POLAND, KRAKOW: ST. MARY'S BASILICA

June 25, 2019

We had tried to get inside St. Mary's Basilica in Krakow's Old Town several times but had not been successful. On our very last evening in Krakow, we were finally successful, and it was definitely worth the effort.

But first, some background. That's the Basilica on the right. Can you tell what the building on the left is?

It's that bastion of European culture, a Hard Rock Cafe, the perfect companion for a basilica. And what is that in between Hard Rock and St. Mary's that everyone is sitting on?

It's called The Student Statue. Yeah, he looks about as awake as most of my students on a Monday morning.

POLAND: EATING IN KRAKOW

June 22-25, 2019

We ate so much good food in Krakow that our restaurant rambles are worth their own post.

WELICZKA SALT MINE
To begin with, there was this rich chocolate ice cream cone that we bought while we were waiting for our tour of the Wieliczka Salt Mine to begin. It was not the first nor the last of an embarrassing number of ice cream cones we would have on this trip.

KUCHNIA U DOROTY
On our first evening in Krakow, we took a recommendation from our guide and planned to eat at Love Pierogi, Krakow's five-star pierogi spot, but when we got there it was closed. We were so disappointed! We were on a relatively busy street near Old Town, and we figured there had to be lots of good restaurants around us.

POLAND, KRAKOW: OSKAR SCHINDLER MUSEUM

June 23, 2019

I have to throw in one picture of a building that is next door to the Oskar Schindler Museum. Any guesses what "MOCAK" stands for? 

MOCAK = Museum Of Contemporary Art Krakow. That was easy, right? It was built in 2011 on a piece of land where part of Oskar Schindler's factory once stood.

The Schindler Museum is actually not a museum about Oskar Schindler and his personally dangerous attempt to save as many Jews as possible. Rather, it is a museum about World War II, including the Holocaust and with a little bit of Schindler. Our guide told us that many people are really disappointed by that fact, but I thought it was one of the best WWII museums I've seen.

I'm pretty sure most people today know who Oskar Schindler was, due largely to the 1993 Steven Spielberg movie Schindler's List. Much of the movie was shot in the Jewish Quarter of Krakow, with some of it filmed in Schindler's factory itself. The factory manufactured enamelware--dishes made of metal covered with a porcelain-like material.

POLAND, KRAKOW: JEWISH QUARTER

June 23 2019

Our next stop was the Jewish Quarter of Krakow, known locally as Kazimierz because it was founded in the 14th century by King Kasimir as a gathering place for Jews. By 1939, the Jewish population of Krakow was 70,000, about 25% of the population.  In less than 18 months, the Jewish population was about 15,000, and in March 1941, the Krakow Ghetto was established to house what was left of the Jews. More about that later. By the end of the war, the Jewish population of Krakow had been essentially decimated.

After the war, this neighborhood was largely neglected in rebuilding efforts. It was a poor area with a high crime rate. In 1988 a Jewish Cultural Festival was started, and the neighborhood began to turn around. Then the movie Schindler's List was filmed here in 1993, and the place became a tourist attraction.

Today, the Jewish Quarter is the second-largest tourist attraction in Krakow after Old Town. It's a busy, famous part of the city, but the Jewish population remains quite small.

When we were there, a flea market was drawing a lot of people to the square around what was once the kosher slaughterhouse:

POLAND: A WALKING TOUR OF KRAKOW'S OLD TOWN

June 23, 2019

Krakow (pronounced "krack - ohv") is one of the oldest cities in Poland and traditionally the center of Polish culture, academics, arts, and economics. Therefore, this is a good time to discuss Polish money, which combines at least culture, arts, and economics.

First off, can I just say that our US dollars are so BORING compared to these colorful bills?  The green 100 zloty note (roughly pronunced "zwall-tuh") has the face of Wladyslaw II Jagiello (King of Poland 1386-1434) on front and the eagle from his tombstone and the Grunwald swords on the back. The blue 50 zloty has the face of Kazimierz II Wielki (aka Casimir the Great, King of Poland 1333-1370) on the front and the white eagle from his personal seal on the back. The pink-orange 20 zloty has the face of Boleslaw I the Brave (first King of Poland in 1025) on front and a silver coin from his reign on the back.  

In the US, our "faces" only go back to George Washington (President from 1789-1797). We are such a young nation.

By the way, $1 USD = 3.78 zloty OR 1 zloty = about 25¢.

We had booked a personal tour of Krakow through Cracowguide.com.pl. Our guide, Krzysztof Blaszczyk (who told us to call him Chris--thank goodness), met us at the edge of Old Town in Jan Matejko Square at the Grunwald Statue, an imposing, hard-to-miss piece:

When I looked up this statue for this post, I learned that the monument was commissioned by Ignacy Jan Paderewski, an internationally famous pianist who became the president of Poland in 1919, nine years after this statue was erected.

The Battle of Grunwald, fought in 1410, was the turning point that marked the end of the domination of the German-Prussian Teutonic Knights and the rise of the Polish-Lithuanian Union. The guy on the horse on the top is King Wladyslaw Jagiello, the king on the 100 zloty note. The prone body on the front is the Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, Urluch Von Jungingen. His pinky finger looks like it gets rubbed/touched a lot: