The day I dreamed of for so long, my first Smingus Dingus in Poland. For years, I have been woken up on Easter Monday by my dad soaking me with cold water and yelling Smingus Dingus! as he ran out the door. For some reason unknown to me, Easter Monday is an official over the top water fight in Poland that lasts until noon that day. My entire life, regailed by my father with stories of how crazy it always was in Poland, I woke up early that morning to see if it was true. Would the years of hype live up to this day? Will the climate of modern times have tempered down this once crazy day like they have to so many other things?
My day started off with soaking Marlena, Craig (who I had promised not to soak the day before) and his sister visiting from England, who didn't believe this holiday existed until she was soaking wet. It was my obligation to soak every girl, because any girl left dry will, according to legend, die alone.
Next Craig and I went out on the balcony to scan the area. I was overjoyed to see gangs of kids, walking around with buckets and waterguns, popping out from behind cars, and generally roaming the streets like packs of rats. It was a war zone. As the gangs roamed, windows would suddenly open up high in apartments buildings and buckets of water would come crashing down on their victims, with an adult laughing from the window as the kids cursed in Polish and regrouped. Entire gangs of up to ten kids, were looking to soak any non adult. This is considered good ettiquete- babcias and dziadeks are totally off limits. Invalids and the homeless are considered a grey area.
It was like some sort of post apocalyptic horror, Escape from New York meets Lord of the Flies meets white water rafting. These monsters were ruling the streets and I was scared to go down. Marlena told me that in the villages, they chase you into your home and even the shortest trip outside means getting soaked. We nailed a few kids from our balcony, only to hear them calling us fags and losers in Polish and taunting us to come down. I couldn't resist.
At this point, Marlena, already soaked by us, left for her train home and Craig and I headed down to try to drown some children. Craig's sister stayed home and locked herself in the bathroom to man the fort. (chicken shit)
What's important to keep in mind at this point, is that this holiday is like Halloween. Only kids are
really allowed to participate, and us walking around the streets could be likened to a 28 year old 'kid' smelling of cigarettes that comes trick or treating to your house, with a 'Scream' mask tied around his neck, asking in a deep voice if you have any schnapps. For kids it's fun, but any adult seeing us running the streets considered us pathetic.
We came back after 20 minutes soaked but looking for more. Marlena returned wetter than ever at this point, saying that a group of bad teenagers were throwing brown river water at everybody at the tram stop, including babcias, and then afterwards began to rock the tram back and forth like in a riot. She raced back to the safety of my arms as quickly as possible.
We hit the streets, all of us, looking for more action. We came across a group of 'bad kids', that were older and looked more like ogres than children and I swear to you, that one of them was 11 years old but had a full moustache. These Chernobyl kids weren't backing down, and I knew we were in trouble when I was dumping water on them from the balcony and one little pervert just stood there asking for more and moaning, like he was getting turned on.
Yes, this was our biggest mistake, not bullying children under 10 years old, because when eventually we had enough, these bad kids got into our building. They then deduced which apartment was ours and began knocking on our door, gently and politely at first, then pounding. We lay there, in complete silence, looking at each other unsure of what to do, feeling he
lpess, trying not to breathe, not to make a sound, as they knocked and asked "Hello? Anybody home?...ANYBODY HOME!?!?!'. My heart was pounding, and I knew it was stupid, but I quickly opened the door and soaked one of them and then locked the door again. That's when enourmous amounts of water began to pour under the door, soaking our entire corridor and bathroom. As they walked away down the street, they kept laughing and pointing at us, asking if our door was wet. Yes, now 28 years old, bigger, but still unable to grow a moustache, a group of bad ass 11 year olds with facial hair had once again humiliated me. Some things never change.
Thank you Smingus Dingus 2006! You were one of the rare times in life that substance matched the hype.
Me soaking the Pope moments before he crushed me with his giant hand. Who did you get this year?
Bitch. He's been on his knee now for 600 years. If you don't know for sure now, you'll never know.
Jesus Christ!
Deeper and deeper in Morlock territory. The tour was 2 hours, and covered 2km of the 250km of tunnels and paths in Wieliczka.
If you are extremely rich and eccentric, you can have your wedding in this enourmous underground hal. Everything is made from salt, even the chandeliers are made from salt crystals. It's these small touches that keep us super-rich satisfied.
Well, they weren't quite Morlocks, but at least I got a couple of notches into my bedpost.
Sloppy seconds for Craig. This man has no sense of shame.
The palace of culture and science. Your first view from the train station. Communist architecture at its finest. A gift from Stalin to Poland, many people want to tear it down. In it's basement levels are 40 feral cats whose job it is to keep the palace mouse free.
Monument to the soldiers who died in the Warsaw Uprising. I was especially intrigued by the detail on the first soldier's leg so I had a closer look.
