Warsaw, rainy Warsaw....

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So the riding is finally over and all that was left to do Wednesday was get everything ready for Thursday's early morning departure for DC, see Warsaw, and listen to Alastair Moock's shows. This seemed like it would provide such a good bookend to the constant 50-mile-plus rides and rainy, cold days on the road. In the end, though, thanks to a bonehead move on my part, some out of date information in the Rough Guide and some complicated logistics, only the music and meeting people part worked out.

So after having gone to some extremes in Riga, Kaunas and Białystok to find ways to wash my laundry, and looking at the distinct absence of clean sox among my clothes, it was exceedingly hard to resist the temptation to use the washing machine in the apartment I had rented. In fact, under normal circumstances, I might have been daunted by the machine's strange format (see an example here: http://www.darty.com/nav/achat/gros_electromenager/lave-linge/lave-linge_ouverture_dessus/fagor_fft-108w.html), but this was exactly the type of machine I had used for a few months in Paris when I was staying in temporary housing. So with this enthusiasm and confidence, I decided to wash some clothes. This being a European model, all the button positions were icons (to avoid language issues), and one icon looked like it meant "dry cycle". My machine in Paris did have a great dry function, so I thought there was a 50-50% chance this one did too. That said, I hedged the risk by not washing my street clothes, as I would be in pretty big trouble if those were clean but wet and I had nothing at all to wear on the street.

At about 10:30, after finishing The Adventures of Auggie March and catching up on the frightening developments in the US financial markets, the washing was done and it became clear there was no way to dry the clothes in the machine. And since it was still raining, I assumed that there was near 100% humidity and I couldn't count on the clothes getting air-dried by 5 am the next morning, when I would have to leave for my flight. So this began the great Warsaw clothes-drying adventure.

First, I had to check into my new apartment. It was just across the street, but didn't have a dryer either (as expected). So I looked up the laundromat listings for Warsaw in the Rough Guide (or rather, the one listing). The one they listed was about a 20-minute walk from Old Town, but I didn't mind, since I figured a walk in a new direction would do me good, and it also appeared to be near several of the monuments to the Warsaw ghetto uprising, which I was interested in seeing. I figured I'd throw the clothes in the dryer, look around the area and then pick them up an hour later.

Well, one thing I am learning about entrepreneurship is not to open a laundromat in Eastern Europe. Seems that this was the third laundromat that I had seen listed in recently uodated guidebooks (mainly in the Rough Guide) that no longer existed. This one appeared to have been replaced by a fancy new Italian restaurant. So there I was at noon with a heavy bag full of wet clothes and nothing to do with them. Luckily (sort of...) the folks at the apartment rental office had told me there were also such facilities at a place a bit further out called "Arkadia". So I walked through several non-descript, concrete city blocks to Arkadia. I should have known and anyone who has read all of these blogs (all two of you, if you include me) will be able to guess what was there -- a giant new mall on the outskirts of town with French and English chain stores and a 5 a Sec dry cleaner! The folks at 5 a Sec loved me, with my big bag of wet clothes. There were like 10 people behind me in line who were pretty frustrated, too. The cleaners were more than happy to dry the clothes, but I had to pay for each individual article as if I was laundering and pressing shirts. It cost me $35 and everything came back 2 hours later on hangers!!! Oh my.

This was frustrating, but it made me realize that I had in general been pretty lucky with things like this -- this was one of the few times when I had to just pay what I was asked to pay to get an issue resolved. I expected a few more of these such "expensive solutions" to be necessary and had effectively budgeted for them in my mind when I planned the trip, but there had been very few of them in the end. In truth, by far the greater frustration was that I had lost my only real chance to see Warsaw and had to, yet again, spend my time in a big, impersonal mall at the edge of town. And just as I was getting really down on myself for this great move, the handle broke on the plastic bag I was using to carry my books and my camera, my camera spilled out and smashed on the ground. The damage was limited to the flash -- the dent prevented it from popping out. But with a little bit of work later on using the best tool ever invented -- the tiny glasses screwdriver -- I was able to pry the casing back out so everything was fine.

Then it was time to pick up the boxed bike. That turned out to be trouble-free (thanks, Speed Bike Shop, Warsaw!) and I headed back to the apartment, packed up for the morning and set to the task of figuring out how to get to Alastair's concert at the American School of Warsaw. But when I got online, I realized that the school was far away from the center of town. By public transportation, the only way was a long subway ride from the center, followed by a longer bus ride. So I gave myself plenty of time (I thought) and tried to follow the route.

The Warsaw metro -- such as it is, with only one line -- is great. Very modern and easy to use. When I got out at the Wilanova stop, I looked for the right bus, but I didn't find it. And at this point, the show was starting in 20 minutes, so I grabbed a taxi and told him where I was going. Oops. This taxi driver was a little off his rocker, especially when driving. It didn't help that he really had no idea of the address and we couldn't really communicate well. But when I said "American School Warsaw" he began to look confident. So he started driving...and driving...and driving. At 40 złotys on the meter, and as the landscape began to look more and more rural, I was getting concerned as to where we were going, whether he knew, and whether I had enough cash to pay him and get myself anywhere if he got us totally lost. The only positive sign was that we seemed to be following the bus lines I was supposed to have taken, so that gave me some sense that he might be going the right way.

When we passed the "you are now leaving Warsaw" sign, that was when worry set in. But, as strange as it may seem, the American School of Warsaw is indeed just on the outskirts of the corporation limit and, well, there it was! I paid him, thanked him very much ("dziekuje, dziekuje, dziekuje!"), went through the various security screenings and headed into the school, 20-minutes late for the concert. A very kind preschool teacher escorted me to the auditorium and said this would give her a good excuse to check out the show.

What I caught of Alastair's show was excellent. There were many children in attendance and he has that fantastic ability of a great folk singer to sing songs that speak simultaneously to children and adults, working on many levels. As an example, he covered an amazing Woodie Guthrie song I had never heard before called "Ship in the Sky". Here are the lyrics so you can get an idea:

Well, a curly-headed girl with a bright shining smile
Heard the roar of a plane as it sailed through the sky
To her playmates she said, with a bright twinkling eye
My Daddy flies that ship in the sky
My Daddy flies that ship in the sky
My Daddy flies that ship in the sky
My Mama's not afraid and neither am I
'Cause my Daddy flies that ship in the sky

Then a button-nosed kid, as he kicked up his heels
He said, My Daddy works in the iron and the steel
My Dad builds the planes and they fly through the sky
And that's what keeps your daddy up there so high
That's what keeps your daddy up there so high
That's what keeps your daddy up there so high
My Dad builds the planes and they fly through the sky
And that's what keeps your daddy up there so high

Then a freckle-faced kid pinched his toe in the sand
He says, My Daddy works at that place where they land
You tell your mama, don't be afraid
My Dad'll bring your daddy back home again
My Dad'll bring your daddy back home again
My Dad'll bring your daddy back home again
Don't be afraid when it gets dark and rains
My Dad'll bring your daddy back home again

(Alastair, I am noticing that you slyly but appropriately changed this last verse to be about the freckle-faced kid's Mamma, rather than Daddy).

Mom, if you do read this (I know you're very busy right now!), in addition to this being such a beautiful song, it reminded for a variety of reasons of those extraordinary 1930s Art Deco tile mosaics of workers and craftsmen that used to be in Cincinnati's Union Terminal. My own "daddy" -- dedicated to historic preservation as he has always been and also as a good, labor-supporting Democrat -- thought it would be a crime for these mosaics to be lost when Union Terminal was being renovated and he found a way for them to be saved and transferred to the Cincinnati airport. As those of you who pass through Cincinnati when you fly may know, they're still there today and I thank him for what he did every time I am there (which is a lot these days). Anyway, that's the story I always heard and remember -- maybe it has been amplified over time by nostalgia and memory, but that would connect it in yet another way with the great lyrics of this Woodie Guthrie song.

After the show, Alastair kindly invited me to join the teachers from the school for dinner in town. We had a great time -- luckily for me, many of them were fellow Midwesterners, from Iowa and Minnesota. And, this being Poland, we had lots of beer.

I ambled home after dinner into Old Town and got ready for tomorrow's flight. I turned on the TV to see the news of the afternoon in the US and heard that McCain and Obama were talking about issuing a joint statement about the economic crisis. Things sounded very muddled and I started to understand how frightening things are getting in the US. And so I head back to Washington to find out first-hand...