Hello Warsaw!

Coming out of the train station, it hits you instantly. You are now in a big city. A bustling business Center of Poland, with towering modern-looking skyscrapers (real ones this time, not those 10-something story high ones that they like to call "skyscrapers" in this part of the world..) surrounding the central rail station core. Beyond it, however, is an ongoing reminder of this being one of the previous communist strongholds (stronghold is a relative word, for all important decisions were basically made in Moscow). With large, dull, non-inspiring but deliberatively imposing concrete blocks of apartments and government buildings lined along all the big, wide, somewhat busy streets. When they say Warsaw isn't pretty, they are not kidding. But beyond the lack of esthetics lies a vibrant, functional city, who is rapidly embracing the fall of communism and, after overcoming a period of growing pains, is emerging as a stronger and more stable economy of Eastern Europe (a Ferrari dealership, the first of its kind in this region, prominently resides in ironically the former communist headquarters in Warsaw, and everywhere, large signs of expensive brands such as LV or Rolex overhangs still dull-looking communist style office towers). Poland never wanted to be communist in the first place, but was shoved down their throat after the Soviets "liberated" them from Nazi rule, and, like the local likes to jokes, "they came and then forgot to leave for almost 50 years".

The train here from Kraków was much more joyful than my previous rail journey, owning to me being able to buy an inter-city express train ticket online (for those who are interested in rail travel in Europe, I highly recommend you visit a resourceful site called "the man at seat 61" (www.seat61.com), whom a friend told me about. It's a very, and I mean VERY, comprehensive study of almost all train routes you can think of across Europe). The express train was a treat to ride. Wide-enough comfortable seats in a sturdy, quiet cabin, with the train clocking at up to 160km/hr across Poland's country side, making the trip from Kraków to Warsaw a rather comfortable 3 hour journey.

To further understand Warsaw's troubled past, I chose another one of these yellow umbrella walks, but this time with a communism theme (they have various special theme ones in addition to the usual "old town" tours). It was a fascinating experience. No Warsaw isn't very pretty, for much of its old town and new were completely destroyed during WWII. There was even talk of not even bother rebuilding it. But like it or not, the miraculous and efficiently rebuilt process of the city was actually one of the few communism efforts that could be called positive. In fact, unlike most other Polish cities that needed a rebuild, sensing the growing displeasure of the Polish people having to take in this new communism ideology, they chose to rebuild a large part of it in the old Polish look, and not all with large square concrete blocks. In that, part of Warsaw got its city back almost instantly, and on many streets almost exactly like they were before the war. The old town still got its old Europe charm, but by this point I'm almost all "old-Europed" out. Like Berlin, Warsaw has a youthful, energetic, optimistic feel to it. There's a film festival going on. Everywhere are large posters of upcoming concerns and cultural events. It's a livable city, not a walking museum, and pretty or not, it felt nice.

Dwarfs, dwarfs, and more dwarfs...

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.

Castles and Dragons and Perogies

Kraków is a Medieval wonder. I've never heard of this place before planning this trip. But while you go to Poland thinking Warsaw, everything you read would point you towards Kraków. Think of Kyoto over Tokyo for a place full of preserved history. In fact, the entire core of Kraków is like a walking medieval museum, topped by a stunning hill top castle and their fascination with an ancient fire breathing dragon that is prominently featured in most their mementos and postcards.

Getting here from Bratislava was a little journey in itself. While I was looking forward to my first rail trip this time around, I had envision a smooth transition of me simply showing up at the right time and waking up at my destination. Word of caution about buying cross country train tickets locally. While the purchase for a Bratislava to Kraków ticket at the Bratislava train station was a simple process of paying 55 Euros, they didn't made clear to me that I was to change train at Katowice, a distant industrial town serving also as a train hub. That's fine, changing train isn't a problem. But somehow the ticket I paid didn't cover the entire trip to Katowice (I had no clue why, it was all in Polish). As the train attendant checked my ticket in the middle of the journey, he had a terrible time explaining to me in Polish that the ticket only took me to a town somewhat 130km from Katowice, while I had terrible time explaining to him in English that I paid the full fare. In the end, I gave up. We settled on an extra 15 Euros to take me from that unknown town to Katowice, where, because my train had arrived late, I missed my connecting train to Kraków. But that's okay, inter-city trains are plenty in Poland, even though they crawl at a snail pace that at times I felt I would have gotten to Kraków sooner had I just walked it. In the end, I arrived happily by 7pm, in the pouring rain. At least my hostel was nice and clean. It even included a hearty breakfast with lots of fruits, something I had been craving right about now.

The rain cleared the next day and I set out to explore. As I had mentioned, much of Krakow's beauty lies in its well preserved old town. It is immensely walkable. The streets are clean and tidy, although the setting feels a little artificial and touristy. I snapped a gazillions photos during the occasional sunny breaks, and after dodging and almost getting hit numerous times by flying pigeons everywhere (they are, literally, EVERYWHERE), took in a hearty lunch of a traditional Polish soup and meat Perogies with a delicious tomato and mushroom "hunter" sauce in one of the few remaining "Milk Bars", essentially a causal local cafeteria style restaurants.

In the afternoon, I joined another one of those "free" walking tours. This is something I have discovered (or reminded of their existence) during this trip. In virtually all these cities, there are a number of organizations that runs these "by donations" tour. I highly recommend it. So far, on all the tours I've been on, the guides have been fun, enthusiastic, and full of insightful information (not simply stories and legends of this and that..). While some may disagree with the notion of "posting a free sign" only to ask for "donations", one should look at these as "pay your own price" sort of tours. In the end, it's pretty clear these guides are professionally trained guides, many of whom have a degree in tourism, and this is just a different business model that might prove to be even more lucrative (I recall reading an article describing that these name your own price businesses often generate an even higher revenue owing to consumer willingly paying more either due to their satisfaction, or in some cases, feeling the pressure to pay "what others may be paying". In any case, if you're in a new city and has a few hours to spare, I strongly suggest finding a good organization and do one of these (for reference, I went with the ones with the bright yellow umbrella, called Walkative Tours, I think).

In the evening, I joined yet another tour, this time focusing on Krakow's Jewish quarters and their relevant tragic history. It was an amazing tour (our guide, in fact, wrote his university thesis on the history of the Poland Jews). I'll spare you the historical details, mostly because I do not think I can remotely do it justice. But seeing this different side of Kraków (after all the legends and fantasies of the old town), really opened up this city to me. Today, the so called "Jewish Quarters" is fasting becoming a hip bohemian hub for the city, filled with night life of bars and fancy restaurants and rowdy street food eateries. This is where Kraków comes alive at night. And I couldn't help but indulged myself with a serving of grilled sausage and a big bowl of Bigos (a rather chunky meat and sauerkraut stew).

Slovak in a day

The rain caught up to us. I sat on my bed staring out the wet soaked window, still in shock over the details of last night's mass shooting at Las Vegas. Everyone has left from my room, and it was barely 7am. I wasn't too surprised. From everyone I have spoken to on this trip, the consensus has been the same. One day in Bratislava, the biggest city in Slovakia, is enough. In fact, I had originally planned not to come here. But why not spend one day in the country, I thought. It's not like I might ever been in Slovakia again. In fact, had I planned this better, I would have scheduled to stay on a night when the local KHL hockey team was playing. I fellow Canadian traveller went to one. It was a riot, he said. I would expect nothing less. The KHL can be the less civilized, more rowdy version of the NHL. There are some sick talents, no doubt, but probably a lot more variation in skill levels and goon plays.

And so, this rainy Tuesday (Tuesday, is it?) is now my travel day, a nice slow intermission in my city hopping schedule. My train in Kraków leaves at 11:10am, which means plenty of time to stay in the appropriately named dreamy Dream Hostel, and get my laundry done.

But spending a day in Bratislava was well worth it (the 3 hr bus journey here was rather comfortable, which I have learned, they do quite good job of long distance bus travels here, with comfortably clean coaches and, in the case of the one I just took ran by RegioJet, even served hot coffee and water enroute along with headrest entertainment systems on each seat). Coming from the stunning city of Budapest to Bratislava, you have got to feel a little bit of a downer. This was it? Damn that castle looked hideous on the hill. The train station looked trashy. That was supposed to be the biggest in the country?

But like all sleepy smaller towns, once you walk it, they usually still have a lot of character. The old town of Bratislava was clean and well preserved, despite losing a large chunk of it over the building of a terrible looking bridge during the communist ruling era. Bratislava is like the always overlooked sibling of Prague. Word was that, when it was Czechoslovakia as a whole, the communist regime felt included to have one beautiful city (Prague), and one simply just functional one (Bratislava). There's a chip on the shoulder of the Slovaks, no doubt. But while it may not be as refined as some of the nearby worldly cities, the charm is that people simply just live here and make it work. In fact, sometimes it feels more real. Everyday modern Slovaks, living among dull looking communist buildings beside historic ones alike. It felt a little like the Eastern part of Berlin, whose chill and laid back attitude actually made me rather fell in love with it. So, Bratislava does have charm, behind its somewhat pretty-enough face.