DAY 36

Tuesday 16 August 2911

We found a recommended mechanic nearby for a needed tune-up. He had no time for some of the other things we needed done, but we had to get the basics handled, since it had become our car for the duration. It was about $85, more expensive than Ruben charges us in Santa Monica (and we even provided the oil). Still: the only thing cheaper in Europe is beer.

We bought a needed pillow, and a lightweight, British-made mountaineering hammock (Polish: hamak). We also made sure the car would be done no later than 3:30, so that when we returned from our tour with Kris, (leaving at 4 PM), we would have a place to sleep that night. It was.

Dian, Kris and Charles

As we walked and rode the subway with Kris, we learned that he was getting a degree in International Economics, emphasis Taiwan (he studied there), and he said when we saw him performing chores around the camp with his iPod in, it was Mandarin lessons he was listening to, not pop music.

The first sight was a square filled with large metal chairs, spaced evenly but far apart, a monument to the Jews who gathered there thinking they would be “relocated,” meaning exterminated, and they put up a losing fight. Next, a visit to Oskar Schindler’s factory site, now a museum. Then, a highlight off the beaten path: a huge mural covering a large building by street artist Blu. It sparked controversy because many of the very Catholic Poles did not take well to the depiction of someone speaking into an oppressive huge megaphone shaped like a bell and covered with the Vatican coat of arms, hovering over a mass of upturned faces. Open to interpretation.

We walked a bit through the center of town but skipped some of the usual tourist sites. What we did not skip was Polish pizza, at the best place in town. Finally we took a bus to a far part of  Krakow where there was an old stadium and one wall of it, about four blocks long, was filled with graffiti. Nicole especially was happy to shoot some of the scenes.

We took a taxi back to camp, where Kris’s smiling colleagues cheered his triumphant return. We invited him back for a beer and wound up playing Boggle with yet another non-native-English speaker. He held his own, and then we lapsed into scary folk tales, about Smok the local dragon.