Poland: Day 3

We had a little more than half a day in Warsaw before we had to go back to Paris, so we decided to take it slow and easy and mostly wander around. Julia suggested that we check out a milk bar and get a genuine Polish experience, so that was our first stop.

Polish milk bars have a long and complicated history, but the bottom line is that they are crappy little places that serve cheap, homemade-style meals. With the aid of google and good old Nigel, our GPS navigator, we found Familijny Bar Mleczny on Nowy Swiat street. Julia, still overwhelmed form the dinner we had the night before, just had to get more Borscht, and also decided to try the Pierogi. I got the Goulash.

Also, peeking into the kitchen is an experience on its own:

We wandered around the market a little bit, got some chocolates to bring home with us, and left for the old city.

We stopped by the library building of the University of Warsaw, because it’s really pretty:

The old city is really pretty:

and there’s a lot of tourists and touristy stuff going on.

When I grow up I want to be this guy:

Before leaving we stopped at an ice-cream place to get some hot chocolate. I was appalled to see this:

And that, children, is why the Smurfs have gone extinct.

We went back to the car to get to the airport, but it then turned out that Nigel had never heard of it.

We drove around, mostly by instinct (Julia’s, of course) until we hit a small town, which turned out to be Modlin. Julia claimed that the airport should be near, but driving back and forth on the main road led to nothing. We finally noticed a sign that directs to a tourist’s information center. We drove there and I went in.

We were getting tight on time, so obviously there just had to be a tour guide who had some 40 people on his hands for the dude at the desk to deal with. This means that the dude in the desk now has to get 40 maps, 40 booklets and 40 teddy-bear-keychains. This of course, has to take place extremely slowly, and god forbid there will be enough teddy-bears at the drawer, so he needs to go to the back and get some more.

Dude at the desk was finally done with the tour-guide and it was my turn to get help. Now, I’m not saying that everybody should know English, but seriously - the dude at the tourist’s information center?

- “airport?”

nothing

-”Air….port ?”

nope.

I stretched out my arms and whistled (as much as I can)  a descending pitch. Dude nods! Bingo. I grab a map and shove it in his hand, he draws a route, we smile, shake hands, and we’re off!

The tiny airport was just outside the town.

This adventure would not have been complete, of course, without noticing the ringtone-scanning dude who sat next to us in the airport on the first day and in the restaurant on the second day. Warsaw - check!