I'm surrounded by dwarfs. Everywhere I turn, there are these tiny bronze men hiding, lurking among. Some of them have suspicious smirks on their faces. But most of them simply hard at work, doing whatever it is they are doing, oblivious to the flocks of tourists around them, many of whom impolitely posing with them without asking, and rubbing their shiny bronze heads for good luck.
I am now in Wroclaw (best pronounced "WroClove", possibly, but one can never be sure no matter how many times I've heard others say it to me). I've decided to come here on a day trip from Kraków (most wouldn't suggest it as a day trip, for it is a 3hr bus ride each way, of which I went with the big red PolskiBus, after reading about their services from a fellow travel blog. Besides, the town is quite pretty, and could likely deserve an overnight stay had I weren't too lazy to pack my bags. For reference, it was a long day, I left around 7am, and got back past 11pm). But I had decided to come regardless, because from everything I've read, Wroclaw is beautiful, if not more so than its more famous sister Kraków. Besides, I was pretty sure the cover of my Lonely Planet Central Europe guidebook was featuring Wroclaw (and hunting for the exact same building sort of became my side mission). So, you can never not go to a town that is prominently photographed on the cover of your guidebook now, can you?
I picked a dreadful day to come. It was raining buckets. But well, you cannot dictate nature, and I must say I have been rather lucky so far weather wise anyway. Rain or not, I was determined to seek out the beauty of Wroclaw. After warming up over a cool beer (ironically) and a large plate of potato cakes with meat stew and pickled cucumbers (or simply, just pickles, a favourite side dish here), I set out to join the yellow umbrella walking tour again (in which the umbrella was far more appropriate today). The cool thing about Wroclaw, or the unfortunate thing about it, is that it was under numerous rules by various nations in different eras. Its architecture, therefore, reflects those different periods depending on who was ruling, but mostly predominately German. (The other thing unfortunate about this was that, because of all those previous rulers and their respective languages, Wroclaw has probably over 10 names that are all being used even today. So one can never be quite sure where you are going when you are telling them you are heading to Wroclaw...). Wroclaw was also heavily bombed during the end of WWII when it was a Nazi stronghold and the Soviets exercised their carpet bombing techniques. As a result, over 75% of the city was levelled, and much of what you see today are simply replicas of what the place had been. Today, Wroclaw is mainly an extremely popular university town, but with a rapidly expanding outsourcing industry attracting numerous big companies to come hunt for talents. "Everyone is coming", the locals would tell me, "if you're an engineer or in IT, you make a lot of money, I mean a LOT..." Rent is also increasing fast, due to lack of living spaces, a familiar tune to my Vancouver friends I'm sure.
And about those dwarfs, some almost five hundreds of them in the city by the last estimate. They are a relatively recent occurrence, starting at around 2001 as part of the youthful efforts to commensurate the Polish anti-communist movements through peaceful, non confrontation, and somewhat comical or sarcastic means, known as the Orange Alternative, in which the dwarf was its symbol. Today, it has literally taken a comical take to the fullness, as shops and artists are releasing these tiny little bronze men day by day, many of which depicting daily life under the communist rule. It's totally getting out of control. They have maps where you can go dwarf hunting, and even online apps where you can walk around, trying to "catch them all" (ahem, you Pokemon fans). For me, I think I saw about 7, all somewhat funny and quirky ones. After a while you start walking around the city with your head down rather than looking up. Sure you may miss all the beautiful sites, but you don't want to miss a dwarf.
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