Poland - Cave, Trout, Mountain

Today we were off to visit Bear Cave (Jaskinia Niedźwiedzia), enjoy trout at a restaurant owned by one of Stanley's friends, and then go for a hike into the Table Mountains (Stołowe).

The walk to reach the Bear Cave was along a path bordered by streams. Beautiful both to look at and listen to.

"Cave"

The cave was beautiful but photos weren't permitted. Ela and I went on the tour while Ula and Stanley enjoyed the sunshine outside. I think one of my favourite things was watching the bats fly around, some swooping within inches of my head. I loved hearing the whispering flutter as they flitted past and seeing them in silhouette as they flew down the passageways. I later told Ula about them and she shuddered - I asked her if she would have been screaming if she had been with us and she looked at me like I was crazy and exclaimed, "Yes!"

Lunch was delicious! We ate outside on the patio of the empty restaurant (it's more of a small resort in the country and this is still low season). Each of us were served a whole trout with sides of about five different salads, including pickled cabbage and greens with a garlic cream sauce.

Ula, normally addicted to formal attire but pulled on the jeans for our hike.

A tradition is to lean a stick or log against the underside of the rocks to "keep them from falling down the hill". Sort of a good-luck thing.

That little person at the top is me!
I cheated... there's a flight of steps up the other side of the rocks, though I did have to scramble over a railing and up some rocks to reach the top.

Down the middle of this deep crack is a rock stairway (covered in snow and ice during our visit) with a chain railing to allow visitors to descend into "Satan's Kitchen" (the Polish language indicates a feminine form of "Satan"). In this long chasm there was still plenty of snow and ice - we were far from equipped for walking on it but we slipped and slided and survived our trip through "hell".

A pile of snow begs for an imprint so I lay back against it - too crunchy to make a snow angel, but we still called it my "angel in hell".

Poland - Church, Castle, and Wrocław

Ula works at the Polish office of a large, American company so she speaks English very well. Her husband Stanisław understands English quite well and is able to speak a few words. Ula's daughter, Ela, has a degree in English and teaches the language full time. She has also spent time living in Ireland. She speaks English fluently and we're both fascinated by language so we spent time discussing the meanings or pronunciations of various words and phrases. So fun to be able to converse freely with them!

During my time in Poland I had asked a couple of people if they speak English and their response, "Of course," came across as being quite rude. Ela seemed eager to learn even the slightest nuances of the English language, so I brought this up with her and asked if the response is a direct translation of how they would respond in Polish. She said it is, and later in the week she asked a few of her students how they repond to the question and she was pleased when they told her they answer with the phrase, "Yes, I do."

Stanisław is a disc jockey so he usually only works on weekends, but Ela and Ula were happy to use my visit as an excuse to take some time off work and have a little vacation. I told Ela she could justify it by telling people that spending so much time speaking English with me counted towards career development.

Ursula and Stanisław - I called them Ula and Stanley.

Ula planned out my time with them, taking me to numerous Polish sites, urging me to come back for another two weeks in the future and she'll take me to even more places. She prepared delicious food and when she found out I enjoy Polish cooking, she introduced me to a number of new dishes - tripe soup, potato pancakes, apple pancakes, and various salads, sausages, and cheeses. I was definitely well-fed throughout my stay with them!

First stop on Tuesday was the Church of Peace in Świdnica - a beautiful, wooden, evangelical church completed in 1657. Check out the link for information about the history of this building - I found it really interesting. Information about the site was played over a sound system, allowing us to explore the church and listen to details about its history and unique features.

Church of Peace.

Interior of the Church of Peace.

Main square in Świdnica.

Next stop was Ula's favourite castle, Książ. For some reason I had never considered that Poland would have castles, but they have numerous castles, both intact and in ruins. Ela and I enjoyed exploring the interior of the castle while Ula and Stanley waited outside, enjoying the sunshine. Ela's high school graduation dance was held at this castle!

Książ Castle.
Click here for a virtual tour.


Wall painting detail.

Ceiling detail.

Ceiling detail.
Repainting this ceiling is not a job I would want.

View from a castle window.

The largest nearby city is Wrocław (believe it or not, it's pronounced VROH-swahv), the city where Ela currently lives and works. After exploring the castle, we headed into the city for lunch and more wandering.

Main square in the old part of Wrocław.

I noticed a little dwarf statue next to a tiny, cave-like house and asked Ela about it. She said the statues are quite new, but they've been placed all over the old town in Wrocław.

Origin of the Dwarfs
Photos of the Dwarfs





It's a lot of fun to get to know my Polish cousins - nice to discover that they love ice cream as much as I do! When I planned to spend five or six days with relatives I'd never heard of before, I wasn't sure how well they'd speak English or how old they'd be or what we'd do. I was definitely pleasantly surprised and I'm being spoiled rotten by my Polish family!

Reflection of me and Ela in Wrocław.

Poland - Głubczyce

In the morning it was only me, Ludmila, and Jan at the house but I managed to figure out the basic meaning when Ludmila repeatedly said, "Proszę, proszę!" (pronounced PRO-sheh with loosely clenched teeth giving a "sz" sound in the middle of the word). I later learned that "proszę" works as "pardon me", "sorry", "thank you", "please", or other words depending on the context. This morning the context meant that I should sit down and help myself to the spread of food on the table - various kinds of sausage, meat and cheese along with pickles, butter, jam, and cakes. Quite the breakfast! I put one of my few Polish words to good use - dziękuję (pronounced djen-KOO-yeh) means "thank you".

Mariusz soon returned to the house and dropped off Angela and Paulina - thankfully they were on their Easter break from school so they were readily available for translation assistance. I think they were dropped off at the house partly to keep me company, partly to visit their babcia, and partly because spending time with me was like having a free English lesson.

Ludmila asked if I wanted to see her father's grave and out of respect for her and a desire to experience more of the Polish culture, I told her I would like to visit the graveyard.

Ludmila's eyes filled with tears while visiting her father's grave and through Angela's translation she told me she loved her father and missed him a lot.

As we walked through the graveyard I noticed a large monument with a unique design using train tracks. I asked Ludmila about it and found out that it's a memorial to those who died during exile to Siberia. As I travelled in Poland I was amazed to repeatedly see memorials to those who were exiled - I didn't expect so much recognition of what my Babcia and her family went through.

Memorial to those who died during their Siberian exile.

Ludmila and Jan's apartment is beautiful and clean with all modern conveniences. I sort of expected Poland to be like the run-down areas I've seen in photos of Ukraine or Russia. Although the exterior of many of the buildings are in need of repair, all the places I visited were very modern and well-kept.

Entrance to the apartment complex where Ludmila and Jan live.

In the afternoon, Ursula (Ula) and her husband, Stanisław, arrived to bring me to their home in Ząbkowice Śląskie (apparently the origin of the story of Frankenstein), two hours away. While everyone else had tea with Ludmila and Jan (Ludmila is Ula's godmother), Mariusz, a city employee near the level of mayor, from what I could understand, took me for a walking tour of Głubczyce.

Town Hall, or the "Rat House" as the Poles call it in German.

A beautiful city park.

A typical apartment building.

I may not speak Polish, but some words don't require translation.

Ludmila was incredibly hospitable, offering me tea or cakes or something to eat every fifteen minutes. Literally. I was recovering from a cold and cough and every time she heard the slightest cough she would make a "tsk tsk" sound and smile compassionately at me. She reminded me of my Babcia and I'm sad she never had children to dote on. She doesn't have any children of her own and has never had anyone from Canada visit since a couple of my great aunts visited Poland over twenty years ago. She gave me one of her gold rings that she's had since 1964 - I felt incredibly honoured to receive such a gift.

Poland - Cousins

Here's my connection to the Polish cousins I stayed with during my time in Poland...
Jan Szerlowski and Anna Psutka had five children:
- Rozalia (mother of Krystyna, my babcia/grandma)
- Stanisław
- Michał
- Zygmunt (father of Ludmila, the first cousin I stayed with)
- Zofia (mother of Alina, mother of Ursula, the second cousin I stayed with, along with her husband, Stanisław, and daughter Elzbieta [Ela is at the same level as me on the family tree])
- Joanna

Rozalia and her children were the only branch of the family tree to immigrate to Canada.

This morning Robyn and Madelein left for the airport bright and early and my Babcia's cousin, Ludmila (pronounced lood-MEEL-ah), picked me up from the hostel with her stepson, Mariusz (pronounced MAR-ee-OOSH). The hostel door is kept locked but I was waiting on the couches and saw a petite older woman knock on the door and I knew it must be Ludmila. When I opened the door she rattled off some Polish and I heard my name so I asked, "Ludmila?" and she gave me a big hug. She only knows a few English words but her stepson speaks English quite well so he was our translator for the two-and-a-half hour drive to reach their flat in Głubczyce.

Ludmila and her husband Jan

Ludmila's mother lives in the flat below Ludmila and Jan.
I just called her "Babcia".

In the afternoon, Mariusz brought over his two teenage daughters, Paulina and Angela, as well as his girlfriend, Ania. The girls spoke English very well and they were fun to hang out with. Angela mentioned her boyfriend and I asked her wryly if he's a good boy and she grinned and said, "Not really." I laughed and asked if Ludmila thinks he's a good boy and she laughed and said, "Yes - it's good that she doesn't understand us." Ludmila soon came into the room and made a comment about not understanding our conversation and we laughed again, with Angela telling her we're just visiting.

I asked the proper way to pronounce "Piechnik" and discovered that the "ch" is actually pronounced with a slightly gutteral and breathy "ck" sound instead of a hard "ck" sound. The "nik" is actually pronounced "neek". As if our last name wasn't already difficult enough, go to Poland and it gets worse!

L-R: Paulina and Angela.

It was Mariusz's sister's husband's birthday so Mariusz said he, Ania, and his daughters would take me over to meet them. I really didn't understand where I was going or what we were doing, but I grabbed my coat and went along. As we were going out the door, they told me to get my passport because we were going to the Czech Republic! After a fifteen minute drive we crossed the border and I was able to add another country to my list of places I've visited! We walked through a little town (saw a Winnie the Pooh book in a shop window and found out the Polish call him Kubuś Puchatek (KOO-boosh poo-HA-teck), drove to the top of a hill for a sweeping view of Poland and the Czech Republic, then back to Poland.

It was strange to spend the evening with a bunch of people who really aren't related to me except through marriage, as Mariusz is Jan's son from his first marriage, but they still felt like family. I met his mom, sister, and brother-in-law - his mom made an amazing sunflower seed cake! She wrote out the recipe for me in Polish and my Babcia is working on translating it. (I'll do a trial run and post the recipe once I know we got the translation correct.) I had a wonderful evening eating plenty of Polish food and listening to Mariusz's sister tell me stories about wanting to visit her best friend in Portsmouth, England. She would speak to me in Polish, using only two or three words at a time and then waiting for Angela or Paulina to translate before continuing. We couldn't stop laughing all evening! (She was getting rather tipsy.) I even heard some Polish singing as Mariusz's sister convinced her husband to pull out his guitar so she could sing a couple of songs. When they were finished, I asked them to sing "Sto Lat", the Polish version of "Happy Birthday", a song I've heard at Polish birthday parties back home. The whole group sang along - I wish I'd had my camera to capture it on video. For those who are curious, I found the lyrics online and also found a funny video clip of a Polish restaurant owner singing the song - I love the faces of the two young waiters.