Sydney Harbour Bridge and Gdańsk Cranes

I am going to write about my first impressions after coming to Gdańsk. It is always emotionally confusing when I change the countries. I then ask myself a question - where I belong? When I come here I sometimes feel that this is the place I want to be. Why would I keep changing my mind about selling the Gdańsk place? I know that I should sell it and I go through the motions of preparing for it. I am not stopping it, but I am vacillating. I like to come to this apartment, I like its spaciousness and I like finding my things I left here the last year. They are like nice surprise presents.  I like some Polish ways, they are not my ways any more, but they are familiar and for a while they bring the past back.

When I arrived here one week ago and saw the cranes of the historic Gdańsk shipyard I felt warmth coming to my heart. I felt that I am home. When I come to Sydney and see the Harbour Bridge, I have exactly the same feeling. I feel that I have come back home. This is a very schizophrenic feeling. It confuses me.

Walking through the park this morning seeing the cranes so close I realized that there are similarities between the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Gdańsk Cranes. I did not like either of them at first. They seemed heavy and clumsy. In both cases they overpower the landscape. They did not seem to have anything elegant about them. The design? From a technical point of view maybe even brilliant, functional for sure, but beautiful? No! And then they grew on me and became a part of me. And I started to love them. When you love people and things they do not need to be objectively beautiful, if there is such a thing as an objective beauty. It is in the eye of the beholder. Now, I love them both. They do not seem to be clumsy and heavy. To my eye and heart they are powerful and strong. They are solid and reliable in their character. You can depend on them.

Come to think about it, the whole Gdansk is like that. Germanic in its style, of course. What else? The architecture of many objects is solid with some heaviness about it. The house I live in is like that as well. Walking, from the place I live, towards the Old Town of Gdansk, I see the heavy body of St. Mary’s Basilica, towering over the town. I like looking at it when walking towards it. It seems so distant, but in fact it is not all that far. When I come closer to it, it disappears from the skyline. The next time I see it is when I am almost next to it. Then it towers over me making me feel insignificant in comparison to the reason it was build all those ages ago. And it was built to the glory of the creator and the higher power. This is an intention behind building churches. I have written about the St Mary’s already, some time ago. http://acobserves.blogspot.com/2014/05/sightseeing-in-tricity.html

I think that I need to accept the fact that I can not choose between the countries and that my confusion is just a fact of life.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge Walk

Bucket list is a little scary name for things we want to do before we kick it. The bucket, I mean. Coming to terms with the last exit or should I rather call it a passage, is one of the things still on my bucket list. But yesterday I walked the Sydney Harbour Bridge! Just the road level but still it has been on my list for a couple of years and doing it had some uplifting meaning to me.

Yesterday was the day for the bridge expedition. The weather was great! It is winter in Sydney now. Maybe not astronomically, but we keep things simple here. The first of June winter officially starts. I love this time of the year here. Most of the days are sunny and many are warm. Yesterday it was around 20 degrees. I rugged up nevertheless, just in case. It is winter after all. The first stage was a bus trip to Milsons Point. I had to change the bus at North Sydney and seeing the park was tempted to take a stroll there instead of the strenuous bridge walk which over the years of postponing it grew in my mind to a really giant event. This time however my decision was firm – bridge walk it is! Few minutes later I faced the steps leading to the bridge and resolutely mounted them prepared for the worst.

The determined me was in action. The walk started. I was excited and expectant of great impressions. The mood lasted about a minute and then suddenly it was a normal walk with passing people in good long weekend spirit who did not look tired at all. After few minutes I reached the first pylon. Hmm… nice, big but suddenly not that overwhelming.

In the next five minutes it was the middle of the bridge! I completed the walk in 15 minutes, 20 at the most.

I had mixed feelings. My expectations did not match the reality. Maybe I was a bit disappointed, a bit amused by my approach to unknown, a bit encouraged to do  things that I consider scary or dangerous? For a moment I even thought, the next time I’ll walk the top the bridge even with my fear of heights. Then I saw  the stairs up to the starting point of the walk. That put me off, at least for now. There are more challenging things like the top of the bridge walk that are a bit more in my area of ability and interest.

The next stage was a bit of flanauring through The Rocks, love the old convict place

 Next point of the day program was lunch and I deserved a little treat – prosecco and smoked salmon bruschetta. Just to reminisce Italy.

Walking through busy and noisy Circular Quay  I remembered the times when I worked there. Circular Quay was the office address and the place I walked every day for some years. This is perhaps another story.

I came back to my suburb by the ferry, one of my favourite ways to commute. Now, I could admire the bridge for the distance. Still monumental but a bit more familiar. Standing in the front of the boat, I loved the wind in my face. It reminded me of my favourite dog Argus when we traveled in the dingy. I was holding him in front of me and he had the best place in this theatre. He looked happy, proud of himself and above all distinguished. I still miss him.

From the Mosman ferry to my home it is quite a distance. It was when I was almost there my fitbit counting steps signaled my daily 10,000 steps made. And I thought that the bridge was going to give me 20,000 steps or more.

It was a great day!