We spent our last day in Poland in the capital, Warsaw (or
“Warsawa” here), which is an easy 3-hour train ride north from Krakow. I have to say that I wasn’t
particularly interested in spending much time in Warsaw, which is a big, modern
city with (supposedly) expensive lodging and came to Poland mainly for Krakow (esp. Auschwitz); however, we actually had a very pleasant less-than-24-hours here and another day (and especially more PTO!) would have been nice.
We took another Old Town walking tour which took us through
the Main Market Square, to the Old Gate/Barbican, the Vistula (Wisla in Polish)
River, and some Ghetto sites and major plazas and buildings. During the tour we got a very
good Polish history lesson, starting with Medieval times, through the 17thcentury and the last Polish King (Stanislaw Augustus Poniatowski, who was
interestingly a lover of Catherine the Great, who then took over Poland as part
of her impressive Russian empire), the century (plus 20 years) of occupation, then
independence in 1918 under Jozef Pilsudski, WWII including the bloody Warsaw
Uprising, Communism, and the present day. Enjoy the photos in the lovely sunshine (I may have even gotten burned today... a sign of a good vacation!)!
Mermaid, the symbol of Warsaw, in the Old Town Square
Barbican
Warsaw Ghetto Wall (if you haven't seen the movie The Pianist,
about Warsaw during WWII, Wladyslaw Szpilman, and the Holocaust, please do)
Supreme Court
Warsaw Uprising Monument
Ogrod Saski
Random hand
On this trip, we learned about many important Poles who are celebrated throughout the country's cities.
- Adam Mickiewicz (19th century poet)
- Fryderyk Chopin (19th century Romantic composer and pianist, after whom the international airport here is named!)
- Nicholaus Copernicus (astronomer whose thinking of the earth revolving around the sun revolutionized science and religion!)
- Marie (Sklodowska) Curie (physicist/chemist) who studied radioactivity and won two Nobel Prizes (but died due to radiation exposure)
- Jozef Pilsudski (leader of Polish Nationalism and independence after WWI)
- Lech Walesa (leader of the Solidarity movement which brought down communism)
- Karol Wojtyla (Pope John Paul II, the first non-Italian Pope in >400 years or something!)
Here are some monuments in Warsaw:
Plaque outside Marie Curie's house (now a museum) in Old Town
(the elements she discovered are painted on the wall)
Jozef Pilsudski, national hero
Copernicus
We visited the (new) Fryderyk Chopin Museum, which opened in 2010 on the bicentennial of the birth (just outside of Warsaw) of this very famous Polish composer/pianist. Chopin actually spent much
of his life in France, as Poland actually did not exist as a country in the 19th
century and his works, some based in Polish dance/folk music were seen as too
nationalistic, prompting his departure. He is, in fact, buried in France, with the exception of his heart,
which oddly is kept in the Holy Cross Church in Warsaw; however, he is very famous and widely celebrated here in his
native country. I am more a fan of Baroque than Romantic music; however, Chopin's pieces are extremely difficult to play and are still brilliant to listen to (as we did in Krakow). The
museum had tons of interactive exhibits as well as items chronicling his
life. Sadly, Chopin, truly a prodigy and prolific composer, lived only 39
years, passing away from some cardiorespiratory ailment (thought to be tuberculosis or
even cystic fibrosis or a rare cardiomyopathy) in 1849.
I'm obviously a music history nerd. I do have to admit that I have also been to Mozart's (two) houses in Salzburg, Austria (one of my favorite cities in the world) and Bach's home/museum in Leipzig, Germany... so seeing "Chopin's City" was a treat for me!
Warsaw has these "Chopin Benches," which play his music
and give a bit of history, throughout the city
(I obviously take lousy pictures)
An old piano-forte
A replica of Chopin's "death mask"...
...and a lock of his hair
"Chopin's last chords"
We ended our afternoon in lovely Lazienski Park, which (as if we hadn't had enough of Fryderyk!) has a large Chopin monument...
...and peacocks throughout!
In reading the complimentary "Warsaw in your Pocket" guide from our hotel, Kelvin discovered that Warsaw has a rather large (50,000 people out of 1 million) Vietnamese population, which forms the largest minority here! Most of the original immigrants in Eastern Europe likely came to the area (or to neighboring Czech Republic, which actually has even more Vietnamese people!) to study under communism and stayed after its collapse... interesting!
We had to take photos of the Asian restaurants!
Phở on Chmielna
K loved chatting it up (in Vietnamese!) with the restaurant owner (while he enjoyed his Polish Phở)
... and we even enjoyed Boba Tea on our way back to our Hotel.
It's back to the U.S. in the wee hours of the morning in just a few hours from now. I am quite sad to be finishing up our wonderful vacation, free from inbox worry and work, but happy to see some friends in CA on our way back home to see our pup [thanks, Elise for watching her for us!]. Thanks, Poland (and Russia), for the wonderful memories!
