Poznan

When we arrived in Poznan yesterday evening I was immediately struck by the size of it, this is a real city! It's quite Manchester-esque, big and busy and modern, lots of trams, lots of people and seemingly very good nightlife.  Outside the old town square it doesn't feel massively Polish, in my opinion cities generally don't.  To me, Poland is little and quaint and pretty and colourful, Poznan is a city like any other, but with a really good feel to it.  But as soon as you step foot in the square, wow!

Old town square

It is huge, but it is also pretty and colourful and quaint, there are a number of statues and fountains making good use of the space available, a big church with a huge spire (as is usual), and lots of little decorations to be found on the many buildings around the edge.  Sean and I walked around the main area before heading back to the hotel for the night, a bargain at 135zl for a decent twin room - less than £30!

This morning I met Sarah and Jen to continue exploring Poznan.  We had a quick walk round and went to a bar mleczny for some food.  These are canteen/restaurants introduced under communism to provide cheap food for workers, and it was cheap!  Although Jen wasn't overly impressed with her hotdog sausage wrapped in a pancake, it was only 50p; Sarah's meat croquette and chips 75p; and my apple filled pancake was the ultimate bargain at 35p.

We went to an art gallery (art really isn't my thing so I wasn't too impressed overall but I gave it a go), had a look round the Cathedral, went for a couple of drinks and then met Sarah's brother who flew in from Paris today.  We were planning on heading straight back to Torun but found that the train was 3 times the price than it was earlier in the day because it was an inter city express; 75zl is a lot of money here, I couldn't believe it.  This was clearly a very good opportunity to head back into town for a(nother) nice meal before journeying home on a cheaper, but much later train.

Listopad come early

Listopad in Polish is November, but it also means leaves falling.

In fact, all the months in Polish have a literal meaning, as do the days.  Check out the links...

It's not quite Listopad, but there are leaves everywhere!!

Toilet trouble

I went to the toilets at the cinema earlier tonight and was a bit puzzled by the circle and triangle markings on the doors.  No stick man and lady around to guide me, I was a bit stuck.  I thought about it for a few seconds and decided the triangle must be the woman's toilet, us having a triangle shaped womb and everything (that really was how I came to the conclusion) so I opened the door and a man walked out.  Oops.  I'm glad he came out just then or I would've gone right in.  Thankfully, it isn't a mistake I'm likely to make twice.

On the subject of toilets, the toilets in pasta i basta in town are also a bit odd, they are unisex but with a different cubicle for men and women.  The weird thing is that they both have a transparent glass door.  When you go in and turn the lock the door frosts over slightly, it's not very reassuring though.  You have to be as quick as you can and hope noone catches you!

My weekend

As much as I love travelling and getting out and about at the weekends, sometimes it's nice just to chill out and take a couple of days off!  I started the weekend with a nice meal and a couple of glasses of wine on Friday night, and then went bargain hunting on the market on Saturday.  The market is huge and you can find all sorts; food, clothes, flowers, make up, electrical goods, etc etc... people here say that if you can't find what you want on the market, there's no point looking any further.  I had a quiet night in on Saturday with a girly film and a couple of Zubrowkas.

I've spent today chilling out in the flat and doing some housework, it's good to know that I'll have something to eat off this week, and something to eat with.  My flatmate Sarah and I intended to visit a photography exhibition in town this afternoon but we turned up just as the museum closed, so we had a walk round some castle ruins on the other side of the bridge and down to the river instead.  I finished the weekend with some strawberry filled pierogi, not the best I've had, and the social network, which turned out to be a good film even if it is about facebook.

Unfortunately the weekend always ends too soon, at least the next one is only 5 days away.

Money matters

Before I came to Torun, I thought I'd struggle to make ends meet on my 1600zl (£350) a month wage.  I had previously been offered 2500zl pm by a school in a small town in Southern Poland, so even though I opted for Torun for the location, I thought things would be tight.  How wrong I turned out to be.  Poles earn an average wage of around 1000zl pm, and rent and bills could come to half of that amount or more, leaving them just £100 a month to spend.  An unemployed person in the UK gets £280 a month in benefit and doesn't even have rent to worry about.  Of course some things are cheaper here, but some things are the same price making them effectively 5 times more expensive in proportion to wages.  Out of my 1600zl wage, I only have to pay for the internet and my phone bill, and the school covers the rest of my bills and pays my rent too.  Turns out I'm rich in Poland, but only because I'm English, which doesn't exactly feel like an achievement.  Anyway, please excuse me while I throw my money in the air.

Polish food

Here are a few of the more traditional Polish dishes;

• Pierogi is a filled dumpling; they can be boiled, fried or baked and filled with anything you can think of.
• Pierniki is the famous Torun gingerbread, delicious!  Even better is pierniki flavoured ice cream.
• Lard on bread.  (That's right)
• Naleśniki - filled pancakes; sweet or savoury.  I think savoury pancakes are almost like a folded pizza, I prefer sweet, especially chocolate and banana.
• Bigos is a pork/sausage/boczek/cabbage stew - I haven't tried it yet but it is supposed to be very good on a cold day.
• Boczek is very fatty pork, or even a porky fat.  It's mostly fat with just a slither of meat on top.
• Soup - worthy of another post altogether.  There are too many different soups to mention here, but they are very popular in Poland.  Barszcz z uszkami (beetroot soup with stuffed pasta) and żurek (sausage and egg soup) are two of my favourites.
• Kapusta - cabbage goes with everything.

Polish food is quite stodgy and often fatty, but looking around very few people are overweight here.  Part of that may be due to genetics or perhaps that Poles traditionally haven't had the money to be gluttonous; however I do think there is a healthier lifestyle here and the sense that food/dieting is just not an issue here like it is in England.  

Unfortunately, despite all this lovely traditional food Poland has to offer I've been eating nothing but toast for a couple of days while I eagerly await payday.

Gniezno Part 1

Old town circle - car boot sale

Gniezno was Poland's first capital city, and if you are to believe the legend of Lech, Czech and Rus, it was the site of the very beginning of Poland.

It was quiet when I arrived in Gniezno this morning, I realised that about 90% of the population were in church with it being Sunday morning, and the other 10% were hosting an antiques/car boot sale in the old town circle.  Oddly enough there was also an avon cosmetics stall there, which served to remind me of the Western influence right across Poland.

St Adalbert's reliquary

I wandered down to the Cathedral which is Gniezno's top tourist attraction.  It's a real treasure-hove, with so much to see and everything made with such intricate detail - the famous bronze doors and St Adalbert's reliquary are definitely worth seeing.

Gniezno town centre is quite small but packed with churches and a few nice parks.  After walking around the centre I took a walk round Jezioro Jelonek to find the Museum of the Origins of the Polish State but unfortunately it was closed for refurbishment.  I think there's plenty more to see in Gniezno and I'll happily go back and see it.

One hair cut please..

When you're new to living abroad, and haven't mastered the language of the country in which you live, you find challenges in the simplest of tasks.  I was quite nervous about getting my hair cut in Poland for the first time; obviously any miscommunication could lead to a complete hair disaster, so I rehearsed the phrase chciałabym obćiąć włosy in preparation for my first trip to the hairdressers.  Obviously, after telling them that you've gone to the hairdressers for a hair cut, there are still plenty of things to say to make sure you get what you want.  My first problem was that I didn't know the word for appointment, so I told them I had a reservation for a hair cut at 11 when I got there, then there was all sorts of pointing and scissor gestures and me saying things like wszystko tutaj and tosamo długość which seemed successful enough.  Still, when she started chopping away I was quite apprehensive but I thought it's too late now!  I emerged one hair cut later, pretty happy with the result.  Mission accomplished.

Pogoda

Whenever I told people at home that I wanted to move to Poland, they would often say 'isn't it cold there?'  Poland is well known for it's freezing winters, but it also has lovely summers with temperatures often reaching 30 degrees or more.  September is usually a good month in Poland too, but this year it was apparently the coldest September for many years, and it's only getting colder!  It's already regularly hitting 0, -2, -4 degrees out at night, and we're expecting snow next week!  Not only that but I've been told this year it's going to be -20 as early as November, when usually it would be late December/January that it gets so cold.  I've already found myself saying jest mi zimno more and more so I've no idea how I'm going to cope; I need to man up, and go winter wardrobe shopping!

P.S. I came out of Piotr i Pawel last Friday and thought wow it's gone foggy all of a sudden, but it turned out a car was on fire in the car park!!

Happy National Teacher's Day!

Today is National Teacher's Day.  One of the students told me that in 1773, King Stanisław founded the 'Commission of Education' on 14th October, and this has been celebrated ever since.  For kids and teachers across Poland this is a very welcome day off!  For me, working at a private school, I still had to go to work, although I did get a lovely red rose and two bars of chocolate from some of the students, which was a really nice surprise and made me feel very appreciated.  Dziękuję bardzo!!

Polish cemeteries

In Poland, cemeteries are much busier places than in England; graves are tended to on a daily basis.  Every day the local cemetery is full of people polishing headstones and replacing flowers, and there are always people selling flowers and candles from stalls at the entrance.  A walk through a Polish cemetery at night is really a beautiful and peaceful experience, nothing but a sea of candles twinkling in the dark all around you, that said, I still wouldn't like to go alone.  I read that in Poland graves are rented by the church for a maximum of 40 years, then they are dug up and rented to someone else.  I haven't looked at the headstones yet to find out if this seems true, and I have no idea what must happen to the bodies that are dug up but I'll do some (uh hum) digging...

Ciechocinek

Teżnie

Ciechocinek is a small spa town about 25km from Toruń.  It is well known for it's several huge teżnie, a word that won't translate into English because there isn't anything like it in the UK.  Teżnie are huge, thatched walls that carry salt from the salty water at the top, to the ground and into the surrounding air.  It is considered extremely healthy to breathe the air around the teżnie, so most people visit Ciechocinek for health reasons and stay in one of the many spa's here (it's full of old people).  You can see the salt glistening down through all the hay, and shining all over the floor.  We found some big foaming chunks of salt falling off the teżnie and drank some of the dripping salt water.  Besides the teżnie there isn't much going on in Ciechocinek.  Still, it's a relaxing place with a few cafes, parks and a tourist market, good for a walk round.

Klif bar

Klif bar is my newly discovered local pub, 20 metres walk from the flat.  I don't think there have ever been women in there before, let alone English women, so the girls got lots of free drinks when they went in!  Unfortunately, I wasn't there then :-( I was out having some traditional zurek i naleśniki for tea; soup with sausage and egg and pancakes with banana and chocolate, smacznego indeed!  I was happy to find I can now drink my Zubrowka and apple juice for only 5zl, so will be going in there again, although I think I smoked about 20 cigarettes in second hand smoke.  At the end of the night the owner even gave us 6 free cans of lager so we could keep drinking after they kicked us out, na zdrowie!

Barbarka

Barbarka is an area of forest on the outskirts of Torun, a good hours walk away from my flat.  There is a lake, little cafe, football field, volley ball pitch and even a high ropes course.

Considering my attempt at becoming a runner went so badly it's good to be able to get out and about, get some fresh air and do some exercise at the same time.

I would recommend it for a Sunday morning stroll/hangover cure.

Dog Tax

It's always difficult when a lesson isn't well received, and today my lesson on global warming went down like a lead balloon!  I was told 'if you want us to discuss global warming, you will be waiting, we aren't interested in this.'  Talk about blunt! Harsh especially considering the previous lesson I had asked what the group was interested in, and global warming was mentioned.

So somehow, we got onto the topic of taxes, and I found out Poland has a dog tax.  If you own a dog, you pay between 30zl and 100zl tax every year, and you pay for every dog you own.  I don't know how they decide if you pay 30zl or 100zl, but my suggestion about it being down to the size of the dog went down nearly as badly as the topic of global warming.  Silly me?

Prices

It's currently 5zl to £1; here is a run down of a few of the things I've found cheap, and not so cheap....

1.5l bottle of water - 2zl
Meal in a restaurant, with drinks - 15 - 20zl
Classical concert - 20zl
Unlimited climbing (at the indoor wall) - 17zl
Zubrowka and apple juice - 6 - 9zl

Bargains all round.

Postage cost to England - 58 - 67zl?! Nearly fell over, it cost less to buy something than to send it home!
Rectangular pillow - 100zl - worth every grosze!

Pillow Hell

It's nearly 2am, I couldn't sleep last night, and then I worked a ten hour day, I'm tired! So, why aren't I asleep?!  These bloody pillows have to be the worst thing about Poland! Great big square things, 80x80cm, that completely deflate as soon as your head gets anywhere near them.  I can't find 'normal' sized pillows anywhere, no nice rectangular ones that fit into a pillow case and don't take up half your bed.  These rubbish pillows aren't confined to Poland either, I've come across them in a few places in Eastern Europe, me no like! I've heard there's a Swedish place nearby that is something similar to Ikea, so I'm crossing my fingers and hoping the Swede's have the right idea.  In the meantime I will be listening to Take That until I drop off or have to get up, not all bad I guess.

Style

Polish girls are pretty stylish, Polish boys, well... Nie rozumiem! 

Toruń

Torun is really a very interesting place.

I'm currently living in Torun.  It's a great city, smaller than I expected but it is a beautiful place; it has one of the few completely authentic old town's left in Poland, as it was largely undamaged in WW2, and is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  It's also famous for being the birthplace of Nicolas Copernicus, and it's the home of pierniki; Polish gingerbread - yum!

If you're interested in reading about Torun, check out www.torun.pl

Piotr i Pawel

Piotr i Pawel is the Polish equivalent of Waitrose; the prices are high but they sell good quality food and a good range of things that I haven't found anywhere else.  I went in for the first time tonight for a wander round and found tortilla wraps, lots of continental sauces and even Cadbury's choclairs (eclairs)!!  I'd rather sample Polish food while I'm here, but it's nice to have some home comforts and I treated myself to some Walls ice cream :-) Saturday night sorted!

Mozart and more

Tonight I've been to a classical concert at Dwor Artusa in the main square; a performance of Mozart's overture, Chopin's opus 11 and Schumann's 3rd symphony by Torun's symphony orchestra.  Chopin's piece was accompanied by a special guest pianist who got lots!!! of applause at the end, he went out and came back 5 times to more applause, I thought he was really enjoying the attention - but apparently it's expected, and he was given a nice bunch of flowers, I've never seen a man receive flowers before.  The whole night was really fantastic, conducted by Tokyo's renowned Mitsuyoshi Oikawa! Nic nie wiem about classical music (so obviously I've never heard of him) but apparently he's very famous, he's involved a lot in the British proms, and he was presented with a special gift by the concert hall, plus more flowers (3 bunches!) and a good slow clap at the end - however, he disappeared from the backstage area when they were trying to present it to him; I enjoyed the presenter's dig at him in English 'you were easier to find in Tokyo than Torun!' 

Good music followed by good food and good company = a good night!

The search

C&A and McDonalds

I can't count the number of times I've heard the words 'when Poland was a real country.'  Sean studied in Czestohowa for a year in 2001, before Poland was infiltrated by tourists and globalisation.  Apparently things have changed!  In the 3 weeks I've been in Torun, I've ate in a cafe owned by an American guy, found the local Indian, been shown the English speaking travel agents and met scores of English folk.  Not only that, but even when I use my (somewhat limited) Polish on an unsuspecting taxi driver, shop worker or passer-by, the response invariably comes in English.  Torun is a very progressive place, and from what I've seen much of Poland is too; it's fantastic, but it's always a shame to see a country's ways and traditions erode under the influence of globalisation.  I thought living in Poland would be quite a challenge, but after just 3 weeks in I've settled into a very comfortable normality.  Too easy!  Real Poland certainly does still exist, I just need to find it.

The move

I've wanted to live abroad for as long as I can remember.  Since I first came to Poland in 2007 I was hooked and decided that it was the place for me; beautiful buildings, rich history, great people and good food.  And now, finally, here I am.  I quit my job, took the infamous CELTA course and got a job in Toruń.  I made it!