Conversations in Silesia

Our Polish Pretend Son got married in his native Silesia last weekend, and naturally his British Fake Foster Parents were there.

I am not going to write much about the wedding, however, as I have the vague intention of borrowing from various Polish parties and adventures to write a heartwarming comedic thriller tragedy set at a Polish wedding.

THURSDAY

Three members of the Men's Schola and I flew to Wrocław on Thursday evening via RyanAir, all sitting apart from one another in "allocated" seats to save money. Going to Poland from Scotland with RyanAir is rather like travelling for 2.5 hours on a crowded bus. It is squashy but mundane. Before you finish your book, you have landed and are standing in a queue to have your passport inspected minutely by an unsmiling customs guard.

Although I know my passport will be scrutinised a lot longer if I speak Polish, I always do. It's daft, for it's not like anyone around is going to yell "You're in Poland: speak Polish" in Polish at me. Meanwhile, the reward for my beautifully articulated "Dobry wieczór" is a look of dark suspicion and the observation that I am in Poland a lot, as if I may have been sneaking into the country to work for zl instead of working decently at home for £ or even $.

Excitingly, this time the Customs Conversation was enlivened by B.A., who had gone before me, not being able to get through the gate.

"Bramka nie działa," I pointed out, which was probably even more suspicious than "Dobry wieczór."

The next conversation was the Bus Ticket Conversation, in which I successfully bought tickets from the young bespectacled driver and accurately answered his "where-to?" His radio was tuned to, apparently, the "Wa-Wa-Wrocław" station, and so the cheerful thump of Disco Polo music accompanied us all the way to the historic centre.

Wrocław used to be Breslau and was flattened near the end of the last World War. However, the historic centre was rebuilt, so it is very pretty.  Well, most of it is very pretty.  The Plac Dominikański, where we alighted, is ugly and modern, flanked by an ugly modern Galleria (indoor shopping mall). However, after I led us all in the wrong direction, the Master of the Men's Schola discovered the way on his phone and we soon found ourselves in our shabby chic turn-of-the-century (i.e. 1903) ex-German hotel.

It was 11 PM, but naturally the Schola was gasping for beer, so we dumped our stuff and found the Main Market Square, which is truly impressive. It is actually a square of buildings within a square, so that one can sit outside one of many bars in the middle and look at the beautiful facades around the periphery. We found a bar called "Pijalnia" ("Open 24 h"), with little tables and chairs outside. It was a very warm and dry night, so we sat down at once and looked about for a server.

It quickly dawned on us that there might not be table service, so the MMS and I approached a waitress coming out of the bar. To my horror, I completely forgot the word for "to order". Dear heavens, the Buying Drinks Conversation was awkward. However, it wasn't a complete failure, for the waitress caught my meaning and told me to order at the bar, which I successfully did.

There followed a lot of drinking of beer, of remarking on Polish girls wearing microscopic skirts, and  of discouraging a Romany beggar. I was longing to get up and look at other parts of the large and lovely square, but B.A. was afraid I'd be stolen. How happy I was when we finally went back to the hotel to sleep.

FRIDAY

The next morning I bounced down to the dining-room before the clerk got there and so breakfasted clandestinely. Then I rushed out to see all the square and the square next to it and further around and about. Although it was only 8:30 AM or so, the sun blazed away fiercely. Fearing sunburn, I scampered back to the hotel and had breakfast with B.A. This time I was stopped and checked off the list by a clerk. Polish breakfast clerks are so anxious about their clipboards, there must be a serious breakfast-stealing problem in Poland.

After breakfast the Men's Schola went off together to look at churches, and I went to the Galleria to book a manicure. The Galleria looks just like an American or British shopping mall, only with such Polish shops as Empik (books) and Sowa (cake) mixed in with H&M and Sephora and the entire staff and clientele being white, European and Polish-speaking.

After some difficulty and two short conversations (Mall Security Guard Conversation, Information Booth Conversation), I found "Mani-Pedi" and my brain froze again because I had no idea how to say, "I would like an appointment for a gel manicure, please."

When I resorted to asking if she spoke English, the young lady behind the desk looked like her brain had frozen too. The poor girl called up Google Translate on the computer to find the English for "Do you have an appointment?" She lacked the courage to pronounce the words, so she motioned me over to look. Poor sweet. I knew exactly how she felt. We both had failed the Beauty Shop Conversation.

But the upshot was that Mani-Pedi had no free slots until Monday, and I went to PPS's wedding with bare fingernails. They were tidy, at least, for I bought a package of nail files in the Galleria's Rossman toiletries store.

My feet got blistered during my morning's walk, and although my self-confidence was low, I knew I had to buy some hot weather shoes. To my pleased surprise, I knew all the necessary words, including "I take a size 38" and "I don't need the box", so my Shoe Shop Conversation has vastly improved since that October day I had to buy emergency snow boots in Kraków.

I was due to meet the Men's Schola outside St. John's Cathedral for lunch. As it happened, we met on the way, and after rejecting a restaurant opposite a church as too expensive, we found ourselves in a cheap and cheerful joint outside the old market hall. There I had a Food and Beer Ordering Conversation, which was redundant as the server clearly spoke English.

I should stress that none of these conversations were as fluent as I would have liked, and my ego was getting as blistered as my poor feet. Every week in Edinburgh I have an hour long conversation with a Polish graduate of Linguistics, and I usually natter on comfortably about anything. In Wroclaw, however,  I was having an awful time---until the Railway Ticket Conversation.

Wrocław Główny railway station looks like a long, low orange castle. It has a couple of Polish cafes, a Starbucks, a Costa Coffee, an Empik, a Biedronka grocery store, a McDonald's and a library. It has no ticket machines, so everyone has to queue up and buy his ticket directly from a person. Sadly by the time the Master of the Men's Schola and I got to the front of our queue, it was our person's break time. At the dot of 5 PM he was out of there. Alas.

MMS and I queued up again and eventually approached a middle-aged lady behind a glass window.

"Does Madame speak English?" I said politely in Polish, for this is my great get-out clause.

"Only a little," said Madame in Polish

"No harm done," I said. "We will try in Polish."

Fluency kicked in. Hooray! And what made the Railway Ticket to PPS's Village Conversation particularly sweet was that the Master of the Men's Schola was right beside me and heard it all.

There followed soon after the Coffee-and-cake in Costa Conversation, the Ticket Inspection Just-as-our-station-approached Conversation and, most gloriously, the Very Chatty Taxi Driver Conversation, although we discovered later he had charged us double the going rate. Fortunately, 70 zl is only about £14, so we were ripped off only £7, and presumably he needed it more than we did. Besides it was worth £7 to hear the cowed silence of the back seat. For the first time in history the Men's Schola shut up and listened to me for a solid 15 minutes.

Polish Pretend Son's wedding reception was in a country hotel. Originally a German Schloss, it is now a Polish pałac. PPS, looking slim and elegant (if a little frazzled), greeted us as we got out of the cab and then ordered me to register in Polish. Thus I had the Registering at a Hotel Conversation Polish hotel clerks usually conduct with foreigners in English, actually.  Then, after B.A. and I had taken possession of our luxurious 19th century suite, we went to the hotel dining room to chat with other English-speaking guests, including a priest.

PPS then took all the young men away to his bachelor party, leaving me to dine with the priest, for whom I ordered (Ordering Supper Conversation), as he speaks no Polish. This was quite easy, as the priest had been in Silesia for four days and developed a taste for both chłodnik and pierogi ruskie, which I like, too. Also, both are meatless, and it was Friday.

I was very tired, but after supper with the priest I managed one more Polish conversation. Polish Pretend Son's war-survivor grandmother was dining at a table near us with a blond lady. I recognised Babcia at once for, as it happens, PPS brought her, his father and one of his sisters to the Historical House one day. Instead of sensibly catering for Polish tastes, I had made an enormously complicated, sweet and British simnel cake, complete with marzipan decorations. Babcia had thought it a very strange cake and said so, eliciting giggles from her grandchildren and blushes from me.

I have been afraid of Babcia ever since, but I thought that it would be rotten not to acknowledge her at her grandson's wedding.  I gathered up my courage and, addressing the blonde lady, launched into the Polite Introductions Conversation. The blonde lady was, I believe, PPS's great-aunt, and it soon transpired that Babcia didn't remember me at all.  

SATURDAY

The next day, wearing meticulously correct English morning dress, Polish Pretend Son married a beautiful, tall, slim, dark-haired young radiologist. She wore a lace dress, a traditional floral wreath, and a floor-length veil. Half the female population of Edinburgh committed suicide, and t The happy couple returned to the hotel from the famous shrine in a vintage white Corvette.