Oh my goodness I wrote so much yesterday and I don't know how I could do less today. I'll skip breakfast- just know that Marta's fourteen year old son brought us to our stop, and the third host, not mine, gave me a hat so I wouldn't be cold. The train to Czestochowa had eight seat compartments so we all sat together eating chocolate (parting gift from our host), telling stories, and playing games. On that trip we invented our very own Polish family because we were so sad to leave our hosts. It was a riot. This is a great group to travel with.*
Czestochowa didn't seem like much when we arrived, only grey and bleak and modern in a very trashy way. It was sadly like home. Then we approached the shrine and the steeple came clear from the fog, and we celebrated Mass before the famous image of Our Lady. (Also, ate lunch, saurkraut and sausage and beans.)** I've never been to a Mass where the priests come through the consecration to distribute the hosts. Reminded me of Masses celebrated by Jerzy Popielusko in the videos we saw in his museum. I've also never knelt on stone to receive the host. It does touch the soul, and form it, there is something fundamental in the gesture, to the point that it is no longer a gesture, but a real submission to a real power.
After Mass we talked through fog on brick roads beneath dead and dipping trees to the spookiest, most derelict train station I've ever seen. It was like something from a book. I expected Count Dracula's coachman to greet us. I loved it. Our train to Krakow was again filled with games, making up shopping lists and menus for the week, and prayer with our 'collapsible shrine', exercising our new Polish personas. When we arrived in Krakow our first mission was to split into teams and shop for groceries, a hassle and adventure unto itself, then we pushed our shopping cart through the mall to find our bus stop. We were very obviously foreign and cold, hungry, and tired, but the walk through Old Town to our bus was beautiful, misty, and lit by street light. I was very sad to leave Warsaw, but Krakow is beautiful and promising. Our apartment is on a lonely stretch outside of the city center, up a hill, and owned by nuns. They came out to greet us, standing with our grocery bundle, but they said they didn't expect us to arrive tonight. They had the room regardless and showed us upstairs. We ate a quick bread and cheese dinner, drank some tea, and made our beds.
So I didn't take as much room as I thought, but I don't know about tomorrow.
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*Our Polish Family: Bobska (Grandma, me); Sna-Sna, my daughter in law; Papa Maple, her father; Uncle Sergei, her mischievous brother; Maria, her aloof sister; Kremowka, "Cream Cake," her dutiful daughter; Rogi, her faithful loyal son; and Baby Mariska, who is embarrassed of Polski family.
**In Polish: bigos
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