Dobre Rano

Good morning!  (in Slovak). I'm posting this photo taken at 7:30 this morning, just prior to breakfast and our heading off to the Slovak Fesitval in Holmdel, NJ.
Well, the day was certainly an exciting one.  One would have thought that we were in Slovakia once we arrived at the PNC Bank Arts center in Holmdel, because most of the people walking around were speaking Slovak, including little children!  Who would have thought that so many Slovaks would be living in the New Jersey area?

We began the day by attending mass, which was completely in Slovak.  The Bishop of Kosice was the presider, giving no less than a half hour sermon in Slovak, and I felt better about myself when the lady sitting next to me began nodding off about 20 minutes into the sermon.  I must admit, though, that the exuberance exhibited by Slovaks gathered for this celebration was infectious.  I'll bet that the voices in Slovak song could be heard throughout the hills of New Jersey.    The Mass itself, last on hour 45 minutes, extended by yet another speech by the visiting Bishop, once again, entirely in Slovak.  There was quite a bit of smiling and chuckling among the crowd, so I can only presume that Fr. Bober was entertaining in his speech.  No one was in a rush to leave the tent, despite the length of time.

One of the highlights of the day was the presence of the Slovak President at the festival.  He was surrounded by several body guards, yet he took the time to walk around the tent where many people sat during the opening ceremonies.  Marty snapped a great photo of him, which I will post some time in the future.

We ate Slovak food and watched some very entertaining Slovak singers and dancers.  The weather was comfortable and cool, and we were fortunate that there was no rain, since the event is held outdoors.

We decided to spend the evening at the B&B, relaxing, and finishing last evening's scrumptious cake that we had brought home from the play house.  All in all, it was surely a super Slovak Day!

Floatin' down the River

Loving all things Slovak (well, maybe not all, but a lot), we decided that it would be fun to make the trip to the Annual Slovak Festival held in Holmdel New Jersey.  One of my fellow Slovak genealogists whom I help out at the FHC had told me what a great time this festival was, so on the calendar went the mark for Sunday, Sept.26.
Since Holmdel, NJ is a few hours from home, we thought that this would be the perfect opportunity to relax this weekend, so I booked a room at the Isaac Hilliard House in Pemberton, NJ,  about an hour away from the festival.
Our adventures began in the  Pinelands in  Wharton, NJ, where Marty and I rented a double kayak and floated along the Wading river for nearly two hours.  The water was smooth, and actually rather shallow and there were several spots where one could have easily waded, as the name implies. But there were a couple of times where I worried about getting impaled by a fallen tree limb.  I realized after short time, that since I was in the front, I could not keep an eye on what Marty was actually looking at, so, after fighting off a few trees nearly in my face which resulted in some annoying comments directed towards Marty,  he finally  caught on to the fact that he needed to pay more attention.  All of the lovely photos that I found on his camera card later verified my suspicions that he was not actually paying attention to the river ahead.  Moral of the story:  sit in the back of the kayak.  
For the most part, the trip down the river was pretty relaxing.  The only wildlife that we spotted was a turtle on a  log, basking in the sun which I decided to feature as  my blog photo.

After our trip down the river, we headed to our B&B in Pemberton.  We had dinner at a lovely Italian Restaurant in New Holly.  For some added fun, we decided to attend a play at a local playhouse just a block down the street from our B&B..   The name of the Play was "All in the Timing" by David Ives, and it was a series of short one-act plays.  We had been warned that the language was strongly adult, and we were worried what awaited us, but were pleasantly surprised to find that we had heard much worse language in some movies that we had watched in the past.  In addition to the performance, you could purchase dessert and coffee at the intermission, which everyone in the small theater had opted for.  Much to our surprise the size of our dessert was humoungous, and Marty and I couldn't help but laughing at the size of it.  Everyone was handed a bag for takeout, as it appears that no one can actually finish the dessert due to the size.  That was certainly the icing on the cake, as they say.

Rekindling Memories

On Saturday, Marty and I attended the Pitt vs. New Hampshire game in Pittsburgh.  Admittedly, the experience was quite different than those from our younger days.  I remember looking forward to Saturday home game days, trudging up "Cardiac Hill" to the back of the old stadium where the Student section entrance was located.  Back then we had benches to huddle on, but I don't recall sitting much.  We had a great time regardless of the weather, and it was a refreshing break for me, from my stringent engineering curriculum.
Today, the Peterson event center stands in the spot of the old stadium, and the University football team shares Heinz Field with the Pittsburgh Steelers.  This means that students now hop busses into the North Side rather than walking to the stadium.  There is much hoopla along the river front with games and DJ's offering entertainment.  Everyone, including the students, is guaranteed an actual seat rather than having masses huddled together.  The entire experience is filled with constant visual stimulation.

From the grand entrance of the Pitt Band to the emergence of the players from the locker room, one cannot help but be caught up in the excitement.   When the Pitt players enter the "red zone", the two Heinz ketchup bottles above the scoreboard flip open their lids, and they begin to tilt downward, getting ready to pour red streams which "fill up" the scoreboard with red, in anticipation of a touchdown.

I'm sure that the fans never tire of hearing the bottles opening!  At least I know that I didn't!

But, what I found the most fun was the entire stadium, at the end of the third quarter, breaking into song along with Neil Diamond, singing out "Sweet Caroline". Words cannot describe the experience.

It was obvious that the regular crowd waited for this big moment and there was no timidness among the ranks of those singing.  And, of course, we certainly had to join in!
Back in our younger days, Pitt was ranked #1 and Tony Dorset was the star of our college days.  But, I have to tell you, attending a Pitt game today is a whole lot more fun than what it used to be.  But, then again, I don't have to worry about cracking open "the books" to study later in the day, either.  That automatically makes it more fun!