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Apr. 3rd, 2004 06:43 pmi'm in warsaw. i'm not supposed to be in warsaw. i'm supposed to be on the train to krakow. but it got cancelled. so we have 2 hours to spend in at the warsaw train station. fortunately it has an internet cafe. and poland is cheap so even internet cafes at train stations (as opposed to the back alley ones we usually hunt down) are not too expensive.
spent yesterday on the train to warsaw. got in late. no one spoke english. went the wrong way on the tram and found a sex shop instead of our hostel. had to take a taxi.
but today went much better. we went to the royal palace which is as splendid as a royal palace had ought to be and wandered the streets of old town. most of warsaw was destroyed in WW2 but they reconstructed the royal palace and old town so they look like they liked before. lots of lovely winding streets and several big open squares, all filled with street vendors. resisted much temptation to buy things.
we also saw, from the outside, the palace of culture. apparently the russians put one in the capital city of all the soviet countries. they're all identical and all incredibly ugly. imagine a huge concrete building, hunkering over the landscape. already not pretty. now add what they seem to have imagined to be ornamentation all along the top. sort of spheres and obelisks arranged in an imitation of classical ornamention. it only worsens the effect of concrete hideousness.
there are so many vendors selling flowers here, which makes me incredibly happy. all winter i forget how much i miss flowers but come spring they start appearing with the warm weather and i am in raptures. the royal holloway campus is covered in daffodils, which are one of my favorites. lovely, lovely lovely. and the streets of warsaw are full of flower vendors, which makes up for all the ads for sex shops.
last trip through europe we looked for saint sebastian. this time we are not going to so many art museums so we are instead looking for ice cream. more expensive but easier and tastier. you can't eat saint sebastian. or at least you wouldn't want to.
spent yesterday on the train to warsaw. got in late. no one spoke english. went the wrong way on the tram and found a sex shop instead of our hostel. had to take a taxi.
but today went much better. we went to the royal palace which is as splendid as a royal palace had ought to be and wandered the streets of old town. most of warsaw was destroyed in WW2 but they reconstructed the royal palace and old town so they look like they liked before. lots of lovely winding streets and several big open squares, all filled with street vendors. resisted much temptation to buy things.
we also saw, from the outside, the palace of culture. apparently the russians put one in the capital city of all the soviet countries. they're all identical and all incredibly ugly. imagine a huge concrete building, hunkering over the landscape. already not pretty. now add what they seem to have imagined to be ornamentation all along the top. sort of spheres and obelisks arranged in an imitation of classical ornamention. it only worsens the effect of concrete hideousness.
there are so many vendors selling flowers here, which makes me incredibly happy. all winter i forget how much i miss flowers but come spring they start appearing with the warm weather and i am in raptures. the royal holloway campus is covered in daffodils, which are one of my favorites. lovely, lovely lovely. and the streets of warsaw are full of flower vendors, which makes up for all the ads for sex shops.
last trip through europe we looked for saint sebastian. this time we are not going to so many art museums so we are instead looking for ice cream. more expensive but easier and tastier. you can't eat saint sebastian. or at least you wouldn't want to.
