What can you do in such a short period of time? Two (and a half!) days in Poland? You've got to be kidding! Ridiculous.
Well, no. So many good moments. Great feelings. So much warmth and friendship! Playing it out in a short period of time doesn't diminish its intensity.
But, predictably, I move quickly. This is not a contemplative, meditative, reflective journey. There will be time for that. Right now, I focus on each step, one foot at a time.
Going to bed close to 4 has its good sides: I cleaned half the party mess before retiring for the day. This was more urgent than I would have liked: I read on the building entrance door that the water will be shut off for much of Saturday. Shockingly, it was shut off too the days I was here last (in September). No, it's not common, not normal at all. But if it's shut off again when I next appear, I will have to think that at the very least, it is a sign from the high heavens that I am the kiss of water shutdowns!
The downside of going to sleep so late is that you don't get up especially early. I'm shocked to see it's 9:30 on my clock as I open my eyes to the new morning. Oh oh! I'm to meet my friend in the Old Town. At 10:30.
I call her: I need coffee, very very badly. I'm dashing out now, but our first order of operations is to sit down somewhere so I can take a swig of a good cup of caffeine!
As I run to meet her, I see that the Royal Way -- the main drag that weaves past the University all the way to the Old Town -- is closed to traffic. Why?
People are setting up booths. Why?
I ask -- what will you be serving?
Borscht!
Hmm, they must be expecting crowds. That's one large vat of soup they have there!
These days, closed off streets and expected crowds are suggestive or a political demonstration. Is this what we are to expect? I don't think about this much. I see my friend! We find a good cafe nearby.
Revived, we continue our walk. My sweet chum is so ensconced in Warsaw life (both in terms of current events and cultural curiosities, to say nothing of the goods and services that city offers), that walking with her now feels like I am in the Warsaw of the everyday. Like it once was for me.
We stop by an eyeglass store right smack in the middle of Old Town. She has an errand there. I sit back, entranced by the whole visit.
The discussion of lenses, of the whole business of seeing through your glasses is so personal, so intimate, that it's as if I fell back many decades to a time when transactions were not conducted mostly with people whom you do not know, or machines that perhaps know you too well.
I tell myself I should come back to buy my glasses here next summer! It would not be a chore to check off. I would enjoy the exchange!
We head on to the Old Town Square. There is a Christmas market. There is an ice skating rink. The ice is a little wet and for the first time I notice that it's not really cold, nor is it raining! These are gifts. I was to have bad weather here. Warsaw is telling me: make no assumptions!
My friend leads me to the recently reopened Museum of the History of Warsaw.
You must come back here some day. The buildings are beautifully restored inside and the exhibits are really interesting! Plus, from the top (is it fifth?) floor, you can look out to a beautiful view of the city!
Let's go now!
She is so right.
(To the north, you can see the River Vistula)
We can't really take the time to explore every last room in this set of houses, but we do pause in this one, where the exhibit is of containers. That's right, old containers used by Varsovians for every which thing in years past.
And I find this box and it's as if I am a little girl again! How well I remember the chocolates that were nestled inside in the Poland of the 1950s and 60s!
I have to smile at this: I am so old that things from my childhood now belong in a museum!
We walk on.
She has invited me to lunch at her house -- and here's a terrific surprise: one of her daughters will be there too -- along with her kids and husband. I'm thrilled. I haven't seen them in several years -- even as these young families of ours are so much at the forefront of our lives, of our stories that we tell in the greatest detail when we meet.
We eat a grand lunch of soups...
And stuffed meat and spinach pies and veggies and her wonderful homemade cheesecake. Because my friend does make the best cheesecake imaginable.
It's dark when I get up to go home. And it strikes me -- it feels so Polish (in a good way) to be leaving in the way I do, out of this Warsaw home, with warmest goodbyes. I catch myself recognizing these tiny details of my years in Poland. I don't really remember them, or think much about them once I am back at the farmette. I will have entered a different story then. But today, I'm immersed in all things Polish.
I take the tram and then the subway...
... and as I alight close to my Tamka home, I detour onto the New Town Street to check the bus schedule for tomorrow. Crowds. Dense crowds. Families, couples, friends, packing the street on this unusually warm evening. I see that the holiday lights are only partially lit. Still, the crowds are tremendous. "iść na spacer." To go for a walk: it's a favorite weekend activity here, one that I see hasn't gone out of fashion despite the cars, metros and other conveniences (there are fifteen times more cars now than there were in the Poland of my youth I'm told).
At home, I return to the clean up. My sister comes over: did you see the lights? She asks.
No...
They're on!
Let's go see!
It's as if the city emptied out itself onto this street that forms the belly of the Royal Way. And you can understand why: it's quite lovely. The candy company sponsoring the decorations surely went all out.
We stroll along the street, enjoying the absence of cars, enjoying this bright, bright bookend, as it were, to my trip.
And so ends my second full day in Warsaw.
Tomorrow morning, I leave for France.
Well, no. So many good moments. Great feelings. So much warmth and friendship! Playing it out in a short period of time doesn't diminish its intensity.
But, predictably, I move quickly. This is not a contemplative, meditative, reflective journey. There will be time for that. Right now, I focus on each step, one foot at a time.
Going to bed close to 4 has its good sides: I cleaned half the party mess before retiring for the day. This was more urgent than I would have liked: I read on the building entrance door that the water will be shut off for much of Saturday. Shockingly, it was shut off too the days I was here last (in September). No, it's not common, not normal at all. But if it's shut off again when I next appear, I will have to think that at the very least, it is a sign from the high heavens that I am the kiss of water shutdowns!
The downside of going to sleep so late is that you don't get up especially early. I'm shocked to see it's 9:30 on my clock as I open my eyes to the new morning. Oh oh! I'm to meet my friend in the Old Town. At 10:30.
I call her: I need coffee, very very badly. I'm dashing out now, but our first order of operations is to sit down somewhere so I can take a swig of a good cup of caffeine!
As I run to meet her, I see that the Royal Way -- the main drag that weaves past the University all the way to the Old Town -- is closed to traffic. Why?
People are setting up booths. Why?
I ask -- what will you be serving?
Borscht!
Hmm, they must be expecting crowds. That's one large vat of soup they have there!
These days, closed off streets and expected crowds are suggestive or a political demonstration. Is this what we are to expect? I don't think about this much. I see my friend! We find a good cafe nearby.
Revived, we continue our walk. My sweet chum is so ensconced in Warsaw life (both in terms of current events and cultural curiosities, to say nothing of the goods and services that city offers), that walking with her now feels like I am in the Warsaw of the everyday. Like it once was for me.
We stop by an eyeglass store right smack in the middle of Old Town. She has an errand there. I sit back, entranced by the whole visit.
The discussion of lenses, of the whole business of seeing through your glasses is so personal, so intimate, that it's as if I fell back many decades to a time when transactions were not conducted mostly with people whom you do not know, or machines that perhaps know you too well.
I tell myself I should come back to buy my glasses here next summer! It would not be a chore to check off. I would enjoy the exchange!
We head on to the Old Town Square. There is a Christmas market. There is an ice skating rink. The ice is a little wet and for the first time I notice that it's not really cold, nor is it raining! These are gifts. I was to have bad weather here. Warsaw is telling me: make no assumptions!
My friend leads me to the recently reopened Museum of the History of Warsaw.
You must come back here some day. The buildings are beautifully restored inside and the exhibits are really interesting! Plus, from the top (is it fifth?) floor, you can look out to a beautiful view of the city!
Let's go now!
She is so right.
(To the north, you can see the River Vistula)
We can't really take the time to explore every last room in this set of houses, but we do pause in this one, where the exhibit is of containers. That's right, old containers used by Varsovians for every which thing in years past.
And I find this box and it's as if I am a little girl again! How well I remember the chocolates that were nestled inside in the Poland of the 1950s and 60s!
I have to smile at this: I am so old that things from my childhood now belong in a museum!
We walk on.
She has invited me to lunch at her house -- and here's a terrific surprise: one of her daughters will be there too -- along with her kids and husband. I'm thrilled. I haven't seen them in several years -- even as these young families of ours are so much at the forefront of our lives, of our stories that we tell in the greatest detail when we meet.
We eat a grand lunch of soups...
And stuffed meat and spinach pies and veggies and her wonderful homemade cheesecake. Because my friend does make the best cheesecake imaginable.
It's dark when I get up to go home. And it strikes me -- it feels so Polish (in a good way) to be leaving in the way I do, out of this Warsaw home, with warmest goodbyes. I catch myself recognizing these tiny details of my years in Poland. I don't really remember them, or think much about them once I am back at the farmette. I will have entered a different story then. But today, I'm immersed in all things Polish.
I take the tram and then the subway...
... and as I alight close to my Tamka home, I detour onto the New Town Street to check the bus schedule for tomorrow. Crowds. Dense crowds. Families, couples, friends, packing the street on this unusually warm evening. I see that the holiday lights are only partially lit. Still, the crowds are tremendous. "iść na spacer." To go for a walk: it's a favorite weekend activity here, one that I see hasn't gone out of fashion despite the cars, metros and other conveniences (there are fifteen times more cars now than there were in the Poland of my youth I'm told).
At home, I return to the clean up. My sister comes over: did you see the lights? She asks.
No...
They're on!
Let's go see!
It's as if the city emptied out itself onto this street that forms the belly of the Royal Way. And you can understand why: it's quite lovely. The candy company sponsoring the decorations surely went all out.
We stroll along the street, enjoying the absence of cars, enjoying this bright, bright bookend, as it were, to my trip.
And so ends my second full day in Warsaw.
Tomorrow morning, I leave for France.
