Eggs

As you may have realized from the number of posts lately on Easter related themes, Easter is a big deal in Poland. Over the past week Krakow has celebrated the Holy Week with several processions, festivals, and markets. I've been fortunate enough to participate in many of the events.

I bought into Easter in a big way this year, and when I say bought, I mean it literally. Beautiful Easter-themed decorations, predominantly eggs, were available for sale all over the city. On Palm Sunday alone I purchased three different varieties of Easter eggs to decorate my flat.

We saw someone painting these beautiful pisanki and I had to have the purple one (and the brown one and a white one).


And I couldn't resist this twig egg.

Of course every Polish residence needs some typical painted wooden eggs. These were all over the Easter market in the Rynek.

Finally, no Easter anywhere would be complete without chocolate Easter eggs. I purchased hundreds of eggs last week and then with the help of a few co-conspirators hid them around my office Friday morning. Most of the Poles had never participated in an Easter Egg hunt before, and I got a thrill out of watching them search the office for eggs. Some of the guys grabbed their caps, filling them with eggs, while others picked up their waste-paper baskets and headed off in pursuit.

A rooster, a few pigs, and a lot of sheep

Animals of all shapes and forms seem to feature prominently in the Easter festivities here in Krakow.

It's traditional to place a sugared lamb in the center of the table on Easter Sunday. I haven't heard anything about the role pigs play but wish I had bought one of these fellas to put in my Easter basket.

Nor have I heard anything about roosters, but I thought these two were cool.

Finally

After 9 days, much pain, and 6 dentist visits, the ordeal is over.

Yesterday I had part two of the root canal and today I had a fibreglass pin inserted into my tooth to reconstruct it. No more dentists visits in the forseeable future.

Finally, I feel normal again.

More palms

Some pictures of the Easter festivities in Krakow on Palm Sunday:

The upside

of a root canal, and 4 trips to the dentist in five days, is weight loss.

Today, when I had to see the dentist about getting antibiotics, she told me I looked skinny. I guess that's what happens when you exist on yogurt for a few days.

Sadly, I regained my appetite around lunchtime today.

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday kicks off Holy Week in Krakow. All over the city you can see the Polish version of palms.



The palms are blessed at Palm Sunday services and also figure prominently in parades and processions.

It's not over yet

Turns out I was optimistic in my hope to feel normal again by Saturday. I went to bed early Friday night, exhausted by all the pain of the past few days, only to be woken up by more pain around midnight. I dosed myself with some Advil and slept for a few more hours, only to be woken up with worse pain around 4 am or so.

I canceled the trip I was supposed to make the mountains yesterday morning around 6 am and then took the painkiller the dentist had given me Thursday night. That gave me a few more hours of sleep, but by 10 am, the pain was excruciating. I phoned the dentist office and was back in the chair a few hours later having a root canal.

The double dose of freezing wore off about 5 hours later and then the pain started again, (fortunately for me, less than it had been) and I developed a fever.

Luckily I had one painkiller left from the dentist, which let me sleep most of last night, and I felt well enough today to participate in Palm Sunday and Easter festivities today. However, I haven't had any painkillers for about 7 hours now (yes, I am counting the hours), and my tooth, jaw, and ear are still bothering me. I hope a few trusty regular strength Advils will let me make it through the night.

I suspect I'll be in contact with the dentist again tomorrow morning.

With any luck I'll be able to blog about something other than my teeth in a few days.

Whew

By the time I got to the dentist's office today at 4 pm, I was willing to undergo any kind of torture to make the pain stop. I even fantasized about having my tooth pulled.

Luckily it didn't come to that. Once the dentist started drilling into the old filling, it almost fell out of my tooth, and she told me that all of my pain had been caused by a loose filling. Apparently the shape of this particular tooth makes it difficult to fill, and at some point the filling had slipped and leaked into my tooth, causing the pain.

Apparently this meant that I didn't have to have a root canal - yippee! Instead the dentist just removed the old filling and then replaced it. Twice actually, as she encountered the same problems with the shape of the tooth as the Canadian dentist, and had to remove the new filling and redo it.

90 minutes in the chair with your mouth screwed open is a long time. And it seems even longer when the freezing wears off before the filling (the second time round) is completed. After that experience and the excruciating pain of the last few days, I'm exhausted.

But I'm looking forward to feeling normal again tomorrow.

Tooth ache

The last few days I've been suffering from a tooth ache. The pain seems to be moving around the left side of my jaw, both upper and lower and is now moving into my ear. I was hoping it would just go away, because the last thing I wanted to do was brave a Polish dentist. I find visiting the Canadian ones bad enough.

However, the pain has had me wishing for some extra strength Advil (no Advil in Krakow), and popping the last of my regular strength supply. Plus the last time I ignored tooth pain, I ended up having a root canal a year later.

So after gathering dental recommendations, I was sent off to get x-rays at one location and then went to the dentist's office at 8:30 pm tonight. Apparently dentists work late in Poland. The attractive, modern office (filled with roses!) was bustling with activity when I arrived, and was still going strong when I left at 9:30.

After much poking and prodding (they had to tap and test every tooth since the location of pain was hard to pinpoint), the senior dentist (I saw two) decided that an old, very deep filling I have is probably the culprit, and that there might be infection under it.

So tomorrow afternoon I am going back. They plan to remove the filling and see what's going on underneath it.

Even with the roses, I'm not looking forward to it. Wish me luck.

Krakow

I've been spending more time this winter seeing the local sites and visiting museums and galleries I haven't been to yet. Yesterday I went on a tour of Wawel castle and the Christian areas of Kazimierz.



Yesterday was grey and chilly (but nothing compared to Canada these days), but spring is definitely on its way. Crocuses are up in the Planty and on Wawel hill and although these branches are still bare, some bushes and trees are starting to bud.

And one more post about Anne

Yesterday one of my writers left a newspaper on my desk, circling the article on the 100th anniversary celebrations of Anne of Green Gables in Krakow this June.

Apparently the festivities include a carrot juice festival, which makes me question the writer's translation, and attempts to get into the Guiness book of world records for some of the Anne-related activities.

Who knew?

It figures . . .

Today, two days after I completed my tax information and submitted it to the accountants, I received 3 tax receipts in the mail.

I'll never learn . . .

It's 11:30 pm and I am frantically going through all of my emails for 2007 looking for online tax receipts for charitable donations. I started this useful activity after spending a good hour digging through my (so-called) filing cupboard (a place where I throw any piece of paper I might need in the future)for a copy of last year's tax return, which I swore I brought to Poland with me.

My normal tax filing process involves me digging through my filing cabinet and spreading out all unfiled contents (which really means all contents) on the floor, sorting them, and then putting a tax file together, and calling my dad with the information (hey, he was a tax partner for years and years . . .).

I thought it would be easier this year, as I emptied my filing cabinet in Canada in March or April, and put a tax file together then. Of course, it would have been easier if I kept that file up to date, or actually brought it to Poland with me.

Dad's already received a desperate phone call on his cellphone tonight. Thankfully, I believe he's a little more organized than his daughter (or at least he keeps up the appearance of it). I know he's shaking his head and cringing as he reads this.

On the bright side, I filed my Polish return (or at least gave the information to the accountants) last week.

This year my tax filing deadline for Canada is the end of this week. Something about being an expat and filing tax returns in two countries. Lucky me.

No nudity please, I'm Canadian

The Bad Gastein region in Austria, where I went skiing last weekend, is famous for its waters. Many of the villages have wellness centers that include hot pools, saunas, spas, and medical treatments.

Spas and hot pools are the perfect way to end the day after hours of skiing. So Saturday evening we headed to the huge complex in the village we were staying in. We'd already visited once Friday morning for a massage, while we were waiting for my luggage to arrive (I arrived in Munich on Thursday afternoon, my skis didn't).

During the massage treatment I was a little uncomfortable when the therapist ordered me to take off my clothes while she was still in the room. She did leave after I started to get changed, and then came back in when I was lying on the massage table under a blanket.

Apparently I was not supposed to use that blanket, as she quickly whipped it off, leaving me lying there completely naked. A few minutes later she did cover me with another sheet, but it made me long for my Canadian massage therapists. To them, draping is an art, and you are never exposed during a massage.

Back to Saturday night. After dips in the hot pools, my friend Y wanted to try the saunas. Being claustrophobic, I am not fond of spending time in small, hot spaces, but I thought I'd go along for a while to see what it was like.

When we entered Sauna World (yes that's what it was called), we blatantly ignored the Nude Zone sign. After all, we saw other people lounging around in their robes and bathing suits, as well as people walking around completely naked.

Sauna World is a series of saunas set at different temperatures. We found one at a lower temperature and settled in. I did notice that everyone else was naked, but it was dark, and I thought I'd just be in the sauna for a few minutes. And really, how much coverage does a bathing suit provide?

Apparently far too much. 5 minutes or so later (which seemed like an eternity for me in a small, dark, hot space), a fully clothed sauna guard came in, chastised a few people for not sitting on towels, and then told me I'd have to take off my bathing suit if I wanted to stay.

Yep, I got kicked out for not being naked. I suppose if I wasn't looking for an excuse to get out of the sauna, I might have taken my bathing suit off and stayed a while.

Or maybe not. After all, I am still Canadian . . .

The hills are alive

Last weekend, in search of snow, I went to Bad Gastein, Austria to ski in the Alps.

I was a little skeptical that there was any snow anywhere after arriving in the town, which was bare, as were the surrounding hillsides.



But the peaks were snow covered, as were the alpine valleys.



So there was more then enough snow for us to both downhill and cross country ski. And the amazing Alpine scenery gave me an excuse to take multiple breaks and enjoy the views, which my aching body demanded.



We also discovered the favourite local drink, Skiwasser, which is just right with a really big pretzel. Both taste even better while sitting outside in the sun enjoying apres ski.