Written by: Cedric Reese
Wow, I can’t believe I’ve only been here for three weeks, feels like I’ve been here for much longer than that! This week I started getting into the routine of going to class. My favorite class currently is Europe under Communism. The professor is very knowledgeable and we’re learning a lot of interesting things. We started with WWII and how, because of that, Poland feel under the control of the USSR. Its interesting seeing the Polish perspective on WWII. In America, while it is an important historical event, I feel like it doesn’t have a whole lot of relevance in today’s society. This is completely different in Poland, people here are still dealing with the impacts of the war. It is brought up so often, you’d think it happened just a few years ago! All of the other classes have fascinating subjects, but none of them have made me think more than the communism class.
This week I went to a few nice places to eat with a few other students. First was just a bistro we found that we decided to try. They had a pretty limited menu, but the options were all unique. My friend Brian and I ultimately went with the beef checks, which apparently were actual cow cheeks. They were super tender, which was good at first, but after a bit they felt like too much. They were good overall, and it was nice to try something different, even if it wasn’t any sort of authentic Polish food. A couple nights later, a few of us went to a duck place. I love duck so I was super excited. My dish was a duck breast in a cherry sauce with plum dumplings, and it was amazing! Honestly, I think the most important thing when visiting a new country is to try all the food. Don’t go to any sort of fast food place, my reasoning is you can eat say McDonalds anytime in the US, but you can only eat foreign food while you’re there. I also think its best to try even things you normally don’t like, as some things can taste completely different in other countries. So really, if you get anything from this blog, let it be this, try new food when you travel!
So, the big thing I did this week was travel to Warsaw on Sunday. It was great but also exhausting, my friend David and I left at 6:45 a.m. and we got back at 2:25 a.m. the next day! I had a class at 12:40 so I was able to sleep in, but my poor friend David had to go into the doctor’s office at 7:00 a.m. because he had suffered a small injury the other week. Anyway, Warsaw was amazing. The train station was right next to what I believe was the old Soviet ministry of culture. It was a tall and imposing building, which had been converted into three different museums. Sadly, they were closed on Sunday so we could just walk into the lobby and look around. After looking around we slowly made our way over to Warsaw’s old town. We stopped to look at buildings on our way there. From what I learned, Krakow has a law limiting the height of buildings, but Warsaw has no such laws meaning there were quite a few skyscrapers. I’m always impressed by tall buildings as they don’t exist in North Dakota.
We got a little lost on our walk to old town, so it ended up taking us a little longer to get there than we had planned. Old town itself was really pretty, all the buildings were painted in really bright colors, which really stood out on what was a cold, gloomy day. We looked around for a while, but we were both getting pretty tired, cold, and hungry. We found a Polish restaurant, so we decided to eat there. I had a pee soup with sausage in it along with a traditional Polish fruit drink called a kompot. It’s a mixture of plum, apples, and pears, and it was really good. Water isn’t free in Poland, and at most restaurants its just as expensive as most other nonalcoholic drinks, so at this point I’m just going to order the fruit drink, as it is everywhere, and it is good.
After lunch, David and myself went to the Jewish history museum. It was quite a museum; it was less about displays and more about reading text blurbs next to a relevant model or picture. We ended up spending four and a half hours in there! I couldn’t believe how much time we had spent in there. We had to speed through the last few exhibits as we had a concert at 8:00 on the other side of town and we needed to walk all the way there! In Poland, it gets dark super early, around 4:30ish, so it was already pitch-black outside when we left. That kinda sucked as we couldn’t look around as much with it being so dark. We made good time as we walked across the city. We finally reached the club where the concert was being held, it was on the campus of one of Warsaw’s main universities. We were both tired and cold, and it was getting close to dinner time. Sadly, there was only one place to eat at and it was some weird Polish version of 1950s American dinner. We reluctantly ate there. The food was just okay, but I think the most I got from that was seeing what a Polish interpretation of an American restaurant. The concert was great, they were rock bands I had never heard before, but David was really into the main act. We hardly to leave right when it finished, because our train left at 11:45! We both walked super-fast, but it was okay as we reached the train station early. On the train, I had to stay awake for the whole two and a half hours, as I was worried, I’d miss my stop or lose my stuff if I feel asleep. What made it worse was my phone was entirely dead, so I just sat there waiting for it all to be over. I was so tired when I got home, I just collapsed on my bed.
It was a fun trip, but I think next time I’ll space the visit out of a few more days. Well, until next time, take care everyone!
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