Blood, Sweat and Tears

So yesterday I returned from a lovely, if not tiring week in Poland. My parents and I went to Krakow and Warsaw which are two very different cities. Both have their own link to the Second World War in very different ways.

Firstly we went to Krakow for four days which was beautiful. On the first day we went to many churches, everything else was shut on Sundays, rather unfortunately. All the churches were stunning and all unique. My mother loves churches, can’t say I enjoy them too much especially when we visit like five in a day. I did enjoy going to see the Bells at the Cathedral, can’t say I loved all the stairs though. (Sometimes, I was scared my backside would get stuck in one of the tiny passage ways) However, on the next day we visited Schindler’s factory which was interesting, but also powerful. We tried to visit Wawel Castle but all the tickets had sold out for that day. As a result we went on a wild goose chase for a Leonardo de Vinci painting called the Lady with an Ermine. This was because Mum was sulking as she believed it was in the castle, so we walked all over looking for it. We did eventually find it in a museum. We did get an Uber home, which was amazing! (It’s the simple things in life that get me) Can you believe it was both of my parents first Uber ride! The next day was moving as we visited Auschwitz. It was horrendous what human beings do to each other, the crimes we commit against one another. Over one million Jews were murdered there. Its safe to say after a day there we did not want to see anything else that day, we needed time to gather our thoughts and process. On our final morning in Krakow we went to the Salt mines, they were amazing! All the sculptures and chandeliers as well as other things were made out of salt! (Do not try the water there, it was so salty!)

Anyway the other side of the trip was the food! It was incredible. I had never had Polish food before but it tasted amazing. I can’t tell you exactly what I ate but I had a lot of goulash, steak and potato pancakes. I did also have quite a lot of ice cream- do not judge I was on holiday. My mother did not like the fact that we were eating so much! As a result she made me swim and go to the gym on top of all the walking we were doing. I was dying! If I didn’t do it she sulked like a child. On average for the whole week I was walking over twenty thousand steps a day- but apparently that was not enough.

In Warsaw, which was completely destroyed during the War, we visited many places. We went to the Warsaw Uprising museum which was very informative. After the museum, I finally got to pick what we got to do! I thought it would be nice to visit the park where the Royal family had there summer residence. Let me tell you this, Google lies! Lies I tell you! It told us it was a fifty minute walk, well after fifty minutes we weren’t even half way- by this point I was hangry and needed to eat. By the time we got there it was thunder and lightning and the park was not as pretty as it could have been. It was still gorgeous though. Anyway after the trip, I was told that we did not need to walk back, also lies. Mum wouldn’t let us get an Uber, so I walked back with aching feet to our hotel. I’d love to say I did it without complaint but that would be a lie- I cried the whole way back. While in Warsaw we also visited the castle, which was completely rebuilt during the 1970s and the Old town.

All in all I really enjoyed our trip to Poland, although it was boiling and I was a puddle most days, probably smelling bad, cause lets be honest sweat does not smell great. Furthermore, although we were eating a lot, the walking must have payed off cause I lost over a kilo while away. On Thursday I am off to Ukraine, so let’s see if the food and activities there surprise me as well.