Womens Day!

The Poles have it right on today....they are celebrating Womens Day...a day to celebrate all women.  I like this idea!!!  Tom celebrted the proper way by buying me flowers as well as buying all of the women in his office flowers.  While buying flowers for female colleagues may send the wrong message in the U.S. it is completely normal and expected here on this day.

Here is a brief explanation of the holiday:

A holdover from Soviet Union rule -- Dzien Kobiet or Women's Day -- is celebrated on March 8.

The holiday was created in 1948, in part, to replace the Roman Catholic feast day of Blessed Wincenty Kadlubek, a 12th-century monk, but also to glorify the ideals of women as hard-working contributors to the economy -- sort of a women's equality day. Although initially this feast was enforced by the government, it became accepted and part of Polish culture. And, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it is still celebrated.

While Valentine's Day is more privately celebrated between lovers in Poland, Women's Day is celebrated more as a national holiday for all women, regardless of age. They receive special attention, usually flowers, sweets and small gifts, not only privately, but at work and schools. The Western trend of giving greeting cards is creeping into this holiday.

Women's Day is now an official holiday in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, and other Eastern European countries.

Does this make us officially Polish?

Tom bought himself and early birthday present this weekend.  He has always wanted this "classic" Polish item since the first week we arrived and he spotted them across the city.  After telling me multiple times that he was "definitely going to get one" I just shrugged it off as one of his funny wants.  He is so lucky that his friends have been helping him search for the perfect model, and lo and behold, found one this weekend.  Here is Tom's new toy.  He is so excited to take official ownership of it this weekend!

What is this crazy car you ask?  It is a Polish legend....its called a Maluch and is very famous around Poland.  Maluch translates into english as "little one" or "toddler"  This car became quite famous during communist times when afforadable cars were nearly impossible to get.  If you could afford a car, you purchased a Maluch.  And, due to the limited supply of all goods people had to wait months and even years during this time to get a car.  Therefore, although they are small and basic, they became quite a covented item across Poland.  Every Pole can tell you stories about riding in a Maluch.  These cars are no longer produced, so Tom's car is technically a vintage vehicle.  His model was built in 1987. 

Here is Wikipedia's description of the car:

The car was produced in Poland under the brand Polski Fiat 126p (literally in English: Polish Fiat 126p) between 1973 and 2000. To distinguish it from the original Italian car, the letter "p" was added to its name. It was produced by Fabryka Samochodów Małolitrażowych (FSM) in Bielsko-Biała and Tychy under Italian Fiat licence. Due to a relatively low price it was very popular in Poland and was arguably the most popular car there in the 1980s. Its very small size gave it the nickname Maluch ("the small one","small child", pronounced. The nickname became so popular that in 1997 it was accepted by the producer as the official name of the car.  It was exported to many Eastern Bloc countries and for several years it was one of the most popular cars in Poland and in Hungary as well.

Austria

Tom and I spent last weekend outside of Salzburg, Austria celebrating our five year wedding anniversary.  The weekend was the perfect combination of relaxing in the gorgeous mountains and sighteseeing.  We stayed at a beautiful resort in the middle of the mountains on a lake.  The views were incredible and there was a ton of fresh snow to add to the scenery.  We spent our first day hiking to view an old castle which should have been quite an easy climb, but it was a bit difficult trying to find the path in two feet of snow.  We knew we were in for trouble when we started the climb and a local guy watching us got a big grin on his face as he muttered something in German.  He got a real kick out of us trekking in the deep snow.  After our hike we relaxed in the hotel spa which featured a number of different saunas and even had a hot tub outside overlooking the mountains. 

On our anniversary we went skiiing on the Hintersee mountain area.  It was quite the adventure considering I had never been skiing before in my life and the last time Tom went skiiing was 20 years ago.  Nothing like two novice skiers hitting the Austrian alps for the first time.  : )  The moutains were absoliutely breathtaking.  I took a ski lesson with a super helpful instructor.  Tom joined in for the beginning of the lesson, but quickly realized that it was "coming back to him" quite easily so he decided to head up the mountain while I continued.  Unfortunately, Tom got a bit confused and took the wrong slope and wound up heading down a black diamond level hill.  He wiped out a few times but was fortunate to get some help from some other skiers.  And, in typical Tom fashion he "figured it out" and made his way to the bottom.  After my lesson finished we headed up the lift to try out the blue slopes.  On the way up I saw the hill that Tom had accidentally come down...I could NOT believe how steep it was and was simply grateful he had made it to the bottom in one piece.  We thoroughly enjoyed our afternoon skiing and hope to go again sometime soon....since we can both use some more practice.

We spent our final morning with a trip to the spa which was a great way to relax our post-skiing sore muscles.  In the afternoon we made our way into Salzburg and walked around the charming city.  We had a wonderful weekend filled with great memories.  And, we fell in love with the beautiful mountains and the area.  We are hoping to plan a return trip in the summer months!

A special Austrian Cake - yum!

Tom's relaxing

The view from our hotel room

Our hotel

Thumbs up for vacation

The gorgeous alps

A cute little place where we had dinner

Hiking up to the castle ruins in feet of snow

Are we ever going t oget there?  Ruins are w-aaaaay up there.

Almost there...

Showing how deep the snow is - at least two feet

We got walking sticks to help

The view from the top

At the base of the ski mountain - Hintersee

Happy 5th Anniversary!

Hintersee Mountain

Getting fitted for skis - here we go!

Time to go up

Me and my ski instructor after a long lesson

Tom taking self portraits on his way down

Church in Salzburg

Pretzel - snack time

 

Tom is super strong!

Tom sampling famous Austrian chocolate

Christmas ornaments in Salzburg

Mozart's birthplace

Salzburg!

Sunrise over the Mountains

Warsaw....

On the hunt....

For most of you reading this, you know that I definitely love a good bargain!  Paying full retail price just about kills me and I get a deep satisfaction knowing I got a deal on something.  My latest shopping hunt has proven a bit challenging here in Poland. 

I have been on the search for a basic chair for our guest bedroom..nothing fancy - a simple place for guests to throw clothes, make themselves comfortable or to sit and put on their shoes.  Ideally, I wanted to get a vintage or used chair for cheap and have fun "modernizing" it with a bright paint color and a reupholstered seat.  So, I started keeping my eyes open for furniture stores in the area.  Charlie and I started varying our route looking for places...a new side street or secret alley to head down.  We discovered that, Yes, there are a number of furniture stores in Warsaw but you pretty much have two extreme ends of the specturm... Ikea or super expensive, high end stores. 

After our search didn't turn up anything I turned to my "experts".  Who are these experts you ask?  My Polish friends.  These friends are amazing resources, but are also probably so sick and tired of being an "expert", so I try to only use them when I have to.  I knew Warsaw had to have a Goodwill/Salvation Army type of store somewhere in the city. 

I was happy to here that my two experts had the exact same response, but I was not quite happy with their response.  They told me that unfortunately, there are no thrift/used furniture stores in Poland.  That the people in this country use something until it completely wears out.   They do not often replace things like furniture and if they change the style of their house they simply have the furniture refinished to match the new decor.  Poles keep their furniture for decades and many times it gets passed down to the next generation.  A part of me felt naive for simply assuming that people wanted to dispose of their used furniture as we do in the states.   And, the other part of me remembered that there are many more cultural differences than those that meet the eye...this one included.  The more I thought about the Poles and their furniture the more it naturally made sense.  These are people who have lived through a horrible history of war, poverty and destruction of their country - then followed by a number of years under communism.  Living under such a horrible past makes you hold on to your posessions tightly - chairs as well as extra money. 

So, I am going to have to rethink my chair hunt looks like Ikea might be it!  : )

The Hills Are Alive...

Five years ago today, I said "I do" to the love of my life.  I am a lucky lady to have such a wonderful partner in my life.  Who ever would have thought that a chance meeting in Rome ten and a half years ago would have led us to so many wonderful adventures in life together?  Can't wait to see what the next ten and a half+ bring.

We are off to celebrate for the weekend...headed to the hills of Austria! 

Snow...

We got one last Valentine's Day surprise when we woke up to beautiful snow this morning.  Charlie is in heaven!



The park behind our house