Day 18 - July 22th - By Patrick

Today, our first official full day of the Rzeszow festival, we all woke up confused. With no one exactly sure how the day was planned out, we were not sure if we had proba or if we were going to Łańcut, a palace built in the 1600s for the lubomirski family. In the end, we visited Łańcut, which was unlike any other palace i have ever seen. It had variety, with different styles ranging from beautiful baroque architecture to entire rooms showing chinese influence. It even had a huge building dedicated specifically to carriages and hunting trophies from all over africa. Afterwords, we all moseyed into town where a group of us found a delicious Pierogarnia with a huge selection of pierogi. We munched on the different types like peach and vanilla, ruskie and even pizza flavored. They were delicious. Later that day was the parade through Rzeszow and the weather was not the best. It literally rained on our parade. Still, there was a crowd of smiling faces alongside the street as we marched and waved our way through the old town.  We sang our songs, chatted with people on the side of the road, and joked around with little kids, who were smiling from ear to ear, carrying their mini flags they had collected from other groups handing them out. At the end of the parade all forty-three groups stood huddled in the main square for the opening of the festival, cold and wet. The speeches given from various people seemed to go on and on, but we had some fun to pass the time. We danced around and made some of the guys look like stare babas by putting scarves on their heads. We arrived back at the dorms after many of the other groups and ate our bag lunch kolacja in our rooms. Later that night, some went back to the main square to party and some stayed back to get some sleep for practice the next morning. And despite the disorganized mess in the morning, it wasn't a bad opening day to the Festival.

 

Day 17 - July 21th - By Lolo

Today we woke up after a night of partying hard-y with the rest of our group after a job well done with our marathon concert in Krakow.  Rzeszow is not necessarily far away (only about 80 miles) but given all the traffic jams in Poland recently, we needed to leave early to have plenty of travel time.  Just before we left we were able to have an amazing obiad at a very nice restaurant.  Needless to say we well fed before leaving Krakow.  An hour into our bus ride Peter almost peed his pants because our bus driver took forever to make sure the bus was in the right position while continuously slamming on the brakes throwing people in the aisles.  I didn’t know the bus we chartered was actually a rollercoaster ride.  Right before we left, some Lowiczanie dancers struck up a conversation with fellow foreigners on the Rynek (Market Square), and it turned out they were Canadians……as well as dancers going to Rzeszow who happened to be trying to find Lowiczanie because they were assigned to travel in their same bus. Quite the coincidence!  We finally got to Rzeszow and the group went out to meet the rest of their festival companions, with whom we would spend the next week.

Day 16 - July 20th - By Kyle

Boy, this tour has gone by kind of fast now that I look back on it. Anyways today was our second day in Krakow, and it was very nice to have the morning to ourselves. We got a chance to go experience Krakow on our own which was wonderful. Our free time was cut short though because we needed to run some of the dances that we did not get to practice the night before. Time flew by and it was time to go catch the bus to go to the Nowa Huta performance, we arrived after a short ride and everyone wasn't real impressed with the look of the outside of the building. Then we got to the stage and were amazed about how BIG the stage was, it was the first stage that we have danced on that was this giant. We all got a little worried because we didn't think we could handle being on such a big stage, but shortly after blocking our places we got a handle on it and were ready to perform. Also we were forced to run Zywiec just a couple hours before the show which was horrible because this forced us to use the energy that we were saving for the show. It was nice that MK gave us an hour to ourselves before the performance so that we could get in the "performance" mode. Time flew by and it was time to get dressed and get on the stage. So, we were waiting in the wings of the stage waiting for someone to speak before the show (that being the cue for us to step out on the stage and get in our places), of course, this didn't happen so we didn't get to the exact spots in Podlasie. Fortunately we just took bigger steps and fixed it, there were few slip-ups in the dance, but it all worked out. By the end of the show everyone who was in every piece that was back-to-back was on the verge of fainting, but everyone held on and made it to the end. We had a short meet and greet with the almost nonexistent audience, there was probably about 50 people, but that didn't stop us from being energetic on stage. After the performance we all had to get dressed up for the reception at the mayor's office with the Mayor of Krakow. The food was great and then it was time to go back to the hotel and get freshened up so that we could go enjoy the city of Krakow at night. It was a rough day, but we all survived. 

-Kyle

Day 15 - July 19th - By Ania

After another late night of partying and packing, the Lowiczanie crew had an early morning. We were on the bus by 8am and started our adventurous drive from Krynica-Zdroj to Krakow. Three and a half hours of travel later, we arrived at Hostel Renesans, our sleeping quarters for the next two nights. We lived it up dorm-style, sharing two big rooms with bunk beds and a public bathroom-great for some real bonding! After dropping off our very large pile of luggage at the Hostel, we enjoyed a delicious obiad and afternoon tea at Dom Poloni, a quaint restaurant off of Krakow's Rynek. Following obiad, the group ventured out on a four hour tour of the city's greatest sites hosted by the very kind and knowledgeable people involved in the San Fransisco-Krakow Sister City agreement. About half of our group attended the tour while others visited family living near by. I hopped on the tram and spent the afternoon catching up with my grandparents over bowls of tiramisu ice cream. After the group reunited in the evening, we ate kolacje at a cafe that offered a bountiful salad bar. 

As is typical for Lowiczanie, our day did not end there! We were troopers and prepared ourselves for a group rehearsal for our next day's concert in Nowa Huta. We split up into two groups; one group headed to City Hall to practice, while the other took a short walk from the Hostel to the rehearsal hall of the local Polish Dance Ensemble, Krakowiacy. The Krakowiacy director and choreographer were sweet enough to offer us their time, energy, and dance space for proba and assisted us in preparing for our Nowa Huta performance. We later joined up for a large group proba, ending around 11:30pm, exhausted by the day's travels and activities. We returned to our Hostel and spent some leisurely time together in the common room, chatting and enjoying each other's company while making use of the common room computer and TV. The day officially tired us out and this was one night that Lowiczanie did not have the energy to go out for official on-the-town partying. The majority snuggled up into their cozy bunk beds by 1am.

-Ania

Day 14 - July 18th - By Gosia

Today after breakfast we continued our Lemko dance lessons with the adorable Pan Jerzy and later went to the pool in the neighboring hotel. There was an awesome water slide and multiple sauna rooms. We all enjoyed our time there in the saunas as well as some of us getting massages, including Brennan's amazing full body chocolate massage. Following our relaxing afternoon we had our last show for the "Swiat Pod Kyciera" festival, during our wait for the stage we had delicious crepes with fruit called "nalesniki z owocami". So yummy! When we got back to the hotel we had even more Lemko dance lessons with Pan Jerzy who is the sweetest man ever and we finished the night with the Serbian dance group having a great bonfire time, girls getting their hair done Serbian style, and saying our goodbyes with countless pictures and exchanging information to stay in touch. There was also a great storm coming up and we danced in the rain with thunder and lightning and finished our time there with a boom at 4 am.

-Gosia

Day 13 - July 17th - By Brennan

Today is Sunday, so like the well-behaved folks we are, we all got dressed for church. Mary Kay asked us all to wear our Podlasie costumes.  All the festival participants who came, arrived dressed in their national or regional costumes.  It was a wonderful image of international and interfaith good will. We were unsure about the kind of service it would be--a Roman Catholic Mass, an Eastern Rite Divine Liturgy, or a type of ecumenical prayer service for peace, but given where we were and the kinds of things we were learning about the Lemko, I guessed correctly about the Divine Liturgy, as most are Eastern Rite Catholics. It was a beautiful liturgy, completely chanted, and of course the only Slavonic I was able to muster was "Gospodi homily".  But that was okay, because "Gospodi pomiluy" is chanted so many times during an Orthodox or Eastern Rite liturgy, I felt like a real participant. We were all asked to sing at the end of the liturgy, preferably a song of peace or one to the Mother of God.  We chose the immediately recognizable American hymn, "Amazing Grace", and surprisingly, so did the Taiwanese (only they sang only one verse, and performed a Chinese fan dance for the instrumental portion).  It was a really beautiful moment as we were singing, when the Chinese musicians chimed in with their instruments during our final verse. 

Following a quick and more or less forgettable lunch at Gwiazda Gor, we were on our way to Slovakia, our only gig on this tour outside of Poland.  It was an extraordinarily beautiful day--sunny, albeit warm.  We were greeted in the town of Kurov by children who were carrying signs announcing our countries of origin. I felt sorry for one of the kids, as he was holding the sign for Mexico. The organizers in Kurov had obviously not received the news that the Mexicans had to leave after lunch that day, and would not be participating.  So,this boy, Mishko, was not able to march in the parade with Mexico.  The poor guy looked really disappointed. A boy named Matej was carrying the USA sign already, so Mishko was really happy when we gave him our flag to carry. 

The parade was probably our longest, about 2 kilometers I believe, completely through the village.  But the journey on foot, through all that heat, was made easier by the occasional shot of alcohol.  We made several stops along the route to toast with one of the locals dressed in traditional costumes (check out those pictures).  I think this was the first time in my life that I had alcohol before a performance. Oh, well, when in Slovakia… 

As we reached the edge of town, a few local Rom families greeted us, and we could see their "mini-village" just outside of the town proper, characteristic of "gypsy" communities in these parts, I suppose.

We were starving and thirsty when we arrived at the festival area, with kolacja scheduled after the show, and most of us having only Polish zloty to spend. A few remembered to bring their euros with them and had no problems. The rest of us had to rely on Majka's charm to get the vendors to accept our zloty (American dollars are useless here) for some refreshment before the performance. After waiting in line for about an hour, we finally got our beer--warm and flat.  But at the same tent I did manage to get some barbecued blood sausage right off the grill.  Dee-lish!!!

It was a really long, mercilessly hot day, but we had an amazing time.  The festival was well attended by several thousand. We were a great team on stage, once again.  Basia and I kicked butt with our duet.  The people of Kurov did provide a great dinner for us (including beer and brandy).  When we returned to Gwiazda Gor, some folks went downstairs for yet another party into the wee hours. Don't know how.  I could only crash for the night.   

-Brennan