Copernicus Droppings & Virgin Apparitions

We had a slower start today, with one of our hosts picking us up from the hotel at 9:45 AM. We headed into the town of Olsztyn and visited the small castle there. This castle was administered by Copernicus and he lived here for a while. There are some actual original instruments that Copernicus used in the museum and even a book that he bequeathed to a friend on his death. This is apparently the book he was reading when he died – a medical book on curing fevers! Even though this place is normally blocked off, because the museum was not busy and since we were not a large group, we were allowed to take the narrow stairs up to Copernicus’ toilet. We climbed a steep and narrow staircase to a chamber that stuck out of the wall of the castle and included a bench with a hole that dropped the famous feces outside the grounds. The chamber led off from his main bedroom, office, and chapel. The castle itself is quite beautiful and well maintained. We also walked all the way to the top of the castle tower (a pretty impressive workout in itself) which afforded us great views of the city.

We then walked around the city and visited the local mall, bought a couple of unique products for use in our classes (you can buy McDonalds brand ketchup here). We also stopped by a music store in the mall (which I was told was the biggest music store in town) and looked for some interesting CDs. This was actually a very small store with a relatively small collection. I found a couple of interesting CDs and found them to be quite expensive. Since I didn’t think I’d get another chance to do any shopping, I went ahead and bought them.

We then headed to a restaurant near an ancient church in the town of Gietrzwald for lunch – Kapuœniak (sour cabbage soup) and cabbage & mushroom pierogis. We walked to the church where a couple of kids had a vision of Virgin Mary in 1877 (this is one of the “church approved” apparitions). After the vision, there was, apparently miraculously, a spring of water that started flowing. So, after admiring the inside of this beautiful church, we walked to the spring and drank a few sips of the water from the stream. Lots of people were filling up bottles of the water – supposedly with some healing powers.

We were back in the hotel only long enough to change and quickly check email before one of our hosts, Wojciech Kozlowski, came by to pick us up for dinner at his apartment. Wojciech and his lovely family (wife who is a lawyer and two kids – a 16-year-old girl and an 8-year-old boy) were great. While the young boy was off playing his PS2 during the evening, his pretty daughter, who is quite fluent in English as she is taking classes after school, and the rest of the family entertained us all evening. His wife had made a really spectacular spread for us. There were numerous dishes (I can’t remember all the names, sorry), several desserts, and beer, wine, and vodka. It seemed like she must have spent all day cooking the dishes. There really were more items than we could even sample. The family had just recently moved into this spectacular, modern apartment that was quite dazzling all around. It was clear that the place had been scrubbed and tidied for our visit. It felt like such a pity to waste all the food she had made, but she could have fed 12 people or more with all the food that had been made. To make matters worse, we had lunch only at about 4 PM. Apparently, the typical time for lunch in Poland is about 3 PM, and dinner is at 6:30 or 7:00 PM. I don’t know how they do it!

Pork, Fish, Beer, and Vodka

Had a relatively busy day today, filled with meetings at the University of Warmia & Mazury. The campus is vast and beautiful. The University is relatively young (with a history stretching back to only a hundred years or so). We met with the Associate Dean and with a group of faculty.

Highlights were lunch, where I had Carpacio Pork (very thinly sliced raw pork) and a breaded pork fillet (another Polish specialty) and beer. For dinner we started with Zyviewc beer (pronounced Zhi-vee-yets), Chlodnik (a cold, yogurt-based "soup" with beets and other vegetables) and sauteed pike-perch with wild forest mushrooms and deep fried potato cakes (another local dish). This was chased down with Zubrowka - Polish bison grass vodka. The vodka is very flavorful and has this relatively strong flavor it gets from a particularly tough, scented grass that the bison feed on. Dinner was at this beautiful restaurant (Prgystan) on a lake.

Again the weather was beautiful with a slight breeze and neither warm nor cool temperatures. I would guess, in the low to mid 70s.

Welcome to Poland!

So, my colleague and I got to Olsztyn, Poland this afternoon after a long flight from Minneapolis to Amsterdam (7.5 hours) and a considerably shorter flight from Amsterdam to Warsaw (less than 2 hours) followed by a 3-hour car ride from Warsaw to Olsztyn. While I made the trip fine, my colleague's bags never even made it to Warsaw. Hopefully, it's somewhere in Poland.

Olsztyn is in northern Poland and is the capital of the Warmian region. Warmia is where Copernicus lived and expounded his theory of a heliocentric astronomical universe. What I find fascinating every time I visit Europe is its living history. Most of us consider Copernicus to be old and waaay in the past. However, it gives me pause to think that Copernicus lived here in the 1500s. He published his theories on the earth revolving around the sun in 1543. Yet, in the town on Olsztyn, you can still see the castle that was built in the 1350s. Also still standing is the Cathedral of St. James which was built between 1380 and 1445. Now think of this. When Copernicus hung around here, these structures were already almost two hundred years old. I can just about imagine a young Copernicus showing visitors around the town explaining about these ancient castles (over a hundred years old!) in his neighborhood. Here we are, an additional 400 years later (more actually), still able to walk through these buildings and marvel at their construction.

That's what I love about history - it's entertaining to imagine people living and seeing these same structures five hundred or more years before me. It is even more fascinating to me to imagine people three hundred years ago pointing to these same "ancient" structures and wondering about the people who lived there two hundred years before them.

This is the sort of sense of insignificance it is hard to get in America. It is so strange to think of how incredibly young our land is. I mean, by the time we had out first settlement in the continental US, Copernicus had been dead for over a hundred years. And we're talking about the first permanent European settlement in the USA!

Had delicious pork cutlets for dinner. The weather here today is just astoundingly beautiful. The sn was shining, but it wasn't hot. We went for a walk in the afternoon and there was a strong breeze blowing that wasn't at all cold, but wasn't warm either. Both my colleague and I commented about how strangely perfect the weather is - not hot and not cold. Let's hope it stays this way.

My room at the Novotel is typical European style. While it is fairly large and not as cramped as these hotels usually are, there is no air conditioning and no fan. So, I know I'm going to find it difficult to sleep. How spoiled we are - I groaned and complained about the lack of air conditioning until I finally realized it wasn't going to do any good. I asked the front desk for a fan and they said they didn't have one. It is now 11 PM and it still isn't as cool as I'd like it to be.