An American studying medicine in the PRL 1978-1985: my story

Rather "Sport".

Lance, it turned out, was the man...... You know, most of the girls in the beginning were very wary of us; the overwhelming majority of Poles treated us well. They may have been jealous but they never showed it. There were of course exceptions :(


Hahaha. I still to this day remember how they tasted (and smelled to high heaven).

You should definitely turn your thread into a book:)
Don't let this storytelling talent be wasted, unbelievable how many details you can remember - really vivid portrayals of people and places. Not to mention that the subject itself is extremely interesting.

Out into the world
The memories of my first days outside the dorm will forever be seered into my memory. Sights, sounds and smells then encountered are as vivid in my consciousness as if they happened yesterday.

It was a beautiful August summer day. The sexy Polkas were out in their summer dresses and I was king of the world!
But then,
the noise! Having been raised in Jersey chicken-farm country(where the most-disturbing sound one might encounter might be a cat fighting an opposum), I wasn't used to the city. Kraków's street symphony was a cacophony of sounds: screeching/squealing/clanging metal (trams), put-put-put of the 2-cycle-engined cars, and the low frequency rumble of the PKS buses. It was noisy and it was sexy. It was exotic. I was a stranger in a strange new world.

After the acoustic assault came the smells. What hit me the quickest and the hardest were the fumes! During my year in Kraków the locals were constantly reminding me of how the city lies in a bowl. And that all the smoke,pollution and fumes just linger above the town to irritate Cracowian mucous membranes for days to come. I couldn't tell where they were coming from. I instinctively recognized them as by-products of internal combustible engines but which engines?! Were they from the trams(I never saw a tram before, so I didn't have a clue lol)? or from the buses? or from the put-puts? or? or?... That smell was so pervasive and pentrating a smell I had ever smelled! It lingered in my nostrils for hours! It was such a novel scent, that it took me a few days to make the connection. After much cogitation I concluded that it had to come from the put-puts! You know, those 2-door, 2-stroke engined Syrenas and Trabants. I'm telling you it was a sight to see: small, flimsy-looking cars with blue smoke spewing from the tailpipe, sparring with the bigger vehicles for the road. They were odd-looking cars with plenty of attitude: cars that got the job done despite their looks (later I was to understand how these fiesty vehicles were emblematic of their owners' attitudes). Just like their un-impressive-looking cars, the Poles, despite the paucity of "fluff" got the job done.

It was simply an orgy of sight, sound and smell.

On our to-do list that day, was to buy bread. Polish bread during those seven years, was always fresh, always good and always cheap. However, it did come at a price: you had to wait. I can count on one hand the times I just walked in, bought my "bohenek żytniego" (loaf of rye) and left without waiting in line. There was always a kolejka. Always! Way before the "nie ma" days that were to follow, where you stood in line for EVERYTHING. If you wanted your bread(and delicious fresh rolls) fresh from the oven, you waited in line.

I'm sorry but I've got to go. My daughter is calling out for food......Maybe one more "relacja"
The babcias
I called all those chunky, blunt, rude,broads who shamelessly corrected my Polish in all the stores of Kraków the Babcias. The Babcias were notorious for correcting your grammar. It didn't matter how hard you were trying or how broad you smiled or how deeply you bowed, these babuszkas, if your sentence was incorrect, would let you know about it. They would just up and say it: "Nie proszę Pana, się mowi ........." WTF? This was the height of insult for us Americans! Can you imagine? How dare these women correct me! Don't they know I'm an American and I AM TRYING! It was so widespread we all thought it was a communist conspiracy(we thought that of a lot of things). It literally didn't matter where you were, kawiarnia, piekarnia, Dom Towarowy, on the tram, anywhere, the Babcias were there to tell you your Polish sucked. Or so I thought.

It didn't take long for me to love them. Those lovely, darling, corpulent ladies of the Communist retail world were directly responsible for me "upping my game". Thanks to them my Polish improved exponentially in that first year!

After a few visits with them I realized they were not correcting me ze złości (out of spite). They were rather doing it out of pride for their language maybe; possibly out of (Christian)love. I didn't know nor did I care. Whatever the reason, it definitely was not out of hate. It became a game after a while. You were determined to return to your Babcia and show her your chops. You were not going to make that same mistake again! Nope! This time I'll buy my bread without any corrections. I won't give her the chance. For me, who has always been a tad competetive, this was all that I needed to spur me on to learn my grammar. And man did it feel good when you did it. You felt high. It was great!

Babcia never complimented you when you got it finally right. Your reward was not to be corrected po prostu. And that was fine my me.

At first it was irritating(insulting too) BUT it turned out to be one of the sincerest expressions of love I have ever experienced from a stranger in my life (that's how I like to look at it). And that's why I do the same to all the foreigners I come into contact with. God bless the Babcias.

It's only noon.

another interesting story. Thanks for posting it. When did you say you are coming to Poland?

Googled him :) Hi is still alive in California. Polish wife, 2 kids , one grandchild ... but no beret :) on pictures.

On that same day we ventured further and deeper towards the heart of the city. Saying our good-byes to our Babcia-teachers we got back on the tram (#7 I think) and continued on Piastowska Street.

(I remember never having to wait long for this tram. It seemed to always be running).

The tram was packed with lots of sweaty, smelly people. They came in all sizes, ages and in both genders were represented. The car was ripe! Adding optical insult to olfactory injury was the sight of the most hirsute women I had ever seen. As an adolescent, I had heard stories of those girls in Europe, who preferred not to shave themselves but to encounter them in the flesh was a zupelna inna sprawa!. To say it was disgusting would be too harsh but it did take a lot of getting used to- especially the legs. Some were endowed with a thicker ruff than PT - and he was hairy. The hairy armpits, on the other hand, didn't evoke much of a reaction. You see, I was already desensitized having been raised by Polish women, who chose to "let it all hang out" (and I do mean hang) but furry lower extremities was something I had never, ever seen. I have to admit they held a certain facination for me. Similar to when you see your first two-headed calf or other such anomaly at your local county fair. I couldn't keep my eyes averted from the fuzziness. " What did they feel like"; "Boy would I love to shave them" - just some of the thoughts running through my head at that time.

The sights and smells notwithstanding, I remember witnessing one of the most beautiful customs I had ever seen in my life on that tram ride. I'm talking about the giving-up of your seat to an elderly person. I had never, ever seen such a thing. People, I was blown away. This young guy just stood up and relinquished his seat just like that! No one had to cue him or nudge him or anything. This type of thing would never go down on a New York City subway. Never! I was thnderstruck and I shared this story for days afterwards. Way to go Poles.

"Kontrol". "Kontrol"..A short, pale-complected man appeared out of nowhere wearing a uniform and a cap telling me to kontrol. Control what? What's he talking about? He gesticulates with his hands and fingers something akin to getting/receiving something. Oh! I think he wants to see my ticket!!! Thankfully, I skasowałem one and showed it to him. He looked at it, grunted something and continued on to the next victim.....Hahaha! I passed my first kontrol! I felt good.

Looking out the window I remember seeing mostly women with their shopping bags walking the sidewalks darting in and out of each store they passed. They reminded me of a school of feeding minnows: always pursuing the meals ever forwards. As I recall, the torebki were mainly filled with apples.

"Let's go, this is our stop", PT barked and off we went.

The place was a madhouse. That I remember. The traffic, the pedestrians, the trams all vying for position and space. The fumes, the noise all were contributing to a real sense of exhiliration I had never felt before. I was dizzy. By the grace of God we crossed the street and entered the Planty. The Planty is a magnificient park encircling the town square. I know it's a stretch but I always thought of this park as Krakow's Central Park.

Poles never do.

Trial by vodka
Unlike Lance, the rest of us kept to ourselves. Friday night was American night along with Saturday night and Sunday night. We were, truth be told, a pathetic, cowardly bunch. In spite of the many invites by Poles to their parties, we Americans froze, said "nie dziękuję" and proceeded to drink Beck's in a cramped American dorm room, with a bunch of cramped Americans. Yep. It was boring and predictable BUT IT WAS SAFE. When you stay with your own you are assured of one thing: no one is going to critique your Polish or interogate you about how much an average plumber makes or how much a loaf of bread costs or how long you have to work to afford a car or an apartment or a house or a..or a... Most of us regretted doing this but we were weak; we were scared and we were paranoid. We inherently knew that our behavior was antithetical to what we were really there for but the prevailing strategy was "better safe than sorry."

It sucked. We knew it. We weren't proud about it. The reasons for this apparent anti-social behavior were myriad. Some, like PT, saw a conspiracy around every corner. His father, like mine, never returned to their homeland after the war. Communism was the root of all evil. That's what we were taught we beleived it. Others, like the Canadians, who were far removed from Polish culture and tradition, were just xenophobic. Still others, were simply suffering from anti-social personality and couldn't get along with the tooth fairy if their lives depended on it.

It didn't take long for me to understand, that booze made you brave and lowered your inhibitions. I used that knowledge to breakthrough and "go Polish". The results were mixed.

One of my most embarassing experiences in Poland occured during my first year at one of those "Polish" dorm parties. As usual, I self-medicated myself with Żytnia and I'm in my glory. I'm szprehaching Polish like there's no tomorrow. People are listening to me AND they appear to be understanding me! I've got the room in the palm of my hands and it feels great! I'm speaking a foreign language in a foreign country and the natives are diggin' it! Then it happens- every foreigner's nightmare: the grand, embarrasing correction. Suddenly a Pole stands up, points an accusatory finger at me and shouts "Co mówiłeś"? ("What did you say"?). The room went still. "CO TY MOWI£EŚ"? This guy was so excited, so animated you'd think I told him tomorrow's Toto-Lotek numbers!! What did I say? What DID I say?? "Czy Ty mowiłeś zawżde"? "zawżde"? I looked at this skinny drunk Pole all flushed with excitement and ethanol and thinking "Yeah, I did say zawżde so what the Fu*k of it"! It turned out, as he explained laughingly, that the form of zawsze I was using, zawżde, was an antiquated word only encountered, heretofore, in Old-Polish literature. I was to them an anthropological hold-over. The entire room got a good laugh at my expense. You know what? I wasn't offended. I instictively understood, that I had just thrown the room a big curve and that they were appreciative of the diversion. Some stopped laughing and began interviewing me in an attempt to figure out how this came about. I, truth be told, enjoyed all the attention. My mom's parents used this form of zawsze so I also used it. For the rest of that year I became known as "Pan Zawżde" to the Poles on my floor. That was a good night.

Our First Thanksgiving
One of the Americans with us that year was Mike from Detroit. "Detroit Mike" as we called him, looked as if he was plucked from a logging field deep within a primordial forest. He was tall, stocky with a full beard and a ruddy complection. All that was missing was a chainsaw and a French-Canadian accent. Michał was about 10 years older than rest of us, not from a Polish background and was a union organizer (United Auto Workers) back home. He gave up the rough n' tumble life of setting-up unions and strikes for the more staid existence of a medical student.

Although Mike was living in Poland, his organizer instincts never left him. He would call monthly meetings where we foreigners would discuss our gripes( eg we hated that the communal toilets were never cleaned; the smell and the ever-present surprises waiting for you at the bottom of the bowl were a daily source of revulsion). These would later be presented to the dorm's administration. Nothing ever got done but it was a great excuse to get together on a regular basis. It was at one of those meetings where PT and I were ambushed.

[i]Before I go any further, I have to preface what's coming by saying, that I was very trusting and naive. My index of suspicion was barely registering.

Sometime before Halloween Mike had called an"emergency meeting". Only a handful of cudzoziemcy showed up. PT and I were the last to arrive. As soon as we sat down, this Jimmy Hoffa wannabe brought the meeting to order and got down to business. "People, Thanksgiving is coming and we need to have a Thanksgiving Day dinner. It would be great for morale (which was getting pretty low by this time). Who wants to do it? Before I could process that last sentence, Michael says "All in favor of PT and Herb organizing the Thanksgiving Dinner say ay". 10 hands went up, next thing we knew pats on the back and a "congratulations" and a warning from Detroit Mike: "make sure you have cranberries".

Were the cranberries hard to find in Poland? I'm assuming they were canned (Ocean Spray?)

Reminds me of spending my Thanksgiving in Paris. We had a pseudo turkey...chicken;)

There were no cranberries in Poland. The best we could do was sos porzeczkowy.......In a nutshell: we went to the nearby hotel and spoke with the manager ( can you imagine?) about the turkey, trimmings, etc. We returned a couple of times to check the progress. On Thanksgiving Day there was turkey and trimmings, albeit Polish ones, and Americans. We ate, drank and celebrated our holiday in splendid fashion trying hard not to feel the deep ache of homesickness that all of us were feeling.

Now we'll eat ham!
I don't remember exactly why I was on the Rynek that October 16, 1978 but I was. I remember being inside the Sukiennice and looking out onto the Rynek at the Kościól Mariacki (St Mary's Church) end. Heretofore, one didn't see groups of clergy walking together. They usually walked alone or in pairs. On that day I noticed as odd, groups of priests and nuns coming onto the square. Soon there were lots of them along with other folks. Most had smiles on their faces (another odd feature) and an unseen before spring in their step. The crowd was definitely into something both PT and I clearly were not. We started hearing Wybrali papierza. Wybrali papierza! "Hey PT they picked this guy Papierz, but for what and why the commotion"? Too bad we didn't know what the Polish word for pope was. We continued walking around the Rynek, watching the happy Poles and hearing about this papierz guy.

When we arrived at the dorm we were met by another yank, who told us what all the excitement was about.....I smiled at our Portier, Pan Jan, who smiled back and called after me "Zobaczy Pan, teraz będziemy jedli szynkę!" (Now we'll eat ham)

Kabanosy
My first month in country was, to say the least, painful. The homesickness was intense - an ache so deep, so all encompassing at times, especially at night, it became incapacitating. You can become very sad during those moments. You begin to question yourself- why, why, why?......About 6 weeks into it I got a note from Pan Robert the lobby-man telling me a gentleman was waiting for me in the lobby. Wow! What's this about? The KGB already! (we were Very paranoid back then). The dorm I was in had a grand staircase that descended into the lobby. One could make a grand entrance on those stairs if one so wished. So off I went, descending down those stairs excited as hell! At the bottom stood a distinguished looking man, suit-and-tie, glasses, holding a large oblong package. We shook hands, bowed; he began to speak. "My name is Doctor so and so", he continued telling me he's a veterinarian somewhere na Śląsku(Silesia) and that my father had asked someone to ask someone to ask him to visit me and bring me some kabanosy. He presented me with this 10-pound package of semi-dried kabanosy (those of you, who are familiar with this Polish delicacy can understand my excitement). I accepted the gift gratefully, thanked him profusely and returned to my room feeling high like I was loved and not forgotten. The delicious smokey sausages reminded me of the folks back home and helped me forget how much I missed them.

this is prob one of the best threads at the moment Rybnik. It talks about real times in Polish history. Thanks for sharing, anticipating more :).

The Money Changers
I was soon to learn that this commie economy was a sham. The dirty truth was that it really ran on twarda waluta (hard currency). It turned out that nobody wanted the Polish zloty. NOBODY. Everybody lusted after the US Dollar, British Pound, German Mark, etc (not necessarily in that order). Hard currency, in other words, was any denomination NOT Warsaw Pact-related. Rubles, East German Marks, and Hungarian forints were pecunia non grata . You see, the real commerce of that day took place in the shadows of public life. Say you needed a new battery for that Syrena you've been driving around. Pay for it in dollars and you got it. Pay in złots (our nickname for złotys) and you might have to wait. And this was way before the "nie ma" days! The Poles knew what was coming.

Hard currency made the Polish world go round. Everyone asked you if you were selling dollars - everyone. The babcias in the stolówka asked. The lobby man asked. Your Polish student neighbor in the dorm asked. Everybody asked!

So it should have been no surprise when short, seedy-looking Polish men, smoking Marlboros, clad in nice leather jackets pestered you on the Rynek. These buggers were worse than the Gypsies for chrise sake! If you looked like a foreigner - "chenge mahnee"? Say something in English to a friend, "chenge mahnee"? These diminutive pains-in-the-asses with greasy hair were everywhere! As soon as you'd shoo one away another one came to bother you. They were tenacious as gnats. They grew more irritating as the years went by. I almost hit one at the Pan Am office in Krakow during my last year.

We were warned early on not to deal with them because you'd get ripped off or worse - arrested. That's what we were told and we listened.

Family
One of my reasons for coming to Poland was to finally meet my family on my father's side. All the aunts, uncles and cousins whom I wished lived near me in New Jersey, would finally be "meeted n' greeted" while in Poland.

I don't remember how our meeting came about. Whether I called them (I doubt that because my Polish was very bad) or wrote them (more likely) whichever way, I found myself on a "kiełbasa bus" bound for Rybnik one September Friday night.

The bus was odd, loud, smelly of diesel fumes and full of people. I was anxious. My Polish was really bad and I was scared I would miss my stop ( I forgot that Rybnik was the end of the line - "koniec jazdy"). That night I recall as chilly and dark- very, very dark. I was not accustomed to the deep darkness of the Polish countryside. I mean it was black! No such thing as light pollution back then.

Rybnik PKS was nothing special. The walking directions I got from somewhere brought me to ul Rudzka. "This is the place". After 22 years I'm finally going to see, touch, hear people who are related to me; of whom I had just heard of in stories. Up until now they were an abstraction. Now I will literally be coming face-to-face with them! My heart was beating a mile -a-minute. I heard it in my ears. A deep breathe and I knocked on the door. After what seemed like a long time a stout lady, with rosey cheeks, who looked a lot like my father, opened the door, screamed my name, like she knew me forever giving me one of the best hugs of my life. The rest is a blur. A man, another man, then another man all shook my hand saying something like nice....see you...nice...your father.....I remeber smiling a lot and nodding. The last person to welcome me was my aunt Marta. Her words(which I had previously heard many times before in Kraków) are forever etched in my memory. While kissing my cheek this Silesian ciocia with the gold bicuspid whispered in a slow, deep voice "masz dolary?"

• 
  the one on the left is the bus
  

excellent story, this has not changed in Poland except it is not so blatant, its replaced by the line that I have no money to buy my medications!

Rybnik: Where did you keep your US currency? Did your parents send you money every now and then? How?

Beleive it or not, we brought it all "en masse". The transfer process was way too cumbersome, took too much time (weeks) and we didn't trust it. I don't remember now how much exactly I brought with me but I think a thousand dollars for the entire year would've sufficed (barring any large purchases eg car).

Where did you hide it though? Bank? Safe? I would imagine a lot the locals would love to get their hands on those dollary!

I can now die a happy woman, knowing what a kielbasa bus looks like ;)

Kielbasa bus?For your information, this bus Jelcz 043 is (was) commonly known and reffered to in Poland as ogórek.

Ogórek works. We Americans gave it that moniker(kiełbasa).

The Pewex
Nothing epitomized the schizophrenia of everyday Polish life more than the Pewex store. Short for Przedsiębiorstwo Eksportu Wewnętznego- Internal Export Company*, the Pewex system was a 24-7, in-your-face reminder to the average Pole, that the communist system which had promised to provide for all their needs had failed them. In the 1970's hard currency eg. US dollar, West German Mark, was desperately needed to help pay back loans taken by an overly ambitous Edward Gierek. The PRL brain-trust devised an exceptionally cynical solution to the problem: sell everything of value (cars, vodka, tractors, TVs, ham, etc) to the West for dollars and sell those same items to the Poles only for hard currency in the Pewex stores (hence Internal Export)..........The hypocrisy was not lost on us. On the one hand, the communist party was pounding the masses with the message " The PRL will take care of all your needs from cradle to grave" but on the other they seemed to be saying "so long as those needs don't include an apartment, a car, a washing machine, food, vitamins..." You get the idea.

My first Pewex experience was in Krakow on ul Piastowska. It was a big two storey modern-looking affair, which stood out from its drab grey soot-covered neighbors. Conveniently, a tram/bus stop was situated immediately in front of it. Besides the modern architecture and convenient access by mass transit, this Pewex also had "greeters" waiting for you. They were always short, seedy-looking men clad in leather jackets, who would oft times open the door for you and ask "chenge mahnee"?

Once inside you immediately knew you were in some place special. The shelves and racks were stocked with colorful new-looking items: sweaters, skirts, shirts, perfumes, make-up, ties, vodka,scotch, cigarettes and much, much more. We initially felt guilty buying stuff there but after 6 months we got over it. From then on until my departure in '85, the Pewex was a frequent shopping destination especially during the "nie ma days".

NB. there was even an "Auto Pewex" in Wroclaw, where I once bought some paint for my "garbus". That's another story.

* leave it to the commies to come up with the concept of "internal export". How's that for an oxymoron!! Come to think of it, life in those days was very oxymoronic.

Hahaha!
I just saw a Polish commercial for M&M's. The word menu(phonetically something like men-yeee) was used. What happened to jadłospis?

During the PRL days I never, ever heard the word menu!
I know, I know language changes and is a fluid thing. Got it.
When I came for a vist last year I also didn't see the word jadłospis written nor spoken.
Why?
I find it funny, that's all.

now I have to go and check if there is one in the places I occasionally eat, at least one of them is from the communist time.

It's very very rare now but still exists. I use it, but mainly because I don't lie the way the word 'menu' is pronounced in Polish. The kind of places that have a 'jadlospis' tend to be the same kind of folksy joints that in England would have a 'bill of fare'.

Alright
That's interesting

Word menu in Polish was borrowed from French so is the pronounciation from French language too.

Unfortunately the French sound doesn't exist in Polish so people come out with an uncomfortable approximation.

I somehow remember the word "menu" adorning "bill of fares" of many restaurants during PRL, supposedly pronounced in somewhat mispronounced French - but definitely not menoo, as many Poles would say it today. There were some people left still speaking French during PRL (my mom did), and this word did not come to Polish from English, but French, you know... Some better restaurants called it "Karta dań" instead.

And how this was done before WWII let be best described by the blog Sto smaków.
stosmakow.blox.pl/tagi_b/1249/kuchnia-polska.html
Search for the word menu, and you will find many good examples, in three languages, French included.

It also doesn't exist in English either and it's pronounced in it's own way in English too.

I think you and I travelled in different gastronomical circle Boletus. I remember Karta Dań but not menu. Maybe once in a hotel but that was the exception.

In the Wałbrzych region quite a few actually - miners who lived and worked in Belgium and France and who returned to Poland, lured by PRL promises.