When there’s a wedding, there must be a …

It has become a bit of a tradition now that when I go to Poland, I photograph Dorota’s sweet art forms. This one is a beautiful floral wedding cake that I found irresistible when shooting the pictures (I had to try hard to keep a distance to prevent inadvertent tasting). I must admit that the more I take these photographs, the more I want to take them and the more I observe what Dorota makes, the more I am curious of what she will make next. You too?

More of Dorota’s sweet beauties on her Facebook site: My Cake

Doubt is good

I’ve got to complete a substantial piece of work for my thesis and submit it towards the end of the month to my supervisor. Criticizing and evaluating other people’s research is not the strongest of my skills. I often doubt my judgement and I must say I have been experiencing a strong writer’s block over the last few weeks. Yesterday, however, something shifted in me… I love going to our parish church on Sunday. There we are given a weekly newsletter not only with parish announcements but also with short articles dedicated to the theme of the Sunday. Well… you all probably know the story of a doubting Thomas and his need to scrutinize the Christ’s wounds before believing in Jesus’ resurrection. Yesterday, in our weekly newsletter, different writers were making commentaries regarding that theme and one of them, Christine Clark, wrote this:

”Doubt is good: it must always be better for something to be challenged. If it’s too fragile to stand up to scrutiny, it’s not worth much.”

I choose to write about this because I think yesterday I have turned a corner in my thinking. Dealing with doubt, criticism and disbelief is an important part of doing research work and I think that only yesterday I understood why having doubts often implies having the courage to think independently.

Doubt is lovely. Welcome doubt.

Transition

Too many eggs and too many baskets*

A while ago I wrote a post in which I was openly confessing my love of reading. I was saying how important it is for me to study and how important it is for me to engage with other people’s ideas. That day I was fortunate to receive a comment from Faye in which she wrote:

“Don’t let ONE aspect of who you are SWAMP other things.”

I read the comment and it was as if I was struck by thunder. I started having a serious dialogue with myself.Maybe Faye was right? Maybe studying was overcrowding other things? Maybe my research was encroaching on our family life and invading our family space a bit too much.

My books, my papers, my notes were everywhere and they were pulling my and my son’s attention pretty much constantly. You can imagine what that meant – lots of frustration and unnecessary conflict, lots of stress and mental burden. I realised then that I needed a solution.

I couldn’t sleep that night. I was seriously considering quitting my work and my research, but that felt terribly wrong to me. I know what happens to people when they quit realizing their dream prematurely, they are scarred for life – I didn’t want that scar. Plus, on the very positive side, I thought to myself, well… I do love myself. I do love what I am doing. Why deny myself the joy that comes with it?

So I was troubled. I love my home, my family but I also love what I am doing and those very dear and very enriching aspects of my life were calling for separation. Calling for boundaries.

I was tossing and turning. I was unable to sleep through the night and then all of a sudden I had a light bulb moment – I just need an office. I immediately went online, yes, at five o’clock in the morning and right there and then I found a perfect place for myself. In a recently renovated old red brick factory I am now doing my research into multilingualism and I am teaching different languages, both in Polish and English. Maybe one day I will also teach some basic Spanish grammar and re-engage with that beautiful language that I studied at University. Once you start studying a foreign language, it really becomes part of you and not being able to speak it for a while is like not being able to access a part of yourself. It’s almost as if language imprints itself into your DNA and becomes part of your life story. It’s quite an amazing process.

Yesterday three years passed since I signed up with WordPress for the first time. The world of blogging gave me friends for life. Thank you WordPress. Thank you readers for taking the time to visit and comment.

Enjoy the Autumn!
xxx

Alicja

*Taken at Biskupin – An Open Air Museum, Poland

As far as our curiosity takes us

Christmas is abundant in culture in our little home. We’re a trilingual household, with Polish, Italian and English being spoken between us and the members of our family, and so when we celebrate Christmas, there are many customs and traditions to follow and weave into the Christmas season. I often ask myself to what extent it is possible to be a multicultural family, how far can we go in being three at once: Polish, Italian and English.

It’s been only recently that I came up with the answer to the how far question:

We can go as far as our curiosity goes.

For is this not what identity is? All that we’ve been thus far and all where our curiosity takes us to.

I feel that the more we cultivate the three languages, the deeper we dive into the cultures that accompany them. It’s either following one’s interest and enjoying it or living in a state of permanent nostalgia for what we once were (or what we once hoped to become). It’s interesting that we can either answer our curiosity or be saddened by it.

If you follow Elizabeth Gilbert on Facebook, you will learn a lot from her about curiosity-driven life. I love her idea and now it is a perfect moment for me to embrace it. A perfect moment to start learning, exploring and loving our three cultures.

So this is where this blog is going to venture now.

From curiosity to cultures. :)

But where was I… oh yes… traditions and customs. I proclaimed myself a custodian of cultures this Christmas and although we celebrated in England, I made a typical Polish dinner on Dec 24: carp, beetroot soup, ginger bread and pasta with poppy seeds, nuts and raisins. Just before Christmas our Italian friends came over for a short visit. It was interesting for me to learn that where they are from in the south of Italy, they also celebrate Christmas starting on Dec 24 eating fish, opening presents and going to church at midnight. This is different to how my husband’s family celebrated it in the north of Italy – with the main emphasis being on Dec 25. If you happen to be from the north of Italy, I am curious to know if this is still true for you.

Children benefit greatly from celebrating multicultural Christmas. Not only because of the different foods, customs and music but also because presents are given in different places of the world at different times which can mean more presents, or if you think like me, it would mean that not everything needs to be opened from everyone on the same day and the joy can be spread throughout the weeks. In Poland we tend to give each other the main presents on Dec 24 after our main Christmas dinner, but also something small a bit earlier in the month on Dec 6 for St Nicholas’ Day (Mikołajki). On Dec 6 my mother used to put some nuts, oranges, a piece of chocolate into our shoes and sometimes a little practical winter present like a pair of gloves, warm tights or a hat. Nothing too fancy – the present was just meant to bring a smile to our faces and warmth to our bodies. Practical and simple. In England, the main presents are opened on the 25th and in Italy, something small is also given on the 6th of January, for la Befana – Befana is an old witch-like woman who brings candies and fruit to good children and garlic and coal to the naughty ones. If you are a cook, you are lucky, you can purposefully misbehave and you will get garlic and fuel with which to start cooking many of your pasta sauces. :)

Have a great curiosity-driven year!

Where do you think your curiosity will take you in 2016?

Thankful Tuesday (Poland)

We didn’t have much time for sight-seeing in Poland but seeing my family was actually what I mainly wanted out of our short visit there. Everything else was an additional treat. So today I am grateful for my family in Poland and all the places of heart-warming indulgence that I like to visit there. :)