Hello stranger,
I'm glad to see you again along my way, I was just daydreaming about one of my latest travels.
I visited Warsaw, Poland's capital. Would you like to know more?
I wandered through Warsaw with a heavy heart, the kind of melancholy that comes from confronting a city’s fractured identity. The rain surely helped to raise this feeling.
It began in the city center. The contrast between the modern skyscrapers and the remaining historic buildings felt jarring.
I walked the streets with a sense of confusion, wondering about the layers of history that lie beneath the glossy facades. Walking through cities with immeasurable historic weight should make each step echo with the past. But there, under the shadow of modernity, it felt silent.
Today, Warsaw felt like a city caught between the echoes of its past and the relentless push towards modernity. The scars of lost identity are visible, and it’s hard not to feel a deep sadness for what has been irretrievably lost.
Next, I visited the POLIN Museum. The exhibit about the Jewish community’s vibrant history and tragic fate struck a deep chord.
The photographs and artifacts spoke volumes about a world that was lost, a culture that was nearly erased. The room dedicated to the Warsaw Ghetto was especially haunting. I felt a profound sadness for the lives that were extinguished, and the city that was forever changed.
My mind wandered seeking for comfort, hoping that not everything was lost from the past, and seeing this tiny urban void gave me a glimpse of hope. The city resilience wasn't entirely corrupted by the globalisation and consumerism of the western world.
In the end, looking at the Keret house, I had to understand the difficulty of keeping a strong tradition root in the everchanging world, expecially for a country settled inbetween the philosophical ideas of power of our time.
Afterward, I made my way to the Army Museum. The displays of military history felt like a solemn tribute to the countless lives lost in conflicts that shaped Warsaw. It was hard not to feel overwhelmed by the weight of all those stories, the unspoken sorrows of battles fought and won, the hope of the many to turn the page on history and regain their pride as a nation.
And near to the Army Museum, the touching monument of Katyń Museum, a silent warden of the memory that should never be forgotten. Do the people visit this museum at all? Do they catch the dramatic importance of knowing how deep their country is rooted in history? Nowadays it looks like the shiny glass of the center defies them. What do they see through the mirror?
As the day waned, I reached the Old Town. The cobblestone streets and colorful facades were eerily beautiful, a reminder of how much was destroyed. But are they a reminder? Now it's all filled with restaurants and tourists, the aesthetic took the role that was once hold by the memory. The historical center, while charming, felt like a bittersweet tribute to a past that will never be accepted, and hopefully forgotten.
And then...on the way back home.. I saw it. The Unknown Soldier monument, and its guardians fiercely protecting the neverending flame. My body was pervaded with overwhelming emotions, I can barely hold my tears even now, telling you this story. As long as the flame will burn, the people who gave their life for the Freedom of their decendants will always live in their soul, even if forgotten, there will come a time of rememberance, a time of need that will rise the flame in their hearts.
At very least, the glass creates a tangible horizon with the sky, which is what we all aim for.
Thank you for reading
Farewell, stranger