More meat and greet

So after a couple of weeks of sickness, snot and sleep for the house on Makolagwy Street, we decided to run out into the night to try and forget.

We went to Svejk Restaurant (http://www.uszwejka.pl/index.php?lang=en), it is a great place and full of hustle and/or bustle. On Friday night it was bursting at the seams and we were waiting for a table in the non-smoking section (yes smoking is still legal in eating establishments here).

Once in and seated we had a great seat, in the sense that it was between the kitchen, the bar and the stairs to the bottom floor, and we could watch lots of different food and drinks passing by. This made us super hungry, and so after seeing another massive plate of meat go past, we knew we had to have something crazy. So we ordered the Svejk platter, which is insane (please see photo above). The platter was huge as was the beers (photo also attached below). So we had a great meal and I didn't even have room in my sweet corner, aka dessert pocket, of my continually expanding belly. That is indeed quite a feat!



Also attached is a photo of a great little trout that Miss Marta made me as a surprise dinner one evening when I was a little sick. It was amazing as she was able to make trout taste nice, something not everyone can do! Otherwise it has just been the end of snot and coughing hopefully on the way to a great week and weekend. Come on sunshine!

Is it the swine flu?

Well once again I was to be sick! I don't think I have ever been this sick before, I am positive it has something to do with public transport system and my massive usage of it. All I need now is to wear a mask, gloves and spray disinfectant on all the coughing and sneezing grannies! :)

So I am thinking that what do you do when you are sick in Poland. The answer of course is to bake gingerbread biscuits! Either that or a jigsaw! Which is killing me! Darned Machu Picchu who ever would have thought that you are this complex! But, thanks to Marta for the birthday present... if there is anyone who wants to come around and finish it..... please email! :)

So after even having to take a morning off work, I have recovered only to be a very pleasant boyfriend and to give Marta the present of sickness, and people think I am not considerate! So I have been the house maid looking after her (basically it was just a great excuse to make chicken soup and buy comfort food).

To all people suffering a flu whether it be swine, bird, gingerbread or Spanish I hope you get well soon. Try baking, it worked for me!

Photoshoot in the Park

The sunshine has been out and about for a while in Polandia and this has inspired many people to take their cameras out on the weekends when they tour the parks and festivals, that includes me.

So this weekend we decided to go to the Lazienki, pron Wa-shen-key, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazienki Park which is the largest park in Warsaw. It is hugely popular with the general public, girls and boys flirting, kiddies diving into icecreams, grannies stretching their old bones, and knobs like me with a camera pointing at every squirrel and pretty flower abound.

Marta had taken me into this park before, but last time it was surrounded by little mounds of snow and grannies wearing furs. Where as these days, there is flesh everywhere and even grass. Alas, many if not all the grassed areas are protected from pedestrian walking.... which is a shame. That said, we may have accidentally walked into some areas to play :) We did get told off, once, but it just gave us something to talk about for the rest of the day.

We were also lucky enough to be joined by Magda and the princess, that is Zuza. Also attached. I found a great model in the park, and luckily enough, this model wanted their picture to be taken by me. As well as the fact that normally I don't really think red-heads are attractive (apologies to all gingers). So I have a photo of my best model here, certainly very cute, as I have been told by many.

That evening we drifted into town for something to feed our normally swollen bellies and found ourselves at the Kompania Piwna Podwale (http://www.podwale25.pl/index.php?lang=en), where I was lucky enough to try to consume a full 1.2 kg's of Golonka. Alas, I couldn't, but they were kind enough to give me a doggy box!! No, I don't mean bag, it was a box. They have a really nice traditional menu and it is a great place to while away the hours when the twilight kicks in, especially in the beer garden where we were. Though it is more a beer courtyard than a garden! Now with even more swollen bellies and walking like last trimester pregnant women, we waddled our way down to our favourite coffee shop (Pozegnanie z Afryka, meaning Farewell to Africa), and played some backgammon. Then, as the twilight was fully upon us, we staggered outside in our confused state, between coffee and full bellies, our bodies were very confused as to how to act. So we didn't feel too bad as we were alert, but still unable to run or move at speed. We strolled the Nowy Swiat and enjoyed watching the glammed up people on their way out, the tourists on their way in, the students sweating and beer-soaked as there was a festival on at the university, and the grannies (who seem to be ever present in Poland) drifting along frowning at all in sundry. We stood at the Copernicus statue and listened to a saxophonist kill the art of music.

Ahhhh fast and hard times in Warsaw.

Off Topic

Well sometimes in life you just need to say something.....

Last night I had the chance to watch the Oscar nominated movie the Wrestler. I was all excited thinking "Wow this must be a great movie", due to the press and the fact that it was nominated for so many awards. Not only the big hoooolywood ones but in Venice and other places too which tend to favour quality more so over budget etc. So we sat down ready to enjoy a story of an old Wrestler struggling with life in tights outside of the ring.

To be honest, this movie just sucked. I have seen some sucky movies in the past, but when it comes to wrist slitting action this was certainly higher than anything I have seen in a very long time. The life of the main character in the movie appears to reflect that of Mickey Rourkes'. It comes to the a head with the saying "Once a loser, always a loser". The most apt quote from the movie was "I'm an old broken down piece of meat", if you were to change broken down to rancid you could interpret the stench of this movie.

Within 30 minutes of the start of the movie it was obvious what would happen. Sometimes knowing the ending is good, however this wasn't anything to be excited by. It was more painful than slowly removing a band aid from your inner thigh that has been there for a month. I don't think I have ever wanted to see someone die so early in a movie, as I did with Rourke. Alas it takes until the end for this to happen.

To make it more enjoyable they should have shown in the movie should his early professional life. Allowing the v iewer to see him at his peak, not cheapening it with paper clippings and adverts for fights, I did however like the Nintendo game. If they barely paid for music, Rourke did it for free and they only took 35 Days to shoot it how on earth did they spend the $US6million?! Maybe this is what it cost to get Marisa Tomei's boobs done. Which overall was probably the highlight of the movie, in a way that I didn't actually expect to see her naked, I thought they would just show her from behind or similar, to keep her dignity. Then again maybe she lost that by doing "My Cousin Vinny"...... Overall the acting was about as deep as the water in a dog bowl, and it has the same effect on you. In the sense that, were you to drink the dog water you would feel sick like you should remove your stomach of any contents.

Anyway, to cease this rant. I recommend, if you are going to get this on DVD or go to the movies, instead you should by a lottery ticket, when you win a lot of money on this ticket, you should then burn it in front of your own eyes. This will indicate the amount of pain you would feel if you wasted the 109 minutes you would have otherwise lost in life to the Wrestler!

May Day and other times around town

Art of the Polish landscape is upon you......

Well now that Spring is in full swing,
I will get to see the blossomy trees,
Feeling the sun is out and mosquitoes about,
The birds sing causing a pleasant din,
But where is the rain on the Warsaw plain?
Away I hope as without it I can cope,
But how and why does that pig over there fly?

Yes, that was an ode to a painting I discovered and attached with the blog. It is certainly interesting. I am not sure how old it actually is and not sure where from, that said, I do like it. I think it can be associated with many things in Poland. Many things will happen when pigs fly! Let\s hope that they don't with the swine flu going round!

However, one thing that has happened of recent times in Poland is that it is officially in drought! Well Warsaw is anyway, and on the last weekend, the long weekend for labour day, the forests were closed for fear of bushfire! It is certainly the last thing I expected in Poland, let alone in Spring in Poland. I think they must be using all the rain water to water the vodka crops instead of using it for normal rain, well maybe.

The weekends weather has been amazing, we were able to go for a long stroll on Friday from where we live over to an area called Wilanow, it is now mostly a new subdivision. It is miles and miles of apartments that, at this stage, are yet to be sold. There are few if any shops, restaurants and cafes. Also no public transport can be found in the new allotment, so it is quite a long walk to the main road to find a way into town. Luckily for all the people on holidays for Labour Day on this main road, there is also the Palace Wilanow. This was absolutely crammed with people! They were all over the place, eating icecreams, parading their fanciest shoes, highest socks and displaying only their happiest of grannies.

The weekend before we took the chance to tour around the town centre again, where we went to some nice areas. There are so many random things to find in a town centre like Warsaw. We went to the Praga side of the river, where we walked around some nice parks, we also went past the most famous Chocolate factory/company in Poland, E.Wedel. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.Wedel This is on the shore of a small lake and is certainly not the most attractive factory ever (not many factories look good though), but I had hoped for something prettier from a chocolate factory. Alas, there was no Willy Wedel singing and dancing. They also have a little shop at the front of the factory which is in a Romanesque (and Grotesque) style. It really stands out in its white form in front of a very drab dark grey factory, but unfortunately the shop only sells what is able to be bought in Supermarkets. This is a huge disappointment, as we had hoped that it would have something really different and nice. This emotion caused us to go to the city centre and go to the Wedel café/bar/restaurant thing (see photos). It is a place of opulence, lots of polished bits, old wooden and velvet chairs along with delicate truffles and THE most rich hot chocolates you have ever had. We ordered two, a mint and a cherry flavoured one. They came out with the appearance of mud or something equally unattractive, they had tacky glace cherries on it, to indicate which was the mint and which was cherry (photo above). We then proceeded to consume these rich delicacies, especially with the excitement of the sugar rush that would surely follow. I thoroughly recommend to anyone visiting Warsaw to go and try one of these, they are simply divine.