I've only been in Poland for 5 hours, only one of those daylight, and it's already stealing my heart away from the Baltics. The overnight bus made a flattish "V" shape southwest out of Lithuania to Olsztyn, and then northwest to Gdasnk. I had a good feeling about Poland as soon as I entered it. The road cuts its way through forest, and I snatched glimpses of the forest in the headlights of the bus through broken, disorientating sleep and despite increasing grumpiness at the prospect of developing deep vein thrombosis. Four hours later we stopped at Olsztyn for a few minutes, and as I stepped off the bus to stretch my veal-calfised legs, I looked back east and was treated to this for a sunrise.
Finally, as if designed to break down the last of anyone's resistance, the countryside on the way back up towards the Baltic coast opens up and dares you not to be impressed. I've wanted to come to Poland for a long time, and I'm happy I finally got round to it.
12 August: Gdansk
What a difference a day makes. Gdansk is a foreboding, sinister feeling city, and I feel distinctly uneasy here. Some cities have a good feel to them, and some have a bad feel. There are varying degrees of good and bad, but they're always one or the other - they never leave me feeling totally indifferent. And Gdansk, for me, is definitely not a good city. I feel on edge here, and tomorrow I'm getting the hell out here. I don't care where, but back to nature, back through that countryside I liked so much and towards the lakes is appealing.
I can't say I've been unlucky, given this is the only unenjoyable day I've had in 4 weeks, but to an extent you make your own luck, and I have to go and seek out the good things again.
The highlight of Gdansk, for me, was seeing the world's oldest recorded evidence of a gurn. This guy looks like a mate after a heavy session at DC10.
13 August: Gdansk - Mikołajki
Again, what a difference a day makes. I caught a train to Olsztyn and onward bus to the lakes. Again I was mesmerised by the countryside. The further I went, the more magnificent it became. At first it was flat, expansive plains that stretched out as far as the eye could see, and then later became more undulating. But always, always bathed in rich and vivid colours - golds, greens and countless shades of earth. It was like agriculture as visual art. And when we got closer to my destination - Mikołajki (pronounced Me-ho-why-key), the lakes and forests were unforgettable.
I arrived shortly after the sun had surrendered to an almost-full moon and went to check into the guest house I'd booked on the phone on the way. With regret, they'd had to release my room an hour earlier, as they weren't sure I was coming and I couldn't explain I'd be later than expected. But they'd found me a room a few doors down which was the perfect size for me and a quarter of the price, so everything's worked out great. The boy's luck is back.
I found a great pub, with a Polish dude outside onstage with a guitar. He opened with what sounded like an Irish song, in Polish, and then moved onto more traditional but lively songs. I couldn't understand a word, but it was great fun to watch the locals clap and sing along. And to hear "Wild Rover" in Polish later in the night and laugh about it with the locals was an unexpected and beautiful bonus.
14 August: Mikołajki
I woke up with a vicious hangover, having had a night with a couple of interesting and intelligent Polish girls about life. This was the view from my window this morning.
The girls are around my age, and were 9 years old when communism collapsed here along with the wall in Berlin. They said that everything changed almost immediately and opened up. It still amazes me that this stuff happened in my lifetime.
I rented a kayak, paddled out across the lake for a couple of hours and went for a swim to chase away the bastard behind my eyes. In that introspective thing that comes from time to time, it occurred to me that I'm kind of representing my family and friends on my travels. The beautiful and interesting places are the setting, the context, but it's the people, and the exchange of ideas and histories and cultures, and its opposite number - quiet reflection - that are the thing.
For every sunrise, there's a sunset. And this is tonight's. Shepherd's fuckin' delight, baby.
I had a fun night catching up again briefly with those girls but spoke most of the time to the man mixing my cocktails. He had the contrasting jobs of working in that bar for a few weeks and working on an oil platform in the North Sea off Norway the rest of the time. What a trip! If he could produce oil like he mixes cockies we'd either have permanent global war or permanent global peace. I'm not sure which
15 August: Mikołajki - Warsaw
I've got a flight to Kiev from Warsaw tomorrow so I made the trip down today. As it happens, it's Independence Day here today so there's not much open but happily I don't want to be running around doing lots of touristy things today. Warsaw's bloody big so it would be quite a mission. I came to an internet cafe, and while I've been in here there's been an awesome thunderstorm outside. So I'm sitting here, doing this, having a beer and listening to the karaoke they've got on and having some random banter about tomorrow's rugby. It's all good.
16 August: Warsaw - Kiev
It was interesting to get an aerial view of the Polish countryside on the flight to Kiev. Instead of the square shape you see in fields in many countries, the Polish fields I saw use long, thin, rectangular strips of land which gives the appearance of a massive wood laminate floor.
The instant heat on arrival into Kiev reminded me of Baghdad, as soon as you step from the plane to the terminal bus. At somewhere in the high 30s or low 40s c, the headline temperature wasn't quite as hot, but the humidity made up for it, and more. I've come to Kiev to meet up with a mate from my Baghdad days. He was the front man in the band I was in there, so when I saw him in the arrivals hall the Baghdad parallel was complete, both of us sweaty, excited and, above all, thirsty.
Kiev is unlike any other city I've been to. It's majestic, enormous, confusing and totally intriguing. It's as East as it gets if you're talking about Europe. Coming here with no knowledge of Russian, let alone comprehension of the Cyrillic alphabet, makes this a pretty overwhelming place. It's a little like Bangkok in terms of its size and chaos, and also the temperature for the first couple of days, though they say this is unusual for Kiev. But in Bangkok there are English signs everywhere so it's easy to navigate the city. Not here.
In some ways I think the Cyrillic alphabet is more confusing than, say, Arabic or Urdu. At least with those alphabets you know you've got no chance. But because some characters in the Cyrillic alphabet bear some kind of resemblance to ours, your brain leads you up blind alleys trying to identify how words might sound. In Germany I found it easy to remember a few words, as many have been assimilated into English while others, such as numbers, are similar enough that you can work with them without too much trouble. Estonian is part of the Finno-Ugric family of languages and would be a difficult language to learn, but the alphabet is similar to ours, with a few dots and squiggles thrown into the mix. Latvian and Lithuanian are the 2 surviving Baltic branches of the Indo-European family, and again bear similarity to our alphabet with minor variations. Polish is a bit more of a curve ball, with some pronunciations being very different from what you'd expect, but again the characters themselves are broadly recognisable. With the Cyrillic alphabet, you're pretty much robbed of any such reference point.
So I was very fortunate that my friend has lived and worked in or near this region for years and is fluent in Russian to the point of it being more or less his first language. But why Russian, if we're in Ukraine? It's true that Ukrainian is the official language here, and everyone is taught in Ukrainian. Official announcements and the TV news are delivered in Ukranian. However, the vast majority of Ukrainians use Russian in everyday conversation and don't like to speak Ukrainian. There are "language police" who might check up on businesses, so menus in bars and restaurants are in Ukrainian but almost everyone interacts in Russian, so they jump through the hoops that they have to jump through in order to keep the authorities happy, but in reality Russian is king.
We went to a karaoke bar one night which was one of the more unique and random experiences I've had. The songs were in Russian, so while I couldn't identify any of the songs or the words, it was an eye opener to say the least. The group on the table behind us were half singing, half slurring songs from the old gangster city of Odessa, so we were speculating as to whether they would belt out a couple of numbers and the go launder some money or something. My mate, for his part, sang a few Russian songs, very well, which went down a treat. He'd always told me in Baghdad about how he'd go to karaoke bars in Ukraine, Georgia, Russia or in the Stans and belt out songs in Russian, so it was nice to see the man in action. There were a few songs on the menu in English, so I could have got up and sang something, but I was concerned that if I did, the gangsters on the table behind might have had me "clipped" and buried in cement, so I kept my counsel and happily absorbed the experience.
The next day we went to one of several beaches lining the Dnipro River, which splits the city. The sand was fine, and the water was the perfect temperature for another sweltering day. Joe's girlfriend' Natalia, doesn't speak a word of English so poor Joe had to translate for 3 days, which must have been exhausting.
In the 1930s, under Stalin, a farmer might be visited by a State official, who would ask how much the farmer produced. If the farmer replied, say, 2 tonnes of whatever per year, the State official would say that the farmer had to produce 4 tonnes, of which the first 3.5 went to the State and the farmer could keep the rest. Natalia's grandmother was around 11 years old when starvation nearly claimed her. She went blind and her skin was a dark, almost black colour from malnutrition. Her brother led her 11 kilometres to the nearest hospital, where they took her in. She survived, regained her sight and is alive and well today, as is her brother. Other family members - there were 8 siblings - didn't make it, along with so many others. Yet another tragic but fascinating personal account that's one of millions that make up the crazy history of the region.
One thing that made me laugh was the driving. There would be no point asking a cab driver to get you from A to B as fast as possible - that's the default approach. It's like being in a game of Grand Theft Auto. These guys like driving like maniacs about as much as they like vodka. And they like vodka just fine.
19 August: Kiev - Warsaw - Krakow
By the time I left Kiev, I'd become a little more comfortable with Cyrillic, and found myself able to seek out and identify a few characters. I still think it would take a good while to be anything like comfortable with the whole alphabet, and there's no doubt that learning the language would be a monumental task. I had a great time in Kiev and would recommend it to anyone, though if you can get a guide who can navigate the lingo for you it would be money well spent.
So it was in and out of Warsaw and a late evening arrival into Krakow. And straight in and out for what turned into a late night with some people from the hostel at a good club which was underground with arches with a couple of main rooms. I knew I would party in Krakow but it turned out to be a big session. It was fun dancing on a bar until the sun came up. Krakow's got a nice feel to it and the people are friendly. I was keen to go to the Wieliczka salt mine nearby and would have considered Auschwitz too, but sadly got round to neither. I'll have to come back to Krakow and see it properly.
22 August: Krakow - Zakopane
Zakopane, nestled at the foot of the Tatra mountains, is my last stop on the way to Slovakia. I was looking forward to coming here and hoping to do some hiking in the hills, but the weather's closed in and my foot's giving me grief. I'm going to an area of national park which is said to be spectacular, so I don't feel so bad about missing out here.
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