Blogs from Lesser Poland, Poland, Europe - page 7

The title of this blog post written from the lobby of the Hotel Kazimierz in the former Jewish section of Kraków exquisitely sums up the complex contradictions and richness of this week's visit. Yesterday our voyage began early with an excursion to the famous Roman Catholic stronghold of Czestochowa. A new museum to the Jews of that city has just opened. The exhibition, narrated by one of its creators and designed in conjunction with the new Polin Museum of Jewish history in Warsaw captures the adaptability, initiative, and dare I say Polishness of that once vibrant community. But there was a tragic underbelly to this place because it became one of the hotbeds of not only Nazi bestiality during the war, but also because of a particular Polish strain of antisemitism, with some roots to that ... read more

In the Talmud we read about the belief that in every generation there exist 36 righteous human beings who are unknown to each other and are also unaware of their own special role in the world. They are simple and humble and anonymous individuals who behave in such a humane way that they justify the reason for the continued existence of humanity. In Hebrew they are called both Lamed Vavnivks- based on the Hebrew letter lamed that equals 30 and the letter vav that equals six, and Tsadikim Nistarim - the hidden righteous. Today many of us felt we had met one of those in our generation. His name is Piotr. He's a Pole in his thirties who was born and lives in the city of Bedzin also known as Bendin in Yiddish. It's located in ... read more

I have always wanted to visit Krakow, so I went to Poland a day early so I could do about 24 hours in Krakow. Not enough time at all, I know. However, I did see a lot of the old town and enjoyed it. I would like to go back someday. We arrived into Frankfurt on time at 10am, and cleared immigration quickly. Next flight to Krakow was around noon time, but it seemed full for stand by. The next flight was not until around 4 pm, but it had lots of open seats. What to do? Shall we go into Frankfurt city for a few hours? Try the early flight? We decided to try the earlier flight, and it was a good choice because we made it on. It was a smooth and routine flight ... read more

Well the rain that started the previous evening carried on all night and throughout the next day putting the dampers on our plans for that day. We had intended to visit an area dotted with lakes and mountains but soon realized that would be impossible as the rain poured and poured. We gave up and watched the Olympic Games on TV and Gary and Milena went shopping. Fortunately, that night, we found a lovely Swiss restaurant close to our guesthouse so didn't get too wet. And there we were once again at the end of our holiday. The next day we caught the bus back to Krakow, spent the afternoon exploring the main square and market before saying our goodbyes as Gary and Milena caught their return flight to London and us back to Manchester.... read more

The morning dawned bright and clear and by 7am we were stood in the queue waiting for the cable car to take us to the summit of Kasprowy Wierch. By 7.45am we were at the summit drinking in the amazing views. Half an hour later the whole group had made it to the top and we were ready to start the long walk down. Although the aim was to go down the mountain there was also a lot of paths going up that we had to encounter, some trickier than others! At one point there was an opportunity to take a detour and take in another peak, Giewont. The path was known to be very steep with chains at the very top to help your ascent. However as we got closer we could see a long ... read more