Part VI: Gdansk and the old town - Żuraw and the Mariacka

This is beginning to feel like the neverending post, but what do I know.

Tour de France is due to come by Tower Bridge anytime soon now, and I am going there to witness history.

(A/N: Back from witnessing history, and got in a few pictures too. Should probably write a new post on this.)

I noticed several extremely ominous-looking clouds overhead, and decided that they would ruin my pictures anyway, and since it was dinnertime I might as well have a bite and watch the Switzerland-Argentina match at the same time. Sure enough, right after I was seated, great dollops of rain began falling down upon the amber city, and there was a huge clap of thunder. I coughed and checked out the menu, and looking at this exquisite and extensive palate in London now only makes it worse.

I ordered Polish dumplings again.

With hot chocolate pudding as dessert.

When I finished dinner, the clouds were still there, but at least it had stopped raining, and sitting in a restaurant without wifi can be very boring. I walked out and went to ul. Mariacka, one of the most famous streets in Gdansk.

In the aftermath of the thunderstorm..

Walked around a bit after that, and went to see the Bazylika Mariacka, the largest brick church in the world. It commenced work in the mid 14th century, and was unfortunately severely damaged by the Red Army in 1945. Most of the cathedral today is a modern reconstruction.

It’s the building on the right, but the angle of the sun prevented me from getting a clearer picture of it

A/N, 2017/12/21. Thanks to improvements in modern technology, I am now able to present an edited version of the photos of the Bazylika Mariacka, in which you can see the cathedral in all its full glory. Four years too late, maybe, but late is better than never. And these newly enhanced photos really are stunning, if I do say so myself.

Walked back to the lovely Motława to see the shipyard, and the famous medieval port crane, the unusually phallic shaped Żuraw.

The Żuraw can be faintly discerned from behind all those boats

And here’s a clearer picture of the Żuraw. It’s the building with the oddly shaped funnel-like structure.

And this is the part where I sort of went crazy and snapped loads of photos again, because it was that time of the day, and this was that kind of city, and I’m an indecisive person who just wants it all.

I went back to the hostel after that and met some of the new arrivals in our room, and talked (as we always do!) about politics and history and visa restrictions. Went through an awful lot of cider too, courtesy of one of the Polish guests.

I really liked Poland, and it’s a rather odd feeling, sitting here again in my London Bridge student room, typing this up, reliving the emotions and feeling of being there. A profound sense of displacement, tempered with a dash of nostalgia and regret. Listening to my roommate cooking in the kitchen, and to the skateboard idiots trying out their tricks in the quad. Wondering who’s going to break through in tomorrow’s match. Thinking about certain people, and the fact that it’s past nine again, and very soon I’m going to go to the kitchen and try to wrap this up. Wanting so much more out of life, even though I already have so much, because that’s the essence of human nature. In the end, if one’s not careful, they’re left with a handful of what-ifs. Humming “Lemon Tree,” and you’re wondering how, and wondering why, that yesterday all you saw was a blue blue sky, but now all that you can see is just another lemon tree.

Part V: Inside the old town of Gdansk

A heads up: this entry is going to be loaded with photos, because as I mentioned about three times already, Poland is ridiculously and utterly photogenic. I actually think that all of the pictures deserve to be uploaded, but unfortunately that can’t be the case, so I’ve whittled it down to...oh, only twice the normal amount I usually put in a post.

I actually had loads and loads of bad weather during this trip. First it rained all day when I arrived at Copenhagen, then a thunderstorm broke out when I came back from Sopot, and then there was a third thunderstorm when I went to Frombork. But I managed to wait them out (and they usually happened when I was in restaurants) and what do you know, I get blue skies again after all the hullaballoo has passed.

When I went back to Gdansk, it was still relatively early on in the day, and I’d decided to visit Frombork the next day, so the rest of the day was happy G-day. The first place I visited (or tried to visit) was the Wystawa 'Drogi do Wolności' exhibition, which the Swedish couple had recommended me the day before. It’s a museum featuring much of the memorabilia pertaining to Poland during the postwar communist period (1956-1989), but unfortunately, it was undergoing maintenance and therefore was not open. I stood around and took some pictures of it. The museum itself looked very communist-y.

I took a tram back to the main station although it was only one stop, but it was too hot to walk and I had my 24 hour pass, so I figured why not.

And then it was bus no. 100 from there to the old city centre, which was...about 3 stops, but again with the heat and my bus pass.

A large part of the city was destroyed during the carnage of WWII, and was painstakingly rebuilt during the 1950s and 1960s, with a special emphasis on Flemish and Italian influences, while studiously avoiding anything that resembled Germanic, Prussian, or anything that spoke of the Third Reich. The destruction that Poland suffered during the second World War was horrendously devastating. There were 457 Nazi concentration camps in Nazi-occupied Germany, including the infamous Auschwitz, and the death toll of the Polish population, which amounted to 22 percent, which was the highest proportion of any European country in World War II. It doesn’t bear thinking about. I was deeply moved, and impressed, when I walked along the streets of Poland’s rebuilt cities and roads. To think that this prosperous, beautiful country had arisen from the ashes in the wake of the second World War, was very inspiring. You’d have to really be there to see what I mean - to see the cathedrals and the houses all restored to their former glory, the bustling streets and the smiling faces of the people. Poland is the friendliest country I’ve ever been in, as well as Luxembourg. You would have thought that the people here would be more reticent and on their guard, given their history and what their neighbouring countries/states have done to them in the past, but they’re the warmest, most open-minded and accommodating people I’ve encountered as a whole so far. Not to mention the fact that they speak the best English, too.

The old city centre is mainly comprised of Ulica Długa (Long Street) and Długi Targ (Long Market). I think it goes without saying that this was one of my favourite old city centres in all the countries I’ve been in.

The Złota Brama.

Walking in to the Ulica Długa.

Thanks for photobombing every single one of my pictures

It was gorgeous. If I lived in Gdansk, I would come here for a cup of coffee every day after school/work.

The Ratusz Głównego Miasta right at the end of the Ulica (the one with the copper spire), with a gilded statue of King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland on its pinnacle (installed in 1561).

Ah yes, this is a closer look.

Crossing into the Długi Targ.

The Zielona Brama is the red building in the backdrop

The buildings with their Flemish designs and pastel colours are very becoming in the early July sun, and the Zielona Brama in the background finishes it off nicely.

One of the main landmarks of this area is the Fontanna Neptuna, which was built in 1617, but the building in its backdrop was undergoing reconstruction and swathed with one of those ugly green construction nets, which photobombed my picture like nobody’s business, so I’m leaving that out of my collection here.

When you walk out of the Zielona Brama, you’re presented with a stunning view of the Motława in all its noonday splendour.

This was the part where I went “damn..I’ve taken about 120 really good photographs of this place, but I’m only allowed to pick one for my blog!”

The other side of the river.

Oh, the deuce. I think I’ll just go ahead and inundate this post anyway.

They do feature minuscule differences in angle, so that you can see them..from various sides.

Oh dear. I’ve just gone back and looked at my “part V” folder, and realised that there are still about 15 photos I want to include in this entry. Maybe I’d better split this one up as well. At this rate, it’s going to take me forever to finish this!

I really need to wrap this up quickly and get cracking on my dissertation. Time’s running out. It doesn’t help that I spent most of the morning rebooting and debugging my system because my wireless wouldn’t work and I thought my laptop had been invaded by a Trojan, only to find out much later that I’d merely turned off the F8 wireless button by accident. Grrr.

Anyway, toodles and TBC!