Back from a wonderful tour of the Polish seaside towns of Gdansk and Sopot. Gdansk comes in a close second to Krakow as coolest city in Poland. It holds a special significance in Polish history as being the birthplace of the Solidarity labor union, which was the first of its kind behind the Iron Curtain. I've heard they have an excellent museum dedicated to "Solidarnosc'" and how it led to the end of Communism in Eastern Europe, but I opted out of this visit in deference to moja dziwczyna, Luiza. It would've been torture for her to submit to a Polish history lesson on such a beautiful weekend. In her words, "I don't need to spend such time walking around with huge pictures of Lech Walesa staring at me." Point taken : ) I really have no frame of reference for comparison. Maybe it would be like me visiting Samuel Gompers Park in Chicago or the Teamsters Freight Transportation Museum. I don't really think the Teamsters did much to alter the course of world events, however.
Sopot, the quaint city with white sand beaches and no shipyard was where we chose to stay for the four day holiday weekend. It is also home of Molo, the largest wooden pier in Europe. Every city is always trying to claim something as the biggest, longest, highest, etc. In fact, there is a great website dedicated to roadside attractions in the U.S. called The Gallery of Huge Beings. For some reason, my home state of Minnesota is contains more than its fair share of fiberglass statues.
It was a great opportunity to unwind before making the final push toward summer. We did a whole helluva lot of nothing productive, one could say. It was all one continuous stretch of walking, talking, sitting, people watching, basking, eating, and drinking.
Oh, I did get to watch the Sopot 7's rugby tournament and also invented a new game called "Polish or not Polish". It's funny to hear Luiza describe for me the reasons she thinks somebody looks "typical Polish" while I explain the importance of footwear and dental health on determining country of origin.
Before I go, I would like to plug a blog I've been reading called The Polandian. This contains some really insightful commentary on Polish culture and also links to obsure youtube vids that have some relevance to my adopted homeland. Maybe I shouldn't tell you about it so I am free to propagate some its literary material as my own. If Big Dan Bergan and Penny Tingstad are reading this . . . I'm only kidding! Plagiarism is a serious crime kids.
Here's a great clip of heavy metal legends Iron Maiden playing a Polish wedding back in 1984. Thanks to the guys (and gals?) at Polandian:
2 comments:
Hey, thanks for the link and the kind words. I'd never come across your place before, always nice to find another English-language blogger in Poland especially such a witty one. Too late in the day now but I'm sure I'll be clicking through your archive soon.
Glad you enjoy the IM clip.
Man, the memories...:) Winston Churchill in Maiden's Intro to "Aces High" was with whom I lost virginity when maturing into a headbanger. In fact, Maiden lyrics were a damn good source to learn more sophisticated English back then in the Polish 80s.
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