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Published: September 18th 2007
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Lunch!
Outside the Palace of Culture and Technology Sightseeing was to be the main aim of today. We were woken by the ruckus outside our window which is a phenomenal amount of glass being smashed into recycling bins.
We set off in the general direction of the presidential palace. Despite having stumbled across it yesterday, we decided to start our sightseeing there so we could photo it. As we were walking down the royal way, we saw the police escorting an important looking car past us. Outside the presidential palace we saw a large group of soldiers lined up and knew something must be happening. We waited and waited, but they just stood there. Just as we were giving up we saw some movement and the band with the soldiers began to play; an important type person left the palace and got into a waiting car with two escort cars and a police car in front and one behind. As the cars withdrew they changed the Egyptian flag outside the palace for a German one. Soon we heard sirens and another convoy arrived, it pulled up and several people in uniform got out, the band then played the German national anthem. After this we had had our fill
of random presidential things and carried on to old town.
First we looked at a tall pillar thing which I had read about; it was the tallest of its type when it was built. It survived 200 years before the pillar part needed replacing, and this new one lasted until ww2. A third pillar was then constructed, both previous pillars were visible.
I then got a super ice cream with an oddly phallic shape for only 4.5 zl, about 70p! Very chocolaty so Steph didn't have one. We sat down in the old town square while I ate it. After finishing we went to the fountain in the middle which was a mermaid that suffered from flatulence; every few minutes a glug of water came from the bottom and then proceeded to gurgle away again.
The 'new' town is located just north of the old town so we headed there. I say new town but it is still 400 years old. Nearby was the Warsaw Uprising monument which is slightly out of the main central area. The monument itself was rather impressive and much bigger than you imagine from seeing it in guidebooks. It was there to
commemorate the brave soldiers who fought to liberate the city from the soviet occupation. The monument was set in the grounds of the law courts which was a very large and modern building with the state library across the road an equally impressive building.
From here we went north further out the city towards the Jewish ghetto monument. We walked and walked until we reached another monument which wasn’t the one we wanted. This monument was a very impressive one which depicted a train carriage full of crosses. Again we set off to the north looking for a monument, passing impressive buildings and some less than impressive ones and eventually we reached it and it was a tiny little statue of a woman at the side of the road. It was then that I worked out that this wasn’t the statue we wanted (the map was polish) and so we gave in looking for it.
I had noticed on the map a very large area was occupied with ‘Cytadyl’ which I cunningly translated to Citadel and it did look like it had a large wall around it. It was only a few minutes walk away from our location
and I thought it would be worth a look. It wasn’t. There was a reason why it wasn’t in the guide book. It was surrounded with a modern wall that had warning signs and the main gate was manned by the military; we found out it was an active barracks.
After the disappointment we trudged all the way home, which was in the opposite direction to which we had been walking. At the hostel we embarked on our first home cooked meal but first we had to wait for the kitchen. We played a wonderful game of scrabble which I won with great words like ‘pelicon’. Our delicious meal included macaroni and pasta sauce from Estonia and carrots. Mmmm.
This was the evening of the England Russia football game and so we headed to a bar which we knew showed it. Unfortunately it was a horrible sports bar. The place was packed as Poland had just played their game but the place soon became tolerable. We managed to get a seat in front of the big screen and sat down with our extortionately priced beer; more then you would pay in England. The game was good and England
managed to win 3:0 so we returned to the hostel.
Once at the hostel Steph called her lovely friend Nina for a chat while I messed around on the internet for a bit. Now we’re off to get ready for bed in the dark.
Night.
Stob
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emma
non-member comment
i love your blogs it makes me feel so close to you both. i miss you soooooooo much. and i love the way neither of you ever seem to get excited about anything - it's blogging eeyore stylee. love it! i put my number on facebook, finally, so please ring me soon xx