Stick juice by Ciera Coyan
Aug 30 (I think)
Today was awesome! Already I feel a little bit self-conciously American because I just used awesome. After church we all went to lunch at the apartment of some friends of Danny and Krista named Anna and Milosh. They are a Czech couple who have been married for, I think, 30 odd years. Anna made the lunch for us. Krista had told her ahead of time that I was a vegetarian, just so she wouldn't be offended that I wasn't eating the meat. She, however, went totally out of her way and made me my own meal. It was amazing. She made these delicious potato dumplings filled with strawberries (from their garden) and covered in chocolate and powdered sugar. Krista informed me that it is not incommon for Czech people to have something sweet like that for a main meal every once in awhile. Roxie and Bekah were all jealous of mine. It was SO good.
Her husband Milosh works in nature somehow, and seems to be a genius with plant life. He had all these jars filled with different herbal creations that were remedies for all sorts of problems. Krista had described to me earlier a "stick juice" that Milosh had. It was basically a jar crammed with these little sticks about 1/2 an inch in length and maybe a little less in diameter. The space surrounding the sticks was filled with alcohol. He poured a tiny bit onto a little spoon for me, and they all watched as I tried it. It tasted like hell fire with a dash of sap burning down my throat. For the rest of the afternoon he plied us with shots that were nothing compared to that.
After lunch we sat in the living room drinking coffee (and shots. Fortunatley Czech shot glasses are much smaller than American ones. Go figure.) and eating a dessert that was a bit like blueberry muffin's and blueberry cobbler's offspring. Of course it was homemade, and of course it was delicious. We looked at all sorts of photographs from their life. Some were current, and some were very old. It was a bit difficult to tell how old some of them were, though. We saw one picture that was in black and white and was very small like old fashioned photographs often are. Anna told us that it was taken in 1980, but because of communism that was the best technology they had access to. The apartment we were in was where they had lived for what seemed like most of their married life. It was fascinating, to hear their backstory, these people who had not only lived but had raised a family under a communist regime.
Their apartment was very small. I couldn't imagine having to raise two children there. But what choice did they have? Their garden, however, was amazing. I was told that there is a Czech phrase that translates to, "Czechs know." It basically means that Czechs know how to do anything, because during communism they had to do all sorts of things for themselves. In order to have vegetables everybody had to grow their own. So in their garden they had zuchinni, bell peppers, apples, strawberries, tomatos, rhubarb, and all sorts of herbs and such. They also had two greenhouses that they built for themselves. Really, it was just fascinating to learn about these people. And they were SO kind to me. They told us that when they met they wrote letters for a year and then they showed us the stacks of letters. It was really sweet. Plus, they had an awesome dog! Really though, this was exactly what I was most excited to see. Just people who have lived their everyday life in a culture that is not mine. It doesn't seem too different, though. Krista described it as Twilight Zone, because she said you will be going along thinking things are the same as in America and then there will be one key element that is totally different. It is fascinating. I'm having so much fun!