Polish Independence Day

Today, 11th November, is an Independence Day of Poland. It is celebrated to commemorate the anniversary of Poland's assumption of independent statehood in 1918 after 123 years of partition by Russia, Prussia and Austria. During this time Poland didn't exist as a country and disappeard from maps.

Here's a short video presenting a history of this holiday.

And here you can watch a nice video showing scenes from last year's celebrations in Warsaw:)

You know you're Polish when...

As you know I'm from Poland. Each nation has some typical characteristics or habits. Here's a funny list of some of our typical habits and behavious:) I've taken some of the points from the Internet and some from observations of a German living in Poland who's book I read.

You know you’re Polish when:

1. You sing the same song - “100 lat”  - on every occasion (weddings, birthdays, baby showers)
2. Someone mentions pierogi and your mouth starts to water
3. You use lots of ketchup
4. People mistake you for being Russian when you go abroad
5. Your grandmother insists on constantly feeding you
6. When you're at a stranger's house, you expect their garbage can to be under the sink
7. You always take off your shoes as soon as you step into someone else's house, even when they say you don’t have to
8. You always find some reason to complain
9. You never answer “I’m fine” if asked “how are you” but explain your whole health and mood situation with details
10. You have pork chops every Sunday for dinner.
11. You hit a bottom of vodka bottle with your hand before opening it.
12. You have to drink “karniaki” (“punishment” shots) if you come late for a party.
13. You don’t listen to “disco polo” music but when someone plays it in a party it turns out you and everyone there know the lyrics.
14. You joke about your nation but you hate it when others do so.
15. You have home made preserves in your cellar.
16. You say “thank you” after getting out of the lift
17. You ask your guests couple of times if they want to eat or drink something and you feel unhappy if they don’t want anything
18. You comply with superstitions even though you don’t believe them
19. You share all the food/drink/anything shareable with friends around you before you eat/drink/use it yourself
20. You invent non-existent words while talking

 Maybe some % of you is Polish?;)

Fragnant stamps

These stamps show the European Bison. It is considered our national animal. The European Bison is the biggest mammal living in the wild in Europe. It was almost extinct. After the 1st World War only several dozen of them survived and only in the zoos. In 1923 Poland went out with the initiative to restore the species. All living nowadays European Bisons originate only from 12 individuals. The biggest number of European Bisons live of course in Poland.

Now about the stamps. What is special about them - when you rub them they smell of forest:) They were issued in 2011 and this year they won International Awards for Philatelic Art.

A postcard from... Częstochowa, Poland

I looked around my postcard collection and I found this one. I got it 12 years ago from my school mates. It shows a pilgrimage to the most holy city in Poland - Częstochowa. It takes place once a year in summer.

Been there, done that... Kazimierz Dolny, Poland

As I didn't have vacation this year, I only had a chance to go somewhere in my own country. In May I took my mum for one day to a lovely town which is called Kazimierz Dolny. The history of it dates back to 11th century and it is considered one of the most beautiful little towns of Poland.

In the middle of the town there is a market square with a historic well in the middle.

The view of the town from the hill in front of a sanctuary.

In the town there are few old granaries. Nowadays they serve as hotels or museums.

The town is famous of rooster shaped breadrolls. If by any chance one day you step your foot in Kazimierz Dolny don't forget to try one:)

Have a sweet day!

Is is the last thursday before the Lent which means we celebrate today Fat Thursday!

 [source]

The tradition of Fat Thursday is very old, even older than the donuts themselves! In the Middle Ages, when they were not yet known in Poland, people were eating pork fat, bacon and fat meats and drinking heavily. The tradition of eating donuts started in XVI century. The supersticion sais that who doesn't eat a donut on Fat Thursday will have bad luck.

In average each Pole eats 2,5 donuts and in total the Polish eat 100 million of donuts that day. An average donut has 200 kcal.

Have a sweet day!:)

The Insurgent Post

I was looking through old photos and found some from my visit in the Warsaw Uprising Museum some 2 years ago. Among them are photos of the letters that people were sending during the Uprising and I thought it might be an interesting topic for mail lovers. Sorry, the photos are not of best quality.

"On 1 August 1944, the Warsaw Uprising was launched that lasted for 63 days involving the civil population, including women and children. Upon its failure, the residents were driven outside the city or placed in camps and the city was razed to the ground. The losses of the civilian population as well as Polish culture were formidable: burnt libraries and museum collections, temples and palaces. Nearly 200 thousand Warsaw residents perished and 84% of the buildings were destroyed". [source]

As soon as the fights started people organized the Scout Field Post (I hope I translated the name well) that was functioning within the limits of Warsaw during the Warsaw Uprising. The post was run by volunteers and sending letters was free of charge (although people were willingly "paying" with books, bandages and food for people in hospitals). It produced it's own stamps in 5 different colors for each of 5 districts. The post boxes with the sign "The Insurgent Post" were located in 40 points of the city. The letters were delivered by scout boys and girls. They could contain up to 25 words and were cenzored (there could be no military information in them). Daily were sent from 3 to 6 thousand letters. During the 63 days of the Uprising 200 thousand letters were delivered. It was one of the biggest organisational phenomenas during the Warsaw Uprising, functioning in extreme circumstances.

In those letter people were writing mostly about their situation, if they are alright and asking for health of their relatives and saying that they're missing them.

If you ever visit Warsaw don't miss the Warsaw Uprising Museum:) It's organised in a very interesting way, even for those that are not particularly interested in history.

Wanna talk abou snail mail?

For most of us in the "penpalling world", writing letters is a real life passion. Yet, everyone has their preferences and opinions according letters and their ways of writing. If you'd like to discuss all the issues related with snail mail, there's a new forum Letter Writer's Circle ♥ Long Letter's Lovers. Feel free to check it out by clicking the image below and join =D

If you'd like to read more about the place I live in, check Panpalling and Letters blog. I've been a guest blogger there with an article Corners of Warsaw ^.^

Using the occasion that I'm "advertising", I'd like to attract your attention to STORIES FROM MEXICO blog where an artist, Kiki, presents her amazingly beautiful and colorful works, together with great stories.

Have fun reading =)

Easter Traditions in Poland

Day 1 (Great Saturday)

People prepare a baskets full of goodies: colorful eggs, some bread, a piece of sausage, salt, a sugar lamb, maybe some fluffy fake chicken or bunnies to decoration. They take it to church were the food is blessed. It’s gonna be eaten on an Easter breakfast on Sunday.

Easter basket

[photo source]

Day 2 (Easter Sunday)

The families meet to have breakfast together. They share the eggs from the basket, say each other wishes and feast. The traditional Easter dishes include:

Żurek - traditional Easter soup

Mazurek - traditional Easter cake

Baba wielkanocna - another traditional Easter cake

[photos source] 

and all sorts of eggs (with mayo or stuffed), meats, salads...

Day 3 (Wet Monday)

The other name of an Easter Monday is Wet Monday (in Polish “Lany Poniedziałek” or “Śmigus-Dyngus”) because traditionally everyone splashes each other with water! This tradition comes yet from pagan times when people in villages were beating (lightly, nothing brutal :P) girls’ legs with willow twigs and splashing them with water. If some girl was omitted, there was a superstition that she wouldn’t find a husband quickly. Nowadays just splashing with water stayed (thank you, I wouldn’t like being beaten with twigs, even lightly:P) and everyone splashes everyone, even strangers. Some people exaggerate pouring whole buckets of water on people going to church or even elders turning the tradition not to be so nice anymore as it’s supposed to be fun, but that’s a different story. As long as it’s made in a civiliezed way it’s a lot of fun:) Especially children love this day.

Happy Easter!

Wesołych Świąt!

Show me... one of your favourite places

One of my favourite places in the world is a place where I go for vacation since I was 10 years old. We have a summer house there and I just love going there. It's in the region with many lakes called Mazury. I have so many good memories connected with this place and I must go there at least for couple of days each year, otherwise I feel like something's missing in my life. There's lake nearby and the forest. A family of swans and storks come there for vacation too;)

It's my little heaven on earth :)

Folk cards

I am being lazy with writing new posts lately, this time as well, so I'll just show a photo of my attempt to being creative:) Some time ago my mum brought me from one of her short trips through our beautiful country a card with typical Polish folk pattern. I absolutely loved the card and wanted to share it with my penpals. Unfortunatelly, there was only one, so I decided to make some myself. The original card was much more professional with perfect details, but these two have a piece of my heart;)

A Day from the Life of Warsaw

Leave counting calories for today...

... it's time for debauchery! It's Fat Thursday, last Thursday before the fast. In Poland we eat today...

... donuts

... and "faworki" (sorry, I don't know the English word, if it even exists)

Haven't eaten any yet? Quick, the day is almost over, at least one donut is a MUST ;)

[photos googled]

Show me on a Tuesday... Traditional Music from Your Country

^ Click this button and take part in Tuesday Shows too! Share your countries traditional music with us, don't be skinflint ;)

The traditional music of Poland is very diverse depending on a region. I decided to choose some folk music from three regions as my Tuesday (or in my case Wednesday) entry. First is a folk group from the region where I live - Masovia in the original Masovian folk clothes. The dresses of women weigh 14 kg!

The second is a folk group form Silesia region, also in their folk clothes. The song title is "A girl went to the woods" and I've read it's also very known in Japan! O.o

And last but not least is a group from Highland region, in the South of Poland, also in their traditional clothes. You still can meet people wearing these in there, probably mostly for touristic reasons, but I also have a feeling they value their folk culture more.

Show me on a Tuesday... Something Traditional

I wouldn't be myself if I wasn't late with my post ;) But no worries, I am still into Tuesday shows. I was thinking what traditional should I show and thought about some food at first, but in the end decided to show a traditional Polish dance - polonaise. It's a folk dance. Sadly, people nowadays, probably not only in Poland, forget about their folk. I am no exception here... But! polonaise isn't forgotten dance. It's danced in the introduction of the ball 100 days before ending high school. So, most people dance it at least once in their life.

Here's a video from a Polish movie "Pan Tadeusz" based on our national epic from 19th century written by Adam Mickiewicz. The last scene is the wedding and they dance polonaise.

And the second version of polonaise, because there are two melodies for it. This dance here is made by some dancing group so they make more figures than just basic ones made during school ball. But there's always the "tunnel" made, which you can see in the end of the video.

Christmas traditions in Poland

Christmas in Poland in some points probably looks like in other countries, in others it deffers. We decorate Christmas tree, buy gifts… *cough*… Santa brings gifts and we fest on Christmas Eve together with the whole family. But of course, we can’t start eating before the first star shines! And even before we sit by the table, we share an “opłatek” between us, wishing each person all the best in the coming year. “Opłatek” looks like the Host and tastes like it, but it’s not the same thing. We also share it with friends before Christmas and we send it together with Christmas cards. People in the country also share “opłatek” with animals, but only these which are believed to have been in the stable where the baby Jesus was born. It is also believed that these animals can talk this one night in the year. As far as I know we are the only country that has this tradition (let me know if I’m wrong :) )

All right, we shared an “opłatek”, now we can sit and start eating. On the table, under the cloth we put some hay (as baby Jesus was lying on the hay after being born) and we leave one empty place by the table for an unexpected guest. We have 12 traditional dishes (like 12 Apostoles). The “must be’s” are:

• Carp

• Borsht (beetroot soup) with little dumplings filled with mushrooms. The dumplings are called “uszka” which means “little ears”. Probably the name is because of their shape :)

• Pierogi with sauerkraut and mushrooms. Or some other filling but on Christmas Eve this one is the most popular.

• Fish in jelly.

• Kutia, which is a sweet meal made of wheat, poppy seeds, honey and all sorts of nuts and raisins. We don’t prepare it in my home, but this is a typical traditional dish that is prepared specifically for Christmas.

As you noticed, there’s no red meat or birds. Meat, excluding fish, is not eaten on Christmas Eve at all.

That day we also get presents. We don’t wait till Christmas Day. If there are no kids in the family there’s no problem with gifts. But if there are children, someone must pretend Santa for a while or get the attention of kids somewhere else and then put the presents under the tree. When I was a kid my grandpa always went outside and knocked in the window. Me and my cousins were running to see Santa (who disappeared too quickly) and at that time the rest of the adults put the gifts under the tree. I need to mention that “our” Santa comes from Lapland – in Finland, not from the North Pole or Coca-Cola factories.



At 12 o clock at night there is a mass in church, were people also share “opłatek” with strangers. Then we have two (not just one) days of Christmas. Time for rest after all the preparations and to watch Home Alone ;P

Merry Christmas!

Wesołych Świąt!

[photos googled]

Andrew's Night

Tonight is a magical night – Andrew’s Night. A holiday which has pagan roots. Why is it so magical? Tonight you can find out who your future husband will be! To know it, you just have to play some fortune-telling games.
The most popular one is pouring hot wax through a hole of a key to a bowl with cold water. From the shape of the shade on the wall of the figure you get when the wax stiffens, you can guess what is going to happen to you in the future.

Other popular game includes shoes. Only unmarried girls can take part in it. They must put their shoes from the left foot in a row in front of the door (starting from the opposite wall of course). Then they should move last shoe in a row to the beginning until some shoe crosses the threshold. The owner of that shoe is going to get married first.

There is also a game in which you write boy’s names on the big paper heart. In the back of the heart the girls need to insert a pin. The name the pin went through is a name of her future husband.

Have a wonderful night!

[photos googled]

Dili dili, trali vali, no more smoke

First of all I would like to express my happiness of the fact that after visit in a club my clothes didn’t stink with smoke. On 15^th November 2010 Poland introduced a prohibition of smoking in public places and I could enjoy it’s result on Friday night. The smokers feel indignant with it, they say it’s against democracy, it’s discrimination of them, that people who go to the pub or club should expect that people smoke there and if they don’t want to sit in the stinky mist they can not go in there at all. Then isn’t that opinion a discrimination of non-smokers? Weren’t the non-smokers discriminated for all these years? So now the non-smokers feel relief. Finally they don’t have to breath the smoke, finally their hair and clothes won’t stink after a meeting with friends in a restaurant. The smokers can always go out, smoke there and come back in. Noone denies them smoking. They are only denied poisoning those who don’t choose to smoke. Why is it so hard to understand to some people? Anyway, I was waiting for this act to be passed for a long time, since it works well in other countries I had occasion to visit and now that it finally got into effect I just wanna scream… YEEEEEEAAH!

Second, I would like to express my happiness of my grandmas’ 90^th birthday which was on Saturday and today we organize a small party for her. My dad prepared chicken soup, Greek style fish (which is a Polish dish that has nothing to do with Greece, besides the name). My mum prepared a Polish vegetable salad (though I discovered with astonishment that it’s not known in all parts of Poland, yet in many houses it’s traditionally served on every holidays, birthdays, names days etc.). It consists of all types of vegetables, eggs and mayonnaise. I once read an article that it became popular during communistic times, as there wasn’t much food in the shops, so people were growing vegetables and fruit in their gardens (if they had one), the mayonnaise was one of the things possible to buy often and so, this salad became traditional. It’s also my dads’ birthday today and in two days, my dogs’… though we’re not celebrating this event, hehe.

Polish vegetable salad

Greek style fish

In the end, let me introduce a cute song I got to know yesterday on my Russian classes. It’s a song for kids from some Russian cartoon, about a lazy boy who doesn’t want to help his brothers. I guess it is supposed to teach children that if they won’t work hard, they won’t get anything, but the lyrics “Это мы не проходили, Это нам не задавали” (we didn’t learn it, that wasn’t required), just ask to be taken as a motto :P

 

All Saint's Day and the Day of the Dead

1^st November – is All Saint’s Day. It’s a catholic holiday celebrated in memory of all saints.

2^nd November – is Day of the Dead. It descend from a pagan celebrations of “beggars”, which used to take place four times a year, and the purpose was to commemorate the dead. People used to feed the souls of the dead who were arriving from the beyond that day. They also used to bake special bread and shared it with beggars who were praying for the souls of the dead (therefore the name of celebrations). It was adopted in XII century as a catholic holiday and diminished to be celebrated just once a year.

Since only 1^st November is free of work, it is celebrated also as Day of the Dead. It doesn't remind the old pagan holiday enymore. We just visit graves of our relatives and close people, leave flowers and candles and recall memories about them with pensiveness.

 [photos googled]

Street legends

Talking about Warsaw I could tell about  all the monuments and buildings but I’d rather  concentrate on something you can’t read in guides… which is famous buskers! Those who are stable element of the city life, who play every day in main places like for example in front of Metro Station in the city centre. When I walk there, there are always the same people, changing days… I wonder if they have some agreement who plays when…

Number 1 is Indians band. I think they are from Peru. They’re performing in Warsaw for many many years so they’re well recognized by everyone. Their music is amazing – it’s either calm, mysterious sounds or more energetic by which they also dance. They have Indians costumes and sell their own CD’s. It’s always a pleasure to listen to them.

Number 2 is an “Orchestra from Chmielna Street”. They usually play in the underpass by the metro. They play pre- and after-war songs that were popular in Warsaw at that time and are dressed in 50’s style. They’re the legend!

 

Number 3 is Mr. Witek aka Dude from Atlantis. I haven’t seen him under the metro for a long time, maybe he changed location. He is always dressed like a cowboy and sings these naughty songs. If you stop and look at him longer he might dedicate you one of them;P The guy is freaking funny, always talking with young people. He’s very famous, a few years ago he even was in jury in some program on MTV and performed in our Woodstock festival. OMG, he even is in Wikipedia;P