June 29, 2008

A Long Awaited Polka Post

(Lenghty post ahead. You’ve been warned. Heh.)

The second day of our Milwaukee trip, Saturday, started off on the wrong foot. Not only did I get NO sleep whatsoever because my mother snores like a bear in hibernation, but my ears were aching from leaving my iPod in all night. I had that sucker cranked, and I swear the louder I turned up the volume, the louder Mom’s snoring would get. It was horrible.

To save costs, we were staying at the Super 8 in West Bend. I made the reservation online after verifying they had WiFi and a clean swimming pool. They lied. The internet connection was shoddy, and very slow, and the front desk clerk assured me that after he reset the system things would be fine. No dice. I should have known that cheap hotels really are cheap.

I had to do some BlogHer work that morning and with an intermittent connection that worked at a snail’s pace it didn’t make my job any easier. After Googling “internet cafes” and finding only one, a coffee house down the street, I packed up the laptop and Dad drove me in that direction.

Turns out the coffee house was invisible. Meaning, the address 310 E. Washington Street didn’t exist. It jumped from 230 to 520. Interesting, don’t you think? Dad finally pulled onto a side street and asked some very nice bicyclists for directions to the Washington County Library, and thank heavens it was only a few blocks away. And they had WiFi. And it was fast. I was happy as clam.

After my work was finished, we took a tour of the Old Courthouse Museum in downtown West Bend, just a few streets over. It was a wonderful museum with many exhibits and thousands of historic artifacts. Some of my favorites:

After we toured the museum, we went back to the hotel to get ready for Polish Fest. Many of you know that my Polish heritage is very important to me. And Polka music…Oh how I love my Polka music. I know, it’s not mainstream pop or rock ‘n roll, but I’ve been a polka fan since birth — before, even.

My father was a member of a polka band. He played bass guitar and some of my earliest memories are of him playing with the Happy Harmony Stars. I loved going to the ballrooms and polka dancing with my mom.

When Doug & I got married, we had the typical Polish wedding — or as it is called in Polish a “przyjecie”.

Now to say that word, it takes some phonetic skill. ‘Prz’ is prounced like the ’s’ in the word “treasure”……the ‘y’ sounds like the letter ‘e’ and the ‘je’ is a “yah” sound, followed by the ‘cie’ which would sound like “sheh”. So put that all together and you have “szhee-yah-sheh.” There. Your first Polish language lesson.

I thank my grandmother for teaching me these invaluable things. She could speak fluently but she couldn’t write in Polish. The language was lost when her grandparents came over from Poland in the 1860s and that’s rather unfortunate I think. I’ve always wanted to take lessons but I haven’t found anyone who teaches it.

Polish Fest is in Milwaukee at the Henry W. Maier Festival Grounds right on Lake Michigan. We always have a wonderful time. On the way down we always pick up my mother’s cousin Butch and his wife Jan along the way. I love Jan’s beautiful garden. She had different species of roses and flowers planted this year:

If only I had the time to plant a garden as beautiful as cousin Jan’s. She has the most amazing lawn and garden in the town of Allenton.

Once we arrived in Milwaukee (after Butch and Dad tried to figure out the best way around all the sky-highway construction), we found a place to park the van and walked a block or so to the festival gates. The beat of the Polka was blaring. I could hear the sounds of John Gora & Gorale, Eddie Blazonczyk’s Versatones and my latest favorite, the DynaBrass (the band featured in the YouTube video above).

Oh how I love my DynaBrass. I wanted to get a ton of photos of the band, but Dawson was insistent on flying through the air on the Sky Ride that stretches across the grounds.

I had to trek down to the far end of the park to get on the thing, and my brother Frankie came with us. This was quite interesting. The seats were a bit smaller than the one at the Milwaukee Zoo, and the nice ride attendants were yelling “Hurry up girl….pick up the baby! Pick up the baby!” It sort of confused me. Dawson is no longer a baby. I was like “Pick up who?” as I was lifting Dawson into the seat. The hilarious attendant laughs and then says, “No I wanted you to pick up the other guy,” and he pointed to my brother. Ha ha. So funny.

I didn’t take any photos from the Sky Ride. I was too worried about plummeting to my death as this thing glides through the air, only attached by a cable. Every creek made my stomach lurch. Good times.

I did get some great photos of my favorite band members. Here are some of my faves:

Josh of the Polka Family Band

Mollie Busta (top) & Ted Lange (above) of Squeezebox Band

Wally Dombrowski of the Polka Country Musicians

John Pilch, also from Polka Country Musicians

Kevin Solecki, Steve Rodgers and Eddie Blazonczyk, Jr. of Eddie Blazonczyk’s Versatones, and Jeff Mleczko & Curt Majeske of the DynaBrass.

We had a great time at Polish Fest. We danced. We had pirogies and potato pancakes and kielbasa. We met up with old friends and made new ones. And we had some Stawski Bizonovka Vodka. Yum.

We left an hour after the fireworks and stopped at Pizza Hut for late night grub. We finally got back to the hotel just after 2 a.m. Dawson fell asleep long before that. Little guy loves to stay up late, especially when Polka music is playing.

My mother fell asleep upon hitting the pillow and her snoring was so loud I couldn’t take it. After not sleeping the night before, I grabbed the comforter off the bed as well as two pillows and a smaller blanket I brought with me and made my bed in the bathtub. With the overhead fan on full blare, I was finally able to drown out the lumberjack in the other room and catch some much needed Zzzz’s.

The next morning, Mom was mad at me for sleeping in the bathtub and refused to talk to me. I gave her the silent treatment as well because somehow my iPod got broken because the last person to use the shower left the shampoo uncapped. In my sleepy state, I must have tipped it over and shampoo oozed down the tub wall and right onto my iPod shuffle that was clipped to my blanket.

Technically, only one headphone is broken, or at least drowned out because it’s clogged with Sunsilk. I was pissed. I gave that iPod to Dawson and promptly bought a new, purple one since they’re so cheap these days.

Everyone was crabby Sunday morning, but we had to put on our happy faces because we were meeting Butch and Jan for breakfast before church. (Yes, we waited one full hour before going to oblige the fasting before Mass rule.)

We always attend Mass at Holy Hill in Hubertus, Wisconsin. It’s a magnificent house of Worship:

So, the trip was a little rocky at times, but we always have a good time. Some funny quotes and tidbits from the trip:

My father was helping me take my suitcase to the van and says to Dawson, “What the heck does your mom have in here? Bricks? We’re going for three days, not 3 years…”
After eating some Polish kielbasa and kraut, one member of our party (names withheld to protect the innocent) had to use the bathroom desperately. I was being a funny gal and yelled out, “Fire in the hole!!!” And laughed hysterically. Then my little copy cat, Dawson, repeated what I said and I damn near peed my pants.
I had a craving for ice cream because it was so darn hot, and I asked my brother if he wanted to go on a search with me. I had just sampled some of the Polish vodka and I said to Frankie, “Do you think they sell Butterflinger Furries here?” I totally meant to say Butterfinger Flurries! We were laughing so hard people began staring.
I bought two t-shirts. One has “Polish Princess” on it, and the other says “You bet your sweet dupa I’m Polish.” And then my cousin made me promise to wear the latter on my trip to San Francisco for BlogHer (because I’ll be missing Pulaski Polka Days this year…it falls the same weekend as BlogHerCon). I have to take pictures of me with all my bloggy pals while I wear that shirt. Y’all hold me to it okay?

When we got home Sunday night, I was going through Polka Withdrawals. I’m definitely a cult member of the Polka Underground. I can’t help it. This music runs through my veins.

I leave you with another awesome Polka Video. Here is John Gora & Gorale with Ted Lange on vocals for the song “Bartenders”. This video was recorded Saturday afternoon at Milwaukee Polish Fest. Nostrowie!