A Simple Use of Idiom
Location: Warsaw, Poland
Liver Status: Creaking Under Strain
October 12
Night spent in the Helsinki airport. Had to book flights separately due to schedule uncertainty. Flew Rovaniemi to Helsinki around 7:00 PM on the 11th, but flight to Warsaw isn't until around 9:00 AM. Fortunately, airport very quiet and cosy, with chairs in easy-to-sleep layout. Manage a full 3 hours of sleep. Getting through check-in, security, and customs during "rush-hour" takes a long time, but gets done. Yet another security problem... these guys can't seem to get enough of rifling through my carry-on bag and making me empty my pockets completely. Do I look scarier than I had previously believed? Simply must stop twisting mustache and cackling while proceeding through security. Also should get rid of turban.
Flight to Warsaw very pleasant. First impression of Poles is not. Group of guys on same flight are very macho intimidating types. Have to stare them down quite a bit. Not exactly sure of their nationality, to be fair. Did catch derisive talk of "Amerikanner," or some such, for whatever that is worth. In any case, not the best of first impressions to have of a country. Second impression is even worse. Reading bus schedules at the airport is incredibly difficult if you are both in Poland and completely ignorant of the Polish language. Handy-dandy Lonely Planet guide gives me a good bus number to find, but there are giant signs warning of roadwork proceeding and detoured busses, so I want to confirm. Inside airport is large kiosk labeled "Tourist Information." Surely they will be helpful. And they might be helpful in some situations, I suppose. Like if you need a curling iron stabbed into your eye. With matters relating to tourist information, however, they are less friendly. The woman running the booth treated my very polite, simple request for knowledge of bus routes as a fucking Inquisition, as if I, bedecked in oily goatee and shiny red robes, was claiming that my three weapons are fear, surprise, and a fantical devotion to the Pope. Armed with only frustration, I take a chance and hop on the bus. My powers of awesomeness overcome, and I make it to the correct stop without incident.
My hostel (Nathan's Villa Hostel) is absolutely swank. It has a gate and a courtyard and everything. Free internet, free laundry, wonderful facilities, free tea and coffee, complementary toast breakfast, the works. And for a very, very good price. Hands down the best hostel I've ever stayed at. Things are looking up. I get settled and go to meet the guys.
Before coming to Warsaw, I had contacted, through the L5R community, a couple of guys in the city, who graciously offered to show me the city and teach me about Poland. This was the full-on open arms treatment. These guys went way above and beyond the call of duty to make sure that I had a good time in Warsaw, and they
deserve every bit of credit I can give them. One of the, Maciek, is a shy, willowy 5th year diplomacy student at the local university who has yet to blossom into everything he could be, but already has a good heart and a soft-spoken conversational manner that's quite nice to experience. Jeske is the exact opposite, a giant round beast of an Austrian-born Polish intellectual, a little out of his head and very outgoing. Both of them have an incredibly good command of English, with Maciek taking the lead in a desire to learn more. Jeske's bad-B-movie stereotypical Eastern-European accent and idiom are hilarious, as I discovered in about five minutes.
The three of us spent the afternoon sightseeing in Warsaw's Old Town, which is absolutely beautiful. Jeske, as it turns out, has a master's degree in history, and is very talkative, and between him and Maciek I get an incredible earful of Polish culture and history in a very short period of time. I'm eating it up. This is exactly the kind of thing that I wanted from traveling Europe. These guys are awesome. We see the Royal Castle (closed so we couldn't take a tour of the interior), the Barbican, various cathedrals and squares, parks, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (the Polish version, guarded by very shifty-eyed soldiers), etc. Really great stuff.
Warsaw, like other towns in Europe, is absolutely littered with statues. Everywhere. The fun thing here is that virtually all of them depict someone bearing a scimitar or sabre. Even the mermaid statue. The mermaid has a scimitar. I do love the imagry of Ariel, upon regaining her voice from Ursula's clutches, leading aquatic Saracen armies to holy conquest in the world's most trout-laded jihad.
After the sightseeing and a delicious kebab (even cheaper than in Brussels), the three of us head to a local favorite bar called Paradox. It's near the US Embassy, just a couple blocks from the hostel. It's a real cellar pub, full of books and board games, rough wooden tables and a great atmosphere. We grab a few rounds of proper Polish beers, all of which are just as good as the Poles would claim, hang out, and play some cards. By the time we call it a night, I am very pleasantly exhausted.
October 13
The Polish language, as it turns out, is extremely easy to understand. All you have to do is take any word in English, replace every other vowel with a Z, every other consonant with a C, and add seven extra R's at random. You have now created the Polish word that means the exact opposite of the word you started with. You should, however, under no circumstances, actually pronounce any of these extra letters. To do so would be a heinous act of linguistic sedition. To correctly pronounce everything, first drink three liters of beer and speak with your mouth full of potatoes. Oh, and the letter W is apparently a servant of some dark, Western conspiracy, so treat all of them as V's. This is the only country where reading a street sign can make you sweat blood.
Today doesn't go exactly as planned. Maciek and I planned on doing some sightseeing, which were kind of able to do, but there was stuff that needed transplanting from various apartments to various dorms, which cut into our plans. We did manage to see a good bit of south-central Warsaw, which is veritably festooned with parks. Beautiful parks, full of rose bushes and statues. One of them is a tribute to the composer Chopin, with an enormous statue of him surrounded by a reflecting pool and rows of rose bushes. I hear tell that they hold piano concerts here in summer, and I can see why. I give the statue the finger and move on.
Lunch at a local Thai place. Apparently Poles call all Asian food "Chinese Food," so I take the opportunity to educate Maciek on the particulars of distinguishing different types. I am not the best at this, lacking the California citizenship that allows me to pinpoint East-Central Viatnamese food and comment, nose held high, about how much better it is at the place I normally go to. But I try regardless. In any case, the food is very good, cheap, plentiful, and different from what I have been existing on.
We hang out a bit at Maciek's dorm, which is built like a friggin' prison. I don't mean that it is squat, concret, and ugly, even though it is. I mean that they treat visitors and guests alike with a disdain usually reserved for Shawshank Penitentiary. To crash on his spare bed for the night, we are actually charged 8 zlotys. WTF? Upon questioning, I find that this policy is indeed universal; if one meets a girl at a bar and decides to bring her home to show her your 'Warsaw Uprising,' one must register and pay for her to stay at the front desk. Do these people not understand that this is the students' home? Why this system has been allowed to continue escapes me.
Later, we head out to the aptly named Rock and Roll Cafe, a local basement bar loaded down with classic and metal rock posters, with a musical selection piped through that is absolutely second to none. Maciek and I have a couple rounds of beers and people watch. I have now had 4 types of Polish beer, all of which are stellar. We then head back to Maciek's place to catch some shut-eye.
Maciek's tiny dorm room is home to three guys, one of whom is out of town, leaving me his bed. The second is a guy named Peter, who is about as standoffish as a guy can get. Maciek theorizes that he is embarrassed at being the only one in the room who doesn't speak English? So? I'm the only guy in the room who doesn't speak Polish, and I can at least look him in the eye and smile politely. I get the feeling that Peter is much like Rich, my ex-roomate from hell, a roughly anti-socialite whose only friends are drinking buddies. I feel bad for Maciek having to live with him. He deserves better.
October 14
There used to be Jews here. Now there aren't. Simple as that.
I've learned quite a lot over the years about World War II and the Holocaust. Facts, figures, pictures, videos, testimonials, autobiographies, everything. But one thing I had never considered was a simple truth that Jeske pointed out: They're just not there anymore. One simply doesn't see Jews on the streets of Warsaw these days. Out in the countryside, whole towns have been reclaimed by the earth after their complete depopulation. It is a very interesting and very horrible thing to think of such atrocities in terms of "they used to be here, now they're just gone." It is amazing that after over 50 years, Polish society is still reeling from the surgical removal of one of it's most important elements.
Today is tournament day. Jeske, Maciek, myself, and a friend of theirs took a drive down to the town of Czestochowa for an L5R tournament. By this time, I'm a big believer in using this game, this hobby of mine, as a tool for meeting and interacting with new people. It's an excellent utensil for the job. The tournament is fun as always, and amazingly enough, I win, going undefeated in 8 straight games. The Poles are universally amazed, expressing shock and awe at my ability to build and play a deck typically considered crap. It's a very good ego day. Plus it was an excuse for a road trip, which is always fun.
By the time we get back into town, there is barely enough time to retrieve my stuff from Maciek's dorm and call Jen before heading to Jeske's parents' apartment, where he has graciously extended the invite to sleep for the night. The trek out there involves a tram, a subway, and about 30 minutes of walking, all while toting everything I own, but we got there eventually. An added challenge was actually finding Jeske to let us into the building, who decided to wait for us lurking in the bushes instead of out in the open.
Oh, and along the way I flip off the Palace of Culture and Science.
We spend the night drinking heavily, beer and vodka, and talking of life and love. As it turns out, a good, manly Polish vodka shot is 100 mL, which is bloody enormous. Never to be outdone, I threw back with the guys, and by the time bed rolled around, I was feeling fantastic. Maciek is in the middle of a crisis of the heart, so Jeske and I spent the night trying to revive his belief in romance, which made my little heart positively glow with thoughts and talk of Jenny.
Even the best must eventually hit the sack, and so I do.
October 15
Up at ten and out by noon, which is later than we had thought. Jeske had to go to work early, but he went in late so that we would have the opportunity to sleep in. That's a good friend, right there. Maciek went to his place to get yet more sleep, and I struck out on my own for further sightseeing.
Took a tour of the Royal Castle, since I found out that admission is free on Sundays. When I get there, I'm just in time to slip in with a tour group of university professors from all over Europe who are in town for a conference. This is a special tour organized especially for them, but I exercised my favorite policy of "If you pretend like you have a right to be there, people will let you in." It works perfectly. The tour is fantastic, with a great guide and some truly crazy-shit professors who practically sweat enthusiasm. The castle, completely destroyed during WWII and then rebuilt exactly as it had been, is beautiful, all gold and marble. I got to see an entire wing of the castle not normally open to tours that they opened just for these professors, so I felt very badass. Flipped off the Senatorial Chamber for good measure.
When leave, there is an open air contemporary Christian concert in the square. Hilariously stereotypical, even if it is in Polish. Watch for a minute, flip off the outside of the Castle, and I'm on my way.
Some weird religious service at a giant cathedral nearby. Public communion? People packed in cheek-by-jowl and spilling out onto the street. Don't know what's going on, but give a couple zlotys to a girl collecting money for some good cause. She gives me a lapel sticker that I can't read and I move on.
In another cathedral a rehearsal for some sort of rock orchestra is underway. Very fun to watch. I stay for a minute and check it out. Cathedrals around here are gorgeous and the acoustics are awesome, as one might expect.
I call Jen, then head back to the hostel to meet Maciek for dinner. I have now realized that I left my bushman's hat at Jeske's parents' place. Not sure what to do about that.
Maciek and I grab a kebab then hang out having tea for a while. We say our goodbyes and I hit the sack. Gotta catch the train early tomorrow.
Progress Thus Far:
Countries Visited: 3
Stupid Tourist Moments: 17
Monuments Flipped Off: 12
Free Food Ganked: 3
Free Booze Ganked: 11
if you've never stared off into the distance than your life is a shame.
-Counting Crows
Liver Status: Creaking Under Strain
October 12
Night spent in the Helsinki airport. Had to book flights separately due to schedule uncertainty. Flew Rovaniemi to Helsinki around 7:00 PM on the 11th, but flight to Warsaw isn't until around 9:00 AM. Fortunately, airport very quiet and cosy, with chairs in easy-to-sleep layout. Manage a full 3 hours of sleep. Getting through check-in, security, and customs during "rush-hour" takes a long time, but gets done. Yet another security problem... these guys can't seem to get enough of rifling through my carry-on bag and making me empty my pockets completely. Do I look scarier than I had previously believed? Simply must stop twisting mustache and cackling while proceeding through security. Also should get rid of turban.
Flight to Warsaw very pleasant. First impression of Poles is not. Group of guys on same flight are very macho intimidating types. Have to stare them down quite a bit. Not exactly sure of their nationality, to be fair. Did catch derisive talk of "Amerikanner," or some such, for whatever that is worth. In any case, not the best of first impressions to have of a country. Second impression is even worse. Reading bus schedules at the airport is incredibly difficult if you are both in Poland and completely ignorant of the Polish language. Handy-dandy Lonely Planet guide gives me a good bus number to find, but there are giant signs warning of roadwork proceeding and detoured busses, so I want to confirm. Inside airport is large kiosk labeled "Tourist Information." Surely they will be helpful. And they might be helpful in some situations, I suppose. Like if you need a curling iron stabbed into your eye. With matters relating to tourist information, however, they are less friendly. The woman running the booth treated my very polite, simple request for knowledge of bus routes as a fucking Inquisition, as if I, bedecked in oily goatee and shiny red robes, was claiming that my three weapons are fear, surprise, and a fantical devotion to the Pope. Armed with only frustration, I take a chance and hop on the bus. My powers of awesomeness overcome, and I make it to the correct stop without incident.
My hostel (Nathan's Villa Hostel) is absolutely swank. It has a gate and a courtyard and everything. Free internet, free laundry, wonderful facilities, free tea and coffee, complementary toast breakfast, the works. And for a very, very good price. Hands down the best hostel I've ever stayed at. Things are looking up. I get settled and go to meet the guys.
Before coming to Warsaw, I had contacted, through the L5R community, a couple of guys in the city, who graciously offered to show me the city and teach me about Poland. This was the full-on open arms treatment. These guys went way above and beyond the call of duty to make sure that I had a good time in Warsaw, and they
deserve every bit of credit I can give them. One of the, Maciek, is a shy, willowy 5th year diplomacy student at the local university who has yet to blossom into everything he could be, but already has a good heart and a soft-spoken conversational manner that's quite nice to experience. Jeske is the exact opposite, a giant round beast of an Austrian-born Polish intellectual, a little out of his head and very outgoing. Both of them have an incredibly good command of English, with Maciek taking the lead in a desire to learn more. Jeske's bad-B-movie stereotypical Eastern-European accent and idiom are hilarious, as I discovered in about five minutes.The three of us spent the afternoon sightseeing in Warsaw's Old Town, which is absolutely beautiful. Jeske, as it turns out, has a master's degree in history, and is very talkative, and between him and Maciek I get an incredible earful of Polish culture and history in a very short period of time. I'm eating it up. This is exactly the kind of thing that I wanted from traveling Europe. These guys are awesome. We see the Royal Castle (closed so we couldn't take a tour of the interior), the Barbican, various cathedrals and squares, parks, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (the Polish version, guarded by very shifty-eyed soldiers), etc. Really great stuff.
Warsaw, like other towns in Europe, is absolutely littered with statues. Everywhere. The fun thing here is that virtually all of them depict someone bearing a scimitar or sabre. Even the mermaid statue. The mermaid has a scimitar. I do love the imagry of Ariel, upon regaining her voice from Ursula's clutches, leading aquatic Saracen armies to holy conquest in the world's most trout-laded jihad.
After the sightseeing and a delicious kebab (even cheaper than in Brussels), the three of us head to a local favorite bar called Paradox. It's near the US Embassy, just a couple blocks from the hostel. It's a real cellar pub, full of books and board games, rough wooden tables and a great atmosphere. We grab a few rounds of proper Polish beers, all of which are just as good as the Poles would claim, hang out, and play some cards. By the time we call it a night, I am very pleasantly exhausted.
October 13
The Polish language, as it turns out, is extremely easy to understand. All you have to do is take any word in English, replace every other vowel with a Z, every other consonant with a C, and add seven extra R's at random. You have now created the Polish word that means the exact opposite of the word you started with. You should, however, under no circumstances, actually pronounce any of these extra letters. To do so would be a heinous act of linguistic sedition. To correctly pronounce everything, first drink three liters of beer and speak with your mouth full of potatoes. Oh, and the letter W is apparently a servant of some dark, Western conspiracy, so treat all of them as V's. This is the only country where reading a street sign can make you sweat blood.
Today doesn't go exactly as planned. Maciek and I planned on doing some sightseeing, which were kind of able to do, but there was stuff that needed transplanting from various apartments to various dorms, which cut into our plans. We did manage to see a good bit of south-central Warsaw, which is veritably festooned with parks. Beautiful parks, full of rose bushes and statues. One of them is a tribute to the composer Chopin, with an enormous statue of him surrounded by a reflecting pool and rows of rose bushes. I hear tell that they hold piano concerts here in summer, and I can see why. I give the statue the finger and move on.
Lunch at a local Thai place. Apparently Poles call all Asian food "Chinese Food," so I take the opportunity to educate Maciek on the particulars of distinguishing different types. I am not the best at this, lacking the California citizenship that allows me to pinpoint East-Central Viatnamese food and comment, nose held high, about how much better it is at the place I normally go to. But I try regardless. In any case, the food is very good, cheap, plentiful, and different from what I have been existing on.
We hang out a bit at Maciek's dorm, which is built like a friggin' prison. I don't mean that it is squat, concret, and ugly, even though it is. I mean that they treat visitors and guests alike with a disdain usually reserved for Shawshank Penitentiary. To crash on his spare bed for the night, we are actually charged 8 zlotys. WTF? Upon questioning, I find that this policy is indeed universal; if one meets a girl at a bar and decides to bring her home to show her your 'Warsaw Uprising,' one must register and pay for her to stay at the front desk. Do these people not understand that this is the students' home? Why this system has been allowed to continue escapes me.
Later, we head out to the aptly named Rock and Roll Cafe, a local basement bar loaded down with classic and metal rock posters, with a musical selection piped through that is absolutely second to none. Maciek and I have a couple rounds of beers and people watch. I have now had 4 types of Polish beer, all of which are stellar. We then head back to Maciek's place to catch some shut-eye.
Maciek's tiny dorm room is home to three guys, one of whom is out of town, leaving me his bed. The second is a guy named Peter, who is about as standoffish as a guy can get. Maciek theorizes that he is embarrassed at being the only one in the room who doesn't speak English? So? I'm the only guy in the room who doesn't speak Polish, and I can at least look him in the eye and smile politely. I get the feeling that Peter is much like Rich, my ex-roomate from hell, a roughly anti-socialite whose only friends are drinking buddies. I feel bad for Maciek having to live with him. He deserves better.
October 14
There used to be Jews here. Now there aren't. Simple as that.
I've learned quite a lot over the years about World War II and the Holocaust. Facts, figures, pictures, videos, testimonials, autobiographies, everything. But one thing I had never considered was a simple truth that Jeske pointed out: They're just not there anymore. One simply doesn't see Jews on the streets of Warsaw these days. Out in the countryside, whole towns have been reclaimed by the earth after their complete depopulation. It is a very interesting and very horrible thing to think of such atrocities in terms of "they used to be here, now they're just gone." It is amazing that after over 50 years, Polish society is still reeling from the surgical removal of one of it's most important elements.
Today is tournament day. Jeske, Maciek, myself, and a friend of theirs took a drive down to the town of Czestochowa for an L5R tournament. By this time, I'm a big believer in using this game, this hobby of mine, as a tool for meeting and interacting with new people. It's an excellent utensil for the job. The tournament is fun as always, and amazingly enough, I win, going undefeated in 8 straight games. The Poles are universally amazed, expressing shock and awe at my ability to build and play a deck typically considered crap. It's a very good ego day. Plus it was an excuse for a road trip, which is always fun.
By the time we get back into town, there is barely enough time to retrieve my stuff from Maciek's dorm and call Jen before heading to Jeske's parents' apartment, where he has graciously extended the invite to sleep for the night. The trek out there involves a tram, a subway, and about 30 minutes of walking, all while toting everything I own, but we got there eventually. An added challenge was actually finding Jeske to let us into the building, who decided to wait for us lurking in the bushes instead of out in the open.
Oh, and along the way I flip off the Palace of Culture and Science.
We spend the night drinking heavily, beer and vodka, and talking of life and love. As it turns out, a good, manly Polish vodka shot is 100 mL, which is bloody enormous. Never to be outdone, I threw back with the guys, and by the time bed rolled around, I was feeling fantastic. Maciek is in the middle of a crisis of the heart, so Jeske and I spent the night trying to revive his belief in romance, which made my little heart positively glow with thoughts and talk of Jenny.
Even the best must eventually hit the sack, and so I do.
October 15
Up at ten and out by noon, which is later than we had thought. Jeske had to go to work early, but he went in late so that we would have the opportunity to sleep in. That's a good friend, right there. Maciek went to his place to get yet more sleep, and I struck out on my own for further sightseeing.
Took a tour of the Royal Castle, since I found out that admission is free on Sundays. When I get there, I'm just in time to slip in with a tour group of university professors from all over Europe who are in town for a conference. This is a special tour organized especially for them, but I exercised my favorite policy of "If you pretend like you have a right to be there, people will let you in." It works perfectly. The tour is fantastic, with a great guide and some truly crazy-shit professors who practically sweat enthusiasm. The castle, completely destroyed during WWII and then rebuilt exactly as it had been, is beautiful, all gold and marble. I got to see an entire wing of the castle not normally open to tours that they opened just for these professors, so I felt very badass. Flipped off the Senatorial Chamber for good measure.When leave, there is an open air contemporary Christian concert in the square. Hilariously stereotypical, even if it is in Polish. Watch for a minute, flip off the outside of the Castle, and I'm on my way.
Some weird religious service at a giant cathedral nearby. Public communion? People packed in cheek-by-jowl and spilling out onto the street. Don't know what's going on, but give a couple zlotys to a girl collecting money for some good cause. She gives me a lapel sticker that I can't read and I move on.
In another cathedral a rehearsal for some sort of rock orchestra is underway. Very fun to watch. I stay for a minute and check it out. Cathedrals around here are gorgeous and the acoustics are awesome, as one might expect.
I call Jen, then head back to the hostel to meet Maciek for dinner. I have now realized that I left my bushman's hat at Jeske's parents' place. Not sure what to do about that.
Maciek and I grab a kebab then hang out having tea for a while. We say our goodbyes and I hit the sack. Gotta catch the train early tomorrow.
Progress Thus Far:
Countries Visited: 3
Stupid Tourist Moments: 17
Monuments Flipped Off: 12
Free Food Ganked: 3
Free Booze Ganked: 11
if you've never stared off into the distance than your life is a shame.
-Counting Crows
posted by Will Jones at 4:29 PM
3 Comments:
I know your deck is good, but is the caliber of players that much different form the US?
Oh, and Jeske looks like your kinda man, just from the picture.
Send me a fabulous beer if you can too. I'll pay you back via Paypal if I have too.
Sounds like you're having an awesome time travelling around! I love to read about what you are doing and where you are in the world!! This make me think about all the fun and good times we had in Australia. I miss you!
I remember rich from hell. I still tell the story about how I was revolted at how he was drinking somewhere near a 3 shot coke 10 shot rum rum and coke at 10AM on a Sunday.
It makes me want to cry a little.
Glad you're having a good time. Flip off some monuments for me.
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