On Canovals' Blog you will encounter Croatian and other music that I like, along with the Psalms, some Croatian Bajka, and fairytales from other lands. I also write about other topics that intrigue me and I hope will interest you too. Dobrodosli! Welcome! Enjoy! Uživati!
Funny, its a day like today when you can see how many of us there are down here at the end of the world. The Amerikanski are all somewhere eating turkey and whatever. Its a holiday and we are either in our usual holes in the ground working or somewhere else working. I decided I wanted something warm to eat. There's only one place open on the holiday around here. Guess where? Jup! Coffee, cheese danish, and a samitch of cheese and bacon of turkey. Don't even ask what language in which I ordered. :) Starbucks came though just fine today. (Hmmm, samitch - that's teksikanski for sandwich on engleski).
The call from the daughter I mentioned last blog? Turned out to be a mass text message to the whole family so she didn't have to mess with any of us. She was too busy to answer the phone when I called her back. Sigh. But she did better than the others, none of the rest of them called or texted. Funny how that bothers me less and less these days.
I remember the first Bozic after Carole died. That soon will have been six Bozic past. The service at the church concluded. I locked up the building and realized that I was alone. Easter was the same. All the holidays were the same. Even when I made sure that I had showered before I came to church it was the same. The children didn't call then either. For years, other people who came into my life made excuses not to be around me on holidays too. It got to the point that when people put on their supercilious smiles and wished me "Merry Christmas" that I snarled "bah! humbug!" somewhere deep inside of me where no one could see.
I went away and cooked my own Christmas eve and Veliki Petak fish and kupus according to the season and the Grinch did what he did in private for himself by himself. I did not realize at the time how many of my brothers and sisters were around me. By brothers and sisters, I do not mean my parent's children. When Jesus brothers and sisters (ok, I suppose they were half-brothers etc.) came accusing Him of being insane, Jesus motioned his hand around the room and said "these are my brothers and my sisters." As it turns out, I have rather a lot of really nice brothers and sisters whom my parents never knew. And me, the Grinch, I am not alone any more and so today on Amerikanski Dan Hvala I am thankful indeed.
First of all, CJ's dogs are "babysitting" me this afternoon as the sun slips out of sight. One is right under my desk. I can hear him when he scratches. Another talks to me if I take too long clicking another song to play.
Still another has been laying quietly near my feet for a good while. We listened to "Second Waltz - Dmitri Shostokovic" for a while and when we finished that playlist we moved on down the line. Right now we are listening to "Breze" performed by Irena Vrčkovic. Next up is Vrčkovic with Pidži singing Tam dol na ravnem polju. Pidži enjoys a bit of fame in the central Teksas area because they've heard him on the radio and some lucky folk have seen him in person.
You really didn't think that Pidži took Teksikanski music back to Slovenija did you? If you thought that, the joke is on you. You've read already here where I've discussed the origins of Tejano music, yes? You've read how that influenced the rest of the music of the region and you read about the "Commanches" in Blanco County, yes? Jup. You got it, the whole blooming Texas music scene is dominated by music with Slavic origins, hi hi :) If you happen to be an "Anglo" Texan reading this,,, go to YouTube and watch Irena and Pidži and the band work out "Tam dol na ravnem polju."
If you have your "languages" ear turned on, no "po noci" in the song most assuredly does not mean the same as "panoche" on španski jezik. The slovenijan expression means "by night" more or less, and the spanoljski means, ummmpf something a bit more crude, yet the root meaning is still something "by night." Hmmmmm so who is going to pop up and give me a reasonable explanation how this non-hispanic heterographic homophone arrived into Mexican Spanish? Ummmm. Gotcha didn't I?
Ok, one of the doggies has just put in her request for Vesna Maria, so we're going to listen to her for a while now.
Today was Vesna Maria's birthday. Sretan rođendan Vesna Maria! We all need to remember the date so she really knows how many friends she has out here next year. Hi hi, I see at least two pages of birthday congratulations on her page over on FaceBook. She is a wonderful performer with a wonderful voice. CJ and I both love to watch her and listen to her voice.
Someday when I think the time is right I am going to ask a certain question and if the answer is right, and if I've won the lottery by that time, I wouldn't mind a bit if Momir and Vesna Maria flew over and sang something like "Tri palme na otoku srece" at a special occaision after that. That would just about make the celebration extra fino. Sigh. If I win the lottery. Anyway, me and the doggies have them on YouTube and we can dream.
Somewhere in one of Patria's songs they say that "a man without dreams is like the heavens without stars." I believe that and so as long as my sky has stars in it I refuse to not dream. Another song I would like Vesna Maria and Momir to do on that day is "Ljubav." Momir knows why. It has something to do with the video sash958 made with Vesna Maria and Momir doing this song. Momir, what do you think? Should I say why this song is so important to me? Or should that just be one of those things that goes to the grave with me?
Another random trip into linguistics. Mariachi. A truely Mexican word. Please explain its Spanish construction for me if you can. You can not, can you? I didn't think so. Mariacke. Slavic. Polish. And no this did not arrive with Napoleon. As I've shown you elsewhere, we Slavs have been arriving in North America in a steady stream since the 1500s. Just 'cause we didn't raise a flag and build an empire doesn't mean we weren't here. We were. We are. Marian musicians in certain cathedrals. Trumpets sound the hours in Krakova and in Warsaw. Hmmmmm. Originally these were church musicians not from the indiginous culture, in Mexico banished from the church into the streets and to this day allowed to perform religious works only at the Shrine of Guadalupe, or perhaps Christmas Eve in certain show cathedrals or in the streets. The priests have taught the mariachi they cannot to play in church. Do you wonder at the anti-clerical feelings in the North of Mexico? Religion was banned from church. Ufffff !!!!! What a concept ...
There was once a wedding at which I had certian duties. The bride's father is a mariachi. He had written a song especially for his daughter's wedding but he was sure his group could not sing in church. Hi hi hi hi hi, that's exactly where that sung was first heard. In Church. I insisted, and they played the man's song for his daughter inside the church in front of the altar. Viva la revolucion!!!! Bog i Hrvati!!! Dios y la gente!!! God and the people! Oh dear, I am a bit radical I'm afraid.
Oh my, here we are, me and the doggies, listening to Vesna Maria sing "Alaj mi je veceras po voji" along with Djerdan - now this is a recording that thrills my heart.
Now here is CJ, and she really thrills my heart.
pa,
do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,
Today when the typical older Amerikanski hears the word "rocket" the image that comes to his mind is about Niel Armstrong on the moon. His parents thought about "Buck Rogers" in the fictionalized stories about things that were yet to come in that time. In the 1960's in America there was a lot of talk about Werner Von Braun from Hitler's V2 rocket program who was now assisting the Americans in their "race for space."
Again, what comes to the mind of Amerikanski is words to his national hymn. O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, thro' the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watch'd, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there.
O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
At the words "The rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air" there is moisture in the eyes of many patriotic Americans. In school the American is taught about how the Chinese supposedly invented rockets. There used to be a mention that Marco Polo brought this technology to the West, but of course there is no mention that Marco Polo was Croatian. Sigh.
There might be some mention about how the British attempted to use rockets in the 18th century. Of course their rockets were ineffective weren't they? The Americans won against them - right? So the school books skip ahead to the rockets of the invincible American military of the present time. There's little mention of William Congreve whose work was behind "the rockets' red glare" in the hymn.
The American never hears about Kazimierz Siemienowicz. I suppose its because his name is too long and too difficult to spell. I will be the first to admit that Казімір Семяновіч is much easier to spell in Belarusian than in Polish. The man literally wrote the book on rocketry in 1650. His "Artis Magnae Artilleriae pars prima" stood as the basic artillery manual for the next two hundred years.
Siemienowicz provided the standard designs for creating rockets, fireballs, and other pyrotechnic devices. It discussed for the first time the idea of applying a reactive technique to artillery. It contains a large chapter on caliber, construction, production and properties of rockets including multistage rockets, batteries of rockets, and rockets with delta wing stabilizers.
What on earth does Siemienowicz have to do with American Veteran's Day, Canadian Day of Remembrance, oh and by the way, Polish Independence Day on 11 November. Why would a Croat, especially a Texas Croat care about any of this?
The year was 1673. The game was on! The grad was Khotyn. Poland versus Ottomans. The odds are on an Ottoman victory. The Turks had won the year before. The Ottomans were invincible. They brought 120 of the most technologically advanced cannons to the battle at Khotyn. Jan Sobieski brought Siemienowicz and his rockets. The Ottoman's lost. Sobieski and Siemienowicz beat them again the next year at Vienna and the Ottoman's were forever excluded from Slovakia and Hungary. Croatia began to arise again. Poland began to recover from the Khmelnytsky disaster and the harsh period of the Swedish disaster during which Poland lost about one third of her population. The red glare of Siemienowicz rockets vaulted the Lion of Lechistan (as the Turks called Jan Sobieski) to the throne of Poland.
For a time Poland's fortunes were much much better. There were major advances toward democracy and Polish officers assisted the Americans in their struggle against monarchy. In that time Poland promulgated one of the world's first written constitutions, a document Potemkin derisively dismissed as "a contagion of democracy." The autocrats of Europe couldn't stand such a contagion. Armies marched and Poland began another long night of foreign domination.
According to many historians Poland ceased to exist then until 1918. Are they correct? I submit to you that these historians are incorrect. Poland existed, but where?
"Oh sure," you say, "Poland existed in the hearts and minds of the Polish people scattered around everywhere and in the hearts and minds of the Polish people under foreign rule." Yup. True enough. But there is more to the story than just that.
Let's start with Felix Wardzinski. One man. A soldier. A Polish soldier. A soldier in an army defeated by the Prussians and defeated by the Russians. A soldier in an army totally crushed. A soldier on the run for his life, Felix Wardzinski crossed the border into Galicia which at that time was controlled by the Hapsburg empire.
If the Hapsburg government had been faced with just one Felix Wardzinski that would have been the end of the story. Felix would have found a job and he would have settled down in his new homeland. That was not the case however, there were a lot of Felix Wardzinskis who crossed into Galicia.
Examine this scenario with me. Let's step inside the brain of the Austrian Crown for a moment. All these Felix Wardzinskis form up their units again inside Austrian territory and continue to strike at the foreign armies occupying their homeland. The Prussians use this as an excuse to strike at Galicia, or the Russians come to stop the raids into the territory they occupy. Either way, the Austro-Hungarian empire loses. The Hapsburg family has just lost Mexico in the Mexican revolution of 1825. Further loses to the family are ~ shudder ~ unthinkable.
The Austrians could just shoot these men and be done with it. That would set the Polish population in Galicia on edge. Galicia, Slovakia, Bohemia, Moravia, Czechy and - God forbid - Croatia might rise up. In short, the Austrian Crown might be left with only Austria. All that disaster over Felix Wardzinski, a defeated soldier, who may have had no idea he could be that important to the rise and fall of nations.
There is a way out for the Triple Crown. (What? You thought the "Triple Crown" was a horse race in Kentucky? Ha! Austria - Hungaria - Croatia, that's the Triple Crown.) There's a simple way out. "Felix, brate moj, where you want to go buddy?" The Triple Crown offered to furnish transportation to any place in the world these men might want to go as long as it was away from any where they could cause trouble to the Empire. "By the way, brate, there is a little thing going on in Teksas. A professional soldier might be appreciated there just now."
Problem solved!! The potential source of grief to the Austrian Crown is on his way to give grief to the Mexicans. Serves them right for breaking away from Hapsburg hegemony! Ha! A brilliant stroke!
Felix was on a boat from Austria to New York in a heartbeat. Ok ok, in as many heartbeats as it took to get Felix from Galicia to the nearest Austrian seaport. So now you are looking at a map and you are asking me where Austria had a seaport. Sigh. That's the same question my son-in-law asked me once. Slovenija, Istria, and Dalmacija were under the Triple Crown dear friend so Austria had a lot of access to the sea.
From New York, Felix found his way to New Orleans where he and a lot of other Felixes were met by a recruiter for the Teksas army which was being formed.
There were already Polski in Teksas. Napoleon had attempted to establish a French colony about where Liberty, Texas is now. The textbooks tell you that the French failed and that they withdrew. Yeah. That's true. The French officials withdrew. The colonists remained.
Simon Wiess was among those colonists. Simon was Polish. Simon was Jewish. Simon hooked up with my father's family and their little business about the Trinity River about which they were a long time discarding. I've already told part of that story elsewhere. Simon was a merchant, a trader. This Polish Jew knew all the roads, all the oxcart trails all the paths and all the waterways of any kind in eastern Texas. Like a true viking he knew how to use them too.
The sort of person who think Jews are all supposed sitting in their counting houses counting out their money are going to have trouble with this story. That kind of person will have difficulty with the picture of a Polish Jew in a coonskin hat, a hunting knife in his belt and a rifle on his shoulder sweaty from walking through the breeze-less forests in the weltering 100+ degree East Texas spring/summer/fall. This, however, is the true picture of Simon Wiess, a frontiersman and pioneer in Texas. We will come back to his role in the matter at hand in a few moments.
19th century Bosnia
19th century Texas
After the battle of the Alamo, the Teksikanski fought the Mexican centrist army at Goliad. Does the flag used by one regiment of the Refugio volunteers remind you of a familiar "Bosnian" ensign? It should. The Texas Hrvati were quietly out in force. They were not alone. Michael Dembinski, Michael Debicki, Francis Petrussewicz, Adolph Petrussewicz, John Kornicky, Joseph Schrusnecki and a lot of others fresh from Poland were right beside them.
Again they lost. Santa Ana gave Colonel Jose Nicolas de la Portilla orders to execute the prisoners. Today there is a monument to Colonel Fannin on that location. The Mexicans attempted to cover up the matter by burning the bodies and burning the records, so its not an easy task to find who all these heros were.
General Sam Houston continued to recruit and train an army to fight Santa Ana. They withdrew toward eastern Texas with Santa Ana in pursuit. Santa Ana's supply lines grew longer and longer and his troops suffered more and more. The soldiers under Sam Houston fared much better. At every river crossing they were met with fresh food, clothing, equipment, and other supplies brought by Simon Wiess.
There came a day when Santa Ana's troops were essentially cut off. They were resting, resting as much as a hungry army being devoured by hordes of mosquitoes can rest. Frederick Lemsky brought his flute to the front with him. Felix Wardzinski was there too in the Teksas army. The Teksikans struck up the tune "Come to the Bower" and began to "drill" right in front of their opposition. The Meksikans were entertained by the Teksikans in their rough clothing as they slouched into formation. No one payed any attention to the cannon which were being brought forward behind the ragged appearing group.
When they were at nearly point blank range, the Teksas army suddenly revealed how well trained and how professional they were. Instantly they stepped aside from the cannon. They formed a straight line with their rifles to their shoulders.
The cannon fired.
The rifles fired.
The shout went up "Zapamiętaj Goliad!" as the Polish army with bayonets fixed streamed across the Mexican position and drove them into the swamp where the alligators had a feast that day. That day the proud Polish army was vindicated as it vanquished tyranny. All the seething anger at Santa Ana for the murder of their brothers at Goliad flashed and flamed with a furious ferocity. All the pent-up anger they had for the Prussian Kaiser and for the Russian Czar burned fiercely for eighteen intense minutes during which the entire Mexican army was utterly destroyed. Felix Wardzinski has the satisfaction of being present when Santa Ana was captured.
Oh dear! Oh dear!! Now I've done it! I was supposed to say all on english "The shout went up 'Remember Goliad" as the Texas army with bayonets fixed .... Oh dear! What have I done? Well now, I told you Poland didn't cease to exist and I asked you "but where?" Here it was, a piece of Poland existed right here in plain view in Texas. Jeszcze Polska nie umarła!
What happened to the Polish soldiers who survived the war? Some of them melted quietly into the Slavic corners of Texas and went about the business of living. Some of them had other adventures. Last Sunday I had breakfast with the great-grandson of one of them. My friend's surname sounds Hispanic. What of it? He is proud of his ancestor who came from so far away bring liberty to this land.
What happened to Simon Wiess? One of his descendants married into a branch of my mother's family. Am I Jewish? Nope. Am I Polish? Nope. Am I proud of my shirt-sleeve relative who was both? Yup. Perhaps more of this story will be another adventure for another time.
In the video I made for this year, I used "Texas Our Texas," the traditional and now legal National Hymn of Texas along with the Polish National Hymn. The school books for the young people in Texas make no mention of these heroes from Poland who came at just the right time. I thought they should be honored. From their blood the flowers of freedom sprang.
The words to "Texas, Our Texas," written by William J. Marsh and Gladys Yoakum Wrightare:
Texas, Our Texas! all hail the mighty State!
Texas, Our Texas! so wonderful so great!
Boldest and grandest, withstanding ev'ry test
O Empire wide and glorious, you stand supremely blest.
(ref)
Texas, O Texas! your freeborn single star,
Sends out its radiance to nations near and far,
Emblem of Freedom! it set our hearts aglow,
With thoughts of San Jacinto and glorious Alamo.
(ref)
Texas, dear Texas! from tyrant grip now free,
Shines forth in splendor, your star of destiny!
Mother of heroes, we come your children true,
Proclaiming our allegiance, our faith, our love for you.
ref: God bless you Texas! And keep you brave and strong,
That you may grow in power and worth, throughout the ages long.
God bless you Texas! And keep you brave and strong, That you may grow in power and worth, throughout the ages long.
The Polish National Hymn: Mazurek Dąbrowskiego - Dąbrowski's Mazurka, also called Pieśń Legionów Polskich we Włoszech Song of the Polish Legions in Italy or Jeszcze Polska nie zginęła Poland has not yet perished :
Jeszcze Polska nie umarła,
Kiedy my żyjemy
Co nam obca moc wydarła,
Szablą odbijemy.
Marsz, marsz, Dąbrowski Do Polski z ziemi włoskiej Za twoim przewodem Złączym się z narodem
Jak Czarniecki do Poznania
Wracał się przez morze
Dla ojczyzny ratowaniaPo szwedzkim rozbiorze.
Marsz, marsz...
Przejdziem Wisłę, przejdziem Wartę
Będziem Polakami
Dał nam przykład Bonaparte
Jak zwyciężac mamy
Marsz, marsz...
Niemiec, Moskal nie osiędzie,
Gdy jąwszy pałasza,
Hasłem wszystkich zgoda będzie
I ojczyzna nasza
Marsz, marsz...
Już tam ojciec do swej BasiMówi zapłakany
Słuchaj jeno, pono nasi
Biją w tarabany
Marsz, marsz...
Na to wszystkich jedne głosy
Dosyć tej niewoli
Mamy racławickie kosy
Kościuszkę Bóg pozwoli.
on english this is: Poland has not yet died,
So long as we still live.
What the alien power has seized from us,
We shall recapture with a sabre. March, march, Dąbrowski,
To Poland from the Italian land.
Under your command
We shall rejoin the nation.
Like Czarniecki to Poznań
Returned across the sea
To save his homeland
After the Swedish occupation. March, march...
We'll cross the Vistula and the Warta,
We shall be Polish.
Bonaparte has given us the example
Of how we should prevail. March, march...
The German nor the Muscovite will settle
When, with a backsword in hand,
"Concord" will be everybody's watchword
And so will be our fatherland. March, march...
A father, in tears,
Says to his Basia
Listen, our boys are said
To be beating the tarabans.
March, march...
All exclaim in unison,
"Enough of this slavery!"
We've got the scythes of Racławice,
God will give us Kościuszko.
Texas is not the only North American nation who should give thanks to God for Poland. The Americans also should give thanks to God for Kościuszko who so greatly assisted in their revolution.
hrabrivojnici izkrvi slobodecvijet
do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,
Please note this is part three of a three part series. The reader is requested to begin with part one and part two before continuing. These will each open in a new window. Part one - спутник , Part two - introducing Adelita
I can not speak about what is taught in other regions of the world. I can speak about what the Roman Catholic Church teaches in this region of the world - the region on either side of the Rio Bravo.
"Sex," they say, "is a vile but necessary evil." Its a sin for a wife to cohabit with her husband and vice-versa. Evil. Wrong. Vile. Ugly. This is what is taught here by the "princes" of the church.
What is taught is that one who remains entirely celibate throughout his or her life is then therefore "holier" than someone who does not remain so. A priest or a nun therefore is thought to be somehow more holy than regular people. Families used to be taught that if they gave a daughter to be a nun this sacrifice gained them some years off their punishment in purgatory. Similarly if a son entered the priesthood the parents gained relief from the punishment for their sins. All this business also somehow feeds the nationalist Guadalupana cult.
Sex has one valid purpose, the Roman Church teaches. Procreation. Sustaining or increasing the population. That's it. Nothing more.
According to them, its a sin to enjoy sex. Never mind that Holy Writ has else to say on this topic, the people aren't supposed to be reading what God has to say. The people are supposed to be doing what they are told.
According to this scheme, a woman's value consists only in being a repository for sperm and in raising children. In this scheme, a woman has no worth beyond being a hole into which the man injects protoplasm.
The woman is forbidden by the teaching of the church to be s putnik with her man. She is forbidden to enjoy her time with him. When the family has a sufficiency of children, hopefully the man will be killed in war or perhaps a rattlesnake will bite him and he will be blissfully absented from the life of the home. Of course a proper man should have accumulated a great deal of wealth before he dutifully dies. If this seems to you that all this would lead to a grasping greedy and violent society - look at the facts, it has.
Should the man survive war, rattlesnakes, and barroom brawls, and should he wish companionship, he will not seek this from his wife. His wife, you see is a good woman who does not enjoy his presence for any reason at all, much less ... So. The man seeks companionship from a woman is not quite so restrained by the tradition she has been taught at church and by even her own mother or grandmother. In short, he takes a mistress.
Sometimes the wife is so very proud of the quality of the mistress with whom her husband is consorting. Somehow this is seen to reflect favorably upon the wife's status in the community.
This how many in the upper classes or would be upper classes have conducted themselves for generations. For the men, loving one's wife is just not au current. There is little a man can do about any of this because perversely this scheme is enforced by the women. A woman who wishes to break from this mold has often been ostracized by the society in which she lives.
That's the upper classes.
Juan and Juana are a different story, thanks be to God. First of all, Juan and Juana are poor and so the church hasn't cultivated them nearly as heavily. The church does not want their daughter to be a nun because parents who send a daughter to be a nun are supposed to support her in the convent. Juan and Juana cannot do this. The church does not want Juan and Juana to send a son to be a priest - if they do, who will pay for his seminary? Not Juan and Juana, they barely have enough to eat in their own household so there is no way they can support a seminarian and no way they can fatten up the monks who teach him.
Juana did not have her husband chosen for her by her parents. She met Juan by the well or in the fields or somewhere in the normal course of life as they were scratching out a living. Juana actually likes Juan. Juan actually likes Juana. Neither Juan nor Juana would ever consider a mistress in the mix of their family. They have each other. They enjoy each other's companionship, each other's bodies and every thing there is about one another and they nurture and care for one another the best they can. They might even hold hands together sometimes in the evening.
Our Juan and our Juana are s putnik. Certainly biology dictates that Juana will bear the children, but she is more, much much more, than a repository for Juan's sperm. They are companions, mutually supportive in nearly all things. They enjoy each other in every way there might be to enjoy one another. They are s putnik. They don't know this word and they certainly can not to spell it on cirilica but they know what it means.
Juana thinks the "upper class" woman and her code of behavior for women is stifling and simply un-natural, even perhaps un- Godly The "upper class" woman thinks Juana is an animal.
Adelita was one of our Juanas. For her men had a greater value than as simply a source of sperm so that she could carry out her purpose as a brood sow for the community. War was not a way to kill off men once they had served their procreative purpose. She saw that men had more value than being a source of sperm.
Adelita did not see herself as a brood sow for the community either. She saw herself as a human being worthy of and deserving of s putnik with a man if she chose.
Adelita saw that the women of the upper classes were attempting to suppress her God given rights. The rights of s putnik. The right for two people a man and a woman to be mutually supportive and nurturing finally outweighed politics and economics. This is why the power of the Roman Church was severely restricted by the Revolution. Now you understand why it is illegal until this day for any priest or any pastor to wear a clerical collar in public in Mexico.
Adelita took up the banner and led the charge. Porfirio sailed away to Europe before the battles began. The word is that his heart too was with Adelita. The perverse and un-natural evil autocrats fell. And yes, Marijan would have followed her into battle by land or by sea. And he did. And they won. And that's the story.
спутник. A hundred years have passed and we have forgotten this word. Until we know again what means спутник, the wrath of Almighty God is upon us.
Here is the text of "Adelita" as sung by Jorge Negrete on spanish jezik: Si Adelita se fuera con otro
la seguria por tierra y por mar
Si por mar en un buque de guerra
Si por tierra en un tren militar.
toca el clarín de campaña la guerra
sale el valiente guerrero a pelear
correrán los arroyos de sangre
que gobierne un tirano jamás.
Y si acaso yo muera en campaña
y mi cadaver en la tierra va a quedar
Adelita por Dios te lo ruego
que tus ojos no vayan a llorar
Ya no llores querida Adelita
Ya no llores querida mujer
No te muestres ingrata conmigo
ya no me hagas tanto padecer.
Ya me despido querida Adelita
ya me alejo con inmenso placer
Tu retrato lo llevo en el pecho
Como escudo q me haga triunfar
Soy soldado y la patria me llama
a los campos que vaya a pelear
Adelita Adelita del alma
no me vayas por Dios a olvidar
Por la noche andando en el campo
oigo el clarín que toca a reunión
Y repito en el fondo de mi alma
Adelita es mi único querer
Ya me despido querida Adelita
De ti un recuerdo quisiera llevar
Tu retrato lo llevo en el pecho
Como escudo q me haga triunfar
On english this says approximately: If Adelita would leave with other
he would follow her by land and by sea
if by sea in a ship of war
if by land in train military
sounds the clarin of campaign of war
out comes the valiant warrior to fight
running streams of blood
that govern a tyrant always
and in case I die in the campaign
and in the land will be lain
Adelita by God I pray
that your eyes will not cry
Now no cry dear Adelita
Now no cry dear woman
no you look ungrateful on me
Now I don't make much suffering
Now I say goodbye dear Adelita
and I go with immense pleasure
your portrait is in my chest
as my triumphal shield
I am a soldier and the country calls me
to the fields that go to fight
Adelita Adelita of the soul
Not me you by God to forget
In the night walking in the fields
I hear the bugle that calls the reunion
and again in the depth of my soul
Adelita is my only wish
Would I follow Adelita by land and by sea? Before I leave this life, I wish once again to kneel at her tomb and lay a few flowers. Here at last is a song commemorating Adelita, a decent and valiant woman worthy of honor and glory as long as the sun rises on this earth.
The year - 1910. War! Meksiko! Women! One Woman! - Adelita!
do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,
If you haven't read the foregoing article, its better if you go read it first and come back here. If its been a few hours hours or days since you read it, please go back and review it before you continue. If you were distracted by the "technological" matters or even the religious matters, please go back and read it again. Its about a word - a single word: Sputnik. What that word signifies. Without understanding that one word and its ramifications there is very little use in continuing with the present article.
Adelita was a real person. My father's second cousin six times removed (whatever on earth that means) knew her and spoke of her. Marijan was his name.
There are some people around who wish to say that Adelita is just some folk fable. Not so. Adelita was a living breathing soul. She was born on the fifth of February, Saint Adele's day which is in the Spanish calendar of saints though it is outside the Croatian calendar. Had she been Hrvat, her imedan would have called for her to be named Agata or Dobrila or Jagoda. Whatever her ancestry, Adelita was simply Adelita, a Mexican woman born in the north. What year Adelita was born remains beyond my knowledge probably forever.
Marijan spoke well of Adelita. He rode with her. He rode into battle with her and he himself said that, like the sargento in the common version of the song about Adelita, he would have ridden into the bowels of hell beside her.
No, Marijan was not Mexican. Marijan bore my surname and was a citizen of the United States. Must I remind you however that the ancestors of some of us came to these regions long before there was a United States, long before there was a Mexican Republic too. Its our land. Its a big land with lots of room so we have no problem with all these other people who have moved in beside us as long as they don't get too pushy.
Lots of Mexican folks in the North of Mexico feel pretty much the same way. Its further from the southernmost part of Mexico to the most northern part of Mexico than it is from Poland to Bulgaria. The folk in the north are satisfied to be Mexicans as long as the folk from way down south don't come around to tell them what to do all the time. Besides, the folk down south talk funny too, they tend to be more urban (Mexico City is one big big place) and their life experiences are very different from the people in the north. Can you see the picture I'm trying to draw?
The Porfirio Díaz regime had a lot of good ideas. They weren't all bad at all. In some ways, if you like "liberal" notions, like the Emperor's ideas, the Porfiriato thoughts were a lot more liberal than the regimes which followed. But there was some big mistakes. Number one mistake was the central government in the south telling the folk way up north how to be and how to live.
Number two mistake was giving land to the peasants. Huh? How can that be a bad idea? "Land and liberty" became the slogan in the uprising that began in 1910. Ok, the right hand passed out land to the people. The left hand took a lot of it back to build railroads. The idea was that the railroads would bring industry and jobs and prosperity to the people. It was a good idea. The railroads accomplished that, no doubt, but lets look at Juan and Juana who spent a season plowing and planting virtually by hand and then before they can harvest the first crop some high and mighty someone from down south comes and says to them that they don't live on their farm anymore because a railroad is coming through.
"Where will we go?" Juan asks the high and mighty someone.
"That's your problem," answers the high and mighty someone.
"How will we eat?" Juana asks.
"You will be very prosperous when industry comes and you have jobs." answers the high and mighty someone.
"What will we eat tomorrow?" Juana asks.
The high and mighty someone doesn't answer. He just tells them to pack their stuff and get out of the way. There is a party of pistoleros with señor high and mighty, so Juan and Juana have no no choice but to leave.
Juana's mother lives with Juan and Juana. Juana's mother is very old and feeble. She dies on the trek across the winter desert to the next town. Juan becomes ill from the worry and frustration of trying against all odds to care for his family.
Now ask yourself the question - how do Juan and Juana feel about this central government who was killing them so they could become prosperous? But that's not the half of it.
Oh yes, there's the little matter of the Russian communists using Mexico to learn how to do the revolution thing. Marijan spoke of being trapped in the cross fire between the "reds" and the "whites" several times. His solution was apparently to kill every one and ride away safely himself. Must have worked too. He lived to be a very old man.
Finally though, the revolution of 1910 was not about economics or politics, nor was it about "land and liberty." There was an even more serious issue - an issue so close to Juan and Juana's hearts that they had no choice but to rise up in arms. More about this next time ...
to be continued
do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,
One outstanding tragedy of the human condition is how words become bastardized through usage or more accurately through mis-usage. One of the most precious words in any language is спутник. The word means one who pilgrimages together with another, one who travels together with another. Please notice the emphasis here on "together with." This is zajedno. People have such trouble with zajedno, literally "for one" or "as one, "together." Not one leading another and one following, nor one dominate and the other dominated, nor one more and the other less, butzajedno с путник.
God said. Jesus said "I go so that the спутник will come." In this context SvetiDuha is the спутник and certainly no human should think he can dominate SvetiDuha , never. The twisted logic of the human condition now is to jump forward and say "if I can not dominate SvetiDuha then He must come to dominate me." Since humans really do not like to be dominated by any one they begin to hate SvetiDuha and they turn away from God and God's ways entirely.
There is a serious flaw in this reasoning which leads to this result. This reasoning perhaps describes how the human would behave but it does not describe how SvetiDuha is behaving. Read: "Но говорю вам истину, Я ухожу ради вашего же блага. Если Я не уйду, то Утешитель не придет к вам, но если Я пойду, то пошлю Его к вам." For those of you who do not read Russian, that's from the Gospel of John 16:7. You are on the internet, Google it up right now and read it in your own language. I'll wait right here until you get back from reading this and then we will continue this discussion.
SvetiDuha no comes to be some Tsar, heaven knows we have enough of those. SvetiDuhacomes to be то Утешитель, which is to say, наш спутник, наш путник, naš Putnik zajedno s nama, fellow wayfarer on life's pilgrimage with us. This is what SvetiDuhasays about himself. Is what Jesus says about SvetiDuha. SvetiDuha s putnik nama.
It's really no difficult to understand this is it? Does it take a rocket scientist to understand? I don't think so. I don't think so because I believe that God has purposefully and carefully put His words for us in clear human language easy for us to understand. Most of the time when God's words become difficult to understand it is because we are substituting our own words and our own thoughts for God's words and God's thoughts. In other words, we are the one's who screw everything up.
Very often the church doesn't help. I am very sorry for that. It's the church's job to stand against the misuse of precious words and keep the message simple and clear and comforting, but oh no, too often the church, catholic, orthodox, protestant, or whatever, obfuscates and muddies the water for the people. If the church doesn't screw up the people, the people screw up the church and sometimes the people and the church walk hand in hand together making a mess of things.
Let's see, an example: the role of the "pastor" is to speak about SvetiDuhawho comes to be naš Putnik zajedno s nama. That's his only task, nothing more, nothing less. Somehow then we humans with our sense of order have to have ranks of pastors and soon there are bishops and archbishops and popes and what not. The popular assumption then is that the pastor himself must be one rank above the people and pretty soon we have Svetižupnik. Ajjjjjjjjjjjjjjj!!!! And now SvetiDuhais no where any longer mentioned except in passing like when we make the sign of the cross and think "oh yeah, U ime Oca, i Sina, i Duha Svetoga. Amen" as if by saying the words we've done something. But where in this is SvetiDuha? I can tell you where He is. He is shaking His head in sorrow and weeping for us because He really did come to be naš Putnik zajedno s nama and we have kicked Him off the bus.
I repeat, one of the most precious words in any language is спутник, s putnik, which is to say literally on english a "with traveler." The politicians in eastern Europe understood this well when they called the nations in eastern Europe not directly in the Soviet sphere sputniks. The word was supposed to paint a picture about fellow traveling on a joint enterprise. That painting was later vandalized in the minds of the people in the West when Soviet troops occupied Praha and Budapest but that came later. The day when the real meaning of спутник was destroyed in the West, and perhaps everywhere, was on Friday, the fourth of October, 1957.
From Hajden, a Croat who lived on the estates of a Slovak noble in Hungary, with a lot of help from CJ, comes a little production which is unlisted on Canoval's YouTube channel. Its our first attempt at merging music long distance, something totally unheard of not so many years ago.
Surprise!!! Yes, that's from Hajden's 94th or Surprise Symphony, otherwise widely known as "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" and that's CJ's voice you've just heard but that's not her picture on the video - CJ is a lot prettier :)
twinkle twinkle little czar
how I wonder what you are
high above us there you fly
twinkle twinkle in the sky
Friday, the fourth of October, 1957. The press and the propagandists in the West could not have s putnik meaning anything nice. S putnik could no longer mean something or someone naš putnik zajedno s nama.
From that day came the fall of the Eastern European civilization. From that day began the fall of the West. From that day forward came chaos. No, the fall of civilization on earth did not begin that day. The fall began much earlier but that day, Friday the fourth of October 1957, marks the day the world ended.
to be continued ...
do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings, Canovals a.k.a. Slavonac
9 studenog 2011
Everyone is opposed to racism, except, of course, avowed racists. So the Mexicans complain that the Texas policeman is being racist when he asks for a "Brown" person to show his papers. This gets a little funny when the policeman's name is something like Sanchez and he himself is "Brown."
No one seems to notice that this is working the other way around and always has. I can not tell you how many times in my life that Mexican law enforcement has demanded to see my papers. Joe's girlfriend is an illegal immigrant and she has never been asked to show her papers. Why has she not been required to show her papers? She lives in Mexico and she is "Brown." The Mexican authorities assume that because she is "Brown" she is Mexican. Racism? You bet it is.
Speaking of that wench, if you are a woman, maybe you better just stay out of my way today. I'm ticked off. For those of you using Google Translator that does not mean there is an insect biting me today. Nor does it have anything to do with the "ticking" in a mattress, or the tick tock of a clock. It means I am jako grumpy upset and if you don't like it go stick a rubber hose up your nose or be really extra soft and sweet around me for a few days. Ladies, you probably ought to be ticked off about that wench too. She did all of you ladies a mighty diservice.
The wedding was set for 1600 today. Alejandra called at 1530 to tell Joe the wedding was off. Now understand this, she called on an American cell phone which is inoperative past el puente in Mexico. She was on this side granica u Teksasu when she called. In fact she was only a few blocks away. I didn't mention it, but this is the third time she has walked away from him at the Altar.
So perhaps that was a wedding which shouldn't have happened anyway. Da, istina, for sure true. What can I say?
I think she wanted a nice boyfriend to pay her some attention. He was a feather in her cap, an honest respectable gentle man, and a gentleman too, besides being a caballero, but she is unwilling to actually invest emotionally in their relationship. Funny how so many women want a man to be faithful to them while they don't invest themselves and their emotions with him. Those are dangerous games ladies. It will work for awhile, but there are limits. Yes, its even worse if you lie to the fellow "oh I love you! Yes, I'll marry you! blah blah blah blah blah blah." Its almost funny how the woman almost always acts betrayed and disappointed when the man wanders on.
I suppose there are plenty of men who do the same thing. Jebote kopilad! Kuja! Shame on all of you. You make it awfully hard on the men and women who just want to love and be loved. May your mothers walk backwards blindfolded in the dark, knee deep in slimy mud along the riverbank looking for you for eternity.
Joe told her "since you can't commit and you cannot keep your commitment you have to understand that the first woman who shows interest in me will get a piece of my action and you have nothing to say about it."
I'm probably in trouble enough for writing this much so I'll shut my yap now. No I don't think any one is going to like what I've just written so don't feel obligated to "like" it. In case you are wondering - yes I'm weeping my heart out for my friend today. This should not have happened to such a decent man as my friend Joe.
do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,
I don't have television. I did have it for many years, but no more. One day I realized that I had not turned it on in over a year. I had been paying for service I did not use for the sake of visitors who never came to see me. If they had come, I would not have turned the television on. I would have wanted to talk.
The day I realized I did had not watched television in all that time was the one day I tried to turn it on. It did not work. The signal converter for my satellite antenna was analog. The days of analog television in these parts were gone. The satellite company had sent a "smart card" for the change over to HD digital television. I did not want to look through the stack of unopened mail for that stupid "smart card." I called the company and told them where they could stick that "smart card." So that was that. They still send me mail every week offering to reconnect my service.
I remember when television changed from black and white to color. Everyone seemed to have to have color television no matter what it cost. Hmpffff! I had always watched television in color. I did not need a color television, but I had gone along then with that change like all the other sheep in the Amerikanski flock, but no more. There was no television in our house when I was a kid. We had books. Some of them had pictures in them. I suppose most of those pictures were black and white too, but I always saw them in color. The books which had no pictures at all often had the more vibrant colors. These days I listen to books with CJ and the colors are the brighter still
.
Colors. Colors are not just colors you know, colors are alive. Tata drew pictures in the air with his voice. White split. A plume of white went back to the green and beyond. Another plume became whiter still and the red followed not far behind. A plume of black came rumbling from the dark as though trying to catch up. All of them leaving a trail of daffodils in their wake. From the knot to the cauldron across the rolling plains they had come davno davno. Deda had songs about how the old ones put their wives and their lives in great wagons then and traveled far to the red of the cauldron. Deda had songs about almost everything.
A few times Deda shook me from my sleep early in the morning with a big grin on his face as he softly said "dolaze!" Under the pretense of going squirrel hunting we went down by where once stood the old school that he had built on his land long ago. Owning the land upon which the school sits and building the building is one way to guarantee that you will be president of the school board. The sound of children playing in the school yard had ended decades before. Now, except for the forlorn sounds of the creatures that prowled before the first colors of the zora painted the forest which had grown up over a few decades, all was quiet. Deda struck up his one stringed instrument and began to sing such songs that even the wolves lay down respectfully close by and listened. There had once been a stand of walnuts by a spring in such and such a place. They found another such place and again planted walnuts and daffodils as they always did.
"ona orah hory
hikori san"
They did business with merchants from Petro Varadan, Asmara Khand, Takṣa Khand (which all mean the same thing even though they are not the same place), as well as Gandhara, and with merchants from Hayastan and Vihara where davno davno in each place there had also once been daffodils and walnuts. Then came another dieing time.
"mornarice engleski
osjetljiv tremolirati"
The old ones left behind a mountain with their name and a town with their name and came away daleko daleko. This time the wagons had had wings and flew across veliko more.
"žuti narcisa
rijeka potoka i vode kotača"
The song continued about fire and flight, wagons and roads, rivers and streams, walnuts and daffodils, always the daffodils.
The cauldron is still there and you can see it for your self if you want to see it. Anyone can see it. After World War II it was given a new name which seems a bit odd theses days because the name honored soldiers in whose country the cauldron is not but was. Well, kind of was anyway. They began as the Česká setina, the Czech Centurions, inside the Russian Empire. Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, after whom Masarykova ulica is named in almost every major city in Croatia, was involved up to his neck with the Československá střelecká brigáda (Czech-Slovak Rifle Brigade) as they soon were called. Leon Trotsky, the People's Commissar of War ordered the disarming and arrest of the Legion, thus betraying his promise of safe passage to Vladivostok. Afterwards the Czechoslovak Legion used heavily armed and armoured trains to control large lengths of the Trans-Siberian Railway (and of Russia itself) during the Russian Civil War at the end of World War I before they were finally evacuated. In 1923 the Czech Republic renamed the cauldron to Štít legionárov.
In the meantime the Car fell. Back in "U RAJ NIJE PIVO" we discussed Ferdinand Maksimilijan Josip, Carskog izHrvataska and then of Meksiko, who came and went in almost in a twinkling of an eye. Today's historians look at the Car with disdain. Maksimilijan after all was a foreigner was he not? He was an Austrian, probably German speaking, maybe since he was the Car Hrvatska he spoke some of a Slavic Language as well, but certainly not Spanish, so what was he doing in Meksiko anyway? The official historians dismiss him without remembering that Maksimilijan's last words in this life were "¡Viva México!"
The man who replaced him also spoke on Spanish as his second language. His first language was Zapotec. Hmmm, he was no more of "Spanish" descent than the Emperor. On 19 June 1867, the rifle shots that rang out on the Hill of Bells killed the Car, the Carica's sanity, and the Mexican constitution which Benito Juárez swore to protect. Not only did Juárez refuse to allow Maksimilian's body to be sent home to his native land, he rejected titles of nobility, the church, the constitution and everything decent. José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz said "no." The Constitution, you see, forbade re-election. Amidst the Porfirio rebellion, Juárez died of a heart attack.
Porfirio ushered in the Nova Zora. This was the era when Cars were Cars, nobles were nobles, knights were knights, bishops were bishops, and entrepreneurs were entrepreneurs. The new Car wore the grand Grand Cross of the Royal Hungarian Order of St. Stephen as had Maksimilijan and the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour from France. He was a knight of the Grand Cross of the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus. He wore the Star of the Imperial Order of St. Alexander Nevsky and the Grand Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic. He was a Grand Knight of Most Honourable Order of the Bath and in Joe's stash of yellowed old documents is his ancestor's invitation to the inauguration of José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz as president of Mexico as the dawn rose on the twentieth century.
Like any enlightened Car of the period, taxes on business transactions were repealed. Telegraph lines began to operate. Railroads were constructed. Payrolls blossomed. Prosperity began to show its face. A middle class appeared. The Amerikanski began again to "lose" shipments of rifles and cartridges near the border. 25 May, 1911, Portfirio sailed quietly away from the maelstrom to France and the Mexican dream receded into the Mexican nightmare as the revolution began.
The revolution had already begun. Seven years later the Car was murdered. He and his wife and his children , the family doctor and the servants were shot. The reign of terror had spread into Europe where it would remain for a long long time. Lev Davidovich Bronshtein was a leading terrorist in Europe and in North Amerika. Marijan, a cousin x number of time removed related tales of the battles fought in Brownsville between the colors. They were the "Reds" and the "Whites" who were associated with Bronshtein, or Trotsky as he was also known. Marijan worked for the Amerikanski government but in Teksas he was on his own for the most part. Several times he found himself caught between the parties whereupon he had to shoot his way out.
Once he was assigned to "lose" rifles and cartridges across the border. The Federales took some exception to that. He and his partner found themselves trapped on the Mexican side with the sheer cliffs leading to the Rio Bravo descending at their back and the Mexican Federal army at the fore. There was nothing to do, he said, except to shoot his way out. Marijan told me that he was assigned by the United States Secret Service to Francisco Villa, to protect the man at the same time General Pershing was supposedly hunting the man. I might have dismissed his stories as the wild stories of an old man except the University of Texas mounted an expedition to the location he gave for this particular adventure. There in the desert were the remnants of many Mexican uniforms, and an unmistakable pile of spent brass cartridges where Marijan had made his stand.
Adelita. A song of the Mexican revolution. Adelita - a song of the Russian Revolution. Adelita was a favorite of the Serbian communists as well. Hmmmm, and no wonder, the practice for the Russian revolution took place right here on the border between Teksas and Tamalipas. I've been planning to do a video of the song Adelita. Soon, soon I will do that.
Oh, Bronshtein? Jaime Ramón Mercader del Río Hernández killed him on 20 August 1940 in Mexico. His aunt is buried underneath the altar of a church here. Her name was Adelita. That's all I'm saying.
Štít legionárov is no longer Štít legionárov, nor is it Stalinov Štít, nor is it in Austria nor Hungary, nor Czechoslovakia, nor Poland any more. (Did they move the blooming mountain? hehe) Never-the-less, the mountain is still the Kotol. The mountain is the Cauldron and it will always be so as long as anyone sings "ona orah hory, hikori san" and daffodils bloom.
do sljedeći put, blagoslov - until next time, blessings,
