Happy New Year!!!

SO... first of all, I would like to wish all of my friends and family following this blog (and even those who aren't) a very happy and prosperous new year. It was definitely an experience to ring in 2006 in Karlskrona. The whole town goes nuts with fireworks! All day on the 31st, people were setting off noismaker firecrackers in the streets & in their yards, then when midnight struck, the place looked & sounded like a war zone (minus the screaming in agony & bloodshed). I wish I could post video, to show you what it was like!
Kyle and I had front-row seats for the display in the sky: we were having dinner with some of his classmates from the Sustainable Development program, in this totally amazing manor house on a hill, with a balcony overlooking a good deal of the city. The landlady showed up at about 11:30 with her son and a whole lot of fireworks of our own to launch from the balcony. I thought, from the size of the fireworks, that they would be pretty meagre, but WOW! They were the full-on type that you see at Canada Day!
So we toasted 2006 with some bubbly and watched Mad Max, because it happened to come on right after the Swedish version of Dick Clark had done his thing.
The next day was spent in some hard-core relaxation, and we packed to go to Poland.
Yesterday, we hit the road at 6:30 to catch a ferry to Gdynia (10 1/2 hours across the Baltic Sea). Upon reaching Poland, we promptly got turned around & took the right bus the wrong way. All persons that we'd asked at the ferry terminal insisted that the 150 bus would take us straight to the train station. "You can't miss it!" was the consensus. We missed it. We dutifully hopped on the first 150 that we saw, and rode it to the end of the line, with nary a train station in sight. When, at the final stop, the last few passengers bailed out, and the driver turned off the engine, we approached him with the words "train station" in Polish, written on a scrap of paper. He laughed his ass off. He motioned for us to stay put. In a few minutes, he started the engine again, and we went whizzing back along the route we had just come, past the ferry station, and to the very obvious train station. Phew.
I'm very glad to have the "point-it" book (a traveller's tool of all kinds of images to help you communicate), and I'm sure it will continue to come in handy, since I am hopeless at Polish, and very few people seem to speak English. Their attitude is friendly and willing to try to help and communicate, though, so that makes me feel a bit more comfortable.
The train ride was not so comfy, though. Because of our ineptitude with the bus, Kyle and I were left with very little time at the train station to figure things out. We got tickets to Poznan, thanks to Anna, who sent the appropriate phrase to get what we wanted. Finding the track to catch said train was a bit more of a challenge. The departure boards were unclear, and constantly changing. We ran from platform to platform with our heavy bags and couldn't get a straight answer from anybody. Finally, we asked a young man waiting on a platform where the train to Poznan was, and he explained that it would arrive just before the departure time. Great! That meant we had 25 minutes to grab food from the kiosk downstairs. Gawd. An epic unto itself!
There were two kebab stands open in the questionably clean station. One was lined up a dozen bodies deep. Too busy. We were in a hurry. We chose the other stand, which was sporting one customer, and ordered two kebabs. Kebabs here are very different from back home: they are slathered in a ranch-type dressing, filled with shredded cabage and rotisserie chicken, and topped off with another heart-stopping dollop of creamy sauce. Tasty, tho!
Anyway, the woman behind the kebab counter soon made it plain why there was nobody at her stand. As we watched in dismay as the dozen customers at the other stand, then a dozen more, got their food and scurried off to their trains, we watched Slowey McSlowerson plod from the bread to the meat, the meat to the sauce, the sauce to the veg and back again in a circle that seemed to accomplish little more than fray our nerves. We checked the time. 10 minutes to departure. Our Kebab lady checked the progress of the grilling bread, and was about to give it another bit. I nearly shouted at her, and made some gestures to indicate that it was bloody well good enough and we had to go! She took the hint and proceeded to very slowly fill my kebab with an intricate arrangement of fillings. I took the meal and ran for the train, leaving Kyle to catch up as best he could (at least I could try to get the train to wait for him). As I was approaching the platform I had terrible visions of there being no food allowed in the cars (and a five-hour journey ahead!) but thankfully, it was all okee-dokee. Kyle made it with moments to spare.
The ride down was dark and steamy, since the fellow passengers closed the window, and it was to remain closed for the whole time. Most of the way, we dozed, interrupted a few times by military-type ticket collectors, who inspected our tickets repeatedly. Intimidating, but not as bad as I had feared on Polish trains.
So this post is coming from the city of Poznan, in north-central Poland. The county is Pomerania (yes, home of the little fur-ball dogs) and we haven't seen too much of it yet, but the first impression is of a fairly gritty facade. The churches and historic buildings we glimpsed in the dark from the train are truly spectacular, and Anna is going to show us around many of them here. The plan is to head to Cracow & see the well-preserved old town there.
She left us to sleep in this morning, and we awoke at noon to a beautiful breakfast laid out on the table! What a gal.
Can't wait to see more of Poland!