the wroclaw international dec2012-jan2013

In 2011 racially-abused em-ployees of a multi-national company felt forced to leave Wroclaw. This event spurred an outcry from local Wrocla-wians who have now estab-lished the WrOpenUp Foun-dation to combat the signifi-cant negative impact of a mi-

nority’s racist activities on the community.

WrOpenUp has been established by citizens to promote openness, tolerance and multi-culturalism. WrOpenUp has the backing of corporate partners in Wroclaw, such as Google, HP and IBM amongst others. The Municipal-ity also backs the project to-

gether with ARAW and the American Chamber of Com-merce. WrOpenUp is in its de-velopmental phase of promotion and training and has just opened an exciting competition for local schools to present ideas for ini-tiatives that the foundation could launch.

Racism is not prominent or

widespread in Wroclaw and does not affect everyone but for the individuals affected, life can be very uncomfortable. Racism can take many forms from con-stantly being stared at to being called names, to people throw-ing objects and to more physical assault. Poland and in particu-lar, Wroclaw is quite unique within Europe as it is a homoge-nous society, rather untouched by the effects of immigration. The reasons are obviously eco-nomic and historic and mean that immigrants, experience a

We introduce you to four new places recently opened in Wro-cław, and report on news from Nadodrze district.

Crédit Agricole has a fab new location on the Rynek. We have two stories from inside HP Wro-cław. Deloitte legal eagles re-mind Board Members of their liabilities.

Read about a French family and their voyage around the world and back to Wrocław, and the young Wrocławian architects involved in building a school in Haiti.

We hear about the White City of Tel Aviv. Wrocław has a new International Youth group, we learn their story. Friesland is famous for more than its black and white cows as you can dis-cover on page 9. You can also brush up on your Polish Christ-m a s v o c a b u l a r y .

We hear how Christmas is cele-brated around the world, as told by nationals of England, Italy, and Trinidad & Tobago.

We bring you recipes for the traditional Polish soup, Żurek and traditional Polish Christmas Spice Cookies, Pierniki. We also introduce you to Wroclaw’s very own French-style wine bar and shop.

You can learn about the biggest fish in the Odra and much more from our fishing article. There is news of Aquapark’s new Sau-narium and of PANATO’s Pimp your Christmas workshops.

We present three movies to watch during the long winter evenings, news from Wrocław’s award-winning Rap Szalet par-ties, a report of the first InterNa-tions Wrocław gathering and news of concerts in January at Hala Stulecia and Impart. We also present to you TEDxWro-claw and Wroclove Speakers.

Information on Wroclaw’s ani-mal rescuers and TWI’s photo-graphic volunteer.. Continued on Page 2

The Wrocław International January 2013

local traditional culture that is intact and vibrant.

Is Wroclaw prepared to be a member of Europe, welcoming foreigners with their foreign investment to the City and all that it entails? On the face of things, the answer is yes. Cer-tainly, that is the message ex-tended by the City’s promotion office and Wroclaw’s agency for foreign investors (ARAW).

On the 11th of November, we were reminded of Polish pride and nationalism primarily with peaceful marches and parades but ending in ugly riots and demonstrations. One cannot deny the horrors Poland has suf-fered and indeed this city at the hands of its neighbours. Some Poles find it difficult to trust their fellow-member states in the EU as some are former allies who famously betrayed Poland in its hour of need at the end of the second World War. Many Poles don’t believe in the EU and don’t believe it is making their lives any better. They don’t see the economic prosper-ity that some of the elite mem-bers of society are beholding.

The fascist element which hi-

jacked these marches has its own agenda, and part of it is xeno-phobia, racism, intolerance. But they do not speak for the major-ity and the WrOpenUp Founda-tion is working hard to increase multi-cultural awareness and tolerance and promote Wroclaw as an open-minded city.

So how to shape minds and combat negativity and intoler-ance? Well of course, the first target is the minds of the young. The WrOpenUp competition is just being launched in all

schools in Wrocław in three age groups. The competition will prompt young people to think about our society, how we can be more tolerant and more con-scious of each others’ cultures. The prizes, which include a trip to Morocco, have been spon-sored by the corporate partners. The results will be known in March 2013.

All too frequently we see busi-nesses come and go in Wro-cław in the space of six months. The high retail rents in Wrocław do not make it easy for small businesses to maintain a foothold in the market for long without seri-ous capital. We would like to introduce you to new busi-nesses that we know of and would like to promote. Let us know your experience.

Al Noor Beauty Salon is a brand new salon and day spa in Wro-cław featuring unique Arabic treatments and products, with a focus on exceptional customer service. While relaxing in the tranquil ambiance of the salon you will be pampered by expert beauticians from Lebanon, Tuni-sia and Poland who specialise in Middle Eastern beauty and well-ness treatments. Al Noor beauty products are natural and are based in Argan Oil, a product from Morocco with distinctive healing and anti-aging proper-ties. Some of the treatments pro-vided include:

Massage

Facial (featuring Ghasoul Mask)

Sugar waxing

Manicure and pedicure

Permanent makeup and makeup design

Henna design and makeup

You can rejuvenate your mind, body and soul at Al Noor Beauty Salon on Ul. Słowincow 49. www.alnoor.pl

BioManiac.pl, a delicatessen/health food shop, is new in town and offers an extensive range of products, different brands from local, regional and international producers. Here you will find

products designed specifically for people intolerant to gluten, lactose or sugar, and the store is constantly expanding their range based on what its customers are asking for. You will find the BioManiac shop at ul. Komuny Paryskiej 83C.

www.biomaniac.pl

The best kept secret in Wrocław opened about three months ago in ul. Nożownicza, midway be-tween the British Council library and the old jail. I visited after a recommendation from a friend and was not disappointed.

You are assured of a warm wel-come from hosts Tomek and Dorota to what must be the cosi-est pub in the city. Seats for twenty (at tables) with room for another.

Good Czech beer at 5 złotys and Johnny Walker Red Label at 6 złotys only increased my sense of well-being. A delicious cheese and ham toast was 5 złotys; though Tomek will order food in for you, if required.

The atmosphere was wonderful due, in part, to the good conver-sation. However, it was the mu-sic that really made it for me. Ranging from Dylan through Clapton and U2 to Chris Isaak, the choice suited me exactly. Tomek is unashamedly an 80s man and it shows. No room for rap, hip-hop or disco-polo. And it was refreshing to be able to talk without having to shout.

The host is also a mean chess player and will always be de-lighted to accept a challenge, but beware, his nickname is not ‘Tigrys’ for no reason.

All in all, a great place to be. Make it your local and you won’t be disappointed, but for a special night Paka Pub is also strongly recommended.

At the end of the year it is time to give thanks and to look to the year ahead. We would like to thank our readers for stick-ing with us this year, despite the fact that our newspaper has gone through some rocky times and not been in print for many months.

Those of you who know The Wrocław International will know that our contributors come from many different countries and write for us on a voluntary basis. In this past year, we have lost a few of our writers and it is time to thank them for their generous contributions and gracious assis-tance with creating our past edi-tions. They include: Kathryn Getty, Shannon Soesbe, Lara Kalashnikova, Adnan Umar, Sheila Garcia Cervino, Oliver Reichold, Cagri Cinaz and Kle-mentyna Patalas. We hope they will send us letters from their new homes in the US, Turkey, England, Spain, UAE, Dublin and Germany.

We would also like to thank Richard Jeffery for writing the IFW column during 2012.

Finally, we would like to con-gratulate our former contributor and member of the editorial team, Gregor Gowans for start-

ing his own website in English, Wrocław Uncut. We would also like to thank our English-language maestro Terence Clark-Ward for his wonderful stories and English tips.

We still maintain a dedicated crew of volunteers, contributors and fans, together with new writ-ers. Without you, our paper would not exist. Thank you!

We are delighted to announce that we will have more TWI Par-ties this coming year. The first will be at 7pm on Friday, 18th of January in Klub Salvador on ul. Szajnochy) to the rear of Plac Solny 16. All readers are wel-come to join us.

Finally, we are pleased to an-nounce a new project Feel Think Write. We are cooperating with Wrocław’s own daily newspaper Gazeta Wrocławska. We are jointly organising and publishing a monthly column with opinions and stories from writers around the globe on one common topic each month. This month, the topic is Christmas and you can read the stories on pages 10 and 11 in our International Voices.

Grace Sexton, Editor-in-Chief t h e w r o c l a w i n t e r n a [email protected]


Nadodrze quarter has been targeted as a revitalization project by the City, aiming to bring investment in order to fulfill the plans laid out for it by the City and Wrocław Capital of Culture 2016. It's dubbed as an artisans' area and has recently seen newly renovated parks.

We attended a recent discussion of those strategically connected with the Nadodrze revitalization project and here is a summary of that meeting.

PANEL:

Krzysztof Bramorski - City council member

Łukasz Wyszkowski - City council member

Przemysław Filar - President of the Society for Beautification of Wrocław

The discussion was aimed at bringing to the forefront bottom-up initiatives that can or are be-ing taken by Wrocław's citizens. There was also plenty of emo-tion and words of criticism for the City's current development path, especially concerning the latest news regarding our Mu-nicipal Stadium.

One direct initiative by the City is the citizens' participatory budget. This is meant for neighborhoods and cooperatives to beautify spaces near their homes. Most voices said that this budget is too small, al-though some successful projects have been implemented. One elderly commentator said that the entire budget of the City is actually the “citizens' budget”. The participatory budget should be a supplement to City initia-tives and not a substitute for them.

On the other hand, City council members lamented that the citi-zens' participation level is very low. One council member said that he gets very few phone calls

or inquiries from people and election participation is also low. In an effort to bridge gaps be-tween City planners and the peo-ple, a biking officer was ap-pointed with the goal of bringing to life pro-biking initiatives in the city.

Of course the discussion touched on topics such as public trans-portation, the stadium and fiscal problems of the City. The trans-portation system, for example, may have trouble fulfilling its functions this year. Both council members claimed that the Mu-nicipality’s vision has become a bit out of touch with reality, becoming a goal in itself rather than reacting to the needs of the community.

Budgetary discussions are grow-ing more tense as debt is reach-ing maximum allowable levels. In past years, Wrocław's presi-dent has been quoted as saying, "It would be a sin not to go into debt", regarding the building of a stadium.

The stadium is of course at the center of attention. The creation of a shopping hub in the vicinity may have been ill-conceived and has been postponed. The trans-portation lines connecting the stadium did little to help connect other parts of the city (for exam-ple, Psie Pole and Nowy Dwór, large communities without tram service). Further, a few years ago there were ideas to renovate the old Olympic Stadium instead of building a new one, but these were dismissed. The opposition claims it suggested a scaled down 35,000 seat stadium, while the current one has 44,000 seats.

The council members gave us a sorely needed view into Munici-pal decision-making processes. Judging by the amount of voices at the meeting, the citizens would like to have more say in the development of Wrocław.

City News 3

Mateusz Czaja


If someone told me one month before writing this article that I would be jumping into the freezing water of a lake in southern Finland just after running out of a sauna, I would not believe them. Still, working in a multinational organization presents us with many unexpected possibilities sometimes. Thanks to Central Ostrobothnia University (COU) of Applied Sciences in Finland we could take part in an unusual event, Interna-tional Career Day presenting job and development opportu-nities in international compa-nies. Hewlett-Packard was one of them.

It seems pretty unbelievable to go all the way from far Ylivi-eska just to work in Wrocław? Not necessarily. Juha Mal-kamäki, graduate of COU and currently a member of one of the teams in Hewlett-Packard de-scribes his experience. “My story from Finland to Wrocław began a few months before graduation from COU. I had applied for HP out of curiosity and also encouraged by my Pol-ish girlfriend whom I had met in my Erasmus time with Poznań University of Technology. After graduation, I went on to work in a local company where I had worked as a summer substitute during studies. I was originally a painter but, due to my degree, I

was working on a project as a production planner. Once the project matured, I was promised a permanent position but no guarantee on the job description. At the same time I was con-tacted by HP Staffing Team, based on my application nine months earlier, and passed suc-cessfully through the recruitment process.

“It didn’t take long for me to decide to “take the leap” and come to Wro-cław for new opportunities instead of the “paint brush”. Since then it has been 2+ years in Wrocław and I’m still enjoying it.”

Encouraged by Juha’s story we decided to explore the market of local and international students in the Ylivieska and Kokkola unit of COU. Thanks to Katarzyna Jämsä who is respon-sible for international relations in COU, we got the unique op-portunity to participate in the International Career Day. To-gether with my colleague from the HP office in Romania, Iulia Blotu we hit the destination in mid March. For two days stu-dents of both university units had the opportunity to see pres-entations of invited companies such as HP in Poland and Roma-nia, P&G in Germany, Don Car-los Resort and Spa in Spain, SABMiller and Mecanova. They could also speak with company representatives in person and

participate in panel discussions together with COU students, who are already working inter-nationally. “We have been re-ceiving very good feedback from our students who have also been coming and asking about your companies and about your offers after the event. We truly hope to deepen our cooperation and mutual understanding in the near future,” wrote Katarzyna Jämsä after the event. We are also receiving first applications

from COU students.

Conference organizers did their best to make their guests feel at home and experience some real Finnish spirit, just to mention an extraordinary smoked sauna, specialties of Finnish cuisine or winter swimming. By winter swimming, I actually mean swimming in winter.

“The best thing about Finland today is that we

no longer ask every for-eigner who comes to Finland: Why did you come here?”

This quotation can be found in “Visit Finland: The Insider’s Guide”. Just after a few days in Finland it is difficult to imagine that someone could actually even think about asking this question.

4

HP has won two SSON (Shared Services & Outsourc-ing Network) Excellence Awards at the 2012 awards ceremony, proving to be the outstanding industry leader in Europe, Middle East and Af-rica region. The awards cere-mony took place during the 12th Annual European Shared Services & Outsourcing Week event held in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

HP was presented with the Euro-pean SSON Excellence in Cus-tomer Service and Excellence

in Improvement & Innovation awards by an independent cross industry leader jury for the re-gion. The awards were won by HP’s Global Business Services – a shared services organization for the HP corporation who demonstrated how driving inno-vation and effective handling of key business processes can con-tribute strongly to overall com-

pany performance. This is achieved by delivering positive business results not only to the company cost base but also by increasing sales opportunities,

optimizing cash flow and en-hancing end customer satisfac-tion.

HP’s shared services organiza-

tion has had a presence in the EMEA region since 1999. It has two mature multi-functional global delivery centers in Wro-cław (Poland) and Bucharest (Romania). The strategy pursued by the organization is based on a growing portfolio of services in key areas: Finance & Admini-stration, HR, Supply Chain and Marketing; this includes han-dling of advanced business proc-esses such as external customer facing activities, pre-sales ser-vices, tax reporting and partner marketing.

“The recognition from the most reputable panel of judges in the industry definitely is a tangible in-dication that HP sets the benchmark for our indus-try,” said Jacek Levernes, Vice President, HP Global Business Services EMEA. “I am sure these SSON awards will strengthen the Hewlett-Packard brand in the region. This also proves the potential of the

European region in devel-oping an environment to handle the most advanced business processes.”

European SSON Excellence Awards are among the most prestigious and coveted awards in the industry. With as many as two awards for 2012, HP GBS EMEA confirms the leading position of HP within the Shared Services and Business Process Outsourcing landscape and is not only the first organization to be recognized in two categories the same year but also the first one to be awarded in two con-secutive years. In 2011 HP also won the European SSON Excel-lence Award for Value Creation.


Just over a year ago we re-ported on Credit Agricole’s formal entrance to the Polish market. The bank has ambi-tious plans to expand its al-ready 400 stong number of branches around the country to 600 in three years. We can already see evidence of this expansion with the number of branches popping up around the city. The particular feather in the bank’s cap is its conveniently located corner branch on Rynek and Oławska. What a nice view of the Ratusz from there!

Business 5

Under the general principles of taxation law the taxpayer is solely liable for incurred ar-rears. However, there are im-portant exceptions to this rule. One of the most marked excep-tions is the joint liability of board members and their as-sets for the tax arrears of lim-ited liability and joint stock companies, even prior to incor-poration. However, according to the Tax Ordinance Act, this liability is only triggered when the execution against the com-pany’s assets proves to be fully or partially ineffective.

The Supreme Administrative Court interpreted the criteria for the finding of insolvency re-ferred to in Article 116 § 1 of the Tax Ordinance Act. In setting

the standard for application the court analyzed the Code of Com-mercial Companies (“CCC”). It provides that any evidence which shows that the company has no assets to satisfy creditors is admissible regardless of the initiation of enforcement pro-ceedings. This extremely lax evidentiary standard should not be applied in assigning joint li-ability to board members under the Tax Ordinance Act. There-fore, the court interpreted the Tax Ordinance Act to require that such findings can be made after the enforcement proceed-ings have been concluded. How-ever, the court retained the appli-cation of low evidentiary thresh-old which allows any legally admissible evidence to be used in proving the insufficiency of

funds.

Fortunately, there are two meth-ods under which board members can waive the discussed liability. Where the board member can demonstrate that (i) bankruptcy or bankruptcy prevention pro-ceeding has been initiated in a timely manner or (ii) where the member did not negligently or intentionally prevent bankruptcy initiation or composition pro-ceedings.

Another route for a board mem-ber to avoid secondary liability is if the member reports company property that is sufficient to sat-isfy a substantial portion of the debt. Importantly, liability of board members includes taxes incurred within the scope of the

members’ duties during the time when they were actively on the board.

It is worth mentioning that the Supreme Administrative Court decision of 20th December 2011 held that board member liability for back taxes and interest can-not be interpreted without regard to the relevant provisions of bankruptcy law and the CCC. The wording of these provisions indicates that the interest on debts due for the period preced-ing the declaration of bankruptcy can be paid from the bankrupt company estate. It is also impor-tant to note that not only are the company assets liquidated but also the company is dissolved and deleted from the national register. Consequently, after the

conclusion of bankruptcy pro-ceedings, which did not satisfy tax creditors and where the com-pany lost its legal existence, the company itself will not be liable for the unpaid tax arrears, in-cluding interest calculated after the bankruptcy date. Also the board member of the bankrupt company cannot be liable for such interest on back taxes. Therefore, as the administrative courts have highlighted, in light of the aforementioned provisions a board member cannot incur a greater liability for the interest on back taxes than the company itself would have suffered.

Deloitte Legal, Pasternak i Wspol-nicy Kancelaria Prawnicza sp. k.


“Education is the most powerful weapon you can use

to change the world.”

Nelson Mandela

In January 2010 Haiti was struck by a devastating earth-quake which was watched by many on the other side of the world. We shook our heads in dismay and sadness and then discussed it until the end of our double espresso and crois-sant. This is adequate time for such a topic and once it is over we move on. We are all guilty of such whimsical feelings and no one should really feel guilty about them however it is reas-suring and somewhat comfort-ing when we know that there

are some people who will make that double espresso last a lit-tle while longer.

After scouring the internet I was pleasantly surprised to note that there have been more than a handful of individuals, groups, and countries that have pulled together to re-build Haiti and it was even nicer to hear that one such group comes from right here in Wrocław. Recently I have been in touch with an ar-chitect by the name of Katarzyna Dąbkowska who has been more than a little helpful in regards sharing information about her work and that of the rest of her team of five young architects from the city; Maciej Siuda, Łukasz Piasta, Marta Niedbalec, Kamil Rusinek and Jerzy Ma-zurkiewicz.

It all began in June 2011 as a competition ran by the charity foundation ‘Polska-Haiti’, the Polish Chamber of Architects, and the Polish Chamber of Civil Engineers. The requirement was to design a new school to be constructed in Jacmel, a town

deeply affected, not only by the infamous earthquake, but also by heavy rain falls, hurricanes and cholera epidemics that have taken their toll on the people and the buildings. After sailing through two stages of the com-petition, in May 2012, the group of Wrocławians took their prize of seeing their designs become a reality and began the arduous task of traveling to Haiti and building a school for the chil-dren who desperately seek an education. Unlike other children in the more fortunate parts of the World, the younger generation of Haiti has been forced to grow up quickly by the tragedies they have faced and have no choice but to carry the heavy burden and restore Haiti to an educated and therefore more prosperous nation.

The school is funded primarily by the Bishop Launay Saturne, Caritas Polska and the charity foundation ‘Polska-Haiti’ and the aim is to have at least part of the school ready and able by September 2013; this will mean that the children can start learn-

ing at the start of the academic year.

My main concern, when I heard about this project, was the stur-diness of the building. For a country that seems quite the target for mother nature’s bow and arrow how can one be sure that the new building will be able to withstand the possibly inevitable future disasters? It was also clear to the architects that there would be huge issues as the materials and technology available in Haiti are very differ-ent and somewhat lacking in comparison to what they were used to dealing with in Poland. Luckily though the idea is for these talented individuals to bring their knowledge over and put them to good use, knowl-edge they gained from Poland, and so the project is being com-pleted by adapting their Polish knowledge and standards and combining them with the local conditions. Also all conditions have been taken into considera-tion and for areas which are more vulnerable to seismic ac-tivity the structure has been opti-

mised. With the dry season last-ing up to 3 months in Jacmel it is imperative that water is col-lected adequately throughout the rainy season and the construc-tion of a deep well is in discus-sion. Through the rainy season the rain water is collected in pools on the roof which is then used in the kitchen and toilets to maintain sanitary conditions.

After just a few emails with Katarzyna Dąbkowska I was amazed by her enthusiasm for such a strenuous task; it is both wonderful and astonishing that people with talents that could push them far in their own per-sonal goals and aspirations are willing to take a step back and spend two to three years build-ing a school for people they hardly know.

I asked Miss Dąbkowska what her thoughts were of the people she encountered in Haiti. “They are passive. They seem to strug-gle every day and continue to live on the rubbles and the ruins of their country but, like Wro-cławians, they are warm and hospitable.’’

The group, when in Haiti, was enthusiastically thrust into a sightseeing tour of, not only the city and buildings, but of places of natural beauty that seemed to have evaded the touch of the catastrophes that have plagued the country. How astonishing that through such tragedies peo-ple can still stand up and intro-duce their place of birth with pride and a smile.

And as for the wonderful group of Wrocławians, they hope that when this project ends it will open the door to many more. It is an excuse to travel, to learn and to integrate with other cul-tures but also for the simple fact that it brings different worlds together in working towards a common goal.

If you wish to know more about this project or to donate (and it is possible to donate 1% of your taxable income towards this pro-ject), please visit the Polska-Haiti foundation website - www.polska-haiti.org.

Special 6

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In 1997, a French family moved to Wrocław, Igor, Ra-chel and their children. Igor was brought here because of his job and it helped a lot that he is half Polish, especially in Wrocław in the late 90s when it wasn’t so common or fash-ionable to speak other lan-guages. For those of us who inhabit Wrocław now, it is amazing to learn that in 1997 there were no supermarkets, the city was a building site, and there was a very small but growing international commu-nity and no international schools. Rachel quickly im-mersed herself into making friends and later became the first President of the Interna-tional Friends of Wrocław.

Igor and Rachel spoke fondly of those early days. It seems that being a pioneer is actually more rewarding than arriving when all the work is done. One senses that they and their comrades shared something special, soli-darity in breaking new ground and creating something. After 1998, because of the previous year’s ravaging floods in Wro-cław, the City received much needed capital to rebuild.

Such was the bond that the Jelinski family felt with their new Polish home that, years later, when faced with a return to France due to the peculiarities of corporate assignments and relo-cations, they were not quite ready to settle back down. At this stage, the children were aged five, eight and ten. Igor and Rachel had been teenage sweethearts, having met at the tender age of sixteen. Back then, these two star-crossed lov-ers had made unspoken promises to travel. How quickly the tides of life came crashing in, and

more than twenty years later they were staring the landmark age of 40 straight in the eyes, with three children, a career, a home and all the trappings of domesticity weighing them down. They knew that they had a choice to make, fulfill their dreams or keep aging with the bitter regret of what might have been.

In the end, the choice was easy. They decided to begin what would be one of the greatest adventures of their lives and booked themselves a trip around the world. Of course, their teen-age plans of sailing around the world were scuppered by the reality of three young children in tow. But the ever resourceful Igor found the ideal mode of transport in a Land Rover De-fender. This was no ordinary vehicle; he artfully redesigned the suspension to deal with the types of terrain they would en-counter and the ultimate neces-sity was a sleeping quarters on the roof in the form of an Afri-can tent which would house the family when they found them-selves miles from nowhere. This vehicle meant total freedom from the expected path.

Naturally, such a brilliant mis-sion was not undertaken over-night. It took months of plan-ning. Thus the adventure began. When I asked the couple what it was like, Rachel responded:

“It was happiness.”

The family travelled to 27 coun-tries over a two-year period. In the beginning, it took them two to three months to shake off the shackles of their daily existence and adapt to this new nomadic life. After a while, they even found it confining when they had to stay in an enclosed space such as a hotel. They became so free that sleeping under the stars became their bedroom of choice.

“I’m just Igor.”

Igor is actually quite a formida-ble, successful businessman. He has spent most of his adult life providing for his family and climbing the career ladder to achieve the highest status. The trappings of such status can sometimes form a cocoon around you so that you are cush-ioned from the hardships or ba-nalities of everyday life. For Igor, he quickly found that this trip ensured he put his ego aside, a process so enriching. Every-where he met people for the first time with no preconceptions of him and he was ‘just Igor’. One strong test of this occurred when the family arrived in Tanzania where they had friends to visit. Their friends brought them to an expat event at which they would normally feel at home. How-ever, this dishevelled and dusty family with their well-worn clothes felt completely out of place and the sensation came as a shock to them.

The Journey

The journey began in Europe and moved to the Middle East, Iran being one of the first coun-tries they visited. There they found ordinary life and the peo-ple in Iran so different, warm and welcoming. For the first time in their lives and that of their children, they saw child labour first hand in Turkey. The

supreme natural beauty of much of Africa overwhelmed them. In South-America, 4-5,000 metres above sea-level, they felt on top of the world. It is hard to pick out one memory on such a di-verse trail. However, Rachel and Igor remember vividly their impressions of the Himba people of Namibia. The way they lived with nature, covering themselves with ochre and butter fat and cleaning with smoke, never us-ing water. They also remember seeing a glacier in Argentina, the striking colours of Bolivia and Peru, the sumptuous tastes of middle-eastern food and the quality of the meat in Argentina. No matter where they went, even if they didn’t speak the language, they could always communicate and that is one of the great lessons of their jour-ney.

It seems that only positivity re-sulted from this journey and bonded this family as never be-fore. Rachel and Igor both val-ued the experience of sharing and learning with their children. Indeed, they felt that this jour-ney provided the children with an education they could never have obtained otherwise. Dur-ing the entire period, they never had a bad experience. Of course, they did not naively journey into the world but took adequate precautions to be safe and remained open to meeting new people. This journey opened the eyes of their children to accept differences.

“Travelling was about meeting people. The world is not just what we see on TV.”

Lessons Learnt

If you are given a small box to

contain all your clothing and belongings for two years, then you will chose carefully and wisely. This downsizing taught each member of the family how few possessions they really need to survive and indeed to enjoy life. The dropping of commodi-ties actually freed them. For Rachel, she has learnt how to respect and value water, given the fact that in many of the countries they visited, water was a scarce luxury. Igor now knows himself better and feels free to follow his own heart and mind, to decide for himself and to stand up for what he believes. In short, he is more in control of his destiny.

“Our children know us so well.”

One of the most beautiful as-pects of this journey has been the bonding between two adults and three children. This price-less outcome was worth every kilometre they travelled.

The End of the Journey

Every circle comes back to the beginning, and so has the story of the Jelinskis. They are now back in France, but their lives have changed forever. They have more diverse friends from around the world, the children have seen and done things that their classmates can just read about in books and they know they must continue travelling in some shape or form for the rest of their lives. Igor has come back to Poland and he divides his time between Wrocław and France, two much loved homes in one big world.

Special 7

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the

ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in

your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”~~ Mark Twain


It is hard to believe that it all started slightly more than a hundred years ago, in 1909, when 66 Jewish families walked out of the ancient city of Jaffa and decided to build a city on a desert. The present Tel Aviv-Yafo, together with the surrounding cities and sub-urbs, is now inhabited by more than three million people, al-most half of the Israeli popula-tion. Due to fourteen kilome-tres of pleasant and clean Mediterranean beach along which the city lies, and the promenade with high rise hotel buildings and palm trees, it is easy to mistake it for Miami.

The architecture of Tel Aviv reflects the past century trends. Since some members of the Ger-man Bauhaus group found shel-ter in Tel Aviv, the city has now about two thousand buildings erected in this style. They are objects of pilgrimages of archi-tects across the world, Germans included. Add to this an unmis-takable though muted Middle Eastern flavour, and you will get something they call there the eclectic or international style. Since Tel Aviv is bustling with business, one will see also many high-rise constructions which at some points reminds one of Manhattan. Tel Aviv, known also as the White City, has earned in 2003 the status of the UNESCO World Heritage City.

We have been the guests of the Mayor of Tel Aviv, Ron Huldai, who invited the representatives of the European Capitals of Cul-ture and journalists from leading world newspapers to attend the Tel Aviv Art Weekend which inaugurated also the Tel Aviv Art Year. For five days the Mayor and his co-workers have been proudly showing us the city and its riches. For Tel Aviv is a city of culture and arts which feels at home in an energetic community of highly educated

Jews who brought with them to Israel wealth of intellect, educa-tion, imagination, creative en-ergy and sophistication unpar-alled anywhere.

It has been a genuine feast to see two dance performances in the Suzanne Dellal Centre in the neighbourhood of Neve Tzedek; the artfulness of the young danc-ers skilfully and vividly depicted the painful fate of the Jewish nation, but also in a wordless yet expressive way criticized and ridiculed some of the Jewish customs.

Another genuine feast has been the Shabbat dinner thrown by the Mayor to honour his interna-tional guests. We have enjoyed the Israeli cuisine which is cos-mopolitan as Israelites them-selves, yet somehow manages to remain kosher. The food has been supplemented by local fruits and fortified by the Israeli richly flavoured wine.

The guides say that Tel Aviv never sleeps, and they are right. Never before have I had a chance to see an art gallery full of visi-tors well after midnight, with no one demonstrating any intention of going home. Galleries show pictures and sculptures of the Jewish, Arab and other artists who meet in the space of art, entering a cosmopolitan dialogue of themes, languages and styles. One can see them side by side, shoulder to shoulder, face to face, telling you through their work and from their divergent perspectives about beauty, but also about grave problems of life and politics.

Undoubtedly, a visit to the Tel Aviv Museum of Art will be the high point for any art connois-seur coming to the White City. Collections are exhibited in one of the boldest museum buildings in the world, where walls, floors, ceilings, planes and lines meet and intersect each other with awe-inspiring weightlessness. In well lit, wide and inviting spaces one will see contemporary design, sculpture and painting by artists

across the world. Visitors, like ourselves, flock especially to see the enviable collection of con-temporary painting. Monet, Pi-casso, Braque, Pissarro, Kandin-sky, Chagall, Archipenko, Rothko, Pollock, Lichtenstein, Klimt and others are among many reasons to come to Tel Aviv.

From a typical Polish perspective Israel is the Holy Land, torn apart by the irreconcilable reli-gious differences between Juda-ism, numerous Christian denomi-nations and Islam. This can be true about Jerusalem and other biblical cities which may well be seen as thematic parks making their living of little else but reli-gious tourists of all persuasions.

From a more international per-spective, propagated by the inter-national daily press, Israel is just a US military base established to protect American interests in the Middle East, constantly embat-tled by the perennial conflict between the Jews and Arabs, and aggravated by the superpowers’ game. Vulnerability of the Israeli status does make itself felt by the ubiquitous sight of the young uniformed people with rifles, frequent and elaborate security arrangements, especially at the Ben Gurion Airport, fences and walls dividing West Bank and Israeli territories. Immediately after Shabbat we had a chance to see an anti-war demonstration; one of the slogans said: “I am already against the next war.”

Yet seen from the inside, Tel Aviv gives a completely different impression. It is a beautifully designed home of gifted, ener-getic (and handsome) people who seriously care about their city and country, who remember about the painful history of their nation and are genuinely proud of their own achievements. Yet in their seriousness and commit-ment they do not forget to enjoy themselves, and certainly know how to do it. It is these people who, within a brief and turbulent hundred years, have turned a piece of desert into a city which is now one of the world capitals of culture.

Special thanks to Eytan Schwartz, Hila Oren and Noa Yaar for their hospitality.

Culture 8

International Youth of Wro-cław is a project set up by two volunteers at the Bente Kahan Foundation (Voja Gleichge-wicht and Rafal Zdanewicz) who wanted to share their curiosity about the world, culture, art, politics and inter-cultural dialogue. One of the main goals of the project is to encourage young people to discover other cultures, ideas, beliefs, habitats and to pro-mote international and cross-cultural dialogue. The group also wants to spread the ideas of mutual respect and toler-ance.

Since September 2012 each week International Youth of Wrocław organizes meetings, artistic workshops, discussions, cultural events that are held in the Center for Jewish Culture and Education in the White Stork Synagogue, “12 Chairs” Atelier (lead by Yoav Rossano) and in other venues all over

Wrocław. Participants of Inter-national Youth of Wrocław come from Brazil, USA, Po-land, Mexico, Japan, Norway, Taiwan.

This year as part of the Days of Mutual Respect the group or-ganized a movie competition called “Respect” and artistic workshops “Fragments of Iden-tity” and a rock concert in Firlej Music Club. During the concert they showed all movies from the competition and all works from the “Fragments of Iden-

tity” workshops.

“Fragments of Identity” – rebuilding the image of man-kind. The main goal was to re-search different figures and races, different culture and to collect all of them, cut them into fragments and to build a cosmopolitan vision of human-ity. Then all of these collages were exposed in Firlej Music Club during the concert (7th November), which was a part of the Days of Mutual Respect. Now you can see the “Fragments of Identity” exhibi-tion in The White Stork Syna-gogue (2nd floor of The White Stork Synagogue), which is a part of “Days of Mutual Re-spect” exhibition.

[email protected]

www.facebook.com/InternationalYouthOfWroclaw


According to a popular saying, God has created the world but the Dutch have created the Netherlands. If there is any truth in it, it is certainly true of Frisians, because one third of their region is a former sea-bed which they have reclaimed for themselves and turned into a fertile land. Friesland, a country they inhabit, is their own creation.

In many ways Friesland is the quintessence of the Netherlands, the country which for centuries has been an incontestable leader in making the best of its land and, when not satisfied with the size of its territory, expanding it by ingenuity, skills, labour, and cooperation.

In a popular perception the Netherlands is usually associated with windmills, polders, dikes, dark-blue porcelain, wooden shoes known as klompen, black-and-white cows, and the highest quality cheese. From a more sophisticated perspective, this country is perceived through the great achievements of Dutch painting, grand Dutch states-manship, and the tradition of tolerance towards a variety of religions and customs.

Friesland is a rich land. Many elements of both popular and sophisticated images of the Netherlands are contributions of the people living in the province of Friesland. It begets also many distinguished people. Among them were Nobel Prize winners Theodor Mommsen and Rudolf Eucken; Rembrandt’s supporting wife Saskia van Uylenburgh; painter of impossible figures Maurits Cornelis Escher; Menno Simons, religious reformer and spiritual leader of the Mennon-ites; Bernard Fokke, hero of the story of the Flying Dutchman; famous female spy Mata Hari; governor of New Amsterdam Peter Stuyvesant, and many other great figures who influ-enced the world. One of the greatest sons of Friesland has been the King of the Nether-lands, William IV of the House of Orange. His predecessor, Wil-liam III, was crowned King of England.

In a steep country many things happen without human interven-tion; without one’s will, or against it. In such places objects, if not fixed, will be moved by gravitation: a car would roll down the street, like in San Francisco; waters will flow in cascades, like in Niagara, the snow would slide down the mountains in avalanches, like in the Alps.

Living on the flatland is very demanding. It requires perhaps more effort than living in high-lands. But also it induces one to invent all sorts of ways to smooth the movement of the object you want to move in or-der to save precious energy while doing it.

Due to the nature of their land, Frisians have to spend a lot of energy in order to achieve al-most any purpose they set for themselves. And in order to save themselves at least some effort,

they have had to learn how to devise ingenious ways to smooth the movement of objects they want to move.

Despite living in the flatland, Frisians have successfully man-aged to avoid stagnation. Their booming industry, elaborate daily customs and robust culture are a great testimony both to their adroitness and their appe-tite for enjoyment. Frisians have accumulated great experience in continuous struggle with natural tendencies towards stagnation and entropy both in nature and in human society.

“ K e e p i n g t h e f l o w ” , “facilitating the movement”, “enab l ing the passage” , “smoothing the way” – these phrases describe an important feature of the Frisian way of life. Indeed, one of the most impor-tant aspects of Frisian life is ingenuity in enabling movement of all those things which refuse to move without action. Frisians have become masters of smooth-

ing the movement of waters and sands, boats and beasts, ships and sheep, cows and cars, every-thing which by itself would not move the way they want to.

The life of Frisians is spent es-pecially on keeping the flow of waters which without their inter-ference would not flow, stag-nate, and eventually putrify. For this purpose they dig ditches in their fields so water flows into them, leaving fields dry enough for pasture and agriculture.

They employ the force of wind to rotate the sails of windmills which pump water out of the former sea, in this way securing for themselves new inhabitable land.

They have built innumerable canals in order to navigate them, as well as bridges, overpasses above and underpasses beneath them; all serve Frisians to enable the transportation of goods and of themselves. They have built countless dikes in order to pro-tect their fields from flooding,

and to facilitate passage of their carts and cars. They have dis-played unique engineering inge-nuity in building floodgates and sluices to hold the waters, or to let them flow as their needs arise.

The Frisian need and necessity to keep things moving smoothly has made its way even into their architecture: in the narrow streets of the historic centre of Leeuwarden*, corners of the buildings have been choking the movement of carriages: in order to facilitate their passage, they introduced a law requiring the protruding corners of the build-ings be rounded. Frisian culture grew out of their experience of struggle with the forces of na-ture. Indeed, Frisians can be truly said to be the masters of keeping the flow of everything.

*The city of Leeuwarden has re-cently qualified in the second and final round of the Dutch leg of the competition for the status of the European Capital of Culture 2018.

Christmas (Boże Narodzenie) is the most important celebration in Poland. We have a lot of traditions related to the day the 24th of December called “Wigilia”; Christmas Eve and Christmas Eve Supper.

Wigilia starts when we see the first star (gwiazdka) in the sky. This is a symbol of the Star of Bethlehem (Gwiazda Betlejem-ska) which led the Three Wise Men (Trzej Królowie) to Jesus.

Traditionally, all the dishes on the table on the 24th of Decem-ber should be Lenten Fare (postne). Nowadays not eating meat that day is not obligatory anymore, just advisable. The supper (kolacja wigilijna) starts with sharing the host (łamanie się opłatkiem) and good wishes for all members of family (składanie życzeń). On the table covered with a white tablecloth (biały obrus) you will find hay (sianko) underneath and there should be 12 dishes on the table. Depending on the region, these

are: carp (karp), beetroot soup with ravioli (barszcz z usz-kami) or mushroom soup (zupa grzybowa), pierogi with cab-bage and mushroom (pierogi z kapusta i grzybami), cabbage with peas (kapusta z grochem), compote made from dried fruits (kompot z suszu), noodle with poppy seeds (kluski z makiem)and others.

The most popular Christmas decoration is the Christmas tree (choinka). A coniferous tree is a symbol of life and rebirth, fertil-ity and lasting. The Christmas tree is decorated with colourful Christmas balls (bombki), lights (światełka), ornamental angels (aniołki), candies (cukierki), apples (jabłka), nuts (orzechy), gingerbread (pierniki), etc.

Below the Christmas tree we put gifts (prezenty), brought by Santa Claus (Święty Mikołaj) and we can also find the Christ-mas crib (szopka) with figures of Joseph, Mary, baby Jesus, shepherds (Pasterze), Three Wise Men (Trzej Królowie) and animals (zwierzęta) like s h e e p ( o w c e ) , c a m e l s (wielbłąd), elephant (słoń) and farm animals.

After the Christmas supper we sing Christmas carols (kolędy) and at midnight all religious people go to the church for the special mass called “pasterka”. This evening we also do not forget about animals. We believe that on this special night they know how to speak (mówią ludzkim głosem)…But I am

curious in what language…Polish in Poland, I suppose...

Merry Christmas (Wesołych Świąt) and Happy New Year ( S z c z ę ś l i w e g o N o w e g o

Roku)!!!


10 International Voices

THINK FEEL WRITE: The Wrocław International and Gazeta Wrocławska are cooperating on a new project called Feel Think Write International Project. Here, each month, writers from around the world will share their opinions and stories about a common theme. This month the theme is how we each spend our Christmas Eve. You can also find Feel Think Write on Facebook.

We are from East Sussex, Eng-land. We are staying here in Wroclaw this Christmas be-cause this is where we live now and travel home at this time of year is very expensive. Also we love to be here.

On Wigilia we are planning to have some friends round to our house for a meal and to celebrate with them. On New Years Eve, a group of us will hopefully go to a Hotel in Sobotka for the Cele-brations.

We are quite happy to stay here, it would be nice to see the Fam-ily but they have all grown up now and are happy doing their own thing.

In England, Christmas Eve is usually spent preparing for Christmas Day, cooking the cold meats for Boxing day and then we would probably go to the local pub and celebrate with family and friends.

Typically on Christmas Eve in England some people frantically do last-minute shopping, most people prepare food ready for Christmas Day and Boxing Day, which is also celebrated in Eng-land. Some go to Midnight Mass but unfortunately not as many as used to go. Many people will go to the local bar to celebrate with their friends and family over a few drinks.

At this time of year in England the weather is usually damp, sometimes it rains. If we are lucky it is sunny but very rarely in the part of England where we live (the South East) do we have snow at Christmas.

Christmas Day is usually spent with Family members. It is the day when we open our presents because we believe (as Chil-dren), Santa calls on us with our presents when we are asleep on Christmas Eve. Boxing Day is generally spent at sporting events, i.e., The Boxing Day Hunt which this is a very tradi-tional event, when a group of horsemen and women hunt for foxes with hounds. It is now illegal so they now drag hunt which is when a person goes out with a scented rag on a string an hour or so before the hunt starts and then the hunters have to track him down. Boxing Day isn't called Boxing Day because

of the sport, it's because in the early days of sailing ships a box was placed on the ship’s deck and sa i lo r s wo uld p u t money into it during the voyage, this was supposed to bring the ship good luck. When they re-turned to England the boxes were given to the Church and distributed to the poor on Box-ing Day. In my husband’s family it was always a day of celebra-tion as it was his parents’ Wed-ding Anniversary. At that time all the family would meet at a local bar to play a darts match and then return to the family home for a party with a few tra-ditional songs and dancing.

Christmas Day is usually a typi-cal meal of roast turkey or goose, potatoes, sausage, bacon, Brussels sprouts, swede, & other vegetables. Christmas Pudding, which is a Dessert made in Sep-tember, is full of fruit and nuts and usually contains either rum or brandy. It is then stored in a cool dark place until Christmas. We also enjoy mince pies (these are sweet fruit pastries), assorted cheese and crackers, mulled wine, sherry, wine, port and wine.

I am from the Island of Trini-dad and Tobago. I am a Pro-fessional Photographer.

My country has a population of 1.3 million people.

I never knew what a White Christmas was until I spent Christmas in Poland, we have warm Caribbean Christmases.

With the passing of our parents especially our mother, our fam-ily gathers every Christmas at the home of one of us, my brother or sister (usually my sister) to share a meal and ex-change presents. It is the one time of the year when we can always be certain to meet. My brother and I are self employed and can also be found travelling. My sister has five children she home schools. With our hectic lives, Christmas Eve is that one day that we know we will be able to see each other and relax.

About the food...

Trinidad and Tobago is made up of a multi ethnic multi cultural society and as such we borrow from each other. Pork is a heavy

feature for most families and a Ham can usually be found grac-ing the tables of most homes, except for my sister as the fam-ily are born again Christians who made the decision abstain from Pork, shrimp and lobster.

On my last visit to Poland I shared one of the Christmas deli-cacies that I enjoyed growing up called Garlic Pork, a Portuguese dish that has become a mainstay of Christmas feasting, Roasted Pork is another favourite. A Baked and stuffed Turkey would round off the main attractions on any Christmas table. Much de-bate is usually made of Pastelle, a meat stuffed corn dumpling wrapped in banana leaves, For those who make them, they are always seeking the nod of ap-proval that their Pastelle is the best they have ever tasted, as such, I avoid them like the plague.

Another item to be served is the traditional Black Cake. It is rich dark rum soaked fruit cake made from dried fruits that have been soaking in alcohol, from the year before, and again, every body who offers you a slice, expects that you would at least say that theirs was the closest to your mother's own, unless you are courting her daughter, then you would ask for tips to pass on to your own mother.

Traditional drinks - Sorrel and Ginger Beer.

Christmas traditions in Trini-dad & Tobago

Carol singing is traditional throughout the country and spe-

cial concerts are held at various venues for the public and at a price, usually for various chari-ties and under the patronage of the President and his wife in one or more cases.

Another traditional Christmas singing tradition is Parang, a Spanish influenced form of Car-olling. It is all sung in Spanish and with an up tempo beat. The Paranderos would move from house to house spreading good cheer and merriment all related to the Christ Child's birth, a lot of alcohol induced merriment is involved. There are some major competitions in the Parang com-munity and it is a traditional event with various cultural or-ganizations vying to hold the biggest and best competition. An off shoot of Parang which has grown in the last two decades is a fusion of our folk song style of Soul and Calypso called Soca, which showcases our Carnival Season with the Parang tradition. This musical fusion is called Soca Parang and had a following all of its own, sung in English, the topics are rich and varied

and add another genre to our already ever growing heritage and cultural fusions.

As children, our own family tradition was that the house would be "put away" by the af-ternoon of Christmas Eve, we would all be resting by 4.00 p.m. when it got dark by 6.00 p.m. we would gather by the creche (you're making me cry) and lay our gifts before it. One of us would read from the Bible, then we would switch off the lights in the house and move from room to room singing Silent Night and other Christmas Carols. We would then go to bed to sleep for a little while and then get up for Midnight Mass usually at Mount St. Benedict. Upon our return we would find that Santa had made a visit and we would be allowed to open our presents.

Catholic Mass or Church Ser-vice is held in the evening on Christmas Eve, at Midnight and three times on Christmas Day. A time when all the Churches are usually packed to capacity.


I will spend my Christmas in Italy this year for a change as it is not my habitude. Until last year I used to spend it in Poland, in the Polish countryside. First of all we have to say that the big difference between Christmas Eve in the two countries is that, in Italy, almost all the traditions have been eaten by consumer-ism. But still, of course, we have a lot of small traditions that re-main. Mainly when it comes to the table. We must absolutely state that Italian food traditions are fabulously resistant: we still eat, for example, special cakes such as Pandoro and Panettone. The first one is a butter based cake of bread and the second one is a sweet bread with raisins and candied fruit.

We used to invite all the family

to our home but after a little some relatives died, youngsters have no children and it’s a lot of work, so the family tables are growing smaller and smaller. This does not prevent our Christ-mas dinners having at least ten guests, and you can even total up to one hundred in the south.

About Christmas gifts, for about the last ten years, we have a really special Italian invention that is the Fair Trade Tents, res-sembling little indoor Christmas

markets completely created by the Italian-based fair trade or-ganizations.

We normally arrive at the 22nd or 23rd of December still without a lot of presents, searching every-where for an original idea to satisfy our hunting enthusiast

uncle, not to annoy his vegetar-ian new wife and some toys for the spoiled son of our best friend that loves transformers and only transformers but already has them all. And after that, of course and by a curse, we have to track all the people that have-n’t joined the Christmas Eve

dinner or the Christmas lunch. And, as I said, those people are a lot. But naturally we can see the upside of that problem: to run from house to house after all that food can be surely good to raise you from the fogs of bulimy and bring you back to real life.

Casa de España, the Spanish academy located at the corner of Rynek and Kuznicza Street, offers free storytelling in Spanish twice a month on Sat-urdays for those parents that want their kids to have their first taste of Cervantes’ lan-guage. The activity started on October 27th and continues due to its popularity.

The Wroclaw International has gotten together with Jesús Can-tarero, Director of ‘Casa de España’. He explains that the storytelling initiative was born

due to the large number of Span-ish speaking families living in Wroclaw, or Latin expats with a Polish fiancée. But it’s not just about learning Spanish, Jesús remarked, also about crossing cultures, sharing emotions and having fun at no cost.

A team of three volunteers from ‘Casa de España’ organizes the activity. They are Susana Díaz Pérez (Spanish), Carlos Palmer (Venezuela) and Patrick Bève (France). The first two take care of the reading and story selec-tion, while the third makes the storytelling more enjoyable thanks to dramatization on stage. Parents are also invited to help by attending, proposing short stories, etc.

The activity is for children up to the age of eight years old and takes place right at the school, which is located at ul. Kużnicza 10/3, every second Saturday of the month, from 11:30 to 12:30. If you wish to attend or receive more information, write to

[email protected] or call 70 343 50 40/42.


My first ever rendezvous with żurek (Polish fermented rye soup) was almost four years ago and since then I have been in love with this Polish deli-cacy. It is light and packed full of dominant flavours of zakwas (fermented rye base), smoked meat, Polish white sausage, mingled with subtle hints of garlic, mushrooms and horseradish. The best bit about żurek though, for me, lies in its presentation when served in an edible bread bowl. The inner layer of the bread bowl soaks up all the goodness of the zakwas and you get to scrape off bits of this flavour-soaked bread bowl with each spoonful of warm and hearty żurek.

We are grateful to Rafał Borys, Head Chef at Mosaiq Restaurant & Wine Lounge for sharing this must-try and easy-to-follow żurek recipe with our readers.

Preparation Time: 3 days to ferment rye flour Cooking Time: 1h 30 to 45 min Servings: 6

Ingredients:

For the zakwas:

300 grams of rye flour (mąka żytnia żurkowa) 1 litre of water 1 slice of wholemeal bread 3 whole garlic cloves

For the broth:

2 dried mushrooms, porcini (borowik) 40 grams of soup vegetables (carrot, leek, celery or celeriac, parsnip, onion) 30 grams of smoked bones or bacon 2 bay leaves 6 grains of allspice (ziele angiel-ski) 1 tablespoon of horseradish paste (chrzan) 2 litres of cold water salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

To assemble the żurek:

1 tablespoon of lard 20 grams smoked bacon 20 grams white sausage 2 onions marjoram (majeranek) and pars-ley to taste 2 garlic cloves 500 millilitres of zakwas 8 chicken eggs

Method:

Making the zakwas:

Heat the water until lukewarm. In a 2-litre glass jar, place 300 grams of rye flour and mix it with 300 ml of lukewarm water to form a slurry. When cool, stir in the remaining water and add bread slice and garlic cloves. Cover the jar with cheesecloth, secure with a rubber band and leave in a warm place for 3 days. Strain the zakwas, discarding bread and garlic. Zakwas can be stored in a glass jar, refrigerated, for almost two weeks.

Making the broth:

Start with soaking dried mush-rooms in hot water for 1 hour and drain afterwards (do not chop them). Meanwhile, peel, wash and coarsely chop the soup vegetables. Place all the soup vegetables, mushrooms, smoked bones or bacon, bay leaves, all-spice and horseradish paste in a stock pot. Add 2 litres of cold water and season with salt and pepper to taste. Bring to a boil on high heat and then cook un-covered for about 90 minutes on low-to-medium heat. Reserve the mushrooms before straining

the broth and chop afterwards. Strain the broth, pressing the veggies to release optimum fla-vour, and return the broth to the pot on low heat.

Assembling the żurek:

While the broth is cooking, peel and dice the onions. Peel and finely chop the garlic cloves. Roughly dice the bacon and slice the sausages. Hard boil 8 eggs (about 8 minutes), peel and cut into halves. Set everything aside. In a separate pan, stir fry bacon and sausage in lard with

marjoram, parsley and onions until light brown. Add to the broth along with the chopped mushrooms and simmer on low heat for 10 minutes. Stir in the zakwas, add minced garlic and boil for another 10 minutes. Serve with boiled eggs, sausage and a slice of sourdough rye bread. Smacznego!

Note: You may use store-bought zakwas, if you can’t make it from scratch; however, I must say it would not be as close in flavour as a home-made one. Bread bowls are available at the bakery.

12

Winnica wine bar was opened earlier this year by a father and son team (Mariusz and Michał Wolkiewicz) who have also been wine wholesalers since 2011. For them, the main purpose of the wine bar is to give people the chance to drink really good wine at rea-sonable prices.

In Wrocław, the wine bar phe-nomenon is still rare. Mariusz and Michał decided on Winnica’s location because of its charm. While being located in the centre of the city in a styl-ish sixteenth century building, Winnica cuts off the city's noises and is a place where you can stop for a while with a glass of good wine, alone with your thoughts.

The Wine:

At Winnica you will find mainly French wine, almost all from the main regions of Bordeaux, Cotes du Rhone, Languedoc and Al-sace. You can find also care-fully selected wine from Italy, Spain together with New World wine from New Zealand, Chile and South Africa. Winnica works directly with the wineries, often small family vineyards that enjoy a high reputation in the World. And with the wine you can also enjoy cheese, meat or

olive platters, Italian breadsticks, grilled peppers or fresh baguette, served with sun-dried tomato spread or salmon. Winnica’s clients also have the option of enjoying coffee, tea, beer, cold drinks and French croissants throughout the day.

When to Drink Wine:

Wine is good for every season but for the Christmas season Winnica recommends wines from Languedoc, France which has an excellent quality-price ratio. For New Year’s Eve, Winnica recommends wine from Alsace: Riesling, Pinot Gris or Gewurztraminer.

More about Winnica:

Winnica is also a wine shop so very often you can taste the wine before you buy it and get honest information about the wines on sale. The interior and garden are particularly attractive and, dur-ing the summer season, attract clients to sit down and drink something special. Winnica cli-ents are people who love good wine and include a good mix of age groups including young peo-ple who begin their wine adven-ture at Winnica.

Happenings at Winnica:

The area of Winnica is small inside, so really cosy and com-fortable for romantic dates, small groups of friends, discus-sion groups and private parties.

In summer, Winnica plans to take advantage of the garden and organise small acoustic concerts or exhibitions of photos, graph-ics, etc., by young artists.

The future at Winnica:

Winnca plans to extend their wine list, to continue to attract wine lovers and maintain their mission which is to give people good wine at a good price.

Welcome Winnica, we like your mission!

Contact: Winnica (Plac Solny 14) Tel: 696-583-227/501-740-225 [email protected] www.winnicanasolnym.pl Mon. to Wed. (16.00 to 23.00) Thu. to Sat. (13.00 to 23.00) Sun. (closed) Free wi-fi


Food & Drink 13

In a mixing bowl, sift together the flour, soda and the spices, and mix with all other ingredi-ents except the sugar.

Place the sugar in a dry pan over medium-to-low heat and wait until it starts melting. Do not stir. It will gradually caramelise. When it is fully caramelised, turn off the heat and wait for a few minutes. Then add 0,5 cup of hot water. When it has cooled down sufficiently, add it to the spiced flour mixture and gently mix to make a soft and pliable dough.

Traditionally, the cookie dough is made 2 to 3 weeks in advance of baking and should be stored in the fridge. If you do not have time to prepare ahead, it is still possible to bake shortly after making the dough, although ob-viously the former is preferable.

Preheat the oven to 175 degree Celsius.

Meanwhile, roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface to 3-4 mm thickness.

Cut the dough with your own choice of cookie cutters or use a sharp knife to cut your own shapes.

Bake them on a buttered sheet for 4 to 5 minutes or until lightly browned. When you remove the cookies from the oven, they will be really soft but will harden quickly as they cool.

Decorating the cookies is the most fun part of the baking ex-perience. Invite your friends over, make some seasonal drinks, play your favourite Christmas tunes.

You can make traditional icing with icing sugar and water, add-ing edible dyes to produce your own colour palette. Or you may buy edible decorations in most supermarkets and you may also use additional decorations such as nuts, dry fruit, icing and col-oured sugar.

The icing is basically powdered sugar with heavy cream or milk. To make colours you add natural things like coco for brown, egg yolk for yellow, beetroot juice for pink and red, spinach juice for dark green, green peas for light green and so on.

The great thing about Christmas Cookies is that they last for months in an airtight container, so all this work really pays off. I hope you enjoy making these cookies as much as I and my friends have. Happy Christmas!

1,5 kg all-purpose flour

1,5 teaspoon soda

ground spices (nutmeg, cloves, pepper, cardamom, cinnamon, ginger) to taste

0,5 kg honey

110 g unsalted melted butter

4 eggs

200 g sugar (to caramelise)

Paulina Michalska is the creator and proprietor of No To Jemy (Let’s Eat) dinner club. She is a food consultant, cook, instructor and party caterer.

NO TO JEMY (LET'S EAT) has emerged owing to a continuous need to experience through cooking, the culinary aspect of life. After eight years of running a family restaurant "TOGA" in Poznań, Paulina moved to Wrocław and created the first dinner club in Wrocław which is a great way of meeting new people and tasting different, experimental and delicious dishes from all over the world in good company and a unique atmosphere. She also caters for home parties, even romantic dinner for two together, busi-ness meetings, wedding receptions, etc., and organises cooking classes.

Paulina uses natural and regional products (she is a member of SLOW FOOD WLKP and WLKP Culi-nary Heritage) as well as those brought from far away. Most of her recipes were collected during her travels around the world or were revealed by her friends or even newly created in her own kitchen. She believes that you can never have enough culinary experimentation.


14 Active Life

Fishing in Wroc aw Arkadiusz Kubale

Wrocław is not just another big city with a market square, pubs and shopping malls. This is the city situated on the Oder River (Polish ‘Odra’) and its smaller tributaries with about one hundred bridges. In spite of proximity to the city, there are some nice, green and calm river stretches in Wrocław. And this is a great chance to go fishing and have a break from the city… within the city!

For those who value active lei-sure on a river bank and are not afraid of riverside mud, Wro-cław is a great place to begin an adventure with angling. Despite considerable regulation of the Oder, in the urban stretches, there are still many fish species living in the river, for example, wels catfish, which is the biggest fish species in Europe. There are even about 100-kilogram catfish specimen in the Oder! Of course, there is rather little chance that you will catch such a big one during a fishing trip of several hours, but catching smaller fish is pretty much pos-sible. Apart from that you can expect such coarse fishing spe-cies like chub, ide, asp, pike, zander and perch. Even though these species are smaller than catfish, you can still have great fun fishing for them. The only thing remaining is to get the angling licence and go fishing!

Getting Started

If you want to fish in Poland, you will need a special fishing licence; it is quite easy to get one. You can buy it in the office of the Polish Angling Associa-tion (Polski Związek Wędkarski) at Kazimierza Wielkiego 65 in Wrocław. A one-day licence costs 40 zlotys and a licence for

the whole season costs 500 zlotys. The prices are lower, by about half, if you decide to be a member of the Association. However, a membership re-quires a permanent residence registration in Poland and to pass an exam in fishing rules and regulations.

Fishing Techniques

Once you have the licence, you can focus on fishing and choose a proper technique. This deci-sion is pretty important, as it is directly linked with the species you will catch and the nature of the trip in itself. In principle, fishing techniques can be di-vided into two main categories - natural baits and artificial baits or lures.

When fishing with natural baits (like worms, insects, various grains), you can catch some of the coarse species, especially roach, bream, ide, rudd. The fish that you may catch this way will usually weigh up to one kilogram but strikes will be quite regular. This kind of angling usually takes place in one spot, so it is a good choice if you would like to combine it with a family trip or have a picnic with friends.

If you want to spend time fish-ing in a more active way, then try to fish with artificial baits or lures. There are two main tech-niques: spin-fishing and fly-fishing. Using these two, you can fish for pike, zander, asp, chub and the biggest of all Euro-pean fish, wels catfish. Addi-tionally, you may have a nice walk along the riverside fishing in such a way.

Where to fish?

The Oder River has a lot of branches and canals in Wrocław. Fishing is allowed in most of these stretches but you should

always check regulations at the particular spot first. Even in the very centre of the city there is a large population of fish but these fisheries are not so pretty. Those who want to have a more scenic view should go on the outskirts of the town or even further. The recommended fish-ery in Wrocław is a flood canal (Kanał Powodziowy) with a par-allel navigation canal (Kanał Żeglugowy). It is also worth seeing the minor rivers near the

city (the Widawa, the Bystrzyca, the Oława and the Ślęza). Wro-cław is also a great base from which to go for a further fishing trip to the south of Poland. You can fish there for trout and gray-lings. Exhileration guaranteed!

A little help?

Angling is a very interesting activity but it also requires at least some fishing tackle and a basic knowledge of fish and water. If you simply don't want

to bother about licences and equipment and at the same time you want to be sure that your fishing trip will be successful, consider taking a fishing guide.

The guide will show you the basics of angling and take you to some good fisheries. Besides you may hire fishing gear and get the licence from him. This way, with only a bit of luck, you will catch a decent fish and learn something new about this hobby.

Igor Glinda, the Editor-in-Chief of Polish fly-fishing magazine and a fishing guide in Lower Silesia, enthusiastically displays his fresh brown trout catch. This decent fish will be released just after a quick photo session to gladden the eye of another angler.

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USEFUL LINKS AND NUMBERS

Polish Angling Association (PZW) - www.pzw.org.pl

Fishing regulations in Poland - www.pzw.org.pl/home/cms/90/the_fishing_regulations_in_poland

Tartak Fly Fishing Center (fishing guiding in Lower Silesia) - www.tartaknadbobrem.com/+48 607 103 249

Mirosław Pieślak (fishing guiding in Lesser Poland) - www.fishingguides.pl/+48 602 380 275

In previous editions, we wrote of the birth of PANATO, a new cooperative. We are pleased to report that the co-operative is now fully formed and has a new home at Plac Macieja in Nadodrze.

About PANATO

PANATO creative cooperative is a grassroots independent ini-tiative where the creative sector and business meet. Its activity is based on the local art market and ecological manufacture. The cultural and social aspects of its ventures are aimed at meeting the demands of the commercial market. The goal is to create a recognizable local brand associ-

ated with high quality of service and unique design.

Members of the Co-op are its greatest assets and guarantee of success. Teamwork is the foun-dation of the efficient manage-ment and development of the PANATO brand. PANATO brings together professionals experienced in the fields of in-dustrial design, interior and landscape design, and photogra-phy. Some members of the Co-op represent rare crafts, such as frame design, gilding, ceramics, glass and wood art. The Co-op's marketing, public relations and administration specialists ensure smooth and efficient operation.

Personality is as important as skills.

PANATO Products

PANATO products are an alter-native to the mass production of chain stores, with special em-phasis on eco-friendly and effi-cient solutions. The Co-op im-plements the latest trends while paying attention to the needs of

potential customers. The crea-tive services include industrial design, architecture, interior design and branding. The main patrons of PANATO are the Institution of Culture Wrocław 2016 and the British Council. The project is supported by part-ner cooperatives from Glasgow, P rag ue , Sa n Seb a s t i an , Södertälje, and Tallin.

PANATO Workshops

We recently attended a PANATO workshop entitled 'Pimp your Christmas'. Profes-

sional artists and craftspeople from PANATO instructed us and paying guests in the making of Christmas decorations and gifts from re-usables and recy-cled materials. We were shown how to iron plastic bags into colourful materials that can be used to make glasses cases, purses and bags. We learned how to make Christmas trees, key rings and other decorations. On our next visit, we hope to learn how to make jewellery. For more information, visit www.PANATO.org.

PANATO PIMPS CHRISTMAS P

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15 Active Life

New Saunas @ Wroc aw Aquapark

Now bask and cool down in the new Finnish saunas and baths in the Saunarium & Wellness Zone at Wrocław Aquapark.

We have two dry saunas (first one for 80 people and second one for 14 people), new steam bath for 15 people, and two cooling

zones… and all of this within an area of 140 sq m.

Relax with our new aromatic ceremonies in the bigger sauna.

The smaller sauna is designed for women and available the whole week.

We cordially invite you!!!

Wroc ul. Borowska 99 50-

Information (Monday to Sunday from 8.00 - 22.00 tel. (71) 77 11 511

e-mail: [email protected]

Opening Hours

Saunarium

Monday-Sunday/10.00-22.40

[email protected]

Wellness & SPA Monday-Sunday/10.00-21.40

Recreational Pools Monday-Sunday/9.00-22.40

Ad

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rt


Imagine a bevy of Hollywood veterans like Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Susan Sarandon and Hugh Grant and new tal-ent like Ben Whishaw, who is the new Q of Bond movies go-ing forward (if I'm not mis-taken) and intersperse them across six stories in different eras of Earth, what you have is an interesting potpourri.

The stories are rather discon-nected, keep coming and going back and forth, many times enough for a viewer to lose track of time, continuity, sense or logic, even though some charac-ters pervade across a few scenes.

There are stories from the 18th Century, 19th one, 20th one, 21st and even a story some years after the Apocalypse. I can't recall the last story's era, but the timestamp said something like "100s of Winters after the Fall".

The movie also tries to capture technology frontiers of the future where protagonists are genetic clones having codes, as their names. This time travel and technology bit is the real niche this movie aims to conquer. It does focus on humanity and the struggle to live life and survive, but alas, this theme offers noth-ing new.

Let me be honest, the author had a good wine meal with a col-league just before this piece-of-art movie and is of average IQ, so the views expressed here maybe alcohol induced, different from that of other well-read and wiser viewers and so feel free to watch the movie and form your own opinion. But the author puts his personal "Avoid" verdict on this.

Cinema 16

I decided to head to see Anna Karenina in Helios as it was one of the few English speak-ing films on there and I spent an enjoyable two hours in a fairly empty cinema.

The initial dread of watching "the jaw Knightly" soon passed as I got sucked into the story. The production has numerous theatrical like scene which is an added twist to the story. Having never read or suffered the 864 pages of the book, (classics aren't my forte), I found the plot very engaging, the costumes

amazing and again the theatrical like effects unique. A scene with horses reminded me of Equis, the play I saw where Harry Potter’s Daniel Radcliffe lets it all hang out on stage; no nakedness here.

Do I think you should go? Of course, an excellent way to stay out of the cold and out of the pub. What surprised me the most was how Jude Law looked so ugly through it all and how Kiera is so stunning. For more in-depth reviews, please check online or trust me and just head on over. Finally, I still think people aren't pronouncing the name correctly.

Director: Joe Wright Poster: Official website

Cast: Keira Knightley, Jude Law, Aaron Taylor-Johnson

From the writer of Training Day, END OF WATCH is a riveting action thriller that puts audiences at the center of the chase like never before. Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Peña star as young LA police officers who discover a secret that makes them the target of the country's most dangerous drug cartel.

Patrolmen Brian (Jake Gyllen-haal) and Mike (Michael Pena) are partners and best friends working in the toughest district of South Central Los Angeles. Between the exciting car chases, house fires and shoot outs, we get a glimpse of the private lives of Brian and his new girlfriend Janet (Anna Kendrick) and Mike and his loving wife Gabby (Natalie Martinez), as well as the unbreakable bond between these two men who would do anything for each other.

The natural rapport between Gyllenhaal and Pena is a rare sight in the modern cop movie, as they have real natural chemis-try and don’t just feel like two actors who have been forced to work together.

End of Watch may be uneven in parts, but it is also one of the most realistic portrayals of po-lice work since 90s TV show cops.

Director: David Ayer

Actors: Anna Kendrick, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michael Pena, Nata-lie Martinez

Polish Title: Bogowie ulicy


17

TEDxWroclaw has been up an running for almost a year now and we at The Wrocław Inter-national have been actively supporting the events organ-ised by the TEDxWroclaw guys and girls. We have been so pleased to see many new activities and events being or-ganised lately through the me-dium of English and TEDx-Wroclaw paved the way.

We spoke to the face of TEDx-Wroclaw, Michał Kasprzyk to get the inside track on how the group started, what they have been up to and what their plans are for 2013.

TWI: Michał, please tell us a little bit about how it all began.

Michał: I got to know TED in February 2011 and after only a few months I found out about TEDx events as well. Without further ado I decided to apply for a license to organize the very first TEDx in Wrocław and after three weeks I was a proud cura-tor of TEDxWroclaw.

Since I was a member of the Board of European Students of Technology at the time, I de-cided to organise TEDx with its local group from Wrocław. The preparations started in December and we managed to hold the conference on the 2nd of March 2012 with 9 speakers and 100 attendees. It was very well re-ceived by the participants.

The first TEDxWroclaw was organised by a student NGO called BEST Wroclaw and the preparat ions went really smoothly. I decided to split

TEDx and BEST because there is so much to do regarding TEDx initiatives that the student NGO would have to allocate half of its members for that. So now there is a bunch of independent volunteers that prepares the event. We are a small group which still seeks new members.

TWI: What are the activities at TEDxWroclaw?

Michał: Our main goal is to organize TEDxWroclaw, a con-ference devoted to ideas worth spreading. Through amazing ideas and emotional stories told by the speakers we want to in-spire people to action. That is why we also strive to build a TEDx Community - a commu-nity of changemakers in Wro-cław. If anyone wants to join, p l e a s e e ma i l u s a t : [email protected].

Another of our initiatives is TEDxWroclawSalon. It was created for the aforementioned community. During the Salons we watch previously prepared TED Talks together and the main point on the agenda is an interview with an invited guest after which the attendees can ask questions. Among the guests so far we had Jim Williams (American mime), Łukasz Stecko (traveller) and Martin Hofman Laursen (sportsman and entrepreneur).

TWI: When is the next event and how do you register?

Michał: The meetings are held irregularly. We strive to organ-ize a TEDxWroclawSalon every month, but since we decided to

make it bigger - the next one will be in January (the last one took place in November). The venue for the community meet-ings was Literatka so far, but since we changed the format, we will most probably also change the place. The participants are people who want to meet other changemakers and inspiring guests.

The next planned event is TEDxWroclawSalon in January. The details are yet to be re-vealed. Just follow our Facebook account (www.facebook.com/TEDxWroclaw) and you will know everything in due course. Salons are open to the public

and only require registration which will be available on our website.

(www.TEDxWroclaw.pl).

As for the main event - TEDx-Wroclaw, we already have sev-eral speakers, not only from Po-land, but we will still keep the secret regarding who they are. The attendance requires invita-

tion given by the organisers on a registration form which will be available before the conference.

TWI: Thank you for sharing this information with us Michał and we look forward to attending more of your events in 2013.

Wroclaw event held in March 2012.

TEDxWroclawSalon held at Literatka Cafe

Toastmasters International (TI) is a non-profit educational organisation that operates clubs worldwide for the pur-pose of helping members im-prove their communication, public speaking and leadership skills. Through its thousands of member clubs, Toastmas-ters International offers a pro-gramme of communication and leadership projects de-signed to help people learn the arts of speaking, listening, and thinking.

The Wroclaw club has decided to start an English-language club called Wroclove Speakers.

The reasons behind this decision include the wish by members to learn, not only to speak publicly but, to speak English along the way and to meet and host people from around the world that do not know Polish. For me, it was because I missed Warsaw and the English-speaking club was an occasion for me to recreate the international atmosphere of meetings I attended there.

At the Meeting:

Every Toastmasters meeting consists of four basic parts: 1. Introduction during which the organisers explain what exactly happens at the meeting and every participant will have a chance to present themselves. 2. Prepared speeches ses-sion: two, three, or four speak-ers will make speeches carrying

out projects from the Competent Communicator manual. In this way participants learn to prepare speeches, improve vocabulary, body language, voice and many other elements of a good speech. 3. Impromptu speeches session: Table Topic Master asks an in-teresting question and indicates a person to answer it; this way participants learn to improvise, think off the cuff and quick ut-t e r a n c e c o n s t r u c t i o n . 4. Evaluations session: the speakers get complete feedback from their own personal evalua-tor letting them know how well they accomplished their project goals. They also receive feed-back from a grammarian, a body language evaluator, an ah-counter and a timer.

What is coming next?

At the next meeting club board members will be elected. We still want to promote the meeting intensively, especially among foreigners living and travelling through Wrocław. We also plan to participate in a Toastmas-ters Distinguished Club Pro-gramme that promotes activities to ensure the highest possible quality of club meetings.

Getting involved:

Although guests have a chance to speak briefly and are asked to provide written feedback to speakers during the meeting, full participation is reserved for club members. A member is allowed to take a role during each meet-ing: they can speak, evaluate a speech, or take another role (such as the Toastmaster who is the host for the evening). Each member receives two printed manuals that represent two paths that a Toastmaster can take to develop themselves: the commu-nication path and the leadership

path. Each manual contains ten projects that are completed by taking roles during meetings. Each member of the club can also participate in club board elections: both as a voter and as a candidate. These are the basics but there are countless opportu-nities that were not mentioned such as: advance manuals, work-shops, contests.

For fur ther information: www.wroclovespeakers.pl


RAP Szalet is a phenomenon born in Wrocław and created by two local lads, Wojtek Furmaniak and Mateusz Kor-nacki. Their RAP Szalet par-ties have recently won an award for best party in Po-land. We spoke to the duo and would like to share their story with you and let you know that more parties are coming in Wroclaw in 2013.

Wojtek is a club DJ, events pro-moter and an experienced ani-mal on the Wrocław club scene under the alias of DJ Teskko. Connected with many legendary clubs, he brings alternative and underground club music rhythms onto the Wrocław dance floor in clubs like Kamfora (closed) and Puzzle (where he happens to be a booking manager at the mo-ment). “Imported Goods” and “RAP Szalet” are two party la-bels organised by him now.

Mateusz, also known as a party animal, is not a DJ but has al-ways been fascinated by music and its development. He grew up listening to rap music (like thou-sands of other people from the Polish 80s generation that wit-nessed the birth of Polish hip hop in the mid 90s and got ac-cess to rap music on cable tele-vision and the earliest CDs). An awesome city insider and de-voted Wrocławian, Mateusz runs a Wrocław-based tour and events company for a living. Mateusz and Wojtek are the duo that created RAP Szalet in May 2011.

TWI: What is Rap Szalet?

W&M: Rap Szalet is a daytime event organised in "Kafe Szalet"

in the summertime, usually once a month on Sunday. It's a huge gathering of DJs, party promot-ers, hip hop journalists and plenty of activists who select and play their favourite rap tunes open air. That is the musical side of the event. There is also an-other interestinging dimension to the event, food; fresh and home-made hamburgers are fried on the barbecue exclusively for the purposes of the event. All this is done for friends, families and people who visit the event and sit there the whole day enjoying the sun, cold beer, music and food. The party is for free. It's the best way to spend your Sun-day in Wrocław, if you can't take holidays.

TWI: What is the inspiration

behind Rap Szalet?

W&M: Mateusz saw a similar event in the US – a daytime party, huge barbecue, people dancing in the sun – which in-spired us, along with our love of rap music, to create this one-of-a-kind event in Wrocław. We wanted to bring together all our creative friends and create some-thing special and this is how RAP Szalet was born. Also, as many guys of our age don’t have too much time for holidays and somehow we are chained to Wrocław, it is always a great idea to make your holidays in the city as exciting as possible. And we don't want to have fun in clubs and closed spaces when it's +30C outside.

TWI: Who are the Szalet-Goers?

W&M: It's a great gathering place for friends. We are not teenagers any longer and we all have our daily routine and re-sponsibilities. RAP Szalet is a great place to get all our friends and spend some time together. Of course, it doesn't mean it is a friends-only event. There's a huge bunch of people coming who love rap music and want to listen to it while relaxing on the grass in the middle of the city. A lot of people bring their kids and dogs. There is badminton being played, Frisbees flying all over people's heads; it's beautiful.

TWI: What is the award that you have won?

W&M: Rap Szalet was nomi-nated for the "Nocne Marki" award which is given by Aktiv-ist, urban monthly magazine. We won in the SMS competi-tion, gathering the most votes from our supporters and became the first Wrocław event to win.

TWI: When is the Next RAP Szalet?

W&M: The next Rap Szalet event is a club edition. It's called “Rap Szalet All Stars” and will take place on Dec 28th in Puzzle Club. We would like to thank everyone for supporting us all year round with this party. The first regular open air edition will probably be in May 2013. It all depends on the weather. No sun, no Rap Szalet.

18


The beginning of the Great Jubilee of Centennial Hall.

Matisyahu starts a series of music events associated with the celebration

of the hundredth anniversary of Centennial Hall (Hala Stulecia) in Wro-

will witness the first Matisyahu concert in

open Matisyahu's European tour promoting his newest album "Spark

Seeker".

Manifestation of deep spirituality.

The incredible music of Matisyahu is his own combination of reggae, hip-

hop and alternative rock. Vocally, the artist draws from the jazz traditions

(scat singing) and the style of Jewish cantors. Still, his most important

inspiration remains Judaism. His work manifests deep spirituality, and

the songs reflect on the relationship between God and man immersed in

the material world. This risky fusion has been widely acclaimed. Mati-

syahu's album "Youth" went Gold and got nomination for a Grammy

Award, and the artist was hailed as the most intriguing reggae musician

in the world.

"No more Hassidic reggae superstar."

Matisyahu has stirred up intense emotions also with his hitherto image.

He used to appear on the stage as an Orthodox Jew wearing a black suit,

a hat and sidelocks, and start to rap with incredible energy, mixing harsh

hip-hop and sensual dancehall. With the latest album, "Spark seeker",

Matisyahu has changed his appearance. He cut his hair, shaved his beard

and moustache, and at the end of 2011 he posted his photo announc-

ing: "No more Hassidic reggae superstar."

CONCERT TICKETS ON SALE NOW!

DATE/TIME/LOCATION:

CONTACT:

Tickets: phone 71/347 51 51

75 PLN - SECTORS D1 and B1

80 PLN - SECTOR A1

85 PLN - MAIN DECK

TICKETS AVAILABLE:

DISCOVERY CENTER IN CENTENNIAL HALL

e-BILET, TicketPRO, Biletin

InterNations, a leading net-work of expatriates with expat communities in over 300 cities worldwide, recently held their first expatriate meet-up in Wrocław.

InterNations was founded to make it easier for expatriates to fit into their new surroundings by meeting other like-minded indi-viduals and by exchanging infor-mation with them. It has become a platform for international ex-change by offering online com-munication tools to reach out to other expats, to benefit from in-formation on local and global forums, and country guides. The community truly comes to life when it is active both online and offline, and when the real meet-ings of InterNations members take place.

Wrocław InterNations’ commu-nity has started this year. It has currently more than 200 mem-bers and this number is con-stantly growing. It went offline on 21st November and held a first live event. The get-together was a success with 37 people from 19 countries having at-tended it. The InterNations members met in one of trendy Wrocław bars and enjoyed net-working and mingling with fel-low expats and global minds.

The official events of InterNa-tions will take place on a monthly basis, while the mem-bers can create groups of their interest and organize additional activities in those groups.

Every expat is welcome to join the network by registering free of charge on the InterNations web-site (www.internations.org). Let’s get to know each other and socialize!

Alexandra Naslin, Ambassador Wrocław InterNations

19 Events

InterNations, Connecting Global Minds

(Photos on right are from Wrocmeet-up held on 21st Novem-ber 2012 in Papa Bar that brought together 37 mem-bers from 19 countries.)

Photos by Indrajeet Photography

MATISYAHU ONLY CONCERT IN POLAND TO CELEBRATE

100TH ANNIVERSARY OF HALA STULECIA 28 February 2013 @ 1900

Photo: Hala Stulecia official facebook page

JAZZ AT IMPART - SLAWEK DUDAR QUARTET

Slawek Dudar - saxophone - piano - double bass, bass guitar - drums

Jazz lovers are all welcome on Monday, 7th of January at 19:30 at the Café at Impart Centre for the Arts called "Autograf". This is the first jam session in the new year, led by Slawek Dudar and his Quar-tet. Enjoy the music in good company, and a relaxed atmosphere on a Monday night.

TICKETS: ADMISSION FREE

www.impart.art.pl

It may come as a surprise to some that Poland is actually the 4th largest producer of fur in the World, larger than the US even. Maybe one will have to wait for the devilishly cold winter months of January and February to truly witness the bundled up individuals riding the city trams with their fox tailed scarves and rabbit eared hats. I didn’t quite lose my mouthful of water when I read the statistics but it did make me slightly twitch in my seat with unease. I am not judging fur connoisseurs but sadly there is a harsh reality that comes with the fur trade and that is how the animals are kept pre-skinning.

An intervention occurred on a fox farm in April 2012, an anonymous informer had con-tacted the animal protection so-ciety of Lower Silesia ‘Ekostraż’ to help the foxes that lived in diabolic conditions. In metal containers such as unused, old ovens in the heat of Polish sum-mer without drinking water and left to breed in these conditions so as to produce more fur. The wonderful unpaid volunteers decided to take on legal action against the owner of the farm.

It is reassuring to most that these kind of societies exist; we can relax in the knowledge that oth-ers are cleaning up the dirt of the inhumane and irresponsible, however, everything has a price tag and Ekostraż, which is non-profit and one of its kind in the whole of Poland, needs money if

it shall continue to fight the good fight.

The reason they are one of a kind is that they not only protect those that we call ‘pets’ such as cats and dogs but also they work on protecting wild animals too; hedgehogs, squirrels, birds and such that happen to fall upon hard times. If they are able to be saved, Ekostraż will pick them up in one of the few cars they have and nurse them back to health in a foster home. It is im-portant to remember that zoos, other shelters and vets here in

Wroclaw have little to no experi-ence dealing with wild animals and so all work burdens the 20 or so Ekostraż members who see domestic pets and wild animals as equal when in need of help.

Unfortunately, unless you seek out the Facebook page of Ekostraż or dine at Vega in the Rynek, where many of their meetings and workshops have taken place, then it is unlikely you, as a native English speaker, would have heard of them. How-ever, it is good to know that most of their members speak

English and although they do not have a shelter, per-se, to work at, you can always provide a help-ing hand by donating, providing transport or even opening your home to animals that need a fos-ter parent until they get perma-nently homed. All vets bills, food and equipment is provided and paid for; all you have to do is have a furry yet very endear-ing house mate to stay for a while. They all come with a guarantee not to block your toi-let, pile up the dirty dishes, and they will attend to you in what-ever mood or state you find

yourself in as long as you scratch behind their ears.

Also if you own a company here in Wroclaw and would like to sponsor a worth-while cause, a cause that is desperately seeking funds to purchase an incubator to help animals with respiratory issues as well as other vital equipment to keep them afloat, please contact them by email [email protected], facebook ht tp : / /www. facebook.com/EKOSTRAZ?fref=ts, or phone +48 605 782 214.

20

Ekostraż: A One of a Kind Superhero in Poland

Ruth Deborah Watson

A young man named Indrajeet Prasad has been sharing his photos with The Wroclaw In-ternational (Facebook edition). We would like to tell you more about him.

Indrajeet or Prasad as he likes to be known is not a professional photographer,. He is studying for a Master's degree in Electri-cal Engineering in Politechnika Wroclawska.

He has no background in pho-tography. ‘I started photography some months ago. It's just me

and my soul that motivates and inspires me to click pictures to catch the running moments and give them a look whenever I want and share it with people.’

When I see the colors, the wow moments, feelings and emotions whilst walking on the street, t h e s c e n e s , t h e s e l -dom affections of human crea-tions and lots more things that are around us, I capture it. I find life in live moments. I am always happy when I have m y c a m e r a i n h a n d . Photography is my hobby... Dancing is my passion...To be a successful researcher is my dream. I live my life king size. and I live every second of it.’

Thank you Prasad for sharing your moments with TWI.

the wroclaw international dec2012-jan2013

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