More Pictures from the weekend

The Hunt!

Recovery Drinks!

The awkwardly smiling/not smiling group of people!

A prized specimine!

The Crew! (P.S. in the next set of photos, the white and red one is NOT a good one! it is a very bad one, but the formatting was all weird. Brown= good.)

Stick to the Back Roads...

Good ones!

I’ve never re-fueled with beer and goulash while mountain biking before. That is, until this past Saturday! Tisovec is in the midst of a memorial celebration for Dr. Vladimir Clementis, a famous political figure in Slovakia, who was born in Tisovec. All week the principle of the school mentioned the concert and an optional (though strongly advised…) bike ride up some hill, to some place where we’d eat some kind of food…If you haven’t picked up on it yet, rarely do I receive information in-full or accompanied with a thorough explanation. If I was good at goin’ with the flow before I’m a master now, but come on—all you have to say is “bike ride” and I’m there.

I met the principle of the school had her husband at 8:30 AM. The pair is currently biased towards tennis, but like any good Tisovec(ians?...) they are also pretty adept cyclists. Helena was sporting some fierce looking glasses and a helmet and my first thought was, ok, this lady probably knows what she’s doing. While explaining the route to me she said, “Vlado has the problem and doesn’t like to wear the helmet, so we will not be on the main roads… I ride a six speed bike, but sometimes I must use the seventh speed, which is me pushing.” HAHAHAHAHAH! We hadn’t even left yet and the lady already had me rolling.

On rides covering any substantial distance I am a devout helmet-wearer, but since mine is currently en-route by mail, I’ve had to do some riding without it. Since I was told we were going to be “avoiding the main roads, so it’s ok, you mustn’t wear helmet” I figured it’d be fiiiiiine, rub some dirt on it. Like I said before, I had no idea what to expect and the ride was being portrayed as more of a pleasure-pedal.

As we made our way further away from town though and passed more and more “Muranska Plania” signs the road gradually became less paved—first just rougher and spotted with more potholes, then it became a dirt road all together and sometimes the deep, parallel tire tracks might be better described as “ditches” than part of a “road.” I consider myself better versed in mountain biking than serious road-biking anyways, and we were exploring an area that I’ve been itching to find out about, so everything was gravy to me. Vlado, Helena’s husband, was keeping a great manageable pace and as we ascended the trail there were no glaringly technical sections or places I felt in eminent danger.

There were plenty of spots however where I wished I had my clip less-pedals and shoes, not to mention suspension and oh, yeah—a helmet. Personally, I’d rather have that piece of hardware to protect my noggin’ on the “back roads” (if that is in fact how we are distinguishing styles of biking) than the main roads. I mean, I’m pretty sure the possibility for wrecking exponentially increases as does the number of obstacles, or as the smoothness and uniformity of the terrain decreases.

Equipment technicalities aside, nothing about this experience so far was entirely new to me. That is until we stopped to re-group and Vlado pointed out an excellent specimen of mushroom. Earlier in the ride I had asked Helena to clear up the difference between “ryba” (fish) and “hriba” (mushroom, the “h” sounds almost silent when native speakers go fast!). Non-English speaking Vlado may have just been turning the awkward silence and waiting time into an educational opportunity, but before I knew it we were gathering mushrooms. I proved a quick study at mushroom taxonomy—picking out the good ones from those that are poisonous—and so I was given license to go off and look by myself. “Dobre?” I would ask returning with a little bit of fungi. “Nei” (no) he would say if it was a bad one, or “Excellent!” if I had found a particularly great one. It became a great excuse for breaks, or a way to spend time re-grouping with the rest of the party. Never before have I stopped mid-ride to forage for food!

Remember that the aim of our ride was a “party” of sorts—including goulash and beer. I dig the Slovaks, because from what I’ve seen so far (Banska Bystrica, the boat festival on the Hron in Brehy, this thing…) they like any and all excuse to congregate outside and have a celebratory get-together. People had ridden bikes, hiked, or ridden in 4x4 cars to get to this spot where a giant pressure-cooker on a trailer was set up and men were preparing goulash in large vats, the keg was tapped and the beer flowed freely, and we met some nice people who shared fresh blueberries they had picked en-route with us. Children decked-out in camo dug holes with big sticks or just chased each other around, people snoozed in the sunshine or milled about talking and laughing. The population of the gathering waxed and waned as people continually came and went on various paths. IT WAS AWESOME!

On the way back we snagged a few more mushrooms (seriously, I’m really good at finding them) for our dinner that evening, and then concluded the adventure in the pub because, “all bike tours should be concluded in the pub—the beer helps with the lactic milk acids. If you don’t drink, you will have the problem walking the next day.” I know all about lactic acid build up, and I’ve heard (and used) remedies as strange as chocolate milk; but I’m pretty sure this was the first time ever that beer has been recommended to me as a recovery drink. Nazdravie!

Plus 5 for Festivals...

As you can see from the following videos, one Slovak tradition that ain’t going nowhere is folk groups. These are groups of young men and women who practice and keep alive traditional song and dance. My heart SANG when I saw this! After a week of hearing crickets whenever I asked students what is cool about Slovakia, these kids were up on a stage, PROCLAIMING what makes this country so special over speaker systems and up on mega-trons. Granted, this was at a festival (I have yet to walk down the street and run into a group of civilian teenagers harmonizing or step dancing—mostly they rollerblade, loiter, or devour various parts of one another’s bodies in PDA’s…) it’s good to know that somewhere there is a population of young Slovak people who are willing to spend hours perfecting the arts of singing, leaping, throwing faux-hatchets (yeah, I saw some of that…). The bands were also composed of young people, so the accordion player, the fiddler and standing bass player are all young people who choose to spend their time practicing traditional ballads over and over and over again, instead of learning the latest and greatest rock or pop song.

As many of you know, the whole reason I am here is to collect oral histories from old people to try and preserve a rich culture which I am afraid is evaporating quickly. As the world gets smaller and young people here try to emulate other cultures they see on television screens and web pages, the one they spring from becomes diluted. It’s a double-edged sword, because who I am to say, “You there, you are not allowed to ‘advance’ with the rest of us—you need to stay antiquated in your ways.”? Yet I’ve seen the problem from the other side, and I know some of what they strive for is not all it’s cracked up to be, and that having a sense of cultural identity is invaluable.

After watching the folklore performances my friend and I milled about all the cute-sy little booths and stands selling traditional knick-knacks and goods. One of the stalls I stopped by belonged to a photographer named Jaro Sykora. I was drawn in by what appeared to be high quality black and white photographs of the Slovak countryside and old Slovak people. When I took a closer look and perused his book (which I bought…) I learned that for over two decades he has been committed to taking photographs of people and places in the Old Orava Region. Apparently this is in the Northwest part of the country, and let me just say that the people he depicts make the ones I have met and am trying to work with look like they’ve been living at the Ritz Carlton. Turns out his family heritage comes from this notoriously brutal region, and when he started dabbling in photography in 1987 he felt drawn there for material. Basically, he has done through images (amazing, breath-taking, make you want to cry, or gasp, or maybe even genuflect images…) what I am trying to do with words.

One of my favorite photographs in the book is called “Pedikura” (“Pedicure”) and it is of an old woman with grubby, gnarled hands gettin’ after her big toe nail with her thumb nail and what may or may not be a book of matches. One foot is still shrouded in an ill-fitting sock and worn-out loafer, and her exposed foot reveals a serious case of hammer-toe. It is unclear whether she is inside or outside—as dirty as the floorboards are she might be sitting on her “deck,” but the broom and wash-basin which creep into the frame suggest the inside of her home. He face is not revealed, and since she is wearing pants and a bulky, tattered, and hopelessly androgynous sweater the only indicators of her gender are the patterned scarf she wears on her head, and the few wisps of silver-white hair that escape from underneath it. The title is ironic, and yet rather than displaying her as pathetic, saying “ha! This lady NEEDS a pedicure, look how down-and-out she is!” it shows her profound strength—she has seen everything, been through it all. While the full extent of her self-pampering might be digging the crap out from under her toes with her equally filthy hands, she’s not asking for more. This is the life she knows. For her the luxury and superfluous ness of a pedicure is far-fetched and probably even incomprehensible.

As I said before, Sykora started taking these pictures over twenty years ago because he felt like this culture and breed of people was rapidly disappearing and he wanted to somehow archive it, and recognize them. That momentarily discouraged me. Surely if he was catching the last of this authentic bunch on the back-ends of their lives then, I’ve lost them by a long shot. The thing about time is it keeps going, and so as tomorrow keeps turning into yesterday and then twenty years ago, this old regime of hard-core Slovaks has or soon will pass away and never again will anyone be able to remember quite that far back. This re-solidifies the urgency I feel for my project. I may not be able to find people living in old log cabins sans-electricity, but I’m sure I can track down a whole slew of people who witnessed the onset of Communism, WW II, the Slovak National Uprising, and life in general in a country that until quite recently seems to have always gotten the short end of the stick since about the 1880’s. These people were and are profoundly strong, seasoned by years of unforgiving labor in living conditions most of us can’t imagine. Let’s not let all their work be in vain. Let’s acknowledge and appreciate these people, and like the folk groups, let’s try to keep the few pleasant aspects of their lives like these traditions alive.

More Festival...

Look how awesome this is! Think about how much they have to practice...

Festival in Banska Bystricia

These young men and women give me hope that not every last tradition is going to slip away...

My Humble abode

This is where I hang my hat at night

I Bes' Show you Where I Am

Six Degrees of Slovakia

I’m pretty sure whoever coined the phrase “it’s not what you know, but who you know,” was alluding to me and this country. After this past weekend, I sort of feel like my life is a giant game of “six degrees of Slovakia;” and with each new connection forged more benefits arise, new friendships develop, and this whole situation becomes more and more unbelievable to me.

I spent last weekend in Brehy, the town my grandfather was from and where I became formally acquainted with Slovakia two years ago. This time around, I know I can rely on the people I met/reconnected with there for anything; the place is already my home away from home. I was under the impression though that I would need to venture back to home-base to reap the benefits of “having people,” that sort of like cell phone service the power of my networking would decrease with range. Turns out though, that one of these friends studied at a pedagogical (teaching) school in Tisovec fifty years ago. She, her husband and grandson all drove me back Sunday afternoon so she could have an epic homecoming of her own. After we stocked my kitchen with the fresh tomatoes, peppers, pears, potatoes, and whole cornucopia of other goods they supplied me with, we hit the town for a nice gander down memory lane. She told us what was new, what had been expanded or re-done over the years, which part of the school she had studied at are original and where she used to sleep—it was pretty unreal.

Somehow our walkabout led us to the home of one of her classmates from back-in-the-day. I have passed this house numerous times on runs or hikes, and have even speculated about its inhabitants. I’m telling you, give Slovak people ten minutes, and they’ll find a connection to anyone, anywhere. One moment my friend was making small talk with a suspicious seeming stranger, and the next the connection was realized—“Schwartzova?!” the taken-aback woman on the porch exclaimed. How’s that for the past falling into your lap?

The woman’s husband, who resembles Toodles from the movie “Hook,” quickly hobbled down the garden steps to the gate and ardently insisted that we come up for “dva minute” (two minutes—of course it turned into an hour…). Over kava (coffee) the two women filled each other in on basically their entire lives, and as I watched I couldn’t help but imagine myself in a similar situation fifty years from now—on a lazy Sunday afternoon I’ll be in the middle of folding laundry or peeling potatoes, maybe just staring at my ceiling, when suddenly some rando poking around my backyard will reference a cloudy and distant past--“Bone? You mean Gracie Bone, as in G-bone?!” or “Selina Melancon—from Vegas?!” How will our bodies be weathered and worn by then, what sort of crazy adventures will life have taken us on, and who will we call family? These women were my age when they were last together, and now they have grandchildren as old as me. I mean, I hope to keep in better touch over the next few decades, but still, you get the idea…

While the people have been receptive enough to me in Tisovec, my relative card was definitely the ticket to my immense success and complete envelopment by the Brehy community. The whole town would bend over backwards to help me. Now I’m just some visiting American. With this new association out in the open though, this woman doted on me just as hard as the folk in Brehy, and positively jumped at the idea of working with me (I still need to sit down with the girl who is going to translate for me so she can fill this woman in on what’s going down—so far we’ve just exchanged sparse broken sentences and smiled and nodded at each other a lot). As I said before, every week these people are hooking it up more and more. I’m learning to let nothing surprise me, and am probably getting a little spoiled.

"He who would leap high must take a long run"

9/3/09

So it has officially been a week since I landed in Tisovec, and in that week I have vacillated across a broad spectrum of attitudes and frames of mind. One moment I’ll be elated as I look out my window and see a flock of sheep grazing on the plush, green hillsides while the shepherd and his dog stand nearby, or I laugh with some of the faculty in the staffroom and work on my Slovak. At other times though I’m bored stiff, at a complete and utter loss for ideas of how to occupy my time.
Like many Americans, (gotta love that puritan work ethic…) I am a doer. I’m used to motion and activity, and as type-A as it sounds, being able to cross things off of lists. Even this past summer, which I spent in the woods, each day we had to accomplish something, even if it was just packing up camp and walking to the next place to pitch out tents. The other day I went for a hike and I saw so many people working out in their gardens, harvesting potatoes and doing general maintenance. I had pangs of nostalgia for picking pine needles out of my mother’s seemingly endless rock beds, or working with tools myself on a trial maintenance crew on the Colorado Trail. I wanted so badly to go work with the random strangers, pull a few weeds, man a hoe, whatever—I just wanted to feel like I had something to do, to feel used.
Now don’t get me wrong, I know how to chill out too. All this free time has allowed me to explore plenty of the surrounding hills (so awesome! See pics…), have a paragliding adventure, and finally get some pleasure reading done. I’ve also been getting more sleep on a nightly basis than I probably have in years, so I’m sure my body is stoked. But I still feel like I’m in a holding tank—classes won’t start regularly until next week (this week is lots of orientation-type stuff and half days) and since I am a teaching assistant and will not have any classes of my own, I don’t even have lesson plans to create. When I arrive at school each morning Helena, the principle, just says to me, “Well, I’m sorry you will have more free time…” I never thought I’d dread free time so much.
As I was making a cup of tea yesterday though, I got TOLD by some teabag wisdom. Lately I’ve been into Good Earth tea, each bag of which comes equipped with a complimentary little something to ponder. At the time I was feeling particularly reflective, and my teabag said, “He who would leap high must take a long run.” BAM. Does it get any more in-your-face than that? I didn’t come away from four years of crew empty-handed, I know all about analogies, metaphors, processes, and delayed gratification!
Before I got here I was all talk about how great living in the tiniest town ever was going to be, especially when pitted against nay-sayers. After experiencing it for a little while though I became sort of disenchanted, this isn’t how I imagined it... But I have to put in the legwork to ease my way into this place. I had all these delusions-a-grandeur about how magical my time here was going to be; but I need to get acclimated, follow that process, and learn how to wait and be still before much of that plan comes to fruition. I need to be alone a little, be bored, confused—basically I need to wrack up some brutal training runs before that perfect, stellar, euphoric leap.