2007 trip to Poland

I look at my phone and feel my stomach doing flips as I realize how late I am. It doesn't help my nerves either to suddenly discover that I had only taken one pair of pants (the ones I am wearing), a mini skirt and some ridiculous shorts I'll be too embarrassed to wear for the three weeks I will be spending in Poland. I prefer not to go down the list of things I need for this trip knowing it won't help my already quite desperate situation. With sweat dripping down my back I frantically reach the KLM lady at the counter demanding she take me first as I am terribly late and cannot by any means miss this flight. She calmly takes my ticket, glances at me with a hardly hidden air of disgust, and slowly instructs to wait in line as I have plenty of time. Plenty of time!? Were we in the same time zone?

I meet my sister at the Amsterdam airport where we transfer to Warsaw. Seeing her brings a relief. It feels as if I have come full circle together with her and all these years in between, both good and bad, sink deep into the Atlantic as we fly over it. We are returning home. It is a bitter-sweet return, nonetheless. We are scared. The whole three hours separating Warsaw from Czestochowa I cannot help but think how will grandma look after this terrible stroke she suffered a week earlier. Will I be able to help her?

A Polish hospital. First thing that jumps out at me is a big colorful poster picturing doctors and nurses boasting fierce faces ready to fight for a higher pay. The poster reads there will be a strike held the following day and continuing until their requests are met. My aunt and cousin ignore the poster as they pass by it. Asked about what will happen with the patients, they reply in a matter-of-fact tone that unless they are about to die, they will have to patiently wait for the strike to end. "But who decides how severe their condition is?" - I asked worriedly. They looked at each other in surprise and tried dispersing my consternation by saying: "Well, whoever happens to be at the hospital at the time.



http://strasznasztuka.blox.pl/resource/strajk.jpg

The hospital stench is a mixture of heavy sweat, urine, and feces and something else which I cannot recognize right away. We are told to put on torn and repulsively stinking coats prior to entering. I glance over at my sister and see her gradually become paler. She assures me it is fine and we go in. This is not the grandma I know. The one in front of me must be someone else, I try hard to convince myself and feel tears pressing against my eyelids. So this is what
happens when your body gives up on you, when the machine that you hardly reflect on under normal circumstances fails. How easily we forget how fragile we really are. My sister is about to faint. I rush her over to the window where she spends the next half an hour and
then we leave.

This night I have trouble falling asleep. I keep on seeing grandma's face and I try thinking of ways to help her out. We need to get a lotion - her skin looked very dry. I will massage her, especially the right side (the one that is paralyzed). Will I be able to do it though? I have never touched grandma anywhere when she was healthy; how will it feel now? I will make sure she drinks lots of fluids. But, wait, she chokes every time someone gives her something to drink. How will I go about feeding her? I have never fed anyone in my life! What was I doing there? I was helpless.

The next day, however, I approach her bed and without any hesitation start doing all the things I was so worried about the night before. She is smiling and infinitely thankful I do not mind doing these things. I am so happy to be there and yet so terribly exhausted every day I leave the hospital. I put all my energy into her. That is all I can really do and it is so little.

Two days later the doctors return to work. I know this because my aunt plans her day around a short visit to see the doctor in charge in the hospital where grandma is. I see not much has changed since when we lived in Poland. Without a few expensive gifts there would not be any visit to speak of and with them my aunt manages to find out what exercises we can do with grandma, what food she can eat, how we can help her regain her speech and memory etc. Overall it is a fruitful visit. We can proceed with the treatment.

One day grandma is moved to a different room. It is a slow day and my sister decides to read her an article from a popular Polish magazine for women. She gets through half of it when the lady next to grandma raises her voice complaining about my sister reading out loud. "This is a hospital and things are different here. At home you watch TV all the time and waste your time on computers and here you come and pretend you read! Hypocrites, you!" Normally I would keep my mouth shut, but this lady really got on my nerves, "Excuse me, do you think you know me personally to be saying these things?" Her response: "Don't be a smart ass!" I am about to burst. I tell her to mind her own business. This gives her even more reasons to continue talking. My sister keeps quiet so I start talking to grandma: "Name all the animals you had on your farm." Grandma smiles and begins: "Cows, geese, ducks, pigs, a horse!" I ask about the color of the horse and she responds: "Ahhh, grizzled!" We start laughing and the lady next to us gives up and shuts up.

After two weeks I feel extremely tired. If I don't leave, I'll go crazy- I think to myself. So I pack my bags and together with a friend we take the train to Krakow.

Krakow, 2007

My friend and I decide to take the two-and-a-half hour train to Krakow. Though the routes of the trains have not changed through all these years nor did the train stations, the trains themselves look somewhat cleaner and more comfortable. We sit in a compartment with three other people (one compartment is intended for 8, which translates into sardines crammed in a can). It is quiet so I tell my friend Ania what happened one day when I was alone at her house. Someone rang from downstairs. I answered and the man informed he had fresh eggs. I was a bit surprised at this kind of service, that is, eggs being delivered to someone's house, so I checked: "Why? Were they ordered?" Everyone in our compartment bursts out laughing. When I think of that man, however, I feel bad I did not buy those eggs from him. What if that was his only job and since eggs go bad after a while, does he have enough money to get by?

Krakow has always had a calming effect on me. I find myself on the Main Square and I am happy. Today I am a bit disturbed by the number of people storming from each and every side, but if I ignore that, I'm happy. Just moments ago I felt like I was in America again as we passed through an immense shopping mall connected with the train station. Nonetheless, in the Main Square is where I feel like I am back in Krakow and I am relaxed and peaceful inside. We sit at one of the many gardens and I know I have to do everything to be able to come and live in that city for a while. Only here I enter in that state of bliss; nowhere else and I can't really pinpoint what it is that makes me feel this good. The university, the old churches, the incredible and mysterious Jewish neighborhood... I don't know. It's Krakow and, magically, I'm home.

Going to Krakow from the North, one can spot many abandoned factories that boomed during the Communist era and now stand as these blind giants (with broken down or, better yet, stolen windows) scarred with obscene graffiti. As the train lazily passes these forgotten structures, I begin imagining what kind of people worked here, whether they liked their jobs, if they made decent money, and where were they now. Not all of them are as bitter about those years as it may seem. Their faces now look even more lost, withdrawn, disappointed.

Interestingly enough, that Saturday night in Krakow we end up in two places that monopolized on the minimalist Communist ideology for entertainment purposes. The place is called "Społem", a word I know all too well, in fact so well, I had to look it up. I know it from all the grocery stores that still today bear that same sign they bore during Communism. The only difference now is that the shelves offer a much wider variety of products than anyone would need, while back in the day, these same shelves stood completely bare collecting dust.
This is the kind of "Społem" people remember and know and my generation is the first one to poke fun at its survival because although the food is available now, the store still looks exactly the same way it did back when I was a little girl standing in a long line for a loaf of bread.

Standing in line is definitely something the Poles have in their blood because it requires great skill, not patience as one might think. I have witnessed and experienced it many times and every such occurrence puts a big smile on my face. Try to stand in line to buy a train ticket or anything really and you will see what happens around you. Polish people simply need to cut in line at the slightest opportunity they get. You might be standing first and turn your eyesight for a second. Chances are before you realize it, there will be five different people standing in front of you already and the ones behind you will be breathing down your neck.

At the airport in Amsterdam going back to NY I spot an older man that I know has to be Polish. As soon as a line begins forming to go through the gate, he shimmies his way through the entire crowd all the way to the front. Just to see what he will do, I approach him from the side, which means I am trying to cut in. He grows extremely uncomfortable and blocks my way with his entire four feet or so posture. I look down and notice a plastic bag bearing a picture of the Madonna and a name of one of the sanctuaries in Poland. Ha! And he was a religious too, but he was even more religiously guarding his sacred spot in the line! I hardly resisted bursting into laughter.