Reflections on the Comenius Trip to Poland 2011
Reflections on the Comenius Trip to Poland 2011
Flying in over an expansive and level agricultural mosaic of elongated strips of greens, browns and golds stretching for miles in all directions, the plane made its final descent to Krakow. A mere 2 ½ hours flight from Edinburgh, we were in a different kind of Europe, redolent with a unique and at times, troubled history. Met by one of our Comenius colleagues, Tomek, we were driven north through woodland, gravel pits and gently undulating farmland, the low ridges on the horizon punctuated by tall chimneys smoking Poland’s “black gold”, lignite. En route we stop at a traditional wooden inn for our first taste of Polish cuisine.
Our arrival at Radomsko in the fading daylight was touching, as we were greeted like old friends and each presented with a single rose. These roses became a symbol of warmth and kindness which we experienced from each and every person we met. Our abiding memory of the visit is the generosity of the Polish people. Nothing was too much bother, and we were quickly made to feel at home.
Radomsko itself is in many ways unremarkable; a small town with a service economy, it lies on the great Polish plain, on major historic routes between Hapsburg Vienna and Warsaw, near the coalfields of Katowice and close to Medieval Czestochowa, site of the famous Black Madonna. It is surrounded by forests which encroach and intertwine the very suburbs, mostly well kept blocks of flats, waste-ground and small shops but now also ribbons of prosperous modern villas of the type seen at the edge of many European villages. It is dark and quiet at night, with sparse and low powered street lighting giving a ghostly yellow pallour to the sky. Occasionally a coal train rumbles through the main line, the clanking metal of the trucks echoing and reverberating against the walls of the flats, creating a stereo effect. Yet it is a proud town, with a well resourced museum that tells of a settlement which began in the Middle Stone Age, and which experienced the vicissitudes of history. Most painful, is the story of the Jewish community, once comprising many thousands, now non-existent. Most of this community of traders and craftsmen were corralled into a ghetto, swelled by unfortunates from Poznan and elsewhere, later to perish in Treblinka. But the opposition to the Soviets is recalled, too, with an impressive memorial to the patriots who fought a guerrilla campaign against the Russians in the local woods after the end of the war.
The school is lively, newly painted, with students polite and a little shy. We see a few familiar faces from our previous meeting in June, and soon we are telling the English class all about life at Hutchie and in Glasgow. Renata and her colleagues delight in showing us the Comenius garden which they planted, complete with the oak tree we gifted last year. At the local culture centre, we give a presentation to the parents and students, who all receive certificates and hearty applause. Our partnership means a great deal to the school community and has clearly opened new doors for these youngsters. The gratitude of the parents is expressed in a buffet of traditional Polish fare, with boar and venison and innumerable cakes. At night, we meet with many new colleagues and share experiences in a mixture of English, German and phrasebook Polish.
A highlight was the Comenius cycle route through miles of farmland and native woodland, the sun splintering and fracturing between the branches of pine. In a clearing we stop at an apiary for mead and delicious honey cake. Our hostess cannot speak a word of English, but her welcome is warm and sincere, and she takes pride in showing us the collection of traditional wooded bee hives carved into folkloric figures that could have come from the Brothers Grimm. A few miles further on, we stop at a small lake, and are served fresh grilled fish. The route through this forest has interpretational panels, devised by the Comenius students and is a celebration of sustainability, history and local culture.
Our last full day took us on a long journey, in many ways. We explored Krakow, on the Vistula, and especially the impressive Wawel castle, seat of power and prestige, with its ornate Flemish tapestries, old masters and Meissen porcelain. The old town was crammed with visitors and the streets full of boutiques, bars and elegant cafes. Buskers in traditional costume pipe merry tunes, and cockaded horses trot by pulling carriages with young couples. In St. Mary's Basilica we see the world’s largest Gothic Altarpiece by Veit Stoss, from Nurnberg. Then, a slow journey out of town, west through farmland, factories and forest until we come to a small town with an old railway station and many sidings. The station name is Oświęcim. We know it better as Auschwitz.
And so, on a beautiful late summer’s day, with the shadows lengthening on autumnal trees we are given a very personal tour of hell. Our guide is young and factual, but we sense a latent anger in her accounts of the methodical and ultimately industrial process devised here for humiliating, breaking and eliminating human beings. First it was Poles and prisoners of war for slave labour, and then it was the Jews for extermination. Each prison block, like Bluebeard’s Castle, revealed some fresh horror. In some cases, literally; an expansive glass case full of human hair, a pile of discarded suitcases, shoes. Even those symbols of vulnerability and frailty, artificial legs, had been cynically and obscenely stockpiled. But the real horror was the realisation of being where it had happened, peering into claustrophobic and suffocating cells, sealed and crammed punishment boxes where people had to stand all night because they could neither sit nor lie. The wall at the end of the yard where people were shot in the back; even the Nazi firing squads could not look women and children in the eye. Standing in the very gas chambers themselves, and shuddering at sight of the oven doors. “Arbeit macht frei” was indeed a sick piece of irony, and a phrase to chill the heart. No wonder our Polish friends were moved to tears. This was, and is, their soil, their country, their story.
So we made the way back on the bus. Quiet, reflective, seeking solace in the setting sun over the narrow strips of land we had seen from the plane just a few days previously. Clive James tells us we need to remember what we owe Poland: “if history could begin again,” he says, “Poland’s contribution and sacrifice would be too much to ask for one small nation” Suddenly the enormity of Poland’s history strikes me; it is the story of Europe, too often at war, crossed and re-crossed by a score of invaders...a country which still grieves a catastrophic plane crash and lost President.
And then, something remarkable. We return to Krakow, and bid a reluctant farewell to friends. There are more gifts of books, jars of local honey and chocolates from people we scarcely knew three days ago. We give a final wave and then head off into the city. It is dark, cloudless and starry. The implacable fortress is bathed in floodlighting. Tourists wander the old streets. A crowd of young people has gathered by the banks of the Vistula. At some unknown signal, first singly and then in flotillas, Chinese lanterns are released. Suspended candles illuminate the pastel coloured paper, the lanterns gain warm air and rise into the sky, catching a wind that takes them far over the city. Soon dozens of lanterns are released, then hundreds, then thousands. The flickering candles illuminate faces, with eyes shining as the lanterns are launched. There is laughter; a thousand mobile photos of friends are taken; love messages are scribbled on the paper. And the lanterns continue their silent flight over the city. After the horror of Auschwitz, here, of all nights and in all cities is a potent symbol-light, a reminder of life and of the power of humanity to overcome darkness. “Better to light a candle than curse the darkness” was never more powerfully illuminated than that night in Krakow.
Our trip to formally mark the end of the joint school project had become something bigger and more profound. Here is the justification for travel; not to identify aims and objectives, or to satisfy “national criteria”, but to engage with people, to come up against the unfamiliar or the uncomfortable. To have a dialogue with somebody who sees things differently, who has a whole set of experiences and culture we cannot know about. It is staying and travelling with someone and seeing the world through their eyes. True understanding, the goal of any learning, arises from the sudden revelation which comes like a jolt on a bumpy road through an old town in ancient Poland, and, like Eliot, we see or comprehend things for the first time:
...The end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
J D McDougall, October 2011
Highlights from the trip can be viewed here and a full picture diary is available on the Hutchesons’ Flickr photostream.
