RIGHT NOW!
Where:
Mike Onka Memorial Building
11520 E. Putnam
Sugar Creek, MO
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After the Outlaw Cigar Party earlier today, I decided to swing by the Slavic Fest. I almost went last year, but when I got to the gate I realized I didn't have any cash and it didn't look like the kind of place that would take plastic, so I bailed and did something else.
But this year I had some cash on me, so I went. $3.00 to get in the door. Not bad at all.
I was WAAYYY early. Gates opened at 3, I was there at 3:15. As I'm writing this it's 6:45 and I'm sure the place isn't even beginning to get hopping yet. The party goes till 11 tonight.
But I don't really like crowds and I just wanted to sample the food, so the "in and out early" technique that I employ at most social events was perfect.
After securing a Boulevard Wheat, my next stop was "Peter May's House of Kielbasa". Although, let's be honest, it was more of a "Tent of Kielbasa"
The process of aquiring food and drink was very strange. You couldn't actually use money. You had to use your money to buy tickets, which could then be exchanged a mere 2 feet away in the same tent for the actual food or drink.
What the fuck?
Is this a modern simulation of some sort of ancient, Slavic barter system? Or is it some sort of "wink, wink, nudge, nudge" way of getting around liquor laws and food safety regulations governing actual businesses?
I don't know, but it was all very confusing. Especially when I went to buy my ticket for the $4.00 kielbasa kabob. I gave the geezer my $4, but he only gave me a $2 ticket. I told him I needed another ticket. He said the tickets were "misprinted". The $2 ticket WAS the $4 ticket.
Alright, let's be clear here. That doesn't sound like a "misprint". It sounds like somebody ordered the wrong fucking tickets from the carnival company or whereever the fuck you order tickets from.
But whatevies. I got my kabob and it was toolicious!
I consumed my food on a stick and then nursed my beer as I surveyed the festival grounds. There is a main stage for the big musical acts with a large, open dance area where the bulk of the drunken festivities will ensue.
And there is a smaller venue inside for the most ancient of humans.
I found the carnival entertainment for the children to be somewhat lacking. A single inflatable bouncy house is kinda lame. I mean come on. I've seen birthday parties for kids in Excelsior Springs with more elaborate attractions.
How much can one of those toothless, unsafe, travelling, midwest, carnival companies really charge to come in and set up a Tilt-A-Whirl or Spinning-Tea-Cups?
I think Peter May might be related to Billy May.
Because he wasnt content to just thrust his kielbasa in your face, he was branching out into other merchandising.
Like T-shirts.
The headliner tonight is the 2 time grammy winning group Brave Combo! You should get off your lazy ass and go! There is stil plenty of time. Here is Brave Combo performing "People Are Strange" by The Doors at the Slavic Fest in 2007.
After thoroughly researching the event, I was done and ready to come home. I had no desire to stay until the place was filled with drunken, Sugar Creek Slavs dancing the night away. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I'm just too old for that crap.
And too smart for DUI checkpoints. Fuck. That.
I had six bucks left so I picked up some ethnic desert to take home. It's called "kolache". Strangely, I could exchange cash directly for kolaches. The intervention of the tickets was not needed. I do not understand Slovacian customs or Sugar Creek laws.
The ones on the left are apricot kolaches. The ones on the right are prune kolaches.
I sampled one of each with a splash of bourbon and they were quite tasty.
But I didn't detect any major ethnic or cultural WOWness. It's bread and fruit.
Go get some fucking Pillsbury dough, flatten it, bake it, squirt some fruit paste into it and VOILA! Kolaches!
What I did detect, whoever, was an uproar in my bowels. My digective tract has no idea what the fuck a "kielbasa" is or what to do with it.
Top that off with a prune filled pastry and this is going to be a very interesting weekend.
I'll be sure to keep you posted!
Ciao, babies!
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