Spontaneous Trip to Warszawa

This trip to Warszawa (Warsaw in english) was so spontaneous that when I went to bed the night before, I had zero plans. Woke up in the morning and thought, 'I really should visit the capital someday.' A few minutes later, I decided that 'someday' was today. And just like that, I went—with no plan whatsoever.

It was my third time in Warszawa, though the first was when I was a kid, and I barely remember anything. The capital interests me, but it also intimidates me because it's such a massive city. After stepping off the train at Warszawa Centralna, I decided to check out the Vistulan Boulevards. I got myself a 24-hour ticket, looked up which bus would take me to the river (the app said 127), and then… spent 40 minutes just trying to find the right bus stop.

By pure accident, I stumbled upon the University of Warsaw Library—a really cool and photogenic building! Then, I finally made it to the boulevards. I know this place shows it's true magic in the middle of summer, when it's packed with people late into the night, but even a springtime stroll was nice.

Funny thing—I had a feeling there might be some street art under the bridge, maybe a mural or something, so I went to check it out. And sure enough, there was a huge collection of posters from different artists on the wall. The quality of these works was insane! Honestly, you could probably find poster exhibitions in museums much worse than this under the bridge gallery, which is constantly being torn up and tagged over.

Then, I ended up in the Old Town. Not even planned, I just followed whatever streets looked interesting. It's a nice Old Town—well-kept, atmospheric, definitely worth seeing. Though personally, I think Gdańsk's Old Town is more beautiful.

By that point, I was starving, plus my phone was about to die, so I needed a place to sit, eat, and charge up. But for the longest time, all I could find were spots selling Polish pierogi. Don't get me wrong—I'm Polish, so obviously, I love pierogi. But when I'm wandering around a city, I'm not looking for dumplings. I'm looking for my greatest culinary obsession—pizza.

Eventually, I found a place called Same Krafty (which roughly means 'Only Craft [Beer]'), serving pizza and burgers. The interior was super cozy, with cool artwork from Trzech Kumpli (Three Buddies), one of Poland's best craft breweries, all over the walls. For the first time in my life, I had pizza with oscypek (Polish smoked cheese)—and it was amazing!

The bartender was a really friendly guy who told me a ton about Warsaw. I even took notes on my phone for my next trip. I'm definitely coming back to that place!

I took the metro back to Warszawa Centralna, which was an experience in itself because, for some reason, I've always been kinda scared of the metro. It was my first time riding it, and honestly, it was cool. Since I had to head home that night—to a village near Łódź—I had to be careful not to miss my train. I spent the rest of my time near the station, listening to two young girls from Belarus performing outside the Palace of Culture and Science—one playing guitar, the other singing beautifully. I also stopped by Złote Tarasy mall, mostly just to check out that crazy glass roof. And finally, I grabbed a beer at Hard Rock Cafe.

I guess I was so caught up in the scale of the city that I played way less on my handhelds than usual during my walk. At Same Krafty, I played a little Final Fantasy 1, and at Hard Rock Cafe, a bit of Advance Wars—both on my tiny Miyoo Mini V4. But I only really sat down to game later in the evening while waiting for my train. I was on the station steps, playing The Urbz: Sims in the City on my Nintendo DSi.

I highly recommend this game—even if you're not into the main The Sims series—but you gotta play the handheld version on Nintendo DS. It's different from the one on PS2, GameCube, and Xbox.

To give you an idea of how fucked up this game is (in the best way possible!): It starts with you working on the rooftop of a skyscraper as a bird poop cleaner. (Yes, there's a whole mini-game about scrubbing bird crap—and it's surprisingly fun.) Then you immediately get fired. Instead of leaving, you decide to squat in the building, eating snacks from a broken vending machine that gives out food for free, sleeping on an office couch, and showering on an unfinished floor.

That lasts until you eventually get caught and… get arrested. You spend the next few in-game days in jail. Eventually, you convince the cop to let you out on probation, but you're now stuck in one district. Then, you start regretting it because jail was actually easier—you could max out all your character's needs in one place. So for the next few days, you keep sneaking back to the jail cell to sleep, shower, and watch TV—until the cop finally locks you out, forcing you to rent a crappy apartment.

I'll definitely be writing more about this game in future!