Slow Train to Nysa

I took a taxi to the train station in Krakow, rather than try and lug my suitcase on and off a couple of trams. The Sheraton offered their own cabs, new Mercedes, but the price was double or triple a regular local cab, so I called for one of those. I’m sure the ride I had was more exciting than I would have enjoyed in the luxo car! The train arrived and left promptly and was reasonably comfortable, though I would date the cars to the 1960’s or earlier. I grabbed a compartment in the non-smoking end of a car, and shared it with one man who said almost nothing, and another who spoke some English, was from Romania, and was traveling to Warsaw to work on a Master’s degree in computer science.

There were about a dozen young men in our car finishing their term in the army and heading home. By ten in the morning, the beer was flowing, and they were standing in the hall outside our compartment smoking, throwing cigarette butts and beer cans out the window. They returned to their compartment, grew louder and louder, then began singing. Others on the train seemed embarrassed by them, and by the time I got off in Opole to change trains, they were hanging out the windows yelling at people and singing. I was glad to be changing trains.

The train from Opole to Nysa was older—maybe the 1940’s or 1950’s, maybe earlier—and was slow. We left about 50 minutes late: I was beginning to think I had crossed a time zone, but the departure was simply and inexplicably delayed. It felt like we never exceeded 30 mph, and stopped at a number of boarded up brick railway stations to pick up and drop off passengers. One stop was in the middle of an open field that had been recently planted, no buildings in sight save for a metal shed open on one side to shelter waiting passengers. Nysa lies in the south of Poland maybe 20 kilometers north of the Czech Republic, and mountains in that neighboring country can be seen in the distance.

Upon my arrival, my friend Ewa (Eva, like Gabor) was there to greet me. We returned to her apartment building, lugging my suitcase up the steps to the top floor. The inside was nicely decorated and comfortable, and they had prepared both some chicken noodle soup and a Polish dish made of cabbage, meat and spices (vigo?) for lunch. There, I got to meet Ewa’s husband Urich, an ambulance driver who is studying to be a paramedic, and their two year old daughter Marta.

After our lunch, we drove to the center of Nysa to visit their 1,000 year old cathedral and to tour the city center. The cathedral was beautiful, and boasted the steepest or second steepest roof of any cathedral in Europe. It too had been bombed out in the Second World War and rebuilt. About half of the buildings in the center were original, the rest built in the last few decades. Nysa looked like a town that people enjoyed living in and taking care of: Soviet era buildings painted with bright colors, flowers planted and tended, people sweeping the sidewalks, shops proudly displaying their wares. We headed to supper in a restaurant located in the basement of an older building, full of ambience, heavy wooden beams, and a fireplace. We enjoyed soup in bread bowls, and a Polish beer made with apples, perhaps what we would call “hard cider”.

That evening, I enjoyed sitting with their daughter Marta on their couch, holding a Polish children’s book and having her tell me what the animals were.

The next day, I visited the school the Ewa teaches at, sitting in on one of her English lessons, then talking to four classes of high school aged students. The school is named “Carolinum”, began as a Jesuit school, and is 400 years old. When we entered the first class, all of the students stood because their teacher was entering the room—very impressive! My first question from a student was “Have you seen Fahrenheit 911, and if so, what did you think of it?”. It was the most important question I received that day, and a variation of the question I have been asked everywhere on this journey. People around the world are afraid of our President and the administration that is in power in our country, and are deeply concerned about what another four years would bring.

A question that I wished I had answered better was from the young man that said that he had heard that Polish women were the most beautiful in the world, and asked if I agreed. A loaded question for sure, but I wish I had said more in regards to the beauty of a person that lies within, and how looking only at the exterior can turn people into objects.

The school building was fantastic, with vaulted ceilings in the hallway, a library that looked like a room out of Oxford, and an auditorium that could have been a small concert hall in Vienna. I did ask one group what their greatest challenge or concern as young people in Poland was, and they instantly replied “jobs”. Most of the factories in Nysa have closed in the past few years, and unemployment there is soaring. Their main hope seems to lie in their participation in the European Union, and their soon to be received right to look for jobs in other countries.

Ewa left me to explore Nysa for another hour or so while she wrapped up at school. Meeting me at the cathedral with Marta in tow, she drove me out to their lake, and then to her father’s house. It was great to meet him—he and Ewa seem to be cut out of the same cloth, and he obviously enjoyed his granddaughter very much. He had been a carpenter, and examples of his handiwork were throughout his home. We then met Urich at the hospital, where he enjoyed showing off his ambulance. More than that, he obviously enjoyed setting two year old Marta in the driver’s seat and turning the lights on.

That evening, they prepared some more traditional Polish food for me, including stuffed cabbage and some wonderful Polish bread. We had a nice visit with Magda, one of Ewa’s co-teachers, watched a video about Nysa, and watched part of “Shrek” in Polish—it seemed pretty natural!

The next morning, Urich drove me into Opole to catch the bus, worried that the train from Nysa could again be delayed and I would miss my connection. We shouldn’t have worried—the bus arrived 30 minutes after our departure time, and we lost another 30 minutes in road construction. Miraculously, we arrived in Warsaw only a few minutes late, making me think that train and bus schedules there involve a fair amount of fiction and creativity. Plan accordingly. Ewa had generously prepared me a wonderful lunch for me to enjoy on the way, including sandwiches, fruit, juice, and a traditional salad made with egg, carrots, and other good stuff. I caught a cab to the airport, arriving well before the time Air France opened their counter for flight check-in.

Poland was a fine country to visit, and I was very fortunate to have friends to help host me for part of my visit. My visit to Nysa was a highlight, especially to stay in a home, visit a school, and see a town that is off the radar screen of American tourists. It once again reinforced my interest in visiting out-of-the-way places that most tourists don’t get to. The word I get from Ewa on the trains is that many more people own cars now, and so the call for trains is declining, and with it the number of trains and connections available. I have to wonder if they’ll enjoy a revival there and will match the service available in western Europe, or if the trains in the Baltics and parts south will die out all together. On my way out, Urich drove me through several more scenic towns en-route to Opole, and each would be worth spending some time in. So, get going, get out there and explore!

Next: Brazil!