I Heart Krak-ow

I woke up on Friday morning around 8:30am. Class with Karanfil was at 9:30. Well, apparently 'twas at 9:00 today, because she likes to change the class meeting time every week, but we didn't start till at least 10 anyways... So...

This was our last class of the semester, at least for this Duke class. We have class next week, too, but classes end next Thursday.

We spent last class (a Wednesday night class Karanfil had us come to because she's cancelled too many class periods this semester, or something like that) giving presentations on one of seven paper topics. Not all of us got to go, so the overflow presented today.

That was me. I went second in the presentation order. My topic was something about arguing the value of scientific knowledge in the philosophical debates regarding religion and morality. I blacked out for the PowerPoint presentation I gave but my classmates told me I did a good job. I have no idea what I said.

I left class a little early because I had a plane to catch. I had to go visit my friend Peter in Krakow. You remember Peter, he owns the hostel in Kiev and Tbilisi. He has also offered to hire me for Euro 2012 in the hostel, the Europe-wide soccer competition that's happening in Warsaw and Kiev this summer. Anyways, I bought the tickets weeks ago, and didn't realize at the time just how crazy I was for making the trip. The commute would be exhausting.

As luck would have it, Jake, one of the Duke kids, was on the first leg of my flight, to Munich. I discovered this after he left class right before me, and we coordinated getting to the airport together.

We each packed our respective bags, and met downstairs in the Superdorm at quarter to one. Our flight was at 4:15. It was a painless commute: we took the bus to the metrobus to the metro to the airport. Easy.

We passed the time at the airport with ease, and our flight left on time. We enjoyed several free beers on the flight, and we managed to get aisle seats next to each other from which we could enjoy them.

At this point I'd like to mention how much I despise the European Union. It's not because of economic policy or because their currency makes my purchases even more expensive over there, but because of their border policy. I can't travel inside the EU countries and get stamps in my passport everywhere I go. This policy is why I have no Poland stamp in my new passport. When I went to Warsaw in January, Judson and I came from and returned to Berlin, which means no border patrols. We got cheated of the stamp. And this time was no exception. I got stamped into the EU in Munich, not Krakow. Damn.

Shortly after immigration rudely robbed me of my Polish entry stamp, Jake and I went our separate ways. Jake to meet with his friends in Munich, and I to make my connection to Krakow.

It was a long layover. 4 hours. I thought it was 3, but didn't account for backing up an hour when going from Istanbul to Munich. Oh, time zones.

I had Weißwürste as a snack, a regional specialty, I've read. Delicious, but doesn't raise my already low opinion on the complexity and creativeness of German cuisine.

I felt like getting a Munich souvenir. So... Instead of getting something that might last, like a little stein-shaped shotglass, I settled on a mini keg. 5L of duty-free Lowenbraü. It was quite cheap and promised to be delicious later.

My flight to Krakow took off at 9:30, landing at 10:50. I slept the whole way.

Peter had given me some pretty terrible directions to find this party of his, so I had to make do. Not that I fault him for it. I think there was some miscommunication on both ends, as he never communicated how easy it would be to get around and I never mentioned how little I had prepared for this.

After collecting my bags and some Polish Złoty from an ATM, I went outside and promptly sought out the bus that goes to the city center and the train station. See, when Peter invited me to his party in Krakow, he neglected to mention he lives 3 hours away from Krakow by train, in a little village called Stróże.

I got on the bus and tried to utilize the ticket machine, which was explained to me in German by the bus driver. But it only accepted coins, and all I had was 50s and 100s from the ATM. I tried the machine outside the bus, where there was a slot for bills. But 50 was too much for it to handle, and it spit it back out. So the bus driver told me he would wait with my bags while I got change.

I sprinted inside and got change from an exchange place in the airport. It was the only place open. On the way back to the bus I helped a German woman find the same bus. She ranted for the entire ride about how her flight from Frankfurt wouldn't let her on so she had to detour and missed dinner in Krakow, or something like that.

The last stop on the bus was the train station. I had to follow signs for a while to find the platforms, and then wandered more to find the ticket office. There didn't seem to be one. It's a damn good thing I got there early (circa 12:15am, train left at 3:33), because to navigate my way through the overpasses, underpasses, construction zones, tunnels, and tracks to get to the Old Station (which, like the tunnels, was covered in scaffolding and tarps) to buy tickets took me at least an hour -- it felt much longer because I was dragging a backpack which, amongst other items, housed at least 5L of liquid encased in a small metal keg.

I took a seat in the old train station after paying for my 18zł ticket, and passed the time until 3ish, when I made my way to track 1. I saw plenty of weird things in the train station (it's an odd type of person who spends the evening in a train station, and there were plenty here), but the top two had to be the super macho guys who showed up, passed out on the floor, then slowly and while still sleeping began to spoon each other, and the man and woman in renaissance-era dress who pranced into the station, did a courtly dance, and walked out, hand in hand.

The track itself was very modern, as were the trains. My train arrived and left on time, something I'm not sued to in the states, but which out in Eastern Europe is a normal thing. The seats on the train were a hard orange plastic, but they conformed weirdly to my body in such a way that I actually felt some semblance of comfort - except for the head-section, which was weird. I pulled out a travel pillow anyways, and passed out.

A series of alarms began around 5:30am, going off every 15 minutes or so, to ensure that I would awaken before my train was due to arrive in Stróże at 6:41. As the morning fog gave way to a sunrise, the Polish countryside came into view. It was beautiful. But I was groggy as hell and just focused on not falling asleep again.

We arrived at 6:41 on the dot. It was uncanny. But I was tired so I didn't dally long. I had called Peter from the platform around 1am the night before and asked him how to get to his house from the station. His response went something like this:

"When you get to Stróże station, look for the church under construction. Take a right. Walk for about a kilometer. Call me."

I had to press him further to get that his house was number 73, and that I'd pass a school, then a stream, and then I'd get to his house. But that's all the information I had and, putting my faith in Peter, I left the train station in this tiny village of 2,000 people and set out into the Polish countryside.

There was indeed a church - quite a large church, in fact. It looked to have some serious age, and was under construction to have an additional wing of the church added. It's been a long time since I've seen wooden scaffolding...

I found that indeed, it would be terribly difficult to miss the only right turn possible in this town. I took a right after the church, and started walking. Before long, I passed the school, and a sports field along with it. Shortly after that, I found what I think was the stream, though to me it looked like 1.5 inches of water running along a bed of paving stones passing under the overpass I was on.

I was a little worried at first, because the houses were all numbered in the hundreds, and going up. Then they were in the thousands, going down. But eventually we hit the double digit houses, and shortly thereafter I found 73.

I called Peter as requested so he could open the gate. He came outside, exhausted and tired, opened the gate, gave me a hug, showed me into the main house, told me to pick a room and sleep, and was gone.

I put my stuff down in the hallway, crept into a room that had two people sprawled on the floor, and went to bed. It was just about 7am.

***

I woke up at 9:30 or 10, feeling surprisingly good. It turns out that my roommates had been Chadwick and Maria. The former was a guest at the Kiev hostel in January and now works in London in the kitchen of a restaurant, and the latter works at Peter's other Kiev hostel - she's also a professional (or at least semi-professional) fire juggler, and put on a great show for us in the hostel in January.

Heading into the hallway, Peter invited me into the kitchen, where I was fed bigos (also called Hunter's Stew), a Polish dish that transcends its description. One recipe I found later online listed the following as ingredients:

• 1 cup pitted prunes

• 1/2 ounce dried Polish or porcini mushrooms

• 2 cups boiling water

• 1 tablespoon bacon drippings or vegetable oil

• 1 medium onion, chopped

• 1 small head fresh cabbage, chopped

• 1 pound sauerkraut, rinsed well and drained

• 1/2 pound smoked Polish sausage, cut into 1-inch pieces

• 1/2 pound cooked fresh Polish sausage, cut into 1-inch pieces

• 1 pound leftover boneless meat, cut into 1-inch pieces

• 3 large tomatoes, peeled and chopped

• 1 cup dry red wine, preferably Madeira

• 1 bay leaf

• Salt and black pepper to taste

It sounds good to begin with, but I was blown away by the taste. I think I was the only one, though, because the others at the party (mostly Poles) seemed to either not care for it or were just used to it - it's the national dish of Poland, apparently. We consumed almost exclusively bigos and sausage for the next few days, so it's a good thing I liked it.

As people started to wake up, I met some new people and saw some familiar faces from January. Nina was there, fresh in from Vienna. Amelia came too, though from where I'm not sure... I think she was/is still in Kiev. Lidka and Vova, Peter's business partners, also came. The others at this thing were mostly Polish friends of Peter's, but there was a representative from Dresden, as well as Brighton.

Peter's house/complex consists of several parts. There's the old house, which I never went inside, but where some people spent the night. It looks slightly run down compared to the big house, but it's quite nice. It sits just to the left of the main gate when you walk in.

To the right of the gate is the main house, which is three floors tall and three or four rooms wide. The basement houses the garage and other basement-y things. The main floor boasts a kitchen, a dining room, a living room (where I was sleeping/claimed a couch), an office room, and a full bath. The top floor has a few bedrooms and a bathroom. Balconies line the house facing the street, and an indoor porch sits behind the house, half a level up, facing back. The interior of the house is beautiful, with hardwood floors and stairs, wood paneling in the hallways, and white walls and large windows in the common areas. It's decorated with all kinds of chachkas from years of chachka gathering - having done a little clearing out of my room at home, and hearing the horror stories from my parents regarding the rest of the house we're about to move out of, I sympathize with the quantity of collectibles, though I definitely appreciate the amount of memories they must hold.

Outside the main house is a pathway that wraps around the house to a second garage. When you follow the path for half of its length and keep going straight, parallel to the road, you reach a clearing with a barn adjacent. There are several benches and a fire pit here. This was also where we spent most of our time.

Behind the barn lies a field, and behind that, woods. In the woods, besides pathways that have been cleared to allow vehicles through, Peter's father keeps bees - he used to be a beekeeper, and still has several hives he keeps around.

After walking through the main gate, instead of turning right to the fire pit, if you turn left and cross into the next property, you find the house belonging to Peter's sister. She and her (crazy) husband live there with their two children. Behind their house is an olympic pool-sized field, where we spent the first few hours of Saturday. 

General shenanigans ensued for the remainder of the day. We broke out the liquor and beer early, as well as a few cigars. We played some soccer on the field behind Peter's sister's house, swung on a swing set next to the field, and even set up a slackline between two trees.

It was a relaxing afternoon. Lots of lying around, and doing nothing. Also lots of smoking -- Europeans tend to smoke a ton of cigarettes, and there always seemed to be a cloud of smoke hovering over us. I never smoke cigarettes, and didn't start now, but by the end of the weekend, when smokes were in short supply, the guests that do smoke were frantically seeking out the last of them.

At one point, about midday, Peter's brother-in-law, Maria and I, got on some bikes and rode for a while. We went about 20km, through the neighboring few villages, up and down some pretty bad hills, and got back, exhausted. Fun ride, though.

When the games were over on the field, we went to the bonfire. A few of us gathered wood from the woods, traveling via glorified lawnmower/tractor to a pile of loose pine branches by the train tracks (the house property comes right up against the tracks). We lit up the fire, and as the sun went down, the party started.

It was 80s/90s themed. I was rocking a jean jacket and jean shorts, Peter's brother-in-law had on an 80s-style power suit, Nina and Amelia went tie-dye shirts and bright colored pants, and Chadwick got a pink jacket and baby blue shorts. Some of us, myself included, had been wearing these all day. But others dressed up for the night part of the party, and once it got dark they cut loose.

It was a blur after that, and I passed out very early, around 11:30 or so. Something about lack of sleep plus baking in the sun all day plus soccer plus a long bike ride plus drinking just exhausted me. But it was quite a fun time.

***

The next morning, Sunday, was all about relaxation. We drank a few beers, ate bigos, chatted, and said goodbye to those who were heading home at various times. Of the people I knew before coming here, only Nina and Lidka went home on Sunday, and in the evening.

It was the third day to the party (more festivities went down on Friday, while I was on my way to Stróże). We didn't do much. Some people went paintballing in the woods, but that only lasted a few minutes.

On Sunday night, those of us remaining (Huw, Maria, Amelia, Chadwick, Peter, Vova and I) roasted Polish sausages over the fire, and hung out. We also got a fire show from Maria. She didn't want to do one at first, as we had no music for her to perform to, but she got headphones out and performed to that - we didn't hear it, but she did, and apparently that's what she needed. It was impressive as always.

Around midnight I got to bed with the express intention of getting up early, as I wanted to see Krakow before I left for Istanbul again.

***

I woke up around 6, woke Peter up to open the gate, and hiked with my stuff back to the train station. I got the 6:33 train to Krakow. Barely made it, too. Fortunately the train was still there, and the conductor saw me running to catch it, bags bouncing on my back. I boarded without a ticket, and paid the penalty for it. Instead of 18zł, I ended up paying 22zł ($6.30) for the three hour ride.

When I arrived in Krakow, I dropped my bags at the train station baggage storage spot, which cost 5zl for the day. I went outside to the square and, seeing a hotel in the distance, made a b-line for the reception inside.

The Hotel Europejski was quite helpful. I got a map of Krakow, and a few places pointed out along the way. Having done no research about the town, I used my brief conversation with the concierge to learn what there was to see.

My itinerary: Old town, Wawel Castle, Jewish Quarter.

Using my new trusty map, I crossed from the hotel towards the Old Town. It's a beautiful little old town, surrounded by a block-wide park on every side, which makes it isolated from the city and accessible from it all at once. Much like Warsaw, trams ride through the streets frequently. Also like Warsaw, one can easily avoid paying for the tram by just not buying or validating a ticket.

I started at the Florian Gate, a famous Polish-gothic tower that was built in the early 14th century to defend the city against Ottoman attacks. I didn't know the Ottoman Empire had made it up as far as Krakow, but you learn something new every day.

Next I walked down the main street, Floriańska, which has been the main entrance to the old city for 600 years. It boasts, among other things, a McDonalds, a Mexican restaurant called The Mexican, and stores selling funny tshirts. Classic Old City?

I reached the main square after a few blocks, called Rynek Glówny. The square itself dates back to the 13th century, and is the largest medieval town square in Europe, at about 40,000 square meters.

The center of the square is dominated by the Sukiennice, or Drapers' Hall, rebuilt in 1555, though it looks as modern and new today as it did at the time. Inside is a small market of local crafts and jewelry.

On the outskirts of the square sit a number of palaces, townhouses, and churches. The dominating structure is St. Mary's Basilica, a brick gothic church built in the early 13th century and rebuilt in the 14th. It's about 80m tall, and is most famous for a beautiful wooden altarpiece inside. Services were going on while I was there (Sunday morning!), but despite the signs saying that tourists should not enter, I snuck in and took a bunch of photos surreptitiously. It is one of the more ornate churches I've ever been inside, with vibrant decorations, frescoes, and carvings in every nook and cranny. Even the open vaulted ceiling houses a gigantic cross with Jesus on it, dangling from the roof.

Every hour, a trumpet sounds. I didn't understand it at first, but later I discovered that this trumpet signal, called the Hejnał mariacki, is played to commemorate a 13th century trumpeter of the same name who was shot in the throat while sounding the alarm before the Mongol's attacked the city. To be authentic to the moment of the tradition's origin, the tune breaks off mid-stream...

On Rynek Glowńy I found what looked to be a Polish take on the Turkish simit. It was fresh, warm, and baked with cheese on the crust. Delicious, and at 1.30zl, cheaper than a simit.

I headed down Grodzka next, a road leading away from the main square and towards the Wawel Castle.

I passed a church along the way that looked a little intriguing, so I went inside.

It was the Church of Saints Peter and Paul. I got a free audio tour when I entered, which was done in the style of one of those children's stories on tape, where they sort-of talk to you and interact with you. It's odd, but interesting, and I learned a lot.

For example, Giovanni Maria Bernardoni built the structure between 1597 and 1619. It seats more than any other church in the Old Town. It's the first structure in Krakow that's entirely in the baroque style. It might be the first baroque building in what is now Poland. Along the sides, beautiful paintings depict scenes from the bible, painted by polish renaissance artists. From the top of the dome, a Foucault pendulum, the longest in Poland, hangs. A demonstration is given every thursday, and on other days the pendulum is pulled off to one side.

In the crypt, a man who was crucial to the counter-reformation movement, Father Piotr Skarga, is buried, along with other prominent locals. Skarga was a vigorous advocate of a union between the Roman Catholic Church and the Ruthenian Church, and a leading figure of the Union of Brzesc in 1596. He was instrumental in getting King Sigismund III Vasa to finance the building of the church. He was a very important man in his time.

After leaving the Church of Saints Peter and Paul, I was quickly out of the Old Town and next to Wawel Castle.

Wawel Castle is a gothic castle, built on orders from Casimir III the Great. It's central courtyard is surrounded by many structures, including a massive cathedral.

Apparently people have lived on the hill that Wawel Castle sits on for the last 50,000 years. As the settlements shifted down the hill, the rulers of Poland took the spot for their own. The Gothic structure was renovated in the 16th century to be more of a Renaissance palace by Sigismund I the Old. When the capital moved from Krakow to Poland, Wawel began to degrade. Swedish invasions in the mid 17th and early 18th centuries didn't help, either.

The medieval cathedral boasts all sorts of gorgeous paintings, frescoes, sculptures, and famous dead guys. But pictures weren't allowed, and I for once listened to the signs.

After seeing the main courtyard and the cathedral, and after ruling out the other things to see, I headed towards the dragon's cave.

In Polish Folklore, a dragon used to lair in a cave at the foot of Wawel hill. The story dates back to at least the 12th century. Apparently, each day the evil dragon would burn and pillage the countryside, stealing maidens to eat. The townsfolk could only appease the dragon by leaving a young girl at the front of the mouth of the cave every month. 

As the story goes, when every little girl in the area had been sacrificed (except for the daughter of the King), the King offered his daughter's hand in marriage to anyone who might defeat the evil dragon. A man named Skuba accepted. He, unlike the other men who tried to kill the dragon, was a cobbler's apprentice, not a knight or a noble. He stuffed a lamb with sulphur and left it by the cave. The dragon came and ate heartily and, after extreme thirst overcame him, he drank from the Vistula River just outside it until he literally exploded (after drinking half of the river itself). Skuba married Wanda, the daughter, and they lived happily ever after.

It was a cave. A tiny one. But it was only 3zl to get inside and it exited by the river, which led to the Jewish Quarter, so worth a look-see. Also, a new friend of mine in Istanbul, Yasemin, had mentioned that I should wait by the dragon statue outside the mouth of the cave for a while, as he breaths fire every fifteen minutes. I had foolishly forgotten her advice, but as I emerged from the cave, he spouted flames in an impressive burst, then fell silent.

Next stop was the Jewish Quarter. I followed my map along the river to Dietla Józefa road, a main street that leads to the Jewish Quarter. I turned into the area along Brzozowa Street.

Not many Jews still live in the Jewish Quarter, not since World War II. But the small Jewish population that remains is there, and they are desperately trying to keep their community alive. I left a donation at my first stop, the Old Synagogue, the oldest synagogue still standing in Poland, built sometime between 1407 and 1492. It's being renovated, so I could only see the bimah and the ark, and I was confined to a small space and couldn't see the impressiveness of the building, but the effect was the same. It was really touching to see the efforts to rebuild this relic and beautiful example of Jewish architecture.

The day before, on Sunday, Nina informed me that she had lost her phone in Krakow a few days prior. She gave me the name of two bars where it might be. Wrega Bar and Krolicze Oczy, both of which are in Kazimierz, aka the Jewish Quarter. So in an effort to explore the quarter, I decided to search for the bars.

I asked around, and found Krolicze Oczy with ease. It's right on the New Square in the quarter, along Estery street. There was no phone inside, though the bartender was very kind in helping me look under all the of the chairs and couches.

The other was more difficult to find, but I discovered Wrega Bar a few blocks away, on the corner of Józefa and Kupa. It was a beer garden, and looked like there was a really nice atmosphere at night. I asked, and was answered with questions:

What color phone was it? What make? Was it with a charger? Where was it left?

Black. Samsung. Yes. In an outlet.

I was delivered the phone in a few minutes. I took it, thanked them profusely, and headed back to the main train station. It was approaching 2pm, and Vova, Amelia, Maria, and Chadwick were about to arrive on the 11am bus from Stróźe.

I took the tram back to the train station, opting for the one that went the scenic way around the Old City, instead of direct. It's a good thing, because they took a while to get from the bus station to the square I was meeting them in.

From Kraków Glówny we immediately made our way to the busses, to drop off their stuff at Lidka's apartment. Bus 120 brought us there after a 15 minute ride or so. We dropped off their crap and sat with Lidka and her boyfriend Bartek in their apartment for a while. Lidka and I popped out to the store to get some beer, tequila, and food, and we made lunch in the apartment, until 3:30 or so, when I left via cab (Bartek ordered one) to the train station to head to the airport.

I barely, barely missed the 16:06 train, which sucked because the next one was at 16:55. I was none too happy about this, since my flight was at 18:25, and even the 16:06 train would cut it close. But I resolved to think positive, and waited on the track until 16:55, when a two-car modern shuttle train arrived to take us to the airport.

My fears were unfounded. The Krakow airport is small, and I had plenty of time to get on the flight. I even had time to check emails. I did not, however, have time to find a post office and mail Nina's phone back to her. I resolved to do that in Frankfurt during my layover.

That didn't work, either. The only post office at the Frankfurt airport was both outside the security area and closed. I resolved to mail the phone from Istanbul.

I arrived in Frankfurt at 20:03, and took off again around 22:16. Landed in Istanbul at 2:07am, got my crap and cabbed back to the Superdorm. I got to bed around 4am.

***

On Tuesday I went to the post office to mail Nina's phone. They told me it would be no problem, only 15€ for overnight delivery. Except Turkey won't let me mail a SIM card... Damn you, T.B.A.!

Nina ended up getting out an old phone of hers, got a replacement SIM with the same number, and found a charger that would work. I'll bring her the phone and charger I have when I see her in Kiev in a few weeks. Until then, I failed once more with the mailing systems on this side of the world. But the trip, other than that, was a great success!