June 18, 2017     Zembrzyce        Visiting the cousins

Michal was going to pick us up at 15:00 for our visit to Zembrzyce.  We went to the yuuuge mall at the Krakow Glowny train station to look around.  We had to meet Michal outside of Old Town as permits are required to drive in Old Town.  I haven’t looked on a map, but it was about an hour drive outside Krakow.  Michal had never been to Zembrzyce, but he talked as if it were maybe five houses on a dirt road.  Well it turned out to be a very nice looking small town.  As you can see from the photo there is even a sign identifying the town.  Michal had an address for the cousins, but Google Maps couldn’t locate it.  We parked in front of the church and Michal went to talk to two old timers sitting in a little park to see if he could get any help.  Sue and I looked at the WW I Memorial in the little park and were surprised to see so many names we recognized from our home town of Kewanee.  Michal said that the cousin’s house was just around the corner from the church.  It didn’t take long to find the house and Michal knocked on the door to see if anyone was home.  A lady answered, who we guessed might have been a neighbor who looks in on the cousins.  She and Michal talked for a bit and then the lady brought the sisters to the door.  We were invited in and shown into a room with a table.  Michal of course did all the talking.  The ladies had to give us cake and coffee, the custom when guests (uninvited) are asked in.  Marisha is the oldest at 83, and the smallest, the other sister is Gienia and she is 80.  They remembered Adella’s visit and they both remarked how much Sue resembled Adella.  Marisha went with us to the cemetery to see Jan Kolata’s grave.  Sue thinks Jan was the sister’s father, but not sure.  I took too many photos, but it was just interesting to us to see so many names of people we knew and grew up with.  We don’t know if the people in Zembrzyce are related to people in Kewanee, but think there is a pretty good chance that they are.  Another interesting observation was that the Cemetery was busy on Sunday after church.  There were many people bringing flowers and candles(?) for the graves, and it seemed that many graves were decorated with fresh flowers and other objects.  We were there for almost an hour.  We stopped back at the house to “talk” a little more and say our goodbyes.

We drove back to Warsaw.  We went to eat at a restaurant run by a friend of Michal’s in the Old Jewish Quarter called the Barfly.  The food was really good.  One think about restaurants in Krakow are the napkins.  Our experience is that the napkins are a 5” x 5” cocktail napkin.  There will be container with more on the table, but they are almost worthless.  Sue got ribs and she asked Michal if there were any bigger napkins.  Michal talked to the waitress, who came back with a handful of the same cocktail napkins, but Sue survived.  Michal walked us around the Jewish Quarter and it looks really interesting.  When we come back we will try to stay in that area.  It was really a wonderful day.

 

2017 06 18 Krakow