K grew up so close to Slovakia that it’s fairly easy to pick up Slovakian programming from her folks’ home. Indeed, that part of Poland used to be Slovakia: there’s still a weekly Mass said in Slovakian, and K’s father’s high school exit exam was in Slovakian.
The program itself has hints of the old communist form.
The church we attend is Saint Mary Magdalene Catholic Church, and since it was recently the Feast of Mary Magdalene, what else was there to do but have a festival? Never mind that the temperature was 101, with humidity that made it feel ten to fifteen degrees hotter — in spite of all risen mercury, the turn out was fairly impressive.
It did make for some challenges. The inflatables were hot to the touch — so hot, we were afraid L would burn her feet without socks, so we didn’t let her romp about on them. (After she touched one, she didn’t want to either.)
The other rides probably weren’t much better.
Due to the high attendance, though, I didn’t usually find out. I wasn’t too upset about missing the whirley ride, though. Dizziness mixed with heat would be potentially embarrassing. How odd: such rides rarely turned my stomach as a kid. As I get older, though, I get more sensitive, which is itself odd: the general trend in aging is to grow less sensitive to so many things.
As always, the highlight for the Girl was the dancing. L will dance — and has danced — to just about any music: bluegrass (one of her favorites), traditional Polish highlander music, Bach’s “English Suite No. 2″, the Grateful Dead, Sonny Stitt, etc.
One of the things I like about the Catholic church in America is how it tends to draw so many cultures into its community, and these communities often have a strong sense of their heritage, which they pass through the generations. It’s most evident with the Hispanic cultures, but that’s probably more a question of demographics than anything else.
It’s almost over: only a couple of concerts remaining, but we finally made it to Furman’s “Music By the Lake” free concert series tonight. It’s an odd crowd: college students who stick around for the summer, families, and literally bus loads of elderly from local nursing homes.
Of course, as soon as the music strikes up, the Girl wants to head to the lake and look at the ducks. We wander down, listening to the strange echo: enormous speakers in the clock tower transmit the concert over the entire campus, but there’s just enough time delay to make a cacophony of otherwise fine playing.
Even behind the stage, it’s noticeable. Not to mention annoying.
The best place: midway up. Good sound, and lots of room for the Girl to run around, dance, fall, and be a three-year-old.
And there’s a lot of reason to dance tonight: the Andy Carlson Band is playing, and Andy Carlson can play a fiddle like no one I’ve ever heard. Classically trained (he’s a professor of violin, after all), the man brings a deep understanding of music along with phenomenal playing. It makes for bluegrass of a rare quality.
Of course, who can go to Furman and not take a picture of the clock tower?
During K’s next-to-last night in Poland, we went out for a little family-and-friends party. I posted several pictures, but only now have I gotten around to the video.
Who could listen to this and sit still? Apparently, not many…
The Girl loves to sing. It turns out her cousin does to, as does the daughter of her godmother.
Two Polish songs and a number in English about butterflies.
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