Another slice of life, PROSZE!

I sensed the need to input some fresh material. So now another "slice of life" Aaron post.

I love milk bars. I love milk bars for the same reason I love blues music: they're both forgiving. No matter what you've done, no matter what crime you may have committed, the blues is there for you. No matter in what station of life you find yourself, no matter how much money you have, the milk bar is there for you. They both provide nourishment.

I wish every visitor to Poland could go to a milk bar. Best food in the country for insanely low prices. The experience is something like this:

You walk in. You see a long line (it feels good to say line knowing that most of the people reading this will cringe) of people from all walks of life but mostly students and the homeless. They are all gazing at the big sign with the prices. These places are--I believe--partially subsidized by the government, so the prices are weird. Tomato soup, for example, wil set you back exactly 1.07 zl.

Once you get to the cashier, you feel a bit put off. She may not even look at you. She spends most of her time looking at her register. She just gives you a "prosze" or, if she's in a bad mood, a "słucham". You then mumble out your order in the best Polish you can. For me, it's like this:

Ja, uhhh, prosze, uhhh, poprosze pee-err-OH-gee, prosze, i ZOO-paa po-me-door-OH-ve.

She then furiously taps out your order on the cash register and tells you an obscure number (yesterday it was 5.63). You give her the money and she yells for the next person in line to come up.

You step aside and look confused. When is the food coming? You see other food, but none of it is yours. You grap a plastic fork and knife and a piece of flimsy wax paper, er napkin that is and wait.

She reaches through a small hole in the wall and extracts a plate with two rolled-up pancakes. But you didn't order pancakes. You are confused even more. She lathers them with whipped cream and pours some red gelatinous substance over them. Then the yell.

NALESNIKIWISNIOWEIOWOCEPROSZE!!!

What? What was that? Before you know it, some balding, stinky old man with hair coming out of his nose edges his way past you and takes the pancakes, moving very slowly to make sure he doesn't drop them, as he has done on many past occcasions.

You understand. She takes the food from the kitchen, places it on the counter, and announces its presence to the entire bar. OK. You get it. You wait a bit.

Three minutes later, your food comes out. Or part of it. Maybe you get the soup first, maybe you don't.

But it's all worth it once you sit down to eat. The food is amazing. When people think about authentic food, you realize, they are talking about this. Your soul warms up. Your glasses steam up. You are content.

So here's a proverbial toast to milk bars!