Impressions of Poland
I'd been intending to spend most of the summer in Slovenia, but then got invited to a work thing in Krakow at the end of June, so it was back on the road - literally, since the bus from Ljubljana all the way to Krakow took almost the same amount of time as flying (with a long layover in Warsaw) at a fraction of the cost. These are some posts from a few days spent in Krakow and Warsaw, before heading east….
Black Comedy on Wheels
When a scheduled 13-hour bus ride ends up taking more than 15 hours, but in addition to driving (poorly) the middle aged Serbian (black) comedy duo running the show provide nonstop comic relief (mostly of the politically incorrect vaudvillian type), so the entire day flies right by. Some beautiful, rainy central European scenery almost the entire time as well....
Small Pleasures
Small Pleasure #24630: Finding a shop open on Sunday in Krakow that sells tiny screwdrivers, so you can 'fix' your laptop's broken network card by jiggling it around a bit and blowing on it....
NB: Turns out that today was one of the seven Sundays during the year that shops are legally allowed to be open in Poland, so a bit of good luck in that regard too, which just about makes up for the bad luck of having the network card stop working in the first place.
Monetising Fidel
Oh, Late Capitalism, what will you commodify next? Seriously, that's not a rhetorical question. Whoever had "monetising Fidel Castro's eyes" on their Late Capitalism Bingo card, go ahead and mark it down....
Hello, Warsaw
A rathole apartment in a good location with a great view for a dirt cheap price will never not be a winning combination....
NB: A ‘dirt cheap price’ in Warsaw is now around €40 per night.
Vegan ramen (was the intention)
When you've been talking about trying the vegan ramen in Poland for two years, but then when you finally meet up with a vegan friend for dinner in Warsaw, just end up ordering the classic version instead....
FYI, Warsaw is very green….
Sportsball Along the Waterfront
If you're into sportsball, these riverside steps along the Vistula in Warsaw are a fine place to watch a match - especially if the match includes a billionaire celebrity crying like a baby because he kicked the ball to the wrong spot.
Alternatively, the riverside is also a fine place just to walk along at sunset and briefly stop to take a few photos, although this might draw the ire of several old drunks who'll then yell at you in Polish because you're blocking their view of the screen, despite the fact that they're not actually patronising the bar showing it and are just kind of lurking up the hill at a couple of public picnic tables. For instance....
Friendly Reminder 🏳️🌈 🏳️🌈 🏳️🌈
Just a friendly reminder that shameless capitalist virtue signalling isn't limited to giant corporations or the month of June!
Left: Warsaw, July 2024
Right: Dahab, March 2024
New Vistula Bridge
When your friend nonchalantly asks if you wanna see a bridge her company just built, and it turns out to be the massive newly opened pedestrian and bike marvel over the river, with panoramic views of Warsaw's skyline....
NB: They are some very random and petty sounding bad reviews on Google Maps (presumably from the burner accounts of rival design firms that lost out on the commission), so if you'd like to leave your own 5-star review to balance these out, you can do so here.
"OLD MAN VS LIAR“
Unrelated to the cover story, I like how this newspaper is printed in the who's who of the Polish diaspora, ie Chicago, Dortmund, Toronto, New York and Vilnius
Time for Wax
Something about this stock photo model just doesn't seem to fit the service being advertised. He seems happy though, and that's what's really important....
Warsaw: The City of Fightin' Mermaids
Prices in Poland
When the prices in Poland give you flashbacks to the first time you went to Switzerland and couldn't believe how expensive everything was. Although in Poland, 'everything' doesn't include vodka, which is still dangerously cheap, ie from €6.70 a bottle in a supermarket.
Some typical street food prices: €2-3 for a donut, €3-4 sandwich, €5-7 falafel wrap, €6-7 döner kebab, €10-11 bowl of ramen.
NB: These prices will likely still sound cheap to anyone in the US, but compared to a few years ago, they feel absurdly high - especially if you just spent several months in Egypt....
Winds of Change
The ‘winds of change’ were blowing all right. Unfortunately after they blew away the drab Soviet dystopia, they just blew in a slightly less drab (although arguably even more soulless) American version, albeit with at least the illusion of real freedom and democracy.
And lo and behold the Scorpions are still touring, even though it's public knowledge that their biggest hit was literally written by the CIA - yeah, that CIA, the one whose catalogue is otherwise most known for various coups, assassinations, sowing of chaos, etc. What a time to be alive....
Hard Rock Über Alles
Seems whenever a post mentions certain subject matter*, it tends to get seen by relatively very few people - like 10% or less of the usual. Strange bit of coincidence that is.
So to be clear, this is just a random photo of a beautiful bright cheery summer day in the bustling Polish capital, without any political, economic or social undertones whatsoever. Although if you'd like to fill in your own, by all means....
*Subject matter like the old bait and switch scam of neoliberal capitalism. For instance, the previous post more directly addressed this (via the Scorpions 'Winds of Change'), but like 44 people in total saw it. With this shot in particular, I like the symbol of a soulless American corporate chain brand appearing to tower over a landmark of the past.
Warsaw's New Old Town
You probably can't read it from this distance, but the date near the roof on that tallest building in the background is 1954, which is when Warsaw's new 'old' town was rebuilt, or at least this part of it.
And if you turn your head to the right where this photo was taken, it's a street of 1950's socialist residential blocks, which is really what ruins the illusion of the district - but also makes it quite interesting and different from most of the other old towns in Europe.
Key Code and Cleaning Correlations?
More research is needed, but there seems to be some truth to the hypothesis that there's a direct correlation between how much (or in this case how very very little) the cleaning person mixes up the code to the key lockbox and how clean (or how not clean) the apartment behind the door is. If anyone knows where we can apply for grants to fund such field work, please email us….