Poland and Berlin



SUNDAY, January 1, 1995.

Thursday morning, we hit the Polish embassy in Munich and secured Ebie's visa in about an hour. What a relief! Then we boarded a train to the East German border town of Gorlitz. Things were pretty dead there, but we found a nice little Italian place for dinner with an excellent onion and gorgonzola pizza. Other than the distinctly low-tech train station, the few hours we spent there were indistinguishable from western Germany. Eastern Germany, while not as developed yet as the west, has come a long way already. Money is pouring into the region and it is rapidly being revamped to meet western standards. Then (music please) it was time to go to Poland.

Feeling scared to leave the security of a world we could pretend to understand (Elizabeth even speaks German), we took deep breaths and headed to the train. The platform was blocked by a fence and we weren't sure how to get in. We found a deserted Polish boarder control hut and lots of empty, fear-inspiring detention rooms. Then we found a short Polish official and a small opening in the fence. The official asked us with a sad tone, "Why do you not speak Polish?" before checking our documents and letting us onto a train with one of the smelliest bathrooms imaginable and crowded compartments, 8 seats in the space used for 6 in the West. On this uninviting train, we continued nervously eastward.

We rode through the night, the train often stopping to pick up more passengers. The scary thing was that when we stopped we saw no lights, no station, no indication of where we were. We began to panic. Will we know when we get to Krakow? Luckily, Krakow is one of the richer cities, and its half completed, well-lit and well-marked modern station greeted us at 6:15 AM.

After a few false starts scurrying nervously through the barely lit early morning streets, we found our hotel. Because of some unexplained Polish government regulation, it was too early for us to check in without leaving our passports at the desk - not an option. We were so spooked; there was no way we were going to part with our documents. We headed back out to look for breakfast and a place to change money. After being forced by oppressive pedestrian barriers to cross three sides of an intersection, we arrived at the Hotel Polonia. There, the waiter agreed (thankfully!) to change our German marks to Polish zloty (at a rate designed to finance his Christmas shopping) and we had breakfast. Then, we meandered slowly back to the hotel, checked in and went to sleep, exhausted from the long trip from Munch - about 19 hours!

When we woke up, it was still Friday the 30th, but it felt like a new day. We headed out looking for lunch and found a Polish hole in the wall. We sucked down a bowl of soup and a plate of perogies for only a dollar each! Growing up, my neighbors, the Meisliks, often had a bag of frozen perogies in the freezer so they were nothing new to me, but it was Ebie's first time. In case you don't know, perogies are (as my dad put it) the Polish version of ravioli. They're heavier and heartier, usually stuffed with meat, cabbage or potatoes and aren't served with tomato sauce, but it's not a bad analogy. Food in Poland is ridiculously cheap. We could stuff ourselves in a restaurant with a full meal for two for less than $5. However, western products, for example a Coke, still cost about 60 cents. The Poles really cannot afford these items. This makes for a puzzling economic climate.

Krakow was the nicest Polish city we visited, a beautiful old city which somehow was spared demolition during World War II. In the town square, the Krakow Glowny, there were many locals out vending their wares. Despite the fact that I had just received a chess set for Christmas, we bought a beautiful handcrafted chess set for about two dollars, a bargain even if it did smell like cheap varnish. I saw a woman with a basket of what appeared to be cookies. I bought myself two. I bit into one expecting something sweet and crunchy. What I got was one the most vile and disgusting tastes I've ever experienced. It turned out to be some sort of preserved, extremely salty, monstrously horrible Polish mountain cheese. I was spitting for the next half hour.

We rode a tram across town in pursuit of the old Jewish quarter. We learned from a brief encounter with a rare English speaker that we had to punch both ends of our ticket in the machine on the tram. Phew! We were super paranoid about getting stuck with fines, being arrested and being absolutely helpless to argue or even find out what we'd done. We found the old Jewish quarter and roamed about looking for various synagogues and museums. We didn't have much luck; we either couldn't find them or they weren't open. It seems typical of these Jewish attractions to be closed. We even returned yesterday to try again but with similar results.

While jumping up and down to see over a fence hoping to spot an attraction we couldn't find, I accidentally and unknowingly let our Let's Go Eastern Europe and a hilarious Polish phrase book fall out of my jacket pocket. Actually it wasn't so much a phrase book, but a bi-directional noun translator, but heck, that's what I could find. The book did things like list 20 English words for breasts and starred the rude ones. I ran back and found the Let's Go in a nearby trash can. A litter conscious citizen apparently decided to keep the phrase book. Ebie scowled at me. Oops, another mistake. After the visa fiasco, how dare I! We did manage to spot Hebrew writing on some buildings. It's eerie to think how many Jews used to live there and that they're simply gone. One of the synagogues we found had been abandoned and allowed to decay.

Yesterday we day tripped from Krakow to Auschwitz to see the concentration camp. The entire camp is a museum now. Both at the Anne Frank house and at Auschwitz, there was information about the murder of people other than Jews in the holocaust. Among others, many Gypsies were murdered and even a significant number of Catholics. Elizabeth liked this because she'd learned in Sunday school that Catholics had also been victimized by the Nazis and felt that this fact was too often overlooked. I was surprised how angry it made me when I felt she was down playing the fact that the Jews suffered disproportionately more. The Jews were all but erased from Europe. I do not see a shortage of Catholics. I felt like I was there alone.

The scariest thing about Auschwitz is that when I saw it, I mean just at first glance, just looking around the place, it didn't look horrible. It was actually kind of pretty - an orderly array of old Polish army barracks on well kept grounds with neat lines of trees. Sure, there's some barbed wire around the wall, but heck, the fence along the back of my elementary school's playground also had barbed wire.

The trees aren't speaking about what they saw, the 50 year old faces of 25 year old men shuffling exhausted in thin clothing in the depths of winter. The gravel paths say nothing about the worn shoes of starving, shivering prisoners. The grounds are silent, and though they may never forget, Spring does come to Auschwitz. Those trees do bloom, and the grass is green. The sunset was vibrant and orange. It's just another place in the Polish countryside. Somehow, I did not expect this. I expected bulldozers digging mass graves. I expected suffering. Was I disappointed? It's interesting how my parents' generation fears the camp; many of them were shocked that I could go. But I must have this fear in me, too.

It was not Spring when I was there. It was during a freezing winter day that I took a closer look at the 50 year old remains of a Nazi death camp. I was freezing. I had the benefit of warm clothing, a meal, a good night's sleep, and I was freezing.

The interior of the buildings tells the story. The mental images are so painful to reconstruct because it is so difficult to imagine the truth behind them. It is so difficult that I can almost (not quite) understand how people could argue for its impossibility. I cannot imagine a horror so huge. Yet it is true, and the evidence is left behind, rooms full of hair, of worn shoes, of suitcases, of combs, of toothbrushes, of eyeglasses. How many thousands of pairs of eyeglasses to fill a room? And what I saw was only a fraction kept by the museum of the fraction that remained at the end of the war. So much more was sold, used by the war machine. The Nazis wove fabric of human hair. They did whatever they could think of.

The hallways of the buildings are lined with photographs of those who were killed or died at the camp. Under each photo is the date the person arrived and the date the person died. Most of them didn't survive for more than a few months. Later, when the camp was a killing machine instead of a labor camp, they lasted only hours. A man was killed for taking a five minute break after ten hours of grueling labor. People were made to stand in ice-cold ponds for entire days. They wore incredibly thin clothing in the winter. The sleeping conditions were horrible, everyone packed together, yet it was their only possibility for warmth in unheated barracks. I saw the torture chambers, tiny rooms where a man cannot sit or stand or stretch his legs, the gallows, the whipping posts. I saw the crematoriums, read that not everyone was dead before they were incinerated. I saw the empty canisters of poison gas. I stood in the gas chambers. I stood there and I stared at the shower heads, and I could not imagine it. I could not.

Photos of Auschwitz

I watched a film shot by the liberating Russian forces, saw the unthinkable sickness and despair of the freed. I saw so many faces. Being there made the holocaust human, and yet made it seem humanly impossible. While staring at a photo and imaging the horror that one individual experienced, I cried. Looking at the crematoriums and imagining that 400,000 bodies were burned there seemed impossible, unbelievable. Standing in the camp, looking at everything, it seems unfathomable. The pain I felt for one individual - multiplied by 6 million. It overloads my comprehension. Yet, I know. I know it happened.

After we got back from Auschwitz, we took another look around Krakow, and then went to the New Year's Eve bash in the town square, the "Rynek Glowny". There were vendors lining the square selling hot wine and food. We bought a delicious bread stuffed with Bosnian sausages and a tasty white sauce. After I'd happily chowed down several bites of sausage, Ebie asked for a bite. She took the sandwich from me and felt suddenly suspicious of Bosnian sausages and insisted that we throw it away. I lived; I even wish I'd finished it.

Ever since Hanukkah, we'd been on an unsuccessful quest to find some potato pancakes. The night before, we'd found a restaurant that served a "dinnerized" version of potato pancakes. They were quite large and smothered with a heavy, creamy goulash of some kind. It's probably better that I'm not sure what was in it. Low and behold, after discarding the Bosnian sausages, we stumbled across a booth selling traditional potato pancakes with apple sauce and sour cream.

Hanging out, eating our potato pancakes, we met three U.S. Air Force employees on vacation in Krakow: a New Yorker, a Texan, and a German. They were funny and told us how after a few years of traveling 200 kmhh on the auto bahn, you start to say, "Come on, step on it, let's get home." The Texan, while funny in his own right, was extra funny once you factored in his accent and his extremely crooked teeth. The guy from New York spoke some Polish and had a Polish uncle who loved to eat huge hunks of that disgusting Polish mountain cheese. In typical New Yorker fashion, he upstaged even my efforts to entertain and had us all as a captive audience; it reminded me of a family gathering where I can't get a word in edgewise. Even Ebie agreed that he had a hilarious, if a touch obnoxious, way about him, and a way of not leaving a silent moment.

We drank hot wine with them for a while before taking a bathroom break at the hotel only a block or two away. We were tired and went to bed before midnight, but I almost had to go back out into the cold when the blues band started. Luckily we could hear them through the window.


TUESDAY, January 3, 1995.

On New Year's Day, we left Krakow and headed to Warsaw. The train ride is a story in itself. Though we'd read in Let's Go to always get seat reservations on Polish trains, we forgot. We found a compartment for 8 with only 3 people in it - a man listening to a walkman, and a young couple - he in a red shirt. Using our hands we gestured the question "Can we sit here?" and sensing no objection, we sat down. Still in the station, and then as the train was moving, more people came in until suddenly there were 9 people for 8 seats. People seemed puzzled and looked down at their tickets and up again. Ebie and I were nervous and squirming, but we assumed that if we were in someone's assigned seat that they'd tell us so. It doesn't take much Polish to tap someone on the shoulder and point.

Mr. Red shirt got up, left and came back with the conductor, who gestured to see our tickets and put us out in the corridor. Gee, they could've just let us know!

Now everyone was settled and there were only 7 people in there. Ebie's foot was bothering her so I told her to take the extra seat. She did, and Mr. Red Shirt commenced scowling at her non-stop. About a half hour later, another guy walks by, sticks his head in the compartment, and says a few words in Polish. Mr. Red Shirt says something and next thing I know, Ebie's back out in the hallway. In our assessment, this new guy didn't have a reservation either. If so, where the heck had he been all this time? We figured that Mr. Red Shirt just hates Americans (and Canadians).

It didn't end there. The guy with the walkman (who's seen everything), gets up, comes out in the hall and offers his seat to Ebie! She accepts. The walkman guy and I smile at each other and nod in mutual understanding. For me, this nod confirmed all my theories. Then about an hour later, the conductor comes strolling by, sees Ebie sitting there and writes her a ticket for about $6 (lunch out for a week in his eyes) although he allows her to remain seated. Of course, we have no idea what "the charge" is, but cannot argue and simply pay. Afterwards, I figured that everything was probably our fault, that we were evil, non-Polish speaking foreigners, not following the customs and deserved everything. Ebie insisted that the people, especially Mr. Red Shirt were simply rude. She turned out to be right - more on this later.

Warsaw was a miserable 24 hours. It was grim, bitterly cold, gray, lifeless, and strictly utilitarian. No color. Nothing ornamental. The people seemed unhappy and indifferent. We saw a man that had fallen face first, arms not out in front of him, on the stairs of an underpass. There were two Canadians already at his aid. We ran and called an ambulance from the nearby Marriott hotel. Our spirits already low, it was disheartening and disgusting to see this man, the way his neck was bent, and the locals who were simply ignoring him.

The old city, which was destroyed in the war, has been painstakingly restored. It's pretty, but it lacks spirit. It feels dead. The whole city feels like it had its spirit broken by communism, and because it is so poor, it has not been able to recover. We were more than ready to leave after one day. The McDonald's was the nicest place in town. We ate there three times. For breakfast, we tried a local restaurant mentioned in Let's Go. We took one bite, almost vomited, and left. On the way out, we saw a man scurry over to take our food. From there, we went straight to McDonalds. It's hard to imagine a better tasting breakfast-time Big Mac.

After a difficult search, we found a synagogue that was closed up tight. We shivered through an outdoor shanty market with $125 fur coats for sale. Though I have my doubts about the quality, maybe I should've stocked up and made my fortune as a Polish fur importer. We searched the city for something, anything warm and friendly, but found nothing. We retreated to our hotel, played chess and counted the hours.


THURSDAY, January 5, 1995.

As hard as we tried, we could not get the ticket man to sell us reservations on the train to Torun. He kept nodding and then waving his hand in dismissal. As it turned out, the train was practically empty. We were happy to be moving again, trying to distance ourselves from the image of the fallen man and his awkwardly angled neck. According to Let's Go, Torun and Krakow are the only two Polish cities to have avoided obliteration in World War II. We'd mentioned this to an American from Wyoming on a train in Germany. He insisted that we were wrong. I also managed to offend him with a wise-crack about Wyoming seeming like a foreign country to me.

Upon arriving in Torun, we scrambled around trying to figure out which bus to take across the river to the hotel. Lots of scribbling, pointing, and jenkoyas (The only word of Polish we could remember. It means thank you). We got on, off, and on a bus, before we eventually succeeded in checking into another cheap Polish hotel with smelly hallway carpeting.

Torun was another cute little Polish city with a nice town square. Many shops around town had red Lego signs out front. Large snowflakes drifted down upon us, as we strolled the streets, though there was only minor accumulation. We went to see "Clear and Present Danger". What a horrible film! I had my Auschwitz photos developed virtually for free, especially compared with the scandalous rates in Belgium. We even managed not to eat at McDonald's.

Photos of Warsaw and Torun

Our room had two single beds on opposite walls. The first night there, we went out for drinks in a cute basement bar and argued. It was mostly an argument about nothing we actually said. It was an argument about the accumulating differences we had regarding conversation styles, standards, expectations, up-bringing, religion, you know, nothing serious. Back at the room, the argument continued and she suggested that we break up and simply remain friends. I agreed. The next day, I treated her differently. No affectionate touches. No hand holding. No little kisses. I could tell she didn't like it. That evening, we grumpily played more chess in the room. When we were ready to go to sleep, she climbed into my bed. I asked, "Is this a friend thing?" and then let her seduce me. Stupid.

From Torun, we went to Poznan. On the train, a young (maybe 21) Polish guy overheard us speaking English and introduced himself. He was full of information and very helpful, even providing us with the surprising correct pronunciation of "Glowny" which sounds more like "Gloovny". We showed him the violation we'd gotten on the train to Warsaw. He said it was complete nonsense. Essentially, it said, "My dog is your best friend's grandmother. Give me $6." Ebie was right, those people on the train were jerks. After arriving in Poznan, he stood on line with us for twenty minutes to help us buy our train tickets to Berlin. Since he was so helpful and we were thrilled to meet a local, we invited him to meet us later for dinner.

We spent the afternoon looking around town trying to protect our faces from the brutal cold. (Is this starting to read like A Day in the Life of Ivan Dennisovich?) Really, we didn't care anymore at that point. We were sick of sight-seeing, sick of each other, sick of Poland, and just anxious to return to the West. Back at the hotel, the Polish guy showed up on time, promptly at 7:30, dressed in a jacket and tie and visibly nervous. He suggested a Chinese place, and we were happy to do whatever he wanted. The meal was about $40 for the three of us! This is a small fortune in Poland! No wonder he wore a tie! Boy, did I ever feel like a rich American. We mostly questioned him about Poland, although he did not really understand our perspective or what we were driving at. We wanted to know what has changed since the communists left. This for him was a difficult question.

"What about school?" we asked.

"Not much has changed at school except maybe in history class they can now tell the truth," he answered. Interestingly, this seems to imply that they knew they were being lied to.

He was clearly a smart, well-educated man. He'd learned English on an internship in Norway. He badly wants to visit the U.S., but explained about the seven year waiting list for a visa. He had us write him a note to prove to his friends that he'd met us and that he'd eaten that meal. We both gave him our addresses. It'd be fascinating to hear from him or to have him come visit.

We asked him who could afford a 60 cent Coke when lunch cost $1. He explained it away - some people can afford it sometimes, or on special occasions. Where did the older fancy cars (BMWs - anything other than the tiny communist-spec go-boxes) come from? He said that some people got on the capitalist bandwagon early. He was so nervous, shaking, and smoking his Marlboros. He was fascinating and fascinated with us. I wish I could remember more of what he said, and of what he didn't say. No doubt he's a quick learner, and his national pride was evident. For better or for worse, but definitely for profit, his generation will westernize Poland. In the morning, it was finally time to leave Poland and return to Germany. Berlin ho!

I was elated upon arriving in Berlin. The incredible modernness of the train station left me wide eyed in wonder. Technology! In retrospect, Poland really wasn't too backward, but emotions play a mighty role; we were scared and nervous. Strange to think that many people have a fear of New York. I am still chewing over what exactly it was that felt "wrong" in Poland.

The big story in Berlin was the lack, the utter absence of the wall. I didn't get to see a single piece of it, and I think the Berliners like it that way. I snapped photos of the Brandenburg gate standing like a foolish tourist in the middle of the street. The McDonald's we ate at was chaotic, filled with punks and exhibitionist lesbians.

Wandering into the east city from the Brandenburg gate, we found incredible revitalization projects under way. Entire square blocks were being rebuilt left and right. Artists' renditions on signs illustrated modern towers of glass, chic modern architecture, color... I'd love to see it when it's done. What I saw that cold day was a gray sky and a skyline full of cranes. We found our way to the remnants of Checkpoint Charlie, and I got picture-happy with the "You are leaving the American sector sign." It was fascinating to stand there and imagine the significance that the sign once held. I danced gleefully, childishly back and forth across the "line." Perhaps this was disrespectful, but it was a true expression of my love of freedom, my sharing the joy of the wall's demise.

We found a museum with a fascinating exhibit on Nazi propaganda. There were anti-semitic posters, written in German that was made to look and feel like Hebrew. Anger. I felt anger.

We went inside a cathedral to get relief from the brutal wind and got to hear the organist practicing a piece. Oh, how I long to hear a Bach Organworks concert in a grand Cathedral on a killer organ. Really, we only spent a few hours in Berlin before catching the ICE to Cologne en route back to Liege, but it was well worthwhile. On the train, I had my first (and still only) dinner in a restaurant car and we played more chess. She still hasn't beaten me.

Photos of Berlin

Photos of Berlin

After we got back to Liege, we had a couple of largely unnotable, errand crammed days. I was busy packing, investigating trains, catching up on e-mail, doing laundry, and bidding a fond farewell to Belgian fries and waffles before it was time to leave for Siena.



Copyright 1997 by Bradley Edelman
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

E-mail: Brad Edelman