Winter Break

Up until recently Torun remained the coldest place on the planet. There are some fearsome-looking icicles hanging from some buildings and so I've adopted a policy of not walking under the eaves; those things have got to drop sometime. It has continued to snow most days so it's piling up beside the roads in rather large mounds. We're now having a bit of a thaw but they say it's due to get cold again.

My Winter Break went well. I started by catching the slow train to Krakow - I wondered why it was so cheap (56zl - about £15 for a 300 mile journey). The next day my good buddy Bob arrived from the UK and we set off for Zakopane. We stayed out of town in a road full of unusual wooden buildings ...

We caught the cablecar to the top of the highest mountain in the area but the visibilty wasn't too good ...

We had thought of walking back down but one wrong turn would have seen us walking down into Slovakia so we drank coffee in the (rather expensive) cafe at the top instead.

However, a few days later I was back in Zakopane with another good buddy, Jane, and we had perfect weather. We went for another stroll - this time starting at the bottom and following paths to a frozen lake. The views were amazing ...


We just happened to be there during the latest round of World Cup Ski-Jumping so we went along to the first evening. It's quite amazing to watch people flying through the air just a few metres away. Britain wasn't represented and so I was tempted to become the next Eddie the Eagle but they make it look easy - if you landed badly you would give yourself a nasty headache so I think I'll give it a miss.

Once Jane had gone I spent a couple of days on my own - Monday was spent down a salt mine. It was a working mine for hundreds of years and has been a tourist attraction for ages too. It's full of carvings made entirely of salt and has a huge cathedral inside, one hundred metres down.

I followed this with a visit to Auschwitz. It wasn't a fun day out. There was a few hundred people walking around following their tour guides and not a smile on anyone's face. The stories about life there are horrific. It was about minus 16 that day and I was freezing. I couldn't imagine standing out in similar weather for ten hours' 'role call' in little more than pyjamas.

On a more cheerful note, I finished up my trip by meeting up with my nephew Simon and his girlfriend Martyna (who's from Krakow). They flew in to visit Martyna's family and to go skiing. My Polish was put to the test before they arrived as I met Martyna's mum and uncle at the arrivals gate. Being able to say 'Hello, my name is Graham, I would like a coffe with milk' is not much help when you want to hold a conversation. I considered impressing them with my ability to count to a hundred and name the days of the week but thought better of it. Once Martyna had arrived we had an interpreter and spent a couple of hours chatting over coffee and cake.

I caught the fast train home. This one cost a bit more but I was stunned when they brought free tea and coffee around. I tried to pay until a kindly soul pointed out my mistake. Now back to normal life at school, which I'm enjoying. More to follow next blog ...

I have learned a few more Polish words:

telefon - telephone

telewizja - television

radio - radio

teatr - theatre

laptop - laptop

komputer -

yes, you guessed it,

computer

Polish just seems to get easier and easier.

Christmas in the UK

Szczesliwego Nowego Roku (shcheslivego novego rokoo) - Happy New Year to you all. It seems appropriate that the first thing Poles say to each other each year is a word that is rather hard to pronounce.

I spent Christmas in the UK - I hired a car and drove 850 miles up and down the country seeing folk. Christmas Eve was spent with my buddies Greg, Juliet, Ben & Tamsin. Greg recruited me into the band for their church nativity. I was given the triangle and told to hit it at the required times. I wouldn't have worried but the whole band stopped at the exact moment that I was supposed to play my solitary note - a very exposed position to be in. Luckily, Greg gave me all the right cues and I didn't ruin the whole show.

Next stop was Christmas Day with all the family for another yummy Christmas dinner and a lot of laughs. Here I can be seen setting the right example for my young and impressionable nephews...

I also managed to visit other family members and took a few of the lads climbing. This one is of Jamie, my youngest nephew (he's getting rather good already)...

I made it to The Lakes for a jolly good new year. We went for a couple of stomps in the hills and plenty of yummy food.

The night before I returned 'home' (which is how I keep finding myself referring to Torun) I was treated to a Polish meal by Alex (who's from Poznan) who cooked all my favourite dishes and made sure that my pronunciation was up to scratch.

I've now been back for a week and was straight into the usual classes. This week I found myself discussing the grammar in a solicitor's letter with my Legal English student and later on was acting out 'sad - sadder - the saddest' with a class of beginners. It was worthy of an Oscar but just seemed to get a lot of laughs. Don't know why.

Now this may make you feel a little bit green but, at the end of next week, we have two weeks' Winter Break - another holiday. Although my blog is called 'Graham on the Road' it has felt more like 'Graham in the Cafe' up until now as the furthest I've been has been a weekend in Warsaw. No longer - I have plans for Krakow, Zakopane and, maybe, Prague. We shall see.

A few more observations to finish this blog:

Public toilets often have a man and woman symbol as you're used to, but many don't - they have a circle (for women) and a triangle (for men). Remember this, should you ever visit Poland, it'll keep you out of trouble.

The snow-clearing is very efficient:

It's too warm for some people ...

(These were taken in Torun today - there was a charity event on. It was about minus 8C in the wind. Yes, they are blocks of ice floating in the water.)

A little more Polish:

cztery (chteh'ryh) - four

piec (pyehn'ch) - five

szesc (shehsh'ch) - six

Have a wonderful 2010!