Jeden Fanta, Jeden Sprite

The other day, my co-worker sent me this link. http://www.vbs.tv/watch/from-poland-with-love
The video follows a couple as they move through Poland, learning about current Polish culture.
After watching it, I don’t know how I made it through Poland without drinking alcohol.

That was in 1995.

McVey and I hadn’t even intended to go to Poland. While we were in Amsterdam, we met this girl who had been teaching English in the former Eastern Europe. She told us we had to go.
In one of our morning conversations, we decided to check out of the hostel and catch a train to Warsaw. This was a great decision. Other than the fact that we got stuck on the German border and had to wait for a later train, it was an awesome experience.

(Side note, Frankfurt-am-Oder is where we saw Waterworld. Dennis Hopper dubbed into German was cold blooded.)

All four nights in Warsaw, we stayed in a convent for less than a dollar a night. You were only supposed to stay a maximum of three nights, but for some reason, they let us do it. I have a theory that they liked McVey.
When we arrived, our train was one of the earlier ones to roll into town. We walked to the convent to see if we could book that night’s visit. The hostel portion was closed. This was not unusual. Most hostels generally kick you out in the morning and don’t let you back until late afternoon.
I encouraged McVey to call out for someone. Maybe at the very least, they would hold our bags for us. I told him to use his Polish language skills to talk them into it. He pointed out that he spoke very, very little Polish.
I then pointed out that he had taken several years of Latin in college. Surely, the sisters in Warsaw knew the liturgy in Latin and would appreciate someone using the language to communicate. McVey jokingly looked to the large wooden door blocking our way to the hostel, raised his hand in oration, and said “O magna porta!”
This was one of those tilt your head and stare moments.
“We had to translate text where the narrator talked about the great door.”

He walked up to the door to a small cross affixed to the wall. I kid you not that McVey pulled on the cross and a doorbell rang.
No one answered, but McVey found a recess above the entryway where he could hide our bags.

I remember walking to some waterway and taking a nap on the bank. When I woke up, there were two men drinking from a bottle nearby. How great was that?
The people of Warsaw were comfortable drinking. They also had no problem smoking. One time, we were waiting at an intersection to cross a street. There was a woman pushing a toddler in a stroller. The child was at exactly the level of car exhaust blowing directly into his face.
“That’s good,” said McVey. “Makes lungs strong.”

We stayed in a loft over a common dining area that had an opening facing the church. We woke up every day at dawn to the sound of their prayers / chants in the church.
The first night, someone made a mistake. There was a young woman in our room with us. I remember her on the bottom bunk bed with her blanket wrapped around her with her eyes closed. She had to be thinking it was a bad dream. She bolted our room first thing in the morning.

One night, there were four Russians in the room with us. They kept talking in whispers and looking at us. Then you would hear them say “Amerikanski” and they would burst out laughing.

We stayed at a more conventional hostel in Wielieska where we had the misfortune of meeting the dumbest dumb American ever. He was from Michigan. When we met him at the dining table, he was complaining about getting a ticket on the tram because there were no signs saying he had to buy a ticket before he boarded.
We compared notes later, and at the table, we had a Let’s Go: Europe, a Rough Guide, and a Lonely Planet that all had information saying how important it was to buy your tickets in advance.
The next day, we were in the city square and ran into him. He had just learned a Polish curse word and wanted to share it with us. It was so embarrassing. We already knew about the word because of the girl we met in Amsterdam. This word is as bad as or worse than MF is here. And he kept trying to say it. His pronunciation was horrible, but he was still offending people left and right.
The next night, we were at the dinner table and he said Birkenau was not worth visiting. He said, “It has nothing but a bunch of buildings.”
This guy from Australia named Anthony couldn’t contain himself. He says, “How can you say that? It is such a visceral experience. Just rows and rows of buildings, each one stacked three high with planks for bunk beds, full of innocent people waiting for death…” Anthony looked at him for a split second and, realizing the futility, trailed off, “Oh, forget it.”
When my applesauce disappeared from the refrigerator earlier, Anthony said it happened to him, too. “Someone pinched me margarina.”

Anthony told a story one night about how small the world was. He said that a couple of months before, he was in England and was talking to a guy in London. The guy asked Anthony where he was from. Anthony said Canberra.
The guy tells Anthony, “I’ve only met one other person from Canberra, a girl named _____. She was a school teacher.”

It was Anthony’s sister. Anthony was roughly following her route from when she visited Europe two years before.

It is disappointing to think that no matter how small the world becomes, I am more likely to bump into Michigan than Anthony.