Praga

I like this picture. It was taken on Marcinkowskiego Street. 

The older guidebooks warn against going to the right-bank neighborhood of Praga, which is a screaming green light: Kids, we're going to Praga! And, indeed, the zoo is over here, with lots of kids in attendance, and you can smell water buffalo poop as you bike along the east bank of the Vistula. I'm pretty much riding bikes everywhere I can, and I've become adept at making the trek to Praga, which for me starts with a crossing of the Gdanski Bridge.

This can be a little hairy, because the bike path is barely big enough for two-way traffic and the railing is only about rib-cage-high. I worry about tangling up head-on with an inattentive bicyclist and having my body fly over the railing into the strong currents of the Vistula. I also worry that a gust of wind will remove my cap.

Once you are in Praga, sure, there are a few junkies who look like they've been up all night. But for a neighborhood that is supposed to have an edgy alternative vibe, nope. Like the rest of Warsaw, it is dormant in a political sense. There are no political posters or graffiti. There are no anarchist bookstores, no smoke-filled coffeeshops where people discuss the dialectic. There is literally no leftist opposition! It's the strangest thing. Poland may be the most conservative place I have ever been. You can't get an abortion. Even if you are raped, you have to prove it to a judge, which can take weeks. Basic contraception is tricky to get. You can't share a bottle of wine while having a picnic in the park.

Yet when the results of the Oct. 13 parliamentary election roll in, Poles will raise an icy glass of vodka to the United Right. If Mitt Romney were a Pole, he would belong to the political alliance known as The Left. They are 28 percentage points behind.

I wonder why? Whaddya know. This is Praga's massive SS. Michael and Florian Cathedral.

And this is the pretty little park outside where the good citizens of Praga hide their bottles of beer under their jackets when the policja drive by.

The floor of the nave positively gleams. It must be waxed twice a day.

Vaulted ceilings like this, even the neo-Gothic kind, never fail to impress.

Eighty percent of Poles identify as Roman Catholic.

For whatever reason, this side of the river was left more intact than the "Warsaw" side. Pockmarked buildings speak to a time when things went "bang."

Polanski's "The Pianist" was filmed in Praga, and you can see why. I love the flower and shell ornamentations at upper right and lower right. 

The Legia soccer vibes are strong here, and on the afternoon I visited, you could hear busloads of young men chanting on their way to the National Stadium for the Polish Cup final. I watched the game on my laptop. Legia Warszawa was outclassed but managed to beat Rakow Czestochowa 6-5 on penalty kicks.

 

I wandered around a three-fingered inlet off the Vistula that appeared to be manmade, probably for some long-ago commercial reason. Today, there are some shacks with little gardens and locked gates along the water's edge. I like these little quirks about the Warsaw area. No doubt there are some developers looking to kick these folks out and turn Praga into the next hipster-drenched area in Europe. Don't let it happen. Stay strung-out, Praga.

Occupied or unoccupied? This is a game I started to play. No drapes in sight. There aren't any personal effects on the balconies. Some of the window casements look new, but what's with the plywood?

I needed some socks, so I walked into a men's clothing store. All that was hanging on the racks were suit coats and pants. All of them black. There was lady sitting at a little desk with an adding machine. I lifted up my pant leg and pointed to a sock. She shuffled to another counter, bent down with great effort and pulled out a tupperware container with four pairs of socks. All black.

"I'll take 'em all," I said, pulling out a credit card. She smiled and rubbed her thumb and forefingers together.

Gotcha. I hated paying the $4 fee for using the ATM next door, but I really needed some socks. I never visited eastern Europe in the 1970s or '80s, but I think I just got something resembling a Cold War retail experience. Till the day I die I will remember Praga as the place where I bought four pairs of socks.

The next thing I know I'm in the Rozyckiego Bazaar, where there a few guys sitting around trying to sell fireworks or pseudo-military paraphernalia like mace and throwing stars. I am reminded of the one-armed character in "The Simpsons." In my experience this is a constant in eastern European flea markets. I suppose it's because you can't buy a billy club or brass knuckles in a department store, but still. Maybe after the sun goes down in Praga that plastic switchblade will come in handy.

Even during WWII, the trade in weapons in the bazaar was brisk. It's a tough neighborhood, I'm not going to lie. To be honest, when I thought about visiting Warsaw a decade ago, I thought it might all look like this.

These little gremlin angels on Praga's main street, Zabkowska, are the perfect ambassadors for the neighborhood.

If you don't want to visit at night, nobody will think less of you.

Some of the buildings are crumbling so badly that catch nets have been installed to keep pedestrians from being hit by bricks and other architectural "flakes." You can see an actual brick lying on the net here.

The five-piece "Praga Courtyard Band," by sculptor Andrzej Renes, stands in front of a coffeeshop where I was tricked again into buying, you know ... coffee. 

Purchase bread products with confidence in Warsaw, but everywhere you go in this city, asking for coffee gets you a cup of dirty water. I will never learn.

To reiterate: Do this. And then ask for an herbata malinowa (tea with a squirt of raspberry syrup).