© 2011, 2016 Rex Jaeschke. All rights reserved.
Official Name: Republic of Poland (Rzeczpospolita Polska); Capital: Warsaw; Language: Polish; Country Code: PL; Currency: Złoty (PLN)
I've visited Poland just the once, for eight days in 2011, but only in the northwest.
[Diary] At the east station [of Berlin, Germany], I bought a First-Class ticket to Poznań, Poland. I went up to Track 1 to find the platform was under renovation and there was nowhere to sit. So I walked to the sunny end outside the cavernous roof and watched the world go by. Outside, there was one visible vestige of the old East-German regime, a large gas main that ran on top of the ground and up and over a local street. It was painted bright pink, and I'd seen lots of them during my first visit to the city in 1999. A rather run-down train pulled in to an adjacent platform. It belonged to the Russian Railways.
My train was the Euro City 43, and it was due to depart at 9:50. However, an announcement came in both German and English that there would be a 20-minute delay. Eventually, that became 30 minutes and then 35. It was a short train as business on a Saturday was slow; behind the engine were one First-Class car, a dining car, and two Second-Class cars. I settled into my reserved seat in a 6-seat compartment that I shared with a young Pole who was returning home from a business meeting in Hamburg. His name was Lukas and he too was in the IT industry. We spoke of many things during the 2:30-hour trip. He spoke English and was learning French. He lived with a German woman who spoke French and was learning Polish. [Now I say his name was Lukas because that's how westerners pronounce his name, which is actually spelled Łukas. Technically, the first letter is "L with stroke", and in Polish it's pronounced as the w in "went", so in Polish his name is pronounced "Wukas", not to be confused with "Woger" or "Wodewick" from Monty Python and the Life of Brian fame. A similar example exists with the Polish currency, spelled "złoty", which Westerners pronounce as "zloty" while the Poles say "zwaty".] To make Polish a bit more challenging, the letter w is pronounced as v, but only on Wednesdays between noon and 3 pm! Now, on the outside of each bus, tram, and train door there is a sign that reads "drzwi". Go ahead, try to pronounce it; I dare you!
The border between Germany and Poland is the Oder River, and just before we crossed, we stopped in Frankfurt (Oder). It is written this way to distinguish it from the other, really big Frankfurt, Frankfurt (Main); that is, the internationally known city is on the river Main. My first look at Poland was forest, forest, and more forest, with occasional farms of corn and cereal crops, and garden houses with large vegetable plots and fruit trees. I saw surprisingly few people or cars and almost no animals. [As it turned out, it was a long weekend after the longest day of the year celebrations of St. John's Day.]
My friend Ewa (remember, w is pronounced v) was there to meet me on the platform in Poznań. [I'd hosted her via Servas in 2008.] We drove back to her apartment where I met her friend Marek. We had a lunch of egg, cauliflower, and potatoes, with drinks and pastries.
Ewa had planned an afternoon and evening in the country. We stopped off in a small village that was hosting a volunteer fire-fighters' contest among the local fire companies, and watched some teams race against a stopwatch to assemble hoses and get their portable pump motors started. We ate some BBQ's sausage and pastries on sale at some stalls.
Next, we laid in some afternoon tea supplies and headed off to Ewa's country house, a 2-story cottage with a garden. We opened the doors and windows to let in the fresh air, and set up a table on the verandah where we ate bread and honey while drinking tea. It was all veddy sophisticated, wot! The village had about 200 cottages, but only five were occupied year-round. Truckloads of sand had been brought in to make a large beach/play area near the large lake, and many of the families in residence for the long weekend were there eating, drinking, and playing. A man had set up a PA system over which he was playing his entire ABBA collection. The main event was the making of floral designs on foam blocks with candles. When it got dark, the candles would be lit and the blocks floated out on the lake. Ewa and I walked quite a way into the woods nearby. Apparently, nearby, wild pigs come down to the water to wallow in the mud.
The cultural highlight of the day was a visit to a small village that had a very old wooden church, and that very night, it would be packed for a concert of "Musica Sacra and Musica Profana", Music, Sacred, and Profane. By the time we arrived, the 150-seat church was almost full and 200+ more people were seated outdoors where they could watch the indoor event via closed-circuit TV projected on a large screen. We squeezed into the back row of the church and settled in to a musical treat as comfortably as one can on hard wooden benches. The first act consisted of six nationally known singers who sang a capella, and from time to time, made sounds with their mouths like a variety of musical instruments. I expected a series of religious pieces, but there really weren't any. Yes, we had some classics, including wonderful renditions of parts of the spring suite from Vivaldi's Four Seasons, and Ravel's Boléro, neither of which has lyrics. Then came Polish-accented pieces in English written by the Bee Gees, Paul Simon, Phil Collins, Ben E. King, Freddy Mercury (of Queen), and Gene Pitney. There was a particularly good rendition of Louis Armstrong singing "What a Wonderful World" and "Hello Dolly". At the end, the singers got a very long, standing ovation, after which they sang an encore. Then after another ovation, they gave a second encore. As it was getting late, we decided to leave before the Profane part started, which featured a different group outdoors. When the church-restoration plate was passed around, I gave generously; it had indeed been a great performance.
We were back home by 10:30 pm and I was fading fast. Lights out at 11 after a very nice introduction to Polish life, the countryside, and local entertainment.
[By the way, Ewa teaches English at a medical university. For some years now, she's been specializing in English as it applies to dentistry, and she co-wrote a book on the subject. I scanned an appendix containing translations of terms from Polish to English; who knew there were so many words specific to that field!]
[Diary] I was awake just before my 9-am alarm. While the others slept, I worked on this diary a bit. Ewa made a traditional Polish breakfast of "milk soup", which consisted of pieces of macaroni boiled in milk, with butter and salt added to taste. That was followed by scrambled eggs on bread with cold meat and "coffee" made not from coffee beans, but from cereal grains.
I brought out the pages I'd photocopied from my Jaeschke family book in Australia that traced my ancestors back to the Posen Province of Prussia. The city of Posen is now called Poznań, and it is Polish. Johann Georg Jaeschke and his first wife had eight children. Some years after his wife died, he married again, but produced no further children. In 1839, because of religious differences, he took his wife and children to Hamburg where they caught the ship Catherina and sailed to Adelaide, the capital of the new state of South Australia. [It had been created in 1836 as a free state; there were no convict settlers. Subsequently, many thousands of German-speaking Prussians from this area emigrated there where they spoke German for 100 years, until WWII made it unfashionable.] Unfortunately, the family book gives only a few place names of where the Jaeschke's were born, and nothing about where they lived, so without some serious research with the help of a Polish speaker I didn't expect to find out any more information. That said, my hosts did know several Jaeschke families in the area and found quite a few more listed in the greater metro area telephone directory. I had visions of finding an old Jaeschke castle and estate in need of a prince or king, but then I thought if there were one, I'd probably have to pay 170-odd years of back taxes. [Be careful what you wish for, right?]
We spent the afternoon on a cultural and nature expedition out in the country. We started at a 14th century castle, which now houses a very large library of old manuscripts. As lots of tourists were going inside, we decided to tour the extensive gardens instead, stopping off to read the many information boards about plants, trees, and shrubs. After that hard work, we sat in the shade eating ice cream.
From there it was on to a large baroque palace that was being restored courtesy of grants from the EU. Once again, we toured the grounds, but this time we were in search of the largest group of old oak trees in Europe. We walked down to a small river and along the flood plain where the water meandered in many horseshoe shaped pools. We came upon a grove of old monsters, quite a few of which are more than 1,000 years old. Some had died, while others had major insect damage via boring under the bark until it fell off in great swaths. The largest we saw had a base diameter of 9.3 meters.
We walked to a restaurant nearby and sat outdoors in the sun perusing the menu. I settled on goulash soup, which was served in a large sphere of bread complete with lid and knob on top. Ewa had traditional pirogues while Marek had pieces of pork in a sauce.
Near home, we stopped to buy me a day ticket for public transportation for the following day. We had a quiet evening reading, and I planned my solo tour into the city. Lights out at 10 pm after another day of fresh air and exercise.
[Diary] Dawn comes early at this latitude in summer, and I awoke several times after sun-up, but went back to sleep each time. When my alarm went off at 8 am, I'd had 10 hours of solid sleep, and I actually felt refreshed. I was nearly two weeks into my trip, and I was finally on local time. I put the kettle on and set the table, after which Ewa appeared. It was already quite warm out, but there was little noise and few people about. We ate a light breakfast of bread and sliced meat with tea/coffee.
At 9:45, I stepped out into a cool breeze and hot sun. It was less than 200 meters to the stop for Bus 63, and I had a 10-minute wait. The city's distinct green and yellow buses are modern and easy to use; however, the driver does not sell tickets. One must buy them from a machine at certain stops and punch them in the time clock on the bus when first boarding. For my day pass, I had only to punch it at the start of the first ride. I had a good map showing street names, bus routes, and bus stops, and I monitored my route as we went, so I would know how to get back again. Traffic was heavy and it took us 30 minutes to get into the city, which was not that far away.
I'd planned a walking tour of the old city, which was built on a slope, so I got off the bus at the top and walked down. It was Monday, and all museums were closed. First up was the Opera House, a fine-looking building with a statue of Pegasus (the winged horse) on top, with big steps up to the front flanked by statues of lions. Right opposite was a large park with a 50 meter-by-20-meter shallow pool in the center of which were a series of fountains. I sat on a park bench for a while watching the locals lying on the grass, reading, and sunbathing. All was right in that part of the world. I walked around the fountain and took in the cool spray from the jets.
Next up was a church, so I went in to look around. It was quite plain with a few stained glass windows and a large banner of the world-famous Polish Pope, John Paul II. I stopped in at a small art gallery and got my first culture fix for the day. Next-door was the tourist information office, so I stopped in to get a city map to supplement the ones my hosts had lent me. As it was getting quite hot out I kept to the shaded side of the street. Everywhere I looked downtown there seemed to be banks!
In the old-town, the streets were all cobblestone with trams lines embedded in many, and the car tires made interesting sounds as they went along the stones. I came upon a large outdoor market. There were fresh flowers of all kinds, with many large sunflowers. There was fruit, vegetables, and herbs, along with men's, women's, and children's clothing.
Nearby was the large town hall square (140x140 meters), which was dominated by a 3-story Renaissance town hall, built in the mid-16th century. The tourist attraction there is the noonday clock. I found a seat and waited 15 minutes for the big event. After the clock bell struck 12 times, two mechanical goats came out, sized each other up, and then proceeded to butt each other 12 times. And may I say, Ladies and Gentlemen, that it was the most exciting goat butting I'd witnessed in weeks! The goats had been at it since 1551, and appeared to be getting a little tired, as they only connected in the first few attempts. By the time the event was over, my side of the square was quite full. As far as I could hear, pretty much everyone was speaking Polish. A few times, I heard German, a couple of times English, and once Dutch.
The 3-story houses around the square were very nicely restored after WWII to their former Baroque and Renaissance styles complete with ornately painted and carved facades. The sides of the square were filled with outdoor restaurants, many of which seemed to be serving desserts. [My Polish host had told me that Poles didn't have a word for "lunch"; they ate breakfast, then late afternoon had an early supper, followed later by a late supper.] Nearby was the Church of St. Stanislaus. The interior was very ornate with marble and gilt everywhere. It surely was impressive, but for me, bordered on being "over the top".
I started back up the slope thinking about something light to eat. After some time, I spied a McDonalds with attached McCafe, so I went in to find it had attractive décor and looked very modern. I ordered some McNuggets, some veggie sticks, and a tall steaming glass of latte. I sat on a bar stool at a window bench and watched the world of Poznań go by, and it sure came in all shapes and sizes.
I'd started out "ready to go" at 8 o'clock. By 11 am, I was a bit lethargic. At 2 pm, I was definitely dragging my feet, so I made my way back to the park opposite the Opera House where I lay on the grass in the shade. Young children were stripped down to their underwear to splash in the pool, two guys were kicking a ball around in the water, and quite a few people were lazing in the sun.
At my home bus stop, I went into a large supermarket, and took my time looking up and down all the aisles. Those Poles have their own words for everything! I bought some emergency rations, such as Polish chocolate with hazelnuts, pasteurized whole milk (a change from the usual shelf-milk), a fresh cake, cheese, and juice.
[Diary] I left the apartment around 10 o'clock and bought a day-ticket at a local stop. I didn't have long to wait before my bus came and took me all the way into the city and out again. Along the way, a woman sitting next to me started asking me questions in Polish. I replied in my best Orstralian, "Sorry Love, no hablo Polski!" I followed the route on a map right up until we turned in an unexpected direction, and soon we pulled up at the end of the line. The driver spoke no English and was less than enthusiastic about helping me. Apparently, the route for Bus 63 had changed since my guide was printed. In any event, he did give me good information, and five minutes later, I was on another bus that took me right where I wanted to be.
My first cultural stop for the day was the church of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, a brick structure that dated back 900 years, and which was the only Maltese church in Poland. I knocked on the door to see if some of the knights could come out to play, but there was no answer. So I walked around the grounds and headed off to my next stop.
As I was getting familiar with the city's transportation system, I decided to hop a tram, and that took me to the Cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul, one of the biggest churches in Poland. It was a good-sized brick building with some very nice stained glass windows. Except for the heavily gilded altarpiece, the building was tastefully decorated. I paid my entrance fee and took a tour of the basement in which 12 long-dead religious leaders lay in repose in coffins in a crypt. Old foundations of predecessor buildings had been excavated. In the garden, people were taking photos of each other standing in front of a large statue of John Paul II.
Next up was the Town Hall. As it was closed the day before, I was determined to visit its city museum, so I paid my money and walked around the three floors. As everything was in Polish I wasn't able to understand any of the explanations. There was a set of metal goats just like the ones in the bell tower. And just as I walked back out into the square, the clock chimed. I was just in time to have my second look at the butting goats in two days; it was almost too much!
Although it wasn't too hot out I was quite lethargic, so I decided to go back home and rest up. This vacation business can be quite tiring! I worked on this diary and some administrative chores.
Ewa came home around 4 o'clock and, not long after, we headed to her father's house some 3 kms away. He'd passed away earlier in the year, and she was taking care of his place. Our first task was to pick all the cherries off a small but heavily laden tree. Our next job was to get the electric lawn mower and extension cable out of the basement, to cut the back yard grass. As I was charging out from the underground garage with my face down, I failed to notice that the doorway top was quite low, and I attempted to move the concrete ceiling with my head. Suffice it to say, it didn't move at all; however, I pushed my skull down my neck a ways and probably now am only 6'2" tall! Nurse Ewa came to the rescue and had a cold compress on my head in no time. As best as we could tell, no brains spilled out and my head did not appear likely to fall off.
After that little wake-up call, I pruned a large rose bush and hand-watered the garden while Ewa did some chores. Then we set up a table on the back deck and ate an afternoon tea of slices of cake with butter, and drank coffee. It was ever so civilized!
Back home, the sun was streaming in the windows at 7:30 pm as I sat writing while listening to Andrea Bocelli belt out some ballads in Spanish. Meanwhile, Ewa was hard at work in her kitchen cooking us a last supper of pasta with her secret tomato sauce and cheese.
After supper, I used a simple hand-operated device to remove the pits from all the cherries we'd picked. Then I packed my luggage and wound down for the day. Lights out at 10 pm.
[Diary] I was up with my 8-am alarm; it was Travel Day! I eased into it with a cup of coffee and some cheese. Surprisingly, my head did not hurt although there was still some swelling. However, my neck was quite stiff. After a shower, I got my final email fix and packed my computer gear. Ewa and I mounted two bicycles onto the roof of her car for her to take to the beach. Then we chatted until 10 o'clock.
Ewa kindly drove me to the main train station where we said our goodbyes. It had been a most enjoyable stay. Inside, I managed to communicate my wishes to the rather stern-looking woman at the ticket counter, and she sold me a 2nd-Class ticket to Szczecin (pronounced "Stettin") for about $15. I thought that was very cheap.
I was on my own in a 6-person compartment in 2nd Class, and it was as good as my 1st Class ride from Berlin. Eventually, a young conductor came along, looked at my ticket, frowned, and then informed that it was for the local train only, and I was on the express. After playing with his mobile ticket machine for some time and then consulting with a colleague, he told me I needed to pay considerably more. My $15 ticket became a $35 ticket, don't you know! [Don't you just hate that when that happens?] Oh well, c'est la vie, right?
I sat facing forwards and saw mile after mile of forest, punctuated occasionally with some small villages and corn and cereal fields. Although I had been reliably informed that Poland did indeed have animals, during the whole 210-km trip, I saw only one horse, one cow, and a group of beehives; that was it!
Ewa had packed me a snack of ham and cheese sandwiches, which I ate en-route with a bottle of fruit juice. An earlier traveler had left several daily papers behind, so I perused those, mostly studying the Polish alphabet, punctuation, and typesetting conventions.
We made three stops along the way with each lasting no more than 60 seconds. A woman came by with her cart offering various items, but after I declined twice, she said, "Gratis", and gave me a small pack of cookies and a smile. As it was a train serving only domestic stations, all announcements were in Polish only.
We arrived in Szczecin at 1:25 pm, about six minutes behind schedule, and I stepped out into bright sunshine. I had about $20-worth of local currency, no map, no information about the city, and no Polish language skills. However, I was not completely without a plan or assets. I did have a cash machine card and the phone number of my Servas host. The first order of business was to find a cash machine, which I did, and to convince it to give me some more local currency. The next problem was how to phone my host. I found a phone, but it took only a phone card, as do most public phones around the world these days. So, where to buy a card and how to ask for it? It was then that I spied a young woman sitting nearby. I asked her if she spoke English, and she replied that she did. Then she walked me around a number of kiosks asking to buy a phone card, and, on the 3rd try, I got one. I invited her to join me for ice cream as a thank-you gesture and we sat and chatted for a while. She had just finished high school and, after the summer holidays, she was off to university to study computers. I phoned my host, Marek, to let him know I was in town, and we agreed I'd call him again at 7 pm to be picked up.
Near the station, I came upon a tour office that on a sign in the window claimed to speak English, and the young woman at the counter did. She sold me a nice map and tourist guidebook to the city, and directed me to the tourist office, which I'd missed in the station. Back there, I got more information.
So, what to do with five hours to spare while pulling my luggage and carrying my heavy computer bag? I walked a km along the riverbank towards the tour-boat dock and there at the ticket office was an ever-so-friendly ticket seller whose English was very good. I bought a ticket for the 1-hour harbor and river cruise, and had 15 minutes to wait. She shared a booth with a tourist information officer from whom I got information about public transportation. She also told me that starting tomorrow there would be a 3-day celebration as Poland took on the EU Presidency for the next six months. I saw plenty of evidence of this along the waterfront where crews were erecting stages and setting up PA systems. In less than an hour, I'd gone from practically nothing to having a whole plan in place.
My tour boat pulled out filled with retired German tourists who were traveling by luxury coach. I sat next to a couple and got a bit of a German workout. Next to our boat dock was a massive 3-mast sailing ship, which belonged to the local maritime university, and was used for training. Although Szczecin is 65 km up the Oder River (Odra in Polish) from the East Sea (the Baltic, that is), it has a big harbor and dock system. [The city was a member of the old Hanseatic League.] And we sailed all around that. There was some cargo sitting around, including quite a few very long wind-turbine blades, but very little activity. A half a dozen small ships were tied up with one being loaded with grain from a huge silo. The ships were from Gibraltar, the Netherlands, and Cyprus. There was a series of floating dry docks with the longest being at least 150 meters, and most had ships inside and out above the water. On the return leg, there was quite a bit of river traffic with ships coming and going, and tugs headed upstream. As we disembarked, an elderly man started talking to me in German. When I said I spoke English and was originally from Australia, he switched to English and told me about his two trips there.
I still had three hours to kill, so I looked for a seat in the shade with a grand view of the river. I found one, but it was up a long series of steep steps. I took my time hauling my gear up, stopping occasionally to put my heart back in my chest, but the end result was worth it. I looked right out over a grassy park to the training sailing ship. There, I worked on this diary and generally watched the world go by.
Around 6:30 pm, I made my way to the Radisson Hotel, which took me through a large park. In these days of mobile phones, public telephones were few and far between; however, there was one 100 meters from the hotel. Soon after 7 o'clock, I phoned Marek, told him where I was, and he came to pick me up. We drove to his house just outside the city and introduced ourselves. His wife and three children had recently headed off in separate directions for vacations, and he was home on his own. He and his wife ran a language school, with him teaching English, as well as Polish to foreigners, and her teaching English, German, and Swedish. They had two classrooms in the basement of their house, and had expanded to space in another building nearby.
While Marek cooked supper, I watched a half-hour of news on Deutsche Welle TV. Marek's good friend and neighbor, Mariusz, joined us for a late meal. Mariusz teaches English at a Catholic "Silesian" school. We talked of many things including American politics, past and present, as well as US foreign policy especially in Afghanistan. All too soon, it was 11:30. Lights out soon after.
[Diary] I was awake with the early light at 5:15 am. [Don't you just hate that when that happens?] And try as I might, I could not get back to sleep. My fertile imagination was in gear and I was working in my head on some business problems. Finally, just before 7 o'clock, I got up, showered and dressed, setup my laptop at the kitchen table, and started writing. It looked like a nice day outside, but rain had been forecast for the first day of the city's festivities.
I sipped hot tea and ate some of my emergency rations while updating this diary. Marek joined me at 8:15. He had a private English lesson at 8:30, during which I washed the breakfast dishes.
Around 9:30, Mariusz arrived to be my driver and guide. We drove 10 km to his school next to which is a 300-acre cemetery I'd read about in a tourist brochure. He gave me a walking tour starting with a section containing the remains of Soviet and Polish soldiers. An especially moving monument remembered the 20,000+ Polish officers executed by the Soviets in 1940 when Hitler invaded from the west and Stalin from the east. The Soviets took 250,000 Polish prisoners in that push. Another equally moving memorial was to all the Poles sent to death camps or forcibly relocated to Siberia, as late as 1952.
From there, we drove downtown, parked, and went to Cafe22 on the top floor of one of the tallest buildings in the city. It was a clear day and Mariusz took me on a 360-degree visual tour of the city. [As they might say in Maine, "You could see so far that it took two of us to look!"] We occupied a table by a window of the circular restaurant and ordered coffee. We shared a large slice of apple cake with whipped cream. After that, we visited the old castle, a pair of old city gates, the main cathedral, and the area around them. We walked by the birthplace of Catherine the Great as well as a small palace that she'd lived in much later on.
By the time we left the downtown area the traffic had gotten quite busy and the weather was deteriorating. On the way home, we stopped at a Tesco, the UK's leading supermarket export, and topped up my juice and milk supplies. A few spits of rain fell and the skies darkened. I spent a couple of hours at Mariusz' house where we drank tea and ate pirogues, a Polish delicacy, while watching some programs on BBC TV.
I was back home by 5:30 after which I worked on some travel planning and did some research on Wikipedia about Polish history and geography relating to the day's events. One particular search involved finding out why Australia's highest mountain, Mt. Kosciuszko, was named in honor of the Polish national hero, and hero of the American Revolutionary War, General Tadeusz Kościuszko. At 8:30, Marek and I ate dinner together, and by the time we finished that and I did the dishes, I was fading fast. Lights out at 10 pm.
[Diary] When my 7:45 am alarm went off I was feeling rested and after a hot shower, I felt even better. Marek had a private lesson, so I fixed a simple breakfast of bread and cheese with tea, and then dealt with business and personal email. Marek then introduced me to his student and she and I spent 30 minutes talking about many things, so she could have a conversation with a native English speaker. She works for HSBC Bank, and travels around Poland each week working with regional sales staff. It was a good workout for both of us. Later, he had a second lesson, with a young woman who has completed one Master's Degree and is now working on another. I spent time talking to her as well.
I spent the afternoon researching and writing an essay for my monthly blog. I also did a load of laundry and hung that out to dry in the afternoon sun; however, by early evening, it starting raining lightly. I caught up with some world news on TV and generally surfed the large selection of international channels to see the world from various cultural perspectives. Then I phoned Belinda in Germany to coordinate our meeting on Sunday, and instead of having her drive 90 minutes each way to get me, we agreed that I'd ride the train to Neubrandenburg, and she'd meet me there.
Marek and I had a late supper and then sat and talked of many things until just after midnight. It was a relaxing and enjoyable day. I was asleep within seconds of my head hitting the pillow.
[Diary] I was awake just before my 9:15 alarm feeling quite rested. Marek and I had a light breakfast of oatmeal, bread, cheese, and tea, and we continued our conversation from the night before. The weather was still inclement, so we stayed indoors, he working on household projects, while I washed the dishes and spoke by internet phone to various people in Australia. I followed that with a lazy afternoon
At 5 pm, we drove into the city in light drizzle. We had a very nice dinner at a local restaurant. I had pork with dumplings and vegetables, and topped that off with milk coffee. Afterwards, we drove around the shipyard area where Solidarity demonstrations had taken place at the same time they occurred at the more famous Gdansk shipyards. It was also the site of unsuccessful demonstrations in 1970, which resulted in the deaths of a number of people. We finished our evening eating ice cream at a small café. Lights out at 10 pm after a good rest day.
[Diary]
It was overcast, but dry and quite a bit warmer, which meant the final day of the festival might not be washed out. At the train station, while Marek parked the van, I went inside. The ticket agent spoke no English, so I wrote down the name of the town I was headed to and the time of the train, and then we played charades as to whether I was going one-way or return. The cost of the ticket was 98.82 złotys, and I had 100 in paper money left plus some change, so that pretty much cleaned me out of local currency.
My train was going all the way to Lübeck, an old Hanseatic League city near the Baltic right on the border of the former West and East Germanys. We waited on Platform 4 for 15 minutes before saying our goodbyes. It had been a very good stay with Marek. Right on time at 10:57, what approached the platform looked like a train only it was much smaller. In fact, it consisted of two motorized carriages.
Conclusion
My only connection with Poland is my paternal ancestry back when it was part of Prussia, and then quite by chance, my one Polish guest came from Poznań, a city not far from Berlin. I had two great 4-day stays with hosts, which generally makes a trip much more interesting. Basically, it becomes an adventure with a safety net!
By the way, just in case you were wondering, drzwi is Polish for door.
Bucket List: There is nothing driving me back to Poland, but as I visit Berlin from time to time, I'd be happy for a repeat visit with Ewa.