ever so slowly. We set a move date, we packed and we flew into the unknown.

We were able to do some unusual and exciting things, to travel extensively. We have indescribable memories to last our lifetimes. Years from now I hope that my kids will look through all of these entries and say, "Oh, yeah...," "Oh, my gosh, I forgot about that...," "Wow, that was really cool..." As time goes on this adventure will become more and more a part of our past. My hope is that my kids will remember it fondly and that this unique experience will bond them forever. I hope they will someday appreciate how much they learned, and I hope they will know how much Myles and I enjoyed this journey with them. I hope they will someday share it with their children.

Today we celebrate America's 234th birthday. As we continue to transition back to our normal, I realize that we are no longer An American Household in Poland. We are simply An American Household. It's been a pleasure.

Is It Weird To Be Back?

2010-07-02T21:30:00.001+02:00

Is it weird to be back?

This is the question that I think I have encountered the most since we returned from our adventure. The short answer is no. In fact, except for a few things it seems like we never left. There is that new Arby's that has appeared as if from nowhere.

Every time we drive by it the kids remind me that we have not been there yet. And they want to make sure we immediately get to Sonic, Taco Bell, Golden Corral and Dairy Queen. I remind them that we need to pace ourselves. If we do everything there is to do immediately, what will we do for the rest of our lives in Olathe? We did cave in and made a trip to Dairy Queen this evening.

But I insisted that we walk, so we earned that treat! You know you're in Kansas when you walk by a cornfield on the way to the Dairy Queen.

There are a few things that have changed. The produce section in Walmart has been rearranged, and the tortillas are in a different part of the store now. Kids we know grew taller and look so grown up. Our trees are taller. But overall, things are more or less the same.

I don't think we have changed too much, but we have a little bit. It is not likely that I will ever forget to bring my own bags to the grocery store again. Yesterday, I took my big and very sturdy grocery bags that we had in Poland to Walmart and caught a bit of guff from the cashier lady. In Poland cashiers sit, here they stand. In Poland people sack their own groceries, here the cashiers do it. People bring their own bags in Poland, and really throughout Europe. Some cashiers here roll their eyes at my noble attempt to go green, especially when I bring my bigger grocery sacks. This cashier filled one of the big ones up and told me I was never going to be able to lift it. I did not let on that while apparently I look wimpy, there were times in very recent Polish history that I hauled two of those big bags from the grocery store on foot more than half a mile.

Instead, I told her it was ok to load it on up because my minivan was just right outside in the parking lot.

I have been unpacking tubs from our attic. I have made quite a bit of headway, but there is still a lot to get to. I am specifically on a quest to find a tub that has our American flag in it. I have not found it yet and 4th of July is two short days away! So far this is the best we have come up with. I will keep looking!

So is it weird to be back? No way. It's wonderful. It is home!

This, That and My New Wheels

2010-06-29T15:11:00.001+02:00

On Monday morning I took Natalie to her soccer camp. Our lives are REALLY getting back to normal. Natalie had been worried about whether or not she would be able to jump back into her soccer routine. While we were in Poland she did not play on a team. Girls do not play soccer, or at least on soccer teams, there. When I looked for a team for her in Gdansk last fall I learned that she COULD play on a boys' team. I was not thrilled with the idea of my 13 year old daughter being the only girl on a team where she does not speak the language or know the culture. She was not too thrilled about that idea either. So she juggled the ball in the backyard when the weather was somewhat decent. She had PE at the British School on Mondays. She used that as her sporty outlet. Her PE teacher commented on her end of year report about how happy Natalie was playing sports.

I watched her for about 20 minutes at the end of camp today. She looked right at home on the soccer field in the goalie box, and I know she was so happy to be back on the field again. Note the skinned up knee that happened when she dove for the ball at camp this morning and the big smile on her face! She has played on the same soccer team since first grade, and will be rejoining them for the fall season in August. She can't wait!

I have had so much fun this past week running into people we know everywhere we go. I ran into Monica at Walmart, Tricia at Quiktrip and so many friends at church. I saw Karen cruising next to me as I was driving down Pflumm yesterday, and Wendy at Target this morning. There have been times this past week where I've had the Cheers theme song running through my head: "Where everybody knows your name..." It is nice to be home!

We have a new phone number. Since we were unwilling to pay the silly monthly fee to keep our old number for nine months, we ran the risk of our old number being unavailable, and that happened. We are adapting and have learned the new number. What I was not expecting was the deluge of sales calls! We had our old number registered with the attorney general in Kansas on the Do Not Call list. After this past week of countless telemarketing calls, I registered our new number this morning. But the telemarketers do not have to comply for 31 days. We will be doing some serious screening of calls in our house until August 1st!

Our trees are growing in the backyard. They are getting big and providing some much needed shade back there as the backyard gets the summer, southwest sun. Our peach tree is producing lots of fruit, but I think we will not be able to enjoy any of it. There seems to be a serious peach theft problem in our backyard. I caught one of the criminals red handed this morning.

And it looks like this was his second helping. The pit from his first course is right by his tail.

We have been running crazy and time has been flying! I cannot believe we have already been home for over a week. When we were in Poland I had promised Ben that he could get his driving permit when we came home. Well, we have not quite gotten around to that yet, but he did have his very first driving lesson. It is a very strange feeling to let my firstborn sit in the driver's seat. It's downright terrifying to allow him to operate the vehicle!

We went to a nearby parking lot and he navigated around curbs at very slow speeds. He was surprised to realize how many things one has to think about while driving a car. He is studying the manual and we will head to the DMV later this week for his permit. He has many more instructional hours in his future before he is allowed to venture off on his own.

Ben's lesson was given in Myles' car, not my BRAND NEW (to me--it's a 2009) minivan!

We picked it up yesterday, and I love it.

One of my requirements for a new car is that it NOT look like every other vehicle out there. I have a tendency to forget where I park in big parking lots, and it is very helpful to have a unique looking vehicle. My old, mint green Ford Windstar was awesome, and I never lost it. If that thing didn't die, I would still be driving it. When it did give out, I had a light blue Town & Country for a while. It happened more than once that I tried to get into a car that wasn't mine when we owned that van! We sold it right before we left for Poland. This new van is navy blue and has a little bit different body shape to it than all the others. In addition, I will slap my "I Love Gdansk," sticker on it to help it stand out.

All of our immediate coming home chores have been accomplished. I still have an attic full of plastic tubs to empty and sort. But we are functional. I'm not complaining!

Here, Kitty, Kitty

2010-06-28T10:44:00.002+02:00

Our cat, Miranda, is home! When we first welcomed Miranda into our family as a nine month old kitten back in 2002, she was terrified and hid behind a big dresser for several days. She was very slow to accept her new surroundings. Then for the next seven years she never left the house except for a yearly (more or less) trip to the vet. Miranda does not care for the vet or to leave the house. Whenever we went out of town we would always have a neighbor come in and check on her and make sure she had enough food and water. When we would return home she would make sure we knew she was annoyed with us for leaving her. But she would not be able to resist our charms for very long.

When we went to Poland, Miranda spent those 10 months with our friends who live here in Olathe. Ginny is a cat lover, sometimes referred to by her family as the "cat whisperer."

Her family has two cats and a dog of their own. She graciously volunteered to foster Miranda while we were bouncing all over Europe. It was so wonderful for us to know that Miranda was loved and well taken care of while we were gone. Ginny emailed pictures of Miranda to us from time to time while we were gone. We can't thank Ginny and her family enough for taking such good care of our kitty.

When we dropped Miranda off at their house last August she was very stressed. She hid behind their bed for about a day before she ventured out. Miranda is a ponderer. She observes for a long time before she even considers engaging. According to Ginny, she eventually adapted and enjoyed, even sometimes initiated play with the other cats. One of her new friends, Olive, was a bit standoffish to Miranda. So Miranda interacted with and played mostly with the other cat, Thor. I understand that they each took turns instigating mischief. Thor was very curious and concerned as we put Miranda in the pet carrier and took her away.

Ginny told me that Miranda tolerated Snowball the dog, but that's about it. That is the same way that I would describe the relationship Miranda used to have with our dog, Ginger. We put Ginger up for adoption last summer and she is permanently living with a family in Memphis, Tennessee.

I did not know how Miranda would react to seeing us. Myles was so jet lagged that he stayed home. Ben wanted to go with me to visit with Ginny's son, Ross. Ben and Ross played together on the same baseball team for a couple of years. Miranda did not come downstairs to greet us. Ginny brought her down and Miranda let me hold her. She is not a cat who likes to be held much so I was very pleasantly surprised about that. She did not seem nervous or worried, so I think she remembered us. On our way to our home from Miranda's temporary home last night, she had a lot to say. She was not one bit pleased to be in a pet carrier and made ugly and insulting comments to us during the entire ride.

When we arrived home I let her out of the carrier. Myles picked her up and reminded her where we keep her food and litter box. She did not fight him when he picked her up. She was most definitely mad, and she spent about 30 minutes hiding between the sofa and a table.

But after a very short time she started walking around just like she normally does. She seems to remember this home and very quickly started acting like she was comfortable here. I'm sure she will miss her animal buddies that she made this past year. And no, we will not be adding any new pets to our family anytime in the foreseeable future.

Step by step we are returning to the life we left. Next we are going to pick up the new van!

The Reunion that Brought Tears to My Eyes

2010-06-27T08:20:00.001+02:00

I left the house at about 1:00 Saturday afternoon. I stopped by Target for what seems like the 12th time this week. From there I headed up toward the airport. I stopped by the Embassy Suites and picked up Natalie's backpack that we had inadvertently left there last weekend. Then I went to the airport to pick up Myles.

His flight from Chicago was scheduled to arrive at 2:50. I was there at 2:30. As I was waiting, I noticed a couple who were waiting for the same flight. They were probably early to mid 50s. The husband was nervously pacing back and forth. The wife was anxiously looking around, checking her watch, scanning the arrival board and watching out the window for the plane. She was telling her husband, "fix your shirt," "it's time for the plane to be here," "are you sure this is the door they will come out?" I was very curious to see which passenger on this plane had this couple so out of sorts.

The plane pulled up to the gate. A few minutes later the exit door to the main area was opened by an airport employee. Then people started coming off the plane. The wife drew in a big breath and started to cry as the second person walked through the jetway. It was a young US soldier in his army fatigues. His parents ran to him as he exited the gate, and there were quiet tears among spectators who happened to be standing nearby. The young man and his dad headed off to the restroom. I asked the mom how long he had been away. She said he had been in Iraq for a year this time and that now he is home for good. I'm glad I was a witness to this today.

Myles exited the plane several minutes later. He has been gone for 10 months, though we just left him in Gdansk a week ago. His homecoming trip was quite an adventure. http://mylesgartland.blogspot.com/2010/06/only-22-hours-late.html We both agree that international travel stinks. We also agree that the right sets of mishaps happened to the right people. I would not have had the patience to haul all the kids and all of our stuff from terminal to terminal trying to resolve the flightmare he endured. I would have shut it all down much sooner, rented a minivan and driven to Kansas from New Jersey.

But all's well that ends well. We are all home now. We have found a minivan to buy. We will be picking it up tomorrow. In the meantime we are making do with Myles' car that seats five people.

Next we need to go pick up our cat and bring her home.

The Best Laid Plans

2010-06-25T16:56:00.011+02:00

This morning I took Myles' car to the shop to have it looked at again. They could not look at it right away so I walked home. It was as if I had never left Poland! Except for the blistering heat. I just checked online and the high in Gdansk was 67 today. After I had been home for about an hour I received a call from the shop. They retested the alternator and it is testing fine. They can't find any problem with it. Well, looks like I just saved $650. The alternator surely won't last forever, but I'm not getting a new one today. Abbie and I walked back up to the shop to get the car. She mentioned that maybe Olathe should consider getting some trams. That would have been helpful this morning and our Gdansk passes are paid up through July 4th!

Today I went through a huge stack of mail that had accumulated while we were gone. It was kind of fun looking at all the Christmas cards we received on this hot June day! The kids were invited to swim with some friends at their neighborhood pool.

They were happy to get away from me and hang out with their friends.

Myles was scheduled to arrive in KC at 4:40 this afternoon. Well...there's been a change. I am not sure what has happened because it was overnight here when he sent the email. I'm sure he's working up his blog right now. But I received an email from him saying that he did not make his flight in Copenhagen to Brussels. So that meant that he was scheduled to fly from Copenhagen to Newark, New Jersey, then to Chicago, then to KC. If all went according to the revised plan, he would be arriving in Kansas City at 9:34 tonight. Well, all did not go according to that plan.

I saw online that the flight from Newark to Chicago had been cancelled. When I arrived in the US last weekend, my Polish cell phone did not work. I assumed that his would not work either. I hoped he would be able to find his way to an internet connection. I emailed him and gave him all of our new phone numbers. I did not think he had them and the numbers are so new they are not even listed with directory assistance yet. Shortly later, I received a call from him while I was standing in line at Walmart. We had a terrible connection. I assume he was using the cell phone of some kind stranger because of the Washington DC area code on my caller ID. He is staying the night in Newark tonight, and will be flying into KC tomorrow afternoon. I guess I will get the full story later this evening.

I know he must be completely frustrated, but he is on the ground in the US. Most of the "process" is behind him now. I have no idea if he has a change of clothes in his carry on bag...I'm thinking not. We are anxious for him to be home. When I head to the airport tomorrow I need to remember to stop by the Embassy Suites by the airport and pick up one of our backpacks that we left there. I somehow left it when we packed up after the first night we were back in KC. It is Natalie's backpack with her books from school in it. Those first few days are pretty foggy in my head.

I am sitting by the phone waiting for Myles to call so I can get all the details.

Progress and Fun

2010-06-24T03:02:00.010+02:00

Monday was a very busy day! I started out pulling gigantic weeds from my garden in the front yard. I planted a few flowers and in no time it looked much better. At 8:30 the air conditioning guy came and checked out the unit on the side of the house. Everything was ok with it so that was great news. A short time later a delivery truck pulls up with my new mattress. Then the AT&T guy came and activated the phone lines, the internet and television service. A crew of cleaning ladies showed up and made the house sparkle from top to bottom. In the afternoon, the washer and dryer showed up on yet another delivery truck. Those folks were summoned back out because the washer water hoses were hooked up backwards. When I was washing my clothes with cold water, hot water was coming out. That's no good. They have come and gone today and the problem is fixed.

I have been to Walmart and Target, each more than once. I stopped by the Hen House and was even able to produce my Hen House card when prompted to do so! While we were away in Poland, all of my kitchen drawers and cabinets here at home were rearranged. I have remedied that and things are back to normal. I took Myles' car to have the oil changed and to check and make sure it is in good running order. It seems that there may be a problem with the battery. They tested the battery yesterday and said it needed to be charged, probably because the car had not been driven much while we were gone. Well today I noticed that it was slow to turn over. So when I drove the girls out to Stanley for an outing with the youth group, I stopped by the tire and battery store across the street. The guy told me that the alternator is bad and it is going to cost $650 to fix. I told him that I would have my husband take care of it! He said he was worried about whether or not the car would make it home.

Well I took my chances and he needn't have worried. I called the shop that worked on it yesterday to ask if they checked the alternator. I was able to speak to the guy who worked on it and he said he did. He said that sometimes alternator problems can be intermittent so it is possible that there is a problem, but that it tested fine yesterday. I am taking it back in to have them retest it tomorrow morning. I picked up the girls from Incredibowl and drove all the way home. I then dropped them off and headed over to the car dealership to begin the process of buying a new minivan (well, not new--new to me). I test drove one but did not love it. It was ok. I talked to Myles and we are going to wait until Saturday morning and go over to the dealership together. I hate car shopping!

One of the school moms hosted a lovely coffee get together this morning at her home. It was so nice to see friends that I have not seen since September. People came and went as their schedules allowed.

It was a very nice welcome home, though I was unable to get a picture with everyone who attended! Pictures will be added to some of my very recent posts as soon as Myles gets home with the photo uploader thing.

Today is the first day that we have all felt like we were on somewhat of a normal schedule. I woke up at 5:00 this morning which is a great improvement! I have been surprised at how long it has taken me to acclimate to the time difference. Yesterday was the worst day and today has been the best day. Myles is coming home late tomorrow afternoon. I'm glad we will all be under one roof in our real home!

What Fanny Pack?

2010-06-22T12:58:00.011+02:00

My poor friend Sarah, had to sit down and take some deep breaths on Sunday when she heard a rumor that I had been traipsing all over Europe with a fanny pack attached to me!

I am admitting nothing.

Now some reasons why one MIGHT think it MAY be a good idea to have a fanny pack as a mother of four children who is on a nine month jaunt around Europe are as follows:

*Passports. They are vitally important while traveling. We used them every time we traveled. If one or all of them had been lost or stolen we would have seen Polish red tape that would stretch to eternity. We would have been stuck in Poland and then thrown in jail for being there illegally! I really had no desire to have to contact the US Embassy in Warsaw. Right now as I sit in my own home, I am not even sure which bag the passports are stashed in. In Poland I always knew exactly where they were at all times.

*Credit cards. While we were in Poland, one of our credit cards expired in March. We did not ever receive the new one over there. In fact I think I will call them today to get that taken care of. Then my debit card was canceled because of some breach of security here in the US (some general thing with hundreds of cards--not my card specifically). I still don't know what happened exactly. They did send a replacement card. But since our mail was being forwarded, and credit cards usually are not forwarded, it was sent back to the bank. That left us with ONE credit/debit card that had to be protected at all costs. Myles and I each had one, and keeping them secure was high priority.

*Public Transportation. We did not have a car in Poland. So we took trams and buses or walked everywhere we went. These modes of transportation are frequently crowded. There is a lot of jostling around. There are often reports of purses being stolen and/or things being stolen out of purses. Also, we had public transportation passes. When a transportation checker boards the bus or tram, people have to show their passes. It might be a big pain to have to search through a purse for them while holding on for dear life as the Polish drivers take us for a ride.

*Groceries. Since we did not have a car, we walked to the grocery store almost every day. Carrying bags of groceries 3/4 of a mile is heavy work. Having to carry a purse in addition to our groceries just might be the straw that sends the camel into a complete meltdown.

I brought home four super cute purses, so even IF I might have had a fanny pack in my wardrobe in Poland, I sure don't need it anymore! Again, I'm not admitting anything, I'm just saying it MIGHT have been the smartest option given the circumstances. And I'm sure my girls Ivija and Claudia will never tell! Oh, no! Proof...

Oh, and by the way, I've put the tennis shoes away, too!

The Long Trip Home

2010-06-21T10:42:00.002+02:00

A few evenings ago we were sitting in our backyard in Gdansk having grilled hamburgers with our wonderful neighbors. We packed up their minivan and SUV with all of our luggage before we went to bed.

The next morning, they all (Mariusz, Basia, Karol, Karolina, Anita and Wojtek piled in three cars at 4:40 a.m. to take us to the airport. It is shockingly light at that hour in Poland in June. The sun starts rising at 3:30 a.m. As we were driving to the airport, I was surprised to see so many people out walking around. It sure did not look or seem like it was still nighttime. I guess they take advantage of all that light since they sure don't have it in the winter time!

We arrived at the airport and there was work to be done. I was so thankful to have so many willing helpers. The five of us each had two suitcases to check and we each had two carry on bags, too. I had to go to the LOT (Polish airline that we flew) business office to pay for our excess baggage. When we came over in September we were allowed to check two bags for free. Going home we were only allowed to check one for free. It ended up costing $325 to check the extra bags. Big bummer, but still less than shipping. It took a long time to get that done because the process is not streamlined. The lady entered all the information individually, having to enter my credit card number five times (once for each bag). I also received cards that I was to turn in at each airport so that they could see that we paid for the extra baggage.

While I was doing that, our friends were hanging out with the kids and all of our carry on baggage. Once I was finished getting the bags taken care of, I checked in. They gave me boarding passes for the flight to Warsaw and the flight to Chicago. The lady told me that we would have to get our boarding passes for the Kansas City flight in Chicago. When I was all checked in, we said our good byes. That was the first hard part of the day.

Our flight to Warsaw took off at 6:45. It is a 45 minute flight to Warsaw. Easy and blissfully uneventful. We arrived in Warsaw and made our way to the international flight area. It was about 7:45 when we made it to the security area and we were the only ones there! We were not rushed with anyone behind us. If there is such a thing as a pleasant security check, that was it. We then went to Passport Control. Here is where they check passports and you get a stamp as you are leaving the country.

I had been a little worried about this point. We were perfectly legal in Poland. In fact, the kids and I are still temporary residents of Poland until June 30th. We received official decision letters back in December when we were approved. We were supposed to receive photo identification cards within four months of getting that letter. We paid for them, we had our pictures taken (with the requirement of the left ear showing -- yep, seriously!), but we never received them. We were mostly certain that the decision letters would suffice, but sometimes Polish bureaucracy can be merciless.

I bravely walked up to the window and handed our five passports to the man and the woman who were checking them. They were friendly and made sure that all of our faces matched the pictures on the passports. They laughed at Trey who was making faces at himself in a two way mirror (where people were working on the other side). Then they did not even look at the stamps to indicate when we arrived. They did not question anything and stamped our passports. While I was so glad to get my "you may now leave Poland" stamp, they sure didn't do what they were supposed to do. I did not have to get my decision letters out or justify anything.

Next we had to wait. And wait. And wait. Our flight from Warsaw to Chicago was scheduled to take off at 12:10 so we had time to kill. We sat and did Mad Libs. That's always fun. After a little while a toddler (maybe 15 months or so) and his mother came to the area we were in. The mother did not speak any English, but the kids loved playing with the little boy. Now here's a cultural difference. After about 30 minutes, the mother comes over to me and says "toaleta" and points to her little boy. She wanted me to watch her baby while she went to the bathroom. I agreed, immediately thinking that there is no way in a million years that I would EVER leave my baby with a stranger who is clearly a foreigner in an airport. I know that I am no threat to that baby and would not run off with him, but how on earth would she know that? It's a different world over there. They stayed a while longer, then left for their flight to Kiev.

At 11:20, we went to our gate and I turned in my first set of cards so our luggage would get on the Warsaw to Chicago flight. We boarded the plane and found our seats in row 24. Trey was by the window and I was right next to him. Then across the aisle was Ben with an aisle seat, then Natalie in the middle, then Abbie on the other aisle seat. The flight ended up leaving 30 minutes late. It is a 9 hour, 40 minute flight. It started out fine and then was fairly bumpy for a long time. The kids were so tired and I tried to get them to sleep. But international flights are so crammed and uncomfortable, and the bumpy ride did not allow for sleep. Trey did doze off a little bit.

After about three hours, I did not think Trey looked like he felt well. He said he felt fine, but his eyes looked sick to me. He kept saying he was ok, so I believed him after a while. We switched seats around from time to time. Ben and I had switched seats so I was sitting by the girls and he was by Trey. All of a sudden, nearly six hours into the painfully slow flight, Ben says, "Mom! Trey is sick!" I look over, grab an "air discomfort" bag from the seat pocket in front of me and in a flash I am holding it to his mouth. Unfortunately, he had already thrown up all over his jacket, pants and seat.

I had Abbie flag down a flight attendant. The flight attendant brought a trash bag. I took Trey's jacket off him and threw it right into the trash. I sent Ben to take Trey to the bathroom to help him get cleaned up, and I worked on cleaning up the seat. The flight attendant brought me hot rags to clean up the seat and then I headed back to the bathroom to see how the boys were doing. Ben did a great job cleaning Trey up, but the damage was more than I had hoped. I knew we had few clothing options in our carry on bags. I quickly looked through what we had and found a German soccer goalie shirt of Natalie's and a pair of her red, shiny, long basketball shorts. I changed him out of his clothes and tossed them into the trash. He looked like a little gangster in the way too big and odd looking outfit. There would be a picture to document this, but the batteries were dead in my camera, so the image is left to the imagination.

I asked the flight attendant for an extra blanket and put that down on the still wet seat. Poor Trey did finally sleep for a couple of hours, but had a fever. I was really worried and wondered how I was going to pull off the rest of the trip. I just told myself that I would make a decision in Chicago as to what to do. If he was too sick to continue, at least we would be in the US. He seemed better when he woke up and there was only 30 minutes left in the flight.

We had a very bumpy landing. There was a thunderstorm approaching Chicago and we bounced all over the place before we ended up safely on the ground. The plane was about 15 minutes late. So this meant we had one hour and 45 minutes before our flight to KC. We got off the plane and walked and walked and walked to the customs area. The line was very long. They have lots of Passport control people working, but the line was still slow. Trey was lying on the floor when the line was not moving. It was so sad. When we finally reached the front of the line, about 35 minutes later, a very nice customs agent asked me a bunch of questions about the time we spent in Poland and what we were bringing into the country. As he stamped our passports, he cheerfully said, "Welcome home to the United States." Music to my ears!

The next step was to get all of our checked luggage from the baggage area. In Chicago, on international flights you have to get your checked luggage yourself and take it to be rescreened in an area about 100 feet away. Well, we rounded up four luggage carts and waited for our baggage. When we collected all 10 pieces, we rolled our carts to the rescreening area. At that point I had to stop at the ticket counter and get our boarding passes for our flight to Kansas City. They lady printed them and told me that we were going to have to take a train to terminal 1 (international is in terminal 5) and we were going to be lucky to make our flight.

Poor Trey was still not feeling great, but was holding his own, so off we went, hurrying to the train. I noticed while waiting for the train that it was pouring rain, and there was lightning everywhere. The flags were blowing like crazy. I was actually relieved because I knew no flights could be taking off in that weather so we had some time. We reached our gate (C-29) at about 5:10 p.m., and the board said that our flight had been delayed until 6:43 p.m. (from 5:15 originally). Ok, so I get the kids situated on the floor by a big pillar and get some sandwiches for dinner. Trey just wanted to drink some root beer, but he did perk up a little bit. At 5:30, I went to check the board to see if our flight had been delayed any further and saw that it had been changed. It had been moved UP to 6:00 and the gate had changed to C-28. I hurried back to where the kids were and we loaded up all of our carry ons and went to the other gate.

They started boarding right when we got there and we made it on the plane and found our seats. I was still questioning whether or not I should push Trey but he seemed ok and the flight was only scheduled to be 90 minutes. We pushed back from the gate a little after six. Then we sat for a long time. Then after about 40 minutes we finally started moving. I thought, "Ok, here we go." Wrong!

We taxied to the runway and got in line behind a whole bunch of planes waiting to take off. The captain came on and announced that they were getting all the planes that had been flying down on the ground because many had been circling due to the thunderstorm and were low on fuel. So we sat. And we sat. And we sat. But they were not letting people get up because every few minutes we would inch forward. Finally, after another hour, we took off. And a little over an hour later, we were on the ground in Kansas City!

At this point we had been awake for more than 24 hours straight. We went to baggage claim and nine out of our 10 bags showed up. I knew that we had all of them in Chicago, but somehow one did not make it on our flight. The lost luggage lady told me that I could call United the next day to make a claim if I didn't want to do it right then. I had decided back in March when we bought our tickets that we would stay at the Embassy Suites by the airport upon our arrival. I knew back then that we would be tired from our trip. I was so glad that I opted for that because we were beyond exhausted and it took only a few minutes to reach the hotel. The hotel stored all of our bags for us so we would not have to take them all to our room. We went right to bed. And when we woke up at about 4 a.m. (that's 11 a.m. by our clocks), we waited for the breakfast buffet to open at 7:00 and enjoyed the fabulous breakfast they have!

It's a long, long way from Gdansk, Poland to Olathe, Kansas.

Until We Meet Again

2010-06-17T15:01:00.002+02:00

We knew it would happen before we started this journey. We expected it to happen. And it did. We made friends here! We have been so lucky to meet such wonderful people from all over the world on our great adventure to Poland. The hard part now is that we've become attached. Saying good bye is much harder leaving Poland than when we left Olathe. When we left home we knew that we would be returning to our fair city in nine months; to the people who are important to us, our house, our church, our school, our neighborhood and our life that is so familiar and easy. We will be able to pick up nearly where we left off. As we leave Poland we are faced with the reality that on this side of heaven, we will likely never again see some of these folks who have become so important to us. That makes this good bye much more difficult.

Myles is continuing his affiliation with Politechnika, so there will be future trips to Gdansk from time to time. But people move, situations change, jobs evolve and it's incredibly expensive to travel. As we prepare to leave, other families we know here are also preparing new chapters in their lives. One family is moving to Italy this summer, one to Denmark next year, one to Japan within the next couple of years, one will be considering whether they stay in Gdansk or not within the next year. I have marveled at the timing and how we happened upon this particular group of people. We were only here for less than a year, just passing through really. It was so unlikely for many of us to ever cross paths. We consider it an incredible gift that we did! And since technology has in recent years made it so easy, we can keep our connections through Facebook and email, though it is of course, not the same.

Going home to the life we know is joyful, make no mistake. But as with any crossroad, taking one path means not taking another one. My friend Claudia, refuses to say "good bye."

She insists that we leave it as, "Until we meet again..." I could not agree more. Her family is moving to Rome in July. So now I have a friend in Rome and she has a friend in Kansas City. Who got the better end in that deal? Sorry, Claudia!

Ivija, who I have added to my permanent BFF collection, grew up in Latvia under communism until it fell when she was a teenager. We frequently discover and laugh about little cultural differences. I consider our friendship one of the greatest treasures of this trip. Ivija can see planes as they take off from the Gdansk airport from her house. She has promised to wave as our plane goes by--we'll be looking for her! And Ulla is from Denmark. I have been able to spend more time with her lately, and she kept us all laughing when we were together--I'm going to miss these girls!

We will always remember the friends we met along the way:

The Politechnika gang

Myles with Ewa, Jerzy and Marzena

Myles with Magda (who helped us with a million and one things) and the Dean of the Faculty of Management, Piotr.

The British School Moms (nothing better than girlfriends!)

The British School Kids

Maria Camilla and Emily

Trey and Emily

Natalie, Inga, Marina, Abbie

Nick, Ben, Mads: I hear that these boys have made big plans to make a trip to our house in Olathe next summer. We'll be at the airport with smiles and the minivan to pick them up!

Ben with Mr. Kevin D'Arcy (teacher and school director from Australia). He tutored us (both Ben and I) with some of the nastier geometry concepts we were doing at home. Here is the website for the school: www.bis-gdansk.pl.

Abbie and Natalie with Mr. Kevin Reilly (teacher from England). He told me recently that when the girls first started at the British school, he had a hard time understanding them with their "American accents". We have to tune our ears to understand HIM. Funny.

Trey with Miss Marta (teacher from Poland). She is so great with the little kids, and she put on the fabulous Christmas play.

Trey with Filip

Mariusz and Basia...our landlords, neighbors, friends

With Basia, one of the sweetest people I have ever met. She was a child bride at 18 years old. She is my age but her children are 23 and 19!

Karol (Mariusz & Basia's son) and his fiancee, Karolina. Karol was our official translator. He speaks English fluently. He had English in school, but says that he really learned how to speak well by watching TV. Karolina also speaks English very well.

Anita and her daddy, Mariusz, at Christmastime.

In this picture (taken in 2001), nine year old Anita is sitting at the feet of Pope John Paul II and they are looking at each other. This is a bit of a digression for this post, but I think the photo is priceless and I had to find a spot for it!

We cannot thank the people we have met enough for their explanations of simple things, assistance in many areas and friendship along the way. We gained much from these folks and we hope that we have been good ambassadors for the United States. We have extended invitations to all our friends to visit us in America, and hope that we can repay some of the kindness they all have shown to us over the past nine months.

So it's not good bye. It's "until we meet again."

Winding Down and Gearing Up

2010-06-14T13:56:00.004+02:00

We are down to less than a week before we are home. HOME! We are all looking forward to getting there, but the chores standing between now and then seem like a mountain.

Today the kids are at the British School for the last time. The school year officially ends here on June 25th, so we're ditching early. Today is the last day of classes, but my kids are getting together with their classmates on Wednesday for some laser tag. So we will get to see everyone one more time.

I went downtown this morning to pick up a couple of things that I want to bring home. I blew through my list (and Myles' money) with no problem. We have five suitcases completely packed, closed up and ready to go. There are three suitcases sitting open on the living room floor. Each one has a specific job and NO ONE (but me) is allowed to add to, take away from or even look in the direction of these suitcases. It is going to be a delicate operation getting everything home. When we came here, we were each allowed to check two bags and take two carry ons. Now since the airline rules have changed, we are only allowed to check one bag each for free. So we are going to be paying a hefty fee to check the five additional bags we have. We weighed the options, and paying the $50/bag is much cheaper than shipping. We still don't like it, though.

So we're getting loose ends tied up here. As the kids and I are arriving in Olathe on Sunday, Myles will be leaving Gdansk for a conference in Denmark. He will arrive home on June 25th, probably the minute after I get everything up and running at home!

There is a school dad at home who is in the car business. We have contacted him by email and he is currently on the lookout for our dream, used, inexpensive, totally loaded minivan! Hmm, we'll see what he comes up with given those parameters. I have no doubt he will find the perfect van for our family!

Ben has one small section left of online geometry. We plan to get that submitted today or tomorrow. Then he has a couple of assignments left for English. Once those are finished we are done for our year of home schooling. We started the home school program in mid October so we made very nice progress.

Next week I have all kinds of people coming to our house in Olathe to restore order to our lives. The a/c guy is coming to check the unit. After living in Poland for nearly a year (the high temp today is 60), we are very unprepared for the wall of heat we are going to hit when we arrive in KC. The phone and tv people will be setting up service for us. We are having some other miscellaneous jobs done, so I will be having lots of traffic in the house.

Then there's the unpacking. I don't even want to think about it! But I'll get the essential things out of the attic first, and then I'll plow through the rest over the course of our short summer. Somehow it all gets done.

These last days are flying by in a hurry. We keep reminding ourselves that even though there is much to do, we need to enjoy this short time left.

We Had Plans To Go To Hel Today

2010-06-10T18:56:00.007+02:00

We had waited and waited for decent weather here because we were wanting to take a boat to Hel. We finally have it! We decided that we would take a two hour boat ride to the city of Hel, Poland. It is a fishing village and tourist town at the tip of a peninsula about 17 miles out in the Baltic Sea. When we looked at the schedule of times for our boat, we misunderstood part of it. Luckily we realized our mistake before we set out on the journey. We decided that we did not want to spend an entire day in Hel since we are leaving in a week and still have a lot to do to prepare for our homecoming trip. Hel will just have to wait until another time we are in northern Poland.

We went to Gdynia instead. Gdynia is north of Gdansk and it takes about 30 minutes to get there by train. It is very scenic up there and we are so glad we visited Gdynia before we left. Of course, they have a John Paul II street.

We walked by a movie theater and I enjoyed seeing all the American movies with the titles in Polish.

We had gigantic hamburgers with cole slaw on them and all kinds of unidentifiable (though yummy) sauces for lunch. Our whole family ate for the equivalent of about $15, including drinks! Here are Natalie, Abbie and Trey enjoying their lunch by the big fountain in Kosciuszki Square.

Gdynia is a haven for tourists. Many cruise ships dock there for a day. We watched a huge one come into the port. That was pretty cool. The view of the Baltic Sea is stunning from the port in Gdynia.

There are many places where people can sit and watch the boats on the water. Of course, there is a beach there, but we did not go to that part. We stayed in the area where all the boats went by.

Abbie really liked this boat with all the mermaids carved on the side.

This warship was in many battles in WWII. It is now a museum. It is the only Polish ship that was built before the war to survive the war.

We have been seeing these waffle dessert treats (gofry) for months. Today we finally tried them. Seriously delicious! That is a Polish tradition that we will bring home with us for sure. Ben had his with chocolate and cherries. Yum!

As we were heading back to the train station we saw these funky trees all over the place.

Our trip to Gdynia was no trip to Hel, but we had a great day! We were gone only for the afternoon and were still able to get some more packing done at home.

What A Day!

2010-06-08T08:12:00.010+02:00

Ok, so I took the kids to school on Monday morning and arrived back home just after 9:00. I was free to clean and organize to my heart's content. Our landlord was bringing over the people interested in renting the house at 1:00.

I started upstairs. I opened all the windows in the three bedrooms and the bathroom up there. I had my music going from 106.5 The Wolf (so awesome to listen to a KC radio station live in Poland!). When it is morning here, it is the middle of the night at home. So guess what? No talking DJs, not so many commercials. It's a good time to listen. Everything was dusted and by the time I was finished upstairs, the sparkling and shining ruled all!

I took my cleaning agent and set to work on the tile stairs. I am not really a fan of tile stairs, but they are quite common here. I am always after the kids to PLEASE be careful and DO NOT run down those stairs--a fall down tile stairs would be bad.

Next I finish up the kitchen and the living room. At this point it is 11:15, and I admire my work and how cute this little house is. I still have the little downstairs bathroom to clean, and to make the bed and straighten up in our bedroom, both of which are visible when you enter the front door of the house.

Right then my music goes off, meaning I have lost my internet connection. Bummer, but that happens fairly frequently here. Last week our neighborhood had no internet from Wednesday until Friday. Suddenly, I hear voices in the yard. I look out the window and here comes Mariusz with people! At 11:15. Excuse me, I have one hour and forty five minutes to get my 30 remaining minutes of work done. Nope. When they knock, I open the door with my scrub brush in hand.

It was obvious that I had been cleaning and that I was not quite finished yet. They breezed by the bedroom and bathroom and into the living room. They went upstairs and stayed there for 10 minutes or so and I had a chance to quickly get the bathroom in pretty good shape. They came back down, talked in the living room for a few more minutes. Then they left, never even giving a glance to my semi clean downstairs bathroom or my mostly clean bedroom with the unmade bed and stacks of stuff on the dresser. They continued to talk out in the yard for about 10 more minutes. I have no idea if they are going to rent the place or not, but they seem interested.

The good thing about them coming early was that it gave me a little extra time in the afternoon that I had not been expecting. Ben is finishing up his Geometry class. This has been the most challenging of his classes because I have to take a lot of time and learn the material so I can go over it with him. The Professor is brilliant in many things, but somehow Geometry is not on his list. So I worked on learning Geometry in my quiet, almost clean house.

When it was time to pick up the kids from school, I walked to the tram as usual. I was about five minutes earlier than I usually am so I caught an earlier tram. This would give me more time to chat with the other moms as we wait for the kids to come out. To get to school we get off the tram at the Reja stop. This time, when the tram stopped there, a 20ish year old girl and I push the button for the doors to open. They don't open. We try again, and again. The doors do not open. Then the tram starts going again. We are stuck! So now I am no longer early and I'm wondering if the doors are broken broken, or if it was just a fluke. They seemed to work fine when I got on the tram two stops prior. Should I call Ivija and have her grab my kids? What if I am trapped in the tram indefinitely? I decide to wait to see if the doors open at the next stop.

When the tram stopped at the next stop, Wyspianskiego, the doors opened just fine. A whole bunch of people exited at this stop. I was glad to be off the tram, but this meant that I would either have to walk all the way back to Reja to walk the path I know, or I would have to figure out how to get to the school from where I was. I decided that it would take too long to walk back to Reja. In Gdansk, there are all kinds of little back ways to get places. These are paths and trails with no signs through wooded areas and neighborhoods. I managed to get to school on time, though I'm pretty sure I would not be able to recreate the exact route again!

When we arrived home from school, we got ready to go to a bowling outing with Myles' colleagues. Myles and I decided to meet in Old Town at 6:00 to have dinner at one of our favorite places in Gdansk.

Trey dropped a piece of his pizza and this pigeon joined us for nearly the entire meal.

I've told my family that I do not plan to buy many groceries for the last week we are here, so we may make it to Lezzetli's one more time before we head home!

After dinner we went to the bowling alley. It was a great night!

It was a gathering to say good bye to Myles. He will be tying up loose ends next week, and they wanted to have an event before time got away from all of us.

There was quite a nice turn out and everyone had a blast.

The Dean gave a very nice little speech about Myles and thanked him for his service to the university this year.

They gave him a beautiful National Geographic book on Polska and three CDs of Polish music.

By the time we got home last night it was 11:00 p.m. The kids were instructed to sleep in this morning! It is 9:30 a.m. right now. Trey and Abbie are watching television, but my teenagers are dutifully following my orders and are sleeping away.

Signs of Gdansk

2010-06-06T20:46:00.009+02:00

Time is whizzing by now! We are hustling around trying to get all our fun in before we leave in two weeks! Our landlord is bringing over prospective tenants to look at our rental house tomorrow. This actually has helped motivate us to get things packed up and ready to go. We have donated all of our winter clothes. Now some really good news for us (though very bad news for Europe overall) is that the Polish currency, the złoty, is very weak right now. The US Dollar is the strongest it has been in Europe in years. Bad for Europe, good for the Gartlands! We are having a little fun with how inexpensive everything is right now. We are going shopping for summer clothes this week. Thanks Greece!

We have been spending time at the beach. It has been getting into the 70s for the past few days, but a jacket is still a must after dinnertime.

Some kids collect seashells on the beach. My seven year old collects bottle caps! And there seems to be an infinite number of them on the beaches of Gdansk.

We have been making an effort to get as many signs in our pictures as we can. In a very short amount of time this will all be a memory. That's hard to believe.

This sign has always made me laugh.

There are signs just like it all over the place. If you follow the sign, hop on a big boat,

and cross the Baltic Sea, you will end up in Stockholm, Sweden. But I guess you're out of luck if you want to go to Helsinki! There is a big red X over Helsinki on all the signs. Hmmm. Here we are on the banks of the Vistula River.

We went to the place where the first shots of World War II were fired. A German soldier with a machine gun climbed up into this lighthouse and began shooting.

There was a German ship here where the Vistula River empties into the Baltic Sea.

At the same time the guy in the lighthouse was starting to shoot, they also began firing on Polish troops across the river into Westerplatte. This is where a big 70th anniversary ceremony was held this past September. Many world leaders were here along with some dude representing the US who I had never heard of.

There is now a big memorial to those Polish soldiers who died in that first battle.

We are going to be very busy for the next two weeks--but we plan to still take in as much as we can while we are here. We are so looking forward to being home! We've been gone a long time!

Now Where Did I Put Those Good Moods?

2010-05-31T18:00:00.002+02:00

On Thursday, our family was invited to dinner at the home of Myles' colleague, Magda. Several other people from the university and their families were there as well. We knew that the others were bringing dishes for the meal. But when we asked Magda what we could bring to contribute to the dinner, she said that she just wanted to bring our good moods!

Magda lives in a neighborhood that we had never been to before. We made it without a problem to the city center. We go there all the time. They don't live far from there but we had to find the right bus stop and there are MANY of them in the city center. It did not help that it was 48 degrees and pouring down rain as we are trying to find the right place. I had packed up our good moods, but by the time we finally located and got on the right bus they were nowhere to be found! It only took about 10 minutes to reach our stop in Magda's neighborhood. Then it was about a five minute walk (in the rain, over the hill and through the woods) to reach her apartment.

When we finally made it everyone else was already there. There were several kids there. The bigger kids played pool and the younger ones played with Legos and ran around. The food was delicious and the company was wonderful. All of the people there were associated with the university, and they all speak English fluently. They had some hearty laughs at what we thought was unusual about Poland. We complained about the tiny bottles of milk. The largest size is one liter. That's not much milk. We complained about the tiny bags of cereal, and the fact that I have to buy a dozen at a time. We complained about everything tiny (refrigerators, ovens, etc). We complained about all stores closing for minor holidays. They laughed and laughed. By the time the evening was over our good moods had reappeared. The time flew by and we enjoyed the visit.

On Friday, Myles and Ben attempted to make a trip to Stutthof. I have been there when my sister was visiting in March. They want to be sure to make it out there before we leave. I went with them to Old Town because I had an errand to do down there. We saw this sign outside the KFC with a new offer: Mojitos! We did not partake, but what a fun idea having a mojito with the original recipe! And they are cheap, too--5,99 PLN is less than $2.

They ended up not going to Stutthof because by the time they reached the bus station, there was a big gap in the schedule and they would have had to wait for a long time. They ended up going to the Post Office that was attacked on September 1, 1939, starting World War II. Myles will blog about what he and Ben saw there. They are planning to go to Stutthof tomorrow.

Yesterday we joined our neighbors at some property they have south of town. I am a little fuzzy on how this all works, but there is land that is divided up into parcels that is owned by the state. It is two kilometers from the Sea and a stone's throw from an arm of the Vistula River. Ship building and repairing goes on just on the other side of the fence of this property.

People can apply for use of the land. Our neighbors have several little pieces of this land that they acquired in 2004, and they are free to do whatever they want with it for their lifetime. They have built a little house (one bedroom, sofa, tiny kitchen, tiny bathroom) out there. Many people use these parcels of land for gardening. Mariusz and Basia have made theirs a lovely little getaway and they go there nearly every weekend that the weather is nice.

We ran into a little problem when Trey's ball went into the little pond and neither he nor the dog could figure out a solution.

We brought an American picnic with us. We served seven layer dip (always a hit at any party!). Myles grilled up some hamburgers (with a little help from Karol and Ben), complete with BBQ sauce, and we fixed a couple of American side dishes as well.

After we ate we visited and were entertained with music. Karol played and Karolina (his fiancee) sang.

The whole family joined in and sang together.

Then Karol took Natalie's request and played a little Bon Jovi!

It was at this gathering that we discovered that my firstborn baby, 15 and a half years old, is now taller than his Momma!

The kids went to school today. I spent the day sorting things in the house. I have three suitcases completely packed and ready to go and much of our winter wardrobe has already been donated. It is a huge hassle and extremely expensive to ship boxes back to the US, so we are trying to avoid that expense. We are not bringing home anything that is easily available in the US. The reality of our return home is coming quickly!

Outside Weather

2010-05-23T17:54:00.011+02:00

It appears that spring MIGHT have come to our neck of the woods. Looks like KC might have skipped spring altogether. From the weather reports I've seen, it sounds like it's summertime at home! We have had some delightful spring days this past week. We spent some time at the beach.

We have to get our beach time in before we leave in just about a month.

We don't have that lovely coastline in Kansas! I sat and read my book while the kids enjoyed the waves.

They came home completely filthy and brought a ridiculous amount of the sand home with us.

On Saturday, we spent the afternoon and evening with some friends having a bar-b-que in their backyard.

We had a very nice time relaxing and visiting with them. And since our time here is short, we are really realizing how much we are going to miss them. We met some other friends of theirs who joined us for the cookout. There were lots of kids running around and everyone had a wonderful time. No one wanted to go home!

Today we went to Mass as normal. They were celebrating a First Communion class today. The kids were so cute. They wear suits and First Communion dresses to church, but during Mass they all have a white robe garment over their clothes. It is neat to see the differences and the similarities between what we know and what they do here. Three of my little nieces made their First Communion in the past few weeks at home. As I watched these little, wide eyed Polish children today, Lindsey, Aubrey and Chloe were on my mind.

This afternoon we went downtown to the city center. The weather has been about 70 for the past two days so it has been fabulous. Vendors are now out on the streets finally. Now there are lots of different things to look at. We have also noticed an upsurge in the number of people speaking English on the streets down there. It is tourist season!

While we were walking around, there was a big emblem on the side of a trailer that is the symbol for the city of Gdansk. We tried several times to have someone take a picture of our family in front of this emblem. While everyone we asked was very nice and willing to take our picture (we have three just like this)...

...we could not seem to make anyone understand that the background was just as important to us as the six of us being in the photo.

We gave up as the truck pulling the trailer started up and drove away with our background.

We watched the boats on the river. Trey loved this pirate boat called Czarne Perla (Black Pearl). He used his allowance money to buy this very stylish pirate hat from a vendor (for about the equivalent of $4).

He's already decided that he will be a pirate for Halloween. So I'll come up with an eyepatch and we'll be ready to go in October! This boat goes to Westerplatte. We have plans to visit there before we leave.

We had an early dinner in Old Town. There were all kinds of food options. Myles and I had kebabs.

Ben had this "pizzaesque" thing and the other kids enjoyed kielbasa and potatoes.

They were setting up for a concert for this evening. We did not stay for it but we did hear plenty of music while they were rehearsing.

We came home a different way than we usually do. We pass by this statue all the time by bus or tram, but we are seldom walking by it. This is the priest from St. Stanislaus (where we go to church) Bronislaw Komorowski, who was kidnapped and taken to Stutthof concentration camp in September 1939. He was murdered along with thousands at Stutthof. We pass by this often and I have never seen it without fresh flowers. His photograph is on the wall at St. Stanislaus and the same photo is displayed at Stutthof.

The temperatures are supposed to be in the 50s this week so it looks like spring kind of comes and goes. But we don't mind the 50s so much. We can get out with jackets if necessary!

Rain, Rain, Rain and a little bit of Sweden

2010-05-16T21:00:00.008+02:00

We have done more than our share of traveling over the past nine months. We've been to nine countries during every part of the year except for summer, when normal people would be traveling around Europe! But this was our opportunity, so we went when we went. We have been incredibly lucky with weather while we hauled ourselves all over Europe. So we were due for one lousy weather day...and we got it! Saturday was our last full day in Copenhagen. We had plans to rent bikes and ride all over the place like all the Danish people do, but it was not to be.

When I got up at about 7:00, it was cold (about 45) and rainy, pouring in fact. Abbie and I walked to a grocery store that is about a block away. I have learned something about myself. If I can find a great grocery store close by wherever we are, I am happy. It's that simple. The store we went to in the morning was fantastic! It had a great selection and was as nice as any Hen House in KC! Abbie and I bought breakfast items: pancakes, eggs, bacon and some kind of awesome looking hash thing to name a few. We came home and made a big cozy breakfast for everyone.

The revised plan was to enjoy our breakfast, take our time getting ready and then head out in the afternoon. We kept looking outside and it kept raining, and kept raining...harder and harder. So at about 1:30 people were getting hungry, AGAIN! So this time Ben and I braved the cold rain and hurried to the same store. While the rest of my family was at the apartment watching Everybody Loves Raymond in English, with Danish subtitles, Ben and I gathered up ingredients for homemade nachos at the wonderful grocery store. I toyed with the idea of getting groceries for dinner as well while I was there. But I decided that we should venture out for dinner no matter what the weather was like. And I vowed that I would not make three trips to the same grocery store in the same day. So we assembled our lunch and it was of course, a big hit. I can't go wrong with nachos as far as my kids are concerned.

As the afternoon progressed into evening, the rain did taper into a drizzle. It was still cold and miserable out, but we went out to find a restaurant for dinner. As we passed by the awesome grocery store, I took a picture of my two brave shopping partners with it in the background.

We found a place to eat about six blocks away and that worked out fine. It was not one of our favorite places that we have ever eaten, but the service was good, the food was good and Natalie got this cool carafe with who knows what kind of leaf in it when she ordered water with her dinner.

Today we headed to the train station to take our train over to Malmo, Sweden. It was still misty when we got to the station. Here are Natalie, Ben and Trey in front of the train station building with the bike parking lot behind them.

We arrived in Malmo around lunchtime. We locked up all of our luggage (we each have one small carry on bag--I have learned to pack light these last nine months!) in lockers at the train station. Our flight was not until 5:40 so we had some time to wander around this really cute city in Sweden.

We had no plans, no agenda, just seeing where the wind would take us.

We came across these very sweet marching band statues. Abbie and Trey got right in line and joined them.

Myles and Ben decided that they wanted to see some castle and city hall, and I'm not sure what else. The girls and I (and tagalong Trey, who wanted no part of any castles) went shopping! We all met up later at the train station, picked up our bags and went to find our bus. Then right as we were getting ready to board the bus for the airport, what did we see? Hints of blue skies!

After an uneventful 40 minute flight back to Gdansk (of course, with applause for safely landing), we waited for about 20 minutes at the Gdansk airport for our bus. It is 45 degrees and overcast and gloomy. While we were waiting, we noticed this sign for Gdansk:

It is of a man and woman lounging in their beach chairs on what appears to be a warm day, enjoying the beautiful Baltic Sea. They are not wearing hats, scarves, coats, gloves in the picture. Um, I don't know what they call it here in Poland, but in America, we call it FALSE ADVERTISING!

The kids are off to school tomorrow and I am going to start organizing our stuff to bring home next month.

A Really Great Day, But No Warm Weather

2010-05-14T21:11:00.013+02:00

We had a fun day on Friday. We had Danish sandwiches called Smørrebrød (open faced with lots of weird stuff on them!) for lunch.

The reviews from the kids were mixed but they did all try them. We walked all over the picturesque city of Copenhagen.

We continued walking and found Amalienborg Palace. This is where the current Queen of Denmark, Margrethe II, lives with her family. Like England, her husband is a Prince rather than the king. They have two grown children, Prince Frederich (heir to the throne) who is married to Princess Mary. They have a son, Prince Christian who will inherit the throne someday. The other son is Prince Joachim, who is also married with a family. We saw many Danish military guards at the palace,

and we were able to see the changing of the guard. That was pretty neat, though these guards are so young. Peoples' children are guarding the palace! There is traffic going right through the royal complex. At one point we saw a huge tractor trailer go through. As Americans, this struck us as so odd. We are used to lock down security! If we had such a complex, there would not be access to just anybody, especially large vehicles.

After our walking tour of the city, we took the kids to Tivoli Gardens. It is the second oldest amusement park in the world, and it opened in 1843. The oldest one is also in Denmark and from what I understand it is not too far from where we were today. Tivoli is a place that Walt Disney visited and inspired his plans for Disneyland. It was easy to see basic similarities as we entered the park. The gardens are stunning, there are many fountains and small town like roads and buildings. Worlds of Fun also has a very similar layout, though it is much bigger. Tivoli is right in the middle of downtown Copenhagen so there is no room to expand as Worlds of Fun has (out in the middle of nowhere!). This replica statue of The Little Mermaid is in one of the many bodies of water at the park.

Abbie, (aka The Kansas Crab) met a new friend at the park.

The kids had a blast. With Myles' encouragement, my BABY went on a big roller coaster with the big kids. I'm not sure I will ever forgive him for that!

Ben has inherited my bad motion intolerance so he wisely chooses to avoid most of the extreme rides. Natalie, however proved to be quite the daredevil. She not only insisted on riding the loopy roller coaster and the tower that drops really fast, she went alone! Myles and I did not buy tickets for us to ride, Ben's stomach can't take those things and Abbie was scared. But then at the end Abbie found some courage and rode on the big roller coaster when Natalie went a second time. They loved it, though I'm not sure Abbie will try it again anytime soon.

They had a blast on many rides: Abbie on the Ferris Wheel

Natalie with the bumper cars

Ben in a boat

Trey pulling himself (and Ben) way high

We left the park at about 8:00 only because we were freezing! We had been out all day. The temperatures were in the low 50s and it was cloudy during the day. In the evening it dropped into the 40s, and that really is not amusement park weather. Nonetheless, everyone had a great time and the Tivoli experience is now right up near the top of our European adventure!

Copenhagen

2010-05-13T20:23:00.013+02:00

The first time I have heard thunder and seen lightning since I've been in Gdansk was yesterday...on our way to the airport! Luckily, the storm was very short and our flight to Malmo, Sweden was unaffected. The flight to Malmo was about 45 minutes and we landed in pretty dense fog. Also not comforting. When we arrived, we took a bus from the airport to the train station in downtown Malmo. The train goes on the Oresund Bridge, crossing the Oresund Strait into Copenhagen, Denmark. The train ride takes about 30 minutes. The bridge is partly over the water and partly a tunnel under the water. It is really cool, but it was so foggy we really could not see a thing. We flew into Malmo as it is much, much cheaper then flying into the Copenhagen airport. The only downside is the little extra train travel. We arrived at our apartment at about 8:00 p.m. That is no problem since it is light until about 10:00 this time of year.

This morning we set out to see what Copenhagen is all about. We were disappointed that it is overcast and only about 50 degrees! We seem to be stuck in March over here in Europe. Also, many shops were closed today. We could not figure out why. I looked it up and Ascension Day is a public holiday here. I was surprised to learn that. On our way into downtown, we came across this model of what Copenhagen looked like in the 1530s.

We walked on to the Ripley's Believe It Or Not museum.

There were many things that we all enjoyed at the museum from the funny mirrors,

to the funny facts, to the bizarre.

Attached to Ripley's is a small museum dedicated to Hans Christian Andersen, who is from Copenhagen. He is most definitely a source of pride for Denmark.

He wrote The Little Mermaid, The Ugly Duckling, Thumbelina,

and many other stories in the early to mid 19th century. This little museum was so well done, appealing to children as well as adults.

From there we had lunch in a little sandwich shop and went to the Guinness World Record Museum. It is actually part of the Ripley Museum. We were not impressed since much of it was not up to date. We did enjoy seeing how we measure up to the tallest man ever, Robert Wadlow, who was 8' 11"...

and the shortest woman ever. There were interesting facts that we learned, and Natalie loved seeing Mia Hamm's jersey.

After all of that we headed back to the apartment to hang out for a bit before dinner. Along the way we saw this restaurant that really made us homesick! We had no idea there was a Hereford House in Copenhagen, Denmark! We thought that was a Kansas City original.

We ended up going to dinner at a place very close to our apartment. It was delicious. Myles and Ben had mussels and enjoyed them tremendously.

Pasta and nachos made the rest of us very happy.

We are hoping that the weather is warmer and brighter for the rest of our trip (we'd settle for warmer!).

NASA Comes to Gdansk

2010-05-10T15:36:00.007+02:00

Last Monday was a Polish holiday so the British School was closed. The Monday before that we were in Germany so the kids did not go to school. And today we ditched school yet again! Actually, we just switched days this week, they will go tomorrow instead. A fantastic opportunity popped up that we could not say no to.

An American astronaut, Steve Robinson, was visiting Gdansk today. He was speaking in a large auditorium at Gdansk Politechnika. In fact, Myles got to introduce him!

The auditorium was jam packed. There were people sitting and standing in the aisles. I was thinking to myself that this would never fly in the US (to heck with fire codes)! We were considered VIPs (wowza!) and we got to sit right up front.

Dr. Robinson went on a space station mission this past February and was there for almost two weeks. He did not do a space walk on this past mission, but he has twice before. His presentation was fascinating with spectacular photos. He talked about what it was like in the international space station.

On this most recent mission, six American astronauts went on the Space Shuttle Endeavor and met up with five others who were already at the space station. Two are American, one is Japanese and two are Russian. He talked about lots of different things about space travel, and we enjoyed his presentation very much. Here is more information on Steve Robinson.

When he was finished with his presentation there was a question and answer session. Imagine my fear when Trey's hand shot up. I needn't have worried. When Dr. Robinson called on Trey, sitting cutely in the front row, Trey asked, "What language do you speak at the Space Station?" What a smart question! Turns out that everyone at the Space Station is fluent in English and Russian. Who knew? Someone asked him if he thought there was a possibility of intelligent life out there somewhere. I liked his answer. He said that the vastness of the universe is incomprehensible. So, it is certainly possible, maybe even likely, that there is something else out there. But because the universe is so vast, if other life does exist, it is highly unlikely that we will ever know about it.

There were many questions from the audience that were answered by Dr. Robinson. There would have been more but they ran out of time. There were television cameras and newspaper reporters there, and many cameras flashing throughout the presentation. I think no one expected the large amount of interest that our American astronaut generated.

We were able to meet him and shake his hand. I was only somewhat offended when he said, "Nice to meet you, mom," to me. I'll just say it's a good thing he was nice looking! I was able to snap this picture at the very end.

It's not as clear as I would have hoped but I was lucky to get a picture of him with my kids at all. Awesome!

It Only Sounds Like a Good Idea

2010-05-06T13:00:00.011+02:00

We recently learned that the museums in Gdansk are free on Tuesdays. Great! We're cheapskates so that sounds perfect for us. This past Tuesday we went to Old Town to go see the museum on the history of Gdansk. This city is 1,000 years old so there is much history. The museum has been closed since we arrived because they have been (presumably) working on it. We were so excited to hear it was opened again and to see all the exhibits that we are now familiar with and certainly feel a connection with Gdansk. Here is Abbie at the top of the steps of the pretty entrance.

The lobby looked promising, and Ben is standing by an ornate doorway. It didn't lead to anywhere, but it was beautiful.

We went into a large room. It had portrait paintings of Polish kings on the walls and this large tapestry that has 1975 at the top on the right side.

And that was it. This museum of the history of Gdansk had some pictures of some kings. There was nothing about who these kings were, when they were kings, what the story is behind the tapestry, or any Gdansk history at all! Ok, so then we realize that there is more to the museum upstairs. Thank goodness! We climb two stories and find another room. But it was filled with some temporary French porcelain exhibit. Pretty stuff, but we did not learn one tidbit about the history of Gdansk. Um, I'm sure glad we didn't go on a day we had to pay!

So then we go to the Artus Court Museum which is a few doors down the street. From the website it looks fascinating. The front door is as far as we got because it was closed! Now it is a bit confusing to me that a museum would advertise that it is free on Tuesdays and then be closed on Tuesday. So our Tuesday museum outing was a bust.

But it was a nice day and we saw a guy with some parakeets that were supposed to do some kind of tricks.

We walked over and continued to be unimpressed as they really did nothing (though Trey enjoyed seeing the birds).

Since we were downtown, we followed the signs to St. Nicholas church. It is a Gothic church that is the oldest in Gdansk. It was built in the late 12th century. That was worth the trip downtown. There is of course, a "John Paul II was here" portrait.

They have the biggest, most beautiful and detailed Stations of the Cross art that I have ever seen.

On our way home we came across this statue of a flower. It was a gift to Gdansk from the city of Nagasaki.

Yesterday was Cinco de Mayo. We did have tacos for dinner, but they were soft shelled. There are no taco shells in Poland (that I have found anyway). That's ok, though. We have found some pretty good salsa here. It is made in Mexico and then distributed from Laredo, Texas! Then when it reaches Poland they put a sticker with the ingredients listed in Polish over the nutrition information in English. They do have some good tortilla chips here, too, so we were all set.

There are more museums in Gdansk that we have not been to yet. We'll try again on another Tuesday and see if we have better luck!

Beach, BBQ and Bigos

2010-05-03T12:10:00.013+02:00

We returned from our trip to Germany last Tuesday. On Thursday evening, Myles and I stole away for a lovely dinner out.

This is the second time since we have been in Europe that we have been out to dinner by ourselves. (The first time was our luxurious cruise down the Danube on New Year's Day in Budapest). We went to Old Town to a nice restaurant that we have walked by many times. It did not disappoint! Both of our dinners came with a salad. This is what a "salad" looks like in Poland. It's good but I will be happy to see an old familiar American salad when I get home!

Friday was a nice warm day and we strolled to the beach.

It was 70 degrees so Abbie and Trey took their shoes off and put their feet in the Baltic Sea. They had fun but that water was freezing! That didn't stop some crazies from swimming though. I saw a couple of people out in the water up to their necks. I'm way too wimpy for that!

On Saturday morning I took my grocery bags and headed to the store. In every part of Europe we have been to, you either bring your own grocery bags or you can purchase them there. So I get to the store and everything is closed. Well I learned quickly that Saturday, May 1st was a holiday. In America, Holiday = Big Sale. In Poland, Holiday = Nobody Buys Anything! May 1st is Poland's Labor Day.

In the afternoon on Saturday our neighbor, Basia, came over to get me to show me how to make bigos. When we had visited them on Easter, I had asked her to show me how to make it sometime. It is a delicious Polish stew and now I have the secret! Basia's English is limited and my Polish is limited so the teaching session was a bit of a comedy, but I got the information I needed! I can't wait to make bigos at home. It will have to be fall though; it will be too hot when we get home in the summer. It is totally cold weather comfort food. We joined them for a cookout in the afternoon with all kinds of yummy food, and we took the leftover bigos home! When I reheated the leftovers yesterday the whole house smelled wonderful! I love this picture of Mariusz and Basia. We sort of got a commitment from them on Saturday that they would come visit us in the US! :) We are going to miss them when we go home in less than two months...

It is harder for citizens of Poland to obtain a visa to visit the US. They will not have a problem since they are business owners and property owners in Poland. But it is still a bigger hassle for them than it is for most of the rest of Europeans.

On Sunday, Abbie, Trey, Myles and I went to a little spring market that was open for the weekend in Old Town. They had fun things for kids to do and Trey had a ball jumping and sliding on the big slide.

Here is Abbie by a pretty spring sign. It translates to "Clean City Gdansk."

And though we have walked in this area many times, this is the first time we have noticed this Millenium Tree that commemorates the 1000 year history of the city of Gdansk (from 997 to 1997).

Today is Constitution Day in Poland, so another holiday. All of the Polish flags were displayed all over town yesterday. Poland was the second country to have a constitution (only after the US). As Myles notes in his blog, their initial constitution was short lived as they were invaded and removed from the map for well over 100 years. But the philosophy was there and that is what is celebrated on Constitution Day. Luckily I stocked up on groceries when the stores were open yesterday since everything is closed again today! It is pouring rain, windy and cold today (high of 46), so we are staying inside and the kids are complaining about all the school I am making them do. Never mind that if today was not a holiday they would be at the British school! Life is rough for my poor American children living abroad...NOT!

19 Years

2010-04-27T19:48:00.014+02:00

Nineteen years ago today I was a new bride. I swear I only blinked a couple of times (maybe three at the most), and suddenly I am 42, the mother of four kids (two of whom are teenagers!), I'm living in Poland and have been happily married for nearly two decades.

When we walked across the Hohenzollern Bridge here in Cologne a few days ago we saw hundreds and hundreds of locks on the fence. This bridge has become a place for young couples to put a lock on the fence and throw the key into the Rhein River below. They are called Love Locks by the locals. Well, Myles and I realize we are not terribly young (still a little young though!), but we could not resist the sweet sentiment since we were visiting Cologne on our 19th wedding anniversary.

Some of the locks are elaborate and have names engraved. Many are simple and have names written on them. We found a simple lock, wrote our names and wedding date on it, and joined this tradition.

We went to the bridge and attached our lock and threw the keys into the river below. We'll make a dinner date later in the week since we were traveling today.

We are now home in Gdansk. We had an uneventful flight. I find it very charming that on every airplane trip we have taken in Europe, the passengers have clapped when we landed. Of course, it is a brisk 44 degrees here. We were spoiled with the weather when we were in Germany!

The words above were on our wedding invitation. Today I will say this: That day I married my friend, the one I still laugh with, still live for, still dream with, still love. Our story continues...

Dusseldorf

2010-04-26T17:28:00.005+02:00

Today we took the train to Dusseldorf. Before we boarded the train we bought three big pretzels from one of the many vendors and snacked on the train. Half of one is plenty for one person. It took about 35 minutes to get to Dusseldorf.

We walked all over the city and saw some of what it has to offer. We were only there for the afternoon, and perhaps we are weary of walking and touristing, but we all decided that between Cologne, Bonn and Dusseldorf, the latter takes third place. It is a toss up between Cologne and Bonn. We love both of those cities.

That said, we are still glad we had the chance to visit Dusseldorf. It is where Augustus Gloop (from Willy Wonka) was from in the 2005 movie. In the 1971 movie, he was from the fictional town of Dusselheim--they had to be representing Dusseldorf, ja? Funny, we did not see any mention of Augustus as we walked around Dusseldorf. It is also on the Rhein River. We walked along their fun wavy sidewalk that symbolizes the waves of the river.

We watched the boats go by and were lucky to have yet another lovely spring day.

We saw parks with funky trees,

quite a few statues,

and Trey entertained himself with his own shadow when he lost interest in all the attractions.

In 1288 there was a Battle of Worrigen which was a fight over territory. The Germans won this battle and legend has it that the children of the area started doing side flips along the banks of the river, thus the cartwheel was born. This cartwheel statue is now one of the most well known symbols of Dusseldorf.

When we thought we could not walk any further, we made it back to the train station and came on back to Cologne. We picked up some curry wurst from a vendor right outside the train station and brought it home for dinner. We all think we could eat this every day!

Tomorrow we have one quick errand to run in the morning and then we are heading back to Gdansk in the afternoon.

Off to Bonn

2010-04-25T17:49:00.010+02:00

This morning we went to the High Mass at the Cathedral at 10:00. It was very ceremonial and was said by a cardinal. The cardinal sprinkled holy water and got Ben really good! It was awesome, and he really could use a good cleansing blessing every now and then. After Mass we took a train 30 minutes south to the adorable city of Bonn. When I was taking German in high school, our teacher talked about Bonn a lot. At the time (80s), Bonn was the capitol of West Germany. Of course, now since the fall of the wall in 1989 and the reunification of Germany, the capitol for the whole country is Berlin.

We happened into Bonn on a beautiful and busy day for them. It was 79 degrees here today--wow! We had lunch at a little outdoor eatery with yummy, inexpensive sandwiches.

As we walked into the center of town, we heard cheers and excitement. We had stumbled upon the Bonn Marathon! The city was crowded with huge numbers of people everywhere. There were DJs, music, food stations, etc. There were people handing out all kinds of things.

We scored some free bottles of water, bottles of apple juice, apples, bananas, carrots, pens and balloons.

Our lucky day for sure! We were able to see some sights and cheer on the runners as they sped by. We saw quite a few reach the finish line with crowds clapping and encouraging each runner. The time clock is visible in this picture. This man met his waiting, cheering, excited daughter and she ran with him the last hundred yards or so.

We walked around the center of the city and saw the home where Beethoven was born.

Bonn is very proud of their native son, as they should be. There is a statue of him in the main square.

Bonn is situated about 37 kilometers south of Cologne and is also on the Rhein. The Siebengebirge Mountain range is to the south of Bonn and is partially visible in this picture of Myles and the girls.

The day was picture perfect, and there were so many people everywhere we went. Many families were at a big park that we found. Children were playing and there were soccer games being played on nearby fields. It was a great day to be outdoors.

The background of this picture is the University of Bonn, and most of Bonn's residents were taking advantage of the spectacular weather.

Tomorrow we are going to take the train the other way, about 40 miles north to the city of Dusseldorf.

A Splash of Cologne

2010-04-24T21:07:00.007+02:00

We had a full second day in Cologne today. We started by touring the huge Catholic Cathedral.

This church is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Germany. It is visited by 20,000 people per DAY. It can be seen from quite a distance. It is actually pictured on the back of Ben's religion book. His visiting the cathedral is surely worth some extra credit!

Construction was started on the church in 1248. After some starts and stops (due to lack of funds, disagreements and wars) it was finally completed in 1880. That's a 600+ year project! This cathedral is known for housing the bones of the three Magi who came to pay homage to the infant, Jesus. The relics are in a gold shrine behind the high altar. This is what has made Cologne a pilgrimage for Catholics for centuries. It is an impressive building with many chapels inside. It has a very long center aisle and lots of stained glass windows.

Each year that the archbishop has served the diocese is symbolized by a guilded rod. These are visible at the top in this picture of Myles and Natalie.

The current archbishop has served for 22 years so far.

This was taken in the Chapel of the Cross. It is the oldest monumental crucifix of the Western World. It was donated to the Archdiocese of Cologne by the Archbishop Gero in 976.

After we explored the cathedral, we went outside and found a fountain representing the Legend of Cologne. The story goes that the people of Cologne were very lazy and that gnomes came in and did all the work of the people at night. One day a woman who was very curious about this, decided she wanted to see some gnomes. So she put peas on the floor and waited. When the gnomes arrived that night to do the work of the people, the peas made them fall down. They were so angry that they all left Cologne. From that point on the people of Cologne could no longer be lazy and had to do their own work!

We walked along the river and decided to hop on an hour boat ride up and down the Rhein. It was a quick little trip where they pointed out the sights of Cologne as we went by.

When the short cruise was over we headed back near the cathedral. When my sister came to visit us in Poland, she made some friends on the flight from LA to Frankfurt, Germany. Margrit and Hans were very kind to her on her very first trans-Atlantic flight, and helped her navigate customs and get to her connecting flight. They have kept in touch with her, and they live near Cologne. We emailed them and told them we were going to be in town. They met us today for a couple of hours. We sat outside on this magnificent spring day and had some ice cream together. Then they showed us a few sights around the area. It was very kind of them to meet us and we enjoyed their company very much!

They showed us this actual Roman era aqueduct that is on display. It is kind of off the beaten path, so we would not have seen it if they had not pointed it out to us. It's hard to imagine that this structure is 2,000 years old
.

We had some sandwiches for dinner and then went back to the apartment after this very full day! We are planning to take a train to Bonn tomorrow and see the sights there.

"So Far I Am LOVING Germany!"

2010-04-23T20:22:00.006+02:00

The title above is a quote from Abbie as we enjoyed our day today!

The ash has cleared from the European skies. We did not know whether or not our flight was going to go as scheduled until Thursday morning. Thursday was the first day that flights were taking off as usual. After seeing all the news reports I was a little concerned about long lines at the airport of people who had been stranded. It was a chilly 39 degrees in Gdansk while we were waiting for our bus to go to the airport at noon. We arrived at the Gdansk airport about an hour before our flight. There were no lines, and we went to our gate. There were quite a few people but it seemed like no more than usual. We boarded the plane, and when they closed up the doors I was shocked to see that no less than half the seats on the plane were empty. I guess people either were not stranded in Gdansk, or they just took a train home.

Our flight to Cologne (Köln) took about 90 minutes. We got off the plane to find the Köln airport quiet, also with no lines and not too many people around. The airports in Gdansk and Köln are not huge, but I was so surprised to see the lack of lines in both places. It was a balmy 55 degrees when we exited the plane at about 4:00 p.m. Myles called the place where we booked the apartment we are staying in, and they texted an address. We found a cab that could seat our family of six. I'm starting to get really annoyed at Europe's complete shock that a family would ever have four children. Everywhere we go in Europe, people are completely baffled by this. And I'm completely baffled by them.

Our cab driver looks at the address and takes us to the center of town. We can see the gigantic, historic cathedral on the way. We know that supposedly we can see that cathedral from where we are staying so we know we are close. The cab driver drops us off at what he thinks is the place and leaves. Turns out it was not the right place. Myles called the apartment lady, who is really aggravated with the cab driver for not following her instructions and for leaving us there. Oh, well, it was only a couple of blocks away, it was light and warm out and we each only had one small bag with us, so it was no big deal.

Our apartment has two bedrooms and a sleeper sofa in the living room, two bathrooms and a tiny kitchen. That works out great for us. We settled in and then headed out to find a nearby restaurant for dinner. On the way home, Abbie and I stopped at a grocery store and found some things for breakfast. The kids made a happy face breakfast for Myles (oh yeah, we found doughnuts--that's a real treat!).

This morning we headed out to a beautiful day! We only brought jackets with us on this trip (first time since October that we did not bring coats with us!). We froze in Gdansk, but since we arrived here it's been wonderful. It was a high of 62, sunny and fabulous today. We walked along the Rhein River.

It is absolutely a beautiful walk and we just strolled along looking at things as they caught someone's eye. We walked to the Lindt Chocolate Factory and Museum. The kids enjoyed learning about how chocolate is made and they watched each step of the process in the factory.

Then of course, we all were able to sample some. And then there's the chocolate store. They sure get you there! Good times.

We sat on the steps of the museum afterwards and everyone had a taste of their purchases.

We left there with goodies in hand and found a place for lunch that had the most delicious bratwurst. We love curry wurst!

So we sat outside on this beautiful day enjoying our German lunch and watching so many people out walking around.

We made our way to a large shopping area that was full of people milling around. Myles, Ben and Trey went into the Lego store where they played for about an hour. The girls and I went shopping! Abbie found a Claire's and was thrilled right out of her mind. The girls also enjoyed shopping at a couple of clothing stores where they each scored a couple of items.

We decided to stop back by the apartment to relax a bit. There is a playground right outside our building where Trey played. He ended up completely filthy before dinner. Everyone cleaned up and we headed out for dinner at 6:00. We found a restaurant that boasted US steaks on their menu.

We went there and it was very good! But the steaks on the menu that were from the US were very expensive. We ordered from the meat that came from Argentina since that was much more in our price range, and it tasted pretty darn good to us!

On our way back we came across a gate from the Roman era. It was built around 50 AD. That's hard to imagine.

The weather is supposed to be warmer each day we are here. We won't know what to do if we encounter a day that is 70 degrees or more. The last time we saw that kind of warm temperature was the day we left Kansas City in September. It was 80 that day! We are looking forward to enjoying the next few spring days in this lovely area.

Volcanic Ash? VOLCANIC ASH?

2010-04-18T09:04:00.004+02:00

I think if I had to make a list a week ago of 100 reasons I might be stuck in Gdansk, volcanic ash from a volcano in Iceland probably would not have made that list. This is the weirdest thing ever! We are not stuck...yet. We are scheduled to fly to Koln, Germany this Thursday, but the likelihood of that is not high at this point. My friend Ivija's husband is stuck in Oslo because of the ash sitting high in the European skies. He was supposed to fly home Friday.

Many world leaders, including Barack Obama, have canceled their plans to attend the state funeral of the Polish president in Krakow today. I read though, that on Thursday over 1,000 secret service police had arrived in Krakow from the US to prepare for the American President's arrival. They are all still stuck there! I hope they are enjoying their time in the beautiful city of Krakow and doing their part to keep the Polish economy going. The family of President and Mrs. Kaczynski do not want to postpone the funeral. While they may be criticized for that because now many world leaders are unable to attend, I totally understand. The shock and intensity of this event has gone on for more than a week now. The sooner they can have peace back in their lives, the better.

Yesterday, at 8:56 a.m., sirens wailed in Gdansk. That was the exact time of the crash, and the siren marked that one week had passed. At noon the sirens sounded again, signaling two minutes of silence. We watched the ceremonies in Warszawa for President and Mrs. Kaczynski and the others who died in the plane crash on television. There were throngs of people with Polish flags and Solidarity flags. Saturday was beautiful but chilly, and the ceremonies were all outside to accommodate the huge number of people. The high here was about 48. I'm sure it was similar in Warszawa. They named each person who was killed in the crash. As they scanned the crowd we could see the president's (30ish year old) daughter and his twin brother. We watched some very emotional speeches. And while our Polish is seriously lacking, some messages and emotions are universal, thus understood. In the crowd were men dressed in blue Solidarity coveralls with Solidarity hardhats. I found this very moving.

Gdansk has shut down again, but his time it was planned. We knew that our favorite grocery store would be closing at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday and would be closed for the rest of the weekend. So we stocked up on groceries Friday night to get us through the weekend. This is a significant cultural difference. Most retail stores here have now been closed for two weekends in a row. That is unheard of in the US.

The kids have school tomorrow, and we will sit tight to see what happens with that crazy volcano in Iceland!

Business As Usual

2010-04-14T11:12:00.001+02:00

After the shock of the airplane crash on Saturday, the city of Gdansk shut down. I assume that the same is true for the rest of Poland but I only know for sure about here. Stores were all closed for the weekend. Polish flags with black ribbons appeared everywhere. Banners and photos of those who died in the crash were posted all over the place. Masses for the dead were going on in all the churches.

On Tuesday we went to Old Town to see what memorials had been set up. We stopped by the shipyard memorial. One of the people on the plane was 80 year old Anna Walentynowicz. She was very involved in the Solidarity Movement in the 70s and 80s. She was well known for her brazen defiance by handing out illegal newspapers directly to the bosses at the shipyards. She was fired days before she was to retire which angered the other workers and sparked further Solidarity events. There is a picture of her and Mr. and Mrs. Kaczynski on the gate of the shipyard.

There were probably around 30 people milling around at the shipyard memorial while we were there. There were hundreds (if not more) lanterns that had been lit and placed in front of the memorial.

There are boxes of matches sitting in front of all the lanterns for people to use to light their lanterns. There was a solemn feeling as people stood quietly and reflected on what has happened.

We've been to the shipyard memorial several times. Today we saw a part of it that we had not seen before. There is a concrete square that has the imprint of John Paul II's shoes where he stood when he visited this spot. Funny how each time we visit a place we see something that we have not seen before.

We walked down the main street with restaurants and shops. Everything was open and there were many people out walking. There is a large display in the middle of the street of facts regarding the horror of Katyn.

This is the 70th anniversary of this mass murder of Polish soldiers, so I imagine this particular display was planned beforehand. It is its own event and has nothing to do with the crash. Sadly though, the crash adds to the tragedy that is Katyn. Or as people are saying here- the second tragedy of Katyn.

We stepped into the Church of Saint Mary. The ceiling in the church is very high. I hesitate to venture a guess because I am not good at that sort of space judgment--maybe 30 feet? 40 feet? It's seriously high! There is a red and white banner from the ceiling nearly to the floor. There is a large framed photograph of the President and First Lady displayed on the altar steps with red and white roses in front of it.

The funeral of President and Mrs. Kaczynski has been set for Sunday in Warsaw and then they will be buried in the crypt of Wawel Cathedral in Krakow. We were there back in October. That was where John Paul II was Cardinal before he was elected Pope in 1978. I was reading this morning that the decision to bury the president there is very controversial among Poles. This president was a polarizing figure. While the nation is united in mourning for the president, political ideals have not changed. So some do not think that he deserves to have the honor of being buried with Poles who are considered true national heroes and kings.

I was happy to learn that Obama will make the trip to Krakow. Regardless of my political view, the fact of the matter is that he represents all of the US people to the world. So I put my politics aside and am very glad that the American President is making the effort to show Poland that we are sorry for their loss.

One thing I will comment on is that the smooth and quick transition of power to Komorowski on the day of the tragedy, the dissention of some Poles over the location of the burial and the "back to normalness" are very telling. Poland is a stable country with the ability to withstand a very catastrophic blow. They had a plan and immediately put it into action. This country has been free for only 20 years. And what strides they have made! They are strong and continuing to move forward. They are a country still in mourning, but fully capable nonetheless. Every person on that plane was significant in forming the Poland that exists today. While I'm sure they did not expect to be involved in such a dramatic and sad accident, this capable and forward moving Poland is what they all worked for many years to achieve.

On his own, Trey drew a Polish flag, signed it "Love, Trey," folded it up, put it in an envelope and asked me for a stamp. He wants it to go to the family of the president so he simply addressed it to "Polska." I'm sure that's good enough!

A Moment of Silence

2010-04-11T14:54:00.001+02:00

As overwhelmingly sad as the tragic airplane crash that killed many Polish leaders is, we realize what a truly amazing experience it is for us to be living in Poland right now. The patriotism here is very moving. As we walked to church this morning, we saw Polish flags everywhere. They are being displayed on houses, businesses and apartments. The long apartment complexes have lots of flags hanging on each building. It is very impressive. Many of them have a black ribbon attached to the top to show that the nation is in mourning.

There are two large flags flying high outside of St. Stanislaus church along with a kneeler set up for people to pray.

Inside the church is the Polish seal (the crowned eagle) with a black ribbon at the top and candles lit in front of it. We went to Mass at 11:00 and that is where we were when the nation had two minutes of silence at noon. Pretty cool.

There are small Polish flags attached to the trams and buses today, too (not a great picture--it is on the right side on top).

Malls are closed today. Grocery stores are closed today. There are lots of people out walking around. I'm not sure where they are all going but it is a beautiful, sunny 50 degree day here.

I have read that there is already speculation regarding whether or not President Obama will be coming to represent the US for the funeral, though details for that have not been announced yet. My opinion is that he needs to get over here. Poland is a loyal friend to America. Obama did not come to the 70th anniversary commemoration of the start of WWII here in Gdansk back in September. I was annoyed about that. This is a monumental tragedy for Poland. They need to see support from us. So I believe it is necessary for Obama to be in Warsaw. And I think it would be nice for George W. Bush to come along, too!

Sad Day in Poland

2010-04-10T14:16:00.001+02:00

Today is cold and dreary. It is about 39 degrees which is at least 10 degrees colder than it has been for the past couple of weeks. It is rainy and gloomy. Myles is still in Holland (he comes home tomorrow). We were having a lazy morning and I was messing around on Facebook. I first noticed that my neighbor, Anita, who is 19, put this: [*] as her status. Hmm, that did not mean anything to me. Within a minute or so, Inga, who is 15 and a classmate of my kids at school here, put the same thing as her status. That struck me as odd. I did not think they knew each other. While they are both young, four years is a pretty significant age difference at ages 15 and 19. They are both Polish so I just thought it was some Polish, young person thing that I was unaware of.

Then moments later, one of our Fulbright friends in another city posted a link to the story that there had been a plane crash and that the president of Poland was likely killed. Wow. I had to read the headline several times before it sunk in. This is a huge blow to Poland. Very quickly, several of our Polish Facebook friends had changed their profile pictures to a black ribbon.

I had just learned about Kaczynski when I was in Warszawa in December. On the way to a Fulbright lunch, the cab driver drove us by the presidential residence and told us all about Lech Kaczynski. He and his twin brother were the President and Prime Minister at the same time for a year and a half back in 2006-2007. The Kaczynski brothers' father was a vetran of the Warszawa Uprising. Wow again. Lech Kaczynski has strong ties to the Gdansk area as he was involved in the Solidarity Movement in the 80s. The current Prime Minister is Donald Tusk. He was here in Gdansk this morning. He immediately headed back south to Warszawa when he learned of the crash.

As of this writing Bronislaw Komorowski, the Parliament Speaker has already been named acting President. Within 14 days, he is required to arrange a special presidential election that will take place within the next 60 days.

We join all of our Polish friends in their days of mourning. While Kaczynski was the most well known of those who perished in this accident, many others died. His wife and many high ranking cabinet members lost their lives as well. This is tragic. Turns out that [*] means "Rest in Peace."

Unexpected Medical Tourism

2010-04-08T21:55:00.001+02:00

One thing that I really, really wanted to avoid while we are living in Poland is having to seek medical attention. When Natalie broke her finger we splinted it ourselves and she is good as new. When we had food poisoning back in December we stayed home and waited it out. But Wednesday was a whole new story.

Myles left early Wednesday morning to catch a flight. He went to The Hague in Holland for a conference. He will be back on Sunday. The morning was going along well. We were getting school stuff done. At about 12:30 the kids had eaten lunch and were working on their assignments. I was in the downstairs bedroom on the computer. All of the sudden my tongue felt weird. I ignored it for a while and it just got worse. The entire right side (and the right side only) was swollen. Hmm, nothing like this has ever happened before. I hadn't eaten anything unusual all morning and I hadn't eaten anything at all for about four hours prior. So I wait a bit longer to see if it resolves itself. It does not and then my throat starts to feel weird. I could breathe, but not like normal. This was definitely an allergic reaction to something.

So I send Abbie over to our neighbor's house. Basia was trained as a nurse when she was in school. She is not practicing anymore but she knows what she is doing way more than I do. They came right over and I asked them to tell me a doctor to go to. They insisted we go to the hospital. I would have done the exact same thing in their shoes, but I really didn't want to visit the hospital. So off to the hospital we go. It is very close to where we live, within a mile.

Basia drove and Karol went along to help translate. He warned me that we could be there quite a while. The kids were home by themselves, but they were fine. Also, they had Mariusz and Anita home in case they needed something. We got there and checked in with the receptionist. They required an ID so I showed my passport. Then since there was concern with breathing I was ushered right in. First they asked if I was allergic to any medications (yes, penicillin) and took my blood pressure. Then immediately after that they started an IV line. In the US you cannot even walk into a doctor's office with a hangnail without them weighing you first. They did not do that here and I did not see a scale anywhere. The nurse who was assigned to me spoke some English. She was very nice. She came up to me with a syringe of something and told me to come with her. I followed and asked her what was in the syringe. She said it was benedryl (or something like it). I start to pull up my sleeve and she says in a very sweet and professional voice, "No, in the ass." Oh.

Ok, so then she points to a chair for me to sit in in the middle of a big room. She attaches some IV drip into my arm. I ask her what it is and she did not exactly know how to translate. I think I got out of her that it was hydrocortisone, or something like it. So I sat in the emergency ward right in the middle of the big room. There was a guy next to me in the chairs also hooked up to some IV. There were 12 beds along the walls, every one of them taken by patients in various states of need. There are small curtains that could potentially provide some privacy, but few of them were in use. It took about 20 minutes for my IV to get finished.

Once it was done, they disconnected me from the IV and told me to follow a young man to where the larynologist (ENT doctor) is. His office was located on the 6th floor so up we go in the elevator. The doctor met us in the hallway up there and he also spoke a little English. So he listens to my story. He then pulls out one of those little mirror things that dentists use. He pulls a lighter from his pocket and lights it. He holds the flame to the mirror thing and then wipes it off with some cotton gauze. Seriously. He then uses it to look at my throat and says that it is looking ok now. I could definitely tell a difference in my throat before I went upstairs.

After about five minutes with the ENT, the young man takes me back down to the emergency ward. I sit there for about 10 more minutes waiting for a doctor to come so I could leave. Finally, I get the ok to go. They gave me a paper with instructions in Polish. I met Basia and Karol who were hanging out in the waiting area. We went to the receptionist and paid the bill. It came to 256,00 PLN (about $85). I paid in cash. The receptionist took my home address in the US and said she would send a bill/receipt there so I could get reimbursement from my insurance at home. If it ever makes it home I will keep it and the Polish instructions as souvenirs. For 85 bucks I'm pretty sure the hassle with our insurance company at home is going to be way more than it is worth, so I'm not going to even bother with it. The whole hospital visit took about an hour and a half. We never did figure out what caused this reaction. I don't really have an allergy tendency, so who knows...?

I was very tired for the rest of they day and ended up with a nasty headache in the evening. But overall I am just fine. The kids and I were in contact with Myles during various points of this experience so he knew what was going on. We decided pretty quickly that it was fine for him to stay where he was and he did not need to come home. We are so very lucky that the kindest Poles in the country are our neighbors. I told Karol how much I appreciated all that they did for us today. He just said that people should help people. Of course they should. But the fact is that lots of times they don't. I hope that someday I will be able to return some of the kindness they have shown to us (for our entire stay here). I would love it if they could come to the US sometime to visit us, and we will take them under our wing in a country that is unfamiliar to them.

Easter Sunday and Wet Monday

2010-04-05T15:04:00.002+02:00

We had a lovely Easter Sunday yesterday. We prepared eggs on Saturday. We did not dye eggs this year. They have Easter egg dye but I opted not to do that. We bought the plastic egg wraps that you put around the hard boiled egg.

When you dip it in boiling water the plastic adheres to the egg and it worked out just dandy.

Trey was of course, the first one up on Easter morning. He woke everyone up and headed right down the stairs to see if the Easter Bunny had found us in Poland. Fortunately, the Easter Bunny keeps good tabs on people and knew where we were. Trey found eggs and candy hidden around the house.

Poor Ben was so tired and could barely keep his eyes open for all of the Easter morning festivities!

We headed off to Mass at 9:30 dressed in our Easter finery. We were very surprised that there were so few people at church. Usually Masses here are full, and last week on Palm Sunday it was packed. At home, Masses on Easter are standing room only. Maybe people went to a different Mass or an unusual number of people were traveling out of town.

After Mass we went to our neighbor's home for an excellent Easter lunch. They had ham, turkey, white kielbasa, and many side dishes and desserts. They served bigos (Polish stew) that was delicious. I asked if they would teach me to make it before we leave Poland.

They said they would teach me to make bigos if I would let them in on my secret brownie recipe. Deal! I will pick up some Betty Crocker next time I am at Walmart and will send some boxes their way. I am definitely getting the better end of that arrangement!

In Poland, the Monday after Easter is still a holiday. Many stores are closed and all kids are off of school. Kids in Poland splash water on passersby the day after Easter. It is considered good luck to be sprinkled with water. Our neighbors warned us yesterday to be on the lookout for kids with buckets of water! We had read about this tradition and had bought water guns, so we were prepared. Here is Trey on the balcony attempting to squirt the people walking by our house on the sidewalk.

We did not see too much action in front of our house, so Myles took the kids for a walk to see if they could stir up any trouble. Trey (in green) found a like minded little fellow and they sprayed each other.

They found a bunch of kids at a park and hung out there for a while, but most of the water play was finished.

We are looking forward to some nice weather this week (in the 50s). Spring has come to Gdansk!

Malbork Castle

2010-04-02T11:31:00.001+02:00

On Thursday we took a day trip to the town of Malbork, Poland. We have taken the train many times south to Warszawa and beyond. On each of these trips we have passed the beautiful Malbork Castle. It is massive and a very impressive sight. We decided to take Pam there with us on her last day here in Poland.

We took a train at 11:00 a.m. and arrived in Malbork at about noon. We walked from the train station through their little downtown area where there were several cute little shops and restaurants.

We had a quick lunch at the Malbork McDonald's, which is right on the walking path to the castle. We then went to the castle and went on a tour with an English speaking guide. Malbork is the largest castle in Europe. This picture is only of a small section.

It was first built by the Teutonic Knights in what was then known as Prussia in the 1200s.

It has seen it's share of battles over the centuries. But the fortification was very strong and deliberate. There were moats 17 meters deep. They have been drained now. There are three fortification walls to keep enemies out. The walls are four or five meters thick. This is a very impressive place. Here are Ben and Trey in the courtyard with centuries old cannon balls.

Over the years there had been restorations but the castle continued to stand. Until 1945.

WWII was brutal in Poland. The castle was destroyed by Russians and Germans. We saw bullet holes in some of the bricks from one of the battles. The Church of the Virgin Mary, part of the castle, has been left in ruins. Our guide told us that there is constant debate about what to do with it. Some want to restore it and some want to leave it as it is. Myles asked our guide what her opinion is. She said that she wants to leave it as it is as a reminder of the war.

We ended our Malbork visit with dinner at a local restaurant and then we took a train back to Gdansk.

Pam left us this morning to head back to her family in California. We are so glad she made this big trip to visit us and we are missing her already.

My First European Adventure

2010-04-02T08:59:00.001+02:00

Obviously from the title, this isn't Lisa blogging. This is her sister Pam, and I am visiting the Gartlands in Poland, and this is my first time in Europe. I left my home in California last Thursday afternoon. I stood in the security line next to a guy from Israel who just couldn't believe that I was spending my first visit to Europe in Poland. I didn't mind - you have to start somewhere!

I arrived in Poland on Friday afternoon after getting very little sleep on the plane. Who knew that they would snap on all of the lights at 12:30 am and start serving breakfast? I met a wonderful German couple on the flight to Frankfurt and they took me under their wing and walked me through customs. It was so nice to finally arrive in Gdansk and see Lisa and Trey smiling and waving.

The weather was overcast and a little chilly. It was just what I expected Poland to be like. Lisa pointed out some of the sites in Gdansk on the cab ride home. The first thing that struck me was the incredible amount of graffiti on all the walls and buildings. There are some areas in CA that are like that, but this was everywhere. I didn't expect it in a town the size of Gdansk. We arrived at their cute little house where Ben, Natalie and Abbie were waiting with open arms. I unloaded my stash of supplies from the states - taco seasoning, beef jerky, brownie mix and girl scout cookies, to name a few.

They seemed very pleased to have these reminders of home. I hate to think of all the things that I would miss if I were away from home for a year. The next couple of days were low key. They introduced me to the public transit system and we took the bus to go shopping for Easter dresses.

One thing that struck me was the number of people out and about on the streets. I'm used to seeing a lot of traffic, but not people just walking around on the streets. Another thing I noticed was that people didn't greet you when you passed them. They ignore you completely, and they rarely smile. I think that Lisa described them as "stoic." It was unsettling.

On Sunday we went to church, and I've never been to a mass where I couldn't understand what they were saying. It was interesting, and I knew what they doing, but I felt strangely disconnected. I wonder if people used to feel this way when they said masses in Latin. We were there on Palm Sunday and they did a fun procession around the outside of the church with homemade palm creations.

The church was filled to capacity. You rarely see that at home unless it is Christmas or Easter.

Myles returned home on Saturday and made sure that I was not only having a good time, but was also learning something. We went to the Solidarity Museum on Monday and it was very interesting.

I vaguely remember hearing about the solidarity movement when I was eleven or twelve, but the magnitude didn't sink in until I was standing in the spot where the protests happened.

Lisa took me to tour a concentration camp not far from their town. I can't say that I enjoyed it, but it was something that I will always remember. The Polish people have been through so many hard times. Perhaps that is why they all seem so solemn.

We did a lot of shopping after that and took a train trip up to the coast where I made friends with the swans and got to dip my hand into the frigid Baltic Sea.

We finished off the week with trips to Old Town Gdansk and an all day excursion to Malbork, the oldest castle in Poland.

Myles asked me to reflect on what was my favorite part of my trip and what surprised me the most. My favorite part had to be Old Town Gdansk. It was very picturesque and what I envisioned Europe to be like.

You could almost hear horse hoofs clattering along the cobblestone streets. The most surprising thing was how the city was laid out in such a hodgepodge fashion. I'm used to a community with lots of zoning regulations. Here, you have small businesses stuck here there and everywhere with no rhyme or reason that I could see. There are huge, ugly apartment buildings everywhere that were built in the communist era. It seems so strange to see a beautiful centuries-old church next to one of these monsters. This difference was very obvious when we went up to visit Myles' university. They had beautiful gothic buildings next to ugly utilitarian communist ones.

This week flew by so fast. The Gartlands were wonderful hosts and tour guides. I went on buses, trains, trams and taxis, and walked for miles and miles. I did my best to stimulate the Polish economy. I would have bought more, but I'm only allowed one checked in bag at the airport. I am amazed at how well the G's have adjusted to their new life. I still think I would get lost going back to their house from the bus stop, but they've mastered school, grocery shopping and ordering at restaurants. I've enjoyed my time in Poland, but would like to explore some other parts of Europe the next time I come.

Shopping on Długa and Sightseeing in Sopot

2010-03-31T21:43:00.001+02:00

On Tuesday we took P to see the university where Myles is working. We walked on the campus and he gave her the guided tour. We had lunch at the little cafeteria in the Business School.

We then went to the tourist section of Gdansk. We wandered around, shopped and ate ice cream.

We walked P through the Torture Museum and she enjoyed trying some of the torture methods out.

We found a very nice Polish cuisine restaurant and had a wonderful dinner together.

P tried out some of Poland's finest pierogies and thought they were very tasty.

Today P, Abbie, Trey and I went out on our own. Ben had some homework to do and Natalie did not feel well so they stayed home (she is feeling fine now). Myles had to work all day today. We walked over to the kids' school so that P could see the journey we take to get there every Monday. We then walked to the train station and took a train about 15 minutes to the resort town of Sopot. We had lunch and did some more shopping. We walked along the pier and the day was a beautiful 61 degrees. My California sister was still sporting her winter coat but we were taking ours off!

We walked under the pier for no good reason at all.

Tomorrow is P's last full day here with us. We will be heading an hour south on the train to Malbork. There is a castle there that belonged to the Teutonic Knights in the 13th century.

Stutthof

2010-03-30T08:43:00.001+02:00

Yesterday P, Natalie and I went to go see Stutthof. Abbie was invited but she declined. She was with us when we went to Auschwitz and does not want any further education on concentration camps at this point. I am fine with that. This is heavy stuff. This camp museum forbids kids under 13 so Myles stayed home with Trey. Myles and Ben are going on their own in the next couple of weeks. Sztutowo is the name of the town and Stutthof is the German version of that. Sztutowo (Shtu-toe-vo) is about 40 kilometers--25 miles--outside of Gdansk. A friend of ours had been there and gave me instructions how to get there by bus. We arrived at the bus station downtown and waited for our 9:15 bus to arrive.

We got on the bus and started on our way. It takes about an hour to get to Sztutowo. About halfway there our bus driver stops along the side of the road and gets out to have a smoke. Then about 15 mintues later he stops and gets out to make a cell phone call.

About 15 minutes later we arrive at our destination. It is out in the middle of nowhere and our bus stop was simply a sign on the side of the road.

In this picture you can see railroad tracks by Natalie's feet. These were the tracks that brought more than 100,000 people to the Stutthof concentration camp. The entrance to the concentration camp is across the street and down a block or so. This sign is original and visible from the street.

This camp was set up at the very beginning of WWII, and the first people to be brought here were people from Gdansk and the area. Jews were not brought to this camp until 1944. The people brought here were normal citizens, mostly men, who were seen as opposing the goals of the Germans. This camp was cruel and similar to Auschwitz and Birkeneau in several ways. People were treated badly. People worked in harsh conditions. All children brought to Stutthof were immediately killed. Little food and inadequate clothing were provided. There were gas chambers and crematoriums. We did not see inside the gas chamber but the guide told us that there are obvious marks on the walls inside where desperate people tried to claw their way out when the poisonous Cyclone B was dropped in. Horrific. 65,000 people were exterminated here and 20,000 more died from disease.

People who survived the camp return on occasion for ceremonies and meetings. There are boards telling some of their stories.

This is a memorial to all the Catholics who died at the camp. In the background is a cattle car like the ones that brought thousands of humans to this place.

This is a memorial to the Jews who were brought here and perished.

This monument is huge and honors all of the people who suffered deplorable conditions and lost their lives at Stutthof.

The parish that we attend here in Gdansk is Saint Stanislaus. We walk there every Sunday, so it is close. On September 2, 1939, the pastor of this parish, Bronisław Komorowski,was abducted and taken to Stutthof along with others. He was murdered there on Good Friday of 1940. There are several pictures of him displayed at Stutthof. One was taken before this trouble and Saint Stanislaus church is in the background. The church looks the same now. This really brings the horror of what happened to life for us. There is a cemetery about two blocks from our house where many of the victims of Stutthof are buried, or at least are recognized.

After our tour we walked a few blocks to the bus stop to head back to Gdansk. We had to wait for about an hour for the bus, but the roosters by the stop kept us entertained.

The bus finally came and we made it home in the late afternoon and relaxed for a while. Then we all went out for pizza for dinner.

Palm Sunday

2010-03-28T20:43:00.001+02:00

I am having a great time with my sister in town! On Saturday it was rainy and in the low 40s. She was still getting acclimated to the time difference so we had a low key day. We went to our nearby mall and shopped with the girls for Easter dresses. They each found one that they are happy with and they both found new spring shoes to match their outfits. We enjoyed wandering around and visiting. Ben and Trey took the bus and met us at the mall for lunch. Then we came home and hung around the house for the rest of the day. Myles arrived home from his trip to France in the evening.

Daylight Savings Time started for us today, so we lost our hour last night. Pam is extra lucky this year. Not everyone gets to spring forward twice in one year (at home in California two weeks ago and now here)! Fortunately, she is still time confused so another lost hour is not having too much of an effect on her. This morning we went to Mass for Palm Sunday. I had decided before we went to church that we were not going to get palms to bring home. Well that all changed when I arrived at church! We walked in and everyone was holding beautiful handmade palm creations. These are so pretty and we do not have anything like this at home for Palm Sunday.

There were children singing and holding their "palms" (for lack of a better word) up high. Whenever they got to the refrain where Jesus is mentioned, they waved their palms around. It was an impressive and very sweet scene. Well, I could not resist, and we did get one of these creations. Mass started and the priest blessed all of the people and the palms. Then he started down the aisle and all of the people followed him. I had no idea where we were going but we didn't want to miss out, so we followed along. He went out the side door and all of the altar boys and the congregation followed. A couple of altar boys had microphones and speakers physically attached to themselves and were singing.

We made one lap around the outside of the church and then went back in. Everyone was in a different seat than we started out in. We were at the end of the procession so there were no seats left. We ended up going up the stairs to the choir loft and sitting up there with some others who had also lost their seats. The rest of Mass was the same as always. We are looking forward to seeing the Easter celebration. On our way home from church we stopped by the grocery store. There was a guy outside, dressed in a dingy gray bunny costume, holding his bunny head, smoking a cigarette. Wish I had a picture of that!

In the afternoon we took Pam to the small Solidarity Museum and to the memorial for the ship builders who were killed in 1970. We had been there before but it was interesting to see again. Here are Pam and Natalie by the "dominoes" at the museum.

They symbolize the chain reaction that occurred when Poland finally broke free from communism. The rest of the countries that were under Soviet control soon broke free as well. After the museum we walked to one of our favorite restaurants here. It is a Turkish restaurant with really yummy kebabs. It's only kind of Turkish because they also have pizza that the kids love. We saw this cute, little, old lady on the way to the restaurant. She is holding a pigeon that is eating out of her hand. I love her hat, her cane and her intense focus on that bird!

After dinner we had to take a tram and a bus home. As we exited the tram we saw our bus coming down the street. We had to run to catch it, and we did! P is learning lots about public transportation. It is quite exciting! Tomorrow P, Natalie and I are going to the Stutthof Musuem. WWII started here in Gdansk on September 1, 1939. Stutthof was the first concentration camp. It was set up September 2, 1939 and it was the last one to be shut down. This will be a somber visit but I think since we are in this part of the world we are obligated to learn and understand what happened here.

P Has Landed

2010-03-26T21:24:00.001+01:00

After much anticipation, my sister's visit to Poland is finally here!

Trey and I went to the airport to pick her up. Her plane was right on time. She flew 11 hours from Los Angeles to Frankfurt and then another hour and a half from Frankfurt to Gdansk. She sure did not look any the worse for wear after that long journey! We arrived home (via taxi) at about 6:30 p.m. We had dinner and then all sat around visiting for the evening. Gdansk is eight hours ahead of California right now. On Sunday we will join the rest of the world in Daylight Savings Time and will then be nine hours ahead. So she has some time adjusting to do.

Look what she brought us! It's hard to tell in the picture, but those are Girl Scout Cookies! Thin Mints!

She brought Ben's paperwork for re-enrolling at Aquinas. I asked Aquinas to send the information to her since we knew she was coming. She also brought beef jerky for Ben and his friends.

We got taco seasoning! That is a very good thing since I cannot find anything close to it here. She brought six packets. That should last us for the next not quite three months!

And brownie mix--American treats! The box even says "America's Favorite!"

We are planning to go to the mall tomorrow to find some Easter dresses for the girls. Pam also wants to see those swans at the beach. I think tomorrow is going to be the warmest day she is here so we will try to get there tomorrow as well. Oh, and today was 68 degrees by the way. What a happy, happy day! Tomorrow is only supposed to be in the 50s but we will take it. Looks like spring has finally made it to Poland.

Myles is still in France but comes home tomorrow night. We will be glad to have him back home as well.

"Sis"

2010-03-22T09:19:00.001+01:00

We just learned today that a beloved member of Myles' family passed away on February 26th. Marie White (pictured on the right), affectionately known as Sis, was 92 years old. Myles' godmother, Aunt Dot (pictured in the center) lost her mother in a fire when she was 14 months old. She and Sis, one year apart in age, were technically cousins but were raised together as sisters. They lived across the street from each other most of their adult lives. We were able to visit with Sis when we went to St. Louis shortly before we left for Poland. She was bedridden but always had a smile and kind words for us. We are sorry we were not able to be with Dottie for her funeral. She was a special lady! Eternal rest, grant unto her, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon her. May she rest in peace.

Americana With a Heap of Pancakes

2010-03-21T08:09:00.001+01:00

On Saturday I took Trey and Abbie to a playground.

We spied it back in early January but this was the first time that it was warm enough to get outside and play. They played hide and seek, and had a great time swinging and climbing.

We then met Myles, Ben and Natalie downtown. We did not really have any plans and just wandered. We walked by the office of Lech Walesa. Although we have not seen him (yet!), he does work right in downtown Gdansk.

It was cloudy but warm so we were happy. We walked by one of the many restaurants in Old Town and look what they had advertised on their board! (Second line under "Polecamy")

We went to a medieval crane museum. Gdansk used to be a major port city and this is where all of the goods came into the city from the ships. It's fascinating to see the innovative ways people used to bring goods ashore.

The best part of the day was that we found a place to eat dinner called Billy's American Restaurant! Wow!

They had license plates on the wall from many states. There was an almost current one from Kansas--Saline County! The expiration sticker was from 07. How did that arrive in a restaurant in Gdansk, Poland? Old Glory is outside and there are pictures of NYC, Mohammad Ali, Harley Davidsons and various other American symbols all throughout the dining area.

It kind of looks like a fast food place, but we went in, sat down and checked out the menu. We had to ask for menus in English but they had them. This was a pretty nice place--and prices were reasonable. So Trey ordered a hot dog, the girls ordered burgers, Ben and I had chicken sandwiches and Myles ordered a steak. While we were waiting for dinner we wondered about how "American" it would be. Red meat is not common here. I have found some fairly good hamburger meat at one of the huge grocery stores, but lots of times the smaller grocery stores don't have it at all. Turns out that this is an awesome American restaurant! It was sort of like an Applebee's. It was definitely a taste of home. The sandwiches, fries and cole slaw were similar to what we would find at any casual dining restaurant in Olathe. And Myles said his steak was pretty good, too.

We told the waiter that it was very American. He was surprised to learn that we were Americans living in Gdansk. He is a student at a different university studying finance, so he and Myles chatted for a bit.

We were full from our dinner so we did not order dessert. But one of the desserts on the dessert menu is "A Heap of American Pancakes with Maple Syrup." That leaves us to wonder how many American pancakes make up a heap? No worries, we will get to the bottom of it before we leave Gdansk for good. We will most certainly be making another visit to Billy's American Restaurant before we head home in June. The kids were already making plans to take Aunt P there while she is visiting us. She will be here on Friday. This Friday! But since she is coming from America, and will be returning to America seven days later, we will probably not be seeking out an American restaurant while she is here.

Spring Starts Tomorrow

2010-03-19T17:35:00.001+01:00

But we got a sneak peek today! We've been craving a day over 40 degrees for a really, really long time, and today it shot clear up to 52! It was cloudy but that did not matter today. The kids went outside and tossed the ball around. There is still a tiny bit of snow on the ground in our yard, but most of it is gone (hopefully for the duration of our stay!).

I put the laundry out on the balconies to dry. We have had the laundry drying on racks in the house since about November. It was so nice to have it outside for a while!

It is back inside now because it looks like it could rain at any moment. But it was nice to have those things out of the way at least for a bit.

We did very little school work today, played hooky and went to the beach for a while. There was a tractor on the beach leveling the mounds of sand.

Ben and Natalie kicked the soccer ball around. Natalie spent a lot of time practicing her soccer juggling. It has been a long time since she has been able to have her foot on the ball and she has been missing it.

Abbie found a bottle in the water. She and Natalie tried to get it but it was too far out. It is way too cold to venture into the water, even if we suspect there might be a note in the bottle (as Abbie did). Someone else will have to get the message this time. Trey played in the sand and came home very dirty!

We were only there for an hour or so, but it is a favorite activity of all of us. If we want to go to the beach at home, major planning and traveling are involved to somehow get us to a coast. Here we can just go for an hour and enjoy the scenery. Everyone was thrilled to be able to ditch their coats this afternoon.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

2010-03-17T07:52:00.001+01:00

'Tis St. Paddy's Day today! The chance of finding corned beef here is close to zero, so we'll just have to wear our green for the day. I just finished reading Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt. What a storyteller! It is a heartbreaking, devastating, sweet and laugh out loud funny Irish memoir. It is now one of my all time favorite reads.

We are still waiting for some sign of spring in Poland! To be fair, it has been reaching above freezing on most days. We are definitely out of the deep freeze, but we are still spending more time than I would like around freezing (and below freezing at night). There are still mounds of snow in parking lots and some still left in our yard. Everyone tells us that they cannot remember a winter in Gdansk like this. Ok, we get it. We are ready to move on! According to the forecast we should have temperatures in the mid 40s in the next few days. Then next week it's back down into the 30s--just in time for my California sister to visit and find herself shocked into my world. We are so excited for her visit, and hopefully she'll be so taken with our warmth that she won't notice the cold weather outside.

We've been staying close to home, getting school work done and finding things to do around the house. Abbie and Trey were bursting with excitement when I brought home play doh from the store over the weekend.

They spent hours rolling, molding, creating. There were many masterpieces throughout the day but the uncontested favorite was the American flag. They improvised yellow stars instead of white, but the idea was surely there.

I have been meaning to mention an interesting thing about Polish money for some time. Polish currency is the złoty. It takes about three of these to equal one dollar. Then the złoty is made up of 100 groszy (like cents). People here in stores like exact change. If you hand them a 50 or 100 bill, most of the time they will ask for the groszy. It took me a while of observing others (and learning a little Polish) to figure out what they were wanting. Now I try to have a handful of change to give them exact change. Sometimes we have it, sometimes not. Lines wait patiently as everyone counts out their groszy. Some people (especially older people) pull out a handful of change, open their hand and the cashier counts it out of their hand for them while they just stand there. I've even seen people (again, mostly older people but not always) just hand over their change purses for the cashier to count out the coins for them. Another subtle difference in money handling is that when exchanging money there is a little change plate at most counters. You set your money on the change plate, they pick it up from there. Then they put your change there and you pick it up. Now that we have been here for six months I am not having to think about these things so much anymore.

Speaking of money, we bought our plane tickets home yesterday! They were not cheap! It is much more expensive for us to go home than it was for us to get here. It's hard to believe we are already making plans to come home!

Common Sense, Anyone?

2010-03-08T23:40:00.001+01:00

A decision has been made by the education officials regarding whether or not Natalie has to take the exam (in Polish) to determine what level she should be in at school. Myles and I wrote a letter explaining that Natalie just arrived in Poland at the end of September. She cannot read, write, speak or understand Polish. We told them that we are leaving the country permanently in June. We advised them that Natalie has been enrolled in our school back in the US, and gave them that contact information in case they wanted to verify the information.

There was a big pow wow Monday morning with the education folks and our school director. The officials have decided that in the future international students will not have to take the Polish test. But this year Polish wisdom dictates that Natalie will have to show up and write her name on the test. That's it. So she will have to go to school on a day that we don't usually go, write her name on this test and head home. Couldn't someone else write her name for her (it's not a signature) so we don't have to trek to the school, I ask. No, she has to write her name herself. Hmm, seems like an illogical waste of time to me!

Last Monday, Natalie hurt her finger in PE at school. We taped it to a popsicle stick and I was prepared to get on with life. By the weekend, after a few showers, the tape needed to be changed. We first ran into a problem because Trey used the rest of the medical adhesive to make a bridge for his trains in his room. So we had to get some more and went about changing it out. Well, her finger was still swollen and very bruised on the underside. Poor Natalie just about fainted from the pain when we were retaping the finger. We are now reasonably certain that it is actually broken, and not just sprained or jammed like we originally thought. I ended up using the popsicle stick and taping her ring finger and middle finger together. I had brought an ace bandage with us from home. (You never know! And it now has come in handy.) So we wrapped her hand to secure the "splint," and will leave it to heal for a while now.

Ben had a couple of friends over Saturday night. They hung out, ate pizza and played computer games all night long. They are a nice group of boys. We hope that they will make the big trip across the Atlantic and come stay with us in the US in the near future.

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

2010-03-04T08:59:00.001+01:00

We continue to march toward spring (ha! ha! Get it?). We had a couple of days in the low 40s, and quite a few in the 30s. It is going to dip back below freezing tomorrow and through the weekend. But the change in the amount of daylight is significant. It is now light well before 7:00 a.m. and stays light until about 5:40 p.m. By the end of the month it will be light until 7:30 p.m. because of the lengthening days and Daylight Savings Time.

On Tuesday the kids went ice skating with their school friends. At the international school the students usually have swimming on Tuesdays. Since it has been so cold the swimming facility has been unavailable. So they are doing other activities and invite us part timers to join in. Here is a picture of most of the students. I love this picture, but Abbie and a couple of other students are not in it. So I will have to keep my camera handy and get a picture of everyone before we leave Poland. The countries represented in this photo are: Italy, Colombia, Japan, Denmark, Latvia, Holland, Norway, Romania, Poland and US. That's pretty cool!

Trey and I skated but we spent most of our time holding onto the wall.

He skated around more than I did. It was a fun afternoon activity. The picture below is Ben and his friend Mads, from Denmark.

We took the tram to the ice skating rink and this ad for Alice in Wonderland was at the tram stop. I love seeing the translations of American movies over here. This version of Alice in Wonderland looks a bit disturbing to me, though.

Yesterday afternoon we went to the beach. It was still cold and pretty windy, but a lot of the snow that had been there has melted. You could at least see that there is sand on the beach. The remaining snow did not keep Trey from playing in the sand.

There has been quite a bit of beach erosion since we were there in January. There is a "cliff" that is about two feet higher than the water.

Natalie took the picture of Trey with the swans. She wants to be a photographer and practices a lot. She likes to take pictures when people are not looking at the camera. This picture is one of my favorites. She has a good eye!

We took this picture at this same spot the last time we came to the beach and it was very snowy. There is still snow on the ground but it is not nearly as deep as it was before, and the sun is much higher in the sky.

Abbie is posing in front of a beautiful background along our walk to the beach.

But Natalie Doesn't Speak Polish

2010-03-01T17:13:00.001+01:00

Our kids go to the International School on Mondays only. Our purpose in sending them is three fold. First, the British School has been a wonderful way for us to meet other English speaking families in the area. Second, on Mondays they have PE and art at school. Since it has been so cold for so long, it is very nice for them to have a place to run and play games and be with other kids. Lastly, it is nice for the kids to have a break from being with mom all of the time. We do not send them to the international school for academics, though they have certainly benefited that way. The girls have done a really neat project on Berlin and they are now learning about the countries of Africa. Ben has had exposure to physics and some advanced algebra that he would not have had otherwise. Trey gets more practice with reading and writing. And I'm pretty sure he's more cooperative with school work with Miss Marta than with me! We spend the rest of the week doing school work so that they will all be ready to go back to their regular schools in Kansas in the fall.

Natalie is at an "in between" age where she could have gone with the older group or gone with the younger group. Since she has not had much algebra, we decided to have her stay in the younger group, so she would not be stressed out and could enjoy her time there. Well, here comes the dilemma. The Polish Government Education Authorities came to meet with our school director. They have decided that Natalie, along with another boy in her class, Jacob, will have to take a test to determine what level they should be enrolled in. Ok, a few issues: The test is April 8th and we had talked about being out of town that week. I'm not sure if our travel plans will work out for that time frame, but we could get in trouble if she does not show up. I don't know what "trouble" means, but I am not looking to get in any trouble at all! Next, we are leaving Poland in 15 weeks. We are not coming back anytime soon. Our kids will not be educated here and have been enrolled in our schools back home for the fall. So what is the point in taking this test? And finally, here's the big one: the test is in Polish. All in Polish. We know a few words and can get by in day to day life here. I was actually very pleased with myself the other day when I went to the little store across the street and asked for bread in Polish. While that was a proud moment, that's the extent of our skills!

So we are going to write a letter and the secretary at the school is going to translate it. We are going to request that Natalie be exempt from the test. The secretary does not think this will be accepted by the complicated Polish bureaucracy, but we are going to give it a try. If they do not excuse her, we will have her show up for the test, she will write her name on the paper and leave the test completely blank. Jacob has the same problem with the language and he will do the same thing. He is from Denmark, but his situation is more complicated than ours because he will be returning to the school in the fall. He is taking Polish lessons but does not have a firm grasp of the language to be able to take an exam.

On another Natalie note, today in PE the kids were playing basketball. She's not sure exactly how it happened, but her ring finger on her right hand was injured in the game. It is swollen and she can barely move it. She can move it a little though, so we don't think it's broken. On the way home from school we stopped at an apteka. This is a little pharmacy where you get prescriptions and all over the counter medications. I was hoping they would have a splint for her finger. They did not. Where's a Walgreen's when you need one? They did have some medical adhesive tape so I bought some of that. When we got home, I ran across the street and bought a popsicle. Myles was very helpful and ate the popsicle for us. We then used the popsicle stick and the tape to splint her finger. It is working just fine and she is on the road to a compete recovery.

The News from Pooland

2010-02-28T23:24:00.001+01:00

No, that's not a typo. There are many things I love about Poland, and there are some things that I have adjusted to and have come to appreciate. But there is one thing that I am not going to miss. Polish people love their dogs. Something that is very different here than at home is that everyone has at least one dog. And dogs are being walked all the time. There are always dogs outside of stores tied to a tree or a metal pole waiting for their owners.

I am not a big fan of dogs in general. I don't hate dogs, I just don't really care one way or the other. I'm just not a love me, love my dog kind of gal. What I am not enjoying is the massive amount of doggie doo doo that is everywhere.

This week the temperatures have been above freezing and the snow has been melting. What is being uncovered is the months' worth of dog droppings. It's hard to enjoy the beautiful, sunny 43 degree day we had today when we are having to watch every single step. And even being watchful does not always do the trick. We have some awesome winter boots that we bought here in Poland in the fall. Our boots have made it possible for us to get through this winter. These boots are well made and warm. I had planned on bringing them home because I have never had boots this great in the US. But after this week, there is NO WAY I am putting them in a suitcase and packing them with the rest of my things that I can't live without. They will be staying here with whatever remnants are left on them.

We walk everywhere, so this has become a big issue for us. In Germany, Scotland and Ireland there are signs everywhere reminding people to pick up after their dogs. I can't remember if there are signs in Hungary or not. At home people all walk their dogs with their little plastic bags. (That is another issue--the bags should be biodegradable, but I digress). But people here do not clean up after their dogs. I don't like that.

Scary Noises and We're Out of Bread

2010-02-24T13:14:00.001+01:00

On Monday the kids went to school and Myles went to work. I was alone in the house for the first time in nearly a month! I was happily getting stuff done around the house, and Brad Paisley was singing to me (through Itunes, but still). I was cleaning away and the washing machine was going and the music was on when I heard a noise. I couldn't tell what it was or where exactly it came from. I was upstairs and it was definitely coming from downstairs, near the bathroom where the washing machine is. That is also right by the front door which I of course, have locked. There is a big iron fence around our landlord's property. It goes around both of the houses and you have to have a key to get in. So I could not imagine that someone could have gotten in the house, but I kept hearing this noise.

I called out, "Hello?" No answer. So I slowly head down the stairs. I had my cell phone in my pocket. I'm not sure who I thought I was going to call with it, but I had it. For emergencies here you call 997 for police, 998 for fire and 999 for ambulance. Is there any chance of me keeping that straight in the face of a real emergency? No way. Basia (our neighbor) taught me how to pronounce the name of our street a couple of months ago. So I was armed with that information and my cell phone as I continued down the stairs. Now I looked in all of the rooms. Nothing was out of the ordinary. I looked out the windows. Everything looked secure.

I finally opened the front door just in time to see a big batch of snow slide from the roof onto the metal railing, causing my mystery noise. It had been sliding down the roof and hitting the metal railings on the balconies and by the front door. It has been above freezing several days this week so the melting of the crazy amounts of snow has begun. So the question is: Is the continuation of the (hopefully) Spring Thaw worth the scare it caused on Monday? Yep. Bring it on! And sooner rather than later, please.

The temperatures have reached above 32 several days this week. While this is a great step in the right direction, it still is dipping below 32 at night, causing the melted snow to refreeze into ice. It was so icy this morning on the sidewalks that Myles took a taxi to work instead of walking to the tram. Trey and I went to the grocery store late this morning. It was pretty slushy and not too bad, but there certainly were icy spots. I was carrying the grocery bag and Trey was carrying our loaf of bread home. When we were about 1/2 block from our house I stepped on a patch of ice. I said to Trey, "Be careful. There is ice right here." The words were barely out of my mouth when he lost his footing and slipped, landing on his rear end. He is absolutely fine, but the end of the bread bag ruptured in the fall and our entire loaf of bread landed in the icy, mucky mess sans wrapper. It is supposed to get up to 41 degrees tomorrow. We'll pick up another loaf of bread then! In the meantime, the birds of Gdansk enjoyed an unexpected treat courtesy of Trey's ice mishap.

It is Above Freezing Today

2010-02-19T16:25:00.001+01:00

For the first time in 2010 we have seen snow dripping off roofs! We had a high of 39 degrees today. That's the good news. The bad news is that we are supposed to get up to 6" of new snow tonight. From all the Facebook posts of our friends back home, we know we are not alone when we say that we are so done with winter!

The kids did not have school this past Monday. All the schools here had a semester break for this week. Schools here start later and go through June. So we have been getting lots of school work done this week. We also are caught up on American Idol! Myles only had to go into the university for a few hours on a couple of days this week. Next week the kids will go to the international school on Monday and Myles will start the second semester classes.

There is another Fulbright family, the Keys, that we met through this experience. They were only here in Poland for one semester.

So they are packing up and heading home to Illinois next week. This Fulbright experience with a family is very unique, and we have formed a strong bond with them.

We spent time with them in Krakow and we spent a lot of time with them in Budapest during the Christmas/New Year holidays.

We wish them safe travels and we're only a little jealous that they are heading home!

Why One Should Never Exit a Bus with Hands in Pockets

2010-02-13T22:37:00.001+01:00

Poor Ben~He gave us quite a fright this morning! We had packed up all of our bags to come home to Gdansk, and we had to be out of the little house we were staying at by 10:00, so the cleaning lady could come. The man who manages the apartment was so nice and said that the new tenants weren't going to be there until 3:00. He suggested that we leave our bags in a corner until we had to leave for the airport at 2:00 for our 5:00 flight. That worked out great.

So we hop on a bus to go to the City Centre to walk around and have lunch. We are pros at public transportation at this point. We take buses and trams all the time. We have not driven one time since we have left the US. So anyway, everyone is exiting the bus--Myles has Trey and Abbie at the front of the line and they get off. I am the last one off, Natalie is in front of me and Ben is in front of her. I did not see exactly what happened, and Ben is not exactly sure himself, but all of a sudden, there is Ben on the pavement face first, just laying there. We think he just stepped off wrong and missed the curb, but his hands were in his pockets! So his face took the blow.

Of course, everyone springs into action. The bus driver (a young guy--probably around 30) was very concerned, other passengers who had gotten off the bus were concerned, people walking by were concerned. It was quite a spectacle! I was sitting on the pavement with Ben and he was clearly hurt, though we couldn't immediately tell how badly. He was certainly dazed, but I would not say he was confused. We got him sitting up and he said he was ok. The bus driver finally went on his way after about a minute or two, and we found a bench for Ben to sit on so we could see if we were dealing with anything serious. We had him sit there for a few minutes and he insisted that he was ok. He hit the curb at the bridge of his nose, and his forehead, and somehow his knee was scraped up, too. He seemed ok, but his face was bloody and dirty.

We were right outside of the Trinity College campus. We walked onto the campus and there was a little security office there. I knocked and asked them if there was a restroom close by so he could get his face cleaned up. There were two guys in the office who told me to have him come in. I don't know if they were EMTs or what, but they sure appeared to know what they were doing. They asked him all kinds of questions, checked his pupils (the normal head injury stuff that we already did), gave us some antiseptic wipes, told him he was going to be bruised and ugly for a while and we went on our way. He has been absolutely fine, except that he looks like he was in a bar fight. His nose is swollen and I guess only time will tell if he gets a black eye or two out of it. We are so thankful that it turned out the way it did! Ben has named this event "A Super Epic Ben-Fail."

Well after that excitement we leisurely walked around downtown. We had lunch and found yet another bookstore. We were all packed up, so we had a strict "we're only looking" policy. We walked out with four new books. There are just so many good ones! After enjoying our time browsing, we went back to get our luggage. The man met us there and called a cab for us to go to the airport. While we were waiting for the taxi to arrive, we chit chatted with him. He couldn't have been any friendlier and I loved listening to the Irish Brogue.

I asked him if he was related to the woman who owns the flat. He said that she is his daughter and she is a screen writer who lives in New York most of the time. He went on to say that her significant other is an American actor. So I say, "Oh, anyone we might know?" He says, "Oh, I don't know. His name is Andrew McCarthy." Myles and I say in unison, "Andrew McCarthy?" He says that he was in a group known as the Brat Pack back in the 80s. We say, "Yeah, we know who he is!" How fun is that?! I knew that little house was too chic for us! That's our little brush with fame. And his daughter and Andrew are coming to Ireland in about three weeks. Guess where they stay when they are in Dublin?!

We are now back home in Gdansk. There is more snow here now than when we left. That's not what we had in mind...but at least we got a nice break from freezing winter for 10 days! Ben is fine and this blog was written with his approval.

The Beautiful Coast of Eastern Ireland

2010-02-12T21:29:00.001+01:00

Today is our last full day here in Ireland. We took a train about 45 minutes south of Dublin to County Wicklow. Myles' great grandfather, Lawrence Gartland, came to the US from County Wicklow in the 1880s. We still are not sure how he landed in St. Louis. We are also not exactly sure what town he was from, but we made it to the right county for sure. I'm sure Myles' dad's Irish Eyes are smiling from heaven today!

My grandfather's family came to the US from Tipperary, Ireland. That is in central Ireland and we were not able to make it there due to our time constraints. The scenery on the train ride to County Wicklow is breathtaking. The train goes right down the coast of the Irish Sea, which is very rocky and rugged.

We had lunch in the town of Greystones and then walked along the beach. It was pretty cold and windy out today, much colder than in Dublin (which was probably about 42). The waves were pretty big today. Myles wanted to put his hand in the Irish Sea and did not anticipate the big wave coming which soaked his shoes! I was plenty far back from the water so that incident was more than a little amusing. We walked for a while and took advantage of the photo ops.

We took the train back to Dublin and Myles took Ben and Natalie back to the apartment. I had a fun surprise for Abbie and Trey. We went to see The Princess and the Frog. In English! They were so excited. It was cute. In Poland, there are plenty of American movies. The regular movies are in English and there are Polish subtitles. I have not been to a movie in Gdansk, but that's what I've heard. But kids' movies are dubbed into Polish so my kids would not be able to understand. They enjoyed it and laughed all throughout the show. Natalie opted to hang with Ben and her dad since she is far too mature to see The Princess and the Frog. I really think she wanted some computer time!

I have really enjoyed our time in Ireland. The people here seem very happy and are generally quite loud. There is much laughter and gregarious conversation. The people seem to always be looking for ways to help each other. It is a very friendly culture. One of my favorite things here is that everyone always thanks the bus driver when they get off the bus. And the drivers are so nice--they make an effort to give direction and are very kind to tourists.

Tomorrow we are going back to Gdansk. It will be good to get back, but we have sure enjoyed our break from the below freezing temperatures there! Spring is sure to arrive in Poland eventually...we hope!

We're Busy Being Irish

2010-02-11T22:28:00.001+01:00

On Wednesday morning we headed to the Guinness World Headquarters.

It is about a 10 minute bus ride from the City Centre. It is a very cool place! The tour is self guided and easy to follow. There are seven floors that explain how the beer is made, advertising, why Guinness is so dark, etc.

The seventh floor is called the Gravity Floor. It is where you get your free pint of Guinness (the kids and I had diet coke!).

The seventh floor is a large circular room that is all windows. We had a nice view of Dublin in all directions. This picture of Abbie has the Wicklow Mountains (to the south) in the background.

We also stopped by the Dublin City Hall building. They have a very informative exhibit on the history of Dublin.

I did not realize that Ireland was under the control of England from 1170 until 1922. That's a long time. Though very few people speak Gaelic anymore, all signs around the city (in the airport, on buses, street signs, etc) are in English and Irish Gaelic. Here is Natalie in the City Hall with the Irish flag.

Today we stayed in the apartment for most of the morning. There are toys in Trey's bedroom here and he has had a blast playing pretend with all of these action figures.

When we finally made it out the door we went to...

What a great day it was! It was around 42 degrees and a beautiful sunny day. There were very few people at the zoo so we meandered around at our own pace. They are doing quite a bit of work on several exhibits, so there were lots of construction people there. But we were able to see lots of the animals. This tiger paced by the glass divider many times while we were there.

Here is another tiger keeping his eye on Natalie.

We had a little snack at the zoo's snack bar and Abbie waited patiently with me for our order.

After the zoo, we went back to the City Centre and found a fabulous bookstore! We spent a long time and a ton of money in there. But our kids love to read so we won't gripe about spending money on books. And now have plenty of English books to bring back to Gdansk to keep us occupied for the next few months.

The trick is going to be packing them all in our carry on luggage to get them back to Gdansk!

We went to a traditional Irish pub for dinner. I had Irish stew made with Guinness beer, beef and mushrooms (yummy!). Myles had an Irish stew made with lamb and other veggies. I liked mine better, but his was still good. We've had a great couple of Irish days!

We're Halfway Home

2010-02-09T19:35:00.001+01:00

Today marks the halfway point of our international adventure. We may be off by a day or so either direction, because we do not have our home travel details set quite yet. But by the time we get back to Gdansk on Saturday, we will definitely be on the second half of our trip. We have been away from home for 4 1/2 months. In some ways it seems like that long, and in some ways I cannot believe it has been that long. I imagine time will really start to fly now. My sister is coming to visit us for a week in six weeks (we can't wait!), and we have several more trips planned. Then we'll be busy packing everything up to come on home.

Today we are in Dublin, Ireland. We are staying at a really nice home. The lady who owns it lives here while she is in Dublin, but rents it out when she spends (I guess) a considerable amount of time in New York. It is very modern and the lay out is interesting.

I am not nearly hip enough to pull off the look, but we are having fun staying here. We are probably 10-15 minutes outside of the City Centre, but there are quite a few buses that come by frequently.

This morning we set out and caught our bus. It was a little rainy and chilly, but not bad. The zipper on my coat has broken. Drat! We are so close to the end of winter and I would really hate to have to buy another coat at this late date. But there surely are plenty of cold days still ahead in Gdansk. It also has buttons so I am going to see if I can get by with it for the rest of winter. It was a very economical buy back in October, so I guess you get what you pay for! The day cleared up in the afternoon and we were able to be outside quite a bit.

We walked around the City Centre for a little while and checked out several of the little shops. We made our way to St. Patrick's Cathedral. It is attached to a little park with a fountain and playground.

I was surprised to see quite a few people walking around and sitting on benches in the park since it was kind of a chilly day. We had lunch at the park.

We saw where St. Patrick baptized the pagans. The actual well is no longer there, but the location is identified.

The 12th century architecture of the cathedral is too "heavy" as far as I am concerned. But I can certainly appreciate the magnitude and detail of it.

St. Patrick is the patron saint of both Myles and Trey.

After seeing the cathedral, we went to a Viking Museum. It was really neat and I think we all learned quite a bit. The Vikings founded the city of Dublin.

This museum started with the year 841 and went through medieval times. Ben had just learned about the Black Death in the 1300s in his (our) World History class, so the part of the exhibit that referred to that was especially interesting to him. Some things at the museum were interactive and then there was a young woman dressed as a medieval woman who gave us great detail about many things.

We left the museum and went to see part of the original wall that surrounded Dublin along with a gate that was built in the 1200s.

We walked to the River Liffey. This river runs right through the middle of Dublin, but I had never heard of it. Here are the kids with the river in the background.

Then we made our way back home. The people here are very friendly. At the bus stop this morning, I asked a young 20ish man if we were on the right bus to go to City Centre. He told us it was. Then as we were getting close to the stop, he appeared from a different part of the bus and made sure we knew where to get off (he was getting off at the same place). Then after we had walked about a block, he approached us again and gave us some further direction. The people here have been happy to help or answer any questions. I have to tune my ear to understand the Irish Brogue, but it has such a pretty sound!

Good-bye to Scotland...Cheers!

2010-02-08T18:45:00.001+01:00

On Sunday we had a lazy morning. I made a big breakfast with all of the yummy breakfast stuff we found in the grocery store. We headed out at about noon. First we went to the National Museum of Scotland.

There was a room with interactive exhibits for kids so that was fun.

The other part of the museum is very large and has many artifacts. But the exhibits were scattered somewhat haphazardly over six floors, which was confusing. To me, a good museum goes in chronological order. Period. This one did not, so it was hard to follow. But there were interesting things to see from many different time periods, and it was free so we still came out ahead.

From there we stopped by an old cemetery that is allegedly very haunted. There is the legend of the dog, a skye terrier named Greyfriar Bobby. He was so devoted to his owner, John Gray, that when the owner died, the dog loyally sat by his grave for the next 14 years, until the dog died, too. This statue is right outside the cemetery.

That's not the haunted part though. There are all kinds of reports of ghost sightings at this place. We did not see any when we were walking through, nor did we feel the sudden chill that many people report. But there are nighttime tours of the graveyard and creepy things happen. There is one ghost in particular, that of a man named George McKenzie, who supposedly actually attacks people. We of course, did not go on any scary tour, but apparently this "presence" has caused injury to people who disturb the space. Weird. Here is a link that tells all about it: http://www.wyrdology.com/edinburgh/poltergeist.html.

After our little journey into the scary cemetery, we went to the National Gallery of Scotland.

It is also free! It was a beautiful art gallery. I do not know much about art or art history, but I do really enjoy wandering around art galleries. We spent about an hour there looking at all of the beautiful paintings. Trey did however, come to me at one point to tell me that he saw a painting that was inappropriate. We pushed past that painting and saw plenty of pieces that were appropriate!

We picked up some dinner from the grocery store on the way home and were in for the evening. This morning we packed up the apartment and took a taxi to the airport for our flight to Dublin. The flight was 40 minutes late and we arrived at the airport early. So there was a lot of waiting. But it was not so bad since we found Skittles for the first time since we left Kansas!

The flight from Edinburgh to Dublin is a short 40 minutes. We took a taxi from the airport to the very hip little house/apartment we are staying in. Ben and I found a grocery here a few blocks away. We've had dinner and are in for the evening. We will start exploring Dublin tomorrow morning.

We are Loving Scotland

2010-02-06T21:39:00.001+01:00

Today was another great day of sightseeing in Edinburgh. When we left the apartment we were greeted by the haar. That's what they call the dense fog that is frequently in the area.

We walked to the Scottish Parliament building and to Holyrood. Both are just a couple of blocks from where we are staying. Holyrood is the palace where members of the royal family stay when they are in Edinburgh. We did not buy tickets to get a tour of the palace, but just took a look from the outside. Here are the kids at the royal gate and the palace is in the background.

We headed on to the Royal Mile toward the castle again. We stopped in some very touristy shops and looked around. That was fun and people here are very outgoing and friendly. When we walk into a shop or restaurant, they say "Hiya." When we leave they say "Cheers!" And they love to chit chat. They remind me of Americans in many ways. The culture here is very much like the US, so I'm sure that has lots to do with it. We stopped in several little shops as we made our way down the Royal Mile. We went to the Loch Ness Experience. It is a 3-D explanation of the Loch Ness Monster and talks about whether it is a myth or not. Myles and I were very disappointed in the film, we thought it was kind of boring and it could have been so much more. But the kids liked it and enjoyed wearing the glasses quite a bit! And we did all learn some new things.

After the Loch Ness Experience we went to a small Writer's Museum.

It has artifacts and works of Robert Lewis Stevenson, Sir Walter Scott and Robert Burns. It is a small museum, but we enjoyed seeing letters and other items that were there. Sir Walter Scott is known for many things including the well known quote "What a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive." There is a massive monument to him on Princes Street. As we walked down Princes Street on this drizzly (but not bad) day, we came across this bagpiper. It actually looks colder than it was. It was probably around 40 degrees. But it was drizzling on and off so that's why hoods were up.

Men playing bagpipes are all over the place. You can hear the music from quite a distance away. I think they significantly add to the charm of Edinburgh. We went and walked around an indoor mall for a bit. Then we went to 6:00 Mass at St. Mary's Cathedral. It is a very large cathedral. I have so missed Masses in English! I really enjoyed being able to understand the words. There is an international retreat going on so our Mass was concelebrated by the normal parish priest, along with four other priests from France, Sweden, Poland and Bosnia-Herzegovina. That was really cool to me, too.

But it is probably the last English Mass we will go to until we get home this summer. The Masses here are much more like Masses at home. There were Eucharistic ministers, and it appears that the parish has many activities going on. Tomorrow we are planning on going to the Scottish National Museum and perhaps the art gallery. We'll see if the wind takes us anywhere else tomorrow!

A Great Day in the UK

2010-02-05T19:13:00.001+01:00

We set out this morning as tourists in Edinburgh. When we left it was overcast, but there was not the dreaded haar (fog) that is so common in Edinburgh. This hill is called the Seat of Arthur and is visible when we walk about a block outside our apartment.

It was cloudy but warm, so we were perfectly content. It was 40-45 degrees all day today. That's fine with us! We walked around and took in the sights for a while. We came upon a statue of Adam Smith. Well, Myles was thrilled and we had to take a picture because Adam Smith is considered the "Father of Economics." He wrote The Wealth of Nations.

Myles was excited to see the statue of Adam, and we were REALLY excited to go to the Elephant House. It was a small coffee shop, now a restaurant as well. The exciting thing about this place is that it is where JK Rowling sat and wrote the early Harry Potter novels!

We are big Harry Potter fans, and it was so cool to visit the Elephant House. We walked around the back room (where she sat) and there is a huge window with a spectacular view of the Edinburgh Castle.

Edinburgh is not that big (about 500,000 people) and JK Rowling lives here. We all have our eagle eyes out for her. Seeing her would be a spectacular celebrity sighting for us!

We were there at about 11:00 and they were not serving lunch yet, so we did not eat there. We walked around for a while longer and then found a pub to eat lunch. It was called Deacon Brodie's. Deacon Brodie was the inspiration for Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. We have had some literary fun today for sure!

This pub had some traditional Scottish dishes. We had a UK favorite, fish and chips. Ben was very brave and ordered the Scottish National Dish. It is called Haggis. It is sheep lungs, liver, hearts--minced and mixed with oatmeal and spices. Ben thought it was quite tasty. Some of us thought the idea of it was so disgusting that we would not even try it!

After lunch we went to Edinburgh Castle.

The castle has a long and fascinating history. Mary, Queen of Scots was born here and was named queen when she was six days old. She was coronated as queen at nine months old. Her son, James was born there, too. This is the James for whom JAMESTOWN in Virginia is named. Those two names are just the tip of the iceberg. We toured the castle and this was by far my favorite castle that we have visited.

The views are breathtaking. Of course, the castle is the highest point of the city. Since it was not too foggy we could see a long way away. The sea was visible and we had a wonderful view of the city. One of the things that I really liked about visiting the castle was all of the employees who were very welcoming. They were all over the place answering questions and offering insight. Here are Trey and Natalie modeling some head wear of medieval soldiers.

Of course, Abbie is in her element at a castle. She ended up with a tiara and her daddy crowning her Queen Abbie. All is right with the world.

We stopped by a grocery store and had dinner at the apartment. We had a full day and are in for the night at 7:00. We'll head out again in the morning...

Getting to Edinburgh

2010-02-04T17:35:00.001+01:00

We made it to Edinburgh! We left our house this morning to catch the 7:44 bus to the train station where we were catching another bus. There we waited about 10 minutes and took the other bus for about 30 minutes to the Lech Wałęsa Airport in Gdansk.

There we showed our passports and our residency papers. We do not have residence cards yet. The lady who was inspecting passports was unsure about our papers so she called a supervisor to come and look at them. The supervisor took a quick look and said that our documentation was acceptable. So we went through all the security fun: coats, laptops, shoes, cell phones, cameras, backpacks...awesome! We took a budget airline, Ryan Air, based out of Dublin. They allow only one carry on bag, and they charge to check any baggage. And there are restrictions on the size of the carry on bag. So we each brought the clothes we are wearing, and two changes of clothes, a pair of pjs and that's it.

The plane was about half full, if that. It is about a two hour flight from Gdansk to Edinburgh. There is no complimentary anything on Ryan Air. They have soft drinks, food, smokeless cigarettes, lottery tickets all for sale though. We did not purchase anything. I had some granola type bars (called Corny Bars--made in Germany) with me that the kids snacked on during the flight. We arrived in Edinburgh at about 12:30. They are an hour behind Gdansk, so at the moment we are only six hours ahead of home! Since we have American passports, we were lucky enough to go through the "All Other Passports" line instead of the "EU Passports" line. We did not have to wait at all to have the lady check and stamp our passports. The "EU Passports" line was very long. Ironically it was much more bureaucratic for us to leave Poland than for us to enter the UK.

We took a cab to our apartment. The cab driver was very friendly and talked to us quite a bit. He told us that our "accents" sound like Helen Hunt! We think that we are not the ones with accents--everybody here is! It has already been fun to be able to understand people and to be able to make small talk when we are out and about. Our apartment is very nice has two bedrooms and a fold out sofa. It is located near the historic Princes Street and is about 30 yards from the US Embassy. We are happy to report that unlike Budapest, it appears that no one actually lives here. There is no underwear in the drawers, no food in the fridge or cabinets. There are however, smoke detectors in this apartment, which we have not had in our other travels. It does not seem to be standard in many parts of Europe like it is in the US. Our house in Gdansk did not have any when we first arrived. But soon after we got there I bought a couple just for my own peace of mind. Oh, and there is a combo washer/dryer here! Woohoo! There is a lot of laundry line drying at our house in Gdansk as of this writing! It should be dry by the time we get home on the 13th! As soon as we dropped off all of our stuff we went out to find some lunch. We found a little restaurant that to the kids' great delight, served nachos!

After lunch we wandered

just a little bit and found a big book store, an ENGLISH bookstore! We need to check our school book lists and we will for sure be making a return trip to that bookstore! On our way back to the apartment we stopped at a little grocery store and got a few things for breakfast. They had Kraft mac & cheese there. Who knew how excited some American children would get buying two boxes of that? They are also very excited that there is Dr. Pepper here. They are on the look out for root beer. They have Diet Coke here instead of Coke Light (like they have in most other parts of Europe). I had some Diet Coke with lunch and it sure tasted different to me. I don't know if it actually tastes different here or if it's been so long since I've had it that I don't remember what it tastes like. We came back to the apartment and the kids have been having fun switching from one English television channel to the next.

We left our apartment at 5:40 to go to dinner. Our very good friend, Cara, who we both know from our KU days, has a cousin who is living here and working on her PhD in Linguistics. Cara put us in touch with Lauren, and we were able to meet her for dinner. She is also a KU grad, though MUCH younger than us! It was so fun having dinner and wonderful conversation with a fellow Jayhawk!

We ate at an excellent Italian restaurant that she knew of and she gave us all kinds of tips on what to do while we are here.

In our efforts to reduce the amount of stuff we were bringing on our trip, we left one particular bag that we usually always bring at home. In it is our computer attachment to download our pictures. So, for tonight we cannot download the few pictures we took today. I am going to go ahead and post this entry, and tomorrow when we pick up the attachment we need, I will insert the pictures. So our pictures from today will be posted on the actual blog site tomorrow (2-5).

And one more thing...we heard that the temperature in Gdansk was 34 degrees today. Whatever! We have been waiting and waiting for some warmer temperatures and it finally warms up a little the day we leave! It is about 42 here in Edinburgh so we're doing ok.

It's Warmer and Lighter

2010-02-03T14:14:00.001+01:00

We are still not above freezing, but the temperatures are close. I have never been so happy to see slush! It snowed another inch or so this morning but now the sun is out. We have been able to get out a little bit more which is very nice. On Saturday we went to the Gdansk National Museum.

It is downtown and we ate lunch at the KFC beforehand. The kids were so happy! The museum is quite small and it took us about an hour to go through all of it. There were various porcelain pieces that were beautiful. There were many paintings from The Netherlands and then quite a few from the Gdansk region. There are also many pieces of artwork that are being housed there that were in the Church of St. Catherine. That church burned in 2006 and is being refurbished.

On Sunday we intended to go to the Cathedral of Gdansk for Mass. It is about a 25 minute tram ride and is the seat of the Bishop of the Gdansk Diocese. Myles had looked up the directions to this cathedral. We got off the tram and headed toward the high steeple a couple of blocks away. Mass was starting at 1:00 and we arrived right on time. After a little while, Myles leans over and says that he doesn't think this is the cathedral. I had not researched it, but the altar piece was very ornate and it looked like it could be a cathedral, though the church was not huge. It was incredibly cold in the church. We could see our breath (and everyone else's, too!) all during Mass. Just as at our church (St. Stanislaus), the holy water (which is inside the doors by the way) was completely frozen. After Mass we asked one of the priests if this was the cathedral. He said it was not and that the cathedral is one kilometer (about six blocks) down the road.

So we walk the six blocks and see another tall steeple. This WAS the cathedral. John Paul II said Mass here while he was pope and there is a huge portrait of him.

We walked around for a little bit, but it also was not heated, so it was freezing. It feels like it is colder inside these churches than it is outside. We cannot figure out why these buildings aren't heated at all. It seems like there would be a benefit to having some sort of climate control for all of the artwork in these churches. We quickly looked around and then decided that we would come back when it is warmer to really look around. Maybe we'll do that when my sister comes to visit next month

It was a great weekend as we were able to get out of the house! The kids went to school on Monday. Trey's class talked about fire safety and they made fire hats to wear (sounds just like what they do at home!).

We are leaving for Scotland tomorrow morning! We are flying and should arrive in the early afternoon. We are looking forward to it.

We've Been Downright Boring

2010-01-29T16:39:00.001+01:00

I am so glad that we had a couple of birthdays in January to liven things up, or we all might have gone mad. It has been very cold, and according to news reports here, the harshest winter in Europe in over 20 years. We can't say we've been too thrilled to be a part of THAT! But we are thankful to have a nice place to live, a big grocery store 1/2 a mile away and the internet at our fingertips.

We have not been out much at all unless we had to. It was bitterly cold the past few weeks. So we only went out to the grocery store when it was absolutely necessary. On Monday the kids were supposed to go to school and they were all looking forward to it to go somewhere. But when we got up in the morning, the temperature was -10 Fahrenheit. I flat out refused to make our school trek in that weather! My decision was not popular, but there was no way we were going. I think if we had gone out the kids would have agreed with me pretty quickly. It's one thing to brave the elements when it is regular cold, but at some point (and -10 is past "some point" to me) it's just stupid to mess with dangerous temperatures.

The bitter cold has let up somewhat. We contacted the kids' school and the director graciously allowed the kids to come on Wednesday instead of Monday. It seemed almost balmy walking to school in snow and 18 degrees! It really wasn't bad at all. When I picked up the kids it was about 23 degrees, AND it was still light for our entire walk home. Things are looking up!

We have all occupied ourselves by finding and listening to the Jayhawks' games online. That's always fun!

Also, we are up to date with American Idol! We are enjoying season 9 so far. We are a couple of days behind with it each week, but what a treat to be able to see it at all! There was a news story about a dog here that somehow found himself on a sheet of ice floating down the Vistula River. According to reports there were people in town who saw this dog on the river through Gdansk. The Vistula River empties into the Baltic Sea so this pooch floated on out there for more than 30 miles! Finally, a boat on the Sea saw him and he was rescued.

We have been doing lots of school work. I know the kids are tired of it. I know I'm tired of it, too! But we are taking a February break next week. We are taking a nine day trip to Scotland and Ireland, and we have no plans of doing any school while we are gone!

Today it warmed up to nearly 30 degrees so Trey and Abbie were finally able to get out and really play in the snow.

They wanted to build a snowman but the snow did not pack very well today. They may try again tomorrow.

We have come to the unanimous agreement that none of us will miss January in Poland! And while this may have been an unusually COLD winter, the darkness is not unusual. We have added nearly an hour of daylight to the days since the beginning of January, and the difference is significant enough each day that it is noticeable (and very welcome). So long January!

We Are Freezing

2010-01-24T19:01:00.001+01:00

It is really cold here in Poland! That is not surprising--it is January after all. But from what we understand this has been an unusually cold and snowy winter for Gdansk. Right now it is -4 Fahrenheit. It has not been above freezing here yet in 2010, and the forecast for the upcoming week does not look promising. It looks like we will be getting an additional 4-6 inches of snow midweek. We have been staying home the vast majority of the time. We are all anxious to get out and do something, but it is really just to cold to be out running around. Ben and Trey found the KU game online last night and enjoyed listening to the Jayhawks win. We're watching a lot of movies, playing board games and doing school work to keep ourselves busy. There's nothing we can do but wait the weather out, so that's what we are doing.

Trey's Happy Birthday

2010-01-20T13:59:00.001+01:00

Trey turned seven today. He woke up early and has been very excited all day long. It is very cold here and we just hung around the house all day. Myles came home from work at about 4:00 and Trey opened his presents. He got the movie "Monsters vs. Aliens." He has wanted to see that movie since it came out in the theaters. The DVD we bought is in Polish, but we can change it to English. We could also watch it in Czech or Slovakian if we want. He was very happy when he opened it up.

He also got a couple of transformers and a few new Thomas vehicles and trains. I love that he has not outgrown his love of trains yet. He has a bunch over here and still drives them all around the house.

We went to his favorite place on earth for dinner and he enjoyed his chicken nuggets and french fries! Myles is in the background eating Chinese food from the food court. The Chinese place and the pizza place in the food court put the food on ceramic dinner dishes (totally breakable). You eat your meal and then return the plate to the restaurant when you are done.

We came home and continued the celebration with cake. He made a wish and blew out his candle. When we got home, Trey was thrilled to see that his class had sent him a very nice Happy Birthday email. It was so sweet of them to send that on his birthday. He was surprised and delighted. Trey's is the last birthday we will celebrate here. My birthday (July) is next and we will be home before it rolls around!

It is still quite cold here. It has not been above freezing so far yet in January. We keep waiting! Ben has had to go to school three times this week. He went on Monday for his regular day of school. He and his classmates have been preparing for a British standardized physics test. That test was administered this morning. Yesterday morning he went in for a review session and then this morning he went in for some review as well. Then the test was late this morning. He just went by himself to school yesterday and today which was nice. When they all go I always go with them in the mornings and pick them up afterwards. To get to school, it is a 10 minute walk to the tram, then a five minute tram ride, then a 10 minute walk to get to school. The walking includes crossing a very busy street and crossing working railroad tracks. We've had to stop and wait for trains to pass before. Ben is fine to handle that himself, but I don't want the big kids to have to be responsible for handling all of that with Trey. We will find out how he did on the test sometime in March or April. They reviewed quite a bit so I would be surprised if any of the kids did not do well. And while this test will not count toward any of Ben's studies back home, we decided that the experience of taking it would be good. Also, he will have familiarity with physics when he does take it at Aquinas eventually.

Myles and I went to city hall on Friday to try to get our residency completed. We arrived with all of our paperwork and the lady told us that our landlord has to fill out a form and provide some other documentation regarding ownership of the house we are renting. So we still have that to do, but hopefully that will be the end of our obligation regarding residency. I wonder if we will even get our cards before we head back home in five months! We have not been out and about much since the weather has been so cold. We are really starting to notice that the days are getting longer. It was still light at 4:00 today! That is a welcome sight!