Wow, I should’ve told you about this before the actual event. So that you could decide to go. But the most I mustered was an Instagram story at realmennotoba. Which, some of you saw. And then I saw you at the event. And I was blown away.
It was called MHV at The Public, and it happened on the evening of Saturday, November 30th.
It was our attempt to raise awareness and funds for the Mennonite Heritage Village by bringing a piece of the MHV experience to our local brewery and taproom in the heart of Steinbach. And, in the end, it was more than an attempt. The Public was very full of wonderful folks and my heart was warmed and all I could think was how grateful I was for the people who walked in those doors, and also the people who had had heard my idea in October and were on board and made it happen — Nathan Dyck (representing the MHV), Steph Klassen (from The Public), Andrew Unger (Unger Review) — and author Mitch Toews and singer songwriter Paul Bergman who agreed to appear.
Here’s what happened!
I mean, it was about two weeks ago already and my memory is very bad and it was kind of a blur for me to be honest and Nathan hosted thank goodness. I just remember people walking in and feeling delighted and also doing my best to ensure they had seating but then I realized all the seats were taken and people were still arriving! Something amazing happens at The Public at times like these — people are contented to find a place to stand. That’s all. And I could leave my seating-arrangement-obsession alone. There was nothing to be done and everyone was chill.
I do not remember the order of events! It’s a blur! I think Andrew and I might have gone first — talking about our trip to Poland this past July, a bit about some of the family history we chased while there, I shared a bit about two villages I loved where my ancestors had been born, and we also talked about how the MHV helped us know where to go in Poland. There’s a lot about Poland in the MHV’s permanent gallery. And we also talked about some of the Mennonite distilling history in Poland (on the topic of Mennonites and alcohol) that we had seen and sampled while there. Space at The Public that night was tight and showing our slides was a bit awkward but also… I loved it. I loved that it was going that way. It felt so much like a community.
Paul Bergman played two sets of music, which made the evening feel even more cozy and special. I don’t know if I can rightly explain how the ambiance was just right for the feeling we were trying to evoke… but it was. I once tried to articulate what it was that I so appreciated about his music with this blog post, and that still holds. (Please do check it out, I’m still trying to work on my articulation skills.)
Nathan Dyck researched the history of Mennonite distilling and created Goldwasser, a Mennonite-made liqueur which is still being made today in Poland but we were unable to purchase any to get it shipped in time. He learned about other spirits that Mennonites made in Poland, including Krambambuli, which he then also found out some guy had written a 50-page song in praise of this Mennonite spirit in 1747 and he led us all in singing it and honestly it’s such an earworm I still have the sound of a taproom chock-full of people singing “kram-bam-bam-bam-buli!” in my head even two weeks later and it still makes me smile.
Mitch Toews shared reflections on the Tourist Hotel — which was Steinbach’s notorious men’s-only drinking establishment up until the 1970s when it was torn down. While he spoke, there were pictures shown behind him of the Tourist Hotel over the years and they were pretty amazing (courtesy of Ralph Friesen and Andrew Unger). Mitch has written a lot of stories but he told us more stories that had not been shared before. Kind of like gossip. Except these were his own stories. This did encourage the sharing of other stories.
This makes me think we could have more events about alcohol and Mennonites. We just might do something like that. Again.
On the realmennotoba Instagram account story I wrote: “I prefer to surround myself with people who are better than me, I kind of ride on their coattails, which is not exactly fair. Everyone gave me far more credit than was accurate. But I’m grateful for every single one of them.”
(Photo credits to Brent Manke!)