UK to Slovakia

So, long time no write!
In most of the western world, it was Easter weekend and here in rather Catholic Slovakia it’s no different. Ok, so the date isn’t different but everything else is.
To explain…
The Thursday before Good Friday has a name both in English (Maundy Thursday) and Slovakia; Green Thursday. Slovak housewives frantically sweep away any last traces of dust and it is customary to clean the windows and wash the curtains (Am.E drapes ). There’s churchy stuff goes on too but not being of a particularly religious bent, I am not qualified to discuss those matters.
Friday, Saturday and Sunday passed off without a hitch.
Then came Monday.
It was my birthday.
And also the day when boys and young men visit the abodes of the local lasses. They don’t go only to wish them a Happy Easter. Oh no, they go armed for serious girlie abusing.

Recipe for Easter Monday (for men)
1. Gather some friends
2. Advance in a tight formation to houses where wenches be found
3. Invite aforementioned wench to step outside
4. Lightly whip wench with a homemade (ok, 21st century - shop bought) birch whip
5. When your wench is squealing well, douse wench in buckets of cold water.
6. Request payment for your ’services’ in the form of Easter eggs or if of age, alcohol.
7. Proceed in a slightly looser formation (effects of alcohol evident) to the next poor maiden.

Recipe for Easter Monday (for women)
1. Gather chocolate eggs and alcohol well in advance.
2. Be sure to wear clothes you don’t mind being ruined and prepare a ‘wet room’ inside.
3. Wait at home for men to knock at door.
4. Endure ritual whipping and squeal appropriately.
5. Brace yourself for the cold shower.
6. Check T-shirt for signs of being the next ‘Miss Wet T-Shirt Competition’ winner. Cover if necessary.
7. Hand over chocolate and alcohol (don’t let them see you staring longingly at the chocolate).
8. Go inside to wet room and await the next batch of assailants.

It was my birthday and while I may have escaped the clutches of Her Majesty, I am still a Brit so I haven’t grown up just accepting this preying on defenceless females in the name of tradition.
So, despite my students best efforts, which coincidentally produced some of their best spoken English, I declined their kind invitations of a Slovak Easter and settled on going out for meal to celebrate my birthday.
That was not as easily accomplished as you might think.
As I have previously noted, Slovakia is a pretty religious country and as such, the best eating establishments were closed. Good ole’ Hotel Club to the rescue. Yes, it was open, no, there weren’t any other diners so it made for a somewhat subdued affair.

It’s back to work tomorrow. I wonder how many female students will turn up sneezing and coughing off the effects of pneumonia after their Easter ordeals.

November 1st - All Saints Day in Slovakia.
There are many religious beliefs surrounding All Saints Day and it has many different names depending upon your religion and country of residence but I’m not getting into that…..

One of Slovakia’s many traditions is, at this time, to visit the local graveyards, light a candle of remembrance and of course say a prayer or three.
Our next door neighbour who is also my wifes employer asked us to go with her to visit the local graveyard with her here in Kezmarok. I must admit I was a little dubious as, wandering around a graveyard on a very cold and misty November night was not exactly high on my list of priorities. However, I sensed she had a need to do this but did not want to do so alone, so we agreed to go with her.

Now, I am not an overtly religious person, nor in fact am I prone to overtly showing emotion but when I walked into that graveyard and saw all the remembrance candles, the people huddled around graves, memorials and war memorials, I was moved, very moved. I could hardly see for the tears streaming down my face and as I write this, the memory alone is causing tears to well up in my eyes, well in truth, I’m crying like a baby..

Like most people, I have friends, family, pets and events that have ‘passed’ that I remember but to see all these people; some praying, some just staring into space, others re-counting past deads and events, a few huddled silently around a bottle of vodka to keep warm sharing a knowing look.
Candles of a multitude of colours and sizes resting on just about every horizontal surface available along with flowers and photographs of loved ones. The whole graveyard was emitting a warm, inviting, multi-coloured glow.
I raised my eyes to the misty night sky and offered thanks that people here still care enough to ‘remember’, a prayer that they would continue to remember and a silent apology for my own past deads and all the could-a, should-a, would-a’s…

And then the real sadness hit me that had me crying like a baby all over again. In my own country, these graves would have likely been vandalised, most probably beyond recognition. The flowers stolen and given to girlfriends or thrown about for juvenile ‘fun’. There would probably not even be anyone in the graveyard but those that might have been would have turned a blind eye and walked away, the reason for their coming there long forgotten.

I had my camera with me, a journalists was taking photographs and although I would have liked the world to share the moment pictorially, it just did not seem appropriate.

Well it seems like forever since I last posted here on my wifes blog (that she never uses ) so I am going to attempt to bring everyone up to date.

We had to go back to the UK during the last week of July 2008 to renew our ‘bus’ road worthiness certificate. This is known in the UK as an MOT Certificate.
Basically they check there are no holes in the floor, excessive rust, no ’sharp’ bits of bodywork sticking out, the brakes are efficient, there is no play or excessive wear in any of the cars components (brakes, steering, suspension etc etc).
In other words, it is a test to make sure the vehicle is safe to be driven on public roads.

One of the ‘tests’ is to check the vehicles lights. Strangely, they even test to see if the red colour of the brake lights is ‘red’ enough, likewise they test the ‘amber’ of the indicators.
All the lights are tested to make sure they all work and in particular, spot/fog lights are checked to make sure they do not ‘dazzle’ other drivers and they also perform a test on the headlight beam angle for the same purpose.

You know there is a reason I’m telling you all this and I’ll get to it shortly

First, I want to tell you about our Sat Nav system which my wife Zoe refers to as ‘Burt’ - I have no idea why but I think it has something to do with a TV program called Sesame Street. Every time the Sat Nav gave me verbal instructions, it was followed with Zoe saying “OK Burt".
I wouldn’t have minded but I was the one driving so the Sat Nav wasn’t even talking to her (and it got a bit tedious after the first few hunderd K’s).

Any way, we arrived at Dunkirk to get our ferry across the pond to the UK and for some reason ‘Burt’ wanted me to

turn left for 42 miles

erm, yeah right, this bus weighs over 2 tonne and there is no way it is going to float - I decided to get the ferry instead.

Once we got off the ferry I turned Burt back on and was promptly greeted with

Please turn around immediately, then go straight ahead for 42 miles

which I found quite hillarious.
Once Burt had re-acquired the satellite though, we were good to go …

The next day I gave the bus a once over, a sort of pre-MOT check to make sure it would pass the MOT which was due in a couple of days.
To my horror, I found the horn had stopped working and after a few quick tests with my trusty volt meter, determined that the button on the steering wheel wasn’t working. A quick trip to Maplins (think Radio Shack) and I wired in a new push switch into a hastily made hole in the dashboard wired to a new relay etc under the bonnet and once more, the bus’ horn was working.
For those of you who might be in need of a decent car forn check Google or fleabay for “Nautilus air horn” - it’s like a ships fog horn but for cars and comes with a written guarantee to scare any unsuspecting pedestrian half to death

Monday arrived and we drove the bus up the road to a local MOT Station for it’s test.
Then I had a brain fart.
My headlights ‘dip’ to the right and in the UK they have to dip to the left so you do not blind on-coming motorists ARGH!!
I had a word with the garage owner and explained we lived abroad but needed the MOT for our British vehicle insurance to be valid and did the usual nod, wink, Masons handshake, vague promises not to feed him to the pooch etc and came back an hour later to find the bus had passed with flying colours.

We spent an absolute fortune in Matalan and Asda and returned to Poland with three times as much stuff as we had taken along with a very disgruntled pooch who had had to share his ‘bed’ in the back of the bus with a box (48 packets) of my beloved Walkers Salt & Vineager crisps.

The move from Poland to Slovakia is coming soon…