Misc. notes from Gdansk

The feel of Gdansk

The biggest curiosity I had about Gdansk before I arrived was what does a city where the democracy is only 20 years old look like? And I admit, I probably had very sterotypical Cold War-era images in my head.

To some extent, Gdansk supports that. Buildings seem to fall into four categories:

• Brand new, modern, and very nice - These are few and far between in the area I'm in. The office building is very nice, though!
• Austere/dull - There are quite a few of these types of apartments around: the kind with a very flat exterior, nothing much exciting going on. Some of them are very colorful, but it dosn't really change the blah-ness of them.
• Cool old buildings - Obviously, there were lots of these in Old Town and Sopot, but they are really scattered everywhere. Houses, churches, and office buildings with amazing architecture are tucked around in random places.
• Rundown sadness - These are scattered everywhere too, and they don't seem to be isolated to certain areas.

The different buildings don't really seem to be concentrated in certain areas; they're just intermingled randomly. For example, here's a picture from my walk home. You can see some interesting buildings on the other side of the street, but my side is a little more depressing.

The school right behind the corporate apartment

Awesome apartment building near my apartment

A hungry vego in Gdansk

One of the websites I read before I arrived said that as a holdover from the war, vegetarian food was quite common and easy to find. I have absolutely not found that to be the case. If anything, Gdansk is one of the most meat-heavy cities I've ever been in!

A sad side effect of this was a disaster in which I ate a piece of bread slathered with lard, topped with pickles. I knew right away from the taste that I didn't much care for it, but it would never have occurred to me that the white spread would be lard! (It was in a bar, so it was very dark.) I felt pretty gross when I found out what it was, and I feel pretty gross thinking about it now!
It looked appetizing enough though...

This is more or less what it looked like

My vegetarianism has raised a few questions from my curious co-workers, who find my choice... intriguing to say the least.

Here are some of the questions I've gotten:

• Do you eat fish?
• Do you eat chicken?
• Do you eat yellow cheese and white cheese?

The office

The office building is very nice, but it's become clear to me that working alongside developers in Poland is just like working alongside developers anywhere else. There are a few unique quirks though.
Like wearing office slippers...

(Everyone seemed to have their own outrageous slippers except for me.)
Getting distracted with funny videos in the afternoon when someone would play a YouTube clip on the TV in the room.

Radishes seem to be a popular snack in the kitchen...

The fresh produce box. Mmmmm.... Radishes!

And on nice spring days when it's 12 C, the windows get opened!

For all their quirks, the guys in the office are some of the nicest I've ever worked with. They went out of their way to make sure I was taken care of in the office and outside of it. They handled all my Polish-language needs, like arranging for an airport taxi, and they made sure I knew how to get around. They also taught me some important Polish phrases - mainly curses, as it turned out.

I had an impression of the Gdansk guys as terse and a little cold. But nothing could have been further from the truth!

The apartment

The apartment where I'm staying is very nice too.

But it definitely has some quirks. The most noticeable of these is the angel-themed decor in the kitchen.

They extend far beyond what's in this pic - they're also on the ceiling

I cannot explain why this is, and no one seems to know the answer. The apartment "just came that way."

The apartment is really big - at least 5 times the size of our Sydney apartment. It has three bedrooms, of which I sleep in one upstairs. I shut the door when I go to the office and it heats up during the day. So by the time I am ready for bed, I can go up to the super warm bedroom and be oh so cozy!

The apartment does have a TV but I couldn't figure out how to turn it on. The guys at work assure me that I'm not missing anything. =)

One feature of the apartment that I really like is the cool lighting. It makes the room seem warmer and happier, which I imagine is important during the short, dark days of the winter.

And finally, it's pretty clear that there have been Australians staying in the apartment! There is one entire drawer dedicated to tea!

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Sopot

On Thursday, a couple of my Polish workmates convinced me I should go check out Sopot after work. Sopot is a little tourist town on the coast of the Baltic Sea, a little west of Gdansk. It was hard for me to reconcile that there is ever a time when people would go to the beach here, but they assure me that it's a very popular spot in the summer!

I had to take a train up to Sopot, but luckily my colleagues had given me really clear instructions on how to find the train, buy tickets, and where to go once I arrived. It was still a bit of an adventure though!

The best button in the world!

The train itself was...interesting. I think there were delays (I couldn't tell from sure from the announcements, but it was my best guess from the signs.) So when the train finally arrived, we were crowded in like I've never been before. I thought the 5:30 train in Sydney was bad, but it has nothing on this train. It was full on bodies against bodies, and everyone had to pile out at following stops to allow the people from the middle of the carriages to get out. Not my favorite part of the trip!

Luckily, I just had six stops to go from my station: Gdansk Wrzeszcz. And luckily I never had to pronounce my station name!

Once I arrived in Sopot, I could see why everyone called it a tourist town. There were lots of little shops and restaurants (about half of them closed up), and there was a nice wide boulevard for strolling. It was really cute!

I found this famous little building!

And I walked out to the longest wooden pier in Europe. The fog was really rolling in, so I couldn't get a great feel for how far the pier extended into the sea. But the fog added its own cool element of mystery: how much farther does this thing go?

There's the Baltic!

I did finally make it to the end, where there was a cool building with a little restaurant in it. I imagine this is quite the place to be in the summer, but it was not so busy in the foggy 8 degrees!

Near the pier was, of course, the beach, and some nice hotels and shopping.

I
 meandered a bit through the main area and once I was as cold as I could stand, I headed back for my train and the warmth of the apartment in Gdansk! It's clear to me that to fully appreciate Sopot, I will need to come back on a summertime visit! =)

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Old Town - a few more pics

My Sunday in Old Town was so fun and beautiful, here are a few more pics!

One thing that I loved were all these tiny shops tucked into the below-ground levels of the buildings. They would put tables outside on the street with their goods for sale (usually amber jewellery), and then you could walk downstairs to go into the rest of the shop.

This is what a closed up shop looks like. Kind of cool, eh?

Of course, there was a little bit of gaudiness here and there. Like this "American" restaurant. Because nothing says America like a Big Bird statue and a "John Kennedy salad!"

And while the souvenir shops weren't too terrible from the outside, inside they looked like every other souvenir shop in existence!

And finally, I snapped a couple pics from the tourist magazine I looked through over lunch. One was this interesting breakdown of the history of the city - I know I would have failed my history tests when I was in school if this is what I had to learn.

And this picture is of a bit that just made me giggle out loud. The article was about Daniel Farenheit, a Pole who invented the Farenheit scale. The opening line is so very... Polish!

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Old Town

On Sunday I headed out to the main tourist area in Gdansk. I wasn't sure what to expect but I was completely enchanted with how beautiful and picturesque it was! Interestingly, not all of the buildings are that old: huge sections of the city had to be rebuilt in the 1950s after WWII. But my untrained eye could not tell the difference and it felt like stepping back in time.

The day was pretty cool and gray. (It was in the mid- to upper-thirties, but down by the water or when a breeze picked up it felt much colder!) The sun did peek out now and then, so I got to see the Old Town in all kinds of light.

Here are a few of my favorites pics from the day:

For 1.5 złoty (which is about fifty cents), I took the cute little ferry across the Motława River. It was only about a 2 minute ride, but it gave me a great view of the buildings I'd been walking along, as well as the Gdansk Crane. The crane is that big weird looking building; it was used since the16th century to lift goods from ships in the harbor.

Other highlights from my afternoon included eating a grilled smoked cheese pastry. I might possibly have loved it so much because it was warm, but I also think it might have been one of the most delicious things I've ever tasted!

The most humorous part of my afternoon came from following signs for the "toalety," only to discover that it was not a free public restroom! In fact, it cost 2 złoty to use it, and the fee was collected by a woman who stood inside the building between gates that separated the male and female sides to take your money. I was pretty taken aback to walk in and find a lady demanding money, but I got a receipt for my visit and everything!

The not-free toilets!

And before I left Old Town, I had lunch at Goldwasswer, a restaurant overlooking the river.

And, yes, there were some crazy people eating outside in the 40 degree weather

It was warm and cozy inside, so I had a nice long lunch of soup, mushroom bruschetta, and Polish apple pie. Luckily the menu had English descriptions for each dish, so I knew what I was getting!

After my late lunch, I wandered through Old Town a bit longer and then I called it a day. It was a super fun afternoon! I had no idea Gdansk would be so beautiful and have such character, but it completely charmed me.

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