Smartphones, Fulbrighters and a Sermon

Annika had an OB appointment recently, but Paul tends to get bored at the doctor's office. One thing that really keeps him occupied is getting his picture taken. Thank goodness for smartphones.



Thursday I took Paul to a different playground, called Ogród Jordanowski. This one has way more playground equipment than the one we went to before, and its much closer to our apartment, close enough that its pretty much a toss up between whether to walk or take the bus.



Of course Paul went straight to the steering wheel.

Friday night there was a potluck for all of the Warsaw Fulbrighters. Not everyone was able to make it but it was a great evening.



These are some of my Fulbright colleagues. The man in the back, Nathan Wood, is a history professor from the University of Kansas. He was hosting the event. His wife Erin (not in the picture) played her harp for us. It was beautiful.

The shortest route to a happy Paul is to feed him pancakes- and he enjoys watching Mommy make them almost as much as eating them.



Here he is all situated and ready for them to hit the pan!

Saturday I got a chance to play Pathfinder with a group of expatriates from the Netherlands, Greece, Italy and Canada. That was a lot of fun and I made some new friends. From what I've seen so far I like it a lot better than the other versions of D&D I've played before.

Sunday I gave a sermon at my church about how important it is for us to share the gospel so that others can enjoy the full blessings of the Atonement of Christ. I gave it in English, and one of the missionaries translated it into Polish for me. At the end I gave my testimony in Polish. Afterwards someone told me that I don't have an American accent; apparently I sound like a Spaniard trying to speak Polish ;).

It still takes me a minute to switch linguistic tracks. One of the members of my congregation is from Mozambique, and although he speaks good English, we always speak Portuguese (because we can). He came up and said something to me in Portuguese, and then I was about to answer in Polish. I caught myself, but it still took a second to force my brain back to Portuguese. All in all it was another great week to be in Poland.

A brief visit to Old Town

Something I forgot to put on last week's entry was about this film:


I saw 1920: Bitwa Warszawska (The Battle of Warsaw) on the 6th of October at the Kino Femina. They had a special screening with English subtitles so I took advantage of it. I ran into a man from the embassy staff (I had met him at the Ambassador's residence) at the screening. Small world. The movie theater had assigned seating. I'm told that's common in both Poland and Russia. It seemed to overuse slow motion effects but overall I thought it was very interesting. The movie is about the Polish-Soviet War. This war ended in a Polish victory that prevented the Red Army from overrunning Europe for twenty years. I thought it used the 3d medium quite well, and the acting and costumes were very good. I was expecting it to be a vehemently anti-Russian film, but the makers of the movie went out of their way to include some sympathetic Russian Cossacks that were also fighting the Communists. Overall, I enjoyed it and thought it was very well done.

This week we had a few more new arrivals to my graduate program, from the Ukraine, Lithuania, Moldova, Laos, and Russia, giving us an even more diverse group of students.

The pleasantly warm fall weather seems to be ending, and winter is definitely on the way. It was good we had already gotten ourselves equipped for the cold. Here we are on the way to church this morning, waiting for the tram:



We were a little late getting out. Getting Paul all layered up takes longer than we are used to, and district conference is on the north side of the city, much further than where we usually go. I got to sing in the choir today. It was a great meeting.

On Saturday morning, my friend Doug Pew and I took the young men from our church out to see Old Town Warsaw. It was a little cold to be out playing the tourist, but we had a good time anyway.


This is a shot of a big square in Old Town. Old Town was completely destroyed by the Germans after the Warsaw Uprising, and was completely rebuilt after the war to look as much like it did before as possible. I think they did a pretty good job. They reused as many of the bricks from the rubble as they could.



This is the Royal Castle, where the Polish kings lived.



This is a statue of a mermaid in the market square. The mermaid is a symbol of Warsaw, and this statue is from 1855.



This is a monument to Jan Kiliński, a leader of a failed insurrection in 1794 against the Prussians and Russians during the second partition of Poland.



Globalization is alive and well in Warsaw. In the midst of this historic district you can enjoy a Subway sandwich.



In the square, there was an old man feeding the birds. These birds have no fear of people at all, as you can see.

But what was really cool was when he would throw his bread into the air, and all the birds would fly off at once:



And here he threw the bread in my direction:





This is a statue of Nike, erected as a monument to the World War II heroes of Poland. It is on Solidarity Avenue near Old Town.

I wish I had had more time to actually go into some of the museums, but we got started a little late. I will have to return when I can take my time to see the inside of more of these places. This week I met a Polish teacher who wants to learn English, so we are trading language lessons. It's a little painful trying to communicate but I'm sure it will help me. Between that, my private lessons, my Polonicum class, Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone I hope I can pick the language up quickly. I'm trying to have as many different tools available as possible. I am convinced that there is no one magic bullet to master a language, but that a variety of tools taken together is much more effective.

The semester begins

Monday was my first day of classes. I had some delays being able to register for my Polish classes at the university, and by the time I could register the courses were all full. I was stubborn and went to a class anyway, and eventually was able to snipe a spot right after someone dropped. My professors are all excellent. The students in my master's program are very diverse. This semester I have both Polish and American professors. One of my professors works at the Ministry of Labor here and is very involved in EU affairs during Poland's term of presidency of the EU. My classmates are from China, India, Serbia, France, Argentina, Turkey and Poland. I am the only American in the first year of the program. I am sure I will enjoy getting a very different perspective on foreign affairs. Some of my classmates studied in the UK so although they are not British they sound like it. It's a great group and I look forward to getting to know them better.

So on to the pictures for this week:


This is the main entrance for the University of Warsaw main campus. The only class I have here is my Polish class. There are actually quite a few campuses. One of the professors from my program said that there are multiple campuses scattered through the city because the communist authorities decentralized the university after a bunch of student protests in the 1960s to make it harder for them to organize such activity in the future. The various faculties are a lot more autonomous than their counterparts at US universities.



This is a monument to Copernicus, a famous Polish astronomer. If the name doesn't ring a bell, he was the scientist who first proposed that the Earth orbited the sun instead of the other way around. The monument is just outside the main campus.



This is the statue on the top of the old library. I love these little details everywhere.



This statue is supposed to bring luck to students and help them to pass their exams. His hand is pretty worn from lots of hopeful students shaking it.



All work and no play makes Ryan a hard man to live with. We found a board game store with a great selection, so we picked up a copy of Dominion: Intrigue in Polish. We are familiar with the original game Dominion but this version was new to us. It helps teach new Polish vocabulary and is a great way to relax with my wife and friends.

Paul (my three-year-old son) started his studies this week too. Annika is teaching him to read, memorize poems, and math. He is a very enthusiastic learner. I read him scripture stories in Polish every night as well. Paul still seems to think that Poland is our apartment for some reason. I've been trying to explain that the apartment is in Poland but isn't Poland itself, but that's a little too abstract for a 3-year-old.

We've been trying to assimilate a little by cooking Polish food as well. Poles love to have soup frequently, so I made a huge batch of barszcz on Saturday from fresh beets. It's good food and also very inexpensive to make (although if you're not careful it can be very messy), and having a lot of it made up ahead of time makes eating during the week a lot more convenient.

Annika and I also started some private Polish lessons this week to try to help us master the grammar. We are both determined to learn the language as quickly as possible. All in all, it's been a very busy and hectic week, but an enjoyable one.

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!

This week has been all about getting settled in Warsaw before school starts. Lots of little details to work out, like getting a polish bank account so we can pay our bills (in Poland pretty much all your bills get paid by bank transfer, not by check). I've also been called as a youth leader at the local branch of my church, and I am in the process of trying to start a scouting program here for the American boys in our congregation so they can stay active in Scouting while they are in Poland. Their fathers work at the US embassy here in Warsaw.

Friday I had my orientation at the University of Warsaw main campus. There are about 700 international students from all over the world here. As the orientation let out, I could hear dozens of languages being spoken all around me. I really enjoyed the orientation program and I am excited for classes to start tomorrow.

All the stuff we had shipped out from the United States back in August finally arrived on Friday. It felt like Christmas opening the packages and finally having all 200 pounds of the stuff we couldn't take on the plane with us. Finally we have all our books, winter clothes and many other odds and ends. Paul was very happy because he finally got his car mat to drive his cars around on!


This weekend is a very exciting time for members of my church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). Twice a year, in April and October, we have a worldwide meeting called General Conference where we get to hear the leaders of our church (who we believe are modern-day prophets and apostles who receive revelation from God) speak to us from Church headquarters in Salt Lake City, Utah in the United States. Millions of people around the world participate by satellite or internet transmission in addition to the thousands of people personally attending the meeting. I attended part of the conference this morning at the one and only LDS chapel in Poland, located in Northern Warsaw:



It is an amazing and wonderful thing to be able to fully participate in Conference even from the other side of the world. I have learned a lot and I appreciate the guidance that comes from listening to sermons of modern apostles.