Day 5: Olsztyn Again
[Wednesday, June 12]
[Click on any photo for a bigger view]
That was a long post yesterday, wasn't it? Today's post will be shorter because we wanted one more day to relax before going back to Warsaw. This morning, Vicky slept in and I went for my first run in Poland. I jogged up the hill, through the old town, and across one of the main streets into the busy newer part of town. I was in an area of offices, apartment buildings, and schools. Tucked among all this was Park Centralny (Central Park), a quiet island of tree-lined paths, ponds, and fountains. It was a cool morning, which made for a pleasant run.
People were walking, bicycling, taking a break. Some teenagers from the high school at the border of the park were having a vape break. I find that more people smoke in Poland than in the States, though it's nowhere near as pervasive as it was in the States 40 years ago when I was in high school. And, like in the States, young people vape more than smoke cigarettes.
Fountain in Park Centralny, Olsztyn
It turns out that post offices in Poland have a bit more to offer to offer than US post offices. First, there was a philatelists shop that was part of the post office, a place where you could buy not just commemorative stamps, but albums and other collector supplies. Vicky once worked at the American Philatelic Society and I collected stamps as a kid, so we were both aware that Poles are big stamp collectors and that they produce some of the nicest collectible stamps in the world. In addition to the shop, many convenience store type items (newspapers, magazines, non-perishable food items) were available in the post office itself. And most important, you could do a money transfer there. That was the way to pay our parking ticket that was outlined on the ticket itself. I dreaded having to figure out how go through my bank to get this done, so I just had the nice clerk, who could read the paragraphs of Polish on the ticket, do it. Her English was marginal, but importantly, she could figure out what to do about the ticket. I gave her the cash to cover the ticket and the transfer and that was that.
Because the food was so good at the home cooking hole-in-the-wall place, we ate there twice on Wednesday. First, for a "light" snack of pierogi and soup before our museum tours, then for something more substantial for dinner just before they closed at 7 PM.
More pierogi
After lunch, it was off to visit some museums. We didn't want to get "museumed-out" that day, but we had a couple in mind. It's a good thing we narrowed down the choices, because for a town its size Olsztyn has a *lot* of museums. One that we nixed (though the concept itself seems interesting) was a visit to the museum of the Archdiocese of Warmia. Poland is still a very Catholic country, and the Catholic Church has played a huge part in its history, even recently, as it was one of the bulwarks of the decades long struggle against communist domination. There are several old churches in close proximity in the Stare Miasto, and even a shop where priests and seminarians can buy vestments and other church supplies. We popped in to that shop, but figured we had enough incense at home to get us through the next few Epiphanies, so we went off to our first museum.
Some of the upper floors of the castle held other exhibits. One was of the fabric and clothing industry of Warmia-Masuria. A major crop of the region is flax, used to make linen. Until recent times, making linen from flax fibers and fabric weaving were very labor-intensive cottage industries. Warmian fabric was woven with sophisticated patterns and was used for clothing, blankets, bedding, and many other home uses.
Another exhibit, a small one, related to the one on linen, was of women's underwear. Yep, an entire exhibit dedicated to the evolution of women's undergarments in the early 20th century.
On the way down, I stopped in one more small exhibit that was in a small room about a quarter of the way up the tower. It was work of Adolfo Wildt, an Italian sculptor with ties to Prussia who was active in the late 19th and early 20th century. He worked in a variety of media, including stone, ceramic, and metal.
We said our spiritual good-byes to the home cooking hole-in-the-wall by having a last meal there. As usual, we ate outside. Constant companions in the outdoor seating areas are flocks of pigeons, jackdaws, and sparrows. They busily patrol the plaza, sometimes boldly weaving between your feet. When you leave your table, if the waitress isn't quick enough, the remains of your food will be taken by either the pigeons or the sparrows. The jackdaws aren't quite so bold. We saw a one-legged jackdaw (I wonder how that happened) trying to open up an abandoned box of candy. A cat in an apartment above the square was very interested in what the birds were doing.
Museum of the Archdiocese of Warmia
The Museum of Warmia and Masuria is located in the Olsztyn Castle, which was constructed in the 14th Century by the Teuotonic Knights. The castle houses a collection of manuscripts, artifacts, and informational displays about Nicolaus Copernicus, the Polish mathematician and astronomer who first formulated the heliocentric theory of the solar system. Copernicus lived in Olsztyn for several year in the early 16th century.
The tower of Olsztyn Castle as seen from the castle courtyard.
Baby Pruskie ('Prussian woman'): Stone statue from pre-Christian Prussia in the courtyard of the Olsztyn Castle
The Ptolemaic model of the solar system, used from ancient times, had the Earth as the center of the universe.
The Copernican model put the sun at the center of the universe.
Painting of Nicolaus Copernicus
In the lowest floors of the castle there were also exhibits of church decorations, including paintings, statues, altar decorations, crucifixes carved from linden wood, and various sacred objects.
Biblical scenes: The Annunciation, The Flight to Egypt, The Finding in the Temple
From an exhibit of Warmian linen making.
From the women's underwear exhibit
From the women's underwear exhibit
Panels of women's underwear
Yet another small exhibit was devoted to some Polish filmmakers who made art films during the communist regime. There were stills from some of the film sets showing Polish people, young and old, at the beach, probably somewhere on the Baltic coast, in the mid 60s.
Still photo from a 60s era Polish film
One last thing to do was scale the stairway in the tower for a view of the city. Vicky wasn't up for it, so I went up alone, 136 steps (I counted). The view at the top was great, though you had to look through long peepholes in the brick structure.
Panorama of the top of the tower of Olsztyn Castle
View of Olsztyn from above
On the way down, I stopped in one more small exhibit that was in a small room about a quarter of the way up the tower. It was work of Adolfo Wildt, an Italian sculptor with ties to Prussia who was active in the late 19th and early 20th century. He worked in a variety of media, including stone, ceramic, and metal.
Sculpture exhibit in the Olsztyn Castle tower.
We visited one more museum, this one much smaller than the collection of exhibits in the Olsztyn Castle. The old office of the Olsztyn Gazette in the Stare Miasto had some interesting exhibits of Polish provincial life and the reporting thereon from the late 19th century on. Pretty cool, and easy to take in.
From the museum of the Olsztyn Gazette: Pope John Paul II visited Olsztyn during an incredibly busy visit to Poland in 1991
Pigeon and one-legged jackdaw.
A house cat couldn't keep his eyes off the birds.
In the evening we went out for a nightcap. We hit a bar that was OK looking on the outside, but obviously divey once indoors. A place where people who are there later than sundown are just there to get drunk. Horrible bathroom. Vomitous drink specials. It reminded me of student dive bars in State College. One sign I did have sympathy with: The drinking age in Poland is 18, as it once was in much of the US and as it should go back to being. Treating otherwise legal adults as children has proven to serve no useful purpose.
Poland and much of Europe have younger drinking ages than the US.
I'm looking forward to conversations with you about your adventures.
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