7-10 novembre 2012
i still can't believe i had the opportunity to go to warsaw and see the jagards! it was the best weekend ever. i say that about every weekend here, but it's so true.
so wednesday morning, we had art history. cori had her french class after that...and at 3:30 we all met up at the institute. (all of us being me, alicia, cori, and carine.) we got our boarding passes printed out and then hopped on the train that took us to cdg (charles de gaulle airport).
everything went so smoothly with airfrance (except for carine having to throw out her toothpaste at security). so glad we went with them and not stupid ryanair. (confused? see my rome post.)
we got on our plane and were off to varsovie || warsaw.
jon picked us up at the airport, where we all piled into a taxi and drove to their apartment. i was so confused by everything in poland. language-wise, i mean. because honestly, i have never been anywhere with a language so foreign. in italy, i could at least understand what was going on and what signs were telling me (thank you, sylvia jimenez-martin for making me take spanish. i'm so glad i did that - not just because it helped in rome - but because i honestly love it). i couldn't even guess at any of the words, except for toalety, which is close enough to toilet for this girl to understand. i kind of loved not knowing anything. it made it that much more of an adventure!
when we stepped into liz and jon's apartment, i just wanted to break down and cry. it was the happiest day of my life. i hugged liz - a super big hug. i just loved being in a home again. don't get me wrong, though i've at my struggles with my host mom, i do enjoy being at her apartment in paris. but this was different. i was in a home where i knew people loved me and wanted me to be there. it was the best feeling in the entire world. we talked for a while, liz showed us her collection of 40 pounds of apples that she bought for 6 american dollars, and we went to bed. and i was probably the happiest girl in the world.
on thursday morning, i was up way before any of my friends. so i took myself a little shower, and then i became acquainted with miss ania. ania was born just before liz and jon ran off to warsaw just a little over three years ago. i hadn't been able to meet her before they left, so this was so fun for me! that little girl immediately stole my heart, with her love of toy story, climbing, sparkles, and dora the explorer. this girl loves dora and insists that she speaks spanish, which is so fun. "i speak spanish! abre!" (which means "open.") within five minutes of meeting her, she had showed me all of her toys and all of isaac's toys, too. isaac, the cutest and snuggliest 18 month-old also had me wrapped around his finger. that little guy would just give you a look, with just the slightest hint of a smile, and it could melt any heart, i promise. seriously, liz and jon got themselves some cute kiddos.
we had a picnic on ania's floor for breakfast! it was super fun. and then we got started with our day. we all bundled up as much as we could (for me, this included one of jon's furry bomber hats and believe me, i looked good) and headed out! we got us some polish money - złoty - and then bus passes, and lunch. our lunch was this traditional polish soup with white sausage and hard boiled egg? i'm not sure what it was exactly, but best soup ever.
and then we headed off to the warsaw uprising museum. this museum is so fantastic. it was all about the uprising movement in warsaw. the polish had a huge underground army based in warsaw, and when the russians were close enough, they decided to make their move against the german army. they assumed that the russians would help them in their efforts, as they were part of the allied countries...but that didn't happen. the russians sat on the other side of the river and let the poles get slaughtered. it was a devastating history of a city that could have been spared from destruction. but it is also a heroic story of people fighting for what they knew was right.
this is when old warsaw was essentially razed. it was reduced to about 10 blocks of buildings, nothing more. liz explained to us that some of the insurgents had broken into the office of some of the german officers and stolen the blueprints of old town before the building was destroyed. when the war was over, those blueprints were used to reconstruct the city exactly as it had once been. i was wondering about warsaw a lot. i knew that it was such an old city, but the buildings i was seeing weren't actually all that old. it all made sense, once i understood the history of the uprising. i actually really loved old town because of the history there. it is so sad that we couldn't see the authentic buildings, but i loved how the poles came together and rebuilt their beloved city just as it had once been because it meant that much to them. it makes it that much more special. something that was fought for and lost, and rebuilt because of that deep polish pride. i think it's there. i wasn't in poland long enough to really feel out the polish pride, but it wasn't quite as apparent as the french pride. it seemed like a quieter pride, but it's there.
after wandering around old town and freezing half to death, we met jon for dinner at this traditional polish restaurant. it was so much fun! the salad bar consisted of lots of weird pickled things. i tried them all. aren't you proud of me? i ate it all and actually really loved it. the polish pickle things better than americans. sorry bout it. for my main course, i had pierogi - traditional polish dumplings. oh my goodness, so good. i've bookmarked a recipe for making them when i get back. i have my doubts that they will be any good...but i really want to try it. just for kicks and rires || giggles in franglais, which i am alarmingly good at.
my favorite part of dinner was when jon was telling us about how fortunate he and liz were to have ania and isaac. at this point, liz had taken ania to use the bathroom before leaving. he said something along the lines of, "and now we have two fortunate incidents!" just as he finished that sentence, ania came running through the restaurant and launched onto his lap, yelling at the top of her lungs, "DADDY I POOPED IN THE TOILET!" it was so perfect. it couldn't have been timed any better. i still laugh about it, almost three weeks later. (yes, i am behind on blogging, okay? and yes, i have been back-dating things so everything would be in chronological order. don't judge me.)
we also got hot chocolate at this place called wedel's. when my aunt lisa and uncle mike came to visit liz and jon two years ago, they visited this place twice in one day. i frequently hear about how delicious this place is, so i was really excited to be able to try it. and it lived up to all the hype auntie lisa and uncle mike gave it. seriously, so good. i got milk chocolate with hazlenut. OH MAN. so good. i was in heaven. after leaving wedel's and buying our train tickets for our adventure to auschwitz, cori, carine, jon, and the kids headed home while alicia, liz, and i stayed out to wander a little more around old town. it was so much fun to just talk to liz and see where she lives. she showed us her favorite spots, and i really loved seeing warsaw from her perspective. we also got to hear the story of how she and jon met and fell in love, which was super fun. and about how they came to live in poland. it was just such a good time, wandering a new city with some of my favorite people. it's one of my favorite memories from this entire study abroad. if i could upload photos, i would post one of the three of us on the old city wall. it's precious :)
on friday morning, mama syd was in full gear. it was time to navigate from warsaw to oświęcim and then back to warsaw. it was just the four of us americans, navigating all the way across poland and back. and the only things i could say in polish were "yes" "no" and "thank you." it was only a little bit daunting. not gonna lie. liz had shown me the night before where we needed to go, and she wrote on our tickets what times we needed to be at the different stations, but it was still a little nerve-wracking being in charge of getting us there and back in one piece.
our first train left at 6:15 in the morning, so we took a taxi from the apartment to the train depot. we slept a lot of our first train, which took us as far as krakow. we had an hour between trains so we got to explore krakow for a little while. it wasn't nearly long enough, though, because by the time we made it to the old city center, it was pretty much time to head back to the train station. we got on our train to oświęcim and were merrily on our way.
in poland, the way the train tickets work is pretty old fashioned (in my mind). you get on the train, and then the conductor walks around through the different cars and punches your ticket. in my head, it's like the movie white christmas. such a good one. anyway, when the conductor got to us, he said something in polish that i didn't understand. i asked him if he spoke english. he said "nie" which means no, and then tried talking to us again in polish. but louder. because speaking louder will make me understand, clearly. so i speedy quick grabbed the extra cell phone that liz gave me before leaving the house and called her. she talked to the conductor over the phone for us, which was extremely silly, but it totally worked. she said that we had gotten on the wrong train. apparently it would end up going to oświęcim, but it would just take a little longer. so really...it was the right train, but it was making a few extra stops. we paid a few extra złoty for our tickets and just kept riding. at one point, our train turned back around and we went back through the krakow station. so really, we could have spent another hour exploring old krakow! we were all okay with it though, because the situation was just so funny and ridiculous.
once we got to oświęcim, we took a cab to auschwitz. now bear with me, people. this part of the post is going to be a little heavy. and a little words. i'm sorry i can't upload any photos to break this up for you...it's really driving me crazy. anyways.
when we got to auschwitz, we were a little disappointed because we had just missed the last english tour by about 30 minutes. but it was okay, because it allowed us to explore the place on our own. this is going to sound weird, but i loved auschwitz. it's so pretty. in a very haunting way, of course. it's a painful beauty that makes you want to cry. the red brick buildings, mixed with the birch trees turning yellow, and a light mist that covered everything. combine that with the well done and disturbing exhibits in each of the buildings, and you have auschwitz. in each building, there were photos of the prisoners. their mug shots lined all the hallways. i hated it. but it was so incredible.
there were two parts in particular that i will never be able to erase from my memory. it's different for everyone, of course. but these are my two poignant memories. in the first block we went into, there were lots of posters and information. nothing too crazy. but as we turned around the corner, i heard cori gasp. it was the kind of gasp that you make when you have the wind knocked out of you. when i made my way to see what was there, i had the same reaction. behind a barbed wire fence, there were prisoners' jumpsuits, all set up on wire frames so they were upright. they looked like they were hanging on a person's body, hunched slightly, but upright. no heads or anything. but behind these jumpsuits were the first of the mugshots that we had seen. they just stared right back at you. all of them with shaved heads, regardless of age or sex. their eyes were the haunting part. some of the people stared back at the camera with a "come at me bro" look in their eyes. some of them had a "yeah, let's get this over with" look. and others just looked terrified. they didn't know where to look, or didn't want to look. they were was fear in those eyes, the kind of fear that makes you gasp like the wind just got knocked out of you. and it hurt to look. it was like i was invading their privacy or something. i just couldn't do it.
the other part that i will never forget was the shooting wall. it was partly reconstructed, but that doesn't make it any less powerful. at this wall, so many people were shot, point blank. they were tortured and humiliated and murdered on that wall. and now on that wall is a pile of flowers. and rows and rows of lighted candles. all in honor of those killed there. this place is where people were stripped of their clothing and put on parade before dying. it's where people stood naked in below freezing weather and had water thrown on them. they were left to freeze. they were hung and they were shot and they were lost. and it was horrible and touching, all at the same time.
after auschwitz, we went to birkenau. birkenau is also referred to as auschwitz ii. it was built as a death camp, where the prisoners were shipped in on trains and unloaded. they either went straight to the gas chambers or they went to the barracks. the size of these barracks could comfortably house 50 horses. instead they housed 400+ humans. there was no insulation, and the fireplaces would not have kept anyone warm. i was freezing at the beginning of november in shirts and sweaters, leggings, and a scarf, pea coat, and furry hat. i can't imagine what the prisoners must have felt like in their bunks, starving and freezing, awaiting an imminent death. it was too miserable. it was also a very haunting place. looking out over the whole of birkenau, i was surprised at how large it was. enclosed by barbed wire fences and the yellow polish forest, all i could see were red brick chimneys. the germans tried to destroy the camp before the red army came in to save the people, but for whatever reason, the chimneys remained. it was a reminder of all the lives lost. more than i could count. more than i will ever know.
after this experience, i was able to reflect on just how wonderful the atonement is. after a summer of heartache - both for myself and others - i learned firsthand how the atonement can cover all pains. the prisoners all across europe in concentration camps felt so much pain, and i'm sure they all felt so alone. but i realized that christ was there for them, just has he is there for me. he felt all of their pains, and he understood what they were going through. he understood the persecution and hatred more than anyone else who has ever lived. he understood being misjudged and having to pay the price for it. it was comforting to me, to know that he suffered equally for all of god's children. and that those who died were not actually alone.
after our time at auschwitz and birkenau and a delish roadside dinner of hot dogs (fun fact, there are no "polish dogs" in poland) that were seriously the best hot dogs of our lives, we were back on the train, but this time to katowice. our train was supposed to pull into the katowice station at 14:26 or something really exact like that, so at the exact time, we got off at this one station that had the word "katowice" in it. when we realized we were standing on a platform with only 3 other people, none of whom spoke english, and there was no other platform for an express train to warsaw...we decided we were at the wrong stop. trains in poland don't have screens displaying train information like in france, so we tried to talk to a man and ask him where katowice was. but...he didn't speak english. and we didn't speak polish. so we called liz again, who talked to the man. and we got on the right train. unfortunately, because of the mix-up, we realized we would be late to our connecting train to warsaw. we ran through the katowice station to get to where we were supposed to be. i was praying the whole time that we would be able to make it, somehow, someway, onto that train. and do you know what? it was a christmas miracle, because the train was late :) and we made it onto the train and into warsaw, all in one piece. it was so great. but really. it was a miracle.
on saturday, we got up, printed our boarding passes, and jon and ania took us out to old town again to have pączki, traditional polish donuts. SO GOOD. they were warm and sticky and delicious. i got mine filled with chocolate, and so did ania. i'm telling you, she's a girl after my own heart. when i asked her if she liked it, she just smiled and nodded really fast, her little face covered in donut. it was a happy happy day. we also did a little more exploring, bought a few souvenirs for our families, and had italian for lunch.
then we had to be off to the airport to catch our flight back to paris. we made it to the train station, but knowing we didn't have much time to catch our flight, we decided it would be less stressful to take a taxi rather than the train. because we could understand the taxi, and couldn't quite remember what jon told us about the train. oops. so we took the taxi all the way to chopin int'l airport and made it just in time. and we spent our remaining złoty on chocolate. which, by the way, is especially delicious in poland. there's really no way of knowing what you're getting...but it really doesn't matter, because all polish chocolate (from my limited experience) is dang good. and then we took the plane back into paris.
i loved my weekend in poland with the jagards. it was so refreshing. and it was so wonderful to see some familiar faces that i haven't seen in three years! oh, i love those people. so much fun. and it was so fun to see them with kids. i loved seeing that. they were just meant to be parents. it's so fun, knowing them before having kids, and then seeing them with two little guys running all over the place. i loved it.
liz, jon, ania, and isaac, thank you so much for sharing your house and country with us! i loved seeing where you live, but most of all, i loved seeing YOU! thanks for being so kind and generous, and i can't wait to see you again. love you!!
sorry, still can't post photos. oops.
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