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When I write one of these, it's like sewing a rug. I take a bunch of ideas and stitch them together till I have a column that I can shake outside and put on the floor.
Today, I have a lot of loose ends. These are remnants from our trip to Europe in June. Instead of rug, it might come out looking like a bunch of rags.
We spent a week in the Czech Republic and a week in Poland with two daughters, a son-in-law, and a 10-year-old grandson. Part of that was seeking ancestral places. Part of it was touristing.
Both those countries were behind the Iron Curtain 50 years ago when I spent a semester in Germany. A group of Americans going there and bopping around would have been unthinkable then.
In the 50 years before that, two World Wars were fought in these places. They've lived some history.
Speaking of history, I spent much of our trip feeling overwhelmed by it. I have a basic high school knowledge of European history. But when you're walking around palaces and churches that are centuries older than our nation's 250 years, you realize you're not in Kansas anymore.
There is recorded history of more than a thousand years in those places. Trying to keep track of all the great movements that impacted those lands can't be done in two weeks.
For all of us, the generations who came before went to make who we are. For sure physically, but also intellectually and emotionally in ways that we can't fully understand. It's why we study the past in general and our ancestry in particular.
Unfortunately, you can't study the history of Central Europe without knowing about battles and wars. Through the sweep of a millennium, it's depressing how often armies were massed and marched off to kill others.
More often than not, they fought for "God." The Hussite Wars were Catholics against Catholics. The Thirty Years War was Catholics against Lutherans. It seems a strange notion of God who wants us to go kill other people.
When I wasn't struggling to get the history straight in my head, I was enjoying being in those places. We alternated eating and walking lots. Good thing, or I would have put on 20 pounds
The food of that region has echoes of the food my mom made. She was a Soukup-Haala mix, both families emigrated from Bohemia. Her sauerkraut and dumplings and schmurkuchen were recipes passed to her from the "old country."
The sauerkraut on our trip was a touch sweeter. There was a variety of spaetzle and dumplings. Every possible part of a pig could be found on menus: knees, knuckles, necks.
Pam warned me about the beer in reading before the trip. Czech beer is served with foamy head several inches deep. It's easy to sip through and settles quickly. But at first, you think something's wrong with the tap.
In Pilsen, we toured the Pilsner Urquell Brewery. It was established in 1842, when five local brewers decided to band together. It is only 18 years older than our Schell's Brewery. Which is reminder of how deep a legacy Schell's has. By coincidence Sleepy Eye Brewery, a mere six years old, brews a beer call "Czech Pilsner," which is a favorite.
We began our trip in Prague. Prague is a beautiful old city in the center of Europe. During the Cold War, it was locked away from westerners. Now that it's open, it's popular with tourists. The cafes and sights were bustling.
I recalled the "Prague Spring" while I was there. That was in 1968. A protest movement against Soviet control rose up. Groups gathered to demand freedoms they didn't have. On the night of August 20, several hundred thousand Warsaw Pact troops and tanks rolled into Prague to crush that.
I was 12 and have memories of listening to reports on my transistor radio. I was kind of a geeky kid, and it upset me greatly. I went upstairs and told my parents, Sylvester and Alyce, who were probably watching Gunsmoke.
This June, I could stand on the streets where the tanks rolled. The Soviet Union was gone; my twelve-year-old self was vindicated.
From our hotel, we walked through Wencelas Square. There, in 1989, thousands gathered as part of the Velvet Revolution. This time no tanks came, and it was the end of the totalitarian regime.
From Prague we took a van with Wade Olsen. Wade was our guide to see the villages where my ancestors lived before emigrating to Brown County. It is a comely rural area with fields and villages set between hills. Wade had connections with local officials who let us in to see old churches where my ancestors were baptized and married for centuries.
Sadly, none of my distant cousins are there now. Bohemia lies at the crossroads of Czech and German speaking people. Going back centuries, that region alternated between cooperation and tension.
After World War II, the German speaking people were expelled. Wade knows some people who remember that as children. In most cases, they had just hours to pack a few belongings before leaving villages where their families had lived for centuries.
We could see the places where all my ancestors lived. Sometimes we could find the house. The Czech people who are there now are friendly. Some seemed aware of the people who lived there before 1947, others not so much.
After that down note, I'll end on a down note. We spent a week in Krakow and Warsaw. Krakow is an old city, with many building hundreds of years old. It was spared from Nazi bombing.
Warsaw was mostly destroyed. Their occupants kept rising to oppose the German occupants. Hitler made them to suffer. But it has been rebuilt and now both cities attract visitors like us.
In both, we spent time in the former Jewish quarters. Many of the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust were from those cities. To stand where those victims stood is heart breaking.
In a tremendous piece of historical irony, we watch the maltreatment and murder of Palestinian people today. Just as all Germans weren't responsible for the Holocaust, not all Israelis are responsible for this genocide.
I guess some of this, too in the name of God.
-- Randy Krzmarzick farms on the home place west of Sleepy Eye, where he lives with his wife, Pam.