Travel To Katowice

Central Stations are probably the same the world over. Everything in its' native language and generally kind of seedy. I can now understand why Glasgow Central has actually won an award!

From Informacja to Kasa Biletowa, I negotiate a ticket (1st class - I received raised eyebrows). Then I had to listen to an old man who wanted to chat at me, in Polish, although we established that I was not Deutsch but English. He continued about 'taxi' and I'm sure I heard Diana. Perhaps there was a purpose in his chat, I'll never know. I must just look like I needed talking to.

Whilst waiting over coffee, a well groomed, slim lady in white from neck to ankle, manoeuvred her large bag next to mine in the space between our tables. She then proceeded to eat 3 large fritters of some sort, with sauce and cake with cream. It was only 11am! There must be some instruction somewhere on how to wear white and eat at the same time. If that was me, I'd have been wearing the sauce down my front for the rest of the day. Doomed to travel hours with sauce stains across my chest.

Someone asked clueless me whether they were on the right Platform for Katowice. I pointed to the large sign. She clearly wasn't convinced and asked for my Bilet to check it against hers.

The trains still have compartments for 6, so I picked one with a young Art Garfunkel look-a-like, he was wearing a T-shirt with an English quotation from Mark Twain. All T-shirts here apparently only speak English, I'd just read one on the chest of a young girl saying 'Grumpy but Gorgeous'. I suspected that she wasn't the former and wasn't really the latter either. T-shirts are not always honest.

Polish countryside seemed relatively flat and very green. Green, green and green. With some really ugly stations that had clearly been left over from the Soviet era or before. I had Rufus Wainwright, Nick Cave and others to sing me Leonard Cohen songs with Leonard chatting in between. This intercity train turned out to be the slow version taking 4 hours so, held captive, I had to read and listen all the way whilst the countryside trundled by. Health and Safety still hasn't reached here, the windows were open a foot and the breeze was lovely. But the gap between the train and the platform is enough to lose a whole me down, and I dreaded the end of the journey when I'd have to do it again with my bags in tow.

Katowice isn't any prettier than I remembered it. Just hotter. Most of the shops were shut at half 4 and there's a really strange mix of very posh shops, one only had canteens of cutlery in the window (who buys them?) and then really cheap looking shops. A shiny black Bentley with an open top passed me with an ugly bloke and a pretty lady (same the world over) and at the other end of the spectrum an elderly couple fishing in the rubbish bins for tins and whatever they required.

There's nothing really for me to do here except have some dinner later, then start reading the next book and listen to music or watch a film. Wonderful. No dishes, no housework, no work. Shame the view and the surroundings weren't better.

Tomorrow to Cieszyn...by bus.