It's our last full day in Poland. And the weather is just perfect. And everyone is still energetic, enthusiastic, effervescent. Though maybe a little sleep deprived. I head the list on that!
They have been setting a table for ten at breakfast for us. A sweet and very helpful gesture, considering that the breakfast room isn't large. The kids have long chosen their favorite dishes and so have we. Routines have been established.
(Wait, where is Sandpiper? Oh, there he is! Croissant in hand, shining his sneakers!)
What's the plan for today? It's both easy and complicated. On the one hand, there isn't a huge checklist. There are few imperatives. On the other hand, our group is large -- our 11 plus my sister, my nephew and his guy. And there are small things I'd like to add, if possible. And as it turns out, some things are of great interest to some of my crew and more time is needed for them. And, because it's the last day, I really want to make sure I don't leave feeling like I should have done more.
But, we set out feeling buoyant and optimistic.
(Through the Saxony Gardens once again...)
(a park in the month of June is always stunning)
(along Marszalkowska)
Our first goal and perhaps only real goal is to visit the Palace of Culture, that tall Stalinist era structure once dedicated to this insane person who was both paranoid and power hungry -- a dire combination.
(side view....)
We're to ride up to the 30th floor, from where you can look out on all of Warsaw. From that famous (for me and for me only) balcony from which I once was dangled by a haughty and unflinching grandfather.
Did you know this is the fastest elevator in Poland -- my sister asks. I did not.
The kids spotted a photo place where you could frame yourself into a view from the Palace. I have to admit, the kids were creative and the photos were great fun. Here's one of them:
Since the whole Palace visit took a while, we decided to skip the hike and catch the tram to Plac Konstytucji (Constitution Square). Sandpiper was thrilled. He likes to try all modes of transportation.
(waiting for the tram...)
(happy boy)
I lived two blocks to the south of Plac Konstytucji when I was a kid, and I lived two blocks to the east during my teen years. Time for a family photo (thank you, Carey!)
The walk here shows postwar Polish architecture in full force.
And yes, as long as I am here, I cannot resist taking them all to the apartment building where my sister and I shared a room (it was a two room apartment) after moving to Warsaw from my grandparents' village. Why? It's a building, nothing more, right? Yes, but it is so different from what they know and see back home. And yet, I can't say that I was an unhappy kid...
(nowadays, the paint isn't pealing and the hallway doesn't smell of urine)
Maybe this is getting out of hand, this running through my past, but we're so close to my elementary school. So we pass that as well. Okay, okay, time for lunch.
We have a reservation at Slodki Slony ("Sweet and Salty"). The locals use it as a special times cake and pastry shops. (The kids focus on that as we come in.)
But you can also stop and have a meal there: For example, I have beetroot soup with potatoes. And kompot.
We all pick our desserts, which of course are rich and beautiful. A few of them:
(As always, the cousins find endless ways to amuse themselves.
The kids have been asking for time at the elaborate playground in the Park Ujazdowski. This is the moment for it.
(hurrying to it)
After a good hour of play, we talk about the significance of the street that branches out right from the entrance to the park. Aleja Roz. I lived there from when I was 13 until I was 19 and left to live in the U.S.
(and now, here I am, with my five...)
My father, when he split with my mom, stayed there with his girl friend for many years (were they ever married? I dont think so, since he never divorced my mother). Until the day he died actually. His GF inherited the place, which is both nuts and proper, since they did live there, but it was an apartment that was my mother's idea of success in life. She found it, she furnished it. Three rooms -- one was a bedroom for my sister and me, one was hers, one was his. And a kitchen, where we hung out over food, or just because.
The GF doesn't live there any more -- she is in an old folk's home. My nephew takes care of the apartment, which is a logical outcome since he was the only one in Warsaw who continued to help her and take care of her once my father died.
My nephew has the keys to it and he asked if we wanted to see it. The question is -- should we? The kids wont care. And the adults? Turns out they do want to see it. Up we go.
And the adults do want to look through my father's photos and papers, which remain there on the shelves, as if he had just tossed them there for the evening, while resting after a long day.
Seeing this place is like a gut punch. A reopening of a long closed window for me, only it is now with the clutter of my father's life without us in it. Lots of clutter. His GF added to it.
(kids hang out in what was my sister's and my bedroom)
What interests my daughters is not this so much, but they are fascinated by my father's photos and papers. They properly belong to my sister and me, but I'm not attached to the idea of carting them home. They are.
(I always thought the best part of the apartment was the balcony; and yet, no one in my family ever used it. Ever.)
Eventually we run low on time or energy. We take the tram back to our hotel and the kids rest. Or play. Or both. I check out a porcelain store and pick up some fruit from a grocer...
And in doing this, I run into my younger girl. A coffee break for the both of us!!
And finally, it's the dinner hour.
(our last walk for an evening meal...)
We have a reservation at Gruby Josek. It's the 11 of us, along with my sister, nephew and partner, and Bee and her husband.
(a gift of storks for the kids...)
A final dinner has elements of deep gratitude, great emotion, total satisfaction, exhaustion. A dinner here also has a ton of food! A table of so many appetizers (bigos, herring, veggies, salads, and beef tartare -- which I told them they should take away because we wont eat it). Each a meal in itself. There were, additionally, soups. There were courses with fish or duck. There were two desserts (szarlotka and cheesecake).
Younger folk had shots of vodka with the appetizers (to be in Poland and to not try a vodka even once? hard to imagine...). We finished with a nalewka -- an after dinner home made liqueur. We had a choice -- sour cherry or black current. I joined in on that because it is such a fine ending to a magical evening.
And the kids? Fantastically happy and enthusiastic about it all, they finished our travels together here with a radiant joy.
(loving the freedom to play some game outside while we chatted inside)
And they made me a booklet -- each doing a page, of their favorite memories here. One said wading in the river. Another -- the visit to the top of the Palace of Culture, where we took those fun photos. Yet another -- he just liked Poland, period. And one liked knowing that Chopin's heart was stuck somewhere in a church wall. And the youngest? She loved the mermaid. She drew a picture of it for proof.
Us grownups also contributed to our own list of favorites. There were so many. But of course, what stood out was the warmth of the welcome. The beauty of being happy together.
Down to the last walk, by the light of the sliver of a moon.
with so much love!!!
