10 miles around Warsaw, Learning Weird Facts

I hear that this will be a blasphemous statement, but I think I prefer Warsaw to Krakow. Don't get me wrong, Krakow was nice with all its history, but for me, Warsaw is more a city. With things to do and monuments and buildings to see that aren't centuries old. And for that reason, I think I preferred my time in Warsaw. I made this decision after a long, cold, misty/drizzly day walking all around the city.

Columns for Warsaw Ghetto's
pedestrian footbridge

My hotel happens to be a bit of a walk from the Old City, but there were still some really interesting things to see along the way. Rather than heading straight for those sites, I decided to take a short detour through the Mirów neighborhood, which was a part of the southern section of the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II. Mirów happens to contain one of the most famous images of the Ghetto, the pedestrian footbridge that the Germans built to ease access between the two main parts, since a major street happened to run through the Ghetto's location. Located at the intersection Chłodna and Żelazna Streets, the footbridge no longer exists, but the steel pillars that held it still do. One thing I've learned about Warsaw in this trek is that most of the city--85 percent--was destroyed during World War II, so old things that remain are unique or reconstructions.

Palace of Culture and Science

I eventually wound my way back to a central intersection, where Marszakołwska meets Jerozolimskie. Every guidebook and "what to do in Warsaw" website I looked at said that this was a good place to start my journey. At one corner is the Palace of Culture and Science, which darts up from the city skyline. It is the tallest building in Poland and definitely has an important feel to it. I didn't go into the museum inside--I considered it, as the clouds were really starting tot mist with force--but I really wanted to press onward to the Old City.

Warsaw, like Krakow, has a royal route from which kings would often pass, especially on the way to their coronations or other important events, such as their baptisms. The route contains Castle Square which, as you can probably guess, is anchored by a castle. I happened to get there around the time that a trumpeter began to play a song that is still stuck in my head, several hours later:

Buildings in the Old City

I continued past Castle Square into the Old City. Old City was actually destroyed twice during World War II. The first time was during the German invasion of 1939, when he Germans bombed  the area. Polish citizens rebuilt it, only to have the Germans destroy it again following the Warsaw Uprising. Apparently Polish citizens used old drawings and sketches to rebuild it as closely as possible using as many original bricks and decorative designs as they could find. While it looks good, the scars of war and destruction are clearly evident in many of the buildings, including those beyond the Old City.

Madame Curie

A couple of monuments later, including one to what I surmise if Poland's favorite daughter, Marie Curie (she's right up there with John Paul II and Nicolas Copernicus in people that are honored a lot!), I finally started to make my way back to the roads that would bring me back to my hotel. But then I heard horns and drums and what sounded like marching. I was right, that's exactly what was going on. So of course I needed to go check it out. In front of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, in a grand plaza, many distinct security units from the military and police were marching. A guy near me told his friend that it was practice for an upcoming Polish celebration in a few days (November 11 is Polish Independence Day), but I cannot confirm the veracity of that claim. In any case, it was pretty cool and I am glad I stumbled upon it.

The military exercise

With that, I meandered through Warsaw's version of Embassy row before heading back to the hotel after what became a 10-mile trek through the city. I also learned along the way that Herbert Hoover's middle name was Clark (he has a square named after him near the Polish Presidential Palace). And Warsaw honors Charles de Gaulle with a circle and put a palm tree in the middle, which is a very weird sight, especially when it is only in the 40s.

To end, here is a video of the military exercise on the plaza:

A Somber Day in Auschwitz

This trip isn't all fun and games. I decided to take a day yesterday to visit the World War II concentration camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau, an essential trip when one is so close. Krakow is about 90 minutes by bus from Oświęcim, the town known for hosting the camps. I woke up early to catch a 7:50am bus to the city and arrived with plenty of time to spare before my 10am tour. When I got there, however, I decided that I should use one of the guides, pushing my tour time back to 10:30.

Auschwitz is the fourth major Holocaust remembrance site I've been to, after Yad Vashem in Israel and the Holocaust museums in Washington, DC, and New York. As such, I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting from this visit, but I don't think it met my undefined expectations. More than a day later, I'm still trying to put my finger on what it is that seemed off with the way the camps were presented. This by no means is a way to take away from the horrors that happened there, but the three memorial museums took time to explain what happened, whereas Auschwitz's approach seemed to be more, "This happened here. Period." Other than what looked like a makeshift memorial site set up at the end of the train tracks in Birkenau, there didn't seem to be any focus on the people; more focused on the operation.

Between two barracks in Auschwitz I.

The tour itself took us through some of the old barracks in Auschwitz I, the original part of the camp, and showed some of the things recovered after the war, such as the tons of hair, eyeglasses, suitcases, shoes, etc. There was also a walk through the torture chambers the Nazis used, and a walk past photographs of hundreds of the victims. After circling Auschwitz I, which I found much smaller than I expected, we took the bus to Auschwitz II-Birkenau, the famous part of the camp. It was at Birkenau that the Nazis built the mass gas chambers, had the train unloading platforms, and planned on housing hundreds of thousands of people. This side was bigger than I expected, and walking the length of the camp and around to some of the restored barracks gave a sense of the scope of the killing.

The memorial at the end of the train tracks.

 

I'm glad I went; I would have been very upset had I not taken the journey out to Auschwitz. It was definitely a full day trip and is something that every person should be forced to see so that the line "Never Again" sinks in. Today I took my Jewish tourism to a happier note by going around Kazmierz, the former Jewish district of Krakow. A few synagogues and Jewish-themed places, but sadly, that to me seemed like the extent of the district's Jewishness.


A synagogue in Kazmierz

Kazmierz is Krakow's Jewish District.

 And for today's video, some live music outside a restaurant in Kazmierz today:

 

Impressions of Poland

I've been in Poland just over 24 hours now and have walked around quite a bit to get a sense of my surroundings, even though I'm only here one more day. Before hitting the somber notes from a day of visiting and walking around the Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration Camps (I'll compile my thoughts and aim to publish tomorrow), here are a few of my (sometimes amusing) impressions of Poland.

I love the way the light was hitting the
church in the central square.

Polish has vowels. They don't like writing them, or saying them, but they do exist if you listen hard enough. It sometimes sounds as if they are trying to fit as many garbled sounds into one word as possible, and every now and then, if I listen hard enough, I can pick something out either because it has a cognate in English or there's some similarity to Russian, which I studied 10 years ago. I was thinking about how to phrase this and was thinking that a Wheel of Fortune reference would probably be in order, but they all seemed long-winded to me. Alas, I can't always be witty.

There is an obsession with receipts. Don't get me wrong, I love me a good receipt when I paid for something and need a record of it, but I do NOT need a record of when I go to the bathroom. Today, I had to use one of the public toilets that cost 1zł (zł stands for złoty, and it's currently about 3.89 złotych to 1 USD). So 1 zł, about 25 cents. To use the bathroom. And I got a receipt. I was trying to think about who I might need to show the receipt to, but came up empty. Instead, it just proved the obsession with handing out receipts here.

Obviously there was a giant marijuana leaf walking down the
street. Oh, you mean that's not normal?

Poland is ridiculously cheap. Further on the theme of money, I have determined that Poland is really cheap. Part of it is a favorable exchange rate (at the upper end of the range over the last decade), but in general, things just seem very cheap. No complaints, just an observation.

If there is a line, Polish people will find a way to swarm it. Queuing, to steal a term from our friends in the UK, is not a Polish strong suit. Cutting lines and trying to push five people through a space clearly meant for one person at a time appears to be a common occurrence. The corollary to this impression is that personal space is just a foreign concept.

You have two religion options--Catholic or Jewish. It seriously feels like everyone is in one of those two camps. I suppose there's good reason it feels like this; official statistics say that 33 million people, 87.5% of the population, are Catholic. Strangely, there are only about 20,000 Jews in Poland, but the strong current of Judaism through Polish culture and history is evident. As such, while most citizens may be Catholic, it definitely seems that most tourists are Jewish.

Wawel Castle Cathedral

Finally, it's nice to blend in. I'm used to traveling places where I stick out just by virtue of being there. Or me carrying a backpack is a sign that I'm an outsider. In Poland, I can look like a local (although I think there is a distinct Polish look, which has as much to do with physical features as it does the average person's way of carrying himself or herself) even when I'm carrying a backpack. Or rolling a suitcase down the sidewalk, because it seems normal. I get that part of this is being in a city like Krakow, and being in a tourist section, but I found this to be true even the farther away from the train/bus station I got. I don't automatically stick out.

Smok Wawelski, Krakow's very own fire-breathing dragon!

As of now, I've really only spent time in Old Town Krakow and some of the surrounding neighborhoods. Tomorrow I hope to go to Kazmierz, the Jewish district, which has many synagogues and other Jewish-y things about it. We'll see what I find!

For today's video, I bring you one I took of a street performer. There are a lot of street performers in almost any major city in the world, but I find that they are much more visible here in Krakow. I even saw a bit of a dueling music interlude between this man playing the guitar and a guy with an accordion a little bit later. It was pretty sweet!

 

Horoscopes and Soul Searching, the Start of a New Adventure

It's been 10 month since I used this blog, in large part because at some points it felt more like a chore than an enjoyable thing to do. But now I'm going off on another adventure, and so I figure there's no better time than now to try to revive it and see if it holds. So off to an entry!

I don't believe in horoscopes. I absolutely LOVE to read them, but the idea that the positions of random stars and planets in made-up houses could somehow determine my fate and the fate of the hundreds of millions other people born around the same time of year as me across many different generations is, frankly, preposterous. I love reading them, though, because I find it a way to think about what's coming. It's impossible for one person to focus on everything all the time, so I sometimes use my horoscope to focus my energies and give me a little bit of direction. Sometimes, however, the horoscope confirms already-created plans, as it did this month.

I'm off on an adventure today. I've been telling friends for weeks that this is my soul searching trip. I went straight from college to real world and never did those few weeks to find myself. Well, now here's my chance. Three weeks of travelling will hopefully let me find myself, my wants, my dreams, and when I return, strengthen the relationships I value while cutting those that are a drain on my being. I've had mini versions of these in the past, but this is one that I'm doing completely on my own terms.

Which brings me to my horoscope. How are these related? (I promise, this ordering all makes sense in my brain!) Buzzfeed had a "What's your horoscope for November" page, and this is what mine is:

It’s okay to feel introspective this month, Sagittarius. Take stock of YOU and your feelings before the holiday rush takes over. Delve deep rather than wide.

Woah.... That was my plan for November! I suppose I was looking for some sort of confirmation about how to do my soul searching (remember, I see horoscopes as guiding forces), but this was almost too spot-on.

And with that, I will make November an introspective month as I traipse around Eastern Europe looking for myself, delving deep into my soul as I explore the beautiful countries and cities and sites my destinations have to offer. Stay tuned to hear about the locations I visit and the things I find out about myself!

I almost forgot my video. Thanks to the very funny Jimmy Fallon:

 

One Year of Blogging

It strange to think that I'm approaching one year of chronicling seemingly mundane things on here. I will unfortunately be away for my blogoversary (if it's not a word, I'm pretending it is now), so this post will serve to mark the occasion. In fact, I'm departing tomorrow and should be packing, but this is serving to help me procrastinate the inevitable. I have a pile of clothes stacked on my bed--probably more than I need--and the suitcase in a separate room. Soon enough they'll all be together and locked away. I'll get to it soon.

In the past year I feel like I've grown. I've found that writing the thoughts in my mind gets them out of my head, freeing me up to think of other things. There's also a series of posts that were intended that never saw the light of day, and unsurprisingly, those thoughts are still running through my mind. It's a balance. The stats on who has read the blog suggests the personal posts were most popular, but those were also the hardest ones to write. I'm a naturally private person to begin with, so opening up can be a difficult task.

In any case, I really should pack for my 3 weeks away. Hopefully I have some fun adventures to relay from another trip to the continent. But first, 'Lil Baby Aidy and her Drake moment: