There is a small bunch of jasmine in a little vase on my table.
A friend from primary school picked them for me when we bumped into each other at the MOTOSERCE fest yesterday. Then, instead of going where she had planned, she joined me. We had a long chat sitting on the wall on the square overlooking the fest, like Humpty-Dumpties (without spectacular falls). I couldn't believe when she instantly agreed to my idea of knocking on the door of our old teacher who lives in a concrete block nearby as we didn't have her phone number.
My friend did the knocking. I stayed outside with my bike and took a picture of the little 'flower bed' by the tall block:
Our teacher wasn't in though, so we stopped to talk more on the corner by an old house where my old schoolmate picked the twigs and stuck them on the handlebar for me.
The corner also marks the border of our primary school grounds. Countless times we would stop there and talk for ages before we went our separate ways home after school. We were in the same class for seven years of the eight-year school and sat at the desk together for most of these years. After three years my family moved to a different flat and for the following four years, we would part on a different corner.
Here are pictures of our school grounds, behold the school tree snail, and a cute canine on its walk along the school fence:
The lawn you can see was looked after by our class. Yes, when we went to school, a reform of the education system was introduced by the then Minister of Ed, Mr Jerzy Kuberski. It was rather interesting and I'm sure, should you wish more details, you can google it. Anyway, those days each class had to do some 'voluntary' work on the school grounds and surrounding area. We had to pick up rubbish or dead leaves in the autumn. We would tidy our classrooms after the lessons finished. When this or that teacher was absent, we would go to tidy our area. We would also do it after school. The number of working hours earned by each schoolchild had to be registered as it would count towards a "Behaviour Grade".
Enough on that fascinating topic. Let's make a good use of the beautiful sunny Sunday!
....
I didn't dare emerge. The knee is swollen and aches. It really is not funny. Instead, I've dug out a few pictures from a visit to The Great Mosque in Abu Dhabi. As you can see, I had to put on special clothes. In Damascus, which I managed to explore a few years ago, there was a big sign as you entered the Umayed Mosque:
'Putting on special clothes room'. The pictures are not with me.
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| Putting on a special robe to enter the mosque |
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| Properly clad |
I owe you an explanation. The pictures above were taken with a proper camera, not a mobile phone.
....
Despite some pain in the knee, having treated the troublesome joint with a bag of frozen veggies, I ventured out on the bike. Once I closed the yard gate and climbed the bike I noticed that something wasn't right. The chain fell off. Well, I didn't want to get messy with the greasy stuff so I returned. The neighbour who was playing with his toddler son, solved the problem in no time. How grateful I am to all the good people I encounter in these troubled limb days!
I biked locally and after a while made a stop in the square in front of the Town Hall. The square has undergone some successful improvements and looks rather pleasant with the bust of General Wladyslaw Sikorski in the centre looking at the street bearing his name.
He was among the mid-war statesmen who granted Skarzysko-Kamienna township rights. However, today he could rest his eyes on something else: an exhibition of original photographs of the town before WWII. They come from a collection accumulated by a keen local historian. The exhibition travels around the town being displayed in different places. I hope that when the tour is over, it will be granted a permanent location for everyone to enjoy.
After a lap of honour around the square, I found a seat on a bench occupied by one old lady. The only unpeopled benches were the ones facing the sun, better avoided. Soon a conversation started and it wasn't hard to navigate it towards her in past the old times, including the Second World War in Warsaw and then, after the uprising, slaving in a German factory and her choosing to return to Poland after being freed by Americans. She was only 14 when she had to work on a factory line producing some screws and bolts, on meager rations of 1/4th of a bread loaf per 48 hours. The sight of the unnaturally long tongue hanging down the mouth of a hanged Russian prisoner will haunt her forever. That was his punishment for stealing two old potatoes!
One day, her bread portion was stolen and she was crying badly while still working. A supervising German, maybe around forty, took pity on her and discreetly placed two sandwiches among the screws in front of her. She couldn't just eat them like that, it was far too dangerous. She had to wait till they had a break at 3 pm. The good German somehow managed to explain to her that it would be safe if she hid the sandwiches and went to eat them in the toilet, so nobody could see it. Otherwise, they would be both in danger. That man was good to her, sometimes he spoke to her. That was the only way she could pick up some German. And she did try hard. He told her he had a wife and two children. Maybe she, 14 at the time, reminded him of his own offspring... I was curious to know why she decided to return to Poland. A girl she befriended in the forced labour camp chose to start a new life in Chicago as the opportunity presented itself to the prisoners.
(I've got to stop now, but will continue 'the history lesson on the bench')
Good night!
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