Expat Life: Contemplating Home and Holidays in Poland

Photo: Michal Osmenda

American expat Jenna Makowski creates her own legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday traditions in Poland.

The booze potion tumbled to a floor, shattering north, south, easterly as well as west. The crash heralded instant silence, a delight as well as wine-smoothed review grinding to a halt. A couple of ungainly moments followed, in a wake of a accident.

Eh, no worries. Its just a glass. The perpetrator jumped to soothe a tension, his good-natured perspective swelling quickly, reinstating a vibrant mood. Cheers. Clapping.

The chairman nearest to a collision site rushed for a broom, while a review as well as delight picked up again, a scars of a situation quickly smoothed as well as forgotten.

Thats how you know youve got a great party, mate. Broken glass, my friend commented as he carried a shards to a kitchen to be laid to rest subsequent to our growing pick up of dull bottles as well as unwashed plates.

It was a great party. A room of full stomachs, full booze glasses, full conversations as well as full friendships creates for a certain night, anytime as well as anywhere.

But this event was more than a celebration for me. The week end straddling November as well as Dec had turn my Thanksgiving, my Yuletide as well as my birthday celebration (which just happens to hover in in in between a two), all rolled in to one.

The period in in between a end of November as well as a end of Dec is regularly a most severe for me, vital as an American expat in Poland, as those occasions for celebration intersect to remind me which Im away from home. In Poland, Thanksgiving is just an additional Thursday in November. And for right away roving home for Yuletide is a monetary non-possibility, as we anticipate as well as hope for a day which bill airlines begin to make their way across a Atlantic.

Photo: Sugar Daze

But home is not something which we regularly conclude as place. Rather, it is a people who fill a place as well as inhale warmth as well as definition in to it. This perspective translates in to a leisure to create home wherever we am. People renovate in to friends as potentially waste holidays renovate in to shared experiences.

So we motionless to prepare a pseudo-Thanksgiving dinner, which additionally served as a birthday cooking as well as an early Yuletide dinner, as well as hosted it right pound in a middle of all of them. we combined my own holiday.

It required a bit of flexibility, though. Solidifying a date required patient maneuvering, as transient fellow expats as well as colleagues done arrangements to scatter in all directions for a arriving winter break. The initial lesson we schooled about my own legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday is which it couldnt presumably share a date with any of a three holidays it was meant to represent.

My grocery list additionally indispensable modification, as a prospects for anticipating a full turkey dwindled with any store we visited.

So have you gone no holds barred with a full legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday spread? my initial guest to arrive asked, upon foot through a doorway laden with dishes to share. Turkey as well as seasoned mixture as well as gravy as well as honeyed potatoes?

Well, we suspect its going to be a deteriorated dinner, we admitted, smiling. Its so hard to find a turkey here, you know? Chicken is great substitute.

Yeah, a roasted duck sort of looks similar to a roasted turkey. Just smaller, right?

Right. But Id taken it even a step further. Tempted in to a kitchen by a aroma of nearly-ready food, my Polish colleague peered in to a oven, a faraway demeanour upon her face. So, here comes a normal Thanksgiving duck casserole, eh?

Shh, its turkey, we joked. Laughter! . Plus c urrently is, technically, a couple of days after a holiday. The post-holiday convention in America is to mix all a leftovers in to a huge stew vessel as well as bake it. So really, Im a couple of steps forward of a game.

Thats a great thing about traditions: theyre flexible. They might appear similar to undying as well as unchanging habits, patterns brittle usually during a responsibility of a world falling apart; thats how society portrays them, anyway. Constant advertisements say, for example, which you must buy this code of seasoned mixture upon Thanksgiving. The arrogance is, of march you will have turkey upon Thanksgiving, as well as of march you will need stuffing. Shopping malls equate down a days until Dec 25, since of march Yuletide is upon Dec 25; thats when a legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday is celebrated.

Home is not something which we regularly conclude as place.

But in my experience, Ive schooled which traditions have been created, as well as traditions have been flexible. The Yuletide traditions which gave structure to my childhood were essentially a mix of Polish as well as American concoctions which morphed as well as altered a bit every year. A mix of patterns from my Polish great-grandparents (Christmas Eve pierogis as well as midnight church services) infused with a complicated sip of American patterns (shopping malls summarized with wreath as well as suburban homes summarized with strings of lights) which ceaselessly deteriorated as family moved as well as changed, grew bigger as well as grew smaller.

And Im pretty sure which most legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday traditions, defined as truth from my childhood perspective, were confined usually inside of my own family. we have yet to meet someone, other than my mother, who incorporates a recipe of pretzel Jell-o in to legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday dinners.

Unfortunately, we voiced to my guests, seated absolutely around a list as we began to carry a steaming dishes from a k! itchen, My moms special legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday recipe, pretzel Jell-o, failed this year. we couldnt find a right kind of thickk cream filling.

The beating was contained usually to me, though, as everyones plates filled. There substantially wouldnt have been room upon a list anyway.

Sweet potato casserole, Photo: Lori Bee

What have been these? inquired my friends grandmother, peering in to a dish of honeyed potatoes. Sweet potatoes have been rarely eaten in Poland, have been really formidable to find, as well as have been substantially a bit off-putting with their bright orange tone resisting a food enlightenment grounded in pale root vegetables.

Theyre honeyed potatoes, we began, scheming to explain.

But a comparison woman had already listened of this American legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday tradition. Sodki ziemniaki! she exclaimed in Polish. She was really excited to try a new food.

I tried to swallow ones pride for a modifications Id done to which recipe too, a lack of marshmallows which usually attend with a dish.

But those seated around a list didnt appear to mind. We upheld a dishes left to right, from a hands of my American friend, to a hands of English as well as Australian friends, to a hands of French as well as Polish as well as Russian friends. It wasnt unequivocally a food itself which mattered. We were all sitting around a table, flitting food family-style, as delight as well as review mingled. Some traditions dont need modifying.

Community Connection

Read about more expat legal legal legal legal legal legal holiday practice in Matadors Celebrating Holidays Away from Home series.