The Funny Sister

I’m excited to (report in on) how Christmas eve goes. Mainly because I promised two (people) we could be at their house for Christmas Eve, assuming we could work out times but they are both demanding that we come at 6:00 and stay all night. It’s kind of like I’m Archie and I’ve asked Betty AND Veronica to the prom.

Let’s see, this past week, was pretty good. We helped throw one heck of a Christmas party. Eighty people came, our brownies were a hit, and the kids all loved their bags from Santa. But in the end I would say there were two major success from the night—
1. Fish avoidance.  You see, Poles still have this old tradition that they don’t eat meat on Christmas Eve, so in order to make up for it they eat a whole lot of fish. Cold fish. Cold fish in oil, cold fish in cream sauce, cold fish fried, cold carp that they let live in their bathtubs for a week so they are fresh, cold fish fried, cold fish in gelatin…etc. I know you can already hear the excitement in my voice. BUT this year they decided to make it buffet style, so each person could CHOOSE which kinds of fish they would like. I chose no kinds of fish. And I was sure that they would notice and say “Oh, Sister Pritchett, you’re going home soon, you must try some polish sledz before you leave!” And everyone would watch me smile with delight. But no, so many people that no one kept track of which people were avoiding which delicacies. Like I said. Success.
2. Carol Survival. They started out the night with some traditional Polish carols, since the branch has carol books. But it turns out ALL Polish carols are like our “12 days of Christmas.” In other words, they all have at least 8 verses. But with more of the pace of “Silent Night.” It took us twenty minutes to get through the first two. And everyone loves singing along to Christmas carols. As long as they know the words. But with such a turn out, no one predicted that the carol books would only go as far back as the 4th row, leaving 70% of the attendees mumbling along in the back. So after the first two they decided to move on and we would sing just one more before the kids would perform the Christmas play. And they chose - I kid you not-  ”The 12 Days of Christmas.” All 12 verses. But no one stormed out! SO again, miracles are everywhere.

Tina Fey - who doesn’t want to be her? Do you think she knows how many fans she has in the “Sister Missionaries in Poland” Demographic?

Yes the weather here is less frightful, hovering around zero, but don’t worry, you can keep right on pitying me seeing how the woman at the library just told me it should hit -20 C tomorrow. Joy.
But the cold has NOT been a big deal at all since I finally followed dad’s real words of advice. While he was usually referring to school supplies, it also has much meaning with regards to cold weather apparel. “Always have the right tools for the job.” And now that I’m sporting brown waterproof boots with very thick soles lined completely in fur as well as a brown down coat with furlined sleeves and hood, the weather has not been deterring me nearly as much. 
And where did I happen to GET such amazing winter wear? Well, you see, last p day Sister Steadman stepped on my heel by mistake as we treked through the snow to get to email. Would NOT be a big deal if I wasn’t wearing hand-me-down sister missionary boots that were not made for winter in the first place. As expected, the glue had been dissolved by the snow and so the minor trip up ended up ripping off the whole sole of the shoe, just leaving it attached at the toe so I could still walk on it, but kind of had to drag it like I was wearing flip-flops. 
Wednesday I realized I was going to have to figure something else out. With no boots left, and holes that went all the way through my Clarks I figured I would try some shoes that Martyna left behind. They were just these little flats, a size too small but my feet were cold enough that they shrunk and could fit. And you know, the flats actually kept my feet a bit warmer, because they kept the water out. Or so I thought. That is until we marched off to visit this lovely less active who lives in a very run-down building and can’t come to church because her son has some sort of disease where his legs randomly go paralyzed and she has to carry him.
 We only had to walk for about half an hour to get there, but with the increased temperature much of the snow is turning to slush and it ended up with me having to LEAP at every intersection to avoid the puddles at each curb that contain brown liquid  the exact consistancy of Bonfare Icees.  
The whole time I was offering a silent prayer because I knew I could not do this for another 3 weeks. And then we show up at Magda’s we talked for a bit, and somehow we got talking about the weather and then she just goes off on this tirade about my shoes. She says “If your mother knew you were walking around in those shoes she would kill you, in fact, I’m surprised the pnemonia hasn’t killed you yet, this is ridiculous” and then she grabbed two pairs of her own boots and said “try them on, I only wear one pair and you’re not leaving this house with those stupid flat shoes on your feet.” 
I really did try to decline. I felt like I was taking candy from a baby. Only the baby was INSISTING I take the candy. So I picked the first pair, and felt that prayers were answered.
That would all have been fine. Until Magda got a look at my coat. Now, sure my one coat (the purple one we bought in Berlin) is not really made for sub-zero temperatures, but that’s why I wear a hat, 2 scarves and 3 sweaters. No big deal. Big deal to Magda. She then went to her closet, pulled out 7 smokey coats and made me try them all on until one fit right. She even zipped me into it! I tried to take it off and politely put mine back on so we could head out but she literally ripped the purple coat off me and threw it in a corner of her apartment. Sister Steadman will stand as a witness to all of this.
Moral of the story is. I’m now relatively toasty, and thinking that maybe-just maybe I will be able to actually do some missionary work even when it is 20 degrees below freezing.

Biggest news… would be the BLIZZARD that hit Lodz yesterday. I have no clue how many inches fell (those of you with unlimited internet access could probably look a handy fact like that up) but here are the insights I gained:
- Those images of the snow desert in Star Wars make much more sense. Snow can act a lot like sand - as in it gets in your eyes and feels like pins and needles hitting your face when carried by the wind at very high speeds.
- One of the benefits of being a capital city seems to be the money to afford street sweeping. I had no idea that I was being spoiled in Warsaw by sidewalks where you could actually see the pavement. I did see one snow plow during the day, but seriously, no sidewalks were swept.
- Missionaries don’t get snow days, even when the rest of the world does. It’s not that people WANTED to cancel their meetings with us, it is that they literally COULD NOT get to the meetings. All the tramwajs went haywire, buses broke down in the middle of tram tracks, general chaos. Which meant an empty day for us. Which meant 3 sessions of tracting, varying from 1.5-3 hours each.
- If you live in Lodz in a prewar building you might very well have windows knocked out in your stairwell which leads to piles of just as much snow INSIDE the window as OUTSIDE.
- I doubt the communists knew it but they were actually creating wonderful missionary tools. Probably not what they were going for. Seriously, blocs make for pretty much the most effective missionary work ever. All you have to do is get into one, head to the 21st floor and then you are systemically engaged in the cause for 3 hours. Good to know that sometimes floor 7 actually connects to other neighbor buildings and therefore you may turn the corner and find a whole other set of doors when you expected a dead end - hard to describe, but very Lost-esque. Lead to otherworldly nightmares last night….

…Another person thought I was pregnant. This time is was a grandma on the tram waj who insisted a man give his seat up to me because of my “condition.” I decided to just take the seat (and my piece of humble pie) rather than just explaining to her that we have come to the season where I wear 7 layers every day.