Ambivalent feelings

I am writing this post as my students write the final examination. The course is over, and it has been an intensive experience both for me and for them. A twelve-week senior course taught in eight weeks. They have learned a lot. I have talked a lot. We have read a lot together: works of literature in all genres (including life writing, of course!), works of literary criticism and theory (mainly about the particular postcoloniality of Canada and Canadian literature), and we have watched four NFB documentaries (have I mentioned how much I love the NFB?).

It is odd to be a 'native informant.' I wonder how many misconceptions I have inadvertently planted in the minds of students whom I have addressed both here and at other universities. I wonder if I have managed to convey the complexities of issues such as "Canadian national identity" (there isn't one, really, or at least not a singular one) to students who live in a country that has had to fight for its national identity and where hyper-nationalism can be dangerous. I wonder how many facts I've gotten wrong when I'm giving Readers' Digest versions of Canadian history, politics, geography, etc. Thank goodness for Google, is what I say to that! And maps; I've shown a lot of maps. I'm confident about all I have said about literary matters (one would hope so!), and I could have told them so much more.

I have absolutely no ambivalent feelings about my experience being a visiting professor at the University of Zagreb. I only have ambivalent feelings about it being over. I am tired. I have done a lot of travelling, a lot of lecturing, a lot of talking. I am ready for Arlequino to join me; I am ready for some holiday time, and eventually, being home. But I have loved it all. And I am very proud of my students. I am consistently impressed by their intelligence, their cultural fluency (not to mention their fluency in often more than two languages), their analytical skills, their writing--their writing is AWESOME! They would do very well in our Canadian university classrooms, and I have told them so.

And how lovely Zagreb is. I have loved living here, even in Novi Zagreb. The tiny apartment became home. The neighbourhood became my neighbourhood. I know my way around the city, and there are delightful visions everywhere you look. Like these amazing blossoms on the chestnut trees.

Today I move out of the apartment and into the Palace Hotel, an old grand hotel with a rich history, across from a gorgeous park in the centre of the city.

In a few days Arlequino and I will pick up a rental car and head to Istria, then to the interior, and eventually down to the Dalmatian coast, ending up in Dubrovnik. So from here on in it will be tourist photos and stories. Hope you will continue to enjoy those.

Zadar

I am on the bus traveling to Zadar where I will yet again give a guest lecture to an audience of students and faculty at the University. It is raining, so there’s lots of fog and although the landscape is very green, the tops of the hills are in cloud. This will be my first visit to the coast, and although I’ve been told that Zadar was heavily bombed during WWII and much of the old town was destroyed, I’m sure enough will be left to give me pleasure. And it’s on the sea. How could that be bad?

Bus travel is not like train travel. Okay, that was a stupid thing to write. But what I’m noticing is how noisy it is. People talk and talk and talk, either to their traveling companions or on cell phones. I swear two women behind me have talked non-stop for three hours. And the ubiquitous cell phones, those weird one-sided and very loud conversations. There’s also music playing. I’m trying to drown it all out with a podcast but with not much luck.


And then I arrive and my host walks me around the town. A medieval cathedral is truly magnificent--and was spared. It's built on top of earlier churches, Roman. 

In the museum across from the medieval church. Look and you can see its reflection in the window.

Pedestrian shopping streets, and Croatia tie shop. The tie was invented in Croatia. Or so they tell me.

A massive cruise ship was docked practically downtown!

While we're walking along the pier, there's a sea organ playing music. It is underneath the concrete and the movement of waves make beautiful, haunting, whale-like sounds. Oh, and the building at the end of the pier is where the University of Zadar English department is housed. 

Yes, this is where our English colleagues at the University of Zadar get to go to work.

You can swim in front of the building. This guy is a famous scientist, cast in bronze, directly in front of the Faculty building. 

After the lecture, dinner. Tonight I enjoyed a raucous conversation with three colleagues in the English and French departments. Croats have a lovely sense of irony. As one of them said when I commented on that: you have to have a sense of irony to live here. I think that's one of the things Croats and Canadians share. On my plate: turkey fillet stuffed with wild asparagus served with sweet/salty boiled new potatoes. 

Oh, and by the way, vote people!

Food

Today I treated myself to a restaurant lunch, as it is a holiday. This is what I ate: it's a traditional Croatian dish called pasticada and it's usually (as it was today) served with homemade gnocchi.

And here's the recipe

2 1/2 pounds beef round (do NOT chop)
6 to 8 slices smoked bacon, cut into ½-inch pieces
2 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup mustard
3/4 cup cooking oil
3/4 pound soup vegetables, chopped (carrots, celery, parsnips, parsley root etc)
1 large onion, minced
1/2 cup red wine
1/4 cup tomato paste
3 fresh figs, slivered, or dried figs
3 pitted prunes, slivered
1 apple, peeled and sliced
1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
1 bay leaf

Day One: slit pockets into the meat and insert the bacon and garlic. Salt and pepper the meat and spread mustard mixed with ¼ cup cooking oil over the meat. Place on platter, cover, and refrigerate overnight.

Day Two: heat ½ cup cooking oil on medium-high heat in a Dutch oven or deep stockpot with a lid. Brown the meat on all sides and then remove from skillet and set aside. Now sauté the vegetables and onion in the same skillet. When vegetables are soft, add the meat and stew about 2 hours, adding water and wine as needed.

When the meat has softened and is tender, add the tomato paste, figs, prunes and apple and continue to stew till the fruit is soft. Near the end, add the rosemary, thyme and bay leaf. Remove the meat, slice, and place on platter. Strain the sauce and pour over the meat or serve separately alongside the meat.

Ode to Canadian university libraries

We are so lucky to have such rich library resources. Here academics wanting to study Canadian or American literature are met with constant frustration. They have some books in their library, and as I have written here before, the collection of Canadian titles is small but well chosen. The Canadian Ambassador has also made some funds available to buy more books. [Excellent work, Ambassador Ed Loughlin.] But access to journal articles is a joke. Google Scholar can only take a researcher so far. The library has a subscription to Project Muse, but it is the meanest version. Colleagues here tell me that they find sources but then can’t access them—one says it’s like getting a candy but only being permitted to lick the wrapper. They get a title, maybe an abstract, but not the article itself. Think of the ease with which I, and others in Canada, download full-text pdfs of recent journal articles! For us it’s routine.

I have been talking to graduate students and faculty members about their research, trying to point them in useful directions, but I can see the frustration. I can feel it. Whatever I tell them about they might not be able to find. Academics have to travel to somewhere that has a good library. One is applying for a Fulbright so that she can go to the US. Another has won a faculty enrichment grant to spend a month in Canada doing research. But travel is expensive; grants are difficult to win.

But me? Even here, through the UW library website and with my magic library barcode number, I have my hands on riches. Yes, I am sharing the wealth, to whatever extent possible. And I am thankful. I will certainly never take my access to library resources for granted again. 

The weekend before Easter

Easter is a big deal here, it being a Catholic country and all. Painted eggs are everywhere, but these are the most beautiful (and also simple) I have seen. I bought one.

People today are carrying around olive branches, which symbolize peace. They are blessed in the church and when the people take the olive branch home it brings peace to the house.

In front of the cathedral are these large eggs, painted by the "Naive" school of artists.

There was also a group of singers, dressed in traditional costumes. In the baskets the women have cakes and cookies which they distribute to the crowd.

And then there was a bit of street theatre. Something about dressing up in 18th century guards' uniforms. And praying at the stone gate, before the miraculous virgin mary who survived a massive fire.

At my favourite cafe beside the stone gate, I am served by two young men who have become sort-of friends. They let me use their wifi, and they make me these lovely coffees. Today the milky image is of an Indian chief--and they did not even know that I am Canadian.

The kindness of strangers

One of the perks of my position here as visiting professor is that someone else cleans my apartment and does my laundry. Her name is Mrs. B. and she comes on Friday mornings when I am at the university teaching.

We have a running joke: I leave her a few kuna as a tip, and we keep turning the same piece of paper around: on one side I have written Hvala! (thank you); on the other side she has written Molim! (you are welcome). Sometimes she leaves me bits of clothing that are not mine. These, of course, I return.

Last week she left me two amazingly wonderful gifts.

Eggs from her own chickens!

And a pair of hand-made wool slippers. She also left a note which translates roughly as "So that you will have something to remember the unknown Mrs. B. by." My friend V. commented that we see to have formed a very loving relationship--remarkable considering we've never met!

Kindness, indeed.

So as not to romanticize

People tell me that the country is bankrupt and the government corrupt. They are looking forward to the government falling. Apparently.

The trains that travel within Croatia are not very clean, and certainly not as clean as the ones that cross borders.

I have eaten enough burek to turn me off phyllo pastry for life. Maybe.

Taxi drivers might rip you off. One did, but this happened only once. 

One of these days I’m going to break my neck when I trip on cracked and dented sidewalks or fall down crumbling concrete steps—which seem to be everywhere in my daily life.

It is not pleasant to see old people digging through garbage cans looking for the plastic bottles that can be turned in for cash.

But then, Zagreb offers me this...sculptures by Ivan Mestrovic. This one is called "Waiting."

This one is called "History of Croatia"

There is no eastern Europe

There is no Eastern Europe.

I’ve been thinking about that statement, made by J, one of the colleagues I have met during my sojourn here. He’s another expat living and teaching Canadian literature at a nearby university. We talked about my surprise at the response I have received both by naming “the Balkans” here in the title of my blog and when I understood that to Croats, Croatia is in central Europe, not eastern Europe. Of course, the Balkans is a geographical term, but its connotations are that “Balkans” are peasants, brutes, primitive peoples. It’s heard as derogatory (and I’ve apologized for using it). The question of who is an eastern European is more complicated, it seems. Where is eastern Europe? I really don’t know.

One of the many gifts I have recently received is a book by Rebecca West called Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. It’s a BIG book (1,150 pages of small print in the edition I have), a travel saga, written in the 1940s by an astonishingly literate and skilled author who became curious about Yugoslavia (as it was then) and took two trips t/here. I’m learning a lot about the complexities of the histories of this region. The first part of West’s book is about Croatia, and I’m struck by how many of her observations then match with mine now. The market, for instance, where people still sell things under red and white umbrellas. In the 1940s the women selling produce are described by West as “peasants [who] stood square on their feet, and amazed us by their faces, which are as mobile and sensitive as if they were the most cultivated townspeople.” Of course, both women and men sell stuff at the Dolac market. Yesterday when I said “dovidjenja/goodbye” to the woman who sold me wild asparagus she giggled at my formality—or perhaps my bad accent! Rebecca West goes on to describe what the women who sold at the market wore: two aprons wrapped around the body, one covering the front; the other covering the back (I’ve worn two hospital gowns that way). Today the women wear completely ordinary modern clothing, but the point of the description of the clothing was this:

They gave the sense of the very opposite of what we mean by the word ‘peasant’ when we use it in a derogatory sense, thinking women made doltish by repeated pregnancies and a lifetime spent in the service of oafs in the villages that swim in mud to the thresholds every winter. This costume was evolved by women who could stride alone if they were eight months gone with child, and who would dance in the mud if they felt like it, no matter what any oaf said. This statue of a “peasant” market woman stands at the top of the steps that lead to the market.

I think I know what she means.

The history of this place is all about other countries, other empires, invading and controlling them, while there is a continuing sense of national identity that unites the regions and invites shows of patriotism. One evening in Osijek I went to a café for a last glass of wine before retiring for the night in the student residence at the university where I was lodged (rather than a hotel). There was a private party going on. Students. One of them was graduating and the friends were celebrating. One guy had a guitar and everyone was singing—loudly, and, clearly, everyone involved knew all the words of the songs. I asked someone what the people were singing and the answer was “old Croatian songs.” If I understood the guy I was talking to correctly, they were old pop songs from 30 years ago, but they were sung with such gusto! This was no karaoke. Describing the singing at an Easter Sunday Mass, Rebecca West writes this: “Western church music is almost commonly petitioning and infantile, a sentiment cozening for remedy against sickness or misfortune, combined with a masochistic enjoyment in the malady, but this singing spoke of health and fullness.” That’s what I heard in that Osijek café bar. Health and fullness. In the main square in Zagreb on Saturdays a man sings what sound to me like folk songs. This evening there is a concert of traditional Croatian choral music. Men and boys wear the colours of the national sports teams. Croatian identity is affirmed over and over again.

But is no one in this region from eastern Europe? Is that connotation of “east” too attached to threatening Turks and colonizing Hungarians? What about Serbians? Please tell me how you identify with respect to the muddled histories and cultures (because it’s not about geography) of Europe. Hvala.

Academic tourism

I’ve borrowed that phrase from one of my colleagues here in Zagreb. It’s a wonderful part of our jobs that we are often given the opportunity to travel for work. Conferences are obviously one way to work abroad (and add on holiday time); so is being a visiting scholar. So far in my career I have been to various parts of Canada and the U.S. including Hawaii, Mexico, Jamaica, Spain (twice), Germany, and now Croatia (plus Slovenia and Austria as side trips). I know I will one day go to Australia. And, of course, many of my colleagues in English routinely go to the U.K.

I haven’t seen much of Croatia yet (except for Osijek), though when Arlequino gets here [hurry up and get here Arlequino!] we will travel all over this country. On Friday, after my class was over, my colleague V. and I went to a small town not far from Zagreb. Samobor is a lovely Baroque town with well cared for streets and buildings and an absolutely gorgeous park. The town is built along a small river, with densely wooded hills as a backdrop. Of course, it’s spring, so the greens are light and fresh. The air was clear. We spent a lovely couple of hours wandering around and we both felt restored by the experience.  

 

Visiting scholar programs for Canadians?

I’ve been thinking a lot about the Fulbright program.

While I have been in Croatia and other parts of central Europe I have met several (and have heard about many more) American professors who, through the Fulbright program, have been enjoying their stints as visiting professors all over the place—and some have travelled on Fulbrights more than once. It’s a sweet, sweet deal if you get a Fulbright, and about 800 American professors a year do win these grants and take up positions at universities abroad for a full academic year.

Everyone here has been asking me how I ended up teaching at the University of Zagreb as a visiting professor, and I explain that it’s through a Memorandum of Understanding between our two universities which, as far as I can tell, is a new agreement and came about through personal connections between people in Zagreb and people in Waterloo. I expect that other visiting scholar or international student exchange programs came into being in a similar manner. Individuals have to adopt the cause and do the legwork to establish these international arrangements. And then, of course, the universities involved have to be constantly encouraged to keep them going.

And what’s the downside to international exchange programs? None that I can see. Students benefit by having foreign professors teach subjects to which they would otherwise not be exposed. The department benefits by having some of their teaching done by people from away. Individual faculty members benefit from personal contact with a Canadian who can help them with their research, can point them towards resources, introduce them to other colleagues, compare notes about teaching and research, and so on. We are constantly exchanging titles and authors and telling stories about our respective lives and careers. And for me, as the visiting professor, the rewards are endless. I hope I have conveyed some of my deep appreciation for all of my experiences in this blog. I am learning so much! And I am enjoying both the hospitality that has been extended to me—consistently—and the evident gratitude that my European colleagues and their students have conveyed. I feel valued.

Why wouldn’t universities develop and support these sorts of academic exchanges? Okay, they often rely on the free labour offered by individuals. More difficult is this question: where does the money come from? Through the MoU between Waterloo and Zagreb my university paid for my airfare (or will after I submit tickets and boarding passes) and covered the costs of shipping books to Croatia. I applied for and was granted an early (6 month) sabbatical, so I receive most of my UW salary. The University of Zagreb is paying for the apartment in which I am living and has given me some money for living expenses (about $900). When I have been invited to give a lecture at other universities, those universities have covered all of the travel, accommodation, and food/drink expenses. I am happy with all of these arrangements.

But where is the external funding? Where is our version of the Fulbright program? Um, there isn’t one, as far as I know. I've found these two programs. But there must be others.

Bridgewater University  http://www.bridgew.edu/canada/killamprofessor.cfm
University of Edinburgh http://www.cst.ed.ac.uk/Staff/Visiting/

Posted from the train!

The lady is on the train again, this time heading east to Osijek, in the Slavonian region. I will give another lecture at the Universtiy of Osijek, and I look forward to seeing a different part of Croatia. Even though I am not crossing any borders this time I have my passport with me. I always have my passport with me. I am wearing a new outfit: a skirt and matching short-sleeved cardigan, and shiny stockings. I did not know that the stockings would be shiny when I bought them. Professor lady attire.

Once the train moves out of the city and its outskirts we quickly come upon small towns with red brick or concrete houses with tile roofs. The houses built of concrete are whitewashed or painted muted yellows, oranges, and greens. The sun is shining and the compartment is stuffy, even with the window open. Across from me are three young people (or at least younger than I): a young man who seems to be traveling on business and is eating biscuits; a high school-age blind girl who is listening to something—a book?—on her laptop; and a very attractive young woman with short hair, black-framed glasses, wearing skinny jeans, a black t-shirt and yellow Converse sneakers. She is reading a Croatian translation of Ana Karenina. A student perhaps? In between staring out of the window (and typing this post) I am reading Dubravka Ugresic’s memoir Baba Yaga Laid an Egg.

In the wooded areas the forest floor is covered with violets and what look like the wild bleeding heart (can’t recall the Latin name) that I have in my garden at home. Marsh marigolds bloom near water. Along the tracks, some sort of bush is in flower, a bright white. 

Sunday afternoon in Zagreb

There’s not much to do in my neighbourhood except live, so on weekends I try to get out of the apartment and go into town to wander around in a wider circle than my day-to-day routes and routines. Yesterday, for example, after doing a couple of hours’ work (marking midterms, reading recent scholarly articles about the novels I will teach) I went into the centre. Did I mention how gorgeous the weather is? 20 degrees and colourful. This magnolia tree is in Trg Tomislav (he's the guy on the horse).

 There was some sort of festival/display going on in the main square, Trg Bana J. Jelacia (does anyone know how to find the Croatian diacritics in Word?). There was singing and dancing and accordian music.

For a moment it felt like I was back at Oktoberfest in Kitchener, and, indeed, I think I did experience a version of Croatian multiculturalism. It appeared that displays were set up to showcase products and activities associated with different regions in Croatia (maybe also nearby countries, but I wasn’t sure).

There were references to hiking and, um, bear hunting? There was food and drink—lots of honey and various cordials made from fruits. Felted wool products such as hats and slippers. Dried herbs.

This one is for Victoria: it’s advertising a frog museum!

In the evening I came home (after skyping with Arlequino at the Gradska Kavana), made dinner (chicken stirfry) and watched the sun set over Novi Zagreb.

Today I am in the old town. I climbed up the 13^th century Lotrscak Tower from which a cannon is fired every single day at precisely noon. This is the view.

Later, after enjoying this superb and gorgeous coffee I will go to a Museum. But which one?