Tell the Pope I said hello (and Happy Easter!)

Krakow is an undeniably beautiful city. It is Europe’s largest medieval square one minute, a fairytale castle the next, gargoyles around every corner, and beautiful churches and crosses literally on every corner. I decided to go to Krakow for Easter for two reasons, 1) I had heard you really need more than a weekend to truly explore and appreciate this place and I had Good Friday and the Monday after Easter off (a colleague in the Helsinki office said, “Yeah, we know you Americans like to work every day except Christmas and 4th of July when you wave the flag and sing about the red, white, and blue but we celebrate Easter in Europe!” Not entirely correct but I can understand where he’s coming from…what a great reputation we Americans have!), and 2) Easter is a bigger holiday than Christmas in Poland which is predominantly and very devoutly Catholic and I thought it would be fun to spend the holiday in a place that really celebrated it. I was not disappointed.

Before I could celebrate Easter, however, I had to visit another must-see, or maybe more appropriately a “must-remember,“ the Nazi concentration camp of Auschwitz which is the German name for Oświęcim, the Polish city outside of which the camp was founded. Oświęcim is 75 km outside of Krakow so was one of my priorities for my visit. I knew it was going to be a hard day and had been dreading it a bit since booking the trip to Krakow, but I thought it a really important site to see and acknowledge. Appropriately, I set out for Auschwitz on the gloomiest of gloomy days – cold, rainy, subsequently damp and bone-chilling cold. The 1.5 hr bus ride out of Krakow was a depressing one. We drove past innumerable farms which all looked depressed and degraded. Maybe it was the weather and the fact that it was early spring but everything looked gray, sad, and poor with dilapidated houses and barns with old, rusty equipment lying around. I have the feeling that had it been early June, sunny, and had I just been driving through the country instead of on my way to the site of 1.1 million murders, things would have looked a bit prettier and brighter. I had gone to a Gestapo museum in Cologne though several weeks ago and had been depressed for several days afterward so was really fearful of what this trip would bring.

I arrived at Auschwitz to see long stretches of intimidating barbed wire fences, and they were intimidating before I found out they had been electrified (although, obviously, not anymore). The tour began with a 20 minute movie detailing the atrocities of the camp, including the human experiments performed on many adults and on children. I was already feeling sick when we began the walking tour of the camp which started under the very famous "Arbeit macht frei" (translated from German, “Work makes you free”) sign at the entrance of the camp. The museum is extraordinarily well-done and the tour was just as good. We began with the history of the camp and how it came to be a concentration camp. It was chosen by the Germans because of its very central and well-connected (with respect to the railroad) location. It had previously been a Polish military barracks so also had the appropriate layout and buildings for housing thousands of people. At this point, the estimated death toll at Auschwitz I (there is another Auschwitz II – Birkenau very close to Auschwitz I, and another Auschwitz III) is about 1.5 million people, 1.1 million of which were Jews. The death toll estimates at this camp range from 1 to 4 million depending on the source and, because most records were destroyed as the Germans retreated right before the camp’s liberation in 1945, no one knows the actual numbers. Regardless, it is a huge, unforgiveable number.

The choice of Auschwitz speaks for itself as you look at a map of clear railway connections and subsequent paths of prisoners, some having been sent all the way from Norway and Greece. The trip from Greece was a 10 day journey in a railcar with no stops, no opening of the car, and no food besides what the people had brought with them. These people had no idea where they were going so couldn’t prepare and I can only imagine what the living conditions were like in a closed rail car after 10 days. Horribly, this was only the beginning of their pain. The tour guide walked us through the selection process whereby families were first ripped apart, more often than not never to see one another again, with men in one group and women and children in the other. Next, the young and able were then separated from each group from the weak, old, and very young who were immediately executed as they were of no “working” value. Regardless, whether you went to the camp or immediately to the gas chamber, you were stripped of all your belongings, had your head shaved, and corralled into the designated line. One of the most disturbing exhibits was a room full of human hair…when the camp was liberated they found 7 tons of human hair on site which was only what was left at that time. The Germans had sold the prisoners’ hair during the war to the textiles industry to be used in blankets. Everything possible that could be taken from these people was taken. We began with the room of hair which was sickening by itself and then moved to other rooms containing thousands of toothbrushes, suitcases, combs, a room with 40,000 shoes (which still, at one pair per person, represents less than 5% of the number of people killed), clothing, shaving brushes, and finally baby shoes and baby clothes. These personal effects were overwhelming and yet still represented just a drop in the bucket of what happened at this place.

We saw the block which housed the punishment cells – mostly starvation cells and 90cm x 90cm holding cells in which four prisoners were kept overnight after 12 hour workdays, and into which they had to crawl through a small opening at floor level and then stand all night with three other cellmates as punishment for some “crime” (and example would be sharing bread with another prisoner) committed. The execution yard was outside where certain prisoners were shot execution style or, after having their hands tied behind their backs, hung by the wrists (behind them) for several hours after which they no longer had use of their hands (and then, of course, were sent to the gas chamber because they were no longer “useful.”)

We saw a model of the gas chambers and learned about the mass executions and then the burning of the bodies. None of the murders put the Nazis face to face with their victims – after the prisoners were forced into the gas chambers, the Nazis dropped the Zyklon B pellets (which then reacted with the oxygen in the air to become a gas) into the chamber from holes in the ceiling and then closed them off and waited…it usually took 20 minutes for everyone in the room to die. After the prescribed amount of waiting time, the Nazis opened the vents to allow the room to air out and then other prisoners were given the horrible task of removing all the dead bodies and taking them to the incinerator. The murder of 700 people might take 20 minutes but the burning of their bodies took the next few days as the furnaces had to be loaded with the corpses one by one.

Some of the most disturbing exhibits were the pictures of survivors taken four months after liberation. The pictures of these women and children, who no longer even looked human because of such extreme starvation and resulting atrophy, are now seared into my mind along with all (both adults and children) who were subjects of live medical experiments. It is incomprehensible to me that someone could think of doing such things to people, let alone actually carry them out. The fact that it was done on such a large scale with so many people involved, whether active or complicit supporters, is nothing less than revolting.

I apologize for the gruesome details but there is really no other way to tell it and, I think, it’s important to tell it. We are now at the point in time where those who were there to see it, to experience it, to tell firsthand what World War II meant to the world, to remember those tortured and murdered by it, are now dying off. There have been recent and, seemingly, increasing reports of those denying that the atrocities at Auschwitz and other concentration camps like it ever happened. We know this isn’t true and whether you credit Churchill or Santayana with the quote, “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” the message still holds true. There were 3 million Jews in Poland before WWII and there are now around 10,000. We have seen “ethnic cleansing” all around the world, we see ethnic cleansing all around the world, from “developed countries” in Europe in WWII to, more recently, Cambodia, North Korea, Croatia, Rwanda, China, the Middle East, Darfur…unfortunately, the list could go on. I personally believe that in matters like this we can not allow “to each their own” to become the excuse, the reason behind complacency. I do not claim to have a solution to these problems but I do believe these are global-, not country- or region-specific, problems and they need to be considered and addressed as such. We as a global community just cannot allow things like this to happen, let alone happen again and again.



Tough transition here but my trip, and Krakow itself, was not all about the horrible things described above. It is actually quite miraculous given Krakow’s proximity to Auschwitz and Birkenau that the city was left unscathed from the effects of WWII (Birkenau was created as a work camp for a rubber-producing facility to make tires for German war aircraft so was considered a military target and bombed by the Americans; Auschwitz was never a military target and, as such, was never bombed). The city is truly a treasure and an incredible place to visit, particularly on Easter. As mentioned, the main square in Krakow called Rynek Główny (“grand market” or “market square” – not entirely sure which!) is one of the largest medieval squares in Europe (some claim it is the largest) and is really beautiful and unique. As I also mentioned earlier, I was lucky enough to visit the city during Easter which was a very special cultural experience.

After spending the day at Auschwitz on Friday, I decided to go to one of the Michelin star Polish restaurants in town. I had cut the timing a bit close and did not yet know my way around the city so I had my map in hand and was walking fast, really fast. I was walking so fast and was so preoccupied with making my dinner reservation that I didn’t notice that I had walked right into the middle of the Good Friday Easter vigil until I was smack dab in the middle of it. Everyone was standing outside a church holding flowers and colored lamps, staring up at a second story window. I suddenly realized I had walked into the middle of something and looked up to see what everyone was staring at…and wouldn’t you know it, there was the Pope standing in the window and waving at the crowd. Holy crap! I mean, crap! I mean, Holy Pope! I stopped in my tracks feeling extraordinarily self conscious and rude (and afraid I’d show up on some BBC news clip as the clueless, obnoxious American who crashed the Pope’s Good Friday vigil) and looked around to see if anyone was about ready to deck me for barging in on the Pope. I looked up again and realized that the waving “Pope” was just a painting of Pope John Paul II which covered one of the windows, painted to make it look like he was standing in the window and waving…I let out a huge sigh of relief, thank goodness! But, then again, why is everyone staring up at a painting of a waving Pope like he’s really there? I quietly backed my way out of the crowd and went another direction. (I learned throughout my four days in Poland just how proud the country is of Pope John Paul II, who was Polish and went to university in Krakow. There are statues of him and monuments to him everywhere!)

Dinner turned out to be excellent and I ate like a pig for $20. I had “Ruskie” (Russian-style) pirogies which are steamed dough dumplings filled with potatoes and cottage cheese finished off with a quick sauté to brown them a bit. They were very simple but actually very good and are a Polish specialty. Poland is also known for its many beet dishes and a side on the menu was translated as “fried beetroot.” I really love beets so figured I would try this out and get some veggies to boot (dough dumplings filled with potatoes and cheese does not a well-balanced diet make!). When my waiter brought it to the table I started to reconsider my choice…the beets had been grated and then cooked or “fried” into what looked like a big pile of beet mush. Yech. I decided I should try it anyway and, despite the fact that it really didn’t look at all appetizing, it was actually quite good. Besides the fact that I was eating dinner and drinking wine alone, it was a very successful introduction to Polish cuisine. Little did I know that I would be eating pirogies for the next 3 days!

I had initially planned to go to the Wieliczka Salt Mines (more on that later) on Saturday as everything was shut down on Easter and most everything was also shut on the Monday after. I had a guidebook with instructions for how to get there, with the appropriate city bus, minibus, and train schedules included. I decided to take the bus so set off in the morning for the Krakow bus station. The buses supposedly (according to all my information) left for Wieliczka every 20 minutes so I could basically leave whenever. I went to the window to buy my ticket (for 3 Polish zloty, or about one US dollar) and the woman at the counter told me in half English half Polish that no, no, there was no bus anymore to Wieliczka but that there was a minibus every 30 minutes outside the galleria at the intersection of something and something. She shooed me away and I pulled out the map to try to figure out where I was supposed to go. I found what I thought was the right intersection and started hustling – I wasn’t too far away but it was 10 minutes to the hour so I would have to wait another 30 minutes if I missed this one. I got to the right intersection and there was a tram line, city buses, minibuses, basically all possible modes of transportation but no signs on the street indicating specific stops and no signs on any of the vehicles which might indicate where they were going. I saw a driver sitting in his minibus so I asked him (well, more accurately, I pointed to the salt mine section in my guidebook) where the bus was to Wieliczka. He didn’t speak any English but jumped out of his bus and waved for me to follow him. He walked with me for two blocks to where he thought it was, got redirected by some other drivers, and waved me to follow him again. We arrived at another minibus driver hangout and the drivers there confirmed I was in the right spot (not anywhere close to where the bus stop lady had told me to go). My driver buddy then pointed to the time of the next bus coming at 12:20 on the schedule. Turns out the minibuses were only running about every 3 hours so I had lucked out as it was just about noon at that point. I sat on the curb and waited…but at 12:20, 12:25, 12:30, 12:35, no minibus appeared. I asked the man who was supposedly manning the stop, and who spoke a bit of English, when the Wieliczka bus was coming, wasn’t it supposed to be there at 12:20? He looked at the schedule and pointed to another column which showed that the next bus wasn’t coming until 3pm. The first driver read from the return schedule instead of the departing schedule. Ugh. The salt mine was closing early at 2pm for Easter celebrations so I had just wasted 2 hours and now wouldn’t be able to get to the mine before it closed.

I chocked it up to typical travel trials and tribulations – I am betting the guidebook was referencing a summer schedule or something – and decided to head back to the main square to see what I could see there instead. This turned out to be a very serendipitous turn of events as I arrived at the square just before the blessing of the Easter baskets at St. Mary’s Basilica, the very famous and beautiful cathedral in Rynek Główny. Everyone in the city turned up with their Easter baskets filled with breads, sausages, colored eggs, tomatoes, and a few chocolates, candies, and cookies thrown in for good measure. The weather was beautiful and all ages were out with their Easter baskets, crowding around the cathedral for the blessing. I have no idea what was said as it was all in Polish but, I assume, at the time of the blessing everyone on the square lifted their baskets up to be blessed by the presiding bishop. The pictures I took are priceless! In the middle of the square there was a little street fair in which you could buy baskets, all the requisite fillings, and doilies to cover your goodies. I didn’t see this until after the blessing was over or I would have made one for myself! It was a really cool tradition to see and be a part of…my only concern was that I was the weird tourist taking pictures of other people’s children! The little kids dressed up for Easter with their baskets were too irresistible so I felt it was worth the risk. I spent most of that afternoon in the square walking around taking pictures, trying Polish snacks, and checking out the arts and crafts. It was a really fun way to celebrate the Easter holiday (even if on the periphery!).

I spent the rest of the day exploring the grounds of the fairytale-ish Castle Wawel. This castle sits on a hill overlooking the city and is amazingly well preserved and, miraculously, survived WWII without a scratch (as did the rest of Krakow). It has the classic castle walls surrounding it (the once upon a time moat has now been turned into city green space) and legend has it that a dragon lives underneath it in a cave and protects the Castle. Can’t get much more medieval than that! The Castle cathedral is also pretty amazing and has been the location of the coronation of most of Poland’s monarchs who, incidentally, are also nearly all entombed inside the cathedral. Pope John Paul II actually said his first mass as a priest in the Crypt of St. Leonard’s underneath the Wawel Cathedral where most of the tombs are kept.

I had intended to go to an English mass on Easter Sunday at one of the small chapels in the city for Easter but because of a mix-up with daylight savings time (I had changed the time on my cell phone when I landed in Poland and picked the right time zone but happened to choose a country setting which doesn’t recognize daylight savings so I was an hour behind), I arrived for mass just as it was ending. UGH. I had so been looking forward to Easter mass! This too turned out to be very serendipitous because I decided I would just suck it up and go to a Polish mass at St. Mary’s Basilica that evening. St. Mary’s was definitely the place to be for Easter mass and it was a cool cultural experience to go to mass with the Poles (and I got a lot of good praying done since I didn’t know what was being said!).

After church I had planned to go to dinner somewhere in the square but because it was Easter most of the restaurants were closed (at least the Polish ones I was interested in going to) and since it hadn’t been much fun to do a sit down dinner alone a couple nights before, I decided to just hang out in the square and eat fair food again. It was easy, good, and there were lots of fun people watching opportunities. I was having a great time (having just found the hot spiced wine vendor) walking around checking out the handmade ceramics, hand-painted Easter eggs, and other Polish Easter trinkets when I noticed that everywhere I went this one man would show up. Now, the fair wasn’t very big and I thought it could very well be a coincidence – no need to get paranoid, right? I brushed it off and kept walking around, bought some hand-painted ceramic salt and pepper shakers and decided to head back to the hotel and call it a night. I started on my way out of the square and, being a little paranoid, turned as I started down a side street just to make sure that the same guy wasn’t following me. To my unpleasant surprise, he was following me and was tracking not far behind. I got a little freaked out and walked quickly back into the square where there were lots of people around.

Just what I needed! I was less than a kilometer from my hotel and now I’d probably have to call a cab or something so I wouldn’t be by myself. I stopped and looked straight at him. I wanted him to know that I saw him and that I knew he was following me. Leave me alone, creep! It is EASTER for goodness’ sake! I stood there for a minute to figure out what to do…call a cab? Walk with a group? Run down a side street so I’d lose him? All of a sudden he was right there in front of me and jabbering away in Polish. I backed away and said, “I’m sorry, I only speak English.” He said, “Sorry, sorry. Coffee?” He pointed at me, “Ty?” he pointed at himself, “Ja?” he pointed to a café, “Coffee?” Are you kidding me? This guy wants a date?! I was so relieved I started laughing. “Sorry.” I lifted my hands up and shrugged. “No Polish.” He continued, “Ty?” pointing at me, “Ja?” pointing at himself, and then he walked his fingers along his arm and pointed at the café, “Coffee?” Now I knew this guy was harmless so I laughed again and said, “I don’t understand.” Why not play dumb in this case? “No Polish.” He tried a couple more times and then grabbed my arm (not scary grabbed) and said, “Come! Come!” He led me over to an outdoor café about 50 meters away, invited me to sit down, and then proceeded to try to talk to me for 30 minutes without a common language. I don’t know why in the world I sat down but I felt bad being rude and this guy didn’t understand, “I have to go.” “No, thank you.” “No coffee.” Looking back I shouldn’t have cared if he understood me and should have just walked, but I just kept thinking I could do it nicely.

So now I was having a drink with some guy who speaks no English and I speak, obviously, no Polish. I should also mention that he was probably 55, balding, and missing several teeth. Unbelievable. He would have been easier to brush off if he hadn’t been so sad already! He ordered drinks from the waitress, found out she spoke English, and had her translate the following message, “He wants me to tell you that he has retired from work so is no longer working in Krakow. He just lives in Krakow now.” Really? That’s the one sentence he chose to have her translate? Me and some random Polish retiree, who would have guessed?

I was very uncomfortable and the “conversation” was extraordinarily painful but he just wouldn’t let me leave. He said, “British? London?” I said, “No, USA.” He looked at me puzzled at first and then his eyes got wide, “AMERICAN? OOOOOHHHHHHH.” Not sure what that was about but ok. Then, “Husband?” Stupidly, I said, “No, no husband.” He said, “No?!” I said, “Nope.” He shook is head like he didn’t understand and then made a sad face. Yes, it’s very sad and you don’t know the half of it, buddy! He then started the me – you (ja – ty) pointing business again, this time with “husband” and “married” thrown in a few times while performing charades describing a wedding ring. I’m not sure if he was proposing or what but I was becoming increasingly more annoyed and upset. I said, “Thank you but I have to go.” He pointed to his wrist like a watch and, I think asked the equivalent of, “When do you have to go?” Or maybe that’s what I wanted him to ask because I said, “I have to go NOW.” He put up his hands and started counting up, “Jeden,” one finger up, “dwa,” two fingers up, “ trzy,” three fingers, “ cztery,” four. It was 9pm. I said as I counted up on my hands, “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Nine. Now nine. Go NOW.” He said, “Sex? Six? Sex.” He laughed. Ok, not so funny anymore. I said again, “I go now.” He started pleading with me in Polish to stay and have another drink. I told him no, no, no. I told the waitress no. She looked tortured and said, “If he orders it I have to bring it…but you don’t have to drink it.” This was just getting worse. He took out his phone and showed me pictures of his dogs, and then asked for my number. I said, “No number. No phone. No Polish.” He asked with numbers when I was leaving for the US (this took about 5 minutes to understand) and I said, “Tomorrow.” He said, “Nooooo!” He pointed to himself, “Ja?” then put his arms out and made a plane noise, pointed to me and said, “Ty? USA.” No. NO. NO! I had had enough and there was no nice way to get out of this one. What a naïve idiot I was! I was so afraid he was going to rob me that I had underestimated how bad the alternative could be! I said, “I don’t understand. No Polish. I go NOW. Thank you. Goodbye.” I got up, kept my eyes on the waitress to make sure she knew to hold on to the bill and then hauled tail out of there. I knew my way home but I didn’t want to take any chances so started taking smaller roads and making multiple turns as I walked quickly, glancing back every few seconds or so.

Next thing I knew, I had no idea where I was. YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME! I knew I wasn’t far off but I still didn’t know where I was and I was already freaked out. Yes, I did have a map and, yes, I did have my phone but who am I going to call in Krakow? I walked a bit further looking for some landmarks (the river, the Castle) but the buildings were too tall to allow me to see anything else. I asked a guy on the street for directions but he didn’t speak English and when I said, “Do you know the Sheraton?” He scratched is head, pointed and said, “Left.” Thankfully, the direction he was pointing was left so I figured I’d walk that way. I walked another couple blocks and then found where I was on the map. Thank you, God! I was so relieved. I was, as I had thought, quite close to the hotel but just on some side streets in an area I hadn’t been before. I have to say though, this getting lost thing is really getting old. I have never been so happy to see a Sheraton in my life! I am also pretty sure that encounter slapped the "being friendly to strangers" out of me for a while.

After a fitful night’s sleep, probably caused by the weirdo on the square but manifested as nightmares about work, I woke up early this morning to make my way to the salt mines before I had to fly home. I had read up on the mines and tour before, as I had planned to go a couple days prior, and knew it cost 60 zloty (~$20) at the mine. The bus ride was about 3 zloty but, as I had experienced a few days before, the bus reliability was somewhat lacking and the Monday after Easter is still a holiday in Poland meaning the buses are likely to be even less reliable. I asked at the front desk about this the night before and was told that I could go straight from the hotel with a tour group for 125 zloty. I said, “But the tour only costs 60 zloty at the mine. Can’t I just take a bus?” The woman at the desk looked skeptical (I get the impression that most of the American tourists at the Sheraton are not interested in taking the Krakow bus) but looked up the schedule and told me the bus stop was literally just around the block. Perfect! This was better than I expected!

I checked out and headed immediately to the bus stop. I reconfirmed the location of the bus stop with the woman at the desk (same one I had talked to before) before I set out and she had circled the “area” on the map with her pen, on the other side of the block. No problem. I went exactly where she had pointed, and checked every sign on the street (on both sides), but while bus 304 was supposed to come at 8:55am (and she had printed off the schedule for me so the time was legit) there was no bus 304 to be found. There was actually no bus of any number to be found. I waited until 9:10am before I dragged my stuff back around the block. I walked in and said, “The bus never came.” She said, "I’m so sorry! I checked the schedule!” At this point the tour bus was already outside and ready to go but a $20 upcharge wasn’t worth missing the mine (although definitely worth me hauling my buns and bags around the block!) so I asked her if I could join late. She did some mad scrambling and was able to hold the bus before it took off so that I could join. Ironically, it was during this mad scramble that I realized I had left my iPod in my room…worth much more than the $20 I would have saved if bus 304 had shown up! Somebody is definitely watching out for me! Finally, after couple days and about 6 buses worth of trying, I was on my way to the Wieliczka salt mine.

The Wieliczka salt mine is on the UNESCO list of world heritage sites and has been on the list since 1978 (I believe it was actually on the first UNESCO list of only 12 sites in the world – there are now nearly 700). Excavation of the mine began in the 13th century and continued until 1996 when mining activities were finally stopped. There are around 300 km of mined passageways through the rock salt deposit and it has now become a museum as well as a venue for showing art and history carved into the salt. We went around 130 meters below the surface during the tour which only took us to level 2 of 9 in the mine. It is really unbelievable to think that people were using pix axes to chip out rock salt at 300 meters below the surface hundreds of years ago! Methane is released as rock salt is excavated so one of the most dangerous jobs was to be the methane burner. These guys would go to the depths of newly excavated passageways with a torch to “burn off” (i.e. “explode”) the methane gas. There is no wonder that there are so many chapels and shrines built into the mine – those guys are all lucky to have made it out alive every day (although many, particularly the burners, did not). The carvings and salt chapel (used each Sunday for mass and for many weddings each year) are pretty amazing and definitely extremely unique. It was well worth the pain of getting there!

After thoroughly enjoying the charms of Krakow (I highly recommend it if you’re looking for a good trip!), I’m now back in Helsinki and was not pleased to see the ground covered in snow when I landed. I was spoiled by Krakow’s gorgeous weather and flowers (FLOWERS! I had forgotten about FLOWERS!) and it got my hopes up for spring in Finland. Vappu, or May Day (1st of May and a huge party and holiday in Finland), is fast-approaching though and, come hell or high-water (or, gulp, snow!) I am celebrating spring here soon! I will, of course, keep you posted!

Lastly…Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad! Thirty-five years is pretty amazing! Love you both.