Dziękuję

Wow. What an amazing start to our Polish tour.

We are in Szczecin, a beautiful Polish town. It’s not hard to be beautiful in Poland. It’s simply a lovely country. I highly recommend a visit.

We performed in an art gallery. A huge room with metal and glass everywhere. A wonderful photo installation on the walls. It gave an incredible feeling to our mental hospital. Our set looked amazing in there. 

 Happily putting together the table.

We really did not expect a big crowd. We have a few friends in Szczecin. Hubert (our Polish tour manager) has some friends. The gallery told a few folks, but our PR in Szczecin was light. And really, it is July. That means holiday. People are out of town or at least have gone away for their Sunday fun. Since the space wasn’t a proper theatre, we could set it up as we wanted. We put out a small amount of cushions and chairs. Perfect, we thought.

                                                       Polish translation.

Nando, Hannah, Drew, and I are all standing in a back room waiting for our places call. We just keep seeing Alex and other gallery people coming back and getting chairs. And more chairs. And more chairs. And more chairs. I'm not kidding. Alex comes back and warns that there is a big group on the side and they’ll be able to see backstage so we need to keep it hidden as best we can. Okay Alex.

Our tiny and weird show played to maybe its biggest house yet. Thanks Poland. You are awesome. Today is a day off and tomorrow we head to Warsaw. Not a bad start.

                                                      Day off. I slept in a bit. 

I guess our official start was last week. New York was great. I am so thankful and humbled by the enormous New Mexico showing. New Mexico rocks you guys. What a bunch of fabulous people. I made up a song about the awesomeness of New York/Mexico. Neither of which are very new, but they are both pretty cool. 

The people at Standard Toykraft where we performed were also rad. I could have spent all day in their puppet workshop staring at their amazing creations. 

Thanks New York. You were super swell. 

Some other things along the way...

We managed all of our set bags on a very packed train, so I am optimistic for the rest of the train travel. 

                                               Oh my.  That is a lot of bags. 

Aaron, Drew, and Nando got monkey dogs (long hot dogs stuffed in a bread tube) and went to a movie.

I have climbed a lot of stairs. 

Pierogi is delicious (so it is good there are stairs everywhere.)

We had a rooftop party.

                                                               Rooftop party.

                                                               Polish hospitality.

It turned into an impromptu dance party.

Nando is probably the best dancer in the whole world.

There is a little wiener dog who lives close by and his owner walks him to the park often. It makes me miss my little Shudek dog. 

Aaron makes the Polish girls giggle. He goes up to the clerk or the server or whatever and he says, "Dzien Dobry!" and then he says other things and then I hear "hee-hee-hee-hee." He's quite the charmer that one. 

                                                                    Charming.

I have to walk some chairs we borrowed for the show back over to another theatre and then go have dinner on the river. More soon. 

Peace.