Poland 7: działki

A Sunday in Warsaw. Everything triggers a recollection! At the farmette, I live very much in the present. If anything, my kids would accuse me for being too eager to embrace the moment rather than dig back to sentimental remembrances. But I'm too busy constructing something out of the present to roll back in time and worry about the past!  However, when I am in Warsaw, it all changes. Warsaw is my past. I come here, I cannot escape it.

Sundays here were park days in my childhood. When my father and us two, the little girls from Nowowjejska Street, were not in the country with my grandparents, he would invariably take us on Sunday morning to Lazienki -- Warsaw's grandest park, one that has royal roots, a summer palace, magnificent ancient trees, a Chopin monument, a pond with swans, and a cafe where you could pick up an ice cream. It was probably the only time he ever spoke to us -- we rarely saw him during the week and he was gone for months on end when fulfilling his diplomatic work obligations. After a walk to the park, he'd hustle us to his friend's house nearby and he would sip tea, talk, and  smoke endless cigarettes while my sister and I fidgeted. So yes, Sundays recall my father for me.

I don't have time to go to the park today -- besides, I'm saving that for when my sister is next in the city. But as it is Sunday, a morning walk is de rigeur. Well, I get a mini walk out of the deal. To the post office and back. After breakfast of course!

Why to the post office? Well it's the weirdest thing: they don't have mailboxes in the city any more. Want to mail a post card from here? Go to the post office. On the upside, the Warsaw post office is open 24/7. No kidding.

(On the way there, I pass someone else with a camera...)

In the late morning, four of us convene once again at my hotel to drive over for a Sunday at another działka, this one being a little further from central Warsaw, and thus having more of an appearance of a weekend retreat. It belongs to Bee and her husband and they've built a lovely three season house there, where they like to go when the city has just proven to be too much for them. Na zielona trawke (for the green grass), as they like to say here. I've been there once before, but now everything has changed (the trees have grown very tall,  for one thing) and Bee and I know each other so much better than we did in years when she was young and I was young.

(Arriving, with food of course! As if our hosts didn't already prepare a three course lunch!)

 

We chat outside because the weather is just so splendid! Breezy and just the right amount of warm.

(It's an Aperol Spritz moment!)

 

(Group photo time!)

Eventually we all move to the grape trelliced porch, even as some conversations cant be put to rest so quickly...

Okay, everyone is here. Someone commented that our beautiful dining space makes us look like we just sat down to a Tuscan meal.

 

 

It may well be the last time our Group gathers in its entirety.You think about such stuff when you're retired. Who will get sick? Who will be away traveling? And honestly, it took me so many years to return to Warsaw this time. Will I wait such a long spell again? 

It's been a very intense set of days. 

As for the lunch itself? Just magnificent. There were little sandwiches with Polish pate and with salmon. There were pierogi with blueberries and with raspberries. There was a pot of turkey meats with prunes and apricots. And there was a mirabelle plum cake to die for! So good!

 

 I have a day trip out of Warsaw tomorrow with Bee and her husband. The rest? The next meeting is forever a question mark. So let me post just one last photo of the Group, as it appeared this afternoon, for the few hours that we had together at the table. With gratitude to all those who made me feel so good about being back.

 

In the evening, I have a dinner date with my nephew and his partner and I can only cross my fingers that I wont be late.

And I'm not! Well, just two minutes late. Not bad, given that I wasn't driving and therefore it wasn't entirely up to me as to when we should get moving. I walked briskly from my hotel, it is true, and I am somewhat hampered by the fact that my knee, the old one, not the replaced one, has decided to act up big time during this entire trip. And still, by 7:02, I am at the restaurant door.

We eat dinner at the place recommended by the person who is best able to critique Vietnamese cuisine -- my nephew's guy, who is, himself, Vietnamese. It's called Vietnamka and though I may be a poor judge of Vietnamese restaurants (I've come across Vietnamese food so rarely in my life), I can tell you that the food in this one is in fact very excellent! (Though I have to say, after a Polish lunch, one should go easy on dinner.)

It's so wonderful to have this chance to sit back with these two.

 

 

My nephew has visited me in Wisconsin, but otherwise I have spent far too little time with him for my liking and every hour I can eek out with him, with his close one here in Warsaw, is special.

So ends my Sunday in Poland. With elements of the traditional, of the new and fresh, of provocative and sometimes heated conversations, of singing (yes, we sang Polish songs, just to say we did!), of sublime encounters and exquisite foods. 

I walk back to my hotel, glance up at this familiar landmark...

... and smile.

Poland 6: działki

I cant think of the good translation for this Polish word: działka (or działki as plural). They've been around since I was a kid in postwar Poland. They are small allotments of land outside the city center, where city residents can plant their gardens. (Sometimes they're very small, resembling community gardens back in the U.S., but sometimes they're quite large, with structures on them to shelter you in inclement weather.)

My friends here are all Warsaw people -- in their youth, many with years away, but now back in the city for good. But except for one (and she has a family home in the country), they all have either a dzialka, or they live at the periphery of the city, in homes with gardens. Poles love and have always loved escaping to the country on vacations, on weekends, whenever time allows. If your city home is in a densely populated urban environment -- all the more reason to plan your escape to a spot of green grass and a a modest or not so modest garden.

These działki have also been places where you can invite family and friends to socialize. Poland is not a country of introverts. Eating, drinking, talking -- they're national past times.

Today and tomorrow there are two such gatherings on two separate działki, owned by two couples from my Group. Today, Gosia and Piotr host us in the afternoon. This is the anchor for my day.

But first, you guessed it -- my "healthy" breakfast. Outside, because guess what! It's going to be one heck of a brilliant day! (I eat to the cackling sound of the Eurasian Magpie and the dainty yet aggressively hungry sparrows, who seize the opportunity to steal food when you get up to refill your coffee.)

Our meetup begins at the Polish lunch hour (1:30 pm) and so I have the morning to myself -- a rare set of hours and this absolutely confounds me: where do I go? What do I have to explore, see again, probe a connection to?

Perhaps predictably, I head south. Toward my childhood haunts once again, this time picking a route along Marszalkowska -- a postwar modern street that's changed little since I was a kid. And I do have a purpose. I really do: to feel that Warsaw vibe within me once again. To connect the dots. To observe and think about where I once fit in and where I fit in now.

As I stand at an intersection, waiting to cross (no one crosses on a red light here -- it's a real no-no; you can get a hefty ticket if you get caught), trying to catch a photo of an older woman whom I see as one representative of my postwar generation, amber necklace and all...

 

 

 ... a much younger woman standing next to me says, in English -- hi Nina, and noticing my momentarily confused look, she continues: I'm Kinga. I rack my brain. I've known two Kingas in my life -- one lives in South Carolina and she has very dark hair and the other was a crush for the guy I thought was into me in my adolescence. But this Kinga is too young for that. Besides, she's speaking to me in English.

She laughs and introduced her husband. Turns out they read Ocean.

This happens to me sometimes in Madison. Hi Nina, you don't know me, but I read Ocean. Or I also will get -- hi Ocean! It happens to me in France: I see you went to Scotland! I know, I read Ocean. Never have I had this happen to me in Poland!

It seems this Kinga has been reading Ocean for a while now, and it becomes obvious what the draw is for her: she's American, but like me, she was born in Warsaw. And there's more: like me, she halted her studies at the University of Warsaw and finished them in the US, where she married an American. And went to law school. (She now practices law in Texas.) And her father, like mine, worked for the Foreign Service in Poland.

Is that not bizarre???

Here she is, with her husband  (and with her permission to post):

We chatted for a while and then went on our way, but the encounter really got me thinking deeply about my past, about all our mixed up paths to adulthood.

I walk on. And here you'll see random shots I took along the way of places and people who either reminded me of the old Poland, or of people who are the faces of the new Poland.

[I noted already that the country just celebrated the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising. Signs, posters, flags are everywhere. And sure, it's the 80th, so perhaps the round number had people thinking especially hard about that event, but the fact is, my generation I think is always thinking about World War II in one way or another. You walk along the streets of the Jewish Ghetto, and you can't help but remember that beneath beneath these pavements lie thousands killed during the massacres that took place here not really that long ago. You pass plaques commemorating bravery, reminding you that those who defended Warsaw paid dearly for it. And especially those who fought and died 80 years ago this month. 63 days of fighting, with little or no support. Warsaw was then destroyed by the Germans in retaliation.]

 

(W Jak Wolnosc -- meaning "F like Freedom")

.

 

I come to MDM, or Constitution Square. It's hard to describe why one would have warm feelings toward this open space, but I do feel some sweetness toward it. Not especially attractive, with a parking space right in the middle. But for us, it was fresh and open and inviting. The buildings had gone up to house families in a new way -- with playgrounds in the back, forming communities of sorts, for the kids, perhaps for the parents too. I didn't live on this square, but I did live not even two blocks away from it as a young kid, and later two blocks up in another direction as a teen.

 

There's no nostalgia in me or in anyone for the years when these Stalinist era experiments in living were thrust upon us. But I have to smile as I remember the hundreds of times I'd gone across this square. To the music store, to the tram stop, to the chocolate shop. I loved the square's vastness, it's opening up to smaller venues, to the sky.

(In the corner, still standing, the socialist realism sculpture -- one of four)

 

And now I come to the church that was just down the block from where I lived and yet... I have never entered it. Nor do I go into it today. It's of historical significance and yet I have always thought it to be austere and not a little frightening. An imagination of a six year old can run wild...

 

I have posted on Ocean a picture of my first Warsaw home before, but it gets another run now, because I am facing it and I pause for a long time thinking about it and how my life changed once my father accepted his position at the United Nations in New York.

(I swear the entrance door is the same one that was there 65 years ago, though the building itself has been at least a little cleaned up.)

I posted the photos of my adolescent apartment windows. Here are the two windows from my childhood place:

(the apartment had two rooms: one for the kids -- with these windows, the other for the parents, facing the courtyard on the other side)

Across the street, there's a guy selling some veggies from a booth. And, too,  these -- a beloved and common snack here, never ever sold in its full form in the US:

Okay, let's look around at the new Warsaw, the younger one that would not call itself the postwar generation.

 

The city is theirs, not mine any more. May they love it in the way I once did. Protectively, with a vision for an even better place to raise the subsequent generations that will pass through it.

In the early afternoon, we (four of us from the Group of ten) drive together to the działka.

The owners (or are they renters? Not sure about how that works..) are two with an acute case of gardening love. Well, Gosia has it. The bug hit her as much as it hit me and her efforts are well displayed in the mass of flowers she grows here.

(she welcomes us at the gate)

 

It's a walk through a garden fairy tale!

 

There's lots to admire and to love here...

 

But of course, in addition to the flowers, we have our friends. 

 

 

 

And food. A Pole will never allow you to go hungry. Never!

I set up a timed release...

 

But it's premature! Two more from our Group have yet to arrive. Here they are! (I'll just leave myself out of this one...)

 

We play our game -- two more questions, lots of discussion, Gosia's chocolate raspberry cake, more wine...

 

 And her daughter comes over too, with her kids. It is a lively set of hours!

It's late by the time I return home.  And later still when I turn out the light (after posting, of course). Sleep is not something I can count on at times that are especially intense for me. This trip isn't a vacation in the traditional sense of the word. It's travel, through time and place, to a past and a future. It shakes up memories and all that brain matter that structures my everyday once I get home. An unforgettable day, an unforgettable trip.

with Gosia's flowers and so much love...

Poland 5: Żyrardów

I know most of the towns and villages just to the east of Warsaw. They were on my train (and later -- car) route to Gniazdowo. But I know very little about the region to the west of the city. And so when Bee proposed an excursion for us to Żyrardów, I was super excited! Have I ever been there? -- she asks. I don't think so. Might we have gone there on a high school trip? Probably not. And certainly my parents weren't much into exploring the towns of Poland. They had their favorite vacation destination -- Zakopane, in the mountains. Once, we went to the seashore. Once -- to Krakow. That's it. And honestly, small Polish towns were, in the postwar years, uninviting. You had to be a travel nut with a curious mindset and an interest in local history and culture to poke around places that were often drab and struggling. My parents preferred to go the simple route: send us kids to the village with my grandparents for the summer.

Let me tell you just a few things about Żyrardów: it's a former industrial hub. I mean just that: the town was built around a textile factory in the year 1833. Literally built and organized to accommodate the factory. The first director of the factory was a French guy called Filip de Girard -- hence the name Żyrardów. If you say it in the Polish way, it sounds like Girard. Toward the end of the 19th century, the factory, under the leadership of two German industrialists, became the most modern, the most prominent place in Europe for flax production. So, think lovely linens.

Everything in Żyrardów took place in support of textile production. If you lived there, in one of the red brick buildings built for you and your family, you worked in some fashion with textiles. Good workers were valued and so extensive social services were provided to keep them there. Schools, hospitals, theaters. Churches, and not just the monolith that is so much the face of Poland now (Roman Catholic). There was a Lutheran church, a Baptist one and a synagogue. I read somewhere that the factories employed many Jewish people in their craft and trade departments and many English doctors, and quite a number of Russians to preserve law and order. It appears that they managed not to fight with each other. Amazing.

Eventually it all came to an end. The factories began a downward spiral after World War I, and they really lost money big time at the end of the last century. (Sure, you can blame China.) The last factory closed in 1999, though there is to this day a small line of fabric production because, you know, people are enthusiastic about the traditions of yore. Nearly all of the former factories now house galleries, restaurants, shops, or they stand abandoned.

Today, we visit Zyrardow.

 

But first, an early wake up (after a very late night, with a malfunctioning blogger platform -- it's always like that: when you most need to get that post up, there comes a system failure), I go down to breakfast.

I'm reconciled to it: yogurt, black bread with farmers cheese and honey. I do wheedle out  of the kitchen a small dish of blueberries. I mean, it's the season! Again I eat outside.

I walk over to the tram stop...

 

 

And as I wait for the next tram, I marvel at how clean, efficient and frequent these trams are. Public transportation at its best.

I take the tram to Bee's home...

 

 

And then her husband drives the three of us to Zyrardow. It's about 40 minutes by car if you leave at a time where there's no rush hour traffic. Congestion at peak hours in Warsaw can be brutal! 

(the landscape around Warsaw is... flat. And pretty!)

 

In Zyrardow, we begin our explorations with a look into the Museum of Linen Production. There's a lot to see and you can spend a lot of time just reading the large placards explaining the process of textile production that went on here for close to 150 years.

(there is a sign here that says that it's the perfect spot for a selfie, so we take one!)

(We meet a guy who worked in the factory from 1976 until it officially closed in 2012. Now he helps with the machines, with tours, and with the production of the few linen pieces that come out of here.)

 

 

 

 

 

In fact, it's because we spend so much time there that we then have to pick up the speed elsewhere. 

(A quick walk past the factory buildings...)

 

And here's another (welcome) distraction: in the villa belonging to the two German industrialists who really propelled Zyrardow factories to their leadership position in the worldwide textile industry, there is currently a display of photographs taken by a famed Polish artist, Zdzislaw Beksinski. His life (about which I knew nothing) is a whole 'nother chapter of mystery and intrigue and sadness and eccentricity. Too long to even briefly recount here. But the photographs, taken maybe 50 or 60 years ago? Magnificent!

And of course, we just had to walk through the adjacent beautiful park (designed by the same guy who designed Warsaw's Botanical Gardens)...

And now it's suddenly getting late. Time to eat! We go for lunch at a very well regarded restaurant, Szpularnia. (Szpularnia, by the way, translates to spool shop.) The place combines traditional Polish dishes with a more modern and at times international approach. For example, you'll find on the menu a main course that is right out of my childhood. We ate in Polish restaurants almost never when I was growing up, but I knew that if we would deem to step inside one, there would be on the menu a pork chop with potatoes and cabbage (unless they were all out of meat. That, much to a Pole's annoyance, was not uncommon).  At Szpularnia, you can get that pork chop, with potatoes and cabbage. I did not order that! Instead, I went for the perch dish (perch is hugely popular in Poland), followed by another Polish beloved -- the szarlotka, which is in fact an apple cake resembling an apple pie.

And now it's getting late and still, we have so much to see! 

 

We make it to the church, built with too many bricks to count! It has magnificent stained glass windows and predictably, I am absolutely awed by the ones depicting flowers.

There are old buildings and new shops that still could be explored, but we have put in a full day of sights already and so we head home. And of course, in the late afternoon, we get stuck in the traffic, reminding me more of Los Angeles at rush hour than of the Poland I know from way back when.

In Warsaw, I linger with Bee in her home for a bit -- her home is the home I've spent the most time in on my Warsaw visits and truly it is the home that I am happy to linger in any time, because right now I get to see it in full view and not just on a Zoom screen... Sigh...

 

Okay, tram back to the hotel, past the Palace of Culture where I get off... 

 

 

... and I walk over to some shops for some quick gift shopping for the Group parties still ahead of us, and too for a sweet treat for me. I thought about what else I would like to have while in Poland and of course, I remembered this:

 

That doughnut with rose jelly that really hits the spot at the end of a long day.

with love...