Snobism, silliness and oysters

 

Today I have been asked by my friend: do you like oysters? It made me smile as I recalled a situation taking place many years ago when I would have categorically answered such a question – Of course not, I am not a snob!

To explain such a strange reaction I need to go back many years to the time when I lived in Paris. This was the first foreign place I lived in after moving from Warsaw to the West. My readers may not know that I was brought up in communistic Poland not being aware of the limitations being exposed over Poles by the regime . I was happy in Poland, you may say, I did not know any better. And I did not. But this is a different story. This one is about oysters.

I despised snobbishness since I can remember. Sometimes I think I am a snob about not being snobbish.  One of friends of my, at the time, husband was a sophisticated, elegant, worldly girl and I decided that she was a snob by my standards. Now when I look at the situation I think that I was just silly and felt inadequate so I had to compensate it somehow by looking down at Charlotte’s (even the name seemed pretentious to me) worldly manners. One autumn she came to visit us in Paris and we went to a coffee place in the Latin Quarter. It was a simple Parisian place but Charlotte knew that they may serve oysters at this time of the year. She asked and got a confirming answer so oysters were ordered. Oh how I was disapproving!! How snobbish can one get?? Oysters?? Ha! I am not sure where I got the idea that to eat oysters is snobbish or exclusive. Maybe it  was one of the communistic, egalitarian ideas which rubbed off on me?

Anyhow the oysters were served and they smelled divine while they were shucked at the table. This is the French way; at least it was at that time.Suddenly the air in the coffee place full of cigarette smoke started to smell of sea, freshness, saltiness and a hint of lemon.

                                                

 

Charlotte was really a nice person, it was me, pehaps, who was not nice towards her. She generously offered me one to try. I still remember the inner fight : it is soooo snobbish to eat that, but it smells soooo good!! I was fighting with my old convictions for a while but I am glad that my silliness was won by the divine smell of oysters which from then on became one of my absolutely favourite foods. Fresh oysters, not cooked in any silly way some consider elegant. Me snobbish this time??? But I really think that fresh oysters are the best, especially the Sydney Rock ones.

Thank you Charlotte for the introduction to the wonderful food and a great lesson of appreciation of  smells and taste of sea captured in oysters. They won over my silliness and sense of insecurity.

Bugle Call from Krakow

For many years I did not think about Poland, for some years I even did not like the country. I felt an Australian even if I still have this funny, some call it charming, Polish accent . I personally do not see much “charming” about my accent but Poland is becoming this way to me. Charming. Also beautiful, sophisticated and sentimental as its people.

Recently I made the second time in my life the choice to live in Australia. I considered that Poland was not my country any more, just the country I was born in. Now I am starting to have doubts, not about living here. Australia is definitely my home. But big part of the space in my heart belongs to Poland and this  I am realising with each day I spent here.

Today, accidentally I changed the radio station and at midday I heard the time signal and Krakow bugle call. This is what I heard as a child and later on, the same sounds the same format.  Something moved in me hearing the sounds I have almost forgotten with time passing.

The Marker Square of Krakow

                                 



Krakow is in my mind the #1 town in Poland. Its XIV century Jagiellonian University, the market Square with its Cloth Hall, monuments, St Mary’s Basilica, doves, horse carriages and many coffee places around the square, the gothic Wawel Castle.... It all makes the town absolutely unique. The sites can be appreciated by Poles and by many visitors from other countries. It is more difficult to appreciate the cultural life of Krakow being a foreigner. In many local cellars there are literary cabarets, jazz concerts, poetry nights. Wonderful, rich, crazy, funny, sad, romantic, sentimental places and people. Krakow is a hermetic place, outsiders are welcome as tourists but not so much welcome into the most important part of the Krakovian life. Any Polish person coming from a place other than Krakow is considered to be an outsider, especially those coming from Warsaw. Those are looked down at, not cultured enough, I suppose.

St Mary's Basilica

                                           

Bugler of current days

The story of the bugle call may be a legend, but it is so much a part of the town history that one doesn’t question it. The St Mary’s Basilica with its two towers always played an important role in the town history. From one of the towers a municipal guardian heralded opening and closing of the city gates. He would also play the bugle in case of a danger. A legend says that in 1240 a bugler played a warning signal seeing Tatars approaching the town. As he played his warning tune an enemy arrow pierced his throat and the tune abruptly stopped. In remembrance of this event the tune is played every hour on the hour towards four directions of the world and interrupted suddenly to commemorate the events from the 1240. 

Bugler of current days

 This is how it sounds
This is a PS written more than one year after the original post but I found out something new about the bugle. Actually not so much about the bugle itself but about Jack Nicholson. He knows the bugle and he can sing it up to its sudden end! Ha! This is surprising. The reason is that he has been for many years a friend of the Polish film director Jerzy Skolimowski. They met in the 60ties when none of them was famous or rich. It was in Cannes and after smoking a few joints on the beach together they became fast friends. I shudder to think what kind of education Jack Nicholson may have received from the Polish larrikin, talented but  crazy and very creative man. And what did they do in Krakow for Jack Nicholson to learn the bugle? I am sure Nicholson knows a few positives about Polish girls.

The first day of summer

Today is the first day of summer on the Northern Hemisphere. I must say that I am attracted to starting seasons at the first of an appropriate month rather than complicating the issue by using astronomical calendar and concepts of equinox and solstice.

I always had problems with knowing when exactly the seasons start in Europe. There are moveable dates. This year the summer in Poland started today – the 21^st of June. This is the longest day of the year. In Gdansk 17 hours and 14

minutes. It is quite nice when around 10 pm there is still some natural light and shortly after 3 am is getting light again. I am glad that I will be in Sydney when in December the daytime here will shrink to 7 hours.

Midsummer has been celebrated in Slavic and Scandinavian countries as a very special day and a special occasion to dancing, drinking, flirting...

I wonder if this is not dictated by the cold climate and dark winter days. Summer by contrast is so much more special than it is in Australia. The midsummer celebrations are linked to the summer solstice and it was celebrated on the day when Poland was a pagan country. The date of celebrations was changed later for religious reasons to take place two days later at the eve of St John’s day.

The midsummer night was an occasion to find a life partner by the young people who either did not want to marry candidates chosen by elders or did not have anybody selected for them yet.

Young girls were weaving wreaths out of magical herbs and flowers placing a light in the middle. The wreaths were placed on water of  rivers, brooks, creeks and sent down the stream.

                                    

 Young men waited for the wreaths to come their way further down the river.  Their task was to catch a wreath which they particularly liked.  Not all were lucky to catch one, but those who did came back to the girls to find the one whose wreath it was. She was going to be the lucky boy’s wife.

                                      

    

Value of an old friendship

I had a very special visitor for few days. My friend who I met many years ago, at the first uni day.

I come from a rather small town by Polish standards. Inexperienced, unsure of myself going to study in Warsaw, big smoke and big challenge for me. Huge cultural shock. I was provincial and had to catch up. The first day at uni I showed up in a hall full of students. I did not knowing what to do, where to turn and I did not know anyone there. Near me was a pretty girl in a grey suit who smiled at me.  She did not know anyone either. There is love from the first sight, confusing perhaps but it happens. This was something similar – it was a friendship at the first sight. We both managed to get our masters degree at maths but we would be very reluctant to count years of our friendship. We are talking big numbers here.

Barbara and I studied together, laughed a lot together, played bridge especially at the exams time. We shared a lot of interests but we were different, like Sense and Sensibility sisters. She was the Sensibility one. Then we went our separate ways, getting married, Barbara having children and choosing different career streams. I even left the country for many years. The friendship was always there, always important to us even if we would not meet for more than 10 years at a time. We still stayed close in some mysterious way. When we meet we have our jokes, we speak the language which only we understand. We talk shorthand. Looking back, I understand why our old boyfriends were not amused being in our company. They must have felt really out of our conversation. For us though, it was fun.

Barbara just left today, after few days we spent together in Gdansk. This time we had a one year break since the last meeting. When she was here we had the same old fun, we still were saying our updated but still private jokes, and talked our specific language. I feel grateful for having a friend I can trust, rely on, respect, learn from and love. A friend I can meet after many years apart and catch up as no time has passed since the last meeting.

Poland I love, my Poland

We often say „my country”, „My Australia” or it could be any place we love and the place we know from the way back. Childhood, happy times, times of personal growth, typically it is a place of our youth. When I say “my Poland” this is the country I was brought up in. Of course, I think about my childhood with tenderness and nostalgia. I also think about Poland of those times with fondness. At the same time this is not the country of today and not  Poland I love.

Is Poland of today “My Poland” ? Yes, it is more my Poland than the country I remember from the past.

Weekends in Gdansk have proved difficult for me and I decided that I need to make some changes in my weekend routine not to get depressed. Today was time for a new approach and I went to  the Old Town. It is a pleasant  walk through the park with my favourite chestnut tree alley, passing the cranes of Gdansk shipyard and three  crosses of Solidarity. But I will write about it some other time.

 I live next to the Medical University and to my surprise in the small park nearby there was a crowd of people instead of normally empty weekend spaces. The university organised an event for the people of Gdansk to inform about health issues in various medical streams. I have not seen anything like that in the past in Gdansk. Smiling  medical students talking to people of different ages, taking their blood pressure and other more complicated medical tests. A band playing on the stage,  people sitting on the grass, some doing yoga. It may sound normal to an Australian but in Poland this is not a normal view. Some time ago one could not even walk on grass without penalty. And now families sitting down to their picnics! This is Poland I love. Relaxed and caring for its people.

I had lunch in the Old Town in a restaurant called Kokieteria – Coquettish at the bank of Motlawa.  The weather was beautiful, the view as well and not too many tourists yet. In a couple of weeks there will be a continuous stream of people passing by.

 The service was perfect, timely, friendly and knowing their menu very I typically have one glass of wine with my meals but this time the waiter came up to ask – would you care for another glass? - in such a perfect moment that I could not give any other answer than – yes, it would be nice. And it was.

Maybe the salmon was not of the perfect pink colour in terms of My Kitchen Rules judges but risotto made of millet groats was beautifully creamy and well spiced. The crust on the salmon was delightful. I enjoyed the scenery, the food and the chat with Pan Tomasz who was taking care of  my meal and enjoyment  in the restaurant.

Asked if I would like tea or coffee after the meal, I ordered coffee not expecting anything to write home about, after all it was a hotel restaurant. To my surprise my espresso was fantastic, so was the subject  knowledge of Pan Tomasz . He knows about coffee more than many baristas and this is not even his job. And again – This is Poland I love. Friendly and professional.

Talking to Pan Tomasz I found out things about Polish life which is perhaps challenging, but I left believing that the new generation of Poles will make the country really special and successful. And not in too distant future.

This is Poland I love. Giving me hope that the country will be soon a really good place to live.

On my way back home I passed one of many small bridges of Gdansk with locks attached to its lace. The locks were put there by couples in love. I guess they symbolise permanence of their feelings. I wonder what was said and felt by people who decorated the bridge in such a way.  This is Poland I love. A romantic country.

June is a season for strawberries in Poland and Poles are very patriotic about this particular fruit. In Gdansk everybody believes Kashubian strawberries are the best in the world.  Kashuby is this the northern part of Poland.

The fruits are not sold in punnets here. If you want to buy them in a container, you need to buy 2 kg thing like the ones on the picture.

Otherwise you buy them by kilos for about 1- 2 dollars  in season. And again this is Poland I love.  It has fantastic strawberries.

Jacek

Today was my day to work on establishing my coaching business. I had been working on my values, purpose, self-actualisation, strength, natural gifts, passions, contribution and life goals. I came to some conclusions and I was pleased with the results. My life purpose is it to help others to engage in  jobs/occupations leading to self-actualisation.

 Beautiful, isn’t it?

I felt I achieved a lot for the day so I decided to go for a walk.

My contacts with Poland, after many years of hardly visiting the country, re-started nine years ago. It was a different Poland then to what it is now after being a part of EU for nine years. I see it now as an affluent country, sophisticated, cultured, elegant and beautiful in spring. Maybe somewhat bigoted but democratic.

Nine years ago to see a “yesterday’s” men and women in streets was quite common. What I mean by “yesterday’s” describes people making their way home the next day after drinking that much that they could not recollect the time after their last drink and the time they started to make their way home. They looked dishevelled, smelled horrible and their gate was unsteady.  They needed to seek help of nearby fences, walls or more steady people to walk home. The saying “drunk as a Pole” was clearly demonstrated by them.

I thought those times have passed as I have not seen such views in  the last few years. Now I am not that sure anymore. Maybe this is not that visible any more but tragedies of drunken lives still exist.

I met Jacek nine years ago. He was a young man, a boy really. Sweet face, flashed with rather cute blush, smiling broadly and collecting money for the next bottle of something which would help him and his companions forget the reality and maybe even pain of living.  He had a good technique of asking for money and he was rather liked by his benefactors. He would say : Hello boss, would you have a coin, we are collecting for bear (or supper). The wording depended on Jacek’s assessment of the situation . All “ bosses” knew that he was collecting for vodka to buy in the neighbouring shop.

Jacek was never a well boy, I think, he may suffer from tuberculosis. Today I found out that he has epilepsy as well. He would say he has an allergy and today he collects money for medications. Officially, I mean. In reality it is still about alcohol.

I never had friends in Gdansk I could meet in streets so I will always remember how few years ago somebody standing in open door of a tram shouted in my direction : Hello boss, how are you?   Jacek was beaming his friendly smile at me obviously pleased that we met. He was not collecting money at that time. He just liked me and wanted to let me know about it.

As I was walking this afternoon, I thought about him, wondering if he was still alive. I knew that he was not well and that he spent winters in some sort of hostel with medical support but without possibility to drink alcohol. Spring was always his time to return to his old territory and his companions and to have an illusion that he is not alone.

He was standing in his old place, in front of the shop where he could buy bear or vodka to help him forget. He looked older, a bit dirty as he lives in the streets in warmer parts of the year. His smile was not there anymore. I stopped to have a chat. I always liked him and cared for him and never knew how to help him. Maybe he always has been beyond help or maybe I never was capable of loving enough to help him.

Inflation hit him as well. His collection went from 1 zloty nine years ago to 10 today.  I could have given him the money, it is an equivalent of about 3 dollars but I was painfully aware that this is not the way to help him.  I felt awful, a coach who wants to help people to live better lives,  faced with real life problems and wonders what to do: buy some food for the boy or give him some money to further hurt himself. Eventually I bought him cigarettes as the least harmful and possibly attractive to him. Obviously an inadequate solution.

The irony and sadness of the situation overwhelmed me.