A break in Blighty.

I took a weeks break back home in London and have now returned to Poland, hence my absence.

The first few days back in Poland I am always struck by the marked contrast between England and Poland. The differences? Where do I start! Hold a shop door open for someone in Poland and you will not get a thank you, they will not even look at you. It is bizarre and something I will never get used to. No-one will ever open or hold a door open for you. They is no friendly eye contact on the street, no smiles or gestures except to stare, and people walk right in front of you without the slightest regard that you have to stop short. Western Europeans (and Americans) are very aware of their physical personal boundaries and do not get too close to people in public, but in ex-eastern bloc countries they barge into and on top of each other, push, shove and generally lurge around without grace or regard for others. In Western Europe it is the norm to gently say "excuse me", and then to move forward once the person has kindly cleared the way. In Eastern Europe, it is normal to walk right up to that person and push them before only then giving a very demanding excuse me. Horrible.

On the road in Poland the behaviour is even worse. No-one will let you out or allow you any space, drivers are dangerous and aggressive. If a pedestrian gets in the way, drivers will swerve into them (within inches) and at high speed, horn blaring, just to let the pedestrian know that the driver has in some way been inconvenienced. For some reason, when Poles are in their cars every single second becomes vital. More often than not, they're just driving back to their block to watch mind numbing Polish television. Today I could only look on as a tiny old lady had to leap for her life onto the pavement as one idiot accelerated towards her on the high street as she tottered across the road. She nearly had a stroke on the pavement. How would he feel if that was his grandmother I thought. In British town centres, cars and people weave in between in other with courtesy and consideration. Here, where there are far less people and far less cars, there is no courtesy and no civility.

In my first two hours back here in Lodz I witnessed more swearing, impatience, rudeness and hostility than I had during a whole week in London.

The end of another long dark dirty winter.

The first week of snow back in October is pretty but after six months the novelty has long worn off... Polish winters last forever. There is no drainage on the roads, not even in the city centres. The new streets and highways being constructed with EU funds do have a few drainage holes but the skill or experience of building good roads does not exist here, so despite the new drainage grates, the moment it rains the thoroughfares become rivers and stay like that. Cars and buildings are caked in filth and the streets are awash with muck. Leaping over piles of snow and negotiating paths through thick brown slush becomes an art form. The sub-zero temperatures are also difficult to deal with.

Today we have no snow and a glimpse of sunshine... a sign that the long dark Polish winter might be coming to an end at last.

It's all in a name.

From time to time I teach English at a language school of which there are many in Lodz. Mostly the teachers are Polish (Poles teaching English??), but at my school only 'native speakers' are employed. Many of the schools try to attract the masses that are leaving by advertising short intensive courses designed for those going abroad to live, there is a lot of competition for the dwindling population.

Despite speaking fluent Polish I often have trouble remembering the names of students which are similar sounding. I once had a class made up of nine men... Czarek, Jarek, Darek, Marek, Mirek, Romek, Krziszek, Grzeszek and Jacek. It gets easier after a few vodkas. The girls are usually called Kasha, Basha, Asha, Ania, Ilona, Ivona, Jola, Ola, Eva, Aga, Monika or Magda. In order to conform to Polish grammar all female names must end in a and male names with a consonant.

Word of the week: Zahipnotyzowac meaning to hypnotise.

A session on the sunbed.

"You look so grey!" Luscious Lola barked at me over coffee, "you will to come with me to solarium, there you will to feel better."
Despite my misgivings she eventually convinced me that a session on the sunbed would do me the world of good so off we set to a local place she attends regularly called Jamaica Sun.

Once inside, a delicious little creature the colour of a tangerine appeared from an alcove like Mr Benn's shopkeeper and smiled. After recommending a sweet smelling bronzing cream, she cooed "I put you nice music to relax" and ushered me into a 'beam me up Scottie' type cubicle. I smothered myself in the cream, stepped in, and pressed the start button. Hoping to be welcomed by the soft soothing tones of Nat King Cole or even Dido, my hopes were dashed as a deafening and ghastly techno beat pounded my entire hearing system until I staggered out in a sweat six minutes later gasping for air.

A quiet Easter in the Ugly City.

I spent Easter with Big Eggs in Warsaw. I booked myself into a hotel as he has a two-roomed flat and a sofa-bed which I'm convinced is stuffed with old potatoes. Poland being very Catholic, Easter is taken seriously and life comes to a standstill as the population return to their families. With nothing much else to do we wandered the desolate streets of the Old Town, not so Old as it was rebuilt fifty years ago. Stalin's troops watched as Hitler destroyed 94% of the city, then the Communists redesigned the capital in concrete. It's been known as the Ugly City ever since.

It wasn't until the next morning looking out of the hotel window 15 floors up and surveying the empty streets that it dawned on me that I was probably the only guest in the whole building. Keen for breakfast I whizzed down in the lift (not so easy with these security cards which often take a few attempts before working) and slinked self-consciously across the foyer which was resplendent in marble. In the restaurant the scowl on the waitress's face read "if it wasn't for cunts like you I could be at home celebrating Easter with my family in Bydgoszcz." I feasted on bacon and eggs (with HP!) with the skeleton staff watching me and then strolled 15 minutes across town to spend another lazy day with Big Eggs watching DVD's and chilling out. He also tends to spend public holidays alone since his mother told him she wished he'd never been born after he opened up to her that he is gay. She also told him he should change his name. Later in the evening, miraculously, we found a bar open and stayed late with a bottle of wine and sipping hot and spicy taco soup.

On waking back at the hotel on Easter Monday I knew that Big Eggs would sleep the whole day as is his wont so I got the surly receptionist to check the times of the trains and headed off to the railway station with my tatty suitcase and a three day old copy of the Sun which I'd discovered rather oddly sticking out of a hotel bin.

The wide and souless communist avenues of the capital were eerily quiet as was the station, a cold war monolith doomed among the sparkling new office blocks and shopping centres sprouting up all around it. I sat on a mile long platform for what seemed like an eternity, looking out at other mile long platforms. A lone tramp shuffled out of the shadows and asked for a cigarette, I gave him a pound, boarded a brand new train and settled down, its sole occupant, to the delights of a discarded tabloid... I'd never buy one of course!

One reason that would certainly keep Polish women off the streets on Easter Monday is the tradition of men drenching women in water. I have no idea from whence this bizarre ritual came but it is prevalent all over the country... men in villages with full buckets standing on street corners waiting for a female to walk by.

Once back in Lodz, I relieved Lola and her family (who'd been throwing back vodka since daybreak) of Molly and Daisy who she'd been looking after, and we waded through the snow to a large local park. We came across a handsome hound with a fine black coat that joined in the running and vigorous stick fetching. A young and bouncy Great Dane with his tail cut off, a cruel practice and one which I've never understood. In too good condition to be homeless, I wasn't surprised when a burly man with a stick emerged from the trees shouting Rex! Rex! Half the dogs in Poland are called Rex, the other half Nero, regardless of sex. I complimented him on his lovely dog but he ignored me, and instead of throwing the stick he proceeded to beat the poor creature. He wasn't interested in my protests and the dog cowered and followed him back to a block that backed onto the park. Rex had obviously escaped for a moments fresh air. We didn't see another living thing. I thought about the other dogs in the city, thousands of them, sat under tables in tiny flats all day while their owners drowned themselves in vodka and gazed at mindnumbing television.

Word of the week: Przeczyszczac meaning to wipe clean.

Kuba, Kristina & Krakow.

I spent a couple of days in Krakow which is my favourite city in Poland. I have a friend Kuba who has two of the nicest bars - including the first (established 10 years ago) in the Jewish Quarter which is the most bohemian part of Krakow and has not yet opened up to swarms of tourists and hordes of stag parties charging from one bar to the next.

I arrived late and Kuba swiftly furnished me with a drink in his dungeon like candlelit tavern. He had a 'meeting' with his solicitor and soon disappeared, but not before confidiing to me that it was to see his third ex-wife with whom he recently has had a child. His girlfriend Kristina with whom he has lived for the last four years didn't believe him... "Solicitor? At this time of the night?!" Watching him slink out the door she asked me if I knew anything but I couldn't betray his trust, although he betrays hers all the time.

Kristina is a pretty girl half Kuba's age. She told me while guzzling red wine that she has found prostitutes numbers in his mobile, brothel business cards in his wallet and keeps a count on the condoms in the bedroom as they regularly disappear. It's true, when I first met him he told me that he didn't know how to be faithful to one woman. He's been married three times with a kid for each, the last child with his third ex-wife just a year ago whilst living with Kristina. Yet Kristina is still with him, checking his mobile and grilling his friends.

Kristina told me how she'd had enough, how she wanted to move to another city, start again, that Kuba didn't love her. I've heard this drunken speech before but the next morning she's back on him again as if everything is hunkydory. After some time and a lot of alcohol an older man and his female student joined us. Having armed themselves with large lagers, they promptly got out a pile of text books and commenced a Persian language lesson. This is at 2am in a loud and very dark bar. Apparently this wise old Pole speaks twelve languages and lived in - amongst other places - Afghanistan for eight years. Kristina whispered to me that he is around 68 and she is 20... I nearly fell off my chair when she confirmed that they are a couple.

Krakow is a medieval city and feels like it, with narrow alleyways and curious nooks and crannies. It is far more European and cosmopolitan than other cities, including Warsaw. Krakow is a city for dreamers, full of crumbling grandeur, students and artists. It is the cultural and intellectual capital of Poland, and unlike elsewhere in Poland, the people are happy not to earn money but just to be in Krakow. The suburbs are blighted by ugly communist blocks like every Polish city, but the Old Town and Kazimierz remains untouched.

Kuba reappeared but didn't stay long as he was tired... not surprisingly. He got out his fags and offered the pack to me across the table... Kristina piped up "Is that all you have? You had a full pack when you left. You smoked them all??" He'd been caught off guard but recovered quickly and launched into a brisk monologue wherein he explained how he had unintentionally swapped the full packet for the near empty packet in the car. I was impressed by the detail, he couldn't possibly have known she would ask him that. He had another speech polished and ready in reply to her inevitable "What was the meeting with the solicitor about?" This is a scene they have been playing for four years. Kristina later whimpered "You see how he lies to me?"

I often think of moving to Krakow although it's much more expensive than Lodz, but what a difference! Cool and laid back, great bars and interesting people. Lots of foreigners around to liven things up and not far from the scenic mountains on the southern border with Slovakia, the rest of Poland being as flat as a pancake.

We left the Persian lesson in full swing and stepped out into the cold. I kissed Kristina goodbye on the corner and watched as she ran back home.

Molly and Daisy.

I found Molly in the deep midwinter on my birthday. Or rather she found me. I was walking to the tram stop one bitterly cold night, it was about minus 12 degrees, when I noticed her walking behind me. Scraggy and nervous, she curled up on my feet as I waited in the thick snow. I managed to get her home and went out again for some food which she in turn devoured. I'd never had a pet before, so the next few days were a sharp learning curve, although Molly made it easy for me.

The next day the vet reckoned that she was about six months old, he said she wouldn't have lasted long on her own. Underweight with worms, and frightened, but otherwise alright. She'd obviously had an owner but it looked like she'd been dumped. Nevertheless, I placed several ads in the local papers, online, and on lamposts to say she'd been found. I was elated when no-one claimed her.

A year later she had six pups, parting with them was difficult but I found good homes and held on to the last one which nobody wanted whom I called Daisy. They are both an absolute joy, we have a lot of fun and are inseparable.

They often draw spectators as they run beside me while I'm cycling (the fastest dogs in Lodz!), plunge down pits or into lakes together and return sharing a stick. We have travelled far and wide and had many adventures.

Molly has been hit twice by cars driven by maniacs that slowed to look at her lying in the road then sped off, but she was lucky to escape with just a broken leg. Daisy is anaemic and so I have to be particularly careful to steer her away from broken bottles which are all over the place.

Until Molly arrived I never really noticed dogs. I didn't see them. Rather like babies, which to me all look the same, until I suppose, you have one and then it connects you to baby world. I am now a 'dog person'. M&D sleep with me, they accompany me on all visits out of town, we run daily in the forest. I'm buying my country retreat with them in mind, without whom I wouldn't have bothered.