Chapter 2: The Seminoles

I entered the host family’s home in the detached townhouse in the northwestern section of Danubia City, following a trolley ride two blocks from the trolley stop.

I learned that the public penance I had joined with my host family included standing while on all public transportation. The stares she received from those riding were many more than even Ivanka, with her bruised bottom, had gotten.

The three other Siminov children were waiting at home for Ivanka and her parents to return, with or without the exchange student. I wasn’t sure which of the three was more excited to meet the now nude American student.

The girls began barraging me with questions before I had a moment to cross the threshold into the Siminov home. With typical curiosity, ‘Did you have a good trip?’ ‘Was Danubia a surprise to you?’ ‘What do you like to eat? Do you listen to Socrates Mistresses? ‘What does a varsity swimmer do? and ‘What happened to your hair?’

I was trying to answer each question as Kivar, looked at them, and reprimanded with, “Martina, Kaleen, go set the table as Mamma asked you before she left. We shall have plenty of time to ask questions on that day.”

Among the cultural differences between Danubian and American siblings interacted; however, the tone Kivar took sounded very condescending and somewhat demeaning toward the twins and me.

“Thank you, Kivar, I needed a moment to get my thoughts together as to the events of the day, and I guess you will be my foster brother for the next year,” Marcia offered her hand.

“Men and women do not have public physical contact unless married or engaged,” Kivar noted at her extended hand to look nowhere else. He did not add that the rule did not apply to criminals, the butchered head hair, and lack of body hair. I must be a wicked criminal in America. Oddly, he found my tan lines strangely erotic and found himself responding physically in a rather uncomfortable and unexpected way.

Kivar turned beet red from embarrassment, muttered something in Danubian slang under his breath, and backed out of the living room. Leaving me standing there alone and listening to the clatter of the dining room. Ivanka came to my rescue and offered to show me the house and yard.

“The sitting room, you have already seen,” Ivanka smiled. “Let us step outdoors into the rear yard.”

Once outside, I viewed a well-kept and gardened area about eighteen by ten meters. It almost looked like a suburban yard in America, there was a four-meter fence around its three sides.

Ivanka explained that although everyone sunned and swam in the nude in Danubia, family privacy was the norm. To intrude upon that privacy was a breach of Danubian protocols.

Ivanka showed me the swimming pool shared by the four units in the quadrangle. It was adequate for social swimming and aquatic exercise, but Marcia would have to find a fifty-meter swimming pool for her lap and speed training. Ivanka explained that the school and work kept the swimming pool open to the public. Ivanka showed me the raised ‘air bath’ platform where the family sunbathed in descent weather – nude and as a family.

I thought for a moment and then realized my body showed evidence of sunbathing but in the form of tan lines where my swimsuit had covered me when I remembered that swimwear was illegal under Danubian law. Her host family wasn’t accustomed to seeing tan marks left from the bikini.

Back into the house through the kitchen door, My host and I passed through with a quick hug from Ivanka for her mother, who was busy stirring a noodle dish on the stove. The twins had finished setting the large family table in the dining room and had retreated to their room just down the hall. Ivanka did not knock; minor children expected privacy from family members and found the two younger girls quietly squabbling with each other over who would get to read a book first.