Together Again in Poland...our 1st Week

Together again....in Poland!

I returned to Poland (after 3 weeks in CA) on Tuesday, July 26th...it felt great to be home once again! I have spent the week working and readjusting my body to a new time.

After working in our home for 3 full days, I realized I had not been beyond our home boundaries...it was time for a walk, meet up with Mark and have some Polish culture across from Mark's office.

The Palace of Culture and Science

This building is directly across from Mark's office and is the tallest building in all of Poland. It is often known as "the gift from Stalin"....it is quite a controversial site. Unfortunately it is a constant reminder to all of Warsaw and Poland of the communist rule experienced for many decades. It took only 3 years to complete, over 5,000 workers were brought in to build it and yet Stalin never lived to see it completed.

There are over 3,000 rooms in this building but there really is not much to see so visitors are brought to the terrace on the 30th floor and treated to a great view of the city. We were having a great summer day so going up to the 30th floor was quite nice (not too cold or breezy).

There are conference rooms, theaters, and areas to hold many concerts inside.

I never tire of seeing the beautiful flowers that are abundantly planted in and around Poland...even on the 30th floor of this building there were beautiful flowers!

Mark says this building needs a major power washing...it will soon be 60 years old!

As you look out towards the eastern direction, you can see Mark's building...it is the 22-story building to the left of the curved one in the middle of the picture above. Marathon has their offices on the 6th floor.

The taller building on the right side of the picture was being built when we were here in Feb. We stayed at the Holiday Inn directly behind it. Mark had a very short walk to work when he stayed at the hotel for the first month of living and working in Warsaw.

It was soon time for dinner and Mark wanted to take me to a restaurant he had visited a few times with co-workers. This is U Kucharzy (The Cooks)....and we were celebrating Mark's birthday since we were apart on July 12th...

Our chef served us personally and did a great job in explaining what we were having and how he had prepared it for us.

Since living in Poland I have not had any fish...it was time. I wasn't prepared though for how my entree was served...I was thinking a slab of meat (forgetting a few weeks ago Mark had ordered fish and received the whole fish on his plate).

I had sea bass, ratatouille, and vegetables (pureed...with a consistency a little thicker than baby food)... celery, broccoli, and carrots and honey.

The food was quite good but I had a difficult time finishing my fish...

This Sea Bass looked a little too personal for me...I tried eating it and I did...but couldn't focus on the left side of my plate. Eating fish like this will take some getting used to. The food was good and we enjoyed eating outside on a lovely summer evening once again.

We returned to Mark's office where he recently changed locations on the 6th floor. He used to work in a cubicle next to a very large window with a great view of the city, park and surrounding areas...now he has a private office, with windows..but the view is not as good.

As you can see...Mark continues to work late into the night hours.

Here are a few "before" and "after" pictures of our upstairs "Attic/Big Room" on our 4th floor.

Before: this is how the room looked after we moved in and before leaving for CA.

After: working a few days and many hours this room became a place for scrap booking, exercising, and office work...

Originally this room was to be where we played ping pong...but it could not work out...I look forward to many hours spent doing a lot of great personal projects!

The lighting is not great...only a few small windows, but Mark had one of our 3 AC units installed up here so it should be a comfortable room to work in.

Here is a picture of one of our phones...our very kind landlord Pan (Mr.) Jakusik brought us a phone to use for our main floor. We have phones with very unique sounds on the 4th and 1st floors. I couldn't tell him we would rather buy our own phone (which we did...a black small cordless one).

We will find a place on our 2nd floor for this dial up relic...

My mom should recognize the hat Mark is wearing...I didn't know this but this hat belonged to Don! We went for errands on foot and taxi and Mark wore this hat. He wears this style often...it's quite European and works well to protect his head from the rain and sun.

We have had a lot of rain since I arrived in June...the grass is very green and beautiful! Along with the rain comes the Polish slugs...they are brown and quite large compared to slugs seen in Houston.

We often see these creatures crawling on the sidewalks and stairs as we walk to the Metro and in and around our neighborhood. You have to be careful where you walk because they are everywhere!

We have had a good week and I look forward to becoming more acclimated to life in Poland once again!