History /
An American studying medicine in the PRL 1978-1985: my story [142]
Out into the worldThe memories of my first days outside the dorm will forever be seered into my memory. Sights, sounds and smells then encountered are as vivid in my consciousness as if they happened yesterday.
It was a beautiful August summer day. The sexy Polkas were out in their summer dresses and I was king of the world!
But then,
the noise! Having been raised in Jersey chicken-farm country(where the most-disturbing sound one might encounter might be a cat fighting an opposum), I wasn't used to the city. Kraków's street symphony was a cacophony of sounds: screeching/squealing/clanging metal (trams), put-put-put of the 2-cycle-engined cars, and the low frequency rumble of the PKS buses. It was noisy and it was sexy. It was exotic. I was a stranger in a strange new world.
After the acoustic assault came the smells. What hit me the quickest and the hardest were the fumes! During my year in Kraków the locals were constantly reminding me of how the city lies in a bowl. And that all the smoke,pollution and fumes just linger above the town to irritate Cracowian mucous membranes for days to come. I couldn't tell where they were coming from. I instinctively recognized them as by-products of internal combustible engines but which engines?! Were they from the trams(I never saw a tram before, so I didn't have a clue lol)? or from the buses? or from the put-puts? or? or?... That smell was so pervasive and pentrating a smell I had ever smelled! It lingered in my nostrils for hours! It was such a novel scent, that it took me a few days to make the connection. After much cogitation I concluded that it had to come from the put-puts! You know, those 2-door, 2-stroke engined Syrenas and Trabants. I'm telling you it was a sight to see: small, flimsy-looking cars with blue smoke spewing from the tailpipe, sparring with the bigger vehicles for the road. They were odd-looking cars with plenty of attitude: cars that got the job done despite their looks (later I was to understand how these fiesty vehicles were emblematic of their owners' attitudes). Just like their un-impressive-looking cars, the Poles, despite the paucity of "fluff" got the job done.
It was simply an orgy of sight, sound and smell.
On our to-do list that day, was to buy bread. Polish bread during those seven years, was always fresh, always good and always cheap. However, it did come at a price: you had to wait. I can count on one hand the times I just walked in, bought my "bohenek żytniego" (loaf of rye) and left without waiting in line. There was always a kolejka. Always! Way before the "nie ma" days that were to follow, where you stood in line for EVERYTHING. If you wanted your bread(and delicious fresh rolls) fresh from the oven, you waited in line.
I'm sorry but I've got to go. My daughter is calling out for food......Maybe one more "relacja"The babciasI called all those chunky, blunt, rude,broads who shamelessly corrected my Polish in all the stores of Kraków the Babcias. The Babcias were notorious for correcting your grammar. It didn't matter how hard you were trying or how broad you smiled or how deeply you bowed, these babuszkas, if your sentence was incorrect, would let you know about it. They would just up and say it: "Nie proszę Pana, się mowi ........." WTF? This was the height of insult for us Americans! Can you imagine? How dare these women correct me! Don't they know I'm an American and I AM TRYING! It was so widespread we all thought it was a communist conspiracy(we thought that of a lot of things). It literally didn't matter where you were, kawiarnia, piekarnia, Dom Towarowy, on the tram, anywhere, the Babcias were there to tell you your Polish sucked. Or so I thought.
It didn't take long for me to love them. Those lovely, darling, corpulent ladies of the Communist retail world were directly responsible for me "upping my game". Thanks to them my Polish improved exponentially in that first year!
After a few visits with them I realized they were not correcting me ze złości (out of spite). They were rather doing it out of pride for their language maybe; possibly out of (Christian)love. I didn't know nor did I care. Whatever the reason, it definitely was not out of hate. It became a game after a while. You were determined to return to your Babcia and show her your chops. You were not going to make that same mistake again! Nope! This time I'll buy my bread without any corrections. I won't give her the chance. For me, who has always been a tad competetive, this was all that I needed to spur me on to learn my grammar. And man did it feel good when you did it. You felt high. It was great!
Babcia never complimented you when you got it finally right. Your reward was not to be corrected po prostu. And that was fine my me.
At first it was irritating(insulting too) BUT it turned out to be one of the sincerest expressions of love I have ever experienced from a stranger in my life (that's how I like to look at it). And that's why I do the same to all the foreigners I come into contact with. God bless the Babcias.
It's only noon.
