One of us is legal

Bratislava, Sunday 8 November

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here are my own personal opinions, not those of the Fulbright Commission or the U.S. Department of State.

Foreign Police update

You may recall that we applied for our Slovak Residency Permits on 5 October, submitting the required dossier of items including the FBI criminal background check, the notarized documents vouching for our status, our marriage certificate with apostille from the State of Minnesota, etc. According to what we were told by the Fulbright Commission, the Foreign Police have 30 days to process our application. So after exactly 30 days, on 4 November, we were excited to receive an email message from Nora, the executive director of the Fulbright Commission, saying: 

Dear Jeff,

Both IDs are ready to be picked up at ERI. Yesterday I mailed the medical clearances and the insurance letters to the respective police office.

Welcome to my country,

Nora

Except that they weren't. When we contacted Beáta at ERI, who was shepherding us through the process, she told us that only my permit was ready and that they wouldn't process Suzanne's application until after mine had been approved. 

So we are still waiting. In the meantime, Suzanne's 90-day tourist visa status in the Schengen Zone expires this Tuesday on the 10th of November. At that point she becomes an "illegal alien" in Slovakia.

We had thought that exiting and re-entering the Schengen Zone would give us another 90 days as a tourist, but that is not the case. The tourist visa is good for 90 days within a 180-day period. We are hopeful that her permit will come through on Monday. If not, to be legal, she would have to leave the Schengen Zone, going to Croatia, England, or someplace outside of Europe, for example, and wait until she could re-enter with the permit once it is issued.

Of course, no one has asked to look at our passports (except when we applied for the permits) since we have been in Bratislava, so the likelihood of getting caught is near zero. But we are planning a trip to Sweden (inside the Schengen Zone) next week to get snow tires put on the Volvo. Even that should not present a problem because passports are not checked at borders within Schengen any more. But with the Syrian refugee crisis, some countries such as Germany are performing random (and not-so-random) border checks.

We have been in contact with the U.S. Embassy staff about this and they did not seem worried. In all likelihood, everything will go smoothly on the trek to Sweden and back even if Suzanne does not have her residency permit before we leave.

But we are still nervous and considering various options. This week is the perfect week to travel because Tuesday 17 November is Fight for Freedom Day in Slovakia, another national holiday. This means we can get the tires installed Monday morning and have until Wednesday morning to get back to Bratislava. One option would be for me to go alone, but 2,000 miles of driving in a week by myself in the car does not seem appealing or particularly safe. We might postpone the trip a week or two, though we wouldn't have the holiday and I'd have to cancel office hours on Tuesday. Or, if this drags out longer, Suzanne might have to fly back to the U.S. to await the arrival of her legitimizing document.

There is a lot that we like about the Slovak people; their immigration and visa policies are not part of that. Stay tuned for the next installment...

Vychutmajte si Ameriku Week at Lidl

Down the hill from our apartment building, where we go to board the tram every day, is a grocery store in the Lidl chain. There are Lidl markets all over Bratislava and, apparently, in other European countries as well, even in England. The Lidl stores in Slovakia are truly different from stores in the U.S. in a number of quirky ways. The grocery selection is decent, but seems different every day. And in the two aisles down the middle of the store, there is an ever-changing variety of non-food items offered at very low prices. We've seen everything from clothing (always a lot) to small furniture items to sewing machines to sledgehammers. The items in the central aisles turn over amazingly rapidly---if you want it, buy it now because it may be gone by tomorrow, or even by this afternoon.

Lidl has a theme every week, with a section of the store dedicated to the theme items. Since we have been here, there has been Auto Week (supplies, not cars themselves), Retro Week, Greek Week, Italian Week, Paris Week, etc. This week was American Week: Vychutmajte si Ameriku means roughly "Experience America."

Lidl from the tram stop. Our apartment building is in the distance on the right

Note the sign for American Week to the left of the green pharmacy awning

They are inviting us to "experience America" through a brand called "McEnnedy American Way." I've never heard of that brand in the U.S., but it looks the part with the Statue of Liberty on the labels and stars all over the place. This week Lidl had lots and lots of McEnnedy stuff: marshmallows, maple syrup, peanut butter (Yay! It sold out the first day but we got two jars!), Monterrey Jack cheese, cheesecakes, pulled pork, beef burgers, an "American-style snack box" with frozen onion rings, mozzarella sticks (so American!?), and chili cheese nuggets, frozen pancakes, hamburger buns, blue cheese salad dressing, ... even the McEnnedy version of Twinkies! We stocked up on the peanut butter, hamburger buns, and snack boxes, and added a few other things into our cart as well.

Next week (starting tomorrow) is Bombastické Ceny Week (Bombastic Prices). We'll have to see what strange and unexpected marvels they are offering up under that theme.

The BEAN

When my sister was visiting in early October, I took her to the wonderful open-air produce market in Bratislava. Suzanne had asked us to buy some of the unusually large beans they grow here so that she could make soup.

When Suzanne opened the large bag of beans a couple of days later, she discovered that the bag was moist inside and that a few of the beans had sprouted little roots. Never one to waste anything, she decided to plant the beans and add them to our little herb garden by the sliding doors in the kitchen. (The grocery stores here commonly sell fresh herbs as living plants rather than as cut sprigs, so we try to keep them going.) 

It seems that we might be re-enacting Jack and the Beanstalk in our kitchen. The beans started growing, and growing, and growing. I thought I heard "Fee, Fie, Foe, Fum" in my dreams last night! She bought stakes for them to climb on. Then she had to add strings to the top of the stakes. In less than a week they will reach the curtain rod from which the strings are hanging. Then what? 

I'll keep you posted...

Exams

In the last two weeks, I have given the first exams in each of my classes. 

I hate exams; they starkly identify all of my failures in educating my students. I always wish that every student would answer every question perfectly, but if that ever happened I would just conclude that my exam had been much too easy. Somehow I always seem to see exams as "glass half empty," though I am usually pretty positive in other situations.

The PhD class exams were the final exam for the four students who enrolled only for the first half of the class, and half of the final exam for the eight full-term students. I tried, and largely succeeded, to write an exam that everyone could pass, even if they did not understand the details of the math in the course. And everyone who had attended class regularly did pass the exam. A few students did better than that and a couple stood out with very strong performances. I guess that's what an exam is supposed to do.

The masters class was just a short midterm to give them a guide about how well they were doing. The final exam, in December and January (I'm expected to give it twice with students choosing which sitting to attend) is 60% of their grade, so the midterm is only 15%. We had the exam during the second half of our three-hour class on Wednesday evening. First we talked about empirical evidence on economic growth, with lots of tables and graphs on the screen. Then, after a break, Suzanne arrived with the cinnamon rolls fresh out of the oven and we started the exam at 6:30. 

The room seemed quite empty when we started; there were only 19 students out of the 25+ who had turned in at least some of the assignments. Three students had emailed and said that they were sick or out of town, so I expected a few missing, but not that many. Two students (one very sick) arrived and started the exam at about 6:45. But when I compared the pile of exams to the list of students, there were still three more who had not taken the exam. I sent email messages to the three inquiring about their status in the course: had they dropped? One responded immediately with a rather lame excuse, a second indicated that he had dropped the course, and from the third I have heard nothing. Four students will take a make-up exam (not the same one, a slightly harder one) on Tuesday next week.

A striking pattern emerged as I was grading the exams this weekend. Almost one-third of the students scored between 71% and 73%, but they all missed  different questions. It wasn't like there was a hard question or two that caused everyone to struggle. 

I guess that I have become more accustomed to an almost bi-modal distribution at Reed, with a large cluster near the top and another cluster further down. This sharply-peaked uni-modal distribution seems almost "too normal."

Bratislaviana

I need a section to show bits and pieces of Bratislava that don't fit into the longer themes of the post, so here is the first installment of Bratislaviana! 

The bookstore at the University of Economics 

Yes, it's one whole room! And it's even open sometimes!

Walking in the city

We spent rainy Saturday and sunny Sunday morning walking in parts of Bratislava we hadn't explored. On Saturday we went to the eastern section near the Polus City Center shopping mall. There is a quite lovely lake there and a large sports complex including Štadión Pasienky where SK Slovan Bratislava plays football. We didn't stay for the 5pm Slovak Super Liga match against FK Senica, which they won 2-1 in the rain.

Lake Kuchajda

Ticket prices for Slovan Bratislava: 10 euros to sit in sideline seats!

This is the Slovak Bowling Association headquarters in the sports complex. Judging by the appearance, it doesn't seem like bowling is too popular here...

Crossing the Bridge

This morning we had breakfast near the Most Slovenského Národného Povstania (Most SNP), the Bridge of the Slovak National Uprising, more commonly called the UFO Bridge because of the single suspension tower with a round, flying-saucer-shaped restaurant at the top. 

Most SNP from the road (earlier picture)

After breakfast we decided to walk across the bridge and explore the large park on the south side of the river. I catch glimpses of the park every day as the bus crosses the bridge, but we'd never gone down there on foot. The fog was just lifting as we crossed the bridge and by the time we reached the other side it was a lovely sunny day. 


Walking along the south side of the river afforded great views of the old city. Then we left the river and walked through a bit of the Janko Kráľ Park, named for a 19th century Slovak poet. The colorful trees were beautiful. Until today, we had not found a big urban greenspace in Bratislava. It was wonderful!

Last traces of fog on the Danube

Two Towers: Looking back across the bridge to the cathedral and the TV tower in the distance

Reduta concert hall of the Slovak Philharmonic (left) from across the Danube

Along the south shore of the Danube

Janko Kráľ Park

Statue of Janko Kráľ, with the UFO Bridge tower in the background

That's all for now. I'll update as soon as we hear anything about Suzanne's residency permit. Otherwise you'll hear about the trip to Sweden, which we hope will be uneventful!