Back
Well I got back last night. Whenever I leave Grinnell, even if its just for a few days, when I come back it feels like years that I've been gone, its really weird.
The funeral mass was beautiful. It was at my grandparent's (Slovakian) Byzantine Church. I'd never been there, or to any Catholic church for that matter, so I had no idea what to expect. The front of the church was covered with gold pictures and gold ornaments, which were gorgeous. There was lots of singing/chanting and sitting down/standing up/kneeling (which I was always afraid I would do at the wrong time!) The words to the songs sounded beautiful and mysterious, and I'm sure they're even more so in their original form (Church Slavonic). The mass had lots of interesting little details, like how at some point the priest kissed the bible once, other times twice, or how he would very purposefully walk out one set of gold doors and in another, or how he would swing the incense in certain directions. I wished I knew the meaning or the history behind a lot of these things.
After the mass the priest came up and we talked for a while about Slavic languages and Eastern Europe. Apparently, though Grandpa spoke Slovak, he's actually Carpatho-Rusyn (an Eastern European Byzantine ethnicity without a state) not Slovak. The priest let me try to read some things in Church Slavonic, but with the old-fashioned type and the extra letters, I could only pick out a few words.
The whole weekend I was worried for Grandpa, who was having a really hard time. Basically the only good thing about the trip was being there for the mass, and seeing him. Other than that, it was just ugly, depressing Detroit, endless family meals, and talk about cars. Urgh.
The flight back was fine and I studied Russian the whole time. Russ and Eric picked me up from the airport shortly after I got in and we had a little adventure getting lost in Des Moines. Eric brought along our favorite quiz book (a collection of bad quizzes from girly magazines) so we amused ourselves finding out what flavor of icrecream we would be, which is our greek goddess, and best of all, what is our fighting style. Delightfully tacky. All of us went and got dinner and then I went over to French House to see Jaime and LA. Luckily I don't have class today so I can try to catch up on everything.
The funeral mass was beautiful. It was at my grandparent's (Slovakian) Byzantine Church. I'd never been there, or to any Catholic church for that matter, so I had no idea what to expect. The front of the church was covered with gold pictures and gold ornaments, which were gorgeous. There was lots of singing/chanting and sitting down/standing up/kneeling (which I was always afraid I would do at the wrong time!) The words to the songs sounded beautiful and mysterious, and I'm sure they're even more so in their original form (Church Slavonic). The mass had lots of interesting little details, like how at some point the priest kissed the bible once, other times twice, or how he would very purposefully walk out one set of gold doors and in another, or how he would swing the incense in certain directions. I wished I knew the meaning or the history behind a lot of these things.
After the mass the priest came up and we talked for a while about Slavic languages and Eastern Europe. Apparently, though Grandpa spoke Slovak, he's actually Carpatho-Rusyn (an Eastern European Byzantine ethnicity without a state) not Slovak. The priest let me try to read some things in Church Slavonic, but with the old-fashioned type and the extra letters, I could only pick out a few words.
The whole weekend I was worried for Grandpa, who was having a really hard time. Basically the only good thing about the trip was being there for the mass, and seeing him. Other than that, it was just ugly, depressing Detroit, endless family meals, and talk about cars. Urgh.
The flight back was fine and I studied Russian the whole time. Russ and Eric picked me up from the airport shortly after I got in and we had a little adventure getting lost in Des Moines. Eric brought along our favorite quiz book (a collection of bad quizzes from girly magazines) so we amused ourselves finding out what flavor of icrecream we would be, which is our greek goddess, and best of all, what is our fighting style. Delightfully tacky. All of us went and got dinner and then I went over to French House to see Jaime and LA. Luckily I don't have class today so I can try to catch up on everything.
posted by Julia | 6:15 AM
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