Even More Language

(originally written on 10/13)

You know how I said Saturday in Warsaw was a clusterfuck? I was just tempting fate. Today was a clusterfuck from top to bottom.

Gdansk and Krakow are at opposite ends of the country. To travel between them you can either take a sleeper train or fly to warsaw, change planes, and fly to krakow. We chose the flying. First off we wound up way early at Walesa airport and had to futz around there for extra time. When we changed planes we had to go through security again (why? we went directly from security to the plane to security - where would we have acquired something dangerous?) and I got a rather personal grope from a Polish TSA lady. Then our Warsaw to Krakow flight was over an hour late. When they finally let us board, we walked through the chute directly onto a tarmac where a bus was waiting for us. I appreciate them not making me run through the airport for a changed gate, but I'm pretty sure the bus driver took the scenic route and then chose a plane at random. When we boarded we found De had been reassigned because some doofus had waited at the wrong gate and missed his (on time) flight to Krakow. Lucky me, I got to sit next to the broad shouldered long legged dude who, while he has no control over the size of his limbs, certainly could have sat without jabbing me with his knee, folded his tabloid style paper in half like every other civilized person, or at the very least not leaned into me whilst he read it. After hanging into the aisle I got up and moved to where De was sitting, which had an empty seat next to it, only to discover the one man who failed to get the memo a couple of decades ago that it was permissable for a European Male to wear deodorant.

When we finally landed, we were exhausted, cranky and hungry as anything and were therefore perhaps not in the best frame of mind to be dropped off at a kind of grotty looking building on a somewhat graffiti-ed block, nor were we prepared for the sheer awfulness of the building lobby and front stairs. Not tackiness, but dark, ill-repaired stairwells.

We were a bit shell-shocked when the receptionist went through city info, recommended restaurants, gave us other helpful info. De's mom and sis had opted for the sleeper the previous evening and had therefore checked in and wandered the city for a couple of hours. She went to apologize to them, but they were not at all displeased with the hotel. After a satisfyingly beige meal (chicken breast with garlic sauce, gnocchi with gorgonzola) we came back and think it might be OK. For one thing, the room and closet are huge. For another, the tv does get a couple of english language channels. We have the run of the nice, modern kitchen, and if my laptop goes out, I am welcome to use either computer here. The only problems we have are these - our bathroom door is some sort of hip, with-it frosted glass, that's really not frosted enough. If either of us has to use the facilities, the other has to turn around because YOU CAN TOTALLY SEE PEOPLE PEEING!!OMG!1eleventy!1 and you know, we're just not that close to eachother. The other issue is that the room keys are master keys for any room on this floor (there are four - we have two). If we are they only guests this week it won't matter, but I really don't like the idea that random strangers could get into the room. At any rate, there's a safe.

I'll probably post my thoughts on Gdansk tomorrow, and some pictures as well. For now, I'm going to brush my teeth, turn off this show on siege engines, and go to bed.