You know those lazy Mondays? Yeah... I had a nice lazy Monday, yesterday. And it's wonderful to say Monday, because people hate Mondays, except when they're lazy. Then the rest of the week is awesome! But really now, yesterday, I essentially sat around in my apartment, did a ton of class work, and then did some groceries. For dinner, Monika, Nate, and I went out to Dominium Pizza for dinner, and then we all enjoyed some McDonald's for dessert.
... That's right. McDonald's. You see! We stopped by CoffeeHeaven, and Monika wasn't certain of the coffee, so we decided to head to the mall for Starbucks, and on our way, Monika sees "DONUTS" on the menu at McDonald's. That's right. American donuts. Not pączki, which translates to donut, but are very different from American donuts (which I actually dislike). So we stopped there, and that is when I had my first McFlurry ever. That's right. I am so unAmerican, that my first McFlurry would be outside of America, particularly in Poland... My thoughts? It was all right. I don't think I'd order it again; I could definitely get a lot of better things for the same price. Or perhaps that's my bias... Shhhhh... By the way, here is a picture of this experience. Whoot for first picture on blog ever (and not being lazy!)! (Thank you Monika!)
That was it for the day. Really. (: But today! Oh, today made up for it. Left the apartment at around 8.30. Got back at around 19.30. That's right. You see, between my first two classes, I have enough a break, but I was running errands! Ah, so Holocaust was very interesting today; we discussed ghettos and the lives in ghettos. I love Professor Orla-Bukowska. She really does make it interesting, and she repeats the important things, and she tries her hardest to make it apply to us, while not killing our emotions. She keeps it light-hearted, which is super important to do for such a heavy course. Ah, at the end of class, she informed the Americans (and one Canadian) that she typically does a field trip/tour of Kazimierz, the old Jewish district in Kraków, as one of the last classes. So she asks us to determine a time we want to do this as a group, and then we have to write a paper on it. Well, short essay really. Although, during this, she informs me that Gina greatly enjoyed hanging out with me. Hoorah!
After class, I headed out to the ksero (xerox) to copy my reading for my Ethnic History of Polish Lands course in Polish, because that's actually a lot easier than walking back every day, trying to find the time to read it. I don't have to worry about someone interrupting, and I can take my sweet time in understanding it as opposed to skimming it and missing half of the information due to my lack of Polish vocabulary! But, the more fun part of that break was going to Professor Orla-Bukowska's office. Well, being in her office. Getting there was a pain in the butt.
So I knew her office address, sort of. I go to the building I think she's in, walk in, and I stare in absolute confusion of where to go. Polish college buildings aren't well marked, understandably so. I see a man in the court yard, smoking, when it says no smoking somewhere, so I'm like whatever. Then this man gets all grumpy and asks me, "Do you need something?" So I respond that I want to know where her room is, and he sends me up a flight of stairs, and complains at me for not noticing him earlier, because he's the porter and that's his job. Well, I'm sorry that I couldn't recognize you were a Porter, because you were smoking and on a break. Then I go up all of the stairs, don't find the room I'm looking for, hopelessly wander the courtyard and see there is no hope, go back to see the Porter in his office and ask him, "Is... this where the sociology department is?" Quite timidly. He responds, "It's on the other side of the street."
Well, damnit. I knew it was one of the two building numbers on either side, but that was still aggravating. So I walk to the next building, decide not to deal with a potentially grumpy porter and start hauling butt up the stairs. Oh, may I remind you: Polish universities are typically spread out across a city, with buildings here and there, not too well addressed or laid out, because they're old. So that's ok. Just... difficult to navigate. Oh, and they are monstrously tall buildings with no elevators, cause they are old. I go to the very top of the building, see a room number which confuses me to absolute heck, cause I was hoping for the first number to represent its floor. Wrong. Then I go down the hall, down, down, down, numbers shrink, turn the corner, go down the stairs on the turn, see a number closer to mine, keep going around, see the number I think I need, enter it, ask for the professor using the wrong name, because up until now, I've really thought of her as the "awesome Holocaust professor with my future life who introduced me to a fellow Tennessean in Kraków." Yeah. Not too informative, right? :) But, the woman at the desk (who stares at me after I come in before I ask about the professor) informs me next door. ARGH.
FINALLY, I walk in, and thank goodness, the lovely professor is sitting at her desk, and she invites me to sit down. Yeah, I'd have to say this was probably the most enjoyable part of my day, to be honest. I asked her about my paper and then I asked her what it's like to be a social anthropologist. So she told me about her job, and what she does, and why she enjoys it, and what the perspective is, and then she gave me a ton of suggested books and readings and authors on the subject so that I could get a better idea, and she told me certain scenarios of what has been studied, such as Jews during Christmas time, or Jews in the South, and other such cases. It's basically looking at the scenarios from the minorities case instead of the winner or the historian's viewpoint, the outside. Super. Awesome. It's far more modern than history, but you need to understand history in order to learn why people behave as they do in their societies, like the Nepalese women! They participate in polyandry! Yes, one woman has multiple husbands. Why? Not enough woman. Woman in Europe outlive men, and in Nepal, men outlive women. That makes total sense too. So she told me how they looked into it, and learned the necessities of such a scenario, and how it's more or less... imposed upon them?
I spent a good thirty minutes, at least, sitting and talking to her in her office about this. I even told her how whenever she told the class that she was born in America to a Polish family, then moved back and is a social anthropologist I essentially flipped out in joy. She is the future me. So she was really nice, and then she invited me back to sit down and talk to her when I get a chance to read some of her suggested books. Oh, life, how I love you. Ah! And when I told her I was super grateful for her telling me about Gina, she said that Gina had been really excited as well, and that she had a feeling that we would get along. Hah. It's so interesting how professors (and people in general) just can tell who you will get along with, even if you haven't had the opportunity to talk to them a lot. So, I left her office quite joyful and thinking about my future, per usual.
I am thinking that if I need to complete a Master's before my Doctorate to become a professor, then I might just do it in Poland... preferably Jagiellonian, and if not, Wrocław University would be awesome too. However, if I do not need a Master's, I'll just take a break year and go volunteer/work/intern somewhere in the world for the year, and then continue on with my Doctorate in the States. But! We'll see how life goes. A lot of things can change between now and then.
Afterwards, I headed to Zapiecek, the pierogi place, to meet up with Nate and Monika! There was a huge English group ahead of us, though, so we decided to say, "Let's go find another place to eat." Because they were a bit annoying... Like, they were observing the menu and were wondering about the traditional mix, and one girl was like, "No, they aren't dumplings unless they say pierogi," so I popped in and said, no... those are dumplings... I've been here a lot. I dunno if they took the advice, but whatever! We went to "U Babci Maliny," the restaurant we ate at the first day. Nate and I lucked out in that we had no line. Then Monika had to wait in the line. And ordered a dish. That took forever to make. But! The food was good. Yummy kiełbasa for me!
Rushed to Poland in Europe in the 20th Century. Good class; mainly talked about the European situation before World War II and building it up to then, and essentially how no one cooperated. I was tired and full of food, so I definitely felt quite drowsy through the course... but that course ended, Monika stayed afterwards to help me with my Polish homework; aka I told her what I was writing, and I had her make sure that my grammar sounded all right. Why? Because I have always been terrible in grammar, English included... So no surprise that my second language also has a very odd idea of grammar! Headed on to my Polish class from there, where we learned about the book we needed to get, did a reading exercise on Chopin and then a writing exercising, condensing the information we were given. Oh, plus, she had us listen to music and describe it. It was a fun class period, but at that point, I was ready to go home. Afterwards, I actually talked to the Polish-Canadian in my class! From Toronto, Polish family, very awesome. He even asked me about the accents in the South, and he's from Canada. xD That's just amusing.
Then I was home, where we waited for Monika, but ended up eating the few leftovers we had instead when we were tired of waiting. Yay for not really having stuff to make a full dinner with! I talked to my aunt and uncle from Gdańsk as well, so that was nice. I think I'll be visiting them one weekend in listopad (November), so that'll be fun! Also, they gave me information about my mom's side of the family that live near Kraków. Oh, and my aunt's brother as well, who I met in 2005 when I visited Poland on my own. It'd be awesome to see that family again! :) But then, in regards to family... oh gosh... I called my parents and Skyped them with a bit, ya know, talking about my life plans and everything, cause that's just what I do, and then I asked my mom about information about my family. ... I did not know about this entire side of the family. I've met a few, apparently, but I don't remember them. I am super excited to meet them! But why in the world must there be so many Marias? Seriously, I was talking with my mom and kept on pausing her to ask, wait, what Marysia? Which one? What? But... you said. Oh wait. What? Oh, yay for Poland loving the Virgin Mary... But... again, I will see more family, and that's just going to rock my world! I love family! <3
I will leave you with that exciting note, as I do have class in the morning, and I have things to do, and I need to wake up early. Unfortunate? Yeah, a bit, I know.
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