Five Things about Płock, Poland

As I finish up my assignment in Płock, Poland, I need to reflect on a few things that are a little different here. Its been my longest assignment so far, 3.5 months, but a very nice one. It was a different summer, but one I will definitely never forget.


Here are a few things that are different about Płock:

#1: Pizza and its Sauce: Here in Plock the main restaurants in town are Pizza, Kebabs, and traditional Polish food. Wherever you go around the world, Pizza is just not the same as it is at home. Here the individual sized pizzas are large - 32 cm..so more than enough for one person. With every pizza they ask you if you want garlic or tomato sauce. This sauce is not the sauce on your main pizza. They bring you an extra gravy boat of sauce. So yes, sometimes we have a pizza that is way too big for one person and two extra grazy boats of sauce...healthy right? Delicious nonetheless!


#2: TV and Dubbing Voice : I have told many people about my two English stations on TV here, Bloomberg and a goofy music video channel. The truth is that many of the other channels have English shows on, but the Polish people make it very difficult to watch. On every station, for every show, they have the SAME man, dub every voice, for every character. He is speaking for every character in Polish, and has no expression in his voice whatsoever. If you turn up the TV loud enough you can hear the English, but its just not worth it with the Polish man ruining every scene...watching Sex and the City just isn't the same...

#3. Picking Mushrooms: September started a new season here...Mushroom Season. I was speaking with one of my friends here, Anna, and she was very excited to have two days off. So I asked her, "Oh what will you do with your time off?" She then told me all about how she and her friends plan to spend the days picking mushrooms. After they were done, they will spend the whole next day boiling them and storing them for the next couple months. She also told me about how many people die each year during mushroom picking. They all know how to tell the difference between the poisonous ones and the good ones...but sometimes people make the mistake. This tradition isn't just my friend Anna - everyone in Poland does it -- and apparently almost all other Slavic nations. I will stick to buying my mushrooms at the store :)

Mushrooms...not sure if they are poisonous..

 #4: Trumpeter in the Town Square: Every day at noon and at 6pm a trumpeter comes out of the clock tower here in Plock and plays a little trumpeter call. I would say it is to announce meal times, but here in Plock they actually eat at 6am, 10am, 2pm, and 6 or 7pm. If you are lucky, the trumpeter will wave to you.

Town Square at Night -- Clock tower is where trumpeter trumpets

#5: Sundays in Płock: Sundays in Płock are definitely something to enjoy! Everyone from the surrounding towns come to the "city" to enjoy a festival, have a nice dinner, and sometimes just a nice stroll by the River Wisla. Every Sunday the town square comes alive. A man brings out his popcorn stand and sells balloons and popcorn. Another man, who I swear is a homeless man, brings out his pony for pony rides. When it was warmer out, kids would put on their swim suits and swim in the fountain. The town also has a small train on wheels that hosts tours all around the town, including the river. As featured in previous entries, every weekend we have been here there was a festival including a Reggae Festival, an "Air and Water Show", a Techno Festival, and even a beauty pageant...among sooo many more!

Weekend Popcorn Cart

Set-up for one of the crazy festivals

It has been a crazy summer and September!

Weekend in Dublin!

A few weeks ago, I found out that my good friend from college, Katie, was moving to Norway for work for a few years! Luckily, her timing was perfect for the trip I was planning to Dublin, Ireland. I arrived late Friday night and Katie arrived early Saturday morning - both ready to sight-see our butts off!

We started our touring about 30 minutes after Katie arrived! She found this awesome free walking tour (only pay tips to the guide at the end) that she attended London. It is available in London, Dublin, Berlin and many more! After going the wrong way three times, a nice Irish gentleman directed us the correct way to the old Dublin town hall where the group gathered. Our first stop was Dublin Castle -- which has a wide mix of architecture. This castle was once the headquarters of the British when Ireland was under British rule, King John -- the mean one from Robin Hood, and many more. For some reason all the details did not stick -- Katie and I were too busy catching up!

Dublin Castle - Probably my best picture from the trip :)

Katie and I in front of the whole castle -- the architect said "He liked the colors"

We then moved on to the Christ Church Cathedral -- where the real Tom and Jerry were found in the church organ. The tour guide also taught us about the vikings here where many Viking remains were found. Did you know that viking helmets did not really have horns on them? Many helmets were found throughout the world...but never any horns! Below is a picture of the church and the tour group laying down on viking beds in a real sized viking house on the pavement.

Viking Houses

Christ Church Cathedral

 At this point in the tour, we decided that we had gone way too long in Ireland without having a beer. On the tour's "coffee break" we had our first Ireland Guinness. It was that much better just being in Ireland.

Katie with our 1st beers!

We continued on the tour where we spent time in the Temple Bar area, and we instantly decided to return at night. The tour guide took us north over the river where we saw first the Liffey bridge and then the O'Connell bridge. Random fact - the O'Connell brides wider than it is long.

O'Connell Bridge and some Dublin skyline

The guide took us back near our hotel to Trinity College. After taking a peak at the college, we split off to have a traditional Irish meal and to move on to our Guinness Storehouse Tour! The Guinness Storehouse Tour is more like a museum compared to the other Brewery tours I have been on in the past. Being Chemical Engineers, and the fact that Katie used to work for Anheuser Busch, we also were sure to take pictures of the factory, some pipes, and some flanges outside the actual tour :)

The tour was awesome though! Complete with a small beer taste halfway through the tour, and then a full Guinness in the Gravity Bar at the end of the tour! The Gravity Bar is at the top of the pint glass shaped building (for real), where everyone is swooping in for seats near the window to get an excellent view of the city of Dublin.

Katie and I in front of one side of the Gravity Bar windows

Believe it or not we kept going, even after our many beers and ciders! Below are a few miscellaneous pictures from our adventure. Katie and I had a fabulous time and already plan to return to Dublin someday :)

Guinness Gate

St. Stephens Green

Before catching our flights on Sunday afternoon, Katie and I had one more thing to see! When we were starving for Irish food at Trinity College, we missed the Book of Kells. The Book of Kells "is an illuminated manuscript Gospel book in Latin, containing the four Gospels of the New Testament together with various prefatory texts and tables. It was created by Celtic monks ca. 800 or slightly earlier." - thank you wikipedia :) Each page is extremely ellaborate calligraphy illustrating the gospels. It really was quite amazing, but unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures inside the library. Instead below is a picture of the banner outside the Old Library at Trinty College.

Visitors from Chicago!

I apologize for not updating! I have no good excuse!

Last week friends from UOP came to visit us! They are Development Engineers but I like to call them Pre-Roadies. They are currently training for the road life that I am currently living. They made plans to come visit Liz (fellow UOP) here in Plock, long before they knew I would be here too! We wanted them to have the full Plock experience so first Liz took them to our favorite brewery - Browar Tumski. We then made them go to the cathedral and the Plock Zoo:

Kathy and Ellen :)

The zoo is actually fairly decent. I would say it is comparable to Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. It only cost us less than $2 to get into this zoo. Below is a picture of us making them eat at our favorite Italian restaurant. This lunch was also Liz's going away party before she left Plock the next day:

Crew at Arturos

After we wished Liz goodbye, we headed to WARSAW! I have been here for 3 months, but it was my first time actually seeing the sites in the capital city. We started our adventure by going to Old Town (Stare Miastro). Warsaw...especially Old Town was completely destroyed during WWII. The Old Town was then completely rebuilt based on a painting. It is absolutely beautiful again.

Warsaw Old Town

We visited the Royal Castle and walked up and down the streets. We then ventured to a Palace on the other side of town. It was a bright yellow Palace and less impressive inside. There were supposed to be beautiful gardens all around the grounds of the palace...but unfortunately everything was under construction. We entered the gardens to find big piles of dirt between the Bright Yellow Palace and a quaint little lake.

In front of the Yellow Palace

Overall we had a great time! It is always so nice to have visitors from home :) We wished Kathy and Ellen goodbye on Tuesday (I sent their 10 postcards out the next day). I ended up seeing them again on Friday at the Warsaw airport on my way to Dublin...that post is coming soon!

Weekend in Berlin

As mentioned in my last post, our crew totally lucked out this past weekend. Due to the "rain", the customer decided that they should do much overdue work without us, and gave us the weekend off. Myself and 5 other crew members decided to venture next door to Germany for a nice touristy weekend. Guten Tag!

Delicious German Sausage and Chips

When I say touristy---I mean REALLY touristy. When the woman car arrived at 7pm on Friday, we hit the streets right away with our cameras. We took lots of pictures and drank our first German beer of the trip. Berlin was only about 5 hr 45 minutes from Plock, unless you get stopped for a ticket...much like the other car. They left Plock at 4pm and did not arrive until about 11:30pm.

Fernsehturm (TV Tower) - Has a revolving restuarant and bar on top

River view on the way to Alexanderplatz

Saturday morning we decided to take the continuous bus tour where you can can hop on and off all day long. We did the full 2 hour circle around, taking horrible bus pictures, and then re-circled to hop on and off at spots where we had to return to see up close. Below are some pictures of the remaining parts of the Berlin wall.

Berlin wall with artwork that was painted on the 20th anniversary of the tearing down of the wall

More Wall

Here are some pictures of the Jewish Memorial that honor all the Jewish people that lost their lives. Each block is supposed to represent a grave stone. Under all these stones was a fantastic museum that told soo many sad stories.

Other sites that we saw were the Sony Center built in Potsdamer Platz after WWII, Checkpoint Charlie - the former passage way between East and West Germany, the Reichstag - the parliament building, and sooo much more. Here are a few more pictures for your viewing pleasure:

Sony Center at night

Checkpoint Charlie and fake guards

Inside the Parliament Building

Just for fun!

Overall it was a great trip! I cannot wait to get back to Germany someday to see traditional towns with beer halls, castles, and lederhosen!

A "Rainy" Week in Płock

Since last Saturday, the rain here has been non-stop. Whenever we thought we had a break in the weather to load adsorbent, it started to drizzle. The customer finally decided to use their time wisely to work on a different task. The new task, digging a ditch and installing pipe in front of the chambers, could not be done simultaneously with adsorbent loading. Fortunately, the ditch digging could be done in the rain and they did not need the UOP advisor's help!

Ironically, here is what the weather looked like two hours after I was given vacation for the day and the rest of the weekend:

As you can see, I took advantage of the beautiful afternoon and the sun! I found a new favorite park, adjacent to the castle and the cathedral. Here are a few pictures from my adventure.

Cathedral picture from the park

 Carving at one of the Cathedral entrances

View of the castle

 Some mushrooms in the park

This morning it began to rain again - so hopefully the customer is still happy with their decision! Our crew has decided to take advantage of our rare weekend off to travel to Berlin! This time I have fully charged my camera and will bring a plug converter! I hope to bring you many wonderful pictures from my point and shoot camera :). 

As a treat, here is a sunset picture I shot coming back to Tumski from dinner:

Bonus Pictures from Scotland

Myself, Justin, my sister Becca, and Uncle Milton took a week trip to golf/drink beer/sight see and have lots of fun! Here are some pictures I love from our Scotland trip in May:

One Year & Quick Trip to Poznan, Poland

It has been too long since I have last updated! I even cheated last update and had my husband -- Justin -- update for me!

Speaking of him -- today is actually our one year anniversary! I can't believe its been one year already! I love him more and more each day -- even when I am away. :) Here is a picture below just to celebrate the occasion:

This weekend I had the good shift change, from morning shift to evening shift. This means I have a full 48 hrs off before going back to work on Monday. To take advantage of the extra time, my coworker, Liz, and I went to a town about 2.5 hrs away - Poznan.

Poznan is Poland's 5th largest city, and an important center of trade and industry. They also have a famous billy goat legend, that now serves as their town symbol. To sum up the legend of the billy goats -- a famous town chef was cooking for prestigious members of the community, but was not paying attention and completely burnt the main dish. He found two billy goats, and planned to substitute them as the roast, but unfortunately, he was distracted again and the billy goats wandered towards the prestigious guests. Instead of being mad, the guests broke out in to laughter, and these goats are now a symbol of the town. Every day at noon, the goats pop out of the town center clock.

The town square in Poznan was a very busy center with many restaurants, museums, fountains, outdoor seating, and lots of music. We stopped by on Saturday night to see the area, and saw two small concerts and almost could not get a seat regardless of the numerous restaurants with outdoor seating. Below is a shrunken version of my panoramic picture of one side of the square.

Sunday morning we did a few of our own made-up walking tours. We had the chance to hear music from an accordion player, as well as a marching band. Poznan is also a place of many churches and cathedrals. The first cathedral in Poland was built in Poznan and is pictured below:

It was a quick 24 hr trip to a very neat city - according to Pope John Paul II and many Polish people, Poznan is the city where Poland started. Here are a few more pictures below from our trip. I will aim to update more often! :)

In the square near a traditional Polish food restaurant

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Fountain Character

 Memorial for riots against communism in 1956

One more cool panoramic picture of the Stary Rynek :)