12 March 1980

Car wash and cold pork broth

After a history class Ann and I go to the Victoria anticipating a good steak, they are well known for their "Chateaubriand". After we park the car two rather destitute men ask whether we'd like Giallina cleaned while we eat. I decline, she is clean enough. besides, they asked for three dollars, while on another occasion, when we were with Polish friends, the rate was only one and a half.

As we walk in we realize that Canaletto restaurant is closed. and the "taverna" does not have it on the menu. We settle for another lunch. A waiter still asks to change money as we are about to leave. As we walk away a bit disappointed a taxi man drives by and he also asks to change money. We find that the two men had claned our car anyway! Well, I give them 200 zloty.

We then go with Ann to various tourist offices where we find no information at all on Wroclaw, Gdansk or Lublin, three cities we'd like to visit over the next several weeks. Poland is clearly not geared up to welcome international tourism. Or domestic tourists, for that matter.

On the other hand we walk into a photographer's shop to get some passport size shots in anticipation for various visas we'll be applying for in the near future. We get 21 pictures each for only 71 zlotys! Several days later I will come back to this shop and have more photographs taken of me, and I will use them for my passports, driver's licences, ID cards etc for many years to come, to the point that by the time I ran out I hardly resembled the twenty year-old man pictured in them.

In the evening we dine with Marian and Ewa. Lots of pork and a special sausage, kind of a "coppa", made by Ewa and served with a tasty cold broth.

10 March 1980

Duck, moon and stars

After our usual morning classes we go for lunch at another "Duck Place", i.e. the restaurant Kmicic. I eat my usual duck, kaczka. Somehow there is never want of ducks in Warsaw.

In the evening we all go to a party at the home of a certain Leszek, also called Dyndol. Lots of friendly people and kanapki and vodka abound. People start behaving funny. A certain Jan sets up a barricade of furniture for the purpose of cornering Ann and making clear his predilection for her. This despite the fact that he is married, his wife Bozena is pregnant and everyone at the party is aware of this. I try to make some sense of this hitherto unheard of (to me) behavior but Alina explains to me that this is normal: "Jan is used to Bozena", she says, and it is natural that he is looking for fun with other women. All Poles do this, apparently, once they "get used" to their partner, and make no apologies for it. I will hear this expression on a number of occasions in the next couple of months. Apparently it is standard operating procedure.

Ann is a bit confused because at the same party Vadim promises "the moon and the stars" if she agrees to accept his love. Well, in the end the matter is resolved innocently and harmlessly, and we all go home safe, if a bit perplexed.


09 March 1980

Church in Warsaw

A pretty easy and uneventful Sunday.

We are not religious but Andrew and I decide to go and have a look at a Church downtown.

The Church is packed to the brim with people. In fact the crowd overflows the building and many faithfuls listen to the Mass from outside. We are of course aware that Poland is a very Catholic country. The official Church has found a modus vivendi with the Communist government, but it remains one of the few channels through which dissent can be aired, if cautiously.

The election of a Polish pope two years ago has galvanized the nation and has provided a ray of hope for the opposition to the Soviet domination.

08 March 1980

Another concert and meeting Polish girls

Wake up late, around noon for a lazy Saturday. Ann and I go for lunch to the Forum hotel (in later years bought by Novotel) but it's nothing special, a little disappointed for its price level. Ann has a bit of stomach ache, who knows why.

In the evening I go to another concert at the Chopin Society, the same venue as yesterdays' concert. Again Buchbinder but this time he plays Schumann and Beethoven.

I have been invited by Christopher, a Pole who speaks perfect English and German.

Ann has gone out with Vadim. After the concert I meet Andrew at the Stodoła (the barn) where we pick up three Polish girls and spend the rest of the evening with them, ending up at the Bazyliszek restaurant for ice-cream.

07 March 1980

Credit, Beethoven and bear steak

Usual classes in the morning.

Rudolf Buchbinder
At 5:00 pm we listen to a lecture by a Polish professor on "East-West Trade". He says nothing unpredictable: we need to increase East-West trade, we need to raise the volume of exchanges. He also asks for "cheap credit" from the West to finance it. Right. Well not surprising: Poland is running out of cash. During the 1970s Gierek's government has been splurging to keep people happy but the coffers are empty. Lacking market reforms cheap credit is the only way forward. I ask him how Poland could increase productivity and thus afford international credit but he is rather evasive. Poland, like other Comecon countries, is getting subsidies from the USSR in the form of cheap energy but it's not enough.

In the evening great concert by the Austrian pianist Rudolf Buchbinder. The three of us manage to get good seats (second row for only 60 zlotys).  All-Beethoven program, including the "Appassionata", one of my favorites.

After the concert we go for dinner at the Canaletto restaurant of the Victoria hotel and for the first time in my life I eat a steak of bear meat! Delicious. Only 1500 zlotys (about 13 dollars) for the three of us and this is the most expensive restaurant in the city. This can't work. Something has to give. The day ends with a long talk in the car with Ann, until 3:00am.

05 March 1980

Pałac Kultury i Nauki

After our usual morning classes again for lunch in the university's cafeteria.  After which I go to the post office to call Rome. I am getting used to not having a phone at "home" as well as not having a phone number people can call me at.

Andrew and I then go downtown for a walk. Our target today is the Palace of Culture and Science. Highly controversial for some time, but we find really nothing special inside that we can access or appreciate. I actually kind of like the architecture of the Soviet style skyscraper, one of many such buildings "donated" bu the USSR to its socialist "brother socialist countries" in the 1950s, though it is easy to understand how Poles see is as a symbol of Soviet domination and therefore resent its intrusion into their capital's skyline.







Pensive Marco in dorm room, Italian flag on the wall
In the evening Ann goes out with Vadim, a Russian who is after her, and some Russian guys while Andrew and I decide to rest in our dorm. After a while, however, Andrew is bored and decides to go and check out the Hades bar/café our friends have recommended, but there is a concert tonight so not as much chance to socialize and pick up!

04 March 1980

Locked up in the dorm

In the afternoon we go to the Praga district of town to deliver two letters on behalf of some American friends of Andrew's. No success, we have the wrong address maybe, but can't find the people to whom the letter is written. Shame. We walk around a bit, it is a dark and desolate place. Dark. Mud everywhere, piles of mud in the streets. This is not a fun part of town... (NOTE 2013: it will change a lot over time though.)

After that we go to Hortex, an eatery serviced by a large food company, and have a good fruit salad with ice-cream and walnuts for 46 zloty.

The three of use spend a quiet evening in our dorm room, chatting and having a light dinner. Around midnight, when it's time for Ann to leave and go back to her dorm we realize all the dorm's doors are locked! No way to get out of the building, not even an emergency exit. Only a quarter (25 US cents) to the chubby, crancky and sleepy porter lady finally buys Ann the freedom to go back to her dorm a few hundred meters away, across the Independence Avenue.

This is a procedure that will become fairly common in the coming months: to get into the dorm late, to get out for a late party somewhere in town, and to let guests in and out the dorm after hours.

Italian flag by my bed

Bread, cheese and Vodka. Polish coat of arms and map on the wall behind Andrew

03 March 1980

Bison in Warsaw

Routine morning of classes at SGPiS.

In the afternoon we go to a public reading room. There are some international newspapers. Under a sign that reads "Newspapers from capitalist countries" there are two-week old copies of "L'Unità" (the offical paper of the Italian Communist Party!) and "La Stampa" (a newspaper owned by the Agnelli family, which also owns FIAT, which made a huge investment in a car factory in Poland). I suppose it all makes sense.

Marco and Marta
Later on Marta once again comes to my room and tries various moves on Andrew and me. Again without success.

I then go to the post office to call Rome. We have no telephone in our room, or in our dorm, and need to go and try our luck at the post office every time. It usually works. I have a funny conversation with my brother Fabio when I try to let him have our address: Ul Niepodlegloszczi (Independence) and when he asks for a spelling I can just utter "you write it as you read it"! As if it were the most obvious for an Italian to understand Polish pronounciation over a decrepit phone line.

(NOTE: As I put these notes in this blog, it is now 2013, my brother still does not miss an opportunity to make fun of me because of this, and he is right!)

Later on we have a chat with Stefan, a fellow student who is also a leader of the youth organization of the Communist party. He is a smart and very reasonable guy, not at all fanatic and in fact highly critical of the Russians. We have yet to find one single really dedicated Polish Communist in fact.

In the evening we go for dinner to Bazyliszczek, one of the best restaurants in town. It is another epicurian experience and for the first time in my life I eat bison steak. A sumptuous meal sets the three of us back by 1300 zloty (12 dollars) including wine and it's as much as we'll ever be able to spend in Warsaw.

(As I look at their website 33 year later, they no longer have bison on the menu. However they have Argentinian beef and Norwegian salmon. Panta rei...)

02 March 1980

Full churches in Warsaw

Get up around 9 and at 10 we go for lunch with Marian and Ewa, together with her brother, father and sister in law. They recommend a restaurant outside Warsaw, on the road to Katowice, called Mak. We buy some "black" gasoline on the way, it is now pretty much routine.

Ewa's father reads our hands, and guesses a number of our personal character traits with surprising accuracy.

Marian is very happy because he has just obtained his passport and asks to change some money. We are given the usual lecture on the "real" Polish economy, this time concentrating on the real estate market. Comes in handy because I am looking for a short let when my parents will come visit in the Spring.

Marian also tells us a lot about the international sales of furs. Like many other things, these are cheap in Poland, if you can find them, and can command a considerable profit if sold in the West.

As we drive around on this easy Sunday we notice a number of packed churches, with crowds of faithfuls overflowing outside the door. Catholicism has a long and deeply rooted tradition in Poland, we know that, but this is surprising. We are told that rallying around the Church is one way (legal and unobjectionable) to demostrate political opposition to the regime. This even though the Church has come to a number of inevitable compromises with the Communist regime. Or perhaps precisely because it has.

Quiet evening at home.

01 March 1980

Partying in the dorm

Andrew and Elzbieta

Evening party at the girls' dorm. One of an endless series of such parties we will attend during our stay i Poland, improvised on the flimsiest of excuses: it's my uncle's birthday, my parents' wedding anniversary... Anything goes to open a bottle of vodka and gobble up a few "kanapki", small open sandwiches topped with pickles, tomatoes, and the inevitable kielbasa (sausage), cheese, and anything else that happens to be at hand. Andrew and I are a bit tipsy but everyting is under control!

kanapki 
Elzbieta is a quiet, soft spoken lady whom I will remember for a heart shaped decal on her glasses. Her friend Bonga is very different exuberant, hard laughing.

Marco Bonga Andrew
Marta is on the offensive: she tries with all her might to get into my bed. Or Andrew's for that matter. Fun company, not so much politics tonight.