Today, Wednesday, marked a full week since we left Washington, but already seemed as though we had covered a lot more time than that. As with Gdańsk, we had a local guide to show us the city during the morning, and most of that trip would be on foot, as much of the downtown is a pedestrian-only zone. Our first stop, after a very short bus trip, was the famous Racławice Panorama, which is a 50 x 375 foot cycloramic painting depicting the Battle of Racławice, during the Kościuszko Uprising. Similar to the famous Cyclorama in Gettysburg, it is a circular painting, which you view from the center. Along the edges are real-life props, which add in creating a natural perspective, giving one the feeling of being in the center of the action. Special lighting and artificial terrain create an added feeling of reality.
The project was conceived as a patriotic commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the victorious Battle of Racławice, a famous episode of the Kościuszko Insurrection, a heroic but ultimately failed attempt to defend Polish independence. The battle was fought in 1794 between the insurrectionist force of regulars and peasant volunteers under the famed Polish general, Tadeusz Kościuszko and the Russian army commanded by General Alexander Tormasov. While the Poles ultimately lost this war, which led to the subsequent erasure of Poland from the map of Europe, this was a symbolic victory over Russia, which remains a source of great national pride until this day. As for General Kościuszko, we had already heard his name quite a bit, and that would continue throughout the trip. Upon learning of the American Revolution, he sailed for America in June 1776 and joined the Continental Army. In addition to becoming a close confidant to General Washington, Kościuszko is known as the hero of Saratoga and Ticonderoga . He was charged by Major General Philip Schuyler (father of Alexander Hamilton's wife Eliza) to slow British forces, allowing the Continental Army to retreat from Ticonderoga. He succeeded in allowing forces to retreat, and then set the ground for the ultimate Battle of Saratoga, which was a resounding victory for the Americans, and which ultimately turned the tide of the revolution. He is also known as the "Father of Westpoint," as he surveyed and designed the military academy, and he designed the fortifications and defensive positions in southern Virginia, which led to the eventual defeat of British General Cornwallis. After the war, Congress promoted him to Brigadier General, but he was never paid a cent for seven years supporting the war cause, and eventually returned to Poland, where -- among other feats -- led the ultimately doomed uprising against Tsarist troops in modern-day Poland.
Anyway, the panorama was put on display in Lviv in a purpose-built building in 1894. It was dismantled and hidden in a barn after the German and Russian invasions of Poland in 1939 and managed to survive the war. It was relocated to Wrocław in 1946, but not displayed. Another purpose-built museum was constructed in 1967 for the panorama, but as the subject portrayed a Russian military defeat, it did not actually open to the public until 1980, as the Solidarity movement was beginning to burgeon. All that said, the panorama was very impressive. I knew nothing about the battle, but they did a wonderful job in the museum. They had wireless earpieces in over 30 languages. On regular cycles, they allow groups to walk up a winding circular staircase, up into the display, where you're handed an earpiece and they walk you through the battle, with lights and effects explaining things point by point. It was interesting from both a historical and artistic point of view.
 |
| Museum Housing the Racławice Panorama |
 |
| Entering the Panorama |
From the museum we walked toward the city center, which as I mentioned comprises a series of islands created from canals and converging rivers. Along the way we visited a very somber memorial erected to mark the 1940 Katyn massacre, in which more than 22,000 Polish military officers and intelligentsia prisoners of war were killed by the Soviet secret police. The order to execute captive members of the Polish officer corps was secretly issued by Joseph Stalin himself, but that only became known for certain after the collapse of the Soviet Union. German soldiers discovered mass graves near the Katyn Forest in 1943, attributing the slaughter to the USSR. Stalin cut off formal relations with the Polish government-in-exile when they asked for an accounting, and they continued to blame the killings on Germany until 1990, with the truth finally came out. We saw several memorials marking Katyn during our trip, though this was by far the most somber. We also saw several memorials to the so-called Smolensk Air Disaster of 2010. On that day, a delegation of very senior Polish officials was flying to the the Russian city of Smolensk, to mark the 70th anniversary of the Katyn massacre. The crash killed all 96 people on board, including Polish President Lech Kaczyński, his wife, Maria, the former president of Poland in exile, Ryszard Kaczorowski, the chief of the Polish General Staff and other senior Polish military officers, Polish Government officials, 18 members of the Polish Parliament, senior members of the Polish clergy, and relatives of victims of the Katyn massacre. All of these serve as reminders of just how sad Polish history truly is.
 |
| Memorial to the 1940 Katyn Massacre |
Things took a decidedly more upbeat turn from here, as we walked toward the riverfront and got a first glimpse of the beautiful old city. We also got to see our first gnome. Yes...gnome. I had heard and read about the hundreds of small gnome statues littered across Wrocław, but I did not know their history. In the 1980s, an anti-communist underground called the "Orange Alternative" started in Wrocław. Its main purpose was to offer a wider group of citizens an alternative way of voicing opposition to the authoritarian regime by means of a peaceful protest that used absurd and nonsensical elements. Members held marches, usually wearing bright orange gnome-like hats, to protest the treatment of dwarfs and gnomes. Their rationale was that the authorities would be hard pressed to prosecute them for publicly protesting the treatment and lack of rights for mythical creatures, and it worked. In 2005, a statue of a gnome was unveiled, to mark where the Orange Alternative held its first protest. Since then, gnome statues have been erected around the city, by private citizens and businesses alike. Each status is unique, and there are now more than 600, but some claim no one knows the real number. Our guide, Joanna, had already issued a challenge to our group, offering prizes to those who captured pictures of the most gnomes. As soon as we caught sight of our first statue, this one of a gnome washing her laundry along the riverbank, the contest was on! Many members of our group were quite competitive, including yours truly. I ended up "only" capturing just under 80 gnomes, whereas the winner had nearly double that! It was all great fun, and the historical background is quite interesting.
 |
| Wrocław |
We spent the next couple of hours with our guide, walking and riding through various parts of the city, to include multiple churches and the only remaining synagogue in the city. We saw another Umschlagplatz, from where trains departed for the death camps, and the synagogue is operational today, but fewer than 50 Jews currently live in the city.
I'll note that we saw our first large flower market in Wrocław. I had already commented to K and Anna several times that one of my most distinct memories of living in Poland was of all the flower stalls. Literally every street corner had a stall (or several) selling cut flowers. The tradition of presenting flowers whenever you visited anyone, for almost any reason, is very strong in Poland. Even if you met someone at the movies, for example, you were expected to exchange flowers. It does make for very fine-smelling theaters. I had already noticed in both Warsaw and Gdańsk that they stalls were all gone. I asked several of our guides if the tradition had changed, and I was assured it had not. Flowers, however, were now available at any time of day in supermarkets, to include the very ubiquitous 7/11-like markets that dot most every street corner. Such establishments didn't exist back in the 1990's. Anyway, one of the several central market squares in Wrocław was dedicated entirely to flowers, and it looked like what I remembered from my time in Warsaw.
 |
| In the Former Jewish Area of Wrocław |
 |
| The Wrocław Philharmonic |
 |
| Central Market Square, with Town Hall |
 |
| One of the Many Statues Moved From Lviv (in modern-day Ukraine) to Wrocław, with the Post-WWII Resettlements |
The afternoon was on our own, as was our dinner, and we all had different ideas on exactly what we wanted to do. For lunch we elected to try a Georgian restaurant. There is a very strong Caucasus influence in Wrocław, primarily from the people resettled here after the war, after the Germans were expelled. We had never had Georgian food. To say we enjoyed our lunch would be an understatement. We enjoyed it so much, we sought out Georgian food two more times during our trip, while in Kraków. We especially enjoyed their dumplings, which were the size of a small fist, and served with in a wrapped fashion, with a mushroom-like stalk on one end. You pick up the dumpling by the "stalk," hold it upside down, and take a small bite. The inside of the dumpling has meat and soup. After each bite, you are to slurp some soup, along with a morsel of meat. They were both fun and tasty.
 |
| At Our Georgian Lunch |
 |
| Georgian Dumplings |
Today was among the warmest of our trip, with temps in the high 80's and no clouds. We had already walked quite a bit. Anna elected to link back up with several others in the tour who were going to take the bus back to the hotel. She had not slept great the night before and welcomed some down time. K and I went the opposite direction. Gnome hunting along the way, we visited several areas we had missed or where we wanted to spend more time. We also wanted to take one of the various boat tours that were on offer. Our guide, however, had recommended we get our own boat, for the "full experience." Thanks to the magic of Google, I found the boat rental place and we headed over. By the way, I should mention that the cell phone and data coverage we had throughout the trip was as good, if not better, than what I have at home, and certainly better than on any other trip of ours. As another example of how the Poles have invested well in infrastructure, their cell networks are consistently rated among the best in Europe. I digress. We rented a small power boat, luckily with a sun cover, and following a very short tutorial from an older man with very limited English, we were off. We were only on the river for about 30 minutes, but we had a grand time, and even managed to get sunburned despite the cover.
 |
| Destruction of Wrocław at End of WWII |
 |
| Polish Pottery Anyone? |
 |
| Wrocław Botanical Gardens |
 |
| Our Boat Rental Stand |
We acquiesced and took an Uber back to the hotel, as we were pretty tuckered by this time. The Uber rides were ridiculously cheap. We looked up several restaurants before making our selection for dinner. We had wanted to use the tram which stopped right in front of our hotel, and this trip to dinner was our opportunity. The restaurant was billed as a traditional Wrocław establishment, which we learned meant that it had a decidedly German-themed menu...which none of us minded one bit.
Using an information sheet from our tour guide, we attempted to take the tram back to our hotel. As we later learned, however, the directions printed on the guide were backwards, so we ended up traveling away from our hotel for a while before Anna realized our mistake. We were all tired, so rather than go all the way back with the tram, we just grabbed an Uber and headed back to the hotel, where we collapsed.
 |
| On the Tram to Dinner |
No comments:
Post a Comment