Teutonic Poland

I was standing in the hall of a moving train, watching the Mazovian plain wisp by. Intermittently a red pine forests would obscure my view, and then, in the blink of the eye, it would go back to the long yellow grain fields. In Mazovia there’s not much variation in the landscape, but you can tell you’ve entered Mazury when that changes. The terrain starts to softly undulate and the energy begins to localize in the towns between the hills.

A friend of mine was leaving for his home back in Sweden. He spent 2 years in Poland, and at this point he felt like he hadn’t dropped anchor here, so he bought a new flat back in Stockholm and started contemplating his next step. As a going away present, his colleagues asked him if he would like to visit anywhere. He said, “castles with sword fighting.” They searched the internet and found the Teutonic castle at Nidzica. After hearing about it, I decided to join him for the day, because I too wanted to see castles and knights.

Poland has an astounding amount of Teutonic heritage. Nearly all of the well-preserved castles associated with the brotherhood are located within the Polish borders, with a few exceptions in the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad to the north. One of the most profound battles in European and world history happened between the Kingdom of Poland and the Teutonic Order in 1410. Called the Battle of Grunwald by the Poles and the Battle of Tannenberg by the Germans, the Teutonic loss was a humiliation that simmered in European politics for centuries and even influenced German propaganda in WW1 as well as the ideology of Hitler and consequently the German extermination tactics in Poland in WW2 through ‘Operation Tannenberg.’

All of the Teutonic castles in Poland are located in the north, in a region known as Mazury, more commonly called the Lake District. It’s an area that is traditionally considered the most underdeveloped part of Poland. Historically Mazury belonged to East Prussia, but this region of the Prussian empire was broken in two after Germany’s loss in WW2, and subsequently divided between the newly established communist People’s Republic of Poland, and the burgeoning Soviet Union. Suddenly, Poland had control over land it had never had direct control over before. Left behind in this stunning yet undeveloped region was the legacy of the Teutonic Order in the form of many gothic red brick castles.

Arriving in Nidzica, we were immediately greeted by the most communist brutalist train station I’ve seen so far in Poland. It was an eerie cement structure with a seemingly permanently closed cashier. Passing through the inside gave you a dusty chill down the spine. Exiting onto the street side there was an old red brick building that signified that we were now in former East Prussia. We caught site of a tourist information sign, and started to head off in that direction. Each sign turned us around another corner and pulled us towards the center of the small town of 15,000 inhabitants. In minutes we were passing through the main square where they were setting up a stage for a local summer concert. It’s amazing, when you’re living in Warsaw, you assume that there is no other activity going on anywhere around in Poland.

Another sign for the tourist office now pointed us around the castle, which we saw the towers of when we first entered the square. We thought it was best to get some information on our return train as well as other ideas on what we could do around Nidzica before we dived between the castle walls. We walked around the castle and found a sign pointing us back towards the castle. We walked up the hill and found another sign pointing us directly into the castle. Finally we realized that the tourist information office was situated in the middle of the castle courtyard.

We were greeted between the walls by costumed knights and medieval village folk, and an Egyptian snake charmer carrying a 10 foot yellow python. The Egyptian man asked us in Polish whether we would like to hold it for 15 PLN or not. In the center of the courtyard a number of the costumed villagers were dancing and singing, and on the other side of the courtyard we took a seat on a raised wooden pavilion and watched the show.

My friend and I ordered a couple of beers, and we started to talk. He told me the story about his Swedish origins, and about how was actually part German. His grandfather came from Germany and eventually set up a business in Sweden where he collected and sold hardened moose droppings to eccentric German tourists. Soon after, we were invited inside the museum by the helpful tourist information clerk.

We walked around the castle for a while and admired the shockingly sadistic medieval weapons and torture devices. The castle was not heavily guarded so we got into parts that were apparently closed to normal tourists. We stumbled upon a darkened room at the top of the castle filled with preset checkerboards that seemed ready for a tournament to begin soon. Laying on a table was the grand prize, an authentic forged sword.

Just outside the castle walls another kind of tournament was taking place. Knights in unique and different armors were hacking at each other with more real swords, and referees were deciding who hacked best. We watched as new knights would enter the ring to challenge the winner, but we couldn’t understand the scoring standards. The knights would bash each other with the sword, and the referees would yell stop when they saw fit, and then point to who they thought was the winner. Some moments seemed downright dangerous as the referee stood less than a meter away from a swinging sword that would easily lodge itself an inch deep into his face. The event was enthralling and especially with the dramatic music from the Lord of the Rings and Star Wars the Phantom Menace playing over a PA system.

My friend explained that these kind of events never gain so much attraction back in Sweden, especially from the older population, and that’s one thing he liked about Poland. Poles love to get involved with reenactments and they take them seriously. From the knights of the middle age to the soldiers in WW1, you can find a lot of dedicated Polish enthusiasts.

As the day went on we enjoyed our time in the small town, a carefree breath of fresh air away from the troubles of the big city. Around the courtyard were some pictures hanging, about the Russian and German soldiers in Nidzica during WW1, and I noticed in one of them a cemetery that had been built for the fallen during those battles. It was easy to guess the location of it in the picture, and we were curious, so we made our way to see if it still existed. On our way there we realized that if we continued we probably wouldn’t have enough time to catch our train, so we turned away from it and instead headed towards the station.

While on the way back we came across another cemetery, the town cemetery, and decided to take a quick look. The first graves I saw all had German names. All the Germans were expelled when this land became Polish, so I assumed that they came back here just to be buried. I looked at one of them, his name was Bernard Ludwig Otello, and he was born in 1897. He had lived in Nidzica, it was called Neidenburg when he was living there, for 48 years before being forced to go somewhere else. He died in 1985, a good 40 years after he left. It’s hard to imagine being expelled from your land after almost 50 years of memories.  The German graves highlighted the German past, and revealed that this Polish land is close to the hearts of more than just its current inhabitants. 

“Excuse me, does the mister have a cigarette?”

The clouds have been covering Warsaw for the past few days, and the mood is starting to resemble that of my hometown back in the States. There are grey skies and lush green foliage, and it’s a stark oppressing contrast that keeps every conversation from getting overly exciting. People constantly say they are in forgetful and woeful moods, and everybody seems to be distracting themselves in order to make it through to the sunny days to come.

I want to take this moment to think about something peculiar about the Polish language, something that sets it apart from most other languages, and something that you encounter early on while learning it. It plays a distinct role in the character of the Polish language, and maybe even the character of the nation and people itself. It’s really worth a quick look at, and if anybody were to do some tests on the psychology of language, I’m sure this would play an important role in the understanding of the Polish soul. I’m talking about the formal language that is used when addressing a stranger or elder. The polite language. A form of language that we have lost in American English, probably due to our affinity for equality and our innate resentment of being controlled or manipulated.

You can find this concept in most other languages, addressing somebody as sir or madam, or in French as monsieur or mademoiselle, and usually it is accompanied by a certain structure that implies a distance from the one you are addressing. In French you use the 2nd person plural, for instance, “Excusez-moi monsieur, avez-vous une cigarette?” Although, today you don’t find many young French people using the terms monsieur or mademoiselle, and same goes for sir and madam. In Russian you address strangers with vy (вы), which is the 2nd person plural, for instance, “Izvinitye, vy znayete kak idti v biblioteku?” (Excuse me, do you know how to get to the library?) This structure extends to most other languages in the Indo-European family with a few exceptions.

Most of these exceptions don’t even use their version of polite speech anymore (Italian, Spanish, Lithuanian) but there is one that uses it profusely, and that is Polish. The exception is that, instead of using the 2nd person plural, they will use the 3rd person singular. So in English the sentence would sound something like this, “Excuse me, does the mister have a cigarette?” And yes, you are saying that to the person who you want the cigarette from. In Polish it looks like this, “Przepraszam, czy ma pan papierosa?” Pan means sir or mister, and Pani is the female equivalent. The title of the great poetic epic, “Pan Tadeusz,” by Adam Mickiewicz, actually translates to “Sir Thaddeus,” even though you will usually find it under its original Polish title. To dissect the previous phrase a little further, “ma” means “he/she has,” but translates here as “you have,” whereas the usual polite form in other languages would be “macie” in Polish, which really means “you have.”

Lithuanian used to operate with a similar construction, and this is probably due to the close historical ties that these two countries have had to each other, but due to Russian influence and the Soviet Union, nowadays it’s version of this is used very rarely. That’s not the case in Poland though. Everybody uses this formal method of addressing.

“Would the miss like anything else?”

“Does this mister have sliced gouda cheese?”

“Does the mister know if there are any more tickets for tomorrow’s show?”

It’s quite a strange world to live in where you cannot address anybody directly, and this is why I say that maybe it has some affect on the social consciousness of Poles.

There is a high level of civility in Poland, and they are often times very sensitive people. The elderly are well respected and get quite offended if you don’t address them properly. They are proud of their history, and this language is historical language, coming from the once great nobility that ruled the Polish plains. It’s also harder to connect to a Pole as a real close friend, and in my opinion this kind of language could have something to do with it.

Besides the rambunctious hooligans that walk the street during a Legia football match, Poland is an incredibly polite country. As a foreigner, and especially an American, this kind of speaking takes some getting used to, but as you start to notice it, you realize that there is something very dignified about it that can momentarily transport you to other epochs of courtship and knighthood in the past. It’s a good idea to traverse some of Warsaw’s bazaars, and you’ll notice how this level of politeness really brings Polish people together in their appreciation for treating each other with respect.

Thanks for reading, and if you have any opinions or knowledge about this subject, please let me know in the comments.

100 Years Later

We were standing between two countries, yet not really in no man’s land. On one side were the mountainous Slovak lands, and on the other were the low river-plains of Poland. We had just exited the undergrowth of a Beskid Niski forest onto a paved road, and were now taking a mental breather, looking at the dual existence of the countries signs, before we would reenter the foliage and continue on the other side of the road.  

The Beskid Niski Mountains are a low lying sub-range of the greater Beskid Mountains that stretch from the corner of the Czech Republic, along the Polish-Slovakian border, and into Ukraine. This greater Beskid range then evolves into the much greater Carpathians which inhabit a large chunk of central and eastern Europe. It’s the mountain range where, because of Bram Stoker, bloodcurdling screams could be heard from Dracula’s castle while he bit the necks of his innocent victims. Luckily we weren’t anywhere near Transylvania.

Our hike was taking us through Gorlice county, where, 100 years ago from that day, a great offensive was being produced on the Eastern Front of World War 1. The group that organized this war-themed hike was named Studenckie Koło Przewodników Beskidzkich or SKPB.

As a group of about 25 of us trampled through the unseen path, following our well-trained guides, I looked at the backpack in front of me, and it started to transform into a ragged rucksack being carried by a Hungarian soldier, with clanking metal pots hanging off of it and a bayoneted rifle being held, poking out languidly towards the ground on the left side of the soldier, and our guides morphed into the commanders dragging us to the battlefields through the uncharted thick forests, where we would most likely fall victim to another bayonet and breath our last breath.

100 years ago the Gorlice-Tarnów offensive was taking place exactly in these mountains. This great offensive came after depressing futile attempts by the Austro-Hungarians to push the Russians back towards Ukraine. The commanders of the Austro-Hungarian armies had needlessly thrown many young soldiers into extreme mountain climates during the height of winter with little thought, causing many helpless and painful deaths. But, as winter dissipated, and conditions became easier to deal with, the Germans joined the Austro-Hungarians on the Eastern Front, and on May 2^nd, 1915, began pushing the Russians back through Gorlice county.

On May 2^nd, 2015, our group stopped in front of two mass graves hidden behind some trees. They were quadrilateral stone structures with bulky half-meter orthodox crosses, symbolizing that they were Russian soldiers. There were two stone plaques commemorating them, but it read in German, “Fallen in the field of honor, 150 Russian soldiers.” Lying beneath us were almost 300 Russian skeletons (the other plaque stated 130 Russian soldiers), but above ground the stone structure had been built by the Austro-Hungarians. At every cemetery we stopped at this would be the case. Most of them were mixed with Austrian, Polish, Hungarian, Ukrainian, Slovakian, German, and Russian soldiers, but all them were built by the Austro-Hungarians, and this concept of indiscriminately honoring soldiers during war, regardless of if they were the enemy or not, was beautifully enchanting.

The cemetaries in the region we were hiking had all been designed by a Slovak architect named Dušan Jurkovič. In designing them he took inspiration from the folk art of the surrounding Łemko people, who were the majority of the inhabitants of this area in 1915. Construction of these cemeteries began during the offensive, and most of them finally finished in 1918. The multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian Empire that produced them no longer existed. For the next three quarters of a century the Łemkos were relocated under communist Poland, so the area became depopulated, and the cemeteries fell into dilapidation. In the late 80s old cemeteries began to be rediscovered in forests that had grown over them, and throughout the 90s restoration projects took place that brought their existences back to reputable and honorable standards. Now they exist as hauntingly contemplative monuments.

We started in Grab, which sat isolated on a soft grassy hillside. There was a wooden structure built in the style of an old Slavic pagan temple. There was something eerie and mystifying about the shape, as though it was a long lost memory of the past. The headstones were wooden crosses, and here there was a mix of Russian and Austro-Hungarian soldiers. Next were the Russian mass graves at Ożenna, and then through the thick beech forests towards the former village of Czarne. This valley had once been populated by Łemko families, and even one gypsy family, but during communist times after the Second World War the population was moved to Soviet Ukraine and North-West Poland, and now there is only small clues that an entire community once lived there. We moved north towards Krzywa, and after a cold night, Kasia and I decided to split from the group, and head to the valley over, where we were in touch with a group from Warsaw that owned an old Łemko cottage in the village of Nowica.

On the road to Nowica, before hitting the Magura Małastowska pass, we were able to spot a little salamander that was famous in this region. It’s black and yellow and named the fire salamander. They are slow moving, and very poor at hiding, and we found one with its head buried in a crack in an old stump every few meters. The path we were on was incredibly scenic and the mist caused by the weather made our way mystical and imaginative. At the pass we reached the last cemetery that we would see on this trip. Between the spruce and silver firs the headstones of Poles, Ukrainians, Hungarians and Austrians protruded from the ground. Here there was even one Jewish headstone, also carved from wood; the only one we saw at any of the cemeteries. We took a moment to think about the consequences of this brutal opening to the 20^th century, and how these cemeteries have changed this landscape forever, and then we moved on towards Nowica. On the paved road we climbed up over the hill and as we were climbing we noticed a dead salamander on the road, squished by a car. A few meters later another one laid crushed with its guts exposed, and then another one and another one. Kasia began to shake, and she grabbed my arm and closed her eyes. As we passed another dead salamander I was reminded of the needless deaths of hundreds of thousands of young men who were not prepared to face the modern environment that was developing quickly before them. 

WW1 Cemetery in Southern Poland

Exploring Warsaw's New Metro Line

I set out to see the newly opened second metro line going east-west across Warsaw. The end of the line on the west side was only a six minute bus ride from my apartment in Wola, and began on Plac Daszyńskiego. The new line opened to the public on March 8th after a long delay. Originally said to be opened at the onset of the December holidays, mysterious reasons kept pushing the opening back. Recently though there was a stronger push to get it up and running, because one of the bridges crossing the Wisła caught fire, diverting and clogging a lot of central traffic. At the time of this incident I was staying in Wesoła in the far east of the city, and was unaffected by this sudden change. I took the suburban train which brought me straight to the center over a different bridge, but a friend of mine living much closer in Saska Kępa, one bus stop away from the bridge, said that after the bridge caught fire her commute skyrocketed from 30 minutes to two hours, because she had to circumvent the old route during high traffic. Initially officials were horrifyingly saying that the bridge wouldn't be reopened for a few years, maybe in 2017 or 2018, but more recently the Warsaw municipality has said that they hope to reopen it by fall of this year. That's a welcome relief for a lot of residents from the districts surrounding Łazienkowski Bridge.

With this backdrop the second metro line was to be hurriedly opened to ease the stress in the pressurizing center. The bus dropped me off at Plac Daszyńskiego and I peered around. From here I could see the skyscrapers of the city center. The ones that stood out were the imposing Złota 44 apartment complex, and Stalin's gift to Warsaw, the Palace of Culture and Science. Towering nearby was the Warsaw Spire currently under construction and revealing its skeletal insides. In order to soften this eyesore the tower is adorned with neon lights that spell out "Kocham Warszawę" (I love Warsaw). A few meters away was the entrance to the metro line, a strong red glass frame in the shape of an "M." I walked towards it and entered the first station.

The new metro line has a color theme, and at this first station I tried to think of the possible decisions for each color. Plac Daszyńskiego was red, but nothing was jumping to mind what that might symbolize. I already knew from pictures that Nowy Świat-Uniwersytet was purple, and I felt that was a good choice for a university stop, because purple was inherently a creative color, but the red remained a mystery. Later I realized that Plac Daszyńskiego was the stop for the Warsaw Uprising museum, and that the red could possibly be connected to this as a patriotic symbol, or even a color of the blood spilled by Warsaw's most praised heroes.

Waiting for the train to come I noted the cleanliness of the station, and the 90's pop-art style that reminded me a little of Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing." I also got a vague impression that I was standing in a contemporary art museum, and that next I would be looking at a Keith Haring exhibit. There was no time of arrival and I kept peeking up the tracks looking for the lights of the next train. Suddenly all the lights of the station flickered then went off for a brief moment, then back on, then off again. This happened five times, and a few people laughed, amused by the apparent ineptitude. The train finally arrived, and everyone boarded. I wondered if there would be any more shortcomings at the other stations.

...

Next was Rondo ONZ, the business center of Warsaw. The station is a calming and slick white, and I think the real connection with the color is the chic looking entrances around the roundabout. The colors here have a connection to modernity, technology, capitalism's love of glass, and the sleek and minimalist tastes of the nouveau riche. The entrances are airy and give off a sense of speed, and they really complement the business buildings surrounding them. Before this area was a little bit tedious to get to, like most of the stops on the new line, but now it's impressively easy, and it's not hard to imagine that this will have a profound effect on the businesses that operate along the line.

I went down again and took the train to the next stop, Świętokrzyska, which means Holy Cross in Polish. The station is yellow with hues of orange, and it's the station where you can switch to the first metro line, "conveniently," according to the recorded English voice with a slight Polish accent that played on the train before arriving to the station. The change was definitely convenient, and this new found convenience made me giddy. Although, the first line looks like a washed-up relic compared to the new line, and going through the lackluster purple and yellow frames into the old line is somewhat of a buzzkill.

I stepped outside for a look around, and immediately felt pity for the ugly first line. The entrance ways are grossly unattractive and have the look of an abandoned project. From afar they look more like entrances to gritty underground bazaars you could find in Central Asia or the Caucasus (Station Square in Tbilisi comes to mind). Compared to the thick and jagged highlighter-yellow "Ms", these ghost-white and faded-blue ancient arcs looked unfortunate and out of place. Luckily, I only found two of them at this intersecting station, while there were at least four new entrances.

I descended back inside the pristine new line and headed towards the station I had seen most in pictures, the university stop. I got off and found that the purple was not overwhelming, and thought that this was evidence of good planning. Nowy Świat-Uniwersytet, is also a portal to Warsaw's past, being situated at one of the most historic streets in the city. It wasn't overly difficult to get to before, but now the psychological effect that exiting the metro into this beautiful area has is lovely. After being destroyed in 1944, Warsaw had to build itself from scratch. The planners wanted to retain some of its original identity, but for the most part the city on the west bank of the Wisła lacked an old European look, that is until you reach Nowy Świat, where they worked meticulously to recreate its 19th century charm (although I would have loved to see it restored to its early 20th century art nouveau style). Suddenly you're among the neoclassical and baroque style architecture you find all across Europe, and exiting the confident purple frames onto the street, you get a real sense that you're really in Europe. Standing on the corner of Nowy Świat and Świętokrzyska streets, I felt a seismic shift in Warsaw. Suddenly the focus was taken away from its old communist center, and brought to balance between its contemporary progress and its proud historic past.

The next station was the Centrum Nauki Kopernik (Copernicus Science Center). As I exited the train I noticed a slight difference in style. The ceiling had changed from perforated plastic to solid sky blue. They were still doing some maintenance on the escalator. There was an old woman who couldn't speak, but wanted her picture taken. She made a beeping noise, much like beaker from sesame street, to people who passed by, and showed them at what angle she wanted the picture taken, pointing wildly and beeping at the same time. After she stopped two or three people she decided to leave, and I could hear her beeping all the way up the working escalator. I followed her and was drenched in light. The station kind of reminded me of the Pacific Science Center in Seattle. Parts of the escalator were exposed and you could examine its insides, and the sky-blue atmosphere gave the sensation of the altruism of science. Its situated near not only the Copernicus Science Center, but also five minutes by walking to one of the nicest academic institutions in the city, the BUW, or Warsaw University Library.

Two of the entrances don't have the thick glass "Ms" overhead, and I felt this a nice thought, in order to keep the feeling of openness at the station. I believe it's also probably because one of the exits brings you right to the bank of the Wisła, and a big glass structure would look out of place and ugly next to the slow moving grey calm of the river. I was ecstatic about this location, and started pondering my future excursions to the riverside.

At this point I sat down in the station and thought about the 930 meter long passage underneath the Wisła. Just above me would be the slow moving water of Poland's beating heart. Just two days before only the handful of construction workers had been able to pass underneath the historic river. Now for the first time in history everyone who bought a ticket would be able to do it.

We reached the other side of the river and exited into the largest of the seven stations. Stadion Narodowy was spacious and grass-field green. Its open space and tall ceilings were a welcome sight after the cramped enclosing space of the rest of the underground. The large pillars between the platforms are curious blossoms of concrete, and across the tracks you can see the preparation for additional metro lines still in their rudimentary stages. The exit emerged onto a desolate looking spot just on the other side of the train tracks that separate it from the main parking lot for the stadium. I thought that maybe it wasn't a good stop to get off if you feel like getting a bite to eat, but on the contrary I realized that just around the corner began one of the main roads in Praga Północ, Targowa street. Two minutes of walking and you could find almost anything you were looking for, be it a cafe or some kebab, a clothes store or some furniture.

I descended back into the green cavern, and boarded the train to the last stop on the line. The Polish accented English speaker made it clear that this was the terminus, and that everybody should leave the train. Dworzec Wileński station drops you off in the heart of Praga Północ, and next to one of my favorite buildings in Warsaw, the Polish Orthodox Cathedral of St. Mary Magdalene. It's a building that shows the beauty of Russian religious architecture, and you can admire it without having to go to Russia.

Praga is a different city in itself, historically somewhat disconnected from the more traditional center. It was the least destroyed part of the city during the war and it has an authenticity about it that makes it quite endearing. One of the best features about the district are little icons that populate many of the courtyards, many festooned with bright flowers. Finished with the line, I decided to take the rest of the day walking around the district, and I found at least five beautiful courtyard icons. Nearby was the famous Ząbkowska street, the heart of Praga Północ. A street that used to be a synonym for crime and destitution, but is now one of the trendiest places in Warsaw. It's said by many that hipster artist have been flocking to this area for the past few years, especially since its cleanup and renovation at the turn of the millennium.

On this street I found a cafe and bistro named Galeria Sztuki (Gallery of Art). I ate an excellent turkey dish with boiled potatoes, an artisan salad, and cream of leek soup for 18 PLN. As I was drinking my coffee in the rustic feeling cafe I looked out the window and marveled at how simple it was for me to get to this point. The seven stations take about 12 minutes to traverse, add another six minutes for a bus ride from my apartment, and I could be at a spot, that traditionally took me 40 plus minutes to get to, in less than 20 minutes. Warsaw is opening up now, and the possibilities are multiplying. This is an exciting time to be a Varsovian.

Lviv and Lwów, the Plight of Ukraine pt 2

While I was in Ukraine, 1,200 km and 15 hours of driving, on the other side of the country, a war was raging. Shadowy crimes against humanity were taking place that won’t really emerge until after the conflict simmers, or possibly never come to light at all. Surprisingly, while walking through the streets of the cultural capital of western Ukraine signs of the conflict were not very noticeable. There was a lot of Ukrainian memorabilia being sold on the streets, the bright blue and yellow were ubiquitous, but nothing that was provocatively nationalist, and signs that people were dying every day within the same borders were almost non-existent.

I happened to come across a monument to the great Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko where hundreds of candles in red and white glass cylinders had been placed in some sort of memorial. The thought crossed my mind that these could be for fallen fighters in the east, but the longer I looked at them the more I realized it had nothing to do with the war, and in fact it turned out to be commemorating a famous Ukrainian musician who died a few days earlier in a car crash near Dnipropetrovsk.

On one of the walls of the town hall in the central square there was a poster with 66 black and white photos of men who had presumably died in the conflict, but the writing underneath only ambiguously mentioned that these were heroes of the homeland. The purported nationalism in the west was not really noticeable, except for when my Russian speaking host suggested that I shouldn’t speak Russian.

I asked my host Ivan if there were signs of the war around the city, and he told me that of course they were everywhere. I asked him what kind of signs, and prompted the answer ‘posters,’ and he said, “Yes, posters.” Walking around many corners of the city, and keeping a special eye out for propaganda posters, I rarely came across anything overt.

Ukraine’s 20^th century can easily go down as one of the most tumultuous of any country in the history of humanity. At one point surrounded by two of the biggest and most genocidal powers to have ever existed, they were faced with impossible decisions and unavoidable subjugation. By both sides they were dehumanized and used as cannon fodder, sent to concentration camps and gulags, lied to about the possibility of independence, and generally violently forced into a form of servitude.

One of the most horrendous events of the 20^th century happened in the core of Ukraine. An event perpetuated by Moscow’s secret police, where the borders where internally cut off from the rest of the USSR, and the people deliberately starved to death. In just one year over 7,000,000 people died from the forced famine. The holocaust took four years and murdered around the same amount of people, give or take 1,000,000. The population of Ukraine before the Holodomer (the name of this genocide) was around 28,000,000. In the years of 1932 and 1933 one in four people would die by excruciating hunger.

Then World War II hit. Ukraine has an incredibly complicated history here, and there is no way to simplify it, but notably during this time the country went through two scorched earth policies, one at the beginning of the war while the Soviets were retreating, and during which vital infrastructure and historical buildings were blown to smithereens, and again after the battle of Stalingrad, during the Nazi retreat, where the Ukrainian land was again torched to ash.  An infernal fire blazed endlessly above Ukraine’s black soil, enveloping the people that walked upon it, and ruthlessly and indiscriminately bringing them to their disquiet grave. By the end of this event, again one in four Ukrainians would indiscriminately die. If you can imagine 79,000,000 Americans dying in the span of four years, or one year due to starvation for that matter, then you can come somewhere close to the psychological impact that these events had (and still have) on Ukrainian people.

After the war the Soviets systematically suppressed any nationalist movements, killing the leaders via trademark Moscovian assassination. Today Ukraine is in turmoil once again, and the violent aggressor is indubitably expansionist Moscow. Moscow is fighting a proxy war for control of rich resources, much like the Americans did in Iraq in the past decade, the difference being that Moscow wants direct control and Russian institutionalization, whereas America just wanted, and still wants, the resources. (I am making no moral judgment, just pointing out the difference in intention)

I finished my stay in Lviv, and headed towards the beautiful art-nouveau Austro-Hungarian train station. There I could catch a mini bus to the Polish-Ukrainian border. Under the illusion and romanticism of Lviv Ukraine’s conflicts were not heavily on my mind. I was well rested, and thoroughly enjoyed my stay. Everything was cheap, charming, and pleasurable.  

On the way home I met a Pole. He was a middle aged man, with some childlike energy (as many travelling Poles have), and he was from the area around Białystok near the border with Belarus, also near one of the most beautiful national parks in Poland, Białowieża. Through him I experienced a very different Lviv. He told me of the countless bodies being brought back home to the surrounding villages, of the constant talk of the conflict and Russian aggression, and of the secret Ukrainian nationalist bar where you must say “Slava Ukraina,” (Long live Ukraine) at the door in order to enter. Hearing this I felt like I missed something. I had a feeling that maybe a longer sojourn in Lviv was needed in order to come into contact with its true contemporary nature. He said he stayed with a friend who was a journalist, and through her he was able to experience Lviv for what it really was.

I crossed the border by foot. It was very easy, unlike crossing the border by car, which took us three hours. I bypassed the long line of Ukrainians by using my nonexistent American charm to go through the stations labeled 'Citizens of the European Union.' Surprisingly, the officers in charge of regulating the lines looked at my American passport once, snickered a little bit, and then with a smiling face and a strong Polish accent said, "I think yes," and I was on my way. 

On the other side I stood in awe of the old Ukrainian ladies that had passed the border just for a few hours in order to sell a bottle of vodka and two packets of cigarettes marked up about 200%. At one point a police car appeared at the end of the street, slowly creeping up towards the central location of the elderly smugglers. At this moment every single old lady, without exception, hid their paraphernalia under their knee length black and mauve overcoats and started walking at a snail’s pace towards the main highway 200 meters away.This was a real spectacle, and one that unfortunately reeked of desperation. I felt sorry for the 60 year old woman who whispered in my ear as I was entering the bus, “Będzie pan papierosy?” (Cigarettes for you sir?) Ukraine desperately needs something more. They need solidarity, belief, and some honesty that might put them on the road to stability. Eventually, if by a miracle things are done correctly, Lviv, and all of Ukraine could solidify its identity and become a prime example of the reconciliation of history.

Link to part 1

Old Ukrainian women trying to sell vodka on the Polish side of the border.

Photo was taken by the author

Lviv and Lwów, a European Palimpsest pt 1

Sitting across the table from me at the Kumpel’ gastropub and microbrewery near the center of Lviv was my host, Ivan. He was young, fit, and precocious, but often held his clenched fist hard against his left cheek, trying to hide the fact that he was cross-eyed. Ivan came from a Russian speaking family, and it was hard to get out of him whether he identified more as a Ukrainian or a Russian, but he explained to me that it would be wise not to use Russian in Lviv. 

With his fist still pressed against his cheek he told me, “Last week I hosted someone from Russia, and nobody would help her in the streets, because she was speaking only Russian. The opposite happened when I hosted a woman from Germany. She spoke English and everyone helped her.” I responded that despite knowing Russian I wouldn’t attempt to speak it in Lviv. Instead I would try my luck with bad Polish and some English.

***

There was a sign that pointed me the direction that I was intending to go, and I turned right down a sinuous cobblestone road. The sun is low on the blue horizon, even though it was midday. Its beams were cutting through the air around me making the weather crisp and invigorating. Suddenly the 19^th century building façade to the left disappeared and opened up to a vast empty contemplative square that evoked a feeling of the eternal. Across the square I saw a small stone wall, and the vibrant blue and yellow Ukrainian flag flying high next to a war memorial with bright bouquets of plastic flowers. Peeking out just beyond the low stone wall were the headstones of the Lychakiv cemetery.

I paid the few hryvna to enter, and the extra in order to take some photographs, then I grabbed a map and eagerly started my little expedition. Lychakiv is one of the oldest cemeteries in Europe, being founded in 1786. The great Pere Lachaise in Paris was first opened 18 years later in 1804. I spent most of my time looking for people that I might recognize, or trying to find the headstones that the map I bought recommended to me.  When I saw a unique sculpture I took a picture and tried to decipher who that person was and what he or she did to deserve such enchanting recognition after death.

There’s something humbling about wandering around such a cemetery, surrounded by the beauty, the inspiration and the expression of death. In a place like this it’s impossible not to put things into perspective. Every sculpture, every headstone represents the life of someone. From their resting place there evolved a new form, an immutable shape chiseled by a local artist to keep the memory of the withered body’s life alive forever. The most remarkable thing about walking here among the dead is the intense appreciation one begins to feel for life. The sound of the birds chirping becomes more pronounced, and the deep colors of brown, green and gray create a subtle longing. It is easy to contemplate love and poetry. Each individual stone is megalomaniacal yet at the same time admirable, and indubitably the eclectic pieces of art that you stumble upon in the great cemeteries of the world are always extraordinary.

My camera suddenly notified me that it could no longer read my memory card. This prompted me to take a more observant stroll, without being preoccupied with photography, listening to the rustling of the ivy on the trees and silence permeating from the stone graves. The beauty of this part of the world, the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains, struck me hard.

I headed towards the sub-cemetery within Lychakiv that is dedicated to Polish war heroes who fought for Poland against the Soviets, as well as in other battles, during the years of the Republic between the two World Wars. This drives home the fact that this city does not have a linear past. There are layers upon layers of influence, and there is not one singular identity that exists in its history. Controlled initially by the Kingdom of Ruthenia, then the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, as well as by the Habsburgs, the Republic of Poland, the Soviet Union, and Ukraine; there is much diversity to be admired. In the cemetery you can see headstones from every epoch, with names like Franz von Hauer, the governor of the Kingdom of Galicia during the rule of the Austro-Hungarian empire; Ivan Franko, one of the most prominent writers in Ukrainian and a great reformer of the language; Artur Grottger, a great Polish painter known for painting epic battles; Viktor Chukarin, one of the first of the abundant and talented Soviet gymnasts.

Sectioned off with its own wall, I entered the monotone Cemetery of Eaglets, as it’s known in Polish. There were rows of diminutive white stone crosses with slim red and white bands wrapped around the top of the cross, each with a name of one of the men, and if possible some relevant information.  I read some of the names. Jerzy Sieradzki, age 19, student at the polytechnic university; Bolesław Wizimierski, age 47, second lieutenant in the Polish Army; Rozwadowski, age unkown, occupation unknown.  There were hundreds more.

This part of the cemetery was bulldozed by the Soviets in 1971 to make way for new apartments, a good statement about the attitude of the Soviet empire towards local and national identity. But luckily the buildings were never realized, and in 2005 renovation  was completed by the Ukrainian government (how it looked in 1997) and it was reopened (how it looks now), showing goodwill to their Polish neighbor. It’s a beautiful and quiet place, and it shows the profound importance that this city still has in Polish history, being once the third largest city in the nation, behind Warsaw and Łódź. Polish citizens make the trip often to Lviv to see a city that they often associate as a symbol of Poland’s historical glory.

Link to part 2

Photo taken by the author

Quotes about Poland #1 "A Country in the Moon."

It's a snowy day in Warsaw, the first of the winter where the snow hasn't melted by nightfall. I look outside towards the grey blackening sky, and hope that tomorrow there will be more snow. Warsaw is an unromantic place in the winter without it. I want to take this opportunity to look at a few quotes from a memoir I recently read about Poland. Michael Moran's experience spans from 1992 to 2008, when he published the book. He has many astute, intuitive, and piercing things to say about the country that he fell in love with and where he eventually dropped anchor. This will be the first of a few parts, or maybe even a running series titled "Quotes about Poland." 

I turn around and see now that the light from the sun has disappeared, and what remains are the illuminations from the windows of the monotonous blocks of flats, suspended in mid-air like apparitions of portals that lead to separate unique worlds. They pattern the horizon like a vertical chessboard, and provide a fleeting sense of intimacy to the residential surroundings. Back to my bright monolithic, yet labyrinthine computer screen, I feel it's time to look at some quotes about Poland from the book A Country in the Moon: Travels in Search of the Heart of Poland by Michael Moran.

Moran-“Warsaw brings into question the nature of memory itself and the responsibility one owes to a fading past. The continued existence of this city is a miracle and it would churlish to criticize its mostly unlovely appearance. Between the wars Warsaw possessed one of the richest cultural and artistic scenes in Europe. The writers Isaac Bashevis Singer and Czesław Miłosz, both Nobel Prize winners, worked in the capital. The concert pianists Artur Rubinstein and Ignacy Jan Paderewski performed in an atmosphere of champagne and cultivated outrageousness. The most daring cabarets such as The Sphinx, the Black Cat and the notorious Qui Pro Puo flourished in Waraw to rival the most risqué cabaret in Berlin. Some considered it ‘the Paris of the north.’”

Sealth-It’s hard to say the same about today, although Warsaw continues to be a center for affluent growth. There’s a perennial feeling that something is developing along the old lines of a cultural hub in Central Europe, but it takes decades to wash away the stench and stagnation of communism. It’s easy to imagine that the citizens of this phoenix have a desire to slowly return it to its former glory, but more probable is the desire to transform it into something unprecedented and unique. This is one of the charms about living in 21^st century Warsaw.

Moran-“In Poland communism led to a complete erosion of ethics in almost all transactions of life outside the family and the few other ‘closed’ social groups.…The communist mentality of absolute distrust and veiled intentions will be difficult to eradicate….The cultivation of Byzantine defensive strategies was an imperative in Polish society if you were not a member of the Party….This is hardly surprising considering the severe penalties imposed by successions of totalitarian invaders if one ‘said the wrong thing.’ Most of my correspondences during the course of the breakdown of the project remained unanswered, telephone calls were not returned whether in English or Polish….Communism seems to have created a permanent climate of fear.”

Sealth-Here he is speaking about Poland in 1992, just 3 years after the fall of communism and the lifting of the Iron Curtain. To tell the truth there are still small traces of these practices. I was in touch with a potential employer who was half way through the visa process, when they changed their mind unexpectedly, and without an explanation. Eventually all communication ceased to exist, and they stopped answering my phone calls. There is disconnection in communication in the business world, and it makes even simple things like renting an apartment a testing experience. There is a major difference between generations though, and the farther Poland moves away from communism, the more open, communicative, collaborative, and ethical the country is becoming.

Moran-“The present generation of young people raised in freedom are largely unaffected by the communist upbringing of their parents. They could be on a different planet to their elders, yet many could profitably relearn the charm, graciousness and sensibility that Poles were famous for throughout Europe before the Second World War. A completely different breed of young Poles is emerging who are excellent at languages, highly skilled professionally, ambitious and hard-working, who have a more cosmopolitan and internationalist outlook.”

Sealth-Move over Germany, here come the Poles. They have energy, and youthful ambition. They are growing into an elite European workforce, and maturing into their proud cultural identities. I love the young generation in Poland, because they fight like they have something to prove, and they fight well. They have an arcane and difficult language that they can be proud of, and an emotional historical past. Their intelligentsia can be credited in some of the most profound ways for music, literature, poetry, anthropology, astronomy, chemistry, and military knowledge. It’s not far off to imagine that western European women will be swooned by the intelligence and charisma of a charming young Pole, as British women so collectively were by the famous Polish pilots during World War II.

70th Anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz

Today is the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau. A few months ago I took the trip to the grounds of the former concentration and extermination camp. I found there the ruins of something far more menacing than I could have ever imagined. Beyond the atrocities of ISIS, beyond the barbaric murdering by Boko Haram, this was something inconceivable to anybody with a conscience and a desire to see humans of all cultural, religious, and ethnic backgrounds work together. It was a precisely planned mass extermination. Witnessing the machination of murder is truly the most harrowing thing I have ever experienced.

To put it plainly Birkenau (Auschwitz II) was designated as an extermination camp in 1942. There was a period of 2 months in 1944 where the gas chambers were used to kill 440,000 Hungarian Jews. They were ushered into the underground “showers” by classical music, told to undress, and then killed by the “showers” they were taking. This wasn’t limited to the Jews, as Hitler’s ideology was planned and extended to the Romanies and the Slavic races. At the end of it all at least 1.1 million people died at this complex of camps.

When the Red Army arrived on this day in 1945 they found emaciated survivors with terror in their eyes. Things would never be the same; no flower would ever smell as sweet. At the bottom there is a link to portraits of some of the miraculous survivors of Auschwitz-Birkenau, and it’s a good idea to take a moment, step back, and reflect on how such an ideology can manifest itself in the fabric of our lives. How can we as a species arrive to this barbaric moment? What questions do we need to ask in order to ensure that something like this will never  happen again? RIP to all the victims of systemized mass murder all over the world.

Link to the portraits