The Word From Krakow

All Saint’s Day

2009-11-29T06:03:00.003-08:00

It’s autumn - and the lengthening nights wrap themselves around us ever closer. All Saints’ Day, 1st November, will soon be upon us: the perfect time for a moment’s reflection and introspection. All across the land, in cities, towns and villages, Poles will make pilgrimages to place thousands of multi-coloured candles on gravestones, family tombs, mausoleums, graves of unknown soldiers, victims of communist oppression as well as poets, priests and painters. In the larger cemeteries, such as Krakow’s Rakowicki, you are arrested by the sight: spectral lights of red, white, yellow and green, conjure up shadows which dance and flicker like wood nymphs in the night as, in a forgotten corner, the branch of a willow gently drapes across a sleeping sarcophagus, ‘Here lies Jaciek’, long since gone. And in a ceremony repeated throughout the land, from the middle of it all, a church is overflowing, its open doors bathing the quick and the dead alike with kind and holy words, as mysterious and beautiful as an Arab call to prayer.

On a dry, warm night I walk slowly around the cemetery: cutting quickly off from the main avenues, finding quiet delight in discovering ever-smaller paths, which become quickly clogged with autumn leaves and roots of trees. I trip, regain my balance and check the unlit candle in my pocket. It’s still there, waiting for that empty grave. It’s a tradition to place a candle on an empty grave and say a prayer for its owner. But, as you could warm your hands by the candle heat from most graves, finding an unlit one is no mean feat. Still, it is good fun looking, all the same.

Most graves and tombs have several carefully and tastefully arranged candles in shaped glass jars, reverently placed by family members. Fresh pots of flowers, too, are provided, in remembrance of the dearly departed. And lest you think my picture a little too rosy, I’ve heard all about the Joneskis next door. You know, the ones you need to keep up with, especially in the village, where appearance is all. It gets like a competition, apparently: the biggest and most impressive candles, wreaths and flowers. But beneath the surface lies something deeper, pagan almost. In the villages especially, every square inch of a grave may sometimes be covered with candles and flowers in the firm and solemn belief that such an over-abundance of familial love and good wishes will itself ensure the soul’s ascent to heaven. Christianity of course, like all religions and cults before it, supplanted and suppressed pre-existing festivals, labelling them inferior, or ‘pagan’. And yet our intuition lives on: throughout the long dark days of clerical, communist and now capitalist oppression, we cannot but feel the occult pull to recognise, if only once a year, the need to connect, either with our ancestors or some part of ourselves, hidden deep within the rest of the year.

It is not surprising that human beings should light fires at this time of year, pause and turn away from the maelstrom of everyday life. It feels right to stop for a moment and reflect as we settle down for the long winter night. But why can similar scenes be found repeated across the world, not just in the autumn, but also on the very same day, 1st November? Is there indeed some truth to the mystical belief that, on this day, the worlds of the living and of the dead draw close, overlap, even?

I once blithely informed an inquiring Pole that, in England, we have only Halloween, a modern, American-influenced, tradition to our name. Of course I was wrong: both All Saints’ Day, 1st November, and All Souls’ Day, 2nd November, were once celebrated in Britain just as much as in the rest of Europe and many other parts of the world besides. All Saints’ Day remembers all the saints in heaven while on the second, All Souls’ Day, prayers are given for those in purgatory, neither in heaven nor in hell. However, back in the English revolutionary mind of the seventeenth century, such concepts smelt far too much of Popery and were discouraged as popular festivals as Protestantism became the norm and Protestant Englishmen became a little more ignorant of, and removed from, their own history and culture.

But it’s never too late to rediscover that which was, temporarily perhaps, lost, and in Krakow, one chilly November night hundreds of years later, at least one Brit could be seen mingling among the reverent, but slightly footsore crowds, glad that extra trams had been laid on from the cemetery to ferry Krakowians between family graves and family homes. As always in any Polish crowd, there was character and style. Smart men with dickie-bows and pork-pie hats, who in England would look rather old-fashioned, strolled proudly past, escorting fur-coated women of a certain age, balancing freshly-sculpted bouffants through the crowds. Mothers hold their smiling children’s hands as fathers struggle beneath plastic bags overflowing with candles for second cousins, twice removed. United in their memories, All Saints’ Day allows the Poles a time of reflection, of quiet and mutual respect which some other countries would do well to observe.

PODGORZE: A WALK ON THE WILD SIDE

2009-11-29T06:03:00.001-08:00

“South of the river! At this time of night?!” It’s a good job Krakowian taxi drivers are braver than London cabbies or us Podgorzians would never get home after a late one. Yes, there is indeed life after Kazimierz. Just five minutes south of Plac Nowy is the district of Podgorze, founded as an independent township in 1784 by the Austrian King Joseph II and long remaining independent until its merger with the city of Krakow in 1915.

On entering Podgorze, via either Piłsudskiego Bridge (from Krakowska) or Powstańców Śląskich Bridge (from Starowiślna), you immediately notice the difference. This oldest part, Stare Podgorze, nestles cosily between the river and the wide green stretches of the hill (gora, from which the area takes its name) just a few hundred metres away. It has a very villagey feel, as I thought when I first set foot here, flat hunting, a couple of years ago. Mind you, the district managed pretty well before I came along and Podgorze is, in fact, currently celebrating its 225th birthday, with many varied events such as open-air concerts, street theatre, fireworks and, in late September, the eighth annual ‘Podgorze Open Door Days’ event.

It cannot be denied that, to foreign visitors to Krakow, Podgorze is perhaps most well known - infamous - for its wartime history. Both the Jewish Ghetto and Oscar Schindler’s factory (fully renovated as a modern museum and opening in full in November this year) are grim, but necessary, stops on the tourist trail. During World War Two, the Nazis created the ghetto in a small area of Stare Podgorze, forcing Krakow’s Jewish population of approximately 10,000 to live for years in squalid conditions, before enacting ‘the final solution’ in 1943. Cross Powstańców Śląskich Bridge, leave the tram at Plac Bohaterow Getta (‘the square of the heroes of the ghetto’) and walk slowly, silently, among straight, orderly lines of cold, oversized metal chairs, which stand as artistic tribute to the murder of thousands and the absence of a culture and community lost to Krakow, and to Poland, forever.

However, the history of Podgorze is, mercifully, long and rich and I, like many foreigners and Krakowians alike, am keen to learn about other aspects about my new neighbourhood. The three-day event ‘Podgórskie Dni Otwartych Drzwi’, (roughly, ‘Podgorze Open Door Days’), which takes place annually in late September, was the perfect opportunity to stroll around: popping into galleries, dipping into local museums and taking in the area’s many green spaces. Depending on your native tongue, we’re either in the middle of an Indian Summer or the beginning of a Złota polska jesien - golden Polish autumn. Either way, a free English-speaking tour guide and a sunny Sunday morning was an opportunity not to be missed.

A good a place as any to start a tour of Podgorze is Rynek Podgorski, which, together with a style of low-rise architecture unique to Krakow, is dominated by the beautiful redbrick Saint Joseph’s Church. Taking my dog for a slow, meandering walk late one night, I estimated the towering structure’s number of bricks at about one and a half million. However, I now believe this figure, like my state of mind at the time, to have been wildly inaccurate.

Being the greenest of Krakow’s eighteen official districts, Podgorze is a great place for dog walking. Just above the church is Park Bednarski, a spacious park populated by dog-walkers, lovers, squirrels, birds and giant multi-coloured animals, drawn on the paths by tiny children with massive chalk crayons. Take tram number 3, 8 or 10 to ‘Korona’ tram stop (just three stops from the Wawel) and you really feel that you’ve left the city behind.

But don’t relax for too long. Just around the corner is Lasota Hill, home to a 19th century Austrian fortification and a modern church on the site of the original, which dates back to the 11th century, shortly after Poland’s official conversion to Christianity. From here, you have a fine view of central and northern Krakow. But for one of the most spectacular views of the city, take a ten-minute walk from there to Krakus Mound. Kopiec Krakusa, in the Polish, is an earthwork, believed to date from the 7th century and to contain the grave of the legendary founder of Krakow, Prince Krakus. It looks just like a (slightly smaller) Glastonbury Tor: an amazing and magical sight, here in (supposedly) non-Celtic Central Europe. Your short climb around its winding path rewards you with a majestic 360-degree panorama of the city: to the north, Stare Miasto and the northern suburbs; to the east, the smoking chimneys and steelmills of Nowa Huta; whilst, turning your head to the south, you may even catch a glimpse of snow on the Tatras - the start of the Carpathian Mountains. Now, that’s not a bad reward for a stroll south of the river!

Krakow Chronicles Summer Quiz

2009-11-29T06:01:00.000-08:00

How well do you know Krakow and its people? Test yourself with the Krakow Chronicles Summer Quiz ...

1. The most famous river in Poland flows through Krakow on its way to Warsaw and, eventually, on to the Baltic Sea. What is the name of Krakow’s river?
a) The Wisła
b) The Vistula
c) The Mississippi
d) Krakow has a river?

2. Kazimierz was once a run-down, neglected district, where only brave souls dared walk at night. How things have changed! What is your impression of the modern Kazimierz?
a) It’s a cool, bohemian place to hang out and meet my friends
b) The parking is a joke and there are few facilities for the local community
c) I can remember when you could buy a beer, a vodka chaser, a zapiekanka with extra ketchup and still have change for a two-bedroom flat on Plac Nowy
d) I prefer Galeria Krakowska

3. The Poles are naturally proud of their extensive range of fine, golden beers. I, for example, support the Okocim brewery. Which is your favourite Polish beer?
a) Tyskie
b) Lech
c) Żywiec
d) Polish beer …?

4. Few are those who leave Krakow without experiencing the Heynal at least once. But what is the Heynal?
a) An informal goral (mountain-man) form of address
b) A trumpet call
c) A strumpet call
d) A spicy Polish kebab

5. A visit to the smallest room in Krakow’s bars, cafes and restaurants can lead to confusion and embarrassment: what should you do when faced with two doors, one marked with a triangle and one marked with a circle?
a) Wait patiently until someone enters or exits, thereby ascertaining which is ‘gents’ and which is ‘ladies’
b) Rattle the doorhandles, bang loudly and insistently on both doors, then suddenly lose all interest and walk back into the bar, all the time shouting inanities to your boyfriend down your mobile phone
c) Use whichever room is free: it’s two in the morning, for God’s sake!
d) Put the vodka back in the fridge, go straight to bed and never try to turn your flat into a nightclub again

6. Some countries queue, some countries don’t. Poland doesn’t. What should you do if, while waiting patiently in line, someone jumps the queue ahead of you?
a) Tap them politely on the shoulder, smile diplomatically and say ‘Przepraszam, ale czy mogł(a)by pan(i) stać na kolej? (Excuse me sir/madam, but could you please take your place in the queue?‘)
b) Pretend to ignore it: you’re only here for the weekend and you don’t want any trouble
c) Quietly slip back in front of the queue-jumper (‘When in Rome …’)
d) Write about the incident on internet forums and / or English-language newspapers

7. Krakow is home to foreign nationals from nearly every country in the world. What are you doing here?
a) Just visiting
b) Teaching English
c) Working in real estate
d) 4 to 5, with time off for good behaviour

8. For what is the nearby town of Wieliczka famous?
a) Its amazing salt mine, listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site
b) The only surviving statue of Lenin tying his shoelaces
c) The longest bar in Poland (over 200 miles long, every inch hand-cut from living rock)
d) Its world-famous ready salted crisps

9. Noone should leave Krakow without seeing the famous Wawel. What is the Wawel, pride of all Poland?
a) The name of a famous bar in Wieliczka
b) A well-established chain of language schools
c) Krakow’s castle: the former seat of the Polish monarchy
d) A Polish traditional wedding dance

10. The Poles are great animal-lovers and it’s no secret that Krakowians love their dogs (cf. daschund parade, 6th September). In Krakow, many dogowners allow their dogs to ‘do their business’ …
a) anywhere they want
b) wherever they want
c) anywhere they like
d) wherever they see fit

SCORING

1 A4 B3 C2 D1
2 A2 B4 C3 D1
3 A1 B1 C1 D4
4 A2 B4 C3 D1
5 A1 B3 C2 D4
6 A4 B1 C2 D3
7 A1 B3 C2 D4
8 A4 B1 C1 D1
9 A1 B1 C4 D2
10 A4 B4 C4 D4

0 - 10
Tourists may be forgiven their lack of Krakowian knowledge; the rest of you obviously live in a shadow-world of unknowing, from which a throwaway quiz in a newspaper cannot ever hope to rescue you.

11 – 20
Congratulations! You’ve done your homework. Take a moment to look smugly around before returning to your guidebook.

21 - 30
You’ve obviously been here some time and should be proud of yourself. But beware that experience does not turn to cynicism.

31 - 40
Impressive: it seems you know Krakow like the back of your hand. However, there’s more to life than the back of your hand. Krakow is a fine city. Never forget it.

The Cut-Out-And-Keep Guide To Modern Poland: No. 2 Customer Service

2009-07-20T06:54:00.001-07:00

First published in Krakow Post, August 2009

Those of you who have spent any time in Poland will probably have noticed something about Polish customer service: it’s pretty lousy. Of course, there are many exceptions to this generalization. But that is precisely what they are: exceptions. During a typical week of shopping, bill-paying and visiting government departments we are all too likely to encounter apathy, laziness, boredom and even downright rudeness.

Firstly, a tip for the tourists, refreshing themselves perhaps in the Main Square. Your time is precious. Don’t waste it waiting for the three waitresses chatting idly by the till to deign to serve you. Each waitress has their own tables - and you’re on the wrong table. Even frantic handwaving will result merely in the kind of thousand-yard stare that leads you to question both the girl’s eyesight and your actual existence upon the planet. But look at it from her side: why should she help you when it’s much, mush easier to ignore you? And remember that when you finally do get served, it’s as well to ask for the bill straight away - that is if you want to get to the Salt Mine today, not tomorrow

But having thrown the book at Polish customer service, let us not immediately throw away the key. Rather, let us first examine the case(s) for the defence. Firstly, Poland is still, in many ways, emerging from a centrally-planned, Communist command economy, which shut up shop barely a generation ago. The concepts of free trade, competition and customer service all need time to take root within the collective consciousness. It’s a fair point - and to prove it you need merely take a walk to your local street kiosk. There, as in most other countries of the world, you might expect to make contact - eye contact - with the proprietor of the establishment. Instead, you are greeted merely by endless rows of cigarettes. And it is only after having been exposed to such subtleties of emerging market capitalism that you notice the small dark hole beneath. It is here that you must supplicate yourself to the All-powerful Keeper of Cigarettes and Bus Tickets, who crouches, troglodyte-like, inside. They have it; you want it. That’s customer service, central European style.

Me being me, of course, I refuse to bow down to such low tricks. Consequently, any transactions I am forced to make involve me addressing myself to sun-bleached packs of Lucky Strike. Although it can be frustrating and takes me twice as long to get what I want, I rest easy in the knowledge that I am completely in the right. Indeed, I am confident that my corrective attitude has already been noticed by kiosk designers and I fully expect the kiosks to be redesigned in a more customer-friendly manner within a matter of months.

Of course were I a little shorter none of this would be necessary and I would be able to see just how charming and friendly the kiosk-dweller actually is. Maybe I’ve been missing out all this time. Because I love to see a smile on a shop assistant’s face. Really I do. But unfortunately they’re about as rare as pubs which actually do serve ‘until the last customer’. And here the Polish defence calls its second witness: an excuse for a common lack of humanity which has been repeated to me many times by Poles themselves: shop and government workers rarely smile because – duh! – they’re at work! The inference being that nobody actually likes their job, and because you’re at work you must therefore be miserable, so what should the customer expect? Just be glad you get served at all!

I disagree. Surely, as a customer (the guy with the money), I have a right not to be made to feel guilty for someone’s educational underachievement and / or existential crisis. However, I fully sympathise with anyone working the Saturday night / Sunday morning graveyard shift at 24 hour off-licence / delicatessens. (Had Dante been Polish and not Italian, he would surely have described an eighth circle of hell, illuminated by the cold half-light of dawn and populated by confused, mumbling souls condemned to wander for all eternity in search of potato chips and alcohol.)

In the end, is it so impossible to brighten up the day with a smile and a friendly attitude? It doesn’t have to be false. The tepid English ‘Hello, sir. And how are you today?’ or the ubiquitous American ‘Have a nice day!’ are regarded by many Poles as meaningless insincerities and we are, perhaps justifiably, derided for them. But we’ve all got to get through our days one way or another and, rather than be greeted with a blank expression, scowl or grimace from my fellow man, I’d much rather both give and receive courtesy, respect and a nice big smile!

The Cut-Out-And-Keep Guide To Modern Poland: No. 1 The Security Guard

2009-07-20T06:51:00.000-07:00

First published in Krakow Post, July 2009

You know what my problem is? Authority. I don’t like authority. Or rules. Or barriers. Or short, ungrammatical sentences. And definitely no quasi-military uniforms. I see red when I see a blue light. It’s wrong, it’s self-defeating and I should just get over it. Thanks for telling me. Now stop telling me! I can make my own decisions, dammit!

Why the sudden rush of blood? Well, I recently made the mistake of slipping casually under a rather flimsy piece of tape, taking a few steps into ‘the forbidden zone’ and ignoring a scary, muscle-bound guard’s command to return. Sure, I was wrong, but was he in the right to bolt after me, grab my skinny wrist tight and start radioing for backup, all the while aggressively shouting phrases that I’m sure both his and my mother would both have been ashamed of? A little excessive, perhaps. However, it seemed he was soon satisfied that – like a trusty guard dog – he had successfully protected his patch and now couldn’t be bothered dealing with a stupid Englishman with broken Polish and a deathwish: he let go of my wrist, turned his back and allowed me to melt once again into the crowd. Fortunately for me.

‘Course, it’s a problem being a middle-aged proto-anarchist in the twenty-first century, especially in a country like Poland. Sometimes it seems that everything – and I mean everything – is ‘protected’. You cannot even pass a busstop without seeing the words ‘obiekt ochrony’ - protected object – slapped on the glass. (Is it even the busstop that’s protected or merely the sticker itself?) Actually, I’ve never seen a security guard at a busstop. There’s not really much to ‘guard’, is there, apart from the odd empty crisp packet and the occasional sleeping drunk? And, anyway, they’ve all got cars now – the guards, that is, not the drunks … although when you consider some of the driving in Krakow …)

Still, at least the ticket inspectors are reasonably civilized. Even open to a joke and a little bribery, on a good day. I can’t say the same about private security guards, though.

These guys (and they are, of course, mostly male) are everywhere! Let’s take a moment to examine the species, starting with those seen pulling up quietly in front of banks, in white mini Hummers, with helmets and guns. This particular genus is guarding that most precious of our commodities: money. As such, they’re hand-picked for their professionalism, attention to detail and muscle size. If you’ve ever messed with one of these, chances are you’re reading this article from either Intensive Care or from Secure Wing B.

Next in the pecking order are the many varieties of black-clothed, big-booted guard. Equipped with hard exo-skeletons and formidable nightsticks, they possess varying levels of energy and testosterone. Their natural habitat is any public event or temporary structure deemed to be worth more than about 5 zlotys as scrap metal. Whilst apparently docile creatures, be warned that they may bite if threatened.

A little further down the genealogical tree and we come across the nocturnal guard. These ‘all-nighters’ are so-called due to their habit of guarding, for example, an impromptu ‘stage’ (in reality some bits of old scaffolding and a few hastily erected floorboards) throughout the long hours of darkness. They often achieve this by spending all night sitting together in a semi-circle, playing cards and smoking cigarettes, whist speaking a secret language that even the Polish mountain-people would find a mystery. Comprised mainly of individuals with – unusually for the security guard - the correct balance of X and Y chromosones and even the odd pony-tailed student, the all-nighter may be approached - albeit with caution – by those curious as to the future function of the guarded object, or else by tramps trying to cadge a fag after midnight.

And now we come to the guard that perhaps all of us are most familiar with: the shop and office security guard. This subspecies is itself strictly hierarchical, with a guard at a government or corporate head office snobbishly refusing to even look at the Kefirek or Biedronka guard, come the security guards’ Christmas party (incidentally, the one unsupervised event in the whole of Poland). These guards are solitary creatures and spend their time incessantly patrolling the same small patch of territory, the more domesticated individuals occasionally helping to weigh fruit and vegetables when needed. They lead a routine, even boring, life. And so, without wishing to seem in any way irresponsible, I would like to take this opportunity to ask, nay implore, some of our more impressionable readers to attempt to steal an item of small worth from one of these neighbourhood shops. The ensuing commotion would make the guard’s day, week or even year. Believe me. You’d be doing him a favour - as well as helping to smash the tyrannous forces of state authority, into the bargain.

Rainbows And Wreaths

2009-06-13T02:32:00.001-07:00

First published in The Krakow Post, June 2009

© John Marshall 2009

Picture the scene: you’re with your girlfriend, relaxing in the Main Square on a sunny Saturday, enjoying some fine Balkan folk singing and dancing; each performer striving to achieve perfect harmony and synchronicity with his/her partner. Then, in the corner of your eye you glimpse something most unharmonious: riot police, visors down and tails up, shuffling around the back of the Sukiennice. Curious, you decide to follow them. And, before you know it, you’re taking part in Krakow’s annual March For Tolerance March. And to think I only went out for a coffee …

It was my first ‘gay march’ and I felt conflicting emotions. Pride at standing up for tolerance and the right of everyone to lead their own lives, free from fear and persecution. But also distinct apprehension: we were tightly ringed by scores of scary-looking riot police whose militaristic get-up was perfectly matched by the aggressive manners and chanting of the far-right boot-boys. These self-appointed guardians of ‘Polish values’ were baying for the marchers’ blood only metres away from bewildered tourists. Knuckled fists were raised and primeval, guttural noises were spat out of angry throats. We banged our drums, waved our Rainbow flags, danced and, most importantly, were there. A little later, honour satisfied, the gathering broke up peacefully and my friend and I caught a beer, gawping (from a safe distance) at the fascists.

It was a strange sight to see both neo-Nazis (sporting the fascist organisation Combat 18 t-shirts) and riot police on the streets of my adopted Krakow, city of culture and learning. But after four years, I’m getting used to this annual face-off. At least the march is allowed now (they have been banned in Poland from time to time, always on spurious grounds) and it must be said that the police do a good – although slightly heavy-handed - job of keeping the peace. I only saw one ‘incident’: a well-dressed middle-aged Polish ‘gentleman’ decided to throw a plastic plant pot (complete with a flower – oh, the irony!) at us. Before you could say ‘strong-arm tactics’, a policeman broke ranks, rushed over and had granddad pinned up against the kebab stall. I caught his eye, smiled and blew the old git a sarcastic kiss as we marched merrily past. Here’s to next year’s march!

On to things less controversial …

Saturday 20th June, (Midsummer’s Day) sees the annual party called Wianki. It’s big, loud and heaps of fun. The main event is a free open-air music concert (Lenny Kravitz this year, no less!) by the Wawel and the river, followed by some spectacular fireworks. More sedately, you will have the chance to observe some ancient pagan traditions during the day.

Dating back to Pagan times, Wianki (meaning 'wreaths') celebrates all the usual midsummer themes of life, renewal and, er, virginity. Unsurprisingly, it was rebranded "Noc Świętojańska" (St. John's Night) by the early Church, which, no doubt, toned down some of the more earthy practices such as young lovers consummating their love in nearby woods. However, some elements have remained, such as jumping over the huge ceremonial bonfires (sobotka) which are lit along the riverbank and, of course, young women casting their wreaths upon the river.
Traditionally, Polish girls wear wreaths of flowers and throw them into the river. According to folklore, if the wreath comes back to shore, the girl will never marry, if it sinks, she will die young and if it flows down the river, she will be married. Oh, if only modern dating was so easy! Fortunately for all, the Wistula is a fast-flowing river and, traditionally, most girls went away happy.
Back in the 16th Century, Jan Kochanowski wrote the following description of Wianki traditions and beliefs:
In Poland the Eve of St. John's is fraught with miracles and magic. Animals talk to each other with human voices. The earth shows the enchanted riches … plants take on magical properties ... Wreaths to which are fixed lighted candles are cast in the waters … From the course and fate of the wreaths auguries of marriage are made. The special promise of St. John is youth, love and general fertility.
(I wish I’d read that last line years ago. It would have made a cracking chat-up line!)

It’s almost impossible not to get caught up in it all: my advice is simply to allow the crowds to gently sweep you towards the river, the lights and the sounds of one of the biggest nights in Krakow’s diary.

Oh, and just because you’re sitting in the middle of the biggest open-air event of the year doesn’t mean you’re legally free to drink alcohol. Take a tip from the locals: buy a bottle of coke, top it up with vodka and let some other dozy ex-pat get fined 200 zloty for open-air drinking!

Polish Landscapes: Magazine Article

2009-05-11T13:05:00.000-07:00

I first set foot in Poland four years ago, spending a couple of weeks in Poznan. It was my longest trip outside England and everything was wonderfully strange and exotic. Later, I was charmed by Krakow: its main square, charming streets and old town architecture. I fell in love with it immediately, the hot summer sun quickly burning away any Cold War stereotypes about the country or its people.

Mind you, those who choose to stay soon discover there’s more to life than tourist trails and there are some less than pretty residential areas in Polish cities. Many’s the time I’ve got lost in a sea of grey apartment blocks whose only identifying features were the massive adverts plastered on the sides. No, give me green, any day. I love a bit of green, especially after a long winter (minus twenty-seven Celsius?! Nobody warned me about that one!). So my dog obligingly pulls me around the nearby park three times a day, I stack my balcony with flowers in the spring, and get out of the city whenever I can.

Take a slow train journey between cities. You’ll soon get the hang of the Polish landscape. It’s flat! Really flat! And kind of plain, too. I mean, even the Poles call it Polska, and everyone knows that pol means ‘field’ in Polish. I rest my case.

Of course, Poland is not actually billiard-table flat. Of course not. That would be silly. The south of the country is a huge area of rolling hills, uplands and, of course, the Tatras, which are a magnet for the foreigner just as much as the Poles. I was only in the country for two weeks before climbing Rysy, one of the range’s highest peaks at 2499m. I didn’t expect that. ‘Beats the English Pennines, that’s for sure!

And, unlike England, there are many landscapes here that seem hardly touched by Man at all, an almost primal wildness still lingering in many of the hills and valleys. Taking a moonlit sleighride along a remote snowy forest track, the sound of wolves echoing along the valley was a wonderful, slightly unnerving brush with the raw Poland that I shall never forget.

Copyright John Marshall 2009

Krakow Chronicles: Easter 2009

2009-04-28T13:28:00.000-07:00

Hmm .. from the warm look of content on your face I see that you’re reading April’s Krakow Post. Well, that must mean one of two things: either you’ve made it through another winter (and if it was the Polish winter, double brownie points to you) or you’re rereading this article at some future point as a distraction to doing something else – probably cleaning the windows or starting your thesis. Either way, welcome (once again) to the Polish spring, which officially started on Saturday 28th March.

Spring is, for most Poles, the finest season of the year. Autumn’s ok, they say, summer’s too hot and winter is … well … winter. Spring days are simply longer, warmer and brighter. And now the streets and parks are full of people enjoying the return of both sunlight and birdsong.

But it’s not quite summer yet, down here in Central Europe. For no sooner does winter give away to spring than attention is turned to serious matters. For, in the Christian calendar, March means Lent (the traditional 40-day period of abstinence echoing Christ’s ordeals and temptations in the wilderness) and April means Easter and the Resurrection of Christ.

Let’s be honest, most Western Christians’ observance of Church festivals is limited – at best – to Christmas and Easter, and even then more often in a purely secular manner: expensively-bought presents at Christmas, expensively-bought chocolate eggs for Easter. Our experience and knowledge of the church, its yearly rites and festivities is, for many, fading fast. Twice a year we may perhaps pop our heads into the local church, shakes hands nervously with the local vicar (just how do you address him / her?) before curtseying backwards into the Women’s Institute flower display, but that’s about it. Or, at least, that’s how it used to be. For as anyone who either lives in Poland or lives near a community of ex-pat Poles knows very well, there are some churches where the cup runneth over - Polish churchgoers standing and even kneeling in the streets outside.

Huge church attendances were one of the first things to hit me when I came to Poland. And Sunday services repeated several times, with people queuing outside a la Harrods on Boxing Day morning?! You just don’t see it in Britain. And, as an occasional church-goer myself, I love to see it: just the sight of so many cheers the soul. However, removing my rose-tinted spectacles for a moment, I wonder how it was ten or twenty years ago. For many, going to church is merely ‘the done thing’. Where the church was once the source of comfort and an alternative to spiritually empty and morally bankrupt Communism, many Poles no longer seek nor, in fact, need such a solidarity and worship instead at the new churches of Ikea and the Galeria shopping centres. In this, of course, Polish society is merely ‘catching up’ with those in the West.

But Easter, at least, is a time of genuine celebration. And Poles fill every part of Holy Week with meaning and tradition. On Easter Saturday, for example, people take baskets of food into church to be blessed by the priest, and children paint eggs, giving them to members of their family. Another of the many family-related traditions is the all-day breakfast on Easter Sunday, when kitchen tables are laden with all manner of tasty foods, to be enjoyed from dawn to dusk. Traditionally, a moderate intake of alcohol from morning onwards helps ensure a particularly cheery Sunday.

Although the Slavs are great churchgoers, Christianity came late to this part of the world, with paganism only beginning to be replaced in the tenth and eleventh centuries. And pagan customs are much more evident in Poland than in the West. For example, the pagan Pole used to sprinkle water on the fields to awaken the Earth Mother after her long winter sleep. This custom has – with some slight modification, it’s true - survived to this day in the custom of throwing (sometimes sizeable quantities of) cold water over innocent passers-by. It’s called Wet Monday, or Śmigus-dyngus (after two mythical pagan gods), and you’d better be on your guard on Easter Monday when any random citizen – usually a child – decides to cover you in water, balconies of flats being a popular launching-pad. Although tradition dictates that you’re not allowed to be angered by this, you are allowed to retaliate. Sales of water pistols, AK47s and orange plastic rocket-launchers are predicted to rise over the Easter period.

First published in the Krakow Post newspaper 2009

Krakow Chronicles: May 2009

2009-04-28T13:27:00.000-07:00

How time flies (or ‘runs’, in Polish)! No sooner have we finished Easter (painted eggs, baskets of food, interminable hours around the family table) than summer’s just around the corner! With the longer and warmer days, Krakow has become a sensual feast. In winter, the stone kamienica across the street was inhabited only by shadows, who scuttled quickly up staircases. Now, the sun has made them flesh and blood, painted smiles on their faces and you notice details in the stone you’d somehow missed before. Double-windows are thrown open to catch the sun and your attention is pleasantly captured by the strains of an unexpected violin or clarinet, wafting through the net curtains and rolling gently down the street. You realize that even shadows have lives, and colourful ones, in fact. Like flowers, they only need the right conditions. And, closer to home, balconies blossom with bratki (‘brother’) and begonias, carefully tended by babcia owners.

Though far from the Main Square and Mariacki Church, I hear the Hynał (the mournful tune played by the trumpeter on the hour, every hour) drifting along my street. It’s maybe the radio, a practicing musician or perhaps a daydream. Whatever it is, like a friendly, sleepy, dragon, ‘Krakow’ - the thought of it, the feel of it - has awoken from its long slumber and permeates once again the souls of its people.

And not only the souls, but their bodies too. Towards the end of April, I received an SMS from a friend. A short message; innocent enough in its way. Did I want to run the Krakow marathon? Well, yes, the thought did appeal to me. After all, I’m not in bad shape and I’ve always wanted to see more of Krakow. And here was my chance. I should leap at it, gazelle-like. And so I did - metaphorically. Sort of. Almost. That is to say that, for a couple of hours or so, I let the idea run around my head for a while, before reluctantly coming to the conclusion that running a dog up and down the local riverbank two or three times a week hardly qualifies me for the remake of Chariots Of Fire. Not to mention the fact that, fortunately for me and all the serious, well-prepared, runners, I discovered that the invitation had arrived just twentyfour hours too late for me to register and pay good money for that particular kind of self-inflicted madness. Not that that stopped nearly four thousand brave souls from taking part on a hot Sunday morning, the winners coming from as far afield as Ukraine, Kenya and Ethiopia. World-class indeed!

However, I personally prefer my pursuits to be more artistic than athletic. Just as well I live in Krakow then: a city with a fine intellectual and artistic heritage – a heritage the City Government is determined to capitalise upon. I recently interviewed an international marketing executive on the City’s behalf. A man who has set foot in more cities than McDonald’s, he was very impressed by Krakow, telling me it had taken him precisely eighteen minutes to fall in love with the place (not, presumably, including baggage-handling and the taxi ride from Balice). According to him, we Krakowians live in ‘a mini-Florence’ (albeit one with its fair share of concrete blocks). Kind words – and no doubt heartfelt – but, as a lifelong Krakowian had, coincidentally, explained to me only a few days previously, Florence – like many historical cities - is a victim of its own success, left wondering where to go now. In the city centre, its winding medieval streets are snarled up with traffic and its overdependence on tourists inevitably impacts upon the local atmosphere. Apparently, it’s even rare to hear a native-to-native Italian conversation there.

The same colleague then recounted how, ten or fifteen years ago, it was, in contrast, extremely rare to hear any foreign language on Krakow’s streets. And, if we go back a little further, twenty years ago would have seen the Rynek Głowny (Main Square) dark and lifeless at 8pm, even at weekends. Impossible now to imagine that huge and vibrant public space, where everything happens and everyone meets, so devoid of life. How the city has changed in a generation – and how the new generation is changing the city!

A spring in my step!

2009-03-14T06:16:00.000-07:00

Copyright John Marshall 2009
First published in Karnet Magazine, April 2009

The sun is shining, birds are singing, the tables are out in the Rynek Głowny and lovers stroll hand in hand along the Planty, drinking in the Poles’ favourite season: spring. For after its long, cold dominion, winter - its beautiful anger spent - has given way once more, sinking gently back into the earth, safe from the sun’s warm rays and longer days.

Unlike my native England, with its mild, clement weather, Poland has four distinct seasons, each with its own particular hue. And, whilst deep snowy winters and long blazing summers have their own particular charms, spring is when the city comes alive.

Saturday morning and I pull back the curtains. The sun beams down from a clear blue sky and my dog Rosie, her lead in her mouth, scampers impatiently back and forth between me and the front door. And so it is that, ten minutes later, I find myself ‘dog-jogging’ for the first time this year, both of us shaking the cobwebs from sleepy muscles and limbs.

My route takes in Rynek Podgórski, the river and the Waweł. We pass the splendid gothic Saint Joseph church, and Rosie is soon galloping along the riverbank like a racehorse, easily outrunning a cruise boat which chugs slowly past us. Its passengers trail their fingers in the water and the sunlight dances over the boat’s wake which fans out gracefully behind it. On the bank below, small children throw bread at ducks and swans. Above them, a hundred cameras click in unison as the Wawel dragon obligingly breathes its fire. We sprint past, our throats also dry. I don’t notice the small, excited dog snapping after Rosie. His babcia (old lady) owner admonishes him as I perform a delicate hop over the pocket-sized pup. Regaining my balance, I turn my head back to see the ubiquitous Polish daschund (jamnik) looking up blankly, yet kindly, into the woman’s yapping mouth. She doesn’t seem to realize the dog can’t speak Polish. But neither does she know dog, and yet they understand each other just fine.

Little old ladies and tourists, lovers, joggers and dogs: enjoying the sun and the beautiful Polish spring.

Buying A Flat In Krakow: Part Two

2009-02-26T03:14:00.000-08:00

INTRODUCTION
With the "credit crunch," rising interest rates and falling property prices raising the spectre of recession in the West, there have certainly been better times to contemplate buying a home. Whether - or just how far - the Polish real estate market will be affected, within the context of an otherwise bullish economy, remains to be seen.

In the July issue of the Krakow Post, I set out my personal reasons for choosing to buy a flat in Krakow. What follows here are the experiences of a first-time property buyer in Poland.

AGENT / OFFER
So, you've spent the usual weeks and months trekking around and now you've actually found that special house or flat. Assuming the property, like most, is being sold through an estate agent (nierochumosci), the first thing you need to do is to agree their commission. Now, in Poland, estate agents charge both the seller and the buyer. The typical fee is 3% (plus tax). However, they are open to negotiation, especially in a quiet market. This done, you put in your offer for the property. This is done formally, with a document being prepared by you and the estate agent (this is not a verbal process, as it is in, say, the UK). Detailed in the offer document are the dates and amounts of the part-payments that, if your offer is accepted, you must legally adhere to as part of the buying process, together with a final hand-over date. All this is regardless of whether the owner accepts your initial offer or not. If not (as in my case), you and the estate agent then tear up the old offer and prepare a new, similar document, with details of the new, higher offer.

So, after several phone calls between all three parties, the owner accepts your offer and you, the owner and the estate agent sign to show acceptance of the offer. Now it's time to arrange the mortgage. Note that, unlike in some Western countries, you must have an offer accepted on a particular property before being offered a mortgage. It is not possible to get a mortgage offer in principle, allowing you from the offset to confidently scour the streets for the property of your dreams. This is important for the unwary foreigner to note, as in Poland it is common practice to pay a non-refundable deposit (zalicki), typically 10% of the agreed price, from your own funds to secure the property, often before receiving confirmation that you will be given a mortgage. Buyer beware.

REGISTRATION
One thing you will definitely need before seeking a Polish mortgage is to be registered (zameldowany) at a Polish address. To be registered is a legal requirement for any foreigner living in Poland longer than three months. Whilst failing to register is quite common and does not usually cause any day-to-day problems, it is very handy to be registered and essential when seeking a mortgage. To register, you need to go to the appropriate local government office (urzad miasta) with, if necessary, a Polish-speaking friend to translate. You must present either the tenancy agreement for the property in which you live or take with you the owner of the property who will then present their proof of ownership and state that you are living there (as, for example, in the case of a foreigner living in his/her Polish partner's flat).

Similarly, if you happen to be in possession of a NIP (tax) or PESEL (social insurance) number, so much the better.

CREDIT
In my case, the process of applying for and being granted a mortgage was a long and tedious one. Not, in fairness, because of any particular problem with the bank (although the usual Polish bureaucracy and inflexibility were much in evidence), but mainly because of my personal circumstances. Although I had been banking with a major Polish bank for three years, my major stumbling block was that I didn?t have a work contract. Now, proof of future earnings is a standard and reasonable requirement for any bank, of course, but not something that every aspiring property-owning ex-pat may have. I needed advice, and so began my association with an independent financial adviser (doradca finansowy).

ADVISERS
Polish financial advisers take their commission from the lender, not from the borrower. As such, using their services you are safe in the knowledge that, should you, for any reason, pull out of the process, you will not be charged even 1 zloty. But check and be clear on this point from the start.

FRANCS VS. ZLOTYS
Now, ideally, reader, you do have a work contract (or your own business) and a long Polish banking history (twelve months minimum is the norm). But if, like me, you don't, you will be severely limited in your options. At the beginning, I wanted to buy a 25-year mortgage, payable in Swiss francs. Perhaps a trifle exotic for this homeboy, but quite common in Poland and, due to low and stable Swiss interest rates, much cheaper than a similar mortgage based on zloty. However, in my case, my financial adviser could find only one bank willing to offer me any kind of mortgage (with each separate application seemingly necessitating reams of documents to sign, email and fax ? all in Polish, of course): a 30-year term, payable in zloty. We filled out the necessary documents, including the crucial estate agent's "offer document" and, in due course, I received the loan, complete, of course, with a four-figure bank commission charge, which I was able to add to the term of the loan. Note that, should you wish to switch from a zloty to a Swiss franc mortgage, you are typically free to do so after twelve months.

SELF-DECLARATION
Perhaps I should say that, lacking a work contract, it was probably only the fact that I had a 40% cash deposit that secured me the remaining 60% from the bank. Without such a contribution, I may not have been deemed so credit-worthy. Of course, some Polish banks allow you to make a "self-declaration." Self-declarations dispense with the need for proof of earnings providing you can provide something like a minimum of 40% cash. However, such documents have, in the West at least, received bad press over the years, encouraging buyers to over-extend themselves (remember the term "credit crunch?"). If offered credit in this way, be realistic with your ability to repay.

I was also required, by the bank, to have the flat valued. Again, this is not, as far as I am aware, standard practice for many Polish properties, but your bank may require it, at your own cost (around 600 to 800 zloty), so be prepared.

SOLICITORS
If all goes well, you now have your mortgage offer and a hand-over date. The estate agent takes details of both parties' bank accounts and arranges a three-way meeting with a local solicitor. If your Polish is poor, you will need to arrange a sworn translator to be in attendance (this cost, a few hundred zloty, is borne by you, although the estate agent will no doubt help you to locate one). All parties meet at the solicitor's office - cost to you, several hundred zloty - and you take legal ownership of the property on an agreed future date. Take great care with the document (Akt Notarialny) you receive as you walk out of the office: this is your title deed and it will need to be shown to utilities, banks and government offices on many occasions.

When, finally, the bank transfers the money shortly after, you may allow yourself a smug grin and a house-warming party (parapetowka). But with the post-party hangover, the real fun begins: dealing with the block's administration department, sorting out utilities, discovering problems with the flat that, somehow, the previous owner forgot to tell you about and, possibly, a disruptive and costly process of renovation. I wish you luck.

Buying A Flat In Krakow: Part One

2009-02-26T03:13:00.000-08:00

© John Marshall 2008
First published in Krakow Post, July 2008

Being quite satisfied with my three years in Poland and feeling the Cancerian need to put down a few roots, I decided last January to put things on a more permanent footing. Having recently sold my house in England I was looking for a good home for my money. Now, being a stereotypical Englishman semi-obsessed with property ownership and with a healthy distrust of banks, there was only one solution: buy a flat - both to live in and, possibly, as an investment.

Now, I can see some of the more longer-serving ex-pats already shaking their heads. “Oh, you should have bought a few years ago, John”. You see? “A friend of mine had the chance to buy the Wawel and St Mary’s Church not three years ago for only ninety-five thousand ...”. You get the picture.

Yes, property in Poland has risen two or three-fold over the last five years, particularly in the desirable areas of the larger cities. So much so that the market has, in many areas, peaked. In Krakow at least, prices have stagnated for the past year and there has even been a general reduction in asking prices, of at least 10%. It is a buyer’s market right now and will continue to be so for the rest of the year. (Ahem: This would seem to be the right point to declare that, as an English teacher and writer, all my business knowledge has been gathered from old reruns of ‘The Apprentice’ and snatched episodes of ‘Location Location Location’, glimpsed in moments of weakness.)

And so, more through intuition than any penetrating market knowledge, another bold statement: prices are set to rise again. Why? Because the Polish economy (and the zloty) is booming, British and Irish property prices have peaked (encouraging foreign investment), and, most importantly, many emigrant Poles are starting to return home intent on developing land or putting a deposit on their own flat. And, whilst primarily seeking somewhere to live rather than to invest in, I was encouraged to try my luck in this buyer’s market.

Of course, anticipated problems with language, bureaucracy and doing business in a different culture were all to play their part. But the first question was: where to live? Now, on my budget the choices were rather limited: a two-roomed fairly modern flat in a middling district. Well, ok, it’s not the Wawel, but then again who wants to pay the administration on that?

As we all know, buying somewhere to live is, for most of us, the biggest financial decision of our lives – and I’m very picky. Frankly, I was not impressed with what I regarded as different variations on the ‘box in the sky’ theme. In England there is a wide range of styles to be had, for all but the smallest budget: flat, semi-detached, terraces, bungalow, for example. I’m not making value judgments here: thirty-odd years surrounded by certain styles of architecture and built environment can’t help but form, or even skew, your opinions. So I kept going: checking out estate agents windows, listening to each new agent telling me s/he has exactly what I want (which always amazed me, considering I hadn’t a clue myself), and generally seeing more new streets than a London cabbie doing ‘the knowledge’.

I wanted character (budget allowing, of course) and perhaps a park, if possible (to walk in, not to own). A tall order but not insurmountable. As an unmarried man, I’m generally able to disregard the well-rehearsed dinner-party conversations regarding the absolute minimum number of bedrooms, distances to the local shops and school league tables, and concentrate instead on actually finding somewhere that I know I’m going to enjoy living and spending time in (there’s the Cancer again, you see).

And now I’ve found it; my very own flat. I can relax, kick back, make myself at home! No more schlepping around town, picking up out-of-date Post Office messages from ex-girlfriends’ flats, trying to remember if I’m registered or not and just who the hell is supposed to change the light bulbs in the hall, anyway? From now on, life seems set to be much simpler.

Of course, nobody ever said it would be easy, right? And between incompetent (yet expensive) banks, an elusive financial adviser, unavoidable (yet all too common) trips to urzad miasta (local government offices) and the signing of seemingly hundreds of documents, it nearly didn’t happen. But it did. And, in part two next month, I’ll tell you how I did it.

Winter Holidays

2009-02-24T13:58:00.001-08:00

Writing in a Winter Wonderland

Copyright John Marshall 2009

You know, there seems an inordinate number of wide-eyed, innocent-looking faces wandering unescorted around town at the moment. This must mean one of two things: either Ryanair’s having another ticket sale or the Polish schools are closed again. Yes, if it’s February, it must be ferie, (winter holidays), the mid-winter school break enjoyed by Poles everywhere (well, those still living in Poland, anyway).

What a wonderfully relaxed country this is! A mere six weeks after Christmas and New Year holidays and schools the length and breadth of the country shut down for two weeks.

So, while Britain grinds to a halt in the snow, Polish sportshops empty quicker than wallets in a January sale. Snow-chained cars piled high with snowboards, skis, hats and gloves, are driven deep into wooded valleys. Everywhere wooden chalets, guest houses and multi-storied hotels, all with steep rooves groaning under months of snow, are packed to the rafters with tourists dreaming of clear blue skies, powder snow and short queues for the skilifts. And this year, like every year before, I have decided to join them.

It’s easy to forget that there’s more to life (and Poland) than Krakow. Whether you’ve settled into a nice domestic routine or continue your intoxicating journey of Krakowian discoveries, the city continues to cast a spell over many of us. But there is no denying that Polish winters are cold and long, and the cities can seem grey, pale in the washed-out sun. For the sake of your health and your sanity, you need to get out for a while, if only for a weekend. And there is no better way to banish those winter blues than to strap on a snowboard or a pair of skis.

Before coming to Poland, my experience of skiing was limited to childhood viewing of Ski Sunday, a British tv programme. While we sat all cosy on the sofa, foreigners with badly-spelt names, dressed in day-glo spray-on costumes, would launch themselves down unfeasibly steep mountainsides in the hope of not breaking one of their 216 bones in the process. It was all very exotic and exciting back then, when my knowledge of Europe and Europeans in general was very limited, fashioned by such reliable sources as Allo!Allo!, old war films and occasional Olympics, featuring scary-looking, steroid-packed eastern European women.

Still, that was thirty years ago, and both me and Europe have changed a lot since then. I’ve actually become a skier! Me, from the flattest county in England! And, you know, I’m actually rather good at it - taking to skiing like a duck to frozen water. I knew all those hours of Ski Sunday would pay off. Now, I zigzag (or, at least, zagzig) my way to the bottom of the slope, to be greeted (in my imagination) by a herd of cowbells and a horde of adoring fans noisily beating their fists against advertising hoardings.

Mind you, skiing’s very tiring, as is snow in general, in fact. Here, as in much of Poland, the snow falls relentlessly. Outside my chalet window, every couple of hours I see inhabitants shovelling snow from the roads, in a show of defiance which makes King Canute’s stand against the rising tide seem like a valuable use of time.

I couldn’t spend half my winter clearing the path just so I could remember where I left the dog. It takes me all my energy just to wade through the snow to get to the ski slopes and put on my skiboots (starość nie radość, as the Poles say). So we decided to take a break yesterday and strolled in one of the area’s many beautiful valleys. Mind you, even this was not without its dangers, complete with signs warning of hungry wild animals and a four-star risk of avalanches. Fortunately, we managed to disturb neither wild bears nor towering walls of snow, the white stuff merely crunching underfoot, echoing softly against the rockfaces which loomed all around us in the gathering dusk. Sleighs lit with flaming torches, made merry by jinglebells, and driven by barrel-chested goralski (mountain men) trotted gently by, daytrippers tucked up beneath thick woolen blankets. They, like we, would later eat heartily in one of the hundreds of karczma (inns) before sleeping it off and dreaming of the next day’s travails.

The pace of life is slower in the sticks than in the city – especially in winter. At breakfast, there’s always time to chat around the dinner table. And I always enjoy having (as opposed, in the city, to choosing) to speak Polish. Out here too, English-speaking Poles are about as rare as Polish-speaking Englishmen, so a little book-learnin’ goes a long way, wherever you choose to stay. Because, let’s face it, there is no shortage of winter holiday destinations for the intrepid tourist. And if it’s your first time, just pop on your thermals and rucksack and take the bus to the main mountain town, Zakopane. The season continues until April, so swap the sludgy streets for the snow-clad peaks and see what a real winter is all about!

Valentine's Day

2009-02-24T13:57:00.001-08:00

VALENTINE’S DAY

Copyright John Marshall 2009

John Marshall is a writer and teacher who has had the great fortune to live in Krakow for several years. Krakow’s been good to him and, he hopes, he’s been good to Krakow.

Well, it’s that time of year again: Valentine’s Day. February 14th, the night which lovers celebrate and singletons dread almost as much as New Year’s Eve. Well, maybe ‘dread’ is too strong a word. But you know what I mean. On that most romantic of nights, anyone who dares to appear in public without a significant other bearing a classic Polish long-stemmed rose will be given a suspicious, sideways look by the silent majority, that is to say couples.

Valentine’s Day: not a good time to be single. But you can’t always time these things, can you? Well, you shouldn’t! I have a Polish friend whose love life ebbs and flows not according to the procession of the moon and stars across the heavens but to his rather more mundane state of his bank balance and, were he to be in a relationship, whether he thinks he would receive or have to give more presents. This cynical and arcane science of his includes many calculations regarding Valentine’s Day, his and her forthcoming birthdays, Polish namedays and, of course, Christmas.

Mind you, many relationships break up over Christmas. Perhaps it’s the imminent new year or ruinous credit card bills that focuses hearts and minds. Whatever it is, after the hangovers, wound-licking and self-imposed exile that, for many, constitutes the month of January, by February there is an inordinately large number of people sending and hoping to perhaps receive a Valentine’s card or two.

Probably most Post readers grew up celebrating – or sometimes trying to avoid – Valentine’s Day. For sure, in the West, advertisers and marketers have long cherished the tradition, giving as it does a warm tingly feeling to otherwise grumpy post-Christmas sales figures. However, in its modern form at least, Valentine’s is a relatively recent addition to the Polish year.

Prior to the fall of Communism some twenty years ago, dewy-eyed Poles had nothing more romantic to look forward to on the socialist calendar than Women’s Day: a Communist invention celebrating the unflagging industry and tightly-knotted headscarves of the sturdy Slavic woman. This athletic archetype was usually portrayed, on posters, sleeves rolled up and with folded arms, rosy cheeks fresh from the fields and leaning nonchalantly against an unfeasibly large combine harvester, the size of which would have Lenin spinning with disbelief in his grave (that is, turning his body around very quickly, as opposed to spinning cloth, which had, prior to The Revolution, traditionally been arduous, low-paid work for an unmarried young woman (c.f. spinster), and was therefore an outmoded symbol of the bourgeoisie’s repression of the proloteriat).

In fact, it wasn’t until the fall of Communism in 1989 that Poles really took the Christian martyr Saint Valentine to heart, promoting him within the pantheon of Polish saints. Previously, he had languished, largely unnoticed, as the admired yet not much loved patron saint of epileptics and cholerics. Now, in his new romantic form, his story (whichever of the many versions is true) is celebrated in all the usual ways.

One of the most popular and international signs of affection is, of course, to give the object of your affection flowers, usually red roses. But be careful if the lucky woman is Polish: it is considered bad luck to proffer an even number of flowers in your bouquet. Actually, this presents something of a problem. (Western) tradition suggests twelve red roses for your true love. Well, twelve’s an even number, so that’s out. Thirteen? I don’t think so. So what about eleven? What! Risk the suspicion that you couldn’t help slipping number twelve to some rival for her affection along the way? Be careful, reader, for the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Along with the flowers must go, of course, The Card. Poles send Valentine’s cards just as other nations do, with younger people exchanging most and also specializing in the unsigned variety. Actually, I’ve always thought it strange that the time when most people send Valentine’s cards is during their teenage years, the years of puberty and raging hormones - precisely the time when parents are doing all they possibly can to make sure that any pubescent urges are not, repeat not, consummated.

For most of us, the later adult experience is – at best - a one-card reality: the expectation from both you and your partner that there will be one, and only one, card waiting on respective (or shared) doormats come the 14th. Any more, and there will be trouble. Laying out a handful of Valentines on the restaurant dinner table and asking for a sample of your girlfriend or wife’s handwriting, ‘just to be sure, kochanie’, is, in most cultures, frowned upon.

And especially in Poland, where the women are, well, Polish. An English-Polish male friend once shared with me the stereotype that Polish women were twice as feminine as those from many other cultures: in looks and in character, traits both positive and negative. Romantic, certainly: you only have to look at the number of long-stemmed roses proudly carried around on any one day by adoring girlfriends. But woe betide any boyfriend or husband who is found romantically-lacking this Valentine’s Day!

But what if you’re lacking more than a nice red nose? A partner, for example? Because, for some reason known only to yourself and half of Facebook, you find yourself single this Valentine’s Day. Available (merely awaiting the opening of your life’s next chapter) yet certainly not desperate (remembering just how life’s rich tapestry can easily tie you up in knots). What to do on the big day / night? Well, you could just treat it as any other day, whether that means crawling around the Rynek Glowny drunkenly on all-fours and crying for your mama (you know who you are) or whether it means finally finishing that matchstick model of the Wawel Castle, before retiring early with the BBC Shipping Forecast and a cup of hot chocolate.

Or you could always take a romantic break in Chelmno, in northern Poland, where a reliquary (allegedly) containing a part of Saint Valentine’s skull has been kept in a parish church for centuries. Apparently, the relic is famed to this day for its miraculous powers. Hopeful parishioners (some, no doubt, looking for a little Valentine’s magic) travel the whole country to kiss its silver container. OK, slapping your lips on a box with a bit of old bone inside in the hope of finding the love of your life is a bit of a long shot, but don’t knock it; it might be the only kiss you get this year!

Well, ok, perhaps things aren’t quite that bad. Maybe something less extreme is called for. Given the heightened sense of boy-girl excitement that hovers, Cupid-like, over February 14th, perhaps this is the night to finally banish those winter blues and finally start the new year with a bang. You arrive in the carefully-selected establishment of your choice and suddenly you see Mr or Miss Right (or, less romantically, Mr or Miss Right Now). It’s February 14th, it’s now or never. Take a deep breath, walk up boldly and – providing you’re not a Pole - impress them with your patchy yet amusing knowledge of Polish. S/he can only say ‘no’, right? But a quick word of warning to the green ex-pat: ‘no’, as well as ‘tak’, can in Polish sometimes mean ‘yes’, depending on the situation and your standard of personal hygiene, neither of which I can actually help you with.

Please note that John Marshall takes no responsibility for relationships either begun or broken as a result of the advice contained in this article. However, he would be quite pleased if you happened to name your first-born son ‘John’.

Poland, parties & police

2009-02-24T13:56:00.000-08:00

John Marshall is a writer and teacher who has had the great fortune to live in Krakow for several years. Krakow’s been good to him and, he hopes, he’s been good to Krakow. Anyway, here’s something he wanted to say about parties …

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a new flat in Krakow is in need of a party. Not to throw a housewarming (parapetwka), dinner party, or a simple soiree would be a clear waste of a practically-empty flat (no furnishings or carpets for your guests to spill wine on) as well as an early opportunity for Krakow’s police to become acquainted with both the flat and the contents of your wallet. Because, if you’ve ever thrown a party in Krakow, chances are that, like me, you have at least once had to pay the police 200 zlotys for the privilege.

Now, I don’t actually throw that many parties these days. Indeed, I freely admit that I have reached the age when I don’t seem to understand anybody under the age of about thirty: metaphorically, due to my age, and literally, due perhaps to my still less-than-perfect command of the Polish language. However, this reluctant middle-aged ex-pat still likes to get down with ‘the kids’ and have a good old knees-up every now and then (it’s good for the circulation, or so my doctor tells me). And, with the festive season in full swing, kitchen annexes groan under the weight of vodka, wine and beer, whilst, outside, balconies the length and breadth of Poland play host to clinking glasses and roars of laughter.

Inside the flat the scene is a cheery one. Guests and host alike are happy, relaxed: old friends make new friends, they celebrate and mingle. What could possibly be missing from this idyllic scene? Your neighbours.

Now, maybe you have wonderful neighbours. Good. Like reliable tradesmen, hold onto good neighbours, for they are golddust. The old lady across the hall who insists on carrying your heavy shopping up the stairs; the otherwise feral gang in the stairwell who doff their baseball caps and, with lowered heads, refer to you as ‘Pan’, and the elderly gentleman next door who, tragically for him though mercifully for you, lost his entire sense of hearing in the pierogi storm of ’86.

I envy those Poles who grew up, cheek by jowl, alongside their neighbours, playing in stairwells and courtyards. They may party all night with nary a murmur from outside. For the relative newcomer, a much more typical party experience involves twenty to thirty minutes of hopeless hallway negotiations with Krakow’s police, having been summoned by a nameless, faceless, yet all-powerful neighbour, their alarm permanently set for one minute past ten and anybody who’s having more fun than they are.

It begins with a cold, official-sounding knock on the door, followed by a rush to the stereo and a hushed, respectful welcome (compliant faces and lots of nodding all around). There follows, perhaps, a gentle, yet misguided, attempt at flattery, the arrival in your hallway of one or two of the more radically-minded guests, last heard praising the Baddher-Meinhoff movie (‘Leave it to me, John, you’ve just got to know how to handle these people’), you asking said guests to stop shouting at the police and shutting them back in the sitting-room, groveling apologies on your part and, lastly, your parting with 200 zlotys for the heinous crime of having played music at three and a half at 10:30 on a Friday night.

Now, lest you think I’m merely a rotten apple with a case of sour grapes mixing up my metaphors, allow me to elucidate. Yes, it is true that I have, in the past, hosted parties of such debauchery and shame that – had the police turned up at any time over the course of those twelve hours - I would gladly have driven myself to the cells, personally, were there not a law in Poland against drink-driving in a stolen police car. But then I have also politely sipped wine from crystal glasses, sat around low glass coffee tables, urbanely discussing politics and Ikea’s latest share price, with John Coltrane murmuring gently in the background, only for our hostess to fall victim to the ire of the unhappy neighbour and the police’s seemingly insatiable desire to cover every square inch of Poland with tickets, fines and receipts.

A friend of mine, recently moved from Warsaw to Krakow, says Krakow parties see much more of the police than in the great metropolis. Are Krakowians, therefore, more intolerant of others’ fun? Are they more sensitive to discopolo than the average music-lover? Or are the neighbours simply angry at not having been invited (even when they have: tip number one)? Whatever it is, houseparties in Krakow can be an expensive affair. So, as you carefully plan the last of those festive bashes, here are a few tips to avoid an expensive New Year financial hangover.

Firstly, and most importantly, invite the neighbours, or at least all those you suspect of having 999 on speeddial. Of course they won’t come but, having been invited, they’d likely feel guilty about calling the police. Second tip: no matter how wise it seems at the time, it is never a good idea to turn the music up after midnight. To avoid those unwanted visits, you must remain king or queen of your own volume control! Thirdly, try to keep to a maximum of eight people per square meter of balcony, especially where grills are concerned. (You know how easily sound – and flames – travel). And fourthly, if all else fails, arrange for one of your better-looking guests to flirt outrageously with any member of the law not sporting a wedding ring. It worked at the party with the grill: the police left without writing a single ticket and I have it on good authority that one of the policemen returned at six o-clock the next morning, off-duty and freshly-shaven, bottle in hand, looking for the party and the girl. Unfortunately for him, both the party and the girl had long gone. Now that’s what I call justice!

The Trouble With Jack (A Devilish Short Story)

2009-02-24T13:54:00.001-08:00

THE TROUBLE WITH JACK: A DEVILISH SHORT STORY

Copyright John Marshall 2008

Part One

“5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Happy New Year!” In the cold winter sky, all over the city, countless fireworks illuminated the darkness. In that great metropolis, people were joyful, laughing and singing. Relationships were being made, some permanent and some not so. It was a time of happiness and of relaxation: for most, but not for all. In the center of it all, in the rooftop garden of a penthouse apartment, a figure leant casually against the wall, pondering. He lit his first cigar of the year and breathed in, contentedly, the sulphur which rained down all around him. Nathaniel, as he was known, loved the new year. It was always a very … enriching … time for him. In the street far below the apartment, a stray dog barked. Nathaniel tipped his head back and laughed at the dumb animal. In so doing, he accidentally swallowed his cigar. He choked and curls of smoke began to drift slowly from his ears. Pausing only to curse the dog, he searched the pockets of his dinner jacket for another Havana.

The french door behind him swung open violently and the balcony was flooded with the soft colours of party lights and the sound of drunken people intent on getting drunker. Nathaniel made a small hissing sound and instinctively backed away from the light, sitting quietly on a carved metal chair in the shadows. At that moment, a smartly-dressed young man rushed onto the balcony, tripped on Nathaniel’s extended left leg and careered towards the railings of the tenth-storey flat, from where he proceeded to relieve his body of an unholy mixture of alcohols and expensive party snacks, carefully selected, prepared and presented on little wooden sticks not three hours earlier by the host’s beautiful yet neurotic wife. Somewhere in the street below, a slightly soiled and surprised dog had finally stopped barking and began to slope off home, a little sadder and a little wiser.

“Feel better now?”, called a voice from behind. With difficulty, the young man slowly lifted his head, and, fighting both sickness and vertigo, turned to the voice. In the shadows, a cigarette lighter flared up, dazzling him. He stumbled forward, caught the back of a chair and found a face, hovering, it seemed, in the darkness. “You look a little pale”, said the face. “If you don’t mind me saying. Won’t you sit for a moment – with me?” Nathaniel pushed forward a seat with his foot. At the same time, he shot a gaze at the open french door, which slammed instantly shut. He allowed himself a brief devilish smile before rearranging his features into what people seemed to think a ‘friendly’ look. It wasn’t easy and it took a moment of his time.

The young man smiled a stupid, drunken smile. Nathaniel smiled back and, doing so, coughed politely, and nodded faintly in the direction of the young man’s trousers. The owner of the trousers looked down and, embarrassed, scrabbled about to do up his trouser zip.

“Don’t worry. I’m sure nobody noticed … Mr …?” There was something about the older man which made the young man suddenly very wary. Was it something in the eyes, a little too dark; the man’s general demeanour, at once controlled yet nervous; or was it the fact that he had just smoked a whole cigar in five puffs and was on his way to lighting another?

Whatever it was, the young man decided to ignore it. He was on his best behaviour tonight. He was keen to impress himself upon his girlfriend’s parents, the hosts of the New Year’s Eve party, so he was determined to be sociable - no matter how strange the company. Besides, he needed to sober up. He took a deep breath of the cold January night air.

“Jack Ashton”, he smiled, offering his hand to the man. Nathaniel merely stared back at him, his eyes flickering red in the light of the fireworks overhead. A moment later, he offered his hand.

“Nathaniel Hopkinson. My mother’s little joke. You smoke, don’t you, Jack?” The question was more of a confirmation than a question.

“Yes. I mean, no. It’s my New Year’s Resolution. I told Jenny …”

“Oh, come on, Jack. One little cigar? I won’t tell if you won’t.” From nowhere, it seemed, Nathaniel was holding out a cigar before Jack’s hungry eyes. “Tempted, Jack?”

For a moment - just a moment - Jack hesitated. But then his body – his whole lower nature - betrayed him. His index finger twitched and a moment later, he was sat back in the chair, smoking contentedly. He coughed. “It’s my first”, he explained. “First of the year.”

Nathaniel nodded his head slowly, his eyes softly closed.

Jack felt comforted by this small shared secret between the two men. He shook his head violently, and sniffed, like a wet dog, trying to move the alcohol lower down his body. He looked up at his new confidante. “So who do you know. Nathaniel, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, everybody. Nobody. You know how it is at these things.”

“Keeping a low profile, huh?”

“I don’t do families. Like you, hey, Jack?”

“It depends.”

“On?”

“The family. You know Mister Tyler? The guy throwing this bash?”

“We’ve done some business together”, said Nathaniel, knocking back a glass of champagne. “A long time ago. Just before he met his wife, if memory serves.”

“Whoa. That must be about twentyf –“

“You in business, Jack?”, said Nathaniel.

“Me? Hell, no! I hate business! Wouldn’t know where to start!”

“Then you must be family.”

“Me - with all this?” Jack cast a quick look around. “No. ’Like to be”, he said.

“Pardon me?”

“I’m Jenny’s boyfriend. Sorry, ‘partner’. Mister Tyler’s daughter. Jenny.”

“Yes, I know her. Very pretty young woman. You’ve done well for yourself, Jack. I congratulate you.”

“Thanks. Listen, I don’t want to be rude, but who did you say you were again?”

“Just an old friend of the family. That’s all.”

“Right”, said Jack. He looked closely at Nathaniel, wondering. “’Bet you’re wondering what I’m doing here, right? Guy like me in a fancy place like this?”

“Not at all”, Nathaniel replied. He held out a fresh handkerchief. “You’ve got caviar - on your chin.” Jack took the handkerchief, mopped up the caviar from his chin and put it in his mouth. Nathaniel smiled politely and poured two glasses of champagne.

“Thanks”, said Jack, taking the glass. “I’m Jenny’s bit of rough, you see.”

In all his many, many years dealing with the human race, Nathaniel had never heard that particular phrase before. “Excuse me?”, he asked.

“Wrong side of the tracks”, said Jack. “She’ll get bored soon enough. Nice girl, though. I shall miss her.”

‘Really?’, thought Nathaniel, ‘The girl or the money?’

“You know what I mean, Nat?” Nathaniel raised a very bushy eyebrow at this last remark. He’d never been called Nat before. He searched for an appropriate response, something sympathetic.

“Women”, he said, shrugging his shoulders. “Can’t live ‘em, can’t live with – “

“Be different if I had money, Nat. Like this.” Jack waved his arm, unsteadily, across the full-length of the balcony, taking in the swimming pool, the fountain and a thousand city lights below. “Even this suit’s borrowed! She’ll never marry me without some serious money and that’s the end of it!”

Nathaniel’s unnaturally-pointed ears twitched at this last remark. Unlike Jack, he was a businessman and this sounded rather like a business opportunity. He didn’t waste a second.

“What if you could have both?” he asked the young man, leaning forward. There was a glint in his eye.

“What?”

“What if you could get the girl and the money - together?”

Jack leaned back in his chair and put his glass down clumsily on the table. “Now that would be the ideal scenario, my friend”, he said. “But this is reality, right? And you ain’t no Father Christmas, Nat!”

Nathaniel smiled, leaned back and refilled their glasses. Jack had a great capacity for alcohol, especially the free and expensive sort. With a speed most unbecoming to the quality of the crystal and the champagne, he took the glass, tipped back his head, shut his eyes and drained the glass in one loud gulp. As he set the glass back down on the table, something caught his eye. A square, dark piece of card. “A business card? Don’t you guys ever rest? It’s New Years’ Eve, Nat!”

“Pick it up, Jack. Take a look”.

Jack picked up the card. “This you? Nathaniel Z. Hopkinson? What’s the ‘Z’ for?”

“Zachary. It’s from the Bible. Old Testament. Check the other side.”

Jack turned the card over. It was black, completely black.

“There’s nothing there”.

“Look again”, Nathaniel said. Jack held the card closer as a firework exploded noisily above. A thousand points of fiery red light lit up the sky as, on the card, tiny red letters appeared in a flowing script:

“Demon, 2nd class: For all your nefarious needs, short or
long-term, individual or group rates. No time-wasters.
(Card not transferable for cash or part-relief from pergatory).

As the letters glowed, the card grew hot between Jack’s fingers.

“Cute”, he said, dropping the card. “Where d’you get it? A fancy Christmas cracker?”

Nathaniel smiled politely, as to a child. Jack looked back at him, trying to figure out if he was mad, dangerous or both. However, whilst he had told Nathaniel the truth that he was no businessman, he was streetwise and smart enough never to let an opportunity, however strange, pass him by. This stranger had, as Jenny would no doubt say, piqued his interest. So, when another guest then tried to open the french door, Jack quickly jammed his foot against it. “Does this help at all?”, asked Nathaniel, fetching a key from his pocket. Jack quickly locked the door.

“Skeleton key, huh?”, said Jack. “Not sure what old Tyler would think of that.”

“Like I said, we go back a long way”, said Nathaniel. He stared at Jack, who was sobering up quickly. He felt a little nervous and looked again at the card laying on the table, whose letters still glowed faintly.

Jack decided to humour the man. “So you’re a demon, Nathaniel?” Nathaniel tipped his head a little, by way of introduction. “But only 2nd class, huh?”, continued Jack sarcastically. “Don’t I deserve a 1st class demon, then?” As the last words fell out of his mouth, Jack knew it was a mistake. Nathaniel slapped a heavy hand upon the thick metal table. He leaned forward and fixed his gaze upon the young man in the borrowed suit as the red-hot metal beneath his fingers smoked and cracked.

“If, Mister Ashton, I was a 1st class demon, you would be dead by now”. He spoke calmly, but through sharp, gritted teeth. His gaze felt like cold steel and, for a moment, Jack’s blood turned to ice. But, a moment later, the storm seemed to pass, the gaze softened and the older man leaned back in his chair, smiling. “Think of this as your lucky night, Jack”. He placed his hand on Jack’s. It was as cold as ice.

“What do you want?” he asked, the sarcasm all gone from his voice.

“I want to help you, Jack. With your situation.”

“Oh, my situation!” said Jack. “And who says I need any help?”

“’Course you do, Jack, it’s as plain as that chip on your shoulder. Besides, I’ve got to be a very good judge of human character over the years. I like you. You see, there’s something not quite right about you, Jack. Dishonest, even. And I respect you for it.”

“Do you? Well, I’m Sorry that I can’t return the compliment, Nat”, said Jack. “In fact, I think if you’ll excuse me, I should go back to the party with the real people.” Jack stood up and walked towards the french door. “Demon”, he muttered contemptuously, shaking his head. He reached out to the door handle. Someone tried the door from the other side. As they touched the handle, they let out a sharp cry of pain. Through the glass, Jack could see the handle glowing red-hot. He looked back at Nathaniel.

“I should leave it to cool for a minute, if I were you”, said Nathaniel. Jack looked at him. Nathaniel was used to the good life, that was clear enough: he was out of condition and at least twenty years older than Jack. But Jack had had too much champagne and, after all, that trick with the door-handle, and those eyes ... He sat down again.

“How long do you want her for, Jack?”

“What?”

“Your beautiful girlfriend, Jack – and her money. How long do you want them for?”

A chill ran through Jack’s body and his throat felt suddenly dry. With difficulty, he forced himself to say the word, “Forever?”

“Sorry, we don’t do ‘forever’. Like the card says, ‘Short or long-term’ only.”

Jack took a drink and then a deep breath. “If this is what I think it is, and you are a real demon – which I’m still not convinced about, even though that was a clever trick with the door - then we’re talking about my soul, right? You give me the girl and the money and you get my soul when I die. Forever. Am I right?”

Nathaniel hit his bony knuckles against his forehead. “No!”, he shouted, his leathery flesh sizzling. “Why does everybody think that?” All that eternal damnation crap! That’s just the church trying to scare you. They don’t like the competition. Look, Jack, nothing’s eternal, nothing. Except possibly … him”, he said, his voice and his anger dropping, looking up through stiff bushy eyebrows to the heavens above.

“You’re afraid of God?”, Jack asked, doubtfully.

“You haven’t seen him! You think I’m scary? He makes me look like the tooth fairy! You got a cigarette?”

“Why? No more cigars? What about your magic pockets?”

“Too many keys, too few cigars. Technical stuff.” Jack reached across and gave him an unlit cigarette. Nathaniel put it in his mouth and sucked, fire appearing immediately at the tip.

“I bet you’re great at parties”, said Jack.

But Nathaniel wasn’t listening. Instead, he was gazing up at the clear night sky. It was brilliant with thousands of glittering stars. He breathed out a long trail of cigarette smoke, tracing perfectly the long, lazy arc of the Milky Way. He snorted, turned away from the wonder of infinity and spat horribly into a nearby plant pot. “Like I said, Jack, we’re not interested in keeping souls for all eternity. We just don’t have the space any more. No, you should think of it more as a lease arrangement - like renting a house or a car. Just tell me what you want, how long you want it for and we agree the terms.”

“No catch?”

“Nothing.”

“No penalty clauses? First-born child, that sort of thing?”

“That’s him, Jack, not us. It was a good one, though, first-born child, I’ll give him that. Beat the hell out of the locusts! Whatever happened to God, hey, Jack? He was a lot more fun in the old days.” Nathaniel chuckled quietly to himself. “Ah well, we all get old, I suppose.”

“The contract?”, asked Jack.

“Oh, yes. The contract. Actually, there is one thing. It’s not a catch, exactly, but, er, if you exceed the terms of the rental we are fully entitled to call into effect Clause 66.”

“Clause 66?”

“Yes, that’s the bit everybody always thinks about. You know, keeping your soul in everlasting torment and all that. But, like I say, Jack, that’s only in very extreme circumstances. We always prefer to work out some kind of deal first. Now how about it? Are we gonna do some business here tonight or what?”

“Are you for real, Nat? I mean, you look the part an’ all. Not that I ever met a real-live demon before, but …”

“So I’m a champagne hallucination! OK. But what if I’m not? Then I make sure that the beautiful Jenny falls – what is it you people say? – ah, yes, head over heels in love with you, you marry into more wealth than you ever dreamed of and you live happily ever after. And, in return, once you die, you spend one day with us –“

“In hell.”

“Please, Jack! That is where I live! I do wish people wouldn’t call it that. Makes it sound so negative. Spend one day with us for every day you spent with the girl. No more, no less. Then you’re free to go. Now how’s that for a deal?”

“Sounds fair enough. But what if I wake up one day and I don’t love her any more? What if she doesn’t love me?”

“Oh, she’ll always be in love with you, Jack. Don’t worry about that. But you’ll always have your free will. And if you want to end the contract at any time, just call me and tell me you wish to cease our business relationship there and then. ‘Number’s on the card.” He nodded towards Jack’s breast pocket from which, somehow, was protruding the demon’s business card. Jack’s eyes flicked towards it and back again to the smooth-talking, champagne and cigar-loving demon in front of him.

“And once the deal’s up, I get to go to Heaven, right?”

“You can go to the tenth dimension for all I care, Jack!”

Jack sat for a moment, thinking. It certainly seemed a good offer, even too good to be true. He stood up and looked through the french doors. Across the dancefloor, he could see Jenny. She was surrounded by several good-looking men, no doubt all very eligible and all very rich. He wanted what they had, what he had never had a chance to get. “Yes”, he said, almost under his breath. And then louder: “Do it! The girl and the money! I want it now, Nathaniel! Do it now!”

Nathaniel was standing right behind him. He smiled a devilish smile and cleared his throat as if about to make a speech. “An excellent decision, Jack. Jack, my boy, let me be the first to congratulate you! As of this moment, you now have a very beautiful and, if I may say, obscenely wealthy wife! Behold!” Slowly, the french door swung open. Jenny turned around and, across the room, saw Jack, smiled at him, and looked at the glittering diamond wedding ring on her finger. She blew a long and sexy kiss to her new husband. Jack straightened his tie, took a quick look at the wedding ring which had magically appeared on his finger and then walked out of the cold dark night and into the warmth and light of his new life to claim his new bride.

Part Two

“I hate you, Jack! You are the most boring, money-obsessed little man that I ever met in my life! God knows what I ever saw in you!”

“Well, there must have been something, darling, or you wouldn’t have married me!”

“Marrying you was the biggest mistake of my life! You know, Jack, I look back two years ago and I don’t understand myself. I really don’t! It must have been the drugs! That’s the only way I can explain it!”

“No, darling. You didn’t start the drugs until after we married. The Kenyan safari, remember? When that Masai warrior offered me half his ancestral homeland to sleep with you.”

“When you agreed, you mean!”

“Jenny, we’ve been through all this. That land is rich in minerals. I tell you, it’s one of the best deals we ever made!”

“You never used to care about money, Jack! Not like all the others! That was the thing I liked about you! I must have been brainwashed. Or hypnotism. I’d never have married you if I’d known what kind of mean little man - !”

“Jenny, I do wish you’d calm down! I know, why don’t we sit down and pray? You know, the family that prays together, stays together!”

“Don’t you ‘pray’ me, Jack! Do you think I’d have even looked at you if I’d known you were going to turn into a Jesus freak!”

“Well, the Lord moves in mysterious ways.”

“Yeah, as fast as this?”

Incensed, Jenny looked around for the nearest thing to throw at her husband, and found an antique vase, given to Jack, now a very successful businessman, by the Sultan Of Brunei.

“Jenny, put that down! That’s worth at least fifty thousand pounds!”

“Was, you mean!”

Jenny, tall and supple, used to play beach volleyball before she married Jack. With perfect poise, she calculated distance, angle and trajectory and then threw the vase with all her might straight at her husband’s head. He, however, had become an expert in dodging priceless antiques and the vase whistled an inch past his head, smashing against the full-length Louis XIV gold-framed mirror behind.

“You know, if this carries on, Jenny, the insurance company is bound to increase our premium again!”

This last remark was too much for Jenny. She stood up straight, put her shoulders back and took a deep breath. She was about to scream and Jack knew it. Before their marriage, she had been an excellent swimmer. She had a fine figure and excellent lung capacity. Jack knew what was coming. He put his fingers in his ears and closed his eyes as his wife opened her mouth wide and let out a great cry, somewhere between a scream and a wail. In the extensive gardens around the villa, several heavily coiffured pedigree dogs began to bark.

“I’m going out!”, she cried, storming across the room.

“Good!”, said Jack. “See how your boyfriend likes you in this mood!”

“It would serve you right if I was having an affair!”, she replied, flinging open the carved wooden doors before her. “At least I’d get some fun!”

Jack sighed and walked slowly over to the bookcase. Whilst not a particularly well-read man, he had one of the largest collections of bibles in any private collection. He had, after all, made a deal with a demon two years ago to spend time in hell in exchange for worldly wealth and a trophy wife. However, with his streetwise logic, Jack had figured that becoming a born-again Christian might just swing things in his favour come the day of reckoning. And so that’s why he found himself, not two months before, pledging one hundred thousand dollars and – not for the first time – his eternal soul, in the Los Angeles Pearly Gates Church Of The Really Rich And Famous. In the meantime, being a Christian had the added benefit of annoying the hell out of his beautiful, yet very neurotic, wife. He picked up a bible and opened it at random. Jesus was telling the guys that story about the prodigal son. Whilst not a true believer, Jack was up on all the stories, rules and creeds. He had an idea. A moment later, he was dialling his father-in-law’s Malibu beachhouse.

‘Hello?’

‘Harry’, said Jack. ‘It’s Jack’.

‘Not so loud!’, said Harry. ‘I’ve got you on speakerphone.’

‘Oh’, said Jack. And then, ‘Why, Harry?’

‘Sarah threw a rock at me yesterday. Caught me right on the ear. Blown up like a cabbage, it has.’

There was a pause. ‘Your wife threw a rock at you, Harry?’ said Jack.

‘Yeah, but it’s not really her fault, Jack. I’d hidden all her guns, you see. I wasn’t getting any sleep. Anyway, what can I do for you, buddy?’

‘Well, I was wondering if maybe perhaps Jenny could stay with you two for a while - just a little while. You know, things are a bit tight between us. I thought that if she spent some time with you, then maybe she’d relax a little and –‘

‘Oh, no you don’t! I mean, I’m sorry, Jack. I understand your situation. Of course I do. But you’ve only had two years of it. I’ve had to live with her mother for over twenty-seven and a half years now. Do you know, since I got married, I’ve lost four inches in height, Jack?’

‘Four inches?!’

‘And shoes! I can’t get anything to fit these days!’

‘Right’. The conversation was not going in exactly the direction Jack had envisaged.

‘Look, Jack, I’m sorry, boy, but it’s not just me. Believe it or not, Sarah’s been a lot better since Jenny left home. If she was to come back to us … no, no, it’s just too awful to contemplate.’ Harry gently pressed the bandage around his head. It was still very sore. ‘Listen’, he said, his voice dropping to a whisper: ‘Why don’t you get yourself a couple of girlfriends, Jack? You know, ease the pressure. That’s what I do!’

‘You do?’

‘Sure! If I had to spend every night with Sarah, I’d be as crazy as she is!’

‘I wish I could, Harry. But adultery is a sin!’

‘Yeah? Well so’s murder, Jack. And I gotta tell you: sometimes, when my little cherry-pie starts screaming and throwing things, like they do, well I just feel like doing something – Jack, I gotta go. Sarah’s just walked in. I’ll send you this month’s money. Bye’. He hung up.

Jack didn’t really mind the idea of adultery, or divorcing his wife for that matter, but all his bibles suggested that God, rather selfishly, objected to both. Unfortunately, so did Jenny, who, in a very smart move by her parents, stood to lose her inheritance should she ever file divorce papers. It now seemed to Jack that by making deals both with God and the devil, he had painted himself into a corner. If he spent another two years married to Jenny, he too would be covered in bandages and whispering on his own answerphone, like Harry. Try as he might, there was no other way out. ‘Though he hated to lose all the riches his pact with the demon had given him, sooner or later he would have to call Nathaniel and cancel their arrangement. Preferably sooner, while he still had his sanity. He flicked open a secret drawer in the Chippendale writing desk and, for the first time in two years, held a small black business card in his hand.

“Nathaniel Z. Hopkinson.
Demon, 2nd class: For all your nefarious needs, short or
long-term, individual or group rates. No time-wasters.
(Card not transferable for cash or part-relief from pergatory).

There was a phone number underneath. With a heavy heart, Jack took a long last look around him. Priceless antiques, statues, eight sports cars in the garage. All this was about to go. But then so was his crazy wife. He took a deep breath and dialled the demon.

‘Hello? said the demon.

‘Nathaniel?’, asked Jack. ‘Is that you?’

‘Last time I looked. It’s been a while! What can I, er, do for you?’ He sounded a little nervous somehow – nervous or distracted.

‘Who’s that, Nat?’, said a woman’s voice.

‘No-one, honey. Just business. You carry on.’

‘OK baby’.

‘Sorry, Jack, er, I’m a little busy right now, if you know what I mean. Can I call you back in an hour – or two?’

‘No, don’t do that! I might change my mind.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I want to cancel our arrangement, Nathaniel. I don’t want the money. I don’t want to be married to Jenny any more.’

‘You don’t? But she’s one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever, I mean, you’ve ever seen. Are you crazy?’

‘No, I’m not, but she is.’

‘Oh, I don’t know about that’, said Nathaniel. ‘A little feisty perhaps, but once you get on top, she’s not so – ‘

‘Look, Nathaniel, you’re not married to her. Now, I’ve thought it all out. I can’t divorce her and I don’t want a mistress – ‘

‘Why not?’, asked Nathaniel.

‘Jenny hates the idea of infidelity’, said Jack. ‘It would kill her, I know it would.’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure about that’, said the demon. And then, to his companion, ‘A little bit lower. Watch the gearstick. That’s it.’

‘Nathaniel, I want you to kill Jenny. I mean, I appreciate we’d have to work out some kind of contract. An extra clause. I spend a few extra months in hell perhaps – ‘

‘Sorry, friend. No can do. I’m not killing anyone.’

‘Why not? You’re a demon, aren’t you? And I bet you could get up to 1st class with a few murders, right?’

‘Why should I? I got your soul when we made the contract.’

‘Yes, but only part-time. One day in hell for each day of the contract, right?’

‘Oh, come now, Jack! You didn’t really take the word of a demon, did you? I own your soul, Jack. Eternal damnation. Just like the church says.’

‘Forever! You evil, lying - ’

‘My advice, Jack? Enjoy yourself while you can, and stop trying to get your wife killed. You know, women can be touchy about that kind of thing, can’t they, honey?’ A woman laughed in the background, before being drowned out by the sound of a dog barking.

‘Nathaniel!’, called Jack. ‘Nathaniel!’ But the line was dead. The demon had returned his attention back to his ladyfriend.

Jack stared out of the French doors, his eyes taking in the tennis court, croquet lawn, nine-hole golf course. So he was going to burn in hell, forever, for this, for his crazy wife. Even the nine sports cars in the garage. What use were they now? He looked over at the garage. Strange, the doors were open and Jenny’s awful yapping little dog was jumping around excitedly by the doors. Was he being burgled? He went to the writing desk and picked up his gun. In a few moments, he was out of the house and standing by the open garage door. As he looked inside, it seemed to Jack that there was someone inside one of the cars, the Maserati MC12. Whoever it was must have flicked one of the switches accidentally, because at that moment the roof on the convertible folded back. And, to Jack’s amazement, the head of one Nathaniel Zachary Hopkinson, demon 2nd class, popped up over the top.

‘Ah, Jack’, he said. ‘Long time, no see.’

‘Jack?’ said a woman’s voice. ‘Is that you, Jack?’

‘Yes, Jenny. It’s me.’

‘Ah’, said Jenny. She slowly, sheepishly, raised her head above the roofline. Her fingers were frantically trying to do up buttons on her dress. ‘This isn’t what it looks like, honey.’

‘Do you know who this is, Jenny?’, he asked his wife, gesturing to Nathaniel. ‘Or, rather, what he is?’ He took a step forward. Both Jenny and Nathaniel saw the gun in his right hand.

‘Look, Jack’, said Nathaniel, ‘I’m sure you’re feeling all kinds of things right now–‘

‘He’s a demon’, interrupted Jack. ‘A servant of hell. Aren’t you, Nathaniel? Go on, tell her.’

‘Well, yes, it’s true. I am. 2nd class’, said Nathaniel, also doing up the buttons of his shirt. Whilst immortal and thus immune to bullets, Nathaniel was feeling a little embarrassed at having being caught in such a compromising situation, especially with a client’s wife. Jack opened the driver door and Nathaniel fell out onto the floor, trousers flailing around his ankles.

‘Get up, Nathaniel.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I’m going to shoot you. You lied to me about the contract and now I find you having sex with my wife in my favourite sports car. You don’t just take a Maserati to the dry cleaners, Nat.’

‘Yes, I’m sorry, Jack. Sorry. Most unprofessional’, said Nathaniel, staggering to his feet.

‘According to you, I’m going to spend eternity in hell, anyway, so I might as well kill you.’

‘Shoot Nathaniel and I’ll shoot you, Jack!’, said Jenny, peering out from behind Nathaniel. She was holding a gun, which she had hastily found in the glove compartment. Jack wished he hadn’t been so security-conscious.

‘What?’, he exclaimed. ‘I’m your husband, Jenny. This … thing … ‘s a demon!’

‘You’re telling me!’, she said, a broad grin on her face. ‘Besides, he’s promised to make me the richest woman in the world! Even you can’t offer me that, Jack!’

‘What you doing, Nathaniel? First Jenny’s father, then me, now Jenny. Who’s gonna be next? Little Flossy here?’ Jack turned his head and gestured to the cocker spaniel, who was yapping widely with all the excitement. This was Nathaniel’s chance: he ran at Jack and launched himself at him. But Jack caught a glimpse of this flying demon in the wing mirror of a 1958 Pontiac Firebird. He span around and fired his gun. This was followed by a second shot, but not from Jack’s, from Jenny’s. Jack’s bullet passed clean through the undead body of the demon and into his wife. Jenny’s bullet, equally, struck her husband right in the heart. They were both dead.

Nathaniel staggered to his feet. He was not hurt, except perhaps for his pride, and that only a little. He decided such a scene would be hard even for a demon to explain to the police. So he took the keys for the Maserati off the shelf, dumped Jenny’s body on the garage floor and drove into the night.

And that is where you might think the story ends. And I would agree with you, were it not for something strange I saw not long after that. I was drinking coffee in a diner one Saturday afternoon, waiting for the parade. I was a journalist on the county paper. Anyway, I noticed there was a funny-looking group at the table in the corner. They were very animated, all talking at once. I put on my glasses to see better. There was an old guy, a youngish fellah and a woman – a beautiful woman, at that. They were all desperately trying to get the attention of a young guy and his girlfriend in the next booth. I suppose they must have upset them, because, a moment later, the young couple left in a hurry, leaving their fries and coffees untouched behind them.

I called the waitress over. ‘Hey, Dorothy. Do you know those three?’

‘Sure, Ben’, she said. ‘Been coming in here for a couple of weeks now.’

‘Out-of-towners?’ I asked.

‘Crazies, more like’, said Dorothy, shaking her head. ’Get this. See the old one? Well, he thinks he’s a demon.’

‘A demon?’

‘Yeah. 3rd class, though. Demoted from 2nd, apparently, by the devil himself!’

‘The devil himself!’

‘That’s right!’

‘And the other two?’ I asked.

‘Well, it’s kinda complicated but, as far as I can tell, they were married once. But now he’s an angel sent by God as a punishment to keep an eye on the demon for some reason, and she’s a ghost.’

‘A ghost?’

‘As God’s my witness. She’s pissed at both of them, apparently, so she’s decided to haunt them both.’ Dorothy pursed her lips and looked at me with a ‘now-what-do-you-think-of-that’ expression on her face.

‘Surely you don’t believe that, do you?’ I asked.

Dorothy coughed and looked down at the ground. They trio passed between us: the second-rate demon, the reluctant angel and the angry ghost, squabbling and fighting like three cats in a bag. Just before they got to the door, the wind must have caught it and it whipped open, just like it’d been told to.

I watched them leave and then jumped up out of my seat. I decided that, whatever these guys were, there was a story there somewhere. And that’s how I got to be the best and most famous journalist in the world. But I suppose that’s a whole other story, isn’t it!

International Men's Day

2009-02-24T13:53:00.005-08:00

International Men’s Day

Copyright John Marshall 2008

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Radio Alfa, 2nd March 2008

I’d like to talk specifically to the men today, about male bonding. Well, let me be honest. Twentyfour hours ago, I didn’t actually expect to be sitting here now talking about male bonding. So why am I? Because, my Krakowian and world-wide internet brothers, I was ordered to write this at the last minute by Ania Becowska, my radical feminist hard-ass landlady. Not only that, but Ania knew very well that I had just finished teaching after a five beer, four-hour sleep hangover and wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed and die. And this is a perfect example of why we need more male bonding.

You know, we hear so much these days about women and how much of a problem life can be for them: it’s a patriarchal society; women can’t do this; they can’t do that. But what about men? Do you think, ladies, that life’s a bowl of cherries for us? Today, I want you all to stop and think for a moment about the plight of the poor modern male.

It’s been said before that the male is an endangered species. ‘What exactly is a man for’, the feminists cry? Show me something a man can do that a woman can’t do better! And, yes, even the one thing we do possess that women don’t is becoming rapidly redundant with advances in fertilization techniques and genetic engineering. Yes, guys, it seems even your wife’s best friend is suffering an identity crisis.

But should we be downhearted? Should we give in to the inevitable, put on our oven gloves and set our lives for Gas Mark 5? No! Resist, my brothers! Unite! Together we can fight this scourge of overreaching feminism, which threatens our very manhoods!

I hereby declare, here on Ex-Pat Radio, today, 2nd March to be Men’s Day. From this day forward, may this day be a beacon, a bastion, of hope for the tired, the hungry, the oppressed males of the world. Let us bond, brothers, in the hope of a better life: let us bond, through beer, through sport, and through a never-ening stream of muttered comments upon members of the opposite sex, asking such questions as ‘What do you think of her then?’ and dropping words such as ‘fit’ into conversations wherever possible.

As I say, women have it all and yet they still want more. Shopping, gossip, heated discussions about orgasms. Women have never had a problem bonding. We should learn from them, brothers. We should embrace the concept of bonding in the best and only ways we know how. Let the first Sunday of March, from this point forward, be proclaimed worldwide as Men’s Day. It shall henceforth be the duty of every man, on this day, to get together with his fellow man to drink vast quantities of beer, play or watch marathon soccer matches or cricket games and, at the end of it all, possibly even fight with each other before, declaring in hushed, reverent tones that ‘You’re my best mate. I love you, I do’, throwing our arms around each other and cracking open another tinny.

Should any woman foolishly choose to interfere with these new Men’s Days traditions, she shall forfeit the right to criticize both his driving and love-making skills for a period of not less than one month.

The very concept of the male, my brothers, has never looked so precarious. It is up to us now to bond together and fight rampant feminism with our tried and tested tools: alcohol, competitive sports and an insane interest in the female breast. It is a difficult challenge I place before you but, together, we will win through. Good luck, brothers!

What? Oh, ok, Right. I’ve just been handed a piece of paper. A late piece of breaking news. Apparently, strikes and mass demonstrations are being planned by women across the world following the shock announcement by lawyers that women don’t really have the vote after all. Lawyers working on behalf of the Coalition Of Incredibly Bigoted And Reactionary Sods have found that, whilst many enfranchisement laws go back nearly one hundred years now, they all, coincidentally, came into force on the same date, April 1st, thereby making them all ineffective. The emergency services are warning of major traffic delays during the demonstrations, although the number of accidents is predicted to be lower than usual, ‘cos you know what bad drivers women are.

Thank you. That was John Marshall’s alternative news. I shall now leave the studio and, quite rightly, get beaten up by several women.

Racism

2009-02-24T13:53:00.003-08:00

Racism

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio 2007

It is generally acknowledged that the 20th century was the century of genocide – again and again across the world from Western Europe to China, Africa to Siberia, cold-blooded murder was committed upon millions of people in the name of political, philosophical or just plain racist ideologies.

And although wholesale slaughter can be found on every page of the history book, the 20th century did see an acceleration of the process, a quickening. Of course we look back on this time in horror: few of us would ever call ourselves racist or would condone acts of ethnic cleansing, pogroms, or racial purification. But then neither did our grandparents or those before them and they still happened; great stains across the pages of our shared history. The American colonists, the British in South Africa, Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot to name but a few who killed millions, often of their own people, in the fear of the other: the fear of individuality, of difference.

It is as if a conquering nation or dictator wished to create an identikit nation made up of colourless copies of itself: where all difference and diversity had been eliminated: the same character, the same genetic code, political beliefs and the same cruel and cowardly distrust of anyone else who dares, or just happens to be, different.

For sure, dictators as well as many mainstream politicians are dangerous beasts, operating to their own designs where megalomania, mental instability and fear of difference are classic elements. It’s understandable and easy to blame them for our problems. It is also wrong. For the truth is that the fear, racism and the causes of genocide are nothing to do with one man’s personality disorders. For that, I am afraid we have to look a lot closer to home.

The fact is that we all have the capacity for evil. Whatever your definition of evil – from a chemical imbalance in the brain to human weakness in the face of Satanic temptation – we all have it. Freud knew this and so did Jung. However, there is a world of difference in how we deal with these thoughts, feelings, and temptations. Take racism, for example. In some of us - a minority – our fearful attitudes to another race may be so extreme that we may, by cause or omission, come to be the cause of another’s death. Fortunately, for most of us, we would never dream of harming another, least of all because of the colour of their skin. No, maybe not harm them, but fear them … ?

Man has a dual nature: we are both spirit and animal in one. And as we tumble through the centuries, DNA and race memories alike are passed down through the generations. Among them, our ancient, yet now unnecessary fear of the other slops around, deep, in our subconscious, where it normally stays, out of reach and out of mind. But when we give people authority and then allow them to delve around in our primal fears, there will only be one outcome. An illogical distrust, fear or hatred of the other, sparked, for sure, by another’s words but allowed by us a home in our minds, to fester and grow into that powerful thing; the group mind. Of course, defying the group mind is difficult and becoming increasingly so and there have always been many reasons not to challenge it: I am too small to make a difference, for example, I was just following orders, and I have a family to think about. All true, but yet all pathetic in the face of a herd mentality which grows louder and more brutal with every denial or act of personal cowardice.

Just as the pure energy of the sub-atomic particle has the potential to be part of any life form in the universe, so do we, human beings composed of pure light, pure energy. Each thought we receive from another or, more rarely, create for ourselves, begins to shape us and our futures. Your future starts, very literally, with your very next thought. What will that thought be?

There are some of us for whom the very next thought will be of a negative nature: distrusting, perhaps, or fearful of those who are somehow different. But why this fear of a different culture, language or skin colour? Perhaps, for some, the mere presence of difference is disturbing, frightening even, challenging long-held beliefs. In the wish to forcibly remove difference from his life, the individual seeks to restore and thus safeguard his comfortable worldview, even at the expense of his spiritual and mental development, and, more importantly, the other person’s comfort, or life.

Having lived for many years in large multicultural English cities, the presence and co-existence of many races has always been normal to me; part of my world view. To deny the reality of that largely peaceful co-existence would simply have been a pathology, a lie, on my part. And when I first arrived in Poland, the lack of a brown or black face was as surprising to me as indeed the presence of such a face is to many a Pole. Our perception of what is normal, or common, in our lives, comes not from some divine truth or grand mathematical equation. It is simply the sum total of our very limited set of experiences, which exist only in the past tense and which become out-of-date even as we experience them.

But what about the present moment? Will our perception and reactions to new experiences continue to be based solely upon limited, erroneous past experiences, social and political conditioning? Or does each present moment offer the chance for a new way of thinking and perceiving, an experiencing of reality ‘as is’, without prejudice or preconception?

Many of you will know a man called Atma Anur, a regular on this radio show. Atma is a very gifted drummer and a very nice guy with, apparently, an unquenchable sense of wonder and enthusiasm. He’s English but has a mid-Atlantic twang from his many years living in the States. What else? Oh, yes, he’s black. Nothing strange about that, of course, until you come and live in Poland. In Krakow. Which he does. Because he loves it here. And that’s why Atma wants to know why Poles are coming up to him in the street, pushing their faces into his and demanding to know what he’s doing ‘here’ and why he doesn’t ‘go home’. Is it good ol’-fashioned, good-ol’boy hatred of dark-skinned difference that he knows all too well, or is it something else peculiar to Eastern Europeans, a genuine, gawping bewilderment, as if Krakow was London in the 1700’s and Atma a swarthy savage transported from the Indies for the amusement of the people?

Let me first be generous: free travel and cultural exchange both in and out of Eastern Europe is still less than twenty years old: a generation raised on the opinions, beliefs and mis-beliefs of its parents, themselves indoctrinated by Communism. It would be only natural if there was still a degree of cultural ignorance and naivety here in Poland. At the height of Stalinism, children informed on their parents, who were publicly executed for supposedly having voiced anti-state thoughts or beliefs. If human beings can be made to do that to their own fathers and mothers, then their children will have no problem staring and gawping at a negro in the streets of Krakow.

However, there is a limit to my devil’s advocacy. The attitudes Atma and many others experience on Polish streets every day goes well beyond the impolite stare or pointing of a child’s finger. How can a historically-oppressed nation like Poland not be naturally sympathetic to minorities? A nation which has been fought over, divided, suppressed and ripped apart time and time again for centuries? A people who died in the hundreds of thousands, both in the streets and the concentration camps, long before Hitler turned his attention to the Jews? In 1980 and 1981, the word ‘Solidarity’ spread through the country like wildfire and spelt the beginning of the end for an authoritarian, morally bankrupt regime. Now, Poland looks to the future and aspires to be one of the most modern, leading European nations. But to be so, it must not forget its past where any group of people could suddenly be labelled different, inferior, and undesirable.

As a white European male, I never experience discrimination. But as a Krakowian, it is my belief and hope that some Poles’ negative attitudes to other races is a mixture of ignorance and fear of the other, which is present in all human beings, and not just that undeniable hatred which finds expression in some of our less enlightened brothers and sisters. Certainly, as the new Polish Diaspora encounters multiculturalism in England, Ireland and elsewhere, it is to be hoped that their experiences of living and working happily alongside people with brown and black skins will begin to feed itself back into the Polish consciousness.

In the 20th century, Poland was once again torn brutally apart by its neighbours. Now, for the first time in centuries, it has the potential to be great again. If it remembers how it is to be persecuted for being different, then it will deserve to be a great nation. But if, instead, it chooses to forget the lessons of history and encourages suspicion and nationalism, it will be forever a poor country, doomed to infighting and ripe for domination. And what goes for the state goes for me and goes for you. This article will now finish and your next thought will begin.

Wianki

2009-02-24T13:50:00.000-08:00

Wianki

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, 15th June 2008
© John Marshall 2008

Next Saturday, 21st June, is Midsummer’s Day, the shortest night of the year. And as you would expect, Krakowians aren’t going to let the occasion pass without some kind of party. And what a party: Wianki, it’s called - and it’s big, loud and heaps of fun. Next Saturday, there’s only one place to be: down by the Wawel and the Wistula river for a night of top class international music, spectacular fireworks and the chance to observe and even take part in ancient pagan traditions.

First, the history. An ancient festival that dates back to Pagan times, Wianki literally means 'wreaths' and it is a traditional midsummer celebration celebrating the usual midsummer themes of life, renewal and, er, virginity. Unsurprisingly, with the early arrival of Christianity into Poland, Wianki was rebranded "Noc Świętojańska", or St. John's Night, and, no doubt, some of the more earthy practices such as young lovers consummating their love in nearby woods, toned down a little. However, even in Christian times, some elements of the original festival remained over the centuries, such as the telling of fortunes, letting wreaths float on water, and jumping over the huge ceremonial bonfires (sobotka), which are still lit along the banks of the river.
Traditionally, on Wianki, Polish girls wear wreaths of flowers with a lighted candle in the centre and throw them into the river. According to folklore, if the wreath comes back to shore, the girl will never marry, if it sinks, she will die young and if it flows down the river, she will be married and be happy. Oh, if only modern dating was so easy! Fortunately for the girls (and the local lads) the Wistula is a fast flowing river and, traditionally, most girls went away happy.
Back in the 16th Century, when times and people were, perhaps, simpler, Jan Kochanowski wrote the following description of Wianki traditions and beliefs:
In Poland the Eve of St. John's is fraught with miracles and magic. Animals talk to each other with human voices. The earth shows the enchanted riches in its depths, glowing with fires. In wild ravines the barren fern blooms. Certain plants take on magical properties. Flowers and grasses made into wreaths will forecast a maiden's fate. Wreaths to which are fixed lighted candles are cast in the waters so that their courses may be followed. From the course and fate of the wreaths auguries of marriage are made. The special promise of St. John is youth, love and general fertility.
The special promise of St. John is youth, love and general fertility, hmm? I think I’ll use that as a chat-up line next Saturday.

I’m not holding out much hope, though. We Europeans, Poles or otherwise, seem to have lost much of our superstitions, pagan beliefs, respect for, and connection to, nature. What started out, in the mists of time, as a celebration of life, health and vitality has, like so many celebrations, been eclipsed by those more modern values: noise, spectacle and the veneration of the new Gods, alcohol and money. Not that I’m one to refuse a drink, thanks, now you’re asking.

But pace yourself with the amber nectar next Saturday, gents. You’ll need to keep your wits about you for all those beautiful maidens and their garlands. There’s a competition, you know, to find the best garland on the day. So, come on, all you ex-pat ladies, do your bit for international relations and throw your garlands – and your destiny – to the Gods!

Now, apart from the floating of wreaths, there are musical performances, dignitaries' speeches, fairs and fireworks by the riverbank opposite the Wawel. If you’re anywhere in the city center next Saturday, it’s going to be almost impossible not to get caught up in it all: my advice is simply to allow the crowds to gently sweep you towards the river, the lights and the sounds of one of the biggest nights in Krakow’s diary.

As Jan Kochanowski himself said:

Let us this evening celebrate
With all its old accustomed state...
With joyous melody and song.

There are always big musical names at Wianki. The list of Polish bands includes Mosquitoo, Loco Star and June. Also, Kasia Nowicka, a real diva of Polish club music, better known by her stage name, Novika, will weave a tapestry of subtle electronic sounds, while Bisquit will seek to enchant with their ethereal jazz and the warm voice of their vocalist Joanna Wlodarska. As for the headline act, no less than the British group Jamiroquai will rock your pagan socks with their mixture of pop, funk and acid jazz. Oh, and did I mention the amazing firework show?

A spectacle it sure is, and one of Krakow’s entertainment highlights of the year. However, having personally experienced the last two Wiankis, it must be said to those of our more cynical listeners that, yes, the size of the crowds are outrageous and it all sometimes seems like just another occasion for Tyskie, Zywiec et al to flog the corporate cow. But don’t throw the baby out with the Wianki bathwater, and remember that, whatever happens next Saturday night, you’ll have a night to remember and at least bloody Fish from Marillion won’t be playing again! See you there!

The Waiting-Room (A One-Act Play For The Stage)

2009-02-24T13:45:00.001-08:00

A basement café.

SETTING: There is a small table downstage right, set with salt and pepper pots. The lights are very low.

AT RISE: Enter GORDON. In one hand, he carries a flashlight. In the other, he carries a mug of tea. A visibly old newspaper is tucked under his arm. He is wearing a long black coat and a hat. He carries a bag. As he stoops to put the bag down, he bangs his leg against the table-leg.

GORDON
Bloody hell! Could’ve killed myself then! I say, can’t you get more light down here? Get some candles, or something! Bloody power-cuts! I’ve never known anything like it!

Hmm, only me here, ay? Quiet today, isn’t it?

(Louder)

I say, it’s quiet today!

(Quieter, apologetically)

Sorry. ’Course, it’s Sunday, isn’t it. And these bloody power-cuts don‘t help, do they! No. I’m surprised you’re open, really. Must be worth it, though, I suppose, ay? I mean, you’re getting enough, are you? Warm bodies - like me - just passing through? Good. I like to see a place do well.

(He takes out some books from his bag and puts them onto the table.)

Listen, this is going to sound weird, I know. I think there’s someone following me.

That‘s why I came. I knew she wouldn’t find me down here. It’s too dark, you see.

It’s a good-looking woman. Or man, not sure which. I keep seeing her, him. Just now, for instance.

I’m walking along, and I get this voice in my head. It’s strong like a man’s, maybe, but softer, warmer.

It’s not the first time. And it’s trying to tell me something - something important. A message, or a warning, maybe. But I can never catch the words. Like a radio not tuned right, you know. And I want to: it’s a beautiful voice. If it is a voice, mind. Sometimes it’s more like the sound of a, a trickling river, if you don’t mind. Heavenly, you might call it. Like a beautiful song. Then, I call it my angel. Well, why not? But, sometimes, you know, it scares me, too. When I feel sad or lonely, it roars like a lion, or maybe a raging fire, you know? It sounds angry and I want to run away. That’s how it was this time. So, I began to walk faster. Then I ran. I ran until I had no strength left. Then, I stopped and looked up. And there it was, right in front of me. A face, eternal, if you get me. Looking straight at me, no, straight into me, into my soul, if you understand me. There’s a real kindness in the eyes and I want to hear the gentle voice again.

I was afraid, you know. But I said, “Why are you tormenting me? You don’t think I have enough problems?” And then it disappeared! Just like that! What do you think? You know, I haven’t touched a drop since coming here, as God’s my witness, but … well, I don’t mind the lovely singing, but the other stuff - and hasn’t a man got a right to some privacy?

So, anyway, I escaped down here, into the darkness. And cold. Bloody cold it is, too! Hey, I said - now where’s he gone to? A customer in the other room, perhaps. Well, good luck to him. I hope it’s warmer than in here.

(Shouts)

And lighter, too!

(He opens his bag, takes out a photograph of himself and puts it on the table.)

Bloody power-cuts! I wouldn’t mind in the summer. ‘Be all right then. But not now. Feels like years since I saw the sun. It’s the cold that’s the worst. Gets to you - right inside your bones. Like everything: your arms, you legs, even your heart, maybe, wants to stop. Maybe he’s got some more candles round here somewhere. Let me have a look.

(He goes upstage and searches for candles. LIGHTS: There is a flash of light and a candle lights on another table. Turning, he sees a young man at the table.)

Alright, mate! Didn’t see you there. I’m not really talking to myself. Just looking for some light, you know. You didn’t bring any with you, did you? Light? No. Not seen you before. Just arrived, have you? OK if I - ?

(He starts to sit at the young man’s table.)

No. ’Course not. Sorry. A man needs his privacy, right? Right.

(He stands behind his chair.)

I remember when I was your age, ’used to like my privacy, too. I valued my time, you see. You know, I used to think that other people might steal it. Sounds silly, doesn’t it? Out loud. ’Stealing time’. I didn’t want to share it with anyone, you see. Afraid that they might take something away from me, perhaps. Yes, if there was one thing I had at your age, it was time to myself.

‘That your paper? Do you mind if I - ? Only, this one’s a bit old, see.

(He reaches for and takes the newspaper from the other table.)

Thanks. Another murder! Only a young lad, too. Look!

(He shows him the photo.)

Fancy! You two not twins, are you? Sorry. Bad taste. Well, it’s no good, anyway.

(He puts the paper back and wanders upstage).

Might as well be blind for all the light there is down here. Surprised you can see - never mind read - that book there. What is it? ‘The Tibetan Book Of The Dead’? Comedy, is it? Sorry. I used to be a great reader. Could always find time for a good book, you know. Didn’t go anywhere without a book. Trouble was, over the years, it got so I couldn’t leave the house without one. Or maybe a newspaper. Company, I suppose. Like a prop, maybe. Then the prop starts to be a crutch, then it turns into a defence, a wall. I mean, if I had my time again …

(He sits at his own table.)

So what’s your story then? Poland, ay? Krakow? You like it there, do you? Yes. You’re studying, I suppose? Oh, a writer, hey? A wordsmith, that’s the word, am I right? Wordsmith. Yes. I knew a writer once. In Berlin. Here’s a good word for you: partition. Meaning: to bisect, to divide. Like Berlin, you see, partitioned. East and West. No, never a soldier: undercover, me. Well, tell the truth, I was the writer. That’s what I told them, anyway. Oh, it’s alright. I can tell you. Can’t hurt me now, can they?

(He moves his chair a little closer to the young man.)

Lvov also. You know? Ukraina, yes.

(He gives a thumbs-up).

I was a baker. Finland, also. Truck driver, there. Norway: repair technician. All very cold. Dark, too. Not much light, you see. Not really. You need the light. To be happy. I’ve learnt that. My travelling days are over, now, of course. Spend most of my time down here, if I’m honest. Trapped, maybe could say.

You got friends over there, have you? Good friends? Course you have. You must have good friends. Married, are you? Oh, girlfriend. Is she? Helps with the language, am I right? Difficult language, yes? Of course it is. ‘How are you?’ - I used to know. Jik … jik shee mish … jik shee nish? Now, tell me, how I’ m wrong. What’s that? Jak sie masz? Yes! Am I right?

(He gives a double thumbs-up).

Never forget, do you?

Polish man comes in here, you know. Most days. I hear the language, you see. You never forget.

(He winks)

‘Dzien dobry‘, he says, every time. That’s right. ‘Good day‘. You know. Him and his friend. Two teas with lemon, they order. Not milk. It’s Polish, see. Herbata, they call it.

Herbata. Kasia used to drink that. Bez cukrem. ’I’m sweet enough,‘ she‘d say. Polish girl, you know, living in Berlin. We were going to get married. Translator. You know, good with words. Clever. Like you. Could tell you any street, church or square in the city - the West, anyway. Mannstrasse vierundfunfzig. Hagenstrasse und Main. I’d say the name and she’d drive.

I remember this one time, there was a party. She hurt her leg, dancing. We’re both pretty drunk but I’ve got the legs, so it’s me driving back.

(He stands.)

I was rushing because of the curfew. ‘Right at the church‘, she said. ‘Right at the church‘. I distinctly remember this, you see. But ‘after’, she meant. ‘After’, not ’before’. I thought it was before. Always words, you see. So important. You know. They wanted to see our papers. Then they wanted names - all words again, do you see? ’Course, we didn’t have our papers, did we? Left them at the party, hadn’t we? Drunk, remember? So they searched the car. And they found them: her translations. ’Classified’. From the Russian.

(He takes some official-looking papers from his bag and puts them onto the table.)

So they took us in: for ‘questioning’. And all the time, questions. For days. ‘What were you doing? Why were you there? Why? Why? Why?’ I don’t really know what they wanted. I don’t even know if they cared. It was all a game back then. The Cold War, you understand.

(He takes a gun from his bag and puts it onto the table.)

And the questions got harder, of course. Longer. Painful questions, if you understand me. And they way they asked, well, it wasn‘t fair, you know. In the dark, at nighttime, when you‘re sleeping.

(He sits down.)

Well, I‘m not a strong man, you see. Never have been. The pain got louder than the questions. I’m not proud of it, but put yourself in my position. I wonder if you can. I made a deal. Me and Kasia would be free to go, but on the condition, of course. They wanted names. Names of people operating in the Eastern Sector. I thought: they only want more words, that's all. To put on their reports: statistics, number and names of enemy operatives identified, year-by-year. That was how I justified it to myself, you see. Just a game, with words.

I don’t remember now which names I gave them. But they seemed happy with their new words and the next morning, they released me. I waited outside all day but Kasia never came. So, I went up and asked them.

(He stands up.)

‘Just a few more questions’, they said. ‘Come back tomorrow’. So I went and I came back the next day. Every day for a week I went back. Always the same answer. Then, on the seventh day, I got a letter.

(He opens a letter.)

Unstamped: I had to pay for it. ‘To whom it may concern. Fraulein Kaminski has been found guilty of espionage. Evidence of serious anti-state activities has come to light during periods of intensive questioning. Her confinement will be indefinite.’

(He puts the letter back into his pocket.)

So it was all for nothing: my treachery, my weakness. I hated myself. But so what? I’d spent most of my life hating myself. But the guilt, that was the worst thing. I couldn’t escape the guilt. Three years they held them for. Three years of questions, pain, words, darkness. I know.

Here’s a good word for you: amnesty. Yes, a word of power. They released them - Kasia too. ‘They took her east. Try the Ukraine.’ I tried to look for her; to tell her that I hadn’t betrayed her - my life for hers. I knew that’s what they would have told her. I wanted to tell her about the words and the games. That it wasn’t treachery. I’d done it for us. For love.

Where is she now, do you think? She’d be older, of course. Yes, with a big family, I reckon. Babcia, even. Do you know ‘babcia’? Grandmother? ‘Course you do. You’re educated, you see. You know things. You know words. Words that have power.

Hey! How about that! They’ve put some lights back on up there. Maybe there’s hope for us yet!

The voice!

(He goes upstage, listening for the voice.)

There it is - again! Still a roar. Quieter, but still … You hear it too, don’t you? But you hear the voice, right? You know what she’s saying, don’t you? Tell me. What’s the message? No, don’t leave now! Please, tell me, what’s the message? Come back. Please … Gone. Just like the others. Where do they go?

(LIGHTS: There’s a flash of light. He returns to his seat. Another flash of light. He half-stands and tips his hat to a young couple who he now sees sat downstage right. As he does so, he bangs his leg again on the table.)

F - ! Oops!

(Apologetically)

Bloody power-cuts. What can you do, ay? Oh, don’t worry; he’ll be back in a minute. You just visiting, are you? Tourists? What - newlyweds! Now, that’s nice. Seems strange, though, a nice, young couple like you, down here. Ah well, you’ve got your own story, I suppose. Everybody has.

(He moves his chair a little closer to the other table.)

So how long is it? Only a week? So you’re on honeymoon, then. From London? Hey, wasn’t there a plane crash from there the other day? No survivors, right? You know, you look a bit rough yourselves, with your clothes all burned and all that blood on your faces. Don’t mind me. Actually, flying’s the safest form of travel, statistically. Provided you don’t believe in fate, that is.

Not sure, myself. Used to be. All for free will, I was. Each moment is the doorway to a thousand possible futures. And each of those thousand futures … in the end, there’s no way of knowing. You start off with all good intentions. Then something happens. It always does. We had a child, you know. In London, it was. I lived there - for a while. Artist, I was. Anyway, let me be honest: she had a baby, and I got drunk. Proud father? The nurse said I didn’t walk into that hospital ward, I floated on air.

(He takes out a family photo from the bag and puts it on the table.)

Those next six months were the happiest time in my life. I adored my son and I worshipped her for giving me such a beautiful child. Nobody was more in love than we were. Nobody.

But you know how to make God laugh? You tell him your plans.

We lost the child. Meningitis, you know? That night, he died, just like that. No warning. Nothing. There was a moment that night when we both walked through a doorway together. Doorways, remember? But, somehow, a moment later, we’d both chosen different routes. It finished us. And I said to God, ‘Why? Why have you done this to me? You’ve taken the only people I’ve ever really loved away from me! I want my happiness back!’

And do you know what happened? Nothing. There’s no God, I thought. And if there is, he doesn’t give a damn! So I began the drinking again, but worse. And every drink moved us further apart. She never said anything, but I knew she blamed me. I should have been quicker. ‘Called the doctor, called an ambulance, done something, for God’s sake!’ She’s right, I thought. It’s my fault. And so I’d have another drink. And another. I deserved to be hurt. Badly. And every time we looked at each other, all we saw was our little boy. And then she left.

I spent a long time hating myself, feeling guilty, usually with a drink in hand. Going over the same scenes, again and again, stopping at the parts that hurt the most, twisting the knife, until there wasn’t a moment I couldn’t fill with some pain or regret, real or imagined. I was screaming inside. I couldn’t think. This is hell, I thought. I’ve died and gone to hell. And then I saw her, for the first time. The lovely voice, remember?

When I listened to the voice, to the song, the screaming would subside, if only for a moment. But even that was a blessing. In time, I learned to listen harder. And as the song took the place of the scream, I began to think, once again, but honestly, without self-hate or deception. It was hard, but at least the screaming had stopped. You know, It’s only when you look back, honestly, that you start to find redemption. I’ve been a bad man. I know that. A fool, a coward, adulterer. Yes. I wanted forgiveness. To get out of hell, you know. You know what I learned? You want forgiveness? You have to forgive. You forgive. Then forgiveness. That was the moment. And I’ve done it. Oh, it’s taken me a while, but I’ve done it. I’ve sat down - God knows how long it’s taken me - I’ve sat down and honestly forgiven everyone who I felt had ever done me harm, including him, God.

(He takes a mirror from the bag and holds it in his hand.)

You know, of all the people, you were the ones I was afraid of seeing the most. It’s what you represent to me, you know. Forgiving myself: the baby. That’s been the hardest thing. Forgiving myself. For everything. And I mean everything! And I feel lighter, you know, all the time. Do you know how free, how light, you feel when you forgive? When you give, you get. Forgive, forget. Let go of the pain you’ve been carrying, holding tight to yourself for all those years. And so I know I’m ready now. To try again, you know. Maybe do things differently this time. Try to make it up to a few people.

(He closes his eyes.)

There she is! My angel! And she’s singing: everything I’m going to do; everything I’m going to be. Hey, I think I like this song!

Lost In Lwow: A Travelogue

2009-02-24T13:41:00.000-08:00

‘5 days in Lwow? In January? In this weather? Don’t tell me … you’re English, right?’

Saturday afternoon, late January. Krakowians hunch and crunch their way home through the snow while, inside, I sit cosy with my crossword. My girlfriend appears, informing me of my neighbourly and boyfriendly duty to clear the snow and icicles from our three balconies, lest a lawsuit await our return from five days in Lwów. I discover the answer to 5 Across (‘Winter Instrument Of Torture’: shovel).Duties discharged and bags packed, we depart for Lwów late on Saturday night. Our driver is Rafał, the son of Asia’s colleagues in Lwów. He’s a quiet, amiable young man, studying at Krakow’s theological college. Tonight, however, he is disconcertingly dressed in camouflage trousers and kicker boots and commences to drive with the same attention to safety as any normal Polish young man. However, as the realities of the severe road conditions and a seven-hour drive begin to unfold, he settles down and selects a Nat King Cole CD. In turn, I relax and stare out of the window, as mile after snowy mile passes, illuminated by a full moon, brilliant stars and memories of Doctor Zhivago.
Suddenly, we hit a snowstorm and slow from 100kph to 10kph in 5 seconds. Outside our warm cocoon, it’s a whiteout: our main Kraków to Lwów road now resembles a mountain track in the Tatras. We crawl slowly through, hoping to pass unnoticed, sheltering for a while in the warm neon-glow of a service station.
I’d heard horror stories about the border, especially the Ukrainian, and fully expected a long, cold wait of several hours. However, we were in and out in only 20 minutes. We could not believe it. What Rafał, a Ukrainian, could believe, however, was the all too predictable demand by a Ukrainian border guard for a 30GRN fee, based upon some spurious ‘problem’ with his car. Be warned, also, that Polish travellers (and maybe other eastern Europeans) will need to buy 10zl insurance at the border. Although this is a legal requirement, the insurance is worthless – just think of it as an entrance fee.

We arrive at Lala and Władek’s flat at 4:30am – a journey time of 7 hours for 350 km. Straight to bed.

Sunday afternoon: Our first taste of Ukrainian hospitality. Lala’s sister has a big, busy house in the woods and the glasses and plates on the long dining-room table bear witness to the day’s many visitors. Some arrive with best wishes, others bear small presents for the children. All leave with bear-like hugs and alcohol breaths – a combination of beer, wine and vodka. In the words of The Borg: ‘Resistance Is Futile’.

The next morning, it’s snowing heavily and the icy paths in the city centre are treacherous (not having been cleared since the winter’s first snowfall). Cars and trucks negotiate their way brusquely past the ice, other vehicles and – sometimes - pedestrians. We retire to a cosy fin-de-siecle patisserie, from where we stock up on provisions: tea (chai), coffee (kawa) and one gateau (ciasto) for 26GRN before the journey home.

A word about the buses. There are lots of them, small and rickety but cheap, scooting past as frequently as Krakówian taxis. A ticket costs 1GRN, no matter how long or short the journey. They are always very full. One night, I found myself acting as go-between between passengers and the driver – my plea of ‘nie rozumiem’ (I don’t understand) failing to discharge me of my duties. So, if you get in through the back door and can’t see, never mind reach, the driver, just pass the money to the person in front, signal ‘1’ and your change will come back to you shortly. (OK, it’s like sardines in there and you’d probably get away with it, but think: it’s only 60 groszy; the country needs the money, and; do you really want to spend a long night in a Ukrainian police station?)

In the evening, our hosts gave a house party; the guests writers, poets and painters all. While poetry was read, cognac, wine and vodka were drunk and a parody composed on-the-spot. Such homely gatherings (whether artistic or otherwise) were a mainstay of both Ukrainian and eastern European communities under Communism, where public gatherings of more than, say, four or five people would attract the attention of the authorities, concerned that they were not simply chewing the fat but plotting the overthrow of an authoritarian regime. Ukrainian, German, Polish and English was exchanged and we raised our glasses as the immaculately-dressed elderly German surgeon gave lengthy toasts to the charming women of Ukraine, Poland and England.

Lwów old town is beautiful. The Rynek (main square) and surrounding streets are calm and dignified; uncluttered by media hoardings, hordes of tourists or the babble of foreign tongues. The four-storey 17th and 18th century buildings share the same pastel-coloured grace and former glories as their counterparts in Venice. We glanced at galleries, crept quietly into cathedrals and quaffed in the kawiarnas. In the churches, it was refreshing to see brightly-lit Christmas trees and nativity scenes, when in England, at the beginning of February, television ads would already be shoving Easter eggs down our throats and dragging us off on sunny summer holidays.

That evening, we ate traditional Ukrainian food at Stefa Restaurant (Steфa Pestpaн) on Svobody Avenue (Пpocпekt Cвoбoди), near to the statue of the hero of Polish literature, Adam Mickiewicz). 63GRN bought 4 beers, 2 starters and 3 main courses (I was hungry!) and, refreshed, we stepped into winter darkness. In the meantime, the city had awoken and people were hustling and bustling their way home.

We were hustling for a bar and found ‘Titanic’, a clean, bright watering hole on Teatral’na Street (Teатpaльна), where we fell in with a friendly bunch of Ukrainians. Graduates of Lwów University, Roman and Zoran’s knowledge of Applied Mathematics was used mainly by the military until the collapse of the USSR. Now they work in printing and marketing, while most of their peers apply their mathematical skills with foreign corporations **** . We discussed politics, the Orange Revolution, and life in general, before proceeding to a newly-opened pub-club ‘Kult’, on Tchaikovsky Street (Чайковського). Although a little empty at 2am, the manageress, Iryna, promised great live music at the weekends.

There seems to be very few bars in Lwów, at least compared to Kraków. Keep your eyes open, follow every lead and see where the people are going; we found several dark, unpromising passageways that led to cosy, hidden bars. Once settled, enjoy the cheap prices. A large beer on the Rynek costs around 4GRN to 5GRN (2.50zl – 3zl) and a vodka about 2.50GRN (1.50zl).

Another night, we were taken to Pub “Korzo” on Brativ Rohatyntsiv Street (Братів Рогатинців). This is a cosy place with live music from Thursday to Sunday and the only pub where I saw Murphy’s. Although heavily tempted, we decided against the 20GRN price-tag, in favour of the local brew, at 8GRN a glass. My frugality, however, proved unnecessary as Roman insisted on paying for everything – both nights we met him: we were his guests and that was all there was to it! Such kindness was, I found, to be typical of the Lwówians.

When not imbibing, my girlfriend and I took several long walks around the old city and castle (Zamek) area, on the hillside. The city, named after Lew, the Lion, is 750 years old (like Krakow) and has an extensive old town, almost a small town in itself, with many old buildings, streets and local churches to explore and get lost in. It felt how Krakow must have felt some years ago: a whole city, seemingly, suspended; a page in a book caught at the moment of turning.

We arose at 7am on Thursday as our host, Władek, was eager to show us Lwów’s market. From furniture (reconditioned) to fish (fresh), it had it all, including a giant meat hall, where all manner of meats lay, hung and were presented for our approval by smiling, well-fed women, who seemed very curious and happy to see us, particularly me, I think, looking, as I do, distinctly non-eastern European. A twenty-second wonder, I felt like I was in Mongolia, not the second city of an aspiring European Union member state.

Earlier in the week, we had tried to book a theatre show. Lwów has many theatres, but they only perform at the weekends. However, after a chance comment of mine on the first day, opera tickets for Thursday were arranged. They were a gift from one of the performers that our hosts knew: more Ukrainian hospitality.

Back to reality and the journey back to Krakow: take the 71 bus from the corner of the opera house - corner of Torhova (Пл Торгова) and Svobody Avenue (Пpocпект Cвободи). Allow about 45 minutes and get off at the last stop, the bus station, in time for the 22:00 departure to Krakow. Tickets are about 110GRN, booked at least a day before. The journey itself was almost too calm: I had expected to share a seat with a formidable middle-aged woman, trussed up like a Christmas turkey, packs of cheap Ukrainian cigarettes and vodka strapped to her body. But it was not to be so. Ten minutes out of the bus station, the lights went off and a peaceful ten-hour journey began, interrupted only by a much more typical border wait of three hours.

Lwów is a beautiful city with generous inhabitants. I advise you to go there, and soon, before people start writing magazine articles about it …

India and Nepal: A Travelogue

2008-08-12T05:44:00.000-07:00

NOTE: I will upload photos as soon as I am able :-) Hi It seems like another lifetime now, although only perhaps three months or so, that I - together with my friends Tim and Andy - agreed on a two-month holiday to India and Nepal. And here I am now, in a friendly internet cafe in Shimla, drinking very sweet tea and looking out at the monsoon clouds, hiding the spectacular mountain scenery. Leaving our lives in Krakow behind us, our itinerary covers August and September, from the deserts of Rajasthan, with their collosal red forts and floating palaces, Agra and the sublime Taj Mahal and the teeming masses of Delhi. Avoiding the worst of the monsoon, we plan to head north to Ladakh (an area bordering Afghanistan, Tibet and Nepal), trekking in Nepal, before recovering somewhat on the tropical beaches of Goa. I hope also to spend some time in an ashram in Rishikesh. So, here's the blog ... We arrived in Delhi last Thursday night. Even then, at midnight, teeming life of the city hit us hard, like the heat: hot and humid. To get us through the two months, we're travelling on a budget: travellers' hostels and cheap guesthouses will mark our progress across the north of this, the second-most populous nation on the planet. In both Delhi and in Agra, we stayed in 'bazaars'. Bazaars are full of narrow, chaotic streets and alleys, small shops and cafes opening onto street refuse dodged ably by all manner of being: locals, travellers, wandering cows, dogs. Oh, and they have cheap accommodation, of course. Quickly leaving Delhi, we spent two days in Agra. It has to be said that Agra is not the prettiest of Indian cities. The whole place seemed one giant bazaar; sights and sounds assaulting one like the smell of dirt and refuse which hangs in the air and the back of your nose. Our goal was, of course, the Taj Mahal, described by India's first Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore as "a teardrop on the face of humanity". Approaching by one of several gates is a low-key, almost squalid affair, but once within the grounds, the first sight to that monument to a man's love leaves one and all speechless and open-mouthed. How can such a thing stand, alone, in this world and Man not be inspired to rise to its challenge of beauty and harmony? At sunset that night, we take a journey on a 'tut-tut' (a dangerous, but exciting three-wheeled covered motorbike) to the opposite riverbank and watch as the dying light falls across the monument's translucent marble stone. The Taj seems to float on the river and its shadows. The morning after the heat again assails us, threatening already to sap us of all energy and resolve. But, a few hours later, we are once again at New Delhi train station, finding our northward connection, stepping gingerly over sleeping sadhus and whole families, sitting on platforms and concourses for all the world like an English family picnic - multipled by ten thousand. Day four (Monday) finds the three of us taking the nighttrain north to Karla, en route to Shimla. The journey to Karla is horrible: we curl up, fitfully, foetally, in train compartments on fold-down beds, like stray dogs waiting for the dawn. We snatch perhaps an hour of sleep, each time we begin to drift, a ticket collector rudely switches on bright flourescent lights or the laughter from the group of nearby young men invades our dreams once again. At 5 in the morning, we change trains at Karla, where we greedily drink cups of hot, sweet tea. And then a sight which cheers us all: our five-hour connection to Shimla is a red, pretty-looking narrow-gauge train, an Indian Thomas The Tank Engine, or one of his friends. We sink gratefully into deep, wide comfortable seats and are presented with much more tea, biscuits, breakfast and that morning's newspaper, fresh off the press. Shimla was the British Government's summer residence, and, tired and grubby though we may be, we imagine ourselves pampered officers of the Raj. Tim calls himself Sebastian, Andy becomes a gentleman by the name of Stiles, while I feel the need to be known as Rupert for the duration of the journey. BLOG 2 Chugging, zigzag, along mountainsides, we pull into Manali, a similar-size town to Shimla, late in the morning. We 'tut-tut' away from the main drag and the touts to 'Ola Manali', a relatively peaceful uphill enclave recently 'discovered' by the hip traveller and hippy set. Think Goa or (if you're old enough) Marrakesh. The Tibetan and Kashmiri traders' multi-coloured wares line the roads with colours, both lurid and alluring: heavy-duty fleece jackets for those travelling north to the cold Ladakhi deserts (that'll be us, then); shocking pink and yellow flared trousers and all manner of bags, hats and other paraphenalia. Charis (cannabis) grows wild by the roadside and a charis-induced torpor hangs over all, like the smell of a hundred cannabis joints. Manali is a welcome relief for us all. The pace of life is much the slowest we have yet encountered in India. Both the locals and the westeners alike are laid-back. Even the touts and salesmen are less pushy. I hope if I ever come back that it'll have retained the same atmosphere. We're staying at a wonderful guest house in Old Manali called 'Tiger Eye'. It's ostensibly run by an Australian and Dutch couple, but the real boss is a 10 year old local boy called Jiban. He knows everything: prices, times, what d'you wannaknow? Respect to Jiban! The monsoon should have been over by now (mid August), but is hanging around a bit this year. Still, there's no mistaking the stupendous views from my 2nd floor window; hanging white wisps of rain only adding to the majesty and beauty of the Kuula Valley, here at 2000m above sea level. Today's Friday. Tomorrow at 6am we begn a 28 hour journey to Leh, the 'capital' of Ladakh, the most northerly part of India. By all accounts, it's a visual and cultural feast: a mixture of India, Nepal, Tibet and China. Having nicely rested in Manali, we're prepared for the bone-shaking journey. What none of us can prepare for is altitude sickness. All, apparently, are affected. None escape its grasp. We shall sleep (mid-journey) at 4000m. A pathetic attempt at acclimatisation, but all we can manage before Leh itself.

LADAKH
The journey to Ladakh quickly dispels any doubts as to its remoteness. Our well-seasoned mini-bus rattles me and my 9 fellow passengers for 20 hours northwards, away from the monsoon and up towards the dry desert of Ladakh. At 6pm the first day, the minibus drops us off in the middle of a majestic valley, russet-brown mountains seeming to close in on us as we stare in amazement. There is a line of large, strong tents and these are to be our home for the night.

After supper, we each of us climb - or fall through exhaution - into big, sturdy beds. I wear a hat, thick walking socks and most of my clean clothes. At about zero degrees, it is, as we were warned, a cold night, yet mercifully much warmer than the minus 40C Ladakh experiences, especially at altitude. Quite why our mini-tented village is situated here, at 4000m above sea level is a mystery - and not a pleaseant mystery. Halfway through the night, I awake with what seems like a giant headache. Altitude sickness has me in its greedy grasp. I toss and turn the next few hours, feeling like I have the biggest hangover ever. However, unknown to me, Tim, one of my travelling companions, is hyperventilating in a nearby tent. It takes his tentmate, Andy, to force him to calm down. The night mercifully ends, we descend to Leh and all agree never again to sleep 4000m up a mountainside.

As I write this, I have been in Leh, the capital of the Ladakh region, for seven days. And although ostensibly just another stage in our two-month journey , it feels as if we have stumbled into some shangri-la. Yes, I am still in India, I tell myself as Tibetan monks, Tibetan and Kasmiri traders and who knows what manner of tribespeople wander past me, each intent on his or her daily business, whether it be the eternal quest for self-enlightenment or the daily round of buying and selling enough of something in order to feed the family.

Leh and Ladakh (as far as I have so far ventured outside of the cityare very comfortable places to be. The pace of life is decidedly slow (aided by the frequent power cuts) and the people are very, very friendly. The exile Tibetans, in particular, seem genuinely calm, relaxed and open people. Should that be in any part due to the influence of the Tibetan Buddhism that is practised by the majority of Ladakh's population, then I'm considering a change of religion.

I've practised yoga here (well, ok, once) as well as meditation. Really more for socialising and getting to know like-minded people than anything else: later, I keep my money in my pocket and, arising early, sun both body and soul on some sun-drenched veranda.

Yesterday, a first in my life: I went rafting. Mild rafting, Grade II for those in the know. But it was on the Indus river. Let me say that again: I rafted in the beautiful sunshine, surrounded by ancient crags and cliffs, ON THE INDUS RIVER!

Having dried off and calmed down a bit, I shall leave Leh today and embark upon a four-day meditation course at a meditation centre/ashram some kilometres from the city. I am looking forward to it immensely. Many people ask me what meditation actually entails. Having been an (inconstant) practitioner for over twenty years now, I still feel unqualified to give a satisfactory answer. There are as many ways to meditate - and things to meditate upon - as there are souls on the earth or stars in the sky. I hope to know more after the next few days. What I do know, however, is that here in India, in Ladakh, mostly on my own, I have oodles of time to reflect, learn, meditate. I see myself changing day by day. There is no-one here to act to, to act against, to defend myself against - as we all are forced to do in our normal, daily lives.

I shall end my journey a different man from when I began it. 'Different' in what ways I cannot tell, but a better man, one who knows himself much more than before and, consequently, is more honest with both himself and those he is blessed enough to have in his life.

A SILENT MEDITATION

Why is it that the words 'silent retreat' never appeared on the poster? Only when I had chosen my dormitory bed and showed my face for a get-to-know-you cup of tea, did I hear those words. Still, I was used to such retreats (although not for four days) and didn't anticipate any problems. The Mahobodhi Meditation Centre, situated in the stark hills 10km out of Leh, is an oasis in the desert, literally and figuratively. Literally, as the thriving community of Buddhist monks, workers, schoolboysm schoolgirls, child novice monks and nuns, local disabled and old people have, since 1995, been steadily, painstakingly, creating a self-sustaining spiritual, humanistic, community in - effectively - the desert. In between long Buddhist meditation sessions and lectures on Buddhist philosophy, delivered by an affable, smiling monk, me and my silent colleagues were free to wander around the grounds during our 'walking meditations', and marvel at the hard work, love and dedication required to create a healthy, thriving community from nothing in such a short space of time.

Like, I believe, most of my fellow 'retreaters', I benefitted greatly from the four-day retreat. The meditations were very useful and will stand me in good stead in the future. Of course, both mind and body, being used to running riot every day, immediately rebelled against being told what to do. But I got there, slowly: both mind and body falling into place, at first resentfully, then - almost - willingly. Like an unruly child, the mind will always try to break free of control, but, also like a child, deep down it needs and respects discipline.

The days began at five in the morning, just before dawn. The gentle, deep and dull 'bong' of a Tibetan drum (hit somewhere in the darkness outside) drawing my dreams to a close, reverberating between the sand and the brilliant stars overhead. By the fourth morning, both body and mind had already adjusted to this early start, although of course, not without the odd moan and groan.

On the final day, we were treated to specially-written songs by the very young novice and monks and nuns (one delightful little 'nun' as young as 6 years old - but what a spirit! Her eyes shone like diamonds and seemed to look deep into one's soul). In the meditation hall, we each arose in turn to be presented with a scarf and blessing from the head monk. It was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life and I know I shall always carry the blessings of that moment and the whole four days with me throughout my life.

A slight rude awakening as the Centre bus kindly brought us back to Leh, each of us then slipping away silently into the night, trying to avoid the shrill noises and turbulent city energies we had been free from for the past four days. I laid my head on my guest house pillow, cosy in the knowledge that, I would not dream of Tibetan drums and could sleep as long as I liked.

LEH BACK TO MANALI

All good things come to an end and it was soon time for me to leave Ladakh. This time, I chose a straight-through journey of 20 hours, thereby avoiding the overnight - and high altitude - stopover. The journey over the highest mountain roads in the world was long, bumpy and dangerous. Fortunately, it wasn't until after my arrival back in Manali that I learned that the drivers catch only a few hours' sleep, at best, before doing the whole thing again ... and again ... and again. Life, it seems, can be pretty cheap in some parts of the world.

Old Manali was its usual self: straggling monsoon rain beating down on the tin rooves of cafes and bars, beneath which sit multi-coloured travellers, recovering: some from treks and near-epic journeys , some from too much locally-grown cannabis and all-night parties. This time I got out before getting sucked in.

MANALI TO AMRITSAR

At this point, we were three or four weeks into our two-month trip to India and Nepal. As a Himalayan trek of a couple of weeks still lay ahead of us, we spread out our big map on the table and began to prioritise. Back in England, we'd put week's tour of Rajasthan on the 'A' list. However, with both time and the scale of any travelling around Indian now unavoidable, we chose to ditch all but Amritsar, city of the Golden Temple. Moonlit camelrides across the desert, the ancient cities of Jodhpur, Jaipur 'the pink city', and Udaipur, 'the lake city'; all would have to wait if or until we return to this amazing and vast country.

We booked the usual 'Second Class Non Air-Conditioned' train tickets and gazed out of the windows, smoked cigarettes and dozed in the sultry afternoon heat as miles and miles of India rolled timelessly past: lush green paddy fields still soaked with late monsoon rain; a boy guiding water buffalo sees us, lifts his stick and cries out 'Hello' in English. We respond in kind.

The train has a life of its own: a self-supporting ecosystem composed of driver, guards, all manner of passengers (mainly Indian, the few Western faces eliciting, as always, good-naturesd stares and the usual questions: 'Where from?', 'Which country?', 'Your name?' etc.). Inside the carriage there is a steady stream of people selling food and drink, chai (tea) being the most popular. I wonder if they are employed by the railway (probably not) and whether, next time I take a train, I could buy a large thermos, fill it with tea and pass myself off as a chai wallah, thus securing a free train ticket.

Besides those selling food and drink, the odd singer, peddler and beggar ply their way steadily the length of the train. The strangest of these was (quite clearly) a man dressed as a woman, performing, it seemed, a rather poor drag act for the benefit of the bemused, yet appreciative, Indians. The end of the act (attempts at a feminine voice, mock sexual overtures and the inevitable flounce away) is followed, predictably, for a request for money. On both the occasions I encountered this particular form of entertainment (the same man or another?) I kept a low profile, fully aware of the fun an Indian transvestite with a captive audience could have with a tired Englishman.

As usual on this trip, we stayed in a fairly cheap guest house in Amritsar. Consequently, the neighbourhood, were it in Europe somewhere, would probably be 'earmarked for development' and millions of Euros investment. In our two days there, we saw little of the rest of Amritsar, and many fine spots there there must be.

By surprise, in the guest house garden, we run into Alan, a Welshman we last met on our Shimla to Manali journey. We shouldn't be surprised, really. Whilst India is a vast country, the main tourist trail is clearly-marked and very well-trodden. In fact, we also caught up with Alan back in Leh, in Ladakh and were also to see many familiar faces in unlikely locations, before the end of our travels. Right now, however, Alan is still sporting the type of orange headscarf we will later be given to enter the Golden Temple. An old hand of two days' standing, Alan gives us the low-down on Amritsar, before we get down to the serious business of drinking a few beers and exchanging Welsh and Polish tongue-twisters.

Amritsar is in the west of India, in the Punjab, and the majority religion is Sikhism. And what most tourists go to Amritsar for is the Sikh Golden Temple: a complex of buildings built around a large central pool. It is a beautiful place. The pool's blue-white ripples reflect gently against the many walls' white marble and gold. Sound complements light: a soothing yet heady mixture of religious chanting, temple bells, a traditional Indian quartet and the calls of exotic birds combine to induce a slightly hypnotic state of calm and well-being. Wide marble steps lift us over beautifully-kept gardens where groups sit in the sun and the shade, some sleeping, some eating. This is our plan, also. Slowly, we make our way barefoot past the many hundreds of serious worshippers, daytripping families, sadhus (holy men) and other tourists to the food hall.

Every day, in the Golden Temple at Amritsar, many thousands of people (both Sikh and non-Sikh) are fed for free by the volunteer temple workers and its generous benefactors. Soon, we are each given a large metal plate and spoon. Further steps deliver us into a large, cool hall. Many long narrow strips of carpet show where a couple of thousand faithful are sometimes fed at once, many times a day. We sit cross-legged and plates are soon filled with a very pleasing dal bhat. We try not to offend by not drinking the water provided (discreetly sipping instead on plastic bottles hidden in shoulderbags). We take our leave as several hundred fresh diners take their seats. As we walk downstairs, towards the immaculate gardens, we begin to hear a busy, metallic sound, or hundreds of sounds together. We investigate and find dozens of people up to their elbows in washing-up suds, pots and pans. Well, someone has to wash up! We roll up our sleeves and pitch in: three slightly silly-looking westerners washing-up after dal bhat, we are a strange sight and provoke much merriment, especially once we begin taking photos of each other.

The Golden Temple is a most beautiful, and calming, place to be. I resolve to take some of the peace away with me as, reluctantly, we leave the chanting, the pool and the overall beauty behind us, collect our sandals and steel ourselves for the inevitable scrum of taxidrivers and rickshaw wallahs outside.

AN UNUSUAL BORDER
The other main stop on the Amritsar tourist trail is some twenty kilometres to the west, at the India/Pakistan border: the daily closing of the border. We'd all seen this completely bizarre spectacle on television before and were unanimous in our desire to experience it first-hand. So, the next day, we were tut-tutting (a small motorbike-style covered taxi) along the 'main road', dodging other tut-tuts, potholes, stray cattle (is there any other kind in India?), chasing the sun to the west before the dusk ceremony was over.

Passing (mercifully) noiselessly through several roadside metal detectors, we walked - quickly, a little excitedly - towards what looked like some sort of sports stadium: long and narrow, with raised sides; a velodrome, perhaps. Though there was some time until the ceremony, the crowds on both the Indian and Pakistani sides of the border point were in loud voice, all competing cheers and goodhearted, nationalistic rivalry. In a short time, border guards would enact a most bizarre ritual, but before that, there was the dancing!

Imagine the centre of an elongated racetrack, surrounded by colourful, cheering onlookers: families, couples, tourists, soldiers and police, all in their way having a fine time of it. And in the middle are perhaps a hundred people - mainly young women - dancing to Indian dance music. There is great excitement in the air and some of the more adventurous tourists saddle their long-range cameras and join in the fray, much to the amusement and delight of the locals.

Immaculately-dressed border guards ensure that everyone takes an orderly seat and soon the main event begins. The music dies away and the dancers retake their seats. From both sides of the imposing border gate, nationalistic (and largely goodhumoured) cries arise, mostly, unfortunately, unintelligible to me. "Hindustan!" seems popular, invariably answered with "Jin da bah!" (no, I don't know, either). Why everyone has come so far, and why they are now busily getting themselves in a (well-rehearsed) fever-pitch, is the most bizarre way of closing an international border since a certain Dutchboy tried sticking his finger in a dyke. Unfeasibly tall (and, I suppose, handsome) border guards parade with great noise and outlandish leg movements to outdo their counterparts across the border, some ten metres away. Their extravagantly-plumed hats contrast with their oh-so-serious faces and the crowds roar with approval with every guard's exaggerated stomp towards the border and a ritualistic face-off with his Pakistani counterpart. Eventually, the rays of the sun sink beyond the Pakistani horizon and, in the most crucial and sensitive part of the whole ceremony, the two neighbours' national flags are slowly lowered, crossing at equal height at the mid point. Woe betide the guard who ever got that wrong!

VARANASI
We slip out of Amritsar on a hot and dusty afternoon. Loaded up with mineral water and snacks, we find our seats and settle back for a twenty-hour journey. It's a relaxing, non-eventful, journey and we each of us sleep well. I awake soon after dawn and brush my teeth (at 60mph) by an open connecting door, both the passing water buffaloes, the Indian Railway Network officials and me all oblivious to the Health and Safety implications of my high-speed toilette.

Varanasi is an ancient city in an ancient country. It straddles - or, I should say, nestles lazily - against the River Ganges, the holiest Indian river. Every day, 365 days of the year, bodies are brought here from all across India. The Ganges is India's holiest river and a riverside cremation or, for some, a watery burial will confer great blessings (and release from karma) for the deceased.

The focal point for both pilgrims and tourists alike are the Ghats, a seemingly-unbroken chain of long, stone steps running parallel to the river for several kilometres. Now, in late August, the river is swelled by monsoon rains - from the Himalayas to the sea - and the river is five or six metres higher than usual. Still, some of the ghats' topmost steps are still dry and it is these, especially 'The Burning Ghat' (the sight of most of the riverside cremations), which are the focus of activity now.

Private space and dignity are not human rights, it seems. For many (poorer) Indians, the daily business of washing, food preparation, and social interaction must, perforce, take place in public. However, by the ghats (long stone steps) of the Ganges, each dawn sees thousands of pilgrims and visiting relatives of the recently-deceased wash and bathe themselves in the rivers' purifying waters. Of course, the truth is that the waters here are anything but purifying. Remains from cremated bodies, as well as those of the lower castes sunk (by tradition) within the river itself should, alone, render the river undrinkable. However, there is also much industrial pollution from upstream as well as many open sewers discharging directly into the river. One early morning, we take a dawn boatride and see the sun rise over the timeless river. But we don't touch it , saving that for the brave, the faithful and the plain stupid.

At dusk one may buy a small candle, set within a small metal dish, and launch it gently on the river, sending with it a prayer for a loved one or a 'Godspeed' to the recently-departed. As the cool, calm evening settles over the river, we follow with our eyes the langrous path of our watery candles until, like the souls they travel towards, they begin to merge into one: a warm, fuzzy glow receding into the distance.

The district closest to the river's western bank is called 'the bazaar'. Whilst many Indian cities, in our experience, have 'bazaars', Varanasi's is certainly the most bizarre bazaar: small streets full of shops, stalls, cattle, and people sleeping off the noonday sun seem to wind around themselves in ever more confusing and ingeneous ways. Somebody once said that English was a nation of shopkeepers. Obviously the speaker had never been to an India bazaar. Shops, small small, some smaller (like small dark caves or even recesses from the street itself) present their wares of bottled water, crisps, toilet rolls and a million assorted necessary items for the locals and tourists alike in a most colourful, garish, disorientating manner. In each 'shop' sits the proprietor, at first greeting, then inviting you to buy something from his Aladdin's cave within this secret labyrinth. Negotiating this maze is quite fun in the daytime, but a little disquietening at night, with neither streetlamps nor even the pale blue light of the moon to guide you safely back to your guest house. However, like prettty much all of my time in India, I never felt scared or even apprehensive for my safety. I have felt the company of Indians to be (when not trying to sell me something) gentle, unassuming, friendly.

We stayed a few nights and days in Varanasi. On the last night, we fell in with a couple of Polish girls and all decided that what we really needed was to hear some authentic Indian music. After perhaps half an hour of wrong directions and false leads in the labyrinth, we realised that anywhere that might possibly have played live traditional music would, of course, be closed by now (nearly 10pm). However, nature abhors a vacuum. A middle-aged moustachioed Indian man met us on the stairs and was soon leading us, via a tut-tut taxi and five-minute torchlight journey to 'something special'. Apprehensive, yet hopeful, I, my two male friends and the two Polish girls swallowed hard and trusted to luck. And lucky we were. A few minutes later, we were safely ensconced in the sitting room of a master Sitar player and his equally talented and world-famous son. As we sat crosslegged on the floor, we were treated to the most amazing and beautiful music. All my Indian experiences seemed to drift across my mind as the intoxicating music grew faster and faster, then falling, like a whisper, as were carried along through the night like candles on a dark black river. We left these amazing musicians' house grateful, amazed and laden with 200 rupee CDs.

VARANASI TO NEPAL

Ask any backpacker what they did in India and chances are that the word 'travel' will be one of the first from their sunburnt, chapped lips. India is such a huge country that any change of location invariably involves a combination of tut-tut/taxi, bus and / or train (not including domestic flights) lasting anything from eight hours to a couple of days and nights. This is also thereason why most westeners' travel itenaries - drawn up months before more in hope than expectation - last about as long as a snowflake on the Ganges. Still, there's no fun in staying in one place for too long and, as the Indian-born Rudyard Kipling might have said, 'If you can keep your head while all about you are the toilets on an Indian cross-continental train, you'll be a man, my son'.

Our time in India was drawing to a close and our second month in Nepal was about to begin. From Varanasi to the Nepali capital, Kathmandu, was to be a journey of some two days, including all of the above-mentioned forms of transport, including a cycle rickshaw and (for a blissful two hours) a private jeep just over the border.

But befoe the border is a town about half-way from Varanasi, called Gorakhpur. I only mention Gorakhpur in order that you may see the name, burn it into your memory and promise both me and your mother that you will never, ever go there in your life - or if you do, you swear neither to eat nor sleep there, no matter how hungry or tired you may be. The town is noisy, full of traffic and pollution, rubbish, aggressive touts and has without a doubt the very worst guest houses in India. Oh, and the food (having eventually tried a few 'establishments') is very, very suspect and invariably served in an underlit room on filthy coffee tables.

Hmmm ... the India / Nepal border. Both leaving and, later, re-entering India was one of the more shall we say 'frustrating' parts of our two-month journey. Without being too negative, suffice it to say that Andy, Tim and I suffered at the hands of black-marketers, corrupt money changers, fake booking agents, the slowest and rudest rickshaw wallahs in Asia, and sundry out and out liars, all out to fleece the tourist both sides of the border. Be warned. The town is called Sanauli. Get in and get out before they get you.

To enter Nepal you must buy a visa costing, for the most popular one-month option, US$30. Not having any dollars to hand, we found ourselves in the hands of corrupt money changers who proceeded to fleece us of what little sterling and Indian rupees we had. Apparently, travel broadens the mind. Well, I personally know of one black marketeer who very nearly had his face broadened that day. Laden with heavy backpacks and crushing indignation, we walked through the two borders and completed the Nepal visa entry forms. 'Don't worry', said the smiling Nepali official. 'You're in Nepal now. This is a different country'. And how right he was!

KATHMANDU

Just writing the word Kathmandu is a bit of a buzz. Reading it's not too bad, either. It ranks up there with Timbuktoo and Ulan Bator as magical, almost alien-sounding places; ancient cities which, fabled throughout history, may no longer even exist, buried perhaps by the sands of both time and the desert. Kathmandu may or may not actually exist. You can read what I write about it but if you really want to know if it's still possible to walk those antique streets, you'll just have to make your own journey and find out for yourself.

Kathmandu is (or was?) the capital city of Nepal, a country until recently advertised by the tourist board as 'Royal Nepal'. The posters will all have to change, though, as the monarchy was overthrown in 2007 and a peaceful UN-administered election in 2008 saw the previously revolutionary, and sometimes violent, Maoists become the ruling party in the country's first ever democratic government. Discussing this transition with many Nepalis, there seems to be a general feeling of optimism for the future. However, having also read many daily newspapers in Nepal, it is already evident that the new administration has promised more than it can reasonably deliver. However, the Nepalis - those tough mountain people famous for their fierce Gurkha soldiers - are not taking these early signs of lassitude or corruption lightly. Most days (summer / autumn 2008) see locally-organised roadblocks and demonstrations called in protest against outstanding land issues and the settling of local grievances.

Krakow Days Part 2: Flathunting

2008-03-07T04:19:00.000-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Radio Alfa, Krakow, 3^rd February 2008

As an English teacher in Poland, I should be enjoying a four-week, although unpaid, holiday right now. Not so. I have, in fact, been rushing ‘round Krakow faster than a bout of influenza.

Why? Well, let me first say that there are two ways to get to know any Polish city really quickly. The first is to become a taxi driver. Unfortunately, this involves a command of both the Polish language and Polish roads – both notoriously difficult to navigate and both beset with traps for the unwary foreigner.

The second way to get to know the city is to buy a flat, or at least to see 99 unsuitable flats in the hope that the 100^th just might be ‘the one’, rather like speeddating, in fact. It’s Sunday night. You look in your diary at the week ahead. It’s a tabla rasa just itching to be filled with appointments, viewings, and scrambled tram journeys from Krowodrza to Pradnik Bialy, Salwator to Grzegorszki. Then Monday morning and the phone never stops: there’s a flat just for me, apparently; no, this one I’ll like; and then another even better; can I make it at 3? Suddenly the whole world wants to be my friend, or at least to be on speaking terms with my bank balance. I’ve never felt so wanted. Apparently, there are old people who go to strangers’ funerals, pretending to be an old family friend, just to get out of the house, meet people and drink free wine. They probably got the taste pretending to be flat hunters when they were younger. You enter the flat and say ‘Dzien Dobry’, smiles and handshakes all round. For 5 or 10 minutes, you’re the king of someone else’s castle, inspecting and inwardly judging another person’s life. You peer into bathrooms and reemerge smiling politely or, secretly, frowning at the orange and green paint scheme.

The trouble is, I’m very picky when it comes to property. I was in picky in England – where there’s a wide variety of properties – and I’m picky in Poland – a country where Henry Ford could have made a fortune selling flats (any colour you like, as long as it’s grey). Of course, we blame the Communists and the pile-em-high, sell-em-cheap school of architecture. I suppose it makes the business of flat hunting simpler for the average Pole, but I long for a bit of character, some small mark of individuality.

Of course, for the people who live there, the flats are all individual, as the owners are too. And I’ve been on the other side in my time: that unique combination of welcome tinged with suspicion as you open the door to the invited, yet uninvited and unknown guest. And how do Poles feel when an Englishman steps foot inside their hallway? Most, no doubt, see me as nothing more than another in a long line of passing bank accounts; a smiling, nodding head to be endured for 5 minutes? Others may be glad, believing me to have a larger bank account than most, whilst a 55-year-old ex-miner may be smiling through gritted teeth, knowing that by selling his home to a foreigner like me, he is making it even harder for his son and his new wife to afford a place of their own.

But shoot the messenger, and two more will come in his place. Poland has made its decision. The future is now. The European Union, emigration, money coming back from England, the football and the Euro in 2012. These truths point in only one direction: bricks and mortar. It’s as safe as houses, as we say in England.

And so that’s why I continue to run around the city, dividing my days into 15-minute blocks, like a not-so-young man at a speed dating event, hoping that perhaps this will be the last time and he can finally hang up his hat and get off the merry-go-round. If you happen to see such a man jumping on or off a tram somewhere this week, say hello, won’t you? Unless you’re an estate agent, that is, ‘cos I’m not sure I’d believe you.

Krakow Days Part 1: Jogging

2008-03-07T04:18:00.001-08:00

Copyright John Marshall 2008

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Radio Alfa, Krakow, 26^th January 2008

In the crisp January air, I warm up for my morning jog. It’s a short jog: I’m 40 years old and out of condition. But the sun’s shining and I’m feeling good, so off we go!

On the paths around the block, there’s a pleasant dusting of snow from the first snow that Krakow’s seen for weeks. I miss the snow this year. Two years ago, in 2005, was the coldest and whitest winter many Poles can remember. Minus 27 degrees centigrade. I still hear it, two years later. Every time you breathed in, your nostril hairs crackled. Another ten degrees, an American doctor told me, and the water in your eyeballs begins to freeze. ‘Think about that!’, he said. I tried not to. For, in my eyes, Krakow was a fairytale that first winter: the Planty, Main Square and Wawel all alive, looking down benevolently at my wide-eyed innocence in those heady days and nights. I miss the snow and I miss seeing things for the first time, too.

A small but angry dog snaps at my feet as I jog blindly around the bend. His babcia owner admonishes him as I slip on the snow. I regain my balance and quickly turn my head to see the little sausage dog looking up blankly, yet kindly, into the woman’s yapping mouth. She probably doesn’t know that her dog doesn’t understand Polish. But then she probably doesn’t understand dog either, and yet they couldn’t be happier: inseparable, their very presence giving each other happiness and a reason to be.

I’m trying out a new route this morning. This new neighbourhood of mine needs exploring. I need to put my mark on it – the dog would understand that. I come to some traffic lights and do something I’d always thought looked faintly stupid: I jog on the spot, waiting for the green man. He duly appears and I find myself trotting along a cycle track, lined with bare winter trees. Soon, I see a flash of colour. A long wall of concrete graffiti: not quite art but some good attempts; imaginative and a welcome improvement on the usual football-related inanities spat out in a black fuzz. So much talent waiting to be channeled: thoughts to be shaped and moulded in essential, primary colours.

The wall fades behind me. I check my watch. Good: half-way through my jog already. Another street crossing and suddenly there’s a bright yellow and red block of flats. It stands tall and proud in an otherwise dull and seemingly lifeless sea of concrete and grey. I slow up a moment, drinking in the colour through the crisp, sharp air. If only more of Krakow was like this, the pastel colours around the Main Square – like Venice or Lwow, even. Unfortunately, the production of coloured paint didn’t figure highly in Communist Five-Year Plans, only heavy industry and subservience to the party. If a nouveau riche Pole wants to do something for his people, he could do worse than paint all the blocks in his town. Colour is light and light is life.

But until that happens, a foreigner like me is forced to look past the cold reconstituted stone and childhood memories of steroid-filled women breaking Olympic records for the glory of the people. It’s been nearly twenty years since ‘the breakthrough’, as Poles call the downfall of Polish Communism, and, despite having embraced Capitalism, many have yet to feel any warmth at all.

As the trees and the blocks and the shops trot slowly past me in their turn, I force myself to notice them, to really take them in. There’s something fresh, unique, about something seen, or someone met, for the very first time. It’s a strangeness, which, try as you might, can never be recaptured, once the moment becomes part of our inner landscape. The first impression should be crisp and sharp, and therefore all the sweeter in later remembrance. The whole of reality really is in this first moment.

I’ve turned the corner now and I tell my aching lungs we’re on our way home, although I’m not exactly sure where that is. ‘Though a newcomer to jogging, I feel sure that, like hill-waking, it’s a golden rule never to return by the same route, to double back on yourself. I tried that a few times before. You think it’ll be easier that way. Maybe, but the trouble is you end up back just where you started. It seems we: me, you, the Poles, we all have this need for new and fresh experiences, good or bad. So, again, I turn around an unknown corner and hope that home’s not too far away now.

John Marshall's Oskar Acceptance Speech

2008-03-07T04:17:00.001-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Radio Alfa, Krakow, 24^th February 2008

Friends, and I feel I may call you my friends, I sit here this morning in this wonderful, luxurious radio station, a grateful recipient of your unconditional love and votes. For, yes, you have, in your love, kindness and wisdom, voted me the best John Marshall on Polish radio Oskar. It is a great privilege and I thank you from my bottom … from the bottom of my heart.

This year, the competition was fiercer than ever and, dear, dear listeners across Krakow, Poland and the world, there is no way you can understand the maelstrom of feelings that I am experiencing right now. Pride, embarrassment, arrogance, modesty; I could go on. But, as always, there is so much I wish to say and so little time in which to say it. The clock on the studio wall patiently ticks away the seconds of my life, seconds which I would share with you, you beautiful people.

Some of you, I know, will recall my earliest days on radio, working first with the legendary radio pioneer, Guglielmo Marconi. I learnt many things from old Gugli, not least of which was how to swear at old ladies in Italian. Shortly after that, I was introduced to Henry Morse, who would later find fame with his Morse code and his extensive collection of flamboyant hats. It was, in fact, after an all-night drinking and arm-wrestling session with Henry in Shanghai that he gave me my big break: appearing with him on his ground-breaking ‘Dot dot dash dash show’, where, for eighty-three happy years, I played first dash to Henry’s dot. Of course, things were very different back then. I remember, for example, that there was only one microphone in the whole of the country. You really had to do it all yourself in those days!

It was in programmes like the ‘Dot dot dash dash show’ where I served my apprenticeship, as it was called then. And I worked with them all: Chaplin, Churchill, Gandhi, Disraeli. What a great bunch of lads! What a shame none of their zany radio comedy exists to this day. As it is, they shall be remembered only for their contributions to social progress and, in the case of dear Winnie, in helping defeat National Socialism during breaks in rehearsals.

And yet I digress. There are many people I wish to, nay, must mention. People without whose help up the greasy pole that is radio stardom I would not be sitting here now receiving this wonderful Radio Oskar. Of course, I must begin with my mother. A strong woman, my mother was the North Of England All-In Ladies Wrestling Champion from 1965 to 1982 and, if I don’t mention her now, she will kill me, but slowly, over nine three-minute periods, three falls or a submission. So, thank you, mother. Similarly, my father. I’ve never mentioned this before, but, when I was very young, father would often be sent home from school for secreting cherries in the biology teacher’s undergarments. Perhaps it was the stress of being the only Christian in a family of twenty-five Buddhists. But there was never any shame in father’s eyes. Never. And I learned something very important from that man.

Now, of course, no radio personality, certainly not one of my stature, would get very far without the help of a loyal, faithful, understanding partner. So here again thanks are due to my pet sheepdog Sandra who, as many of you know, has been my faithful companion for over forty-five years. I couldn’t have done it without you, Sandra.

As I look back, I see that, more than any other radio personality, I have, uniquely in this profession, worked with all the great public figures over the last hundred years, and quite a few bad ones, too. My professionalism bars me from naming names, but you know who you are, Andrew, George, Mary, Mishumi, MayFan, Bertrand, N’goumo, Big Chief Sitting Down and, of course, Adolf.

Radio, my friends, is a demanding business and even we media personalities must let off steam once in a while. But to call, as some ministers have done, for the temporary restoration of the death penalty just because of what I did in that night club seems somewhat of an over-reaction. However, I feel I should take this opportunity to apologise for any distress that either I or my actions may have caused.

So what of the future? Letters continue to pile up in all of my houses imploring, not to say begging, me …to retire. But I know it’s all meant in fun and, instead, I intend to go on and on. So, once again, thank you all awarding me the Oskar For The Best John Marshall On Polish Radio and here’s to the next hundred years.

Chaos, Fear & Terror

2008-03-07T04:10:00.001-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, 2007

For as long as I can remember, the media has misused and overused the words ‘fear’ and ‘chaos’, usually in screaming headlines and usually unnecessarily, hyperbolically. And whilst I can only comment on the British media, I am pretty sure the situation is the same in other, principally Western, countries.

This predilection for extreme, scary words can partly be explained by the media’s apparent need to grab our attention, to excite and shock: as our blood pressure rises, so, it seems, does newspaper circulation. In Britain, at least, we are all used to such headlines as “Transport chaos as two inches of snow fall in a single day!” Now, whilst I freely admit that the combination of a little inclement weather and Britain’s inadequate transport system can indeed cause sudden problems, the use of the precise word chaos is nothing more than an over-worn cliché and we, the reader, can usually make up our own minds about the real meaning of the word chaos (the snow causing you to arrive at work an hour late, for example, as opposed to being plunged suddenly into a primeval state of disorder and inherent unpredictability). But then why do the media love this word so much? Is it merely because they can’t help sensationalising news stories or is it also because the word ‘chaos’ unsettles us, frightens us?

The second scary word beloved by the media is ‘fear’. Fear, it seems to me, is quite different from chaos in its effect upon the listener or reader. To be sure, the use of the word ‘fear’ is sometimes entirely appropriate to the article. But usually it is used with the sole intention of generating fear (or anxiety) itself: literal, physiological, emotional fear. Take another sample headline: “Fears continue to grow over the whereabouts of a missing teenager”, or this: “A group of mountain-climbers are feared to have died last night” (in passing, we may note the media’s use of the abstract noun ‘fear’ as a verb, thus allowing its use in an ever-widening range of situations). Such anxiety-inducing headlines as these are everyday occurrences and we are passively complicit: we hand over our money, pick up a paper and spread the virus in pockets and briefcases or allow these disturbing words and emotions to be transmitted and broadcast onto our TVs and laptops.

And, in the end, are these ‘human interest’ stories in fact fearful? I don’t think they are. Yes, of course I am sorry that a young woman may have been abducted or that a party of mountain-climbers have perished several hundred or thousand miles away but I would argue that many such quote “news items” unquote are of little or no interest to the rest of us. Do you really wish to be notified of every distant abduction, house fire, murder and cot death in the country – or world, for that matter? Yes, knowledge is indeed power and in many ways the global village is a beneficial reality. We may choose to send a loving thought or donation to the disaster appeal fund but, be honest, more often, we don’t. Most of us, most of the time, simply allow a flow of sentiment to wash steadily over us, tut-tutting as we are led by the hand to the next apparently necessary piece of chaos or fear.

And even if we did wish to keep informed of every sad, tragic and fearful global occurrence, we simply don’t have the time or the attention-spans. The media is well aware of this: notice how they all seem to agree upon a certain story to be fed to us: hourly, daily, weekly, relentlessly.

The thing about ‘fear’ is, that like forest-fires and lies, it spreads quickly and easily. It has long been commonplace for fear to be inserted into what would otherwise be a much more mundane news story: for example “It is feared that several hospitals may close this year” et cetera. What’s wrong with using another, more expressive and accurate verb? “It is thought, believed, rumoured” etc. The answer, of course, is that it wouldn’t be as sensational, not so … scary. Someone, somewhere, it seems, wants you to be afraid.

And yet it would seem that it’s not enough any more to be merely afraid. You have to be terrified. Yes, ‘terror’ is the new word, the new thing. Suddenly, terror is on everyone’s lips. For the media, for politicians and advertisers, fear is … sexy. Open your paper, turn on your TV, check the net: what do you see? ‘Terror!’ Of course, terror’s been around for quite a while. Terrorists. IRA terrorists, for example. Us Brits grew up with that, got used to it, even. And they were real enough, those terrorists. In Northern Ireland alone, there are thousands of gravestones, ruined lives and families to testify to the reality of the terrorist’s bullet and bomb. But the trouble with terrorists is that they can be beaten or negotiated with. The terrorists, at some point, stop being terrorists: they die, grow old, renounce violence or become politicians. History shows that there is always an end to terrorism. But the need for terror - in some minds, at least - is never-ending. The vacuum in our minds must be filled – by those in power, by those with power, by those who want - and are determined to keep - their power.

‘The War On Terror’. Every day for the past four or five years, we have heard about the war on terror – terror which is not an army, not flesh and blood, but ‘terror’, grammatically, an abstract noun. Like stupidity or deceit. Soldiers and civilians die every day. And what killed them? According to your government, according to your media, terror: an undefined, unknowable, unbeatable force. You see, as soon as you defeat terror here, terror pops up over there! And how do you know? Because you’re told, you’re told to know, by the media – sorry, by the government.

There is real fighting and real bloodshed every hour of the day: in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in a dozen other ‘terror-filled places’ of the world. In fact, the war on terror begins anew every morning: at every breakfast table, every sitting-room and every tube-train and tram in the land. It’s a mighty battle, to be sure. The Long War. It’s a battle for hearts and minds, principally minds – mine and yours. Every time you read, and accept without questioning, the words chaos, fear, terror, the war on terror, you unconsciously help strengthen the concept, and a concept, if believed in by enough people for a long enough time, becomes and stays a reality.

Terror is a state of mind. Choose your own state of mind. Do not believe in terror and certainly do not believe in the thing called the war on terror. These things simply do not – cannot – exist, unless you, by your thoughts, words and actions, choose to give them life. Remember what the man said? “The revolution will not be televised”. The revolution, the battleground, is in our heads, in our minds, and not, ultimately, on the streets on Basra and Baghdad. What we all believe to be true and necessary things in this world, these beliefs, opinions and attitudes are where the real battle takes place. It began the day you first opened your eyes all those years ago, is influenced by every thought, word and deed and will continue, for as long as you are capable of free and independent thought – and not a moment longer.

In George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984, an elite member of the ruling totalitarian party sets out the desired mentality of the everyday citizen …

‘It is necessary that the Party member be a credulous and ignorant fanatic whose prevailing moods are fear, hatred, adulation and orgiastic triumph. In other words it is necessary that he should have the mentality appropriate to a state of war. It does not matter whether the war is actually happening and, since no decisive victory is possible, it does not matter whether the war is going well or badly. All that is needed is that a state of war should exist.’

In 1984, there exists a state of perpetual, but carefully-managed and orchestrated warfare between three global power blocs. Such a situation is uncomfortably close to that of ‘The Long War’, George Bush’s short-lived re-classification of the war on terror, a war which cannot be won either by grammatical definition (terror being an abstract noun) or because, in fact, it is not in the interests of a small yet hugely powerful section of global society. And why is it not in certain interests that the war be won? 1984 again: quote “If the High … are to keep their places permanently – then the prevailing mental condition must be controlled insanity.” Unquote. In a world where foreign forces invade and continue to occupy sovereign nations in breach of international law and on the pretext of what have long turned out to be lies, fuelled in reality by the desire for a consolidation of regional power, well, I think that we too exist within such a controlled insanity.

This article is not meant to be a polemic or rant against the Western presence in the Middle East. It is, rather, a gentle and, I hope, timely reminder: always to think for yourself, to remain alert to what exactly you do and don’t believe to be true, to keep the media, the government and its many systems of misinformation well at arm’s length. And most essentially, I mean to be positive. This is not 1984, this is reality. And in reality, you get to write a new page every day. Choose your words with care.

A foreshadowing (alcoholism)

2007-11-25T13:09:00.000-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Radio Alfa, Krakow, 25th November 2007

Like most of us, I don’t really know what ‘alcoholism’ is. Although we use and abuse the words alcoholic, alcoholism, and alcohol particularly, I have a limited knowledge of what the words mean exactly. And yet I do have a vested interest in the subject, for my father was an alcoholic. He died two years ago, of a heart attack, his system wracked by years of alcohol abuse.

Like many alcoholics, my dad left the family home - soon after the birth of his two sons, finding the parental responsibility too much on top of the traumas that had scarred both his childhood and now his adulthood. In the language of the early 1970’s, he dropped out. He lived for the next thirty years in a thirty-storey tower block in the centre of a large English city: the concrete jungle, he called it. The tower blocks of post-war England were once shiny, new and full of hope. But the cracks soon began to appear, the concrete developed concrete cancer and naïve optimism was replaced by premature aging and cynicism. And thus he lived a perfect existence in his hole in the ground in the sky.

It was the 1980’s and England was booming: in the champagne bars of London, money men pissed away centuries of industry while Margaret Thatcher talked of ‘the trickle-down effect’. But, in the steel and coal-towns of England, all I saw were broken families from the once-proud communities and societies which Thatcher said didn’t exist. A self-fulfilling prophecy if ever there was one.

I sometimes wonder if a man’s life is just one big self-fulfilling prophecy. Even without the responsibilities that most other men seem desperate to have (a family, a job), my father continued to drink for the next thirty years. And each visit I made to him saw him get a little older, a little greyer, a little smaller, in every way. He once repeated to me the oft-quoted maxim that ‘For years you take from the bottle, and then one day the bottle starts taking from you.’ In my father’s case, I couldn’t say when that tuning point came, as it must, for any heavy drinker, eventually. But knowing him as I did, probably the bottle started taking from him the very first time he tasted, as he called it, ‘my lord alcohol’. Ten, twelve, fifteen years of age? Like many an alcoholic, he was doomed from the first drink. Deep childhood traumas combined with a weakness of spirit crippled him, tying one hand behind his back, but leaving his drinking arm free.

We think it’s easy to spot an alcoholic, certainly the more pathetic cases. Here, in Krakow, grey shambling men splutter and argue with cronies on street corners or collapse - bodies swimming in cheap, strong booze - on park benches, to sleep it off before the next round of self-mutilation can begin. Sure, they’re the chronics who remember only two things: where their bed is and where to get the cheapest, strongest hooch. But they weren’t born like that, stinking of booze in their mother’s womb. And there are, of course, many shades of alcoholism, many types of alcoholic and many ways to use and abuse alcohol. I do not have an alcohol problem, at least not in comparison to anyone honest enough to stand up and say in front of other people: ‘My name is John Marshall and I am an alcoholic’, as my father, like millions like him around the world, do in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. However, at 40 years of age, I’m finally beginning to learn something about my life and my past experiences. I know now that alcohol has, on occasion, helped damage both my relationships and my self of self-worth. But, whether through hard work, chance or the grace of God, I know I shall never follow in my father’s footsteps. I once spent a month working with an American actor and recovering alcoholic. I asked him what he thought of my drinking habits, of my youthful excesses and partying of that time. ‘Certainly not alcoholism’, he replied. ‘But possibly a foreshadowing’.

A foreshadowing. Is a shadow a sign of something that already exists or rather a warning of what may be? I could, if I wanted, let an alcohol dependence happen, let it creep up on me. Especially in this society, especially in Krakow. Not a shambling drunkenness, of course, but an over-dependence on the social lubrication that is alcohol. Many people’s social lives revolve around the consumption of alcohol and, through legalisation and taxation, governments encourage this. Most people who drink, I am sure, would like to cut back, just a little.

But then I remember my father’s face when my visit coincided with his government benefit money: ‘Better to live like a king for a day, John’, he would say, toasting my health, ‘than a pauper for a fortnight!’ He would then break into a verse of two of his favourite song, ‘Giro Calypso’, penned himself specially for the fortnightly occasion and I would make my excuses and leave him in a pub with a fifty-foot bar while the going and his legendary humour were good, not wishing to witness the three-day binges, Dantesque hell-holes, outbursts and recriminations, mostly against himself, which would usually follow.

The last time I saw my father was just after his triple-heart bypass, a couple of years before he died, having ignored the doctor’s pleas to quit drinking and smoking. I decided never to see him again. After thirty years of drink, I no longer recognised him. A greyness lay heavily about him, like a fog, malevolent, cruel, like a cancer oozing out of his dying body. His eyes were gone, but, most distressingly, so had the mind. There was nothing of any value left: the zany English humour, the joy of simply being alive, the good-hearted mockery of those who daily confine themselves in suits, commuter trains or factories, all was gone. The bottles had finally drunk their fill of him and tossed him aside. He was just one more grey man, old before his time, walking alone on the streets of Birmingham, afraid of his own shadow and everyone else’s.

In truth, I knew and still know little of my father’s existence after he left the family home. He ran from anyone who may have been able to help or comfort him, that much is clear: his mother, his brothers and sisters as well as, later, his own wife and children, all of whom reminded him in some way of the pain and guilt he had experienced as a child and sought to blot out with alcohol and a self-imposed exile from humanity. However, there was one group he welcomed with open arms: a family whose members knew each other only as ‘Lincoln John’, ‘London Barry’ or ‘Birmingham Mary’. Alcoholics Anonymous was and is a lifeline for millions like my father. There, they ask no questions. Why should they? All the stories end in ‘rock bottom’ and, anyway, they know more than most what liars alcohol has makes of us. Instead, it’s enough just to be able to walk in sober, stand up and say, perhaps for the first time, ‘My name is John and I am an alcoholic’.

Alcoholic or not, we each of us, somewhere, have pain or shame which we are holding tight within or perhaps denying even exists. But once this truth, this hurt, is faced, openly and without self-deception or condemnation, we begin the healing process. Immediately, we feel a flicker and a promise of hope. Something tells us that we are not alone, there are others with the same hurt and we know, in the depths of our spirits, that we will never be alone again.

© John Marshall 2007

RFID (microchip) technology

2007-11-25T13:08:00.000-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Krakow, September 2007

I shall be giving out a few web addresses at the end of this article, so get a pen and paper ready.

Did you know that if you buy a retail product from a large company such as a national supermarket chain, as well as the product, you might also be taking home with you an electronic tag, called a RFID (or radio frequency identification) chip? An RFID is a tiny microchip, stamped onto an increasing number of consumer products at the time of manufacture. It is designed to communicate its exact location to the manufacturer and retailer. For instance, products as diverse as television sets, toothpaste and boxer shorts are now routinely tracked by manufacturers and retailers for logistical, stocktaking and marketing purposes. How common is it? Well, for example, Wal-mart, the largest retailer in the world is encouraging its 20,000 suppliers to incorporate RFID chips into their products at the time of manufacture. Whilst only 600 (or 3%) of these have chosen – or can afford – to do this, there will, no doubt, come a time when Wal-Mart refuses to trade with suppliers who do not put chips onto their products. No chip, no deal.

Well, you know, I’m no businessman and, to be honest, if big business really wants to minutely monitor and track its products from production line to cash till, then fine, whatever makes them happy. Trouble is, that’s just the start of it. Gillette, for example, recently made use of RFID technology in a very un-customer-friendly way. A couple of years ago, in a Tesco supermarket in Cambridge, England, a small, hidden camera was placed opposite the shelf with the Gillette razors. Every time someone picked up a pack, the chip sent a message to the camera which then took a photo of the unassuming shopper. Cameras by the checkout tills then took a photo of each customer in the checkout queue. If a person on the first photo (picking up the razors) didn’t appear on a second photo (paying for razors) by the time he or she left the shop, an alarm was raised and the shopper (or, possibly, thief) apprehended. A pretty clever was of dealing with shoplifters, but do you really want to be photographed every time you take something off a supermarket shelf and treated as a potential thief every time you go shopping?

What is not so well known by the general public is that every time we take home an RFID-chipped product, the chip is still capable of transmitting its location to any interested parties with the necessary receiving equipment. Manufacturers and retailers say that, as there is no commercial value in such longer-term tracking, they would not be interested in putting into place the necessary huge and expensive network of radio receivers. But they would say that, wouldn’t they? And, anyway, how would you like your underwear to be keeping the whole world updated on your movements?

The plain fact is that the technology exists for every single item in the world to be given its own unique item code. Whereas, as present, a particular brand e.g. a tube of Gillette’s 100ml red and blue striped toothpaste, has its own bar code, there are plans to identify each and every single manufactured item with its own unique item code – a different number scanned and tracked for every single tube of toothpaste, pair of socks, DVD or morning-after pill. Now perhaps I’m missing something here but why exactly should a retailer (or anyone else for that matter) wish to be updated minute-by-minute with the location of each particular item unless it foresees a near-future where the product tracking extends beyond the cashdesk, into our car boots and, from there, into our sitting-rooms, kitchens and bathrooms.

To be fair, it is suggested that such technology would enable faulty, or even dangerous goods, to be more easily traced and recalled. Product recalls would no longer be hit-and-miss affairs using full-page scary newspaper ads. Instead, retailers would send messages to the chips on faulty products. What’s that strange beeping sound coming from the fridge? It’s that jar of guacamole dip you bought yesterday, squeaking to be sent back to the Walmart mothership for a bit of TLC. Your food and drink reporting its location and current status back to head office? No problem! Just talk to the Eastman Kodak Company who have filed two patents for the development of ingestible and digestible RFID chips. The idea here is that chips would be put into medicines which, when swallowed, would transmit data about the body’s interaction with the drug. In principle, perhaps a good idea with a possible place in future healthcare. But potentially, a very invasive activity capable of great misuse.

Some people have suggested that pill bottles in medicine cabinets be tagged with RFID devices to allow doctors to remotely monitor patient compliance with prescriptions. All very well, but what if you don’t quote comply unquote? Perhaps granny forgets to take her pills or decides she doesn’t want them this week. Will the doctor, semi-sponsored by multinational drug companies and with his all-seeing electronic RFID eye, decide that granny must take her pills or else … ?

The more you look into radio-frequency technology, the more it seems to be (or soon will be) all around us. For example, the European Central Bank is quietly working to embed RFID tags in the fibers of Euro banknotes. The tag would allow money to carry its own history by recording information about where it has been, thus giving governments and law enforcement agencies a means to literally "follow the money" in every transaction. If and when RFID devices are embedded in banknotes, the anonymity that cash affords in consumer transactions will be eliminated. Of course, the standard defence to such intrusions into private life is “If you’re not a criminal, you’ve nothing to hide.” To this, I have two standard responses. The first is that, quite simply, I do not wish the state (and, increasingly, private business) to intrude any more than is absolutely necessary in my life. You know, not so very long ago, it was considered bad manners to request or to disclose details of one’s private life. Private time and a private life were dearly valued and jealously guarded. Not so now, of course, in the age of the internet and blogosphere. The world changes and, at 40 years old, I’m not that old that I’m not a part of the online revolution. But neither do I consider it strange or unhealthy not to want to share all my private details with the world, especially the world’s governments.

My second response to “Only criminals need fear the state” is that not all of us agree to what should and should not be criminal activities. In an age when western governments seem intent on prying ever-closer into our lifestyles and practices, what is legal today becomes suspect tomorrow and illegal next week. Silent, unnoticed, but ever-watchful technologies like CCTV cameras and, shortly perhaps, RFID chips are pushing us steadily backwards, backs against the walls, the notion of – and need for - private space threatening shortly to become old-fashioned and quaint. Further down the line, a private life may come to be regarded as bizarre or even unhealthy. Oh, I know it’s starting to sound all very Orwellian: Big Brother, Thought Police and all that. And I’ve have to agree with you, were it not for the fact that around 2,000 people have been implanted with RDIF chips. That’s right: microchips implanted inside human bodies. It sounds like the stuff of science fiction, doesn’t it? But welcome to the future. Human implants (as they’re called in the trade) are not science fiction, but reality, today, 14th October 2007. Around 2000 people in the world have already chosen to have a microchip about the size of two grains of rice implanted in their bodies. The question is why do they now see themselves as nothing more than a product, an oven-ready chicken for example, to be chipped, scanned and identified by anyone with the technology, money or right connections?

Well, maybe you’ve heard about Baja Beach nightclub in Barcelona, amongst others, that allows you to queue-jump by brushing your microchip-implanted shoulder against an electronic scanner, thereby removing the need to show ID or to pay cash for drinks. By now, you’re probably expecting me to be against this. However, as a lot of people go to nightclubs in search of casual sex, then I’d much rather these Latin morons procreate with each other and leave those of us with more respect for our bodies alone.

More seriously is the issue of personal health and safety. At the moment, one of the biggest current ‘selling points’ of the RFID chip is that, in case of accident or emergency, the already 2,000 or so implanted people are able to be scanned by doctors and nurses who may then view their medical details on an internet database. For this, of course, both patient and hospital must pay subscriptions to the chip’s manufacturer, VeriChip Corporation. Many hospitals in the USA have already signed up to this database and are operating in this manner right now. VeriChip Corporation says that people implanted with microchips stand a better chance of receiving more timely and appropriate healthcare, saving both lives and, for the hospitals and doctors’ practices, time and money. On the face of it, human microchips would thus seem to be a great aid to effective healthcare, in the same way that electronically-tagging your newborn child or aged parent in a rest home would seem to improve personal security. (Again, these are realities right now). But immediately the thought arises in my mind: might there come a time when we will only be given emergency medical treatment, access to natal and childcare units, residential homes etc. on condition that we have been implanted with a microchip or have agreed to put an electronic band around our baby’s wrist? To those of you who find such a reality manifestly totalitarian, well, good: you are entitled to your opinion. It is your right to disagree. For now. But what about tomorrow? And next year? When the state propaganda tells us that we have to have microchip implants because the health services are overstretched and under-funded. Would it be wrong to argue? Would you, in fact, be given the choice? Would you, good and lawful citizen that you are, suddenly find yourself questioning the role and rightful powers of the state, harbouring thoughts of mental and civil disobedience in an effort to maintain your privacy and your humanity? For remember, when only criminals have something to fear, it is as easy as the stroke of a president’s pen to make us all criminals.

Next week, I shall be continuing this article on the erosion of civil liberties and the steady incursion of the state into our day-to-day affairs. In the meantime, if you would like to know more about RFID technology or human microchip implants, you can go to the following websites …

http://www.nocards.org/ (look for the link to RFID on the left)
www.implantedmicrochip.com
www.verichipcorp.com

… or search the internet for ‘RFID’ or ‘microchip implant’, for example, on Wikipedia. You can also write to me, John Marshall, at jpm1234@hotmail.com and read my blog at http://krakowjohn.blogspot.com/.

Media Fear

2007-11-25T13:06:00.002-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Krakow, August 2007

For as long as I can remember, the media has misused and overused the words ‘fear’ and ‘chaos’, usually in screaming headlines and usually unnecessarily, hyperbolically. And whilst I can only comment on the British media, I am pretty sure the situation is the same in other, principally Western, countries.

This predilection for extreme, scary words can partly be explained by the media’s apparent need to grab our attention, to excite and shock: as our blood pressure rises, so, it seems, does newspaper circulation. In Britain, at least, we are all used to such headlines as “Transport chaos as two inches of snow fall in a single day!” Now, whilst I freely admit that the combination of a little inclement weather and Britain’s inadequate transport system can indeed cause sudden problems, the use of the precise word chaos is nothing more than an over-worn cliché and we, the reader, can usually make up our own minds about the real meaning of the word chaos (the snow causing you to arrive at work an hour late, for example, as opposed to being plunged suddenly into a primeval state of disorder and inherent unpredictability). But then why do the media love this word so much? Is it merely because they can’t help sensationalising news stories or is it also because the word ‘chaos’ unsettles us, frightens us?

The second scary word beloved by the media is ‘fear’. Fear, it seems to me, is quite different from chaos in its effect upon the listener or reader. To be sure, the use of the word ‘fear’ is sometimes entirely appropriate to the article. But usually it is used with the sole intention of generating fear (or anxiety) itself: literal, physiological, emotional fear. Take another sample headline: “Fears continue to grow over the whereabouts of a missing teenager”, or this one: “A group of mountain-climbers are feared to have died last night” (in passing, we may note the media’s use of the abstract noun ‘fear’ as a verb, thus allowing its use in an ever-widening range of situations). Such anxiety-inducing headlines as these are everyday occurrences and we are passively complicit: we hand over our money, pick up a paper and spread the virus in pockets and briefcases or allow these disturbing words and emotions to be transmitted and broadcast onto our TVs and laptops.

And, in the end, are these ‘human interest’ stories in fact fearful? I don’t think they are. Yes, of course I am sorry that a young woman may have been abducted or that a party of mountain-climbers have perished several hundred or thousand miles away but I would argue that many such quote “news items” unquote are of little or no interest to the rest of us. Do you really wish to be notified of every distant abduction, house fire, murder and cot death in the country – or world, for that matter? Yes, knowledge is indeed power and in many ways the global village is a beneficial reality. We may choose to send a loving thought or donation to the disaster appeal fund but, be honest, more often, we don’t. Most of us, most of the time, simply allow a flow of sentiment to wash steadily over us, tut-tutting as we are led by the hand to the next apparently necessary piece of chaos or fear.

And even if we did wish to keep informed of every sad, tragic and fearful global occurrence, we simply don’t have the time or the attention-spans. The media is well aware of this: notice how they all seem to agree upon a certain story to be fed to us: hourly, daily, weekly, relentlessly.

The thing about ‘fear’ is, that like forest-fires and lies, it spreads quickly and easily. It has long been commonplace for fear to be inserted into what would otherwise be a much more mundane news story: for example “It is feared that several hospitals may close this year” et cetera. What’s wrong with using another, more expressive and accurate verb? “It is thought, believed, rumoured” etc. The answer, of course, is that wouldn’t be as sensational, not so … scary. Someone, somewhere, wants you to be afraid.

And yet it would seem that it’s not enough any more to be merely afraid. You have to be terrified. Yes, ‘terror’ is the new word, the new thing. Suddenly, terror is on everyone’s lips. For the media, for politicians and advertisers, fear is … sexy. Open your paper, turn on your TV, check the net: what do you see? ‘Terror!’ Of course, terror’s been around for quite a while. Terrorists. IRA terrorists, for example. Us Brits grew up with that, got used to it, even. And they were real enough, those terrorists. In Northern Ireland alone, there are thousands of gravestones, ruined lives and families to testify to the reality of the terrorist’s bullet and bomb. But the trouble with terrorists is that they can be beaten or negotiated with. The terrorists, at some point, stop being terrorists: they die, grow old, renounce violence or become politicians. History shows that there is always an end to terrorism. But the need for terror - in some minds, at least - is never-ending. The vacuum in our minds must be filled – by those in power, by those with power, by those who want - and are determined – to keep their power.

‘The War On Terror’. Every day for the past four or five years, we have heard about the war on terror – terror which is not an army, not flesh and blood, but ‘terror’, grammatically, an abstract noun. Like stupidity or deceit. Soldiers and civilians die every day. And what killed them? According to your government, according to your media, terror: an undefined, unknowable, unbeatable force. You see, as soon as you defeat terror here, terror pops up over there! And how do you know? Because you’re told, you’re told to know, by the media – sorry, by the government.

There is real fighting and real bloodshed every hour of the day: in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in a dozen other ‘terror-filled places’ of the world. In fact, the war on terror begins anew every morning: at every breakfast table, every sitting-room and every tube-train and tram in the land. It’s a mighty battle, to be sure. The Long War. It’s a battle for hearts and minds, principally minds – mine and yours. Every time you read, and accept without questioning, the words chaos, fear, terror, the war on terror, you unconsciously help strengthen the concept, and a concept, if believed in by enough people for a long enough time, becomes and stays a reality.

Terror is a state of mind. Choose your own state of mind. Do not believe in terror and certainly do not believe in the thing called the war on terror. These things simply do not – cannot – exist, unless you, by your thoughts, words and actions, choose to give them life. Remember what the man said? “The revolution will not be televised”. The revolution, the battleground, is in our heads, in our minds, and not, ultimately, on the streets on Basra and Baghdad. What we all believe to be true, what we all believe to be true and necessary things in this world, these beliefs, opinions and attitudes are where the real battle takes place. It began the day you first opened your eyes all those years ago, is influenced by every thought, word and deed and will continue, as long as you are capable of free and independent thought.

In George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984, an elite member of the ruling totalitarian party sets out the desired mentality of the everyday citizen …

Quote. ‘It is necessary that the Party member be a credulous and ignorant fanatic whose prevailing moods are fear, hatred, adulation and orgiastic triumph. In other words it is necessary that he should have the mentality appropriate to a state of war. It does not matter whether the war is actually happening and, since no decisive victory is possible, it does not matter whether the war is going well or badly. All that is needed is that a state of war should exist.’ Unquote.

In 1984, there exists a state of perpetual, but carefully-managed and orchestrated warfare between three global power blocs. Such a situation is uncomfortably close to that of ‘The Long War’, George Bush’s short-lived re-classification of the war on terror, a war which cannot be won either by grammatical definition (terror being an abstract noun) or because, in fact, it is not in the interests of a small yet hugely powerful section of global society. And why is it not in certain interests that the war be won? 1984 again: quote “If the High … are to keep their places permanently – then the prevailing mental condition must be controlled insanity.” Unquote. In a world where foreign forces invade and continue to occupy sovereign nations in breach of international law and on the pretext of what have long turned out to be lies, fuelled in reality by the desire for a consolidation of regional power, well, I think that we too exist within such a controlled insanity.

This article is not meant to be a polemic or rant against the Western presence in the Middle East. It is, rather, a gentle and, I hope, timely reminder: always to think for yourself, to remain alert to what exactly you do and don’t believe to be true, to keep the media, the government and its many systems of misinformation well at arm’s length. And most essentially, I mean to be positive. This is not 1984, this is reality. And in reality, you get to write a new page every day. Choose your words with care.

Election Time

2007-11-25T13:05:00.001-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Krakow, October 2007

So, that’s another election over! Funny how quick they seem to come around, isn’t it! They certainly do in Poland! Fortunately, this one wasn’t a cliffhanger; Civic Platform winning by a clear ten per cent. No Florida-style shambles last Sunday! You remember Unimpresident Bush’s’s first victory in Florida 2000? The hanging chads, the recounts, the legal shennanigans? The whole fiasco laid the system bare and showed it for what it is: the machinery of elections and governments – illogical, unfair - strutting naked before us like the emperor with no clothes. But this time, many of us saw King George’s nakedness from the off and have been crying out for justice ever since. And all because of a few hanging chads: absolute power hanging by a thread. And when power means the power to save or destroy the global environment or murder possibly millions of innocent people in illegal wars, we may safely call that power ‘absolute’. Am I just another Brit knocking America? No, I am knocking the current US administration. Because from day one this Republican government was built upon lie and denial. And there is only one thing that can be said for it. It does not bow to popular opinion. It remains true to itself. It continues to run on lies and denial.

Now, watch my lips. Even ol’ Bill Clinton knew that ‘It’s the economy, stupid!’. ‘Pity George Doubleyer wasn’t listening (perhaps he was playing golf at the time, or busy ruining another of his daddy’s oil businesses). Whatever. Let’s start with the American economy. It’s not a pretty sight. Zero Bush fiddles on Capitol Hill while the economy burns, destroying hundreds of thousands of sub-prime families in a matter of weeks. Sure, the Federal Reserve Bank quickly bailed out the poor lenders, but who was there to rescue the people? Once given a poor credit status on some dismal database, their only sin was to aspire to own their own home, one of the many ‘American dreams’. In their insatiable desire to bleed the people for every cent possible, the moneymen offered vulnerable people the chance to improve their lot in life by buying their own homes. But when the party ended and the markets demanded their pound of flesh, who suffered? The greedy, irresponsible lenders? No, the Fed looks after its own (give or take the odd engineered crash, of course). The American people lost. As usual, the little people, who, unlike Mary Astor and all the other pigs with snouts in the trough, are decent and stupid enough to pay taxes. At least most of the sub-prime real estate had already been destroyed in New Orleans, by Hurricane Katrina and damp squib Bush. Thank God for global warming, hey, guys!

Global warming, global warming, global warming … . Have you ever noticed when you say the same word over and over again, how it begins to lose its meaning? No? You should try it! It’s very easy. Even ol’ Doubleyer can do it. For example, close your eyes and repeat this simple phrase: evil, lying bastards, evil, lying bastards, evil, lying bastards. Actually, it’s amazing just how many politicians can do this little trick. Take Blair or Brown, for example. They’re almost as good as Bush (or Rupert Murdoch, for that matter).

Ah, Rupert Murdoch! What a fine purveyor of truth and incisive political analysis! (Just to recap, Rupert Murdoch, the Australian media magnate, is one of the most powerful men on the planet. He owns hundreds of newspapers, tv channels, satellite channels, and God knows what else besides. As such, he is a part of your life. He is inside your head, shaping your so-called thoughts, whether you like it or not. And why is he inside your head? Because, as the smug car stickers say: ‘free trade works’!).

Remember when Hamlet was in the library and Claudius asks him what he was reading? ‘Words, words, words’, said our hero, dismissively. That’s how I feel on the rare occasions I listen to politicians or dare myself to read something from the Politburo - sorry, daily press. Oh, sure, there is original, honest thought out there. But you have to search for it. You won’t find it in the tabloids, in the quality papers and certainly not on the 6 o-clock news, with its preference for drama and nervous excitement over truth and objectivity. You have to disentangle yourself from the matrix of spin, deception and downright lying that is The Sun, The Telegraph and Fox News. Thank God for the internet! For all its faults and inaccuracies, it is (for now) a largely unpoliced, independent avenue of free speech and honest inquiry.

However, like Hamlet’s mind, I seem to have strayed a little. I was busy attacking the current US administration over its environmental record. But that’s like attacking former Beach Boy Brian Wilson over his ‘Smile’ record. A great work, delivered over thirty years late by a half-crazed genius. America has a crucial role to play in environmental management, but not quite yet, it seems. Instead, Bush and the oil lobby continue to play in the sandpits of Saudi and Iraq while the rest of the world – China and India included – face up to reality and the real world order. ‘It’s the environment, stupid!’

Out of curiosity, I once read the opening sentence of a book on economics. It read: ‘Any economy that is not growing year on year is an efficient and failing economy’. I thought about this and saw that it was a lie. When the global economy is based on the extraction and inefficient use of raw materials (e.g. oil, coal, gas, wood), without adequate reinvestment or replacement (e.g. by reforestation), it is mathematically impossible for economies (measured in standard terms) to continue to grow, year on year, ad infinitum. Something’s gotta give and, of course, it’s the environment, stupid.

This is the where it gets a bit hazy. If we as individual citizens can work it out, then why can’t the politicans? Why can’t the so-called leaders of the industrialised world see the train crash approaching? The truth is that they see it very well, but that they don’t care. Influenced by big business, oil and the military-industrial complex they, like the sub-prime mortgage lenders, are desperately bleeding the planet and its peoples for everything they can before the game is finally up and we finally turn on the emperor, for shame. Clear-thinking, rational people across the world are now, for example, wondering just how the hell Bush and his dwindling bunch of neo-con cronies can even consider invading Iran, given the shoot-em-up carnage that is Iraq, and the body bags shipped back to yet more families whose trust has been betrayed and whose hearts will never heal. And all because the oil firms, the Halliburtons and all those other selfish, short-term idiots know that the game is nearly up. A few more years is all they have left to rape the planet and its peoples. They’re starting their cars and slamming dollar bills into briefcases as we speak.

My point is this: take control of your own thoughts. If you find truth and decency in politics and big business, rejoice in it, encourage it. But do not expect it: do not expect those with great power to live, much less improve, your life for you. They are looking after themselves. They do not care for you or your problems.

And that is actually a wonderful, wonderful thing. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, we are being given an opportunity to stand on our own feet, to think for ourselves, to make our own decisions and to develop as individuals as never before. Most of what counts for thought is actually the passive acceptance of someone else’s thoughts and will. We need to make more of our own thoughts. And it’s really such a simple process. When a thought appears in your head, ask yourself sometimes whether you actually believe in the thought: is it your own, original thought or, for that moment, is your mind merely a stopping-off point, a relay station, for someone else’s ideas. In the battle for the control of your own mind, I wish you good luck, because I know that you will win that battle. Starting from now.

An immigrant’s thoughts on returning to Krakow

2007-11-25T13:02:00.000-08:00

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Krakow, October 2007

I’ve just come back from a week’s walking and camping in Devon, south-west England. The sun shined brightly as me and my girlfriend hauled rucksack, sleeping bags and tent around one of the most beautiful stretches of coastline in the country. As an unfit, middle-aged man, I was anxious how my body would cope. Surprisingly well, it turned out, and that old knee problem from my abortive Pennine Way trip many years ago seems to have healed up nicely. All this by way of saying that I stepped off the Ryanair plane last Saturday night feeling like a new man.

Under a full, crisp, Krakowian moon, the Balice shuttle bus whisked us efficiently the thirty or so metres from the aircraft to Customs. This fifteen-second hop always seems quite unnecessary to me. Is it a piece of classic British health & safety stowed away to Poland via an Extraordinary Rendition flight, a nod to a full-employment Communist past or, and this I suspect, a simple act of kindness to us, the weary travellers? Either way, it is infinitely preferable to the fifteen-minute slog through the Essex countryside when arriving at London Stansted.

Owing to my somewhat old-fashioned and probably reactionary English attitude to standards of public behaviour, I have, for as long as I can remember, always adopted a sedate, almost langorous, pace when joining a queue, considering any unseemly jostling or scrambling for position to be rather barbaric, certainly not ‘British’. However, I’ve been an expat for two years now and, hopping quickly first off the bus, I found myself the first to stand before the guard at passport control, looking just over his shoulder with a carefully-constructed mix of innocence (me, a terrorist?) and affected boredom in an effort to convince him I feel just the same as he does and the sooner he lets me back onto Polish soil, the sooner both he and I can go home. He appears not to notice my subliminal attempt at camaraderie and merely slides my passport back to me, his gaze already transferred to the babcia behind me, who is already digging her passport into my back, in mute defiance of both regulations and what was once-upon-a-time known as ‘personal space’.

On the bus, I’m immersed, cocoon-like, into blissful ignorance as the still largely-unfamiliar Polish language begins to bubble all around me. I’m tired of being shouted at from invisible speakers to buy Ryanair scratchcards and to choose from the exclusive range of in-flight purchases. Now, as the familiar houses and blocks slip past in the night, I relax, safe in the knowledge that whatever inanities and profanities are being muttered, most of them will slip harmlessly by.

I close my flat door behind me, disconnect myself from my rucksack (na koncu!) and, as a dear friend used to advise me, try to ‘feel how I feel’. It, in fact, feels good to be back in Krakow. And I like my flat. A little cold now in the autumn, but a small adjustment to the brown ceramic sentinel standing guard in the corner will soon sort that. I switched on the kettle and fired up some BBC radio comedy on the laptop.

Windows XP appears rudely disturbed by my presence. It yawns, rubs the sleep out of its eyes and staggers slowly out of hibernation.

Under the streetlight outside, an alcoholic shakily proffers his mate a cigarette and receives, in exchange, a swig of something nameless and purple from a clear glass bottle. I wonder, once again, just how many broken, middle-aged alcoholic men there are in Krakow. Tens of thousands? Maybe. For every one on the street, you can bet there are another ten creeping about in dosshouses and soon-to-be redeveloped attics and basements. Where do these poor souls go when they get their marching orders? Where now, for example, are all those dangerous individuals who, we hear, made it impossible to walk safely through Kazimierz before the fall of Communism began to reunite kamienicas with long-forgotten landlords?

Because of the passage of time, and the passing of both generations and title deeds, some of these nouveau landlords, of course, have little connection to the city and have probably never even set foot here. Strangers from afar remoulding the country and its economy. I’m an immigrant myself, of course. Sounds strange, doesn’t it? Me, an Englishman, an immigrant. ‘Funny how we all prefer the term ‘ex-pat’, when the name we give to the rest of the world is immigrant. Is it because many of us ‘ex-pats’ consider ourselves only temporary Krakowians, ready to skip off to the next country in a year or two or is it that the word ‘immigrant’ suggests a search for money and material gain while we are, in contrast, so wonderful, talented and comparatively affluent that ‘ex-pat’ is so much more appropriate: empowered, assured, cosmopolitan, safe?

If the truth be told, I am three things in one: ex-pat, immigrant and asylum-seeker. Firstly, I am an ex-pat, by which I mean that I am an educated Westerner who is blessed with opportunity and choice. Imagine, as a native English-speaker and teacher with money in my pocket, I can actually choose just about any country in the world to live in! Like most ex-pats, I am fairly affluent by Polish standards and I am also an ex-pat because I am able to skim along the surface of everyday Polish life without getting bogged down in details. It’s easy to be invisible in Poland. It’s easy not to pay taxes. It’s easy not to understand the language and remain aloof from day-to-day life. There is, to use Milan Kundera’s phrase, a ‘lightness of being’ in being an ex-pat.

But if immigration is about seeking a better standard of living, then I am also an immigrant as well as an ex-pat. Currently, I am in the process of buying a flat in Krakow and have also begun working for a company that never, never pays cash. After two years, I have this week officially become a resident, I have applied to the tax office for a tax number and I shortly intend to start my own business. Why this sudden loss of social invisibility? Money. I want more of it and I want it here, in Poland, where I don’t have to work as hard as I would in England - just like any other immigrant.

Oh, yes, I said I was an asylum-seeker, too. OK, maybe not in the real sense of the term but, come on, have you seen your country lately? Americans love America and I sure love England, but, to quote the bard himself, I fear that England has become quote a country afraid to know itself unquote. I am happy to be back in Poland. Sure, Krakow’s not all Rynek Glowny and beautiful Planty: outside the old city dogshit, graffiti and alcoholics assault the eye at every turn while the city and its people struggle to find a sense of self and of pride after generations, if not centuries, of humiliation and subjugation to foreign powers. But at least Poland is moving, slowly and painfully, in the right direction, not squandering its inheritance, afraid of its own shadow like England. I am here seeking asylum, not from oppression or tyranny, but from cultural ignorance, mental slavery and moral and political cowardice. Now of course Eastern Europe (like much of the world) is seeking to emulate the west in so many ways: its embrace of free-market economics and the attendant fracturing of once-supportive communities, for example. Poland is not a paradise and I am very glad I don’t understand the moronic television news or the foul-mouthed teenager standing next to me on the tram. But I am lucky: in England, it would be nigh-impossible to escape such things. Here, I am an ex-pat, an immigrant and an asylum-seeker, and am thus largely able to cherry-pick from Krakow and Poland only those experiences and realities I wish to.

One thing that definitely is ‘ex-pat’ and not ‘immigrant’ or ‘asylum-seeker’ is that sense of difference, the feeling of otherness that we all enjoy so much. I suspect that, for many of us, besides the wanderlust and sense of cultural inquiry that first sent us from our shores, there is also a desire to be a little out of focus, just a bit off the radar in a way that we could never be back home. We enjoy being the foreigner, the one looking in instead of out. As we wonder, marvel, gripe and groan about our new surroundings, we sometimes also stop and learn things about ourselves and those around us: things we’d never notice in our own cultures. And that’s worth a hell of a lot of dogshit!

All Saints' Day

2007-11-25T12:52:00.000-08:00

ALL SAINT’S DAY

First broadcast on Ex-Pat Radio, Krakow, October 2007

As my long-suffering English students fastened coats and snapped shut briefcases, I called out: ‘Enjoy your holiday, Piotr!’ Piotr turned, grinned and shook his head. ‘Better to say ‘Happy Holiday’, he corrected me, winking. Be happy but don’t enjoy, seemed to be the message; have some respect for the dead.

Like many ex-pats and immigrants, I took part in the All Saints’ Day observance last Thursday night, 1st November, and went to Krakow’s biggest and most famous cemetery, Rakowicki, here in Krakow. There can be few of us who have yet to experience All Saints’ night in Poland. All across the land, in cities, towns and villages, Poles make pilgrimages to place thousands and thousands of multi-coloured candles on gravestones, family tombs, mausoleums, graves of unknown soldiers, victims of communist oppression as well as poets, priests and painters, spectral lights of red, white, yellow and green conjuring up shadows which dance and flicker like wood nymphs in the night. The heavenly sight is an arresting one, certainly the first time: the branch of a willow gently brushing against some sleeping sarcophagus, ‘Here lies Jaciek’, long since gone. And in a ceremony repeated throughout the land, from the middle of it all, a church is overflowing, its open doors bathing the people and sleeping ones alike with kind and holy words, as mysterious and beautiful to me as an Arab call to prayer.

It is a dry, warm night and we walk slowly around the cemetery: cutting quickly off from the main paths, finding quiet delight in discovering ever-smaller avenues, which become quickly clogged with autumn leaves and roots of trees. I trip, regain my balance and check the unlit candle in my pocket. It’s still there, waiting for that empty grave. My girlfriend – who has no family members buried here - tells me it’s a tradition to place a candle on an empty grave and say a prayer for its owner. But, as you could warm your hands by the candle heat from most graves, finding an unlit one is no mean feat. Still, it’s good fun looking, all the same.

Most graves and tombs have several, or many, carefully and tastefully-arranged candles in shaped glass jars, placed there by reverent family members. Fresh pots of flowers, too, are provided, in rememberance of the dearly departed. And yes, lest you, o cynical soul, think my picture is a little too rosy, I’ve heard all about the Joneskis next door. You know, the ones you need to keep up with, especially in the village, where appearance is all. It gets like a competition, apparently. The biggest and most impressive candles, wreaths and flowers. At least one of my students hates it all and only takes the night-train to Hel (the northern peninsula, not the southern pergatory) for the money her family gives her, which will tide her over ‘til Christmas and the next family shindig. But scratch the modern surface and you’ll often find something deeper, pagan almost. I’m told that in some villages every inch of a grave may sometimes be covered with candles and flowers in the firm and solemn belief that such an over-abundance of familial love and good wishes will help speed the soul to heaven. I, for one, hope that story to be true. For we all know that Christianity, like all successful religions and cults before it, supplanted and suppressed pre-existing festivals, labelling them inferior, or ‘pagan’. And yet our intuition lives on: throughout the long dark days of first clerical and now consumerist subjugation, we cannot but feel the occult pull to remember, to recognise, once a year, at least, the need to connect, either with our ancestors or some part of ourselves, for most of us buried deep within for 364 days a year.

It is not surprising that human beings across the northern hemisphere should light fires and turn away from the maelstrom of everyday life and look towards the shadows now in the autumn. A year is like a day. The summer, like the heat from a busy working day, has died down and as the hot afternoon gives way to the cooler autumnal evening, it feels right to stop for a moment and reflect as we settle down for the long winter night. But why can similar scenes be found repeated across the world, not just in the autumn, but on the very same day, 1st November? Is there indeed some truth to the mystical belief that, on this day, the worlds of the living and of the dead draw close, overlap, even? And, if so, then no amount of date-changing or spiritual obsfucation will ever snuff out our awareness of the fact.

As in so many other ways, much of English culture has been either forgotten or torn apart in the case of progress and liberalism. Only a few days ago, I blithely, yet wrongly, told an inquiring Pole that, in England, we have only Halloween, a modern, American-influenced, tradition to our name. You, intelligent listener that you are, see immediately how foolish I was. The truth is that both All Saints’ Day, 1st November, and All Souls’ Day, 2nd November, were once celebrated in Britain just as much as in the rest of Europe and many other parts of the world besides. The first, All Saints’ Day, remembered all the saints in heaven while the second, All Souls’ Day, prayed for those in pergatory, neither in heaven nor in hell. However, to the revolutionary mind of the seventeenth century, such concepts smelt far too much of Popery and were discouraged as popular festivals as Protestantism and the Age of Enlightenment took gradual hold of the newly-United Kingdom.

And yet there I was placing a candle on an unknown grave, offering a silent prayer for an unknown soul in a foreign land, neither he nor I feeling part of a world that could stop for the silent fall of another autumn leaf.

They had laid on extra trams to ferry Krakowians to family graves and back to family homes. As always in any Polish crowd, there was character and style. Smart men with dickie-bows and pork-pie hats, who in England would look faintly ridiculous, strolled proudly past, escorting fur-coated women of a certain age, balancing freshly-sculpted bouffants through the crowds. Mothers held their smiling children’s hands as fathers struggled slightly beneath plastic bags full of candles for second cousins, twice removed. But at least he knows their names and, this year, just maybe, they’ll remember his.