Hi all,

I finally managed to convince Andy- the mostly silent partner of FishwithWhiskey- to do a guest post.

I just feel like he is more in touch with the Fatherland/Poland than me- given that it is actually the land of his forfathers.

Here goes:

In search of Stalinist architecture and Polish hipsters we bravely headed East of Central Europe to Warsaw

Unfortunately in Ostbahnhof, Tegan’s head spontaneously turned into an apple

But by the time she was aboard the train and on the way to Catholic Poland an unknown saint intervened and she was miraculously cured

Before long we were crossing the Mighty Odra river. Please not the absence of ponies and rainbows on the German side and similar lack of burning rubble and rusting BMW car chassis on the Polish side

While Tegan basked in the sun I attempted to finish reading Infinite Jest before I get old next month

Greeted by the advance party at Warszawa Centralna

We checked in and explored the Warszawa old town

In front of the Polish Academy of Sciences we have Copernicus’ vision of the universe

Here is little old Earth with my favourite Moon in the background

The Martian! Now a Major Motion Picture

One small step, one giant leap

T perfecting her dandy

Family!

While Warszawa was almost completely destroyed by the end of 1944 clearly a lot of work has been put into restoring the old town down to the smallest detail and elsewhere there are many modern buildings springing up.

This poor guy had to keep on asking tourists to please stop hitting him and touching his costume

Here is the Royal Castle with clock tower

In the old square or Rynek Starego Miasto is a statue of the Mermaid of Warsaw. Legend has it that in the Polish Dreamtime she was swimming down the Vistula River and liked the look of Warszawa so she decided to stay. Now she protects the city with her trusty shield and sword.

Church!

Meat in a cup of bread