Real American

Dearest Old Bolds, Friends and Family,

Our starting point today is Lodz (pronounced Woodszch in Polish).

There are three things that will help with orientation:  One: Lodz is halfway between Breslau(Wroclaw) and Warsaw.  Two: it was one of the most Jewish cities in Poland before World War II.  And, three, wow, they really do eat pierogis here, just like in Chicago.

Poland is a country in transition.  One gets the feeling that there is finally money flowing in, but that the investment in infrastructure here remains decades behind other central European countries like the Czech Republic or Hungary.  Experience having lived in East Berlin after the wall fell is helpful to cope with some of the sights of 18th and 19th century building decay, but one also feels a despair here that was not present in Germany, where investment and renovation were taken for granted.

What I didn’t realize before coming was that Breslau was a magnificent, wealthy city with architecture rivaling that found in cities like Prague or Budapest.  In 1945, when this part of Germany was given to the Poles, it didn’t seem like they really believed it would stay that way.  So many of the buildings damaged by the fighting, and many that were still whole – those rich merchant homes, palaces and residences built by master builders over centuries – were pulled down, their stones and bricks sold and sent in trainloads to rebuild Warsaw. It’s like imagining that the heart of Vienna was ripped out, and its stones sold for cash.  Every single German was forced out of Poland within a very short time, so anyone who had built, lived in, worked in, owned, or loved those buildings was gone.  There was almost nothing to stop anyone desperate for cash (and there were many living on the brink of starvation after the war), from coming in and taking part in this destruction.  On the footprint of these irreplaceable gems, truly awful cement apartment blocks were built, and, more recently, modern malls.

Eventually, the Poles realized that the history of this city could be its salvation.  Now, the Renaissance, 19th century, and Art Deco buildings that previously lined one of largest marketplaces in Europe have been rebuilt or renovated, and painted pleasing pastel colors.  But just one block behind the main square on all sides, crumbling, grey decrepitude on a Cuban-like scale extends for miles, interrupted only by modern glass and steel structures, and the occasionally renovated church or cultural icon, like the opera house.   The juxtaposition is extraordinary.  And heartbreaking.

Standing in the middle of the square, you could feel the faintest pulse of the medieval, Hansa-league city.  But you also feel waves of agony for what has been lost – the love of a people for, and connection to the century-old history of the city in which they live.  How does one reconcile oneself with a city that was for centuries German when one is a Pole, given what happened in the 20th century, let alone love it or claim its history?

It is a question I cannot answer.

We left the city, and drove on a new, divided highway – two lanes each direction – that leads from Breslau/Wroclaw to Lodz.  This road is so new it was neither in our GPS, nor on our maps.  Given the heavy 18-wheeler traffic, we wondered how commerce functioned before its existence.  Did these thousands of trucks previously drive on country roads through villages and never-ending stoplights on their way to Warsaw?

As we rolled deeper into Poland the number of cars sporting German license plates diminished.  We are now the only ones we ever see.  I thought about this a lot in advance, so I bought an American flag magnet, which I stick on the back by the license plate.  But I’m not sure of the positive effect.  Perhaps we look doubly rich.

When we arrived in the first of the towns mentioned in Charley’s father’s military papers, Zdunska Wola, we saw a sign for a history museum (Muzeum Historii), and decided to drop by.  We walked in just as a local historian was finishing a presentation on the Holocaust and concentration camps.  So the timing was a bit awkward.

Although the speaker coolly regarded us, everyone else was so nice, insisting we sit down and drink tea until they could find an English-speaker (here only some university-educated people, or those in the hotels, speak English.  No one speaks German).  A lively little old man came over and spoke to us in Polish, obviously asking me where I was from. When I said I was Amerikanska he danced around in glee, and repeated American, American, while miming a soldier holding a rifle up to shoot.  When Charley said he was German, our new friend started reciting Plattdeutsch vocabulary – Plattdeutsch is the German dialect found around Hamburg.  We were delighted.  He was pulled away by a young girl family member as our translator arrived, but before he left, he asked if I were a real American.

Yes, I answered.  I am a real American.  Really real.  He turned his head to the side?  I nodded vigorously.

This caused him to beam and dance again in delight.  It’s by far the best welcome I’ve ever had based on my nationality outside of Sweden (but that’s another story for another time).

Although not much was known about the battles that took place here in World War I, we asked if there were any military cemeteries around, hoping they might give us a clue as to the units that fought in a particular area.  A young historian was assigned to take us to two cemeteries, quite a ways out of town.

As the sun dipped low, we parked in the woods, walked along the busy road, and through a deep ditch, and finally arrived at a sad, dilapidated cemetery for perhaps 30 Germans killed in the battle here at the end of November, 1914.
The first grave we saw contained the bodies of men in Charley’s father’s unit.

And so what we were not able to determine in the archives, we found, by the grace of God, on the ground.

If this is all we find, it will be enough.

But of course, we will push on, towards the Vistula.