European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - December 01, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse Century enclave. But the churches feel too clean and the statues too neat. Nothing has the Patina you subconsciously look you can t you must t write cum off As bogus for that would be to concede Victory to the nazis. And if you did t know the truth you probably would t guess the National museum shows a film of Warsaw s transformations from 1930s playground to bomb site to building site to socialist Paradise. Any Day now i am told by an exasperated guide it will be replaced by a new film with a Post communist commentary and a capitalist final chapter the original director apparently won t change a word. Endearingly polish that the Royal Castle which i padded round in the obligatory museum slippers under the Glare of a Stern attendant no talking you will please listen to Meis a still singly grand and charmless world of Gilt Marble and Glass. And How these people love their rehabilitated Royal _ past. But its cellars contain a War memento As surreal As anything in London s Tate gallery. Silver from floor to ceiling overflowing from big boxes Laid out on tables in ghostly seas. Reticule rings necklaces knives and Forks Napkin rings snuff boxes. All Given by Warsaw s citizens for the War Effort never utilized and never Given Back owners dead or missing. There had been Gold too but the communists found a use for that. Frederic Chopin s shrine May be in his Home Village 20 saw task Psi Lis s a a A a s Wjk a. Is Ken George an elderly jewish Man strolls near the Monument to the heroes of the Warsaw ghetto uprising. Parts of the old town destroyed during world War ii including the Market Square have been carefully restored. Miles outside town but his spirit walks Here. I find him swooning in Stone beneath a Willow by a Pond in the Lazienka Park and get a whiff of the Milieu in which he moved from the portraits in the exquisite Bilanow Palace. I go to a Chopin recital at the More intimate my Lewicki Palace by a Warsaw piano professor in a room where the composer himself used to play. In surroundings of the most refined elegance she dishes up the mazurkas and polonaises with rolled up sleeves and Fairground vigor. It should t work but it does superbly. I also Check out the communist regime s most impressive cultural legacy the grand opera and Ballet theater on one of the biggest and most technologically sophisticated stages in the world i find a magnificent production of Krzysztof Penderecki s Paradise lost line stately promenade in the interval All jewels and dark velvet with cordoned off in the bars is a spectacle in itself. My seat in the stalls costs$7.50. .".-,. A a i later that evening at the aquarium club a group called new presentation is presenting Vintage 1960s jazz identical twin Trotsky at the piano and on Bass with a Bux Orn redhead singing the blues. They have won big awards in Poland and Germany but have never performed in London. On then to the Irish club said to be one of in town. Here much Irish whiskey is drunk and the rules of darts Are carefully spelled out in polish beside the v Dartboard. This joint is jumping to country and Western by a band calling itself Little Maggie. What More Thatcher worship bar Onawa Thatcher gets plaques and accolades All Over this City no the band s name is a joke they re All polish and they Tell me plaintively that Warsaw s limited interest in country and Western Means they have to do gigs All Over Europe to survive. Then up jumps a Little Man in a Sharp suit and Trilby an irishman from top to toe who leads the encore of dirty old town. He turns out to be an sex publican from Ollie never mind Triy surname who has settled Here because anyone who wants to can make it s a wide open he s about to open his own bar with an armed policeman on the door you can t really Trust people Here but they re quite easygoing How do they compare with the Irish very -., i find convivial student bar like a wooden Igloo deep underground but sense then Ruth of my resident Friend s claim that most polish nightlife takes place at Home bolstered by Vodka and satellite r television. People learn not to hang Loose in a police state which this was until recently and supermarket Vodka is Only $2.25 a bottle. At the checkout of a supermarket where i get some sausage people Are buying just two or three tilings each. And i Don t see a single shopping cart grossly heaped in continued on Page 6 sask a a tort names of victims of the holocaust cover the trunk of a tree near the old jewish ghetto. Below tourists have photos taken with a Man costumed As a medieval moslem invader. Is december 7, 1994 stripes Magazine
