St. John's Night

In this part of the world, the summer Solstice occurs a little later. This past Saturday was the longest day of the year. This is followed by the shortest night, of which I witnessed both ends.

After bowling with the Aiesecers on Saturday afternoon (I'm bowling . . . in Poland), Jackie and I met our friends Rafel and Domenika in the town square. They picked us up there and drove us to Rafel's house in the suburbs. Rafel's parents were out of town this weekend. You can imagine where this story is going.

It wasn't a crazy party, just Rafel and Domenika, Jackie and me, and three friends of Rafels; Pawel, Darek, and of course, Kostek. We started barbequing and drinking beers around 6 pm. We watched the sun go down over the field behind Rafel's place. Two liters of vodka, maybe 20 liters of beer, and a liter of wine later, Kostek and I were the only ones still awake, and we watched the sun rise over the field in front of Rafel's place. My personal consumption of the crazy amount of alcohol we went through that night was pretty modest compared to these Polish boys. Nothing extraordinary happened, which is what made the night so good. We just talked and laughed and listened to Polish underground hip hop and ate keilbasa and bread around the campfire all night. Most memorable highlights:

1.) Around midnight, Rafel and Domenika decided we needed more vodka, so we went to a 24-hr gas station. They were closed and in the middle of inventory when we arrived, so we had to wait ten minutes before we could go in. We walked around the building, which was, more or less, in the middle of nowhere. And we found a hedgehog. It got scared and rolled into a ball, and we were able to pet it. Maybe that wouldn't be a highlight for anybody else, but it was awesome.

2.) Jackie and I had told Rafel and Domenika that we tried to bring marshmellows for the campfire, but couldn't find any. On the way to Rafel's, we stopped at a grocery store and they helped us find them. They were, yes, basically marshmellows, but also fruit-flavored. So we showed the Poles how to roast strawberry marshmellows on the fire. They were impressed. I think.

3.) Around dawn, when we realized we had lost everybody else, I requested that Kostek give me one dreadlock. Totally my favorite souveneir. As he gave it to me, he cursed and said it was too difficult because my hair was so clean. He also (totally platonically) told me that when we first met at Strefa 0, he was really happy because my English is so easy to understand, but he doesn't feel like I dumb it down and that, generally, I'm very easy to talk to. It gives me hope for teaching English.

The whole evening was very chill and very fun. These kids are so cool, but so friendly and inviting. It's a refreshing change from all of the gaurded, intimidating, hip, hip kids I'm so used to. I'm already thinking about how I can make it back to Wroclaw some day.