warsaw

Old Town Warsaw

Warsaw, Poland has made me think. We've seen so much that just is in the past. A lot about Poland seems stuck in the past, stuck in the wars that Poland has been caught in the middle of, stuck in communism, stuck in trying to get out of being stuck. It's sad, it feels like things so dark happened here. Death, disease, cold...it might just be the winter. It's a weird feeling to put a finger on, it's not sinister at all, it's just an intense sense of sadness that pervades everything. I feel bad for these people, for the ancestors of these people, for the grandparents and the parents of these people. They try so hard so hard to move on and try to modernize, but they have this past that trickles into the architecture, into the reconstructed streets and wrinkles on the older people's faces. I feel bad, I feel like I want to help them, to tell them to just move on and not look back. To respect the past, but leave it there, view it as a bridge to the present. But they just seem so stuck. And it's so grey in Poland in the winter.
I guess it didn't help matters that we saw this man on the street who nearly died because of a sudden heart attack. The fragility of life is startling sometimes.

Justyna, Shaina and I near the Old Town

Anyway, on a lighter note, Justyna is an absolute angel. And Warsaw is stunningly beautiful despite what I just wrote. The old city is like walking through the past, the new part of the city is modern and reminded me a lot of Wisconsin. The weather here is similar to Wisconsin's spring weather...damp and windy, but the wind at least is at most times warm and when the sun peeks through it makes you appreciate it so much more than you would on a full sunny day.
Back to Justyna. Her apartment is a palace and she gave Shaina and I both welcome gifts for staying here. And she baked us muffins! Her house really looks like a catalogue picture out of Ikea, I'm so grateful for us taking us in and I just hope I can find an adequate way to repay her for her remarkable kindness. She's incredibly great in English so it's easy to confide in her and find things in common to talk about. I'm just so grateful for this experience, it's been great, especially having such a great tour guide and friend to be here to help us understand the city.

an array of Polish gifts

Otherwise, things have been great. I love that I feel like I am looking forward to going home to a new place that I love on a cursory level. I keep dreaming about Bonn...about how my life will be in less than a week. How normal it will be, how scheduled and school centric it will be. I just look forward to unpacking my suitcase, having a steady place to keep my coat, to rest my blankets on my bed. I just want a sense of security and normalcy, a place to come back to. These past few weeks, while amazing and the experience of a lifetime, have been nomadic. I have no home, really. My stuff is all sitting in the dark basement of a building I've only been to once, waiting for me to use it and place it where it needs to be. (Think: enchanted stuff in Beauty and the Beast)

Shaina and I in front of the Palace