One day this past summer I was heading out of Prague to do my last couple of projects. I was planning to meet a friend at the main train station in Prague and we were going to travel to the first camp together. Before catching our train we were going to rendezvous with this couple who had been in Prague for a month to pick up the key to the flat they had stayed in and pass it along to someone who would be responsible for the flat until the owner returned from her summer travels. I’m not really sure why we needed to be the middleman for this but now I’m really glad we did.
When we met with this couple they brought a few things with them that they had left over from their stay and didn’t want to take with them. One of these items was a giant cucumber. Now, I understand not wanting to waste a perfectly good piece of produce but why they brought all this stuff with them, it was more than just the cucumber, rather than leaving it all at the flat where the person they were giving the key was about to go after we met escapes my logic. They were quintessentially hipster and I guess there is no hipster protocol for how to donate unwanted produce because if there was, they would have known about it for sure.
After they left us at the train station I could tell my friend Stacy seemed kind of annoyed that she was now going to have to travel back to the aforementioned flat with a bag full of stuff that could have just easily been left at the flat with a note. My friend Erin and I were about to head to a town on the Polish/Czech border and a girl from the church we work with there was going to be taking care of our arrangements so I had the idea: “Hey, why don’t we take the cucumber with us as a thank you gift for the folks helping us out.” Erin agreed and we set off for camp packing a nice big cucumber with us.
When we arrived and got settled my friends Noemi and Christina were helping to prepare dinner for us and we offered them the cucumber as a thank you for all the work they did and told them it was an American tradition. I’m not sure what they thought about this unusual gift but immediately they went to cut it up for us to have with dinner. After a few minutes we explained the story to them about why we had this cucumber and we all had a good laugh. And so now Erin and I always take a cucumber with us whenever either of us go and visit Czech friends.
Then a couple of months ago one of our friends from the camp, Hanka, came to Prague for a workshop and was asking if I knew where she could stay. Since I was stateside at the time I told her to talk to Erin since she also lives in Prague. But I told her, “hey do me a favor, take them a cucumber as a thank you gift and let me know their reaction.” It was great. I received some nice pictures of my friends passing along cumbers. And now the legend of the cucumber continues to grow. The cover photo to this post shows the two thank you cucumbers I took with me a couple weeks ago to this same town as I visited to promote the summer camp in schools. And below you’ll see evidence of the first delivery right outside a friend’s flat. It was quite cold that night.
Hanka and her husband Peta (Hannah and Peter) moments after the goods delivery.
If you would like to join us in gifting some cucumbers in the Czech Republic this summer then send us a message and let us know. We are going to be involved in multiple events this summer: English camps, sports camps, worship festivals, and possibly more. There are many “real” Czech traditions you will learn about and experience on a trip with us. It’s a beautiful country with beautiful people. The harvest in Czech is plentiful but the laborers are few. Pray about joining us this summer and pray for us as we continue our preparations for the summer projects.